Background
In March 2020, the U.S. Marine Corps (USMC) announced a major force design initiative planned to occur over 10 years originally referred to as “Force Design 2030” which is now known as “Force Design.” Under Force Design, the Marines are redesigning forces to place a stronger emphasis on naval expeditionary warfare. As part of the redesign, the Marines plan to establish at least three Marine Littoral Regiments (MLRs) organized, trained, and equipped to accomplish a number of missions within contested maritime spaces.MLR Missions
According to the Marines, the MLR is to be capable of the following missions:
- Conduct Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO), a form of expeditionary warfare involving the employment of naval expeditionary forces. Selected Marine and Navy forces are to be arrayed in a series of austere, temporary locations ashore within a contested or potentially contested maritime area to conduct sea denial and control and fleet sustainment operations.
- Conduct strike operations with a variety of systems.
- Coordinate air and missile defense operations.
- Support maritime domain awareness.
- Support naval surface warfare operations.
- Support information operations.
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