Accelerating Space Competency: How the Marine Corps' Aviation Experience Can Inform Space Domain Integration
Abstract
The U.S. Marine Corps' value proposition as a Navy and Joint Force enabler in contested areas is at risk because it lacks capability in space. The national defense industry widely recognizes space as a consequential warfighting domain that a near-peer adversary will, with certainty, take actions to degrade, disrupt, and deny. To fight within and into these space-contested environments, Marines must be organically skilled and capable of incorporating space into their operations at the speed of relevance. Unfortunately, most Marine space personnel serve in those roles temporarily, limiting institutional expertise and representation in the military space community. In addition to the problem of temporary employment, the insufficient number of Marine space personnel causes centralization at the Marine Expeditionary Force (3-star) level and at Marine Expeditionary Units, leaving all other forms of the Marine Air-Ground Task Force with minimal access to space-based assets, and virtually no integration of space considerations into their training and operations. By drawing on lessons from the Corps slow embrace of aviation, this paper urges the prioritization and development of a sufficient and permanent Space Cadre that will be able to develop the deep relationship and competence in space needed to make good on the Corps value proposition.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- May 08, 2023
- Accession Number
- AD1210780
Entities
People
- Michael Arguello
Organizations
- Naval War College