The word on the street is that President Trump’s administration has turned its eye on the senior leadership of the Marine Corps and not liked what it sees. A series of dud Commandants has left the Corps in a bad way.
The current Commandant’s predecessor wrapped the Marine Corps around something called Force Design 2030 that makes no sense. It is focused on a war with China that is unlikely to happen because both China and the U.S. are nuclear powers. Nuclear powers don’t fight conventional wars with each other because the danger of escalation is too great. Assuming such an improbable event occurs, the Marine Corps would seize sand-spit islands from China and mount anti-ship missiles on them. This duplicates Japan’s Pacific strategy in World War II with missiles replacing Japanese naval bombers. The Japanese strategy failed because the islands could not be adequately re-supplied. We would face the same problem, plus a lack of targets because China’s and America’s surface warships will all quickly be in port or on the bottom. Seen Russia’s Black Sea fleet recently? Anywhere near the Chinese mainland the air will be filled with both sides’ anti-ship missiles without the Marine Corps’ small contribution. If the Corps really wants to prepare for a war with China, it would train for boarding ships to enforce a distant blockade and defending against amphibious assaults in case a President wants to come to Taiwan's aid directly (which would be a big mistake).
The current Commandant, General Smith, inherited this situation from his predecessor and so far has not visibly acted to get the Marine Corps out of it.
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