One of the world's experts in business strategy breaks down every industry into three groups:
- The rule makers—reigning corporations such as IBM, Ford, and Coca-Cola
- The rule takers—those who chase the rigidly orthodox standard setters in a depressing life of futile imitation, never to see the frontiers of innovation
- The rule breakers, those never happy with emulation or preservation of the status quo, who refuse to be shackled by convention or orthodoxy1
Rule breakers never are satisfied with their current position or the rules established by the rule makers. In Gary Hamel's description, "They are the malcontents, the radicals, the industry revolutionaries." Almost all progress, certainly any revolutionary change, is the product of the rule breakers.
This same analogy can be applied to the U.S. defense organization with the Pentagon's staff, the joint community, and the individual services as separate companies. Within this construct, anyone following the Marine Corps in 1997 has little doubt about placing America's force in readiness among the revolutionaries.
Strategic Reviews: The Marine Corps breaks down its tasks into two overarching objectives, winning battles—in war and peace—and making Marines. During 1997, the Corps participated in two strategic reviews; in each case, its status as a rule breaker clearly was evident.
The Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) was directed by Congress. In response, the Marine Corps created a special task force headed by Major General John E. Rhodes, at the time the Deputy Commanding General, Marine Corps Combat Development Command at Quantico, to coordinate its efforts during this major overview of defense strategy and programs. Assisted by a small staff, General Rhodes's team represented the Marines in the Byzantine conglomeration of the QDR's 55 different working groups and panels, which were characterized by redundant efforts and overlapping coverage that seemed to function without strategic direction.
While many Pentagon bureaucrats sought to maintain a business-as-usual approach to ongoing programs and stressed budget-oriented approaches, the Corps emphasized the need for a more strategy-driven approach that would seek to peer into the 21st century and take advantage of what General Charles Krulak, the Commandant of the Marine Corps (CMC), has called today's strategic inflection point—the discontinuities that arise when revolutionary transformations in the fundamentals of business or the art of war are about to occur.
The QDR's final report did not acknowledge such an inflection point, but it did reflect favorably upon the Marine Corps. The strategy portion of the review acknowledged today's chaotic conditions and the need to prepare for a volatile world with asymmetric threats and increasingly urbanized populations along the littorals. The strategy also emphasized the importance of forward presence, such as that provided by naval forces, which rapidly can respond to crises without infringing on political sensitivities or overloading fragile infrastructures. The report, however, reads as though the rule makers really do not believe in any substantive change beyond incremental or evolutionary adaptations.
Yet the QDR endorsed specific elements of the Corps' revolution. In fact, as noted by General Krulak in a message to the Marine Corps after the QDR was approved, ". . . In many respects, the QDR revalidated our statutory role as the nation's force in readiness, and approved our current programs and plans for the future." With respect to its major programs, the essential MV-22 Osprey tilt-rotor—long a suspect aircraft to Office of the Secretary of Defense analysts—was accelerated. MV-22 production increased from a glacial-like output to a reasonable 30 planes per year, which has to be considered a major victory for the operators in the fleet, dependent on aging CH-46 assets to achieve vertical assault.
While many outside experts called for radical force structure reductions to balance the Pentagon's books and meet pressing modernization funding needs, the final report produced little pain or impact on the Corps. End-strength cuts of roughly 6,000 Marines from the total force were directed. These were split: 1,800 from the active component and 4,200 from the Marine Corps Reserve; 400 civilian positions also were cut. The Marine Corps plan for meeting these cuts oriented on preserving trigger-pullers, and used consolidations in naval security forces to produce more flexible and responsive force protection assets to theater commanders-in-chief (CinCs).
The Congress-created National Defense Panel (NDP) that followed was to generate a much-needed public debate and to posit alternatives to what the Congress correctly assumed would be a status-quo QDR. The NDP's independent, forward-thinking defense experts looked beyond 2015 to develop an alternative force. The panel was comprised of nine members chaired by Philip Odeen, the chief executive officer of BDM Corporation. Marine participation included former Assistant Commandant General Richard Hearney, now retired, as a panelist; five active-duty Marines served on the NDP staff.
The panel took great issue with major strategic themes behind the QDR, particularly stressing the need to increase dramatically the pace of change to meet new threats and new missions. In direct contrast to the QDR, the NDP argued that taking short-term risks today was better than failing to prepare now for the long term. It argued for a major Defense Department transformation to meet future threats, including attacks against the U.S. homeland, the proliferation of nuclear, chemical, and biological agents, and terrorism and information warfare against critical infrastructure or against U.S. forces overly reliant on information systems.
