Marine: A Guided Tour of a Marine Expeditionary Unit

Extra Credit: JTFEX-95

JTFEX-95 is a series of joint service exercises designed to try out operational warfighting concepts in contingency and expeditionary situations. The JTFEX-SERIES was initiated in the fall of 1994, and the 26th MEU (SOC) and PHIBRON 4 were to be some of the key players in this edition. Unlike the NEO I observed in June, the 26th would not be working alone; it would be part of a larger joint service force, simulating an operation that could easily take place at the start to the kind of military deployment that we ran in the Persian Gulf in 1990.

JTFEX-95: The Scenario

The JTFEX-series exercises are run through the U.S. Atlantic Command (USACOM), which is headquartered in Norfolk, Virginia: Component units from each of the services are assembled in a joint task force (JTF), which is commanded by the 2nd/Atlantic Fleet battle staff aboard their command ship Mount Whitney (LCC-20). Component commanders are drawn from around USACOM to provide community leadership, and then a mission is assigned. For our JTFEX, the Navy would supply the America CVBG and PHIBRON 4, the Marines contributed the 26th MEU (SOC), the Army donated the 1st Battalion of the 325th Airborne Infantry Regiment (1/325th) from the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, and the Air Force kicked in units from a variety of different bases, including F-15s from the 1st Fighter Wing at Langley AFB, Virginia; F-16s, A-10s, and C-130s from the 23rd Wing at Pope AFB, North Carolina, and even a couple of cells of B-1B bombers from Ellsworth AFB, South Dakota. This force would play out a hypothetical war game with an opposing (Red) force. They would have a specified period of time to achieve their objectives.

The scenario to be played out involved an invasion of an imaginary small country ('Kartuna') by a larger, more powerful neighbor ('Koronan'). In many details, it resembled the invasion of Kuwait….but with several additional challenges for the U.S. (Blue) forces — now known as Joint Task Force Eleven (JTF-11). For one thing, other than local land-based air support, there were no nearby bases for the Blue force to use. All the ground forces involved would either come from the sea or be flown in during the airdrop of the 1/325th. Next, the Red ('Koronan') forces were going to be anything but the automatons that the Iraqis had been during Desert Storm.

The Red forces were drawn from Marine, Air Force, and Navy units along the coast of the Southeastern United States, and they intended to fight like hell to keep the Blue forces out at sea. The OPFOR included a Marine regimental headquarters, a BLT (a sister unit of Lieutenant Colonel Allen's) heavily reinforced with additional armor, several squadrons of Marine F-18s out of MCAS Beaufort, South Carolina (simulating Mirage F-1 fighter bombers equipped with AM-39 Exocet anti-ship missiles), several squadrons of helicopters (acting the part of Super Pumas loaded with Exocets), and an assortment of small frigates, submarines, and patrol craft from the naval base at Norfolk, Virginia. JTF-11's object was to liberate the Kartunan homeland and destroy the ability of the Koronans to threaten their neighbors.

The area for this matchup was a region bounded by the Camp Lejeune reservation and some other parts of coastal North Carolina. This was both good and bad for the Blue forces. On the one hand, it meant that everyone on both sides knew the ins and outs of the planned battlespace well. On the other hand, it was an extremely small place to fight a war; there weren't many maneuver possibilities for the 26th MEU (SOC) and the 1/325th. Also, the Koronan forces knew they were coming, and would consequently be alert. The exercise would start on July 18th, 1995, and run some four days.

PHIBRON 4, off the Virginia Capes, Tuesday, July 18th, 1995

The day started for me on the steaming ramp at NAS Norfolk, Virginia, boarding an HC-6 UH-46D for the ride out to PHIBRON 4 and the Wasp. As I rode out over the Virginia Capes, I talked with some personnel from the 26th MEU (SOC) command group who gave me some background on the coming exercise and the challenges the unit was facing. The 26th had only just finished up their SOCEX a couple of days earlier, and their biggest challenge was that they were jumping into JTFEX-95 before they could take a breather. Because of the round-the-clock planning schedule, the command group was showing fatigue from almost two weeks of continuous operation. In addition, there'd been almost no opportunity following the SOCEX to pull maintenance on equipment, vehicles, and aircraft. Maintenance crews were working frantically to make their machines ready. The operations were to start that evening.

As we entered the landing pattern of the Wasp, she was already steaming south for the waters of Onslow Bay, with Whidbey Island and Shreveport in a tactical (triangle) formation. The force was doing over 20 kt/36.6 kph with a bone in their teeth. A few miles ahead, JTF-11 had already started the air campaign against the Koronan forces, with strikes by CVW-1 off the America and various Air Force units against air and naval targets, including some 'SCUD' sites in the Koronan 'homeland.' The air units would have to work smart and fast, for the invasion of the Kartunan homeland was scheduled for the morning of the 21st.

After the helicopter thumped down on the deck, I was met by the friendly faces of Major Arinello and Gunnery Sergeant Shearer and escorted to my stateroom on the 02 Level. As I stowed my gear, they explained that I would have full run of the ship, and would be able to go almost anywhere, and do almost anything I might desire. I intended to make the most of the opportunity. After a break for lunch, the first major event was the confirmation briefing for the 26th's initial mission of the JTFEX-insertion of their reconnaissance and surveillance (R&S) elements into Camp Lejeune. The 26th needed to develop an intelligence picture of what the Koronan ground forces were up to.

Compared with my earlier experience, this briefing was leisurely; it ran over a period of about two hours. Here is a short version: Using three CH-53E Super Stallions from HMM-264, the MEU (SOC) was going to covertly insert fifty-two PAX in ten different teams around the Camp Lejeune reservation that evening. A couple of problems were foreseen: For one, the weather was looking marginal. Tropical Storm Chantal had been beating the hell out of the Atlantic, and was still a threat to our north. Chantal was forcing a cold front down on top of our planned launch position that evening, and weather conditions might get dicey as a result. There was also the matter of the Red (Koronan) forces. The Koronan ground component was composed of a BLT from the 6th Marines, heavily reinforced with armor and artillery. Though the OPFOR had no organic helicopters, their armor overmatch was about two-to- one compared to what Lieutenant Colonel Allen and BLT 2/6 could bring to bear. In addition, the Koronan ground force was commanded by a Marine lieutenant colonel who was reputedly smart and aggressive. To counter all of that, Colonel Battaglini and Lieutenant Colonel Allen had given their personnel carte blanche to their own forces to conduct deception operations and generally screw with the minds of their opponents.

^{Lieutenant Colonel John Allen (third from left) and the BLT 2/6 plan operations during JTFEX-95 in August of 1995.}

^{JOHN D. GRESHAM}

As for the R&S mission itself, the job of the various teams was to position themselves at strategic points around Camp Lejeune and pass their observations back to the JIC aboard Wasp. Nine of the teams would be 'eyes'-observation-capable, while the tenth would include a radio-intelligence capability for intercepting enemy short-range tactical communications. It was hoped that these — together with intelligence assets from JTF-11, the America CVBG, and national sources — would shine some light through the 'fog of war' that always obscures force-on-force engagements. Some of these other intelligence assets included the ships' SSES spaces, the PHIBRON's Pioneer UAVs from the Shreveport,