
U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Jeffrey A. Cosola
From The Danger Room:
During the Cold War, the Navy's "big-deck" amphibious assault ships, with full loads of Marines, helicopters and Harrier jump jets, rotated through two stations: one in the eastern Mediterranean, and another in the Pacific. The idea was that the Pentagon would always have a reinforced battalion of troops close to potential hot spots, primed for action.
Iraq changed all that. Since 2003, with the Marines busy in the sandbox, it became impossible to keep a battalion at those old sea stations, and the Marines' "expeditionary" amphibious skills decayed as a result.
Read more ....
My Comment: I do not think that most of the marines will object to this change in focus.