Yes:
Amid rising tensions with great power competitor China, the Navy and Marine Corps are planning to more closely integrate their forces. ...
“We have watched them ... build [and] expand a conventional defensive force and kind of yawned for a long time — until they went to sea,” [Marine Corps Commandant Gen. David Berger] said.
China — alongside Russia — was listed as a peer competitor in the 2018 National Defense Strategy. ...
In order for the United States to maintain its maritime advantage, the Navy and Marine Corps will need to more closely integrate, particularly if they want to be ready to take on China in a potential future fight, Berger said.
Successful integration will require a concerted effort after decades of land warfare during conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, Berger said.
I've long noted that the Marines have reacted to their campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan by trying to return to the sea after being a "second army" in ground warfare.
And the need to support the Navy via advance base establishment and defense is important to helping the Navy gain control of the seas in the face of anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) weapons:
The Marines have long been the most significant "allied" army to fight alongside the Army in expeditionary warfare. This shifts the Marines more to helping the Navy deploy, sustain, and fight.
I am on board attempts to get the Marines to adapt to A2/AD by spreading out in smaller units more useful for raids or small missions, as I wrote about in this article in the Naval Institute Proceedings (USNI membership required to access it online)--at least until naval and air dominance is achieved.
The idea of coastal defense is also an idea I'm in favor of the Navy or Marines adopting.I thought that in place of MEUs as the building block that Marine Expeditionary Companies (MECs) could be that basic unit for disaggregated operations under A2/AD threat. And some could be used for other purposes in support of expeditionary advanced base operations[.]
And how does the Navy Expeditionary Combat Command--the Navy's own ground component--fit in this?
Only after that control of the seas is secured can the Marines fully carry out their large-scale amphibious warfare against opposition role--and partner with the Army ashore. Until then, being expeditionary is the key role for the Marines, with only small-scale amphibious operations possible in an A2/AD environment such as the one that China has established.
I've long been in favor of the Marines and Army working together as ground forces despite different roles (starting on page 38 of that JFQ issue). And the rise of China makes it more compelling, as I argue in this Military Review article.