The panel also picked up key CMC themes, underscored repeatedly, about asymmetric threats, about "radically altering" the way we approach power-projection operations, about the increasing likelihood of urban combat, and about creating a broader conception of national security and a reshaped force structure that moves away from outdated Industrial Age tactics and equipment.
While the NDP's report, "Transforming Defense," was criticized for skirting specifics and failing to fulfill its legislated mission of producing an alternative force structure, the panel did produce a striking list of force-structure characteristics to reshape the U.S. military. Their qualitative force supports ongoing numerous conceptual efforts at the Marine Corps Combat Developments Command (MCCDC), as well as several Marine Corps Warfighting Lab projects.
To create the NDP's vision, panelists urged the Pentagon to establish a formal system of experimentation to develop specific recommendations for changes to the services' existing force structures and programs. The NDP's proposal included an expensive and infrastructure-intensive set of recommendations, calling for the establishment of a Joint Concept Development Center, Joint Battle Labs and headquarters, a Joint Urban Warfare Center, and a Joint National Training Center. All of these centers, on top of the current dozen or so joint activities that have been created in the past decade, would be subordinated to a new CinC, who would be responsible for a new Joint Force Command. The command would get $5 to $10 billion annually to conduct joint experimentation and testing.
The "Transforming Defense" vision of the future is provocative and is consistent with the Marine Corps' own assessment and ongoing efforts to transform itself. But its solution could take the initiative and resources away from the revolutionaries and put them into a process dominated by bureaucratic rule makers.
Force-Structure Reviews: The Marine Corps established separate active and reserve force-structure review groups to determine how to meet directed end-strength cuts. Brigadier General Gregory Newbold, U.S. Marine Corps, headed the active-duty group; Major General John Hill, U.S. Marine Corps Reserve, and Brigadier General Wallace C. Gregson, U.S. Marine Corps, co-chaired the reserve group.
The QDR-approved active force cuts of 1,800 Marines originally were to come mainly from consolidations in the Marine Corps Security Force Battalion, the Norfolk, Virginia-based organization that provides security for naval installations, nuclear weapons and refueling sites, and from detachments on board the Navy's carriers. Planned cuts for about 1,700 Marines generated some debate within the Department of the Navy, but eventually a plan was approved. The carrier detachments will be withdrawn and a new unit established to support the CinCs.
In addition to meeting its QDR-mandated end strength cuts, the Corps elected to apply the guidance from the Secretary of Defense about force readiness. General Newbold's team identified more than 4,000 jobs in the Marine Corps that could be scrapped to shift the manning into the Fleet Marine Force. As General Krulak explained to his general officers at their annual off-site symposium, "We cannot afford the Corps we have today, nor can we afford the Corps we want for the 21st century." To improve today's readiness and generate resources for long-term modernization needs, the active force structure group recommended small cuts in headquarters, cutting antiarmor TOW units in favor of new weapons such as Javelin and Predator, eliminating the Air and Naval Gunfire Liaison Companies (ANGLICO) and the remaining Hawk batteries, and nearly 1,000 administration and base-support positions. The cuts will be implemented over three years, and will bring manning levels up to an unprecedented level of 91% in the near term. Table 1 presents the breakdown of the structure reductions.
Table 2. USMC Budget FY97 to FY99 (dollars in millions)2 |
FY98 | FY99 | FY00 | |
Active Manpower | 5,979 | 6,113 | 6,272 |
Reserve Manpower | 393 | 392 | 402 |
Operations &Maintenance (O&M) | 2,352 | 2,380 | 2,524 |
Reserve O&M | 110 | 116 | 115 |
Procurement/ammo | 813 | 598 | 893 |
R & D | 266 | 268 | 306 |
Family Housing/ Construction | 424 | 412 | 293 |
TOTAL | 10,243 | 10,290 | 10,810 |
The Rheostat: While long-term modernization budgets place tomorrow's readiness at risk, today's force continues to win battles where they count. The flexible range of capabilities in amphibious task forces has been compared to a rheostat that the National Command Authorities (NCA) can dial up or down to put an appropriately tailored force on the scene anytime, anywhere. Events in 1997 indicated that the NCA kept their hands on that rheostat during the year and never hesitated to dial up the power of the Navy-Marine Corps team in pursuit of U.S. national interests.
