U.S. Marines Forming New Combat Units to Battle China in Asia

The U.S. Marine Corps is pushing through with its plan to form a new combat unit designed to seize Chinese-held islands in the Indo-Pacific should armed conflict between the United States and China break out over the next decade.

The new, lethal and more mobile combat unit is designated the "Marine Littoral Regiment" or MLR. The Marines intend to stand-up, or make operational, their first MLR later this year. Other MLRs will be stood-up in succeeding years.

MLRs will be designed to execute the Marines' island-hopping strategy against the People's Liberation Army Ground Force and the People's Liberation Army Navy Marine Corps in the Indo-Pacific.

“We’re laser-focused on the Pacific," said Lt. Gen. Lewis Craparotta, commanding general of the Marine Corps Training and Education Command.

"And this is where you’ll see our first Marine Littoral Regiment come online. This is where we have our forward-based fifth-[generation] aircraft in [Marine Corps Air Station] Iwakuni."

Initial plans call for an MLR consisting of 1,800 to 2,000 Marines and U.S. Navy sailors. An MLR will consist of a Littoral Combat Team, a Littoral Anti-Air Battalion and a Littoral Logistics Battalion, according to USNI News.

Experimentation with the MLR began in 2020 to determine what this unit might look like, and involved the 3rd Marine Regiment in Hawaii. This storied unit, which belongs to the U.S. 3rd Marine Division and the III Marine Expeditionary Force (MEF), will eventually become the first operational unit in this new concept.

Marine commanders said III MEF will stand-up the first three MLRs and begin a three-year experiment to figure out how to best build and fight the regiments against the Chinese.

The plan is to convert the 3rd Marine Regiment into the experimental 3rd Marine Littoral Regiment, said Maj. Gen. Kevin Iiams, assistant deputy commandant for combat development and integration.

“We’ll put that all in, we’ll do some experimentation over the next couple of years out there in Hawaii to see what this will look like for a for an MLR,” said  Iiams.

U.S. Marines

In creating the MLRs, Marine Corps leaders are prioritizing naval integration between the Navy, which will carry Marines into battle, and the Marines themselves. The integration needed to create MLRs is seeing closer coordination to develop a joint warfighting concept between the staffs of U.S. Seventh Fleet, which is responsible for the Indo-Pacific, and III MEF.

“The MLR will be uniquely designed to maneuver and persist inside a contested maritime environment where its primary mission will be to conduct sea denial operations as part of a larger Naval Expeditionary Force,” said Marine Corps spokesman Maj. Josh Benson.

“The MLR being built in Hawaii over the next three years will be the first of its kind in the Marine Corps.”

Benson said the specifics of the MLR will begin to take shape over the next few years. He said experiments, wargames, modeling and simulation will be used in the phased approach to the MLR development.

Organizing the first MLR will first involve constructing the new formation mainly from units that already exist in Hawaii. Combat capabilities will then be incorporated.

“The largest muscle movements between now and the standup of the MLR will be structure and manpower adjustments," Benson revealed.

"While this is taking place, further refinement of associated capabilities and concept development will occur in order to ensure the first MLR is capable of contributing to the continued Force Design Phase III efforts.” (Jan. 23, 2021)