Top Marine’s deployment plans face familiar wrinkle: Inert Navy ships
By Todd South
Apr 8, 2025, 11:19 AM
NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The top Marine has a key objective for the Corps: getting Marine Expeditionary Units back on full deployment schedules.
But he’s going to need some help.
“My top priority ... is restoring a 3.0 MEU presence worldwide,” Commandant Gen. Eric Smith said April 7 at the Navy League’s annual Sea-Air-Space Exposition.
More specifically, that means a three-ship MEU with an Amphibious Ready Group, or ARG-MEU, deployed out of the East Coast, one out of the West Coast and a third on periodic deployments out of Okinawa, Japan.
The primary impediment? Amphibious ships.
https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-marine-corps/2025/04/08/top-marines-deployment-plans-face-familiar-wrinkle-inert-navy-ships/
