Can the Navy and Marine Corps plague the Chinese sufficiently by focusing on the anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) weapons and tactics in the sea domain alone?
The Marines want to insert small contingents across the western Pacific to inflict A2/AD capabilities on the Chinese navy if it surges out to sea to defeat America and our naval allies:
David Berger wants to give Xi Jinping an ulcer. Early this month the U.S. Marine Corps commandant signed out the “Concept for Stand-in Forces,” a strategic directive that outlines how small marine units will operate along Asia’s first island chain in concert with the U.S. Navy fleet to make things tough on China’s People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLA Navy) during a conflict in the East China Sea, Taiwan Strait, or South China Sea.
The Navy will do the same thing with dispersed but linked forces that mass effects:
The navy wants swarms of light combatant ships able to fight in a “distributed” fashion, dispersing in space to evade the brunt of access denial. A smaller percentage of the fleet’s combat power would reside in each hull, and thus the fleet could afford to take losses in action yet retain enough combat power to fight on to victory.
The "ulcer" recalls the British campaign on the Iberian Peninsula that bled Napoleon's forces at its periphery:
The approach owes homage to the British Army and Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars. In 1807 Sir Arthur Wellesley, later Lord Wellington, led a modest-sized army ashore in Portugal. In the ensuing seven years Wellington’s army, supported from the sea, fought alongside Portuguese and Spanish partisans.
It wasn't just partisans. The Portuguese supplied regular infantry to the British, too, I believe.
But I digress.
The 19th century French ulcer was an army ulcer enabled by British naval power. A British and allied army threatened the French on land in a peripheral area bordering France. The French had more important land problems but could not afford to lose Spain and bring a ground threat to France's border while France had those other more important land problems.
I have no problem with this approach to the Chinese in the 21st century. But I would like to see the Army have a role around China's periphery in support of allies, small theaters, or in direct raids. Indeed, I recalled the campaign of Wellington and called for inflicting that ulcer with the United States Army carrying out its core capability of large-scale ground combat. See my article in Military Review for that proposal.
A Navy-Marine ulcer can certainly inflict damaging and disproportionate casualties on the Chinese navy if the PLAN pushes out to the first island chain. But it won't prove to be deadly if China can pull back in the face of America's kill web, and still hold off direct attacks on China.
Ultimately, it is not enough even to be able to sail at will close to China. The Navy and Marine effort must ultimately enable a major ground campaign around China's periphery. Just as 19th century British naval supremacy enabled Wellington's "ulcer" campaign ashore.
Posing a threat to China itself on the ground in cooperation with China's ground enemies is the way to make the ulcer debilitating and pressure China to end their war.
UPDATE: Is it too late to rename INDOPACOM as PAINCOM?
