Marines seek better training, gear for Urban combat.

• Author: Kennedy, Harold
• Position: URBAN COMBAT

THE U.S. MARINE CORPS--FAMED FOR ITS trademark beachhead assaults--is shifting its emphasis to preparing leathernecks to fight in urban areas, in addition to deserts, mountains and jungles. Traditionally, the Marines have focused on taking the beach and the terrain directly behind it, not city streets. "The last time we fought in an urban environment was in Hue [Vietnam] in 1968," said Capt. Michael Little, of the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory in Quantico, Va.

Now, in Iraq, most of the fighting--for the first time in almost four decades--is taking place once again in the country's towns and cities, forcing the Marines to reconsider their concepts, training and equipment, Little told National Defense.

Of all the environments you might face, the urban is the most complex," he said. "It's asymmetrical. It's multi-dimensional. You have to be concerned about what's beneath you--in the sewers--and what's above you--not in the airspace, but the floors above you."

The Marines are convinced that urban combat similar to that taking place in Iraq is the wave of the future. Seventy five to 80 percent of the world's population lives within 50 miles of a coast," Little said. "If the Marine Corps is going to continue to accomplish its mission, it has to be able to operate in urban environments."

With this in mind, the Marine Corps is introducing new packages of training for virtually all leathernecks, said the Warfighting Laboratory's chief of staff, Col. Douglas J. Jerothe. The Marines established the lab in 1995, two years after 17 U.S. special operators perished during an aborted raid in Mogadishu, Somalia, leading to the collapse of a United Nations peacekeeping operation.

The lab's mission is to improve naval expeditionary warfare capabilities. In 1999, it launched Project Metropolis after an exercise documented a need for Marines to have more training in city-like settings.

Since then, ProMet, as it is called, has developed a two-week basic urban-skills training, or BUST, course. Until recently, BUST was restricted to a small number of Marines.

In 2004, however, Marine leaders decided to offer it to all of the Corps' four divisions, air wings and force service support groups. "Eventually, every battalion will receive the training," Jerothe said.

BUST focuses on those combat skills required to succeed in an urban environment, including specific techniques for patrolling, clearing rooms, dealing with improvised explosives, dispensing first aid...