Among the numerous examples of such power adjustments were operations in support of U.N. No-Fly Zones over Iraq. In Southern Watch, elements of the 1st and 2d Marine Aircraft Wings enforced sanctions below the 33rd parallel. At the same time, Tactical Electronic Warfare Squadron assets from the 2d Marine Aircraft Wing supported Northern Watch above the 36th parallel. Equally demanding were sorties provided by Marine aircraft flying out of Aviano, Italy, supporting Operation Joint Guard over Bosnia. Throughout the year, Marine Security Forces, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) units, and three different Marine Expeditionary Units (Special Operations Capable [MEU(SOC)] supported NATO-led efforts.
Other resources dialed up included Marine security, intelligence, and engineer support detachments with the U.S. Support Group in Haiti. In Bahrain, security forces assisted Naval Forces Central Command during a heightened threat condition, and a detachment from I Marine Expeditionary Force (MEF) supported the Commander Joint Task Force-Southwest Asia. The annual UNITAS deployment was a major success, with more than a dozen allies participating in this international exchange, making port calls at almost 20 countries in Central and South America.
Riverine warfare training teams made two visits, one to Columbia and another to Peru, during the year. Communicators and radar operators from II MEF at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, ably supported Southern Command's Operation Laser Strike counterdrug operations in South America. The counterdrug effort was not limited to offshore activities, however. Marines participated in 51 such missions in support of JTF-6 along the U.S. border with Mexico. Marine Forces Reserve provided forces for half of these missions.
The potential downside of employing military forces in domestic missions was raised during the year in Texas. On 20 May, Marine Corporal Clemente Banuelos shot and killed 18-year-old Esequiel Hernandez, who was tending his herd of goats near a West Texas border town. Hernandez was armed and was shooting in the direction of a Marine observation team led by Banuelos. Subsequent reviews by Justice officials, a local grand jury, and the Pentagon cleared Banuelos, ruling that his actions were justified.
III MEF Marines and sailors also helped wrap up the relocation of Kurdish refugees in Guam as part of Operation Pacific Haven.
Operation Silver Wake provided an outstanding example of the utility of naval forces. Albania was in the throes of massive public disorder in March 1997 generated by wide-spread financial failures. As public looting and mob disorder increased, the 26th MEU(SOC)—commanded by Colonel Emerson Gardner and stationed in the Adriatic as strategic reserve for U.S. peacekeeping forces in Bosnia, was ordered to stand by. On 13 March, the U.S. ambassador in the capital of Tirana requested evacuation and additional security for the diplomatic mission. Within two hours of receipt of his mission execution order, Marines from Battalion Landing Team (BLT) 1/8, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel R. Scott Moore, secured the landing zones. By the end of the next day, 278 U.S. citizens and 80 foreign nationals were receivedsafely on board the USS Nashville (LPD-13).
Then civil war broke out in Zaire. On 20 March, the Amphibious Ready Group (ARG) headed 5,000 miles south to support the existing joint task force located in Brazzaville in the neighboring country of Congo. The ships arrived on 2 April and quickly became the central U.S. evacuation capability for American citizens in the Zairean capital of Kinshasa. Fortunately, rebel forces were not able to reach Kinshasa. Once again, however, the Navy/Marine Corps team had demonstrated its versatility and operational reach. Furthermore, the MEU's prototype JTF-enabler command-and-control package portends a new age in naval expeditionary capabilities in support of any regional CinC.
Just how volatile the theater was became evident in short order. While poised to evacuate civilians in Zaire, the MEU also supported Silver Wake in Albania. The evacuation was completed by 26 March, but the Marines continued to provide local security for a month, until a Fleet Antiterrorist Security Team arrived on 29 April. The 26th MEU continued its overwatch mission until portions of the 22d MEU, commanded by Colonel Sam Helland, on board the USS Kearsarge, (LHD-3) deployed early to relieve them. The 22d MEU maintained a sea-based operation from the Kearsarge supporting a detachment from BLT 1/2—commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Greenwood—based more than 300 miles inland at Brazzaville, just across the border from Kinshasa.
