With the long-anticipated Quadrennial Defense Review likely to be published in February, defense experts say to expect few surprises in the document, but marked support for the Marine Corps’ equipment needs, its post-Afghanistan mission, and its stated minimum end-strength goal of 174,000 troops.
Last published in 2010, the congressionally mandated review of U.S. military strategy and priorities will carry added weight this year as the Defense Department seeks to chart a path forward through fiscal austerity caused by sequestration, said Bryan Clark, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments and former QDR contributor. While the 2010 review didn’t adequately take into account the coming onslaught of budget cuts, Clark said the current fiscal realities, plus the budget compromise legislation passed at the end of 2013, would give this year’s QDR increased significance.
“I think the bipartisan budget resolution will provide enough stability for the budget that the QDR will be able to make some statements to the defense program that are likely to stick and will reflect some reductions mandated by [the 2011 Budget Control Act],” Clark said.
The most significant question for the Marine Corps has been the question of end strength: while top Marine brass has said a force of 186,800 is best for the Corps’ postwar mission. Last year’s Strategic Choices and Management Review, published at the direction of Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, postulated a force of 150,000 to 175,00 instead. The good news for the Corps, experts say , is it probably won’t be asked to draw down below 174,000 in this review.
“I don’t think it will necessarily have a lower number. I think it will kind of identify an objective force that’s kind of around that [174,000] size because those are already reductions,” Clark said. “So they’ll want to stick to the glide path they’re on now to get down to 174,000. And the QDR will probably emphasize the fact that we continue to need to have the force in readiness, the force that’s forward-deployed.”
But Dakota L. Wood, a retired Marine lieutenant colonel and senior research fellow for defense programs at the Heritage Foundation, cautioned that this assessment, which he agreed with, didn’t mean the Marine Corps would be safe from additional cuts.
“I don’t think [174K] is a floor,” he said. ‘I think it’s probably a new ceiling.”
Emerging priorities
The QDR will attempt to define the nation’s top defense priorities as U.S. combat troops depart Afghanistan by the end of the year. At a time when all the services are positioning themselves for peacetime missions, the Marines’ preparation and focus on their future mission sets will pay off, Wood said.
“I think the Marine Corps is going to come out best of all the services,” he said. “They have really made a good case for their role as a crisis response force ... The Marine Corps has positioned itself as this middle-weight response force, very mobile, very flexible. That has really resonated well with the combatant commanders.”
Congress has also endorsed the Marines’ growing identity as a crisis response force, calling — in the wake of the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya — for 1,000 additional Marine embassy security guards at American diplomatic outposts around the world.
Clark said all this gave the Corps an edge over bulkier service branches with less flexible mission sets.
“I think what might surprise people is that while we are talking about shrinking the Army pretty aggressively and talking about the Army’s missions changing pretty dramatically, the Marine Corps mission is going to be enforced in the QDR,” he said. “The emphasis on crisis response, having a ready force out there, all of those point to a need for that Marine Corps that’s going to be supported by the QDR to a degree.”
The review is expected to outline the nation’s military requirements in the Pacific, where all the services — including, most recently, the Army — have laid claim to a post-Afghanistan mission. While the Marine Corps has also worked hard to develop its identity in that theater with its “Pacific rebalancing” strategy, the QDR could identify needs that require the Corps to rethink the size of its amphibious units or the structure of its missions.
For example, the growth and development of anti-access, area-denial technologies may mean that large-scale amphibious assault capabilities should not remain a primary focus of the Corps. And the dispersed nature of the Pacific theater may dictate that the three-ship amphibious ready group model prized by the Navy and Marine Corps should be replaced with smaller or more modular amphibious units.
“I think the QDR will have to describe, ‘What is the Marine Corps needed for in the future?’” Clark said. “There’s probably going to be some discussion about the Navy and Marine Corps organizing constructs”/.../