I don't like this:
The Army is looking to reduce or even eliminate much of its fleet of boats that is tasked with moving equipment to distant shores for battle, even as they acknowledge that the Navy’s role in that mission is suffering from a lack of funding and priority.
A report by Stars and Stripes revealed a briefing in early January that referenced directives in June from Army Secretary Mark Esper to “divest all watercraft systems" from the Army Reserve.
That move and others noted in the briefing slides obtained by Stripes could eliminate the Reserve and Army National Guard units, and jobs and civilian support that operate the maritime capability.
Not that the Army can ever replace the Navy in moving Army forces:
The Army’s fleet includes a variety of vessels from small landing craft that date to the 1960s to cranes, barges, tugboats and larger ships capable of carrying up to 15 Abrams tanks.
The Navy ships are special-purpose, roll-on/roll-off vessels run by Military Sealift Command and the Maritime Administration.
The command includes 26 pre-positioning ships, 46 Ready Reserve Force ships and 15 roll-on/roll-off surge force ships.
But it fills capabilities gaps at the theater.
Not only does this reduction in Army capabilities make it more difficult for the Army to crew The AFRICOM Queen power projection modularized auxiliary cruiser (see my 2016 article in Military Review), it hinders an Army role in the Asia-Pacific region in the Army's core capability of large-scale combat operations (see my 2018 article in Military Review) rather than being just an auxiliary to the Navy mission.
Really, China's army isn't the same as it was when it carried out human wave attacks in the Korean War:
China's military, the world's largest force, has cut the size of its land-based army by about 50 per cent and significantly boosted its navy and air force as part of an "unprecedented" strategic shift designed to transform the People's Liberation Army (PLA) into a comprehensive modern force.
The 2 million-strong Chinese military has significantly boosted its navy, air force and new strategic units and downsized its land-based army, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post reported quoting a state-run Xinhua report.
This has been a long-term shift as the Chinese army ditched their leg infantry units (although in large part they were simply relabeled "police" for internal security).
The way the Chinese have been reducing the size of their once huge but primitive army gives the United States Army (and other armies, of course) an opportunity to defeat it when once nearly limitless reinforcements would replace the defeated Chinese forces.
It would be nice if our military was truly joint so that no service needs to provide minor functions in support of its core function (for example, Navy ground troops--the NECC--or Air Force base security light infantry, in addition to Army mariners or non-fixed wing crewed air support ), but each service quite naturally focuses limited resources on its core functions at the expense of providing them to other services.
The Army needs its mariners and limited shipping capabilities.