The 22d MEU(SOC), like many of its predecessors, found ample opportunity to demonstrate its flexibility and readiness. On 30 May 1997, the MEU was ordered to execute a major evacuation in the West African nation of Sierra Leone, where the elected government had been ousted by a bloody coup, the third in five years. With the Kearsarge positioned 12 miles offshore of the capital of Freetown, the ARG/MEU team was ready for the first stage of Operation Noble Obelisk, which began on 31 May. About 200 Marines and Sailors secured the evacuation landing zone near a hotel in Freetown's harbor, and helicopters evacuated more than 900 civilians from 40 nations, including 330 Americans, to the secure sea base. Non-stop helicopter shuttles by Marine Heavy Helicopter Squadron (HMH)-261 (Reinforced) were the key as 22d MEU evacuated more than 2,500 Americans and third-country nationals over the course of the five-day operation.
The Marine Corps' latest institutional initiative, the Chemical Biological Incident Response Force (CBIRF), deployed to Washington, D.C., early in the year to support President Bill Clinton's second inauguration, and returned in April to demonstrate its unique capabilities to a congressional audience on Capitol Hill in April. As Congressman Curt Weldon (R-PA) noted at the time, "Unfortunately, chemical and biological terrorism is an ever increasing threat to the United States. I thank the Marines for taking the important step of forming this team to respond to potential incidents." The pioneering unit, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Arthur Corbett, later loaned its unique skills to the Summit of Eight Economic Conference, held in Denver, Colorado.
Throughout the year, Marines supported disaster-relief operations, including those during the extensive snowstorms suffered by the Dakotas and the severe flooding experienced in the central and western states in the spring. One reserve unit deployed from its training center on two hours' notice to Moorhead, Minnesota, to help hold back the swollen Red River before it destroyed hundreds of homes. Arriving just after midnight, the Reserve Military Police Company (132 Marines and Sailors) worked through the night and into the next day filling sand bags. When asked to help out again in nearby Fargo, North Dakota, the unit moved across the river to finish the job, without missing a beat.
Marine Forces Reserve: The foregoing operations also highlighted the integration of the Total Force under Major General Thomas L. Wilkerson, Commanding General, Marine Forces Reserve program of "One Corps, One Standard, One Total Force-in-readiness." Marines are deployed worldwide—but it takes a close look to figure out whether they are regulars or reserves. Never before has the distinction between active-duty and reserve Marines been less evident—or relevant.
The Corps further integrated training and education programs. Separate Reserve combined arms exercises (CAXs) at Twentynine Palms, California, are being shifted to Total Force CAXs, to enhance training opportunities for both components. The integration of the active-duty inspector-instructor billets into the reserve structure continued, further tying both components together. Throughout the year, reservists trained alongside their fellow active-duty warriors in "every clime and place."
Reservists also participated in a joint service air-defense exercise, the All Service Combat Identification Evaluation Team (ASCIET) exercise in the Gulf during the year. "[It] is a wonderful training opportunity because of the joint environment," said Lieutenant Colonel Art Athens, who commanded one of the reserve units. Exercise Coral Reefer in the Caribbean—where fighter and aerial refueler pilots honed their skills while operating from Naval Air Station Roosevelt Roads, Puerto Rico—offered yet another opportunity.
Reservists from the 3d Battalion, 25th Marines, practiced their cold-weather fighting skills in Canada in Arctic Warrior 97 in January. During this exercise, roughly 430 Marines endured up to four feet of snow and biting gusts that produced wind-chill temperatures of 70° below zero. At the other end of the weather gamut, Marines from 4th Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion participated in Exercise Deep Strike. This exercise/experiment included amphibious landings at Camp Pendleton, California, and long-range maneuvers in the California high desert. Not to be outdone, the 24th Marine Regiment, commanded by Colonel Clifford O. Myers, conducted the first reserve regimental-sized exercise in more than a decade. Composed of units from seven states (Indiana, Ohio, Iowa, Michigan, Missouri, Illinois, and Tennessee) and headquartered in Kansas, the 24th Marines stormed ashore on 6 August in an amphibious assault, culminating their annual two-week training stint.
The 3d Battalion, 25th Marines also went to Panama, where it pioneered a new concept for the Marine Total Force—a volunteer composite unit fulfilling a real-world mission providing a forward-deployed rifle company in Panama to support the U.S. Southern Command's forward-presence requirements. The unit as comprised of volunteers from several different reserve units. While in Panama, the unit conducted riot control, riverine operations, and jungle warfare training, taking advantage of the unique geography and available facilities.
Innovation and Revolution: Long recognized as an innovative organization, the Corpsextended its reputation for anticipating change and for being among the revolutionary rule breakers in 1997, with the execution of the first of the Marines' major Sea Dragon experiments. This experiment, the first of three planned major Advanced Warfighting Experiments (AWE), was designed and executed by the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory (MCWL), headed by Colonel Anthony Wood.
