Psst.. Would You Like to Meet the Commandant?

I had just spent 15 minutes talking about the Coast Guard with the man sitting to my right, RADM Fred M. Rosa Jr., who entertained my ignorance of the Coast Guard by patiently answering all of my questions, and tolerating my sarcasm. I may have annoyed him with one of my questions, specifically asking what he thinks about the Navy building high speed littoral ships while the Coast Guard is building endurance ships, which I suggested seems backwards to me, and whether he sees this as a sign the Coast Guard will be forward deploying to more places in the world where the Navy doesn't send warships anymore. I cited the Dallas specifically.

His answer was very good, he went all in with Deepwater and explained how endurance is more important than speed for the Coast Guard, highlighting how the Navy has their own logistics train when making a forward deployment whereas the Coast Guard takes everything with them on the deploying ship. Reliability was the word that stuck in my mind. The conversation was mostly a learning experience for me. While I understand what the Coast Guard does, I do not well understand how they do their job. RADM Rosa was both smart and interesting, and the coincidence of sitting next to him during the symposium turned out to be a nice distraction from the regularly scheduled program.

It was about 10:20am on Thursday September 18th, and the regularly scheduled program was about to annoy me, and I knew it. I've read The Art of the Long View by Peter Schwartz, and I wasn't looking forward to sitting through a video, because I wasn't sure if I had enough caffine to stay awake. So far that morning I had seen Karl Wallings presentation, spent time talking with Jack Taylor (who I will be talking about again soon), and has just completed my brief discussion with RADM Fred Rosa... and I was starting to wonder what the rest of the day would bring.

As the lights were about to go out, CDR Cappy Surette asked me if I wanted to meet General James T. Conway. My legs stood up before my mouth answered in the affirmative, and I followed him into the lobby. I was led into a room where a few men sat at a table, Ray Gronberg of the Herald Sun in Durham and Estes Thompson of the Associated Press. I was the guy with "Information Dissemination Blog" as a title on the name tag, and was being treated like a reporter. Turns out, that isn't too bad a gig, if you can get it.

After 5 minutes of chit-chat and introductions, General James T. Conway walked into the room, sat down with the three of us, announced he had about a half hour, and asked us if we had any questions for him. FYI, that was a really cool moment in time for this humble blogger, and I think there may have been a picture taken by a Marine in the room that captured my cheesy grin in that moment.

Maybe it was the atmosphere, a long rectangle table with the General at the head of the table, flanked on both sides by a reporter, and me sitting to the Generals right two chairs down. A small side room, a half hour, and his staff outnumbering all of us with a few Navy uniforms filling a few chairs across from my position. As Estes led the questions, all of which centered around the wars, I realized I would be the guy to talk about the topics other than the war. I remember almost everything that he said, and can't remember anything that either reporter or myself said, and the setting and atmosphere combined with the time allotment gave the General an opportunity to discuss at length every answer for every topic.

Most of my questions centered around amphibious ship concerns and Sea Basing topics that have been discussed on the blog. Both reporters focused on questions central to events in Afghanistan and Iraq. Here are my thoughts from that conversation.

The General never said it directly, but change is coming to the Marine Corps. The 3 ship ARG in particular was a subject he covered as 'possible' to change. Equipment is heavier and requirements are changing, and the Marines are looking to be flexible in the changing environment. Sea Basing is about logistics and reserve from his point of view, and General Conway is committed to Sea Basing as a concept, but he didn't talk much about the specific plan.

The the General mentioned something that caught me completely off guard, and definitely something that needs to be followed up with the Navy. He actually repeated it to everyone in the audience in the open session during his keynote address later that day.

The Navy has told the Marines that the Navy will not be putting amphibious ships closer than 25 miles to shore to embark Marines due to the threat environment of the littorals. I thought that was a profound statement of concession of territory by the Navy, and I immediately thought about how many lessons the Army has learned in Iraq about the dangers of conceding territory.

And once that statement was made, General Conway stressed the Marines needed the MV-22 and EFV, highlighting that LCUs take too long at 8 knots to travel the open 25 miles between ship to shore. I missed about 3 minutes of the discussion shortly after General Conway made that statement, because my mind began racing as I thought about how the idea of fighting in the littorals must have evolved inside the Navy to come to the conclusion to concede out to 25 miles from the coast. My one regret was not asking who in the Navy had made that statement.

Near the end of the conversation, General Conway allowed me the last question. I asked about the evolution of the Marines, the necessity to be the 'kick down the door' heavy force and the 'small wars' force for the US, and which direction the Marines intend to evolve in the future. General Conway said the Marines will be both, and believes they can be both. Marines will stick to a 7 month deployment schedule and 14 month training schedule, and in 14 months the Marines will train to be the conventional war force that can insert itself into any warzone, and the COIN force ready for small wars across the globe.

His mind was made up on this point, the decision has been made and there isn't an either/or debate to be had with the Marines. The Marines will be everything required, and the discussion isn't what type of force the Marines will be, rather how the Marines will be both the conventionally optimized, kick down the door force able to adapt quickly to COIN with the same men and material as conditions require. In listening to him discuss it, I realized how much intellectual rigor is wasted in the public domain as others debate the merits of whether that is the right decision, and how little intellectual rigor I've read regarding how to make it happen. Conway did not see the necessity to specialize Marines towards one or the other at this time, everyone will do both.

From about 10:30am until 11:30am on Thursday I had the best hour of my day. General Conway is the most impressive man I've met in my life to date, and I think I've met some impressive people over time. He made it clear he sees a major reduction in Iraq of the Marines over the next year, but he also made clear it takes 12 months for the Marines to pull out of Iraq from the day the order is given, because that is how long it will take to move the equipment out.

General Conway was very candid, clearly when you reach the last step of your career you feel free to speak clearly. He made it clear to us he no longer sees Iraq as the best mission for Marines, and he believes it is time for the Marines to go to Afghanistan.

As for what I believe... I think there is great irony that on the same day the Navy takes delivery of the Littoral Combat Ship, General Conway tells a crowd in North Carolina that the Navy has no intention to take amphibious ships within 25 miles of the beach. We get very little information directly from the Navy, but combining this information with what the Navy said in the House back on July 31st, I get the sense the littorals warfare discussion we have had over the last several years has ended with the Navy in retreat. If that is not correct, I am clearly missing the signs, statements, and smoke signals that suggest otherwise.