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U.S. Marines Train For Large Scale Urban Warfare

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U.S Marine Corps photo by Lance Cpl. Juan A. Soto-Delgado

With tensions rising up in the Middle East, the U.S. Marines are preparing for extensive land battles that can occur when the shit hits the fan with Iran. It is expected that many of the fighting will be urban areas and underground locations and thus, they better come really prepared as urban warfare usually take a high number of casualties.

In a Military.com story, the Marines together with their British counterparts will be at the Muscatatuck Urban Training Center located near Butlerville, Indiana, this August. They will engaging in fighting against a high-tech enemy in this massive urban training site that will also involve participants playing the role of civilians caught up in conflicts.

This summer training is part of a four-year effort called Project Metropolis which will help in making soldiers fight more effectively in urban battles. Project Metropolis is not exactly a new project, in 2002 it was introduced with the Basic Urban Skills Training Package. With the reality that in the future, they will be coming up against a more sophisticated enemy, such as near–peer ones, they will have to combine what they have learned for almost two decades fighting insurgents in Afghanistan, Iraq, and reducing the ISIS threat in the Middle East with new tactics for this type of enemy.

U.S. Marine Corps Photo by Cpl. Thor J. Larson/Released

U.S. Marine Corps Photo by Cpl. Thor J. Larson

In the Marine Corps’ Operating Concept, that was published in 2016, it found that the service isn’t ready to fight in urban centers.  In the Military.com story, Maj. Edward Leslie, lead planner for Dense Urban Operations at the Warfighting Lab, said that, “The enemy has changed. They obviously have more access to drones. I think the enemy’s sensing capabilities have increased, they have the ability to see in the night just as well as we can, and they have capabilities that can exploit our technology or disrupt our technology.”

Urban combat is brutal. Soldiers will have to be on their toes all the time as the enemy can appear in the most unlikely places and in different altitudes. The enemy on top of a building might fire off an RPG on a patrolling squad below, terrorists behind walls, IEDs, civilians caught up in the cross fire and less maneuvering space for vehicles. The battle will be building to building, room to room, and there will be no let up.

So train they have to and they will have to train harder than before.

 

Top photo: U.S Marine Corps photo by Lance Cpl. Juan A. Soto-Delgado

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