The concept-based experiments are the culmination of a series of Limited Objective Experiments that explore cutting-edge ideas and technologies.
The objective of Exercise Hunter Warrior, conducted in March at the Marine Air Ground Combat Center, Twentynine Palms, was to explore means of increasing the capabilities and effectiveness of modestly sized naval forces in the littorals. This experiment marked the Corps' first operational exploration of advanced sea-basing tactics and techniques for command and control, fire support, and logistics.
The culmination of a number of years of inquiry and limited experimentation in the Corps, Hunter Warrior featured the projection of dispersed teams more than 150 miles inland from their notional sea base and looked at ways a shared doctrine might allow dispersed units to operate on a non-contiguous littoral battlefield. The units were supported by fires from sea-based platforms. The experiment also tested various command-and-control technologies, new command element organizational structures, and advanced decision-making tools and techniques.
The experiment was not used to justify any predetermined force-structure changes or hardware solutions, but it did provide insights into areas the Corps continues to investigate, including the potential of tactical unmanned aerial vehicles, commercially available computer-based decision aids for small unit leaders, and the challenges of generating long- range precision naval surface fires and close air support for deep-maneuver units in an extended battle space.
One of the major lessons was the great untapped potential that resides in today's young Marines, who are capable of absorbing even more responsibility.
While Hunter Warrior focused on command-and-control and support to dispersed units fighting over relatively open terrain along the littorals, the lab's next efforts will focus on the densely packed urban canyons of tomorrow's projected battle space—the megacity.
Demographic trends confirmed by the Joint Staff's latest strategic review strongly suggest that the U.S. military must prepare for the clutter and confusion of urban warfare. Thus, the lab's Urban Warrior experiment is preparing the Marines for this operational challenge. Urban Warrior began in 1997, with efforts in counter-sniper operations, mobility enhancements for penetrating and operating in cities, the use of UAVs and parafoils for intelligence gathering and mobility, and means to enhance indirect fires. These efforts will culminate in a major experiment on the West Coast, with elements of I MEF, in March-April, 1999.
The legacy of innovation and creativity is not dependent solely on activities at the Wafighting Laboratory. Throughout the Marine Corps, one can sense a commitment to exploration and change. III MEF tested command-and-control and target-acquisition techniques on Okinawa. In California, I MEF experimented with deep-maneuver concepts and forward- thinking logistics sustainment ideas. Other Marines and leading-edge thinkers at Quantico drew scientists from around the world with their envelope-stretching computer modeling and simulation projects based on chaos and complexity theory.
Strategy as Revolution: Close observers of the U.S. military do not sense the same interest in exploration elsewhere. A close reading of the QDR shows just how ossified the Pentagon has become; the report, written by the rule makers of the day, is replete with the curse of incrementalism. Never has the defense establishment needed more rule breakers. As General Krulak stresses, the United States has approached not an opportunity to take a pause, but a strategic inflection point, a fork in the road. One road leads to incremental and tactical enhancements of the existing Industrial Age order. The other leads to revolutionary change and a new level of performance by harnessing new approaches and technologies more appropriate to the Information Age and the cunning competitors of the next millennium.
Many in the Pentagon, and even inside the Marine Corps, seem bent on remaining rule makers, clinging to the safe and the orthodox. Yet, now is the time for the rule breakers to break conventions, generate a renewed commitment to change, and create new approaches to power projection. Now is the time for those whom Gary Hamel called the "malcontents, the radicals, and the industry revolutionaries" to come to the fore.
General Krulak has unleashed that revolution and set the Corps in motion, on a journey that moves the nation's force in readiness to a new level. Many programs such as the Crucible and Unit Cohesion have achieved initial success. The rudder is starting to bite deeper, however, slowly shifting the course and speed of the nation's premier crisis-response force. The ultimate destination is not clear—and it cannot be. In a real revolution, "You can't see the end from the beginning."3 But once you get there, you do get to rewrite the rules.
Colonel Hoffman is a National Security Studies Analyst in the Studies and Analysis Division, Marine Corps Combat Developments Command, Quantico, Virginia.
1. Gary Hamel, "Strategy As Revolution," Harvard Business Review, July-August 1996, pp. 69-82. back to article
2. Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, Concepts and Issues-1998, p. 169. back to article
3. Hamel, p. 81. back to article