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29 Dec 19. New in 2020: Marines move to greater naval integration, starting with training changes. How the Marine Corps will shift back its naval roots, as outlined in the new commandant’s planning guidance begins this year. And a key piece of that initiative, laid out by Gen. David Berger, is naval integration.
Berger hasn’t pulled punches when speaking publicly about what the Marine Corps needs to do ― the role he sees as part of that naval force is to support the fleet in sea denial and deter the pacing threats that are China and Russia.
But naval integration goes beyond putting more Marines on ships.
Much of that will begin at the training level. Training and Education Command staff told Marine Corps Times that while most naval curricula at Marine schools is focused on traditional amphibious operations, new doctrine and standards will include skills Marines need to operate inside enemy sensor and weapons engagement zones within maritime terrain.
That means injecting emerging naval concepts into professional military education, likely changes to the commandant’s reading list, adding a Navy captain to education command staff and potentially increasing the number of naval officers attending Marine Corps schools.
The command will also review and update service concepts and doctrine related to command and control in the Composite Warfare Construct.
“Years of fighting in the desert have atrophied many of the long standing Navy and Marine relationships,” Tom Hartshorne, with TECOM Policy, Standards and Doctrine Division, wrote in a statement.
“Today, we must ensure the Navy and Marine Corps visions of the future are synchronized and nested and ensure that our actions are complimentary to those of the Navy with respect to force design, doctrine, education and training, among other areas,” according to the statement.
All of these changes mean it’s likely that Marine training, schools and doctrine will see a lot more Navy in it that has been the case over the past two decades. (Source: Defense News Early Bird/Marine Times)
29 Dec 19. New in 2020: Army revamps rifle qualifications and small arms training. Over the next year the Army’s new rifle marksmanship qualification standards are being rolled out across the force. They’ll put soldiers to the test, cutting the time to shoot and increasing requirements to meet the expert standards. All of this while better simulating some of the features of more realistic combat shooting.
In July, the Army released “TC 3-20.40 Training and Qualification-Individual Weapons,” or “Dot-40,” that covers not just rifle and carbine marksmanship but also has new standards for pistol and other individual weapons.
The changes, along with a companion manual that updates crew served weapons work, are the biggest revamp to shooting since current system was established in 1956.
As many as 200 marksmanship experts contributed to the two-year project, led by the Maneuver Center of Excellence’s Directorate of Training and Doctrine.
The training is broken down into six tables – preliminary marksmanship instruction and evaluation, pre-live fire simulation training, magazine and shooting position drills, grouping and zeroing, practice qualification and qualification.
Shooters will fire at night, also while wearing gas masks. And coaches will assess how they transition from station to station on their own while also changing magazines from their gear.
Previously, soldiers could stack magazines at the ready before firing.
Also, no more ‘alibis,’ meaning a reshoot on a part of the course of fire for a weapons malfunction. The soldier must simply clear the weapon and keep firing.
The new course added a standing firing position, shortened target exposure times and wants soldiers shooting from standing to prone, as they might if under attack.
To pass, soldiers will have to score 23 out of 40, make 23 to 29 for marksman, 30 to 35 for sharpshooter and 36 to 40 for expert.
Those parallel existing standards, but now to make expert soldiers must hit at least one of the five 300-meter exposures. Sharpshooters have to hit one target or more at the 250 meter range or farther. (Source: Defense News Early Bird/Army Times)
27 Dec 19. Indonesian Navy inducts five Piper Archer DX trainers. The Indonesian Navy’s (Tentara Nasional Indonesia – Angkatan Laut: TNI-AL’s) aviation wing has commissioned five new Piper Archer DX trainer aircraft. The airframes were inducted on 20 December at the unit’s base in Juanda, Surabaya. The aircraft type has a wingspan of 10.8 m, a length of 7.3 m, and can accommodate up to four people. It has a maximum range of 848 n miles, and a maximum cruise speed of 228 km/h at 75% engine power.
Prior to its commissioning, five pilot instructors and six technicians from the TNI-AL underwent a training programme to familiarise themselves with the aircraft at Vero Beach, Florida, in the United States. (Source: Jane’s)
27 Dec 19. New for 2020: A few big, new Army training exercises are coming. The Army is gearing up for some new exercises. The biggest one on the docket is Defender 2020. Secretary of the Army Ryan D. McCarthy said that it will be similar in size and scope to Exercise Reforger — a Cold War-era strategic deployment of a division or more to West Germany in annual iterations. The new exercise, held from April to May, will move roughly 20,000 U.S. troops from the continental United States to Europe. But elsewhere in the world, Army leaders are planning other new and interesting training iterations to keep an eye on.
The Army component of U.S. Africa Command recently took the African Lion exercise from the Marine Corps and plans to make it the biggest on the African continent in spring 2020.
The Corps has owned the exercise for nearly two decades, but Army Africa is assuming responsibility for planning and execution when it takes place at the end of March and early April.
Army Africa commander Maj. Gen. Roger Cloutier plans to give the exercise more of a multi-domain focus, including strategic logistics planning, naval gunfire, special operations forces and even bombers out of Europe.
Army South is also planning to send a Stryker battalion to Chile for the first strategic deployment of that kind called Southern Vanguard in October 2020, according to Maj. Gen. Daniel Walrath, Army South’s commander.
“It will involve strategic deployment from the continental United States to Chile of a Stryker battalion out of the 81st Washington Army National Guard,” Walrath said. The battalion will conduct “combined live fire training with the Chilean Army for about a six-week period from beginning to end.” (Source: Defense News)
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Meggitt Training Systems, makers of FATS® and Caswell technologies, a division of Meggitt PLC, is the leading supplier of integrated live-fire and virtual weapons training systems. Meggitt Training Systems continues to grow its capabilities based on the legacy of these two industry leaders.
Over 13,600 Meggitt live-fire ranges and 5,100 virtual systems are fielded internationally, providing judgmental, situational awareness and marksmanship training to the armed forces, law enforcement and security organizations. Meggitt Training Systems employs more than 400 people at its headquarters in Atlanta and at facilities in Orlando, Canada, the United Kingdom, Netherlands, UAE, Australia and Singapore. It can deploy service personnel anywhere in the world for instructor training, system installation and maintenance. Learn more at https://meggitttrainingsystems.com/.
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