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CAMP PENDLETON – This week, the skies and seas around Southern California are filled with military equipment or personnel from seven countries taking part in one of world’s biggest annual training events.Dawn Blitz, a roughly 10-day operation that began Monday, is nothing less than a dress rehearsal for a new type of war.Or, technically, wars.The exercise, which this year involves naval, aviation and ground forces from the U.S., Japan, Mexico and New Zealand, reflects a change of focus for the Marine Corps as it shifts from a post 9/11 emphasis on counterinsurgency and counterterrorism to a full spectrum of operations.Modern Marines and sailors are training for everything from disaster relief and major combat to cyberwarfare and defeating non-traditional threats such as Islamic State.“We have to be prepared for that kind of hybrid, mixed-up, ugly operating environment,” said Lt. Gen. David Berger, who commands more than 50,000 Marines based at the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force at Camp Pendleton. About 2,000 Marines from the 1st Marine Expeditionary Brigade and sailors from Expeditionary Strike Group 3 are participating in the exercise.

Source: Want to see the future of war? Military from seven countries descend on Camp Pendleton for ‘war games’ – The Orange County Register

It looks like the Marines are training for similar scenarios as the Army is, wherein units are concurrently conducting both Wide Area Security (WAS) and Decisive Action (DA).

That is, the future battlefield will be chaotic and constantly changing, with units forced to both conduct COIN style operations against non-state actors, while simultaneously facing near-peer military formations operating along more conventional lines.

Doing either task is a challenging operation. Doing both simultaneously is, of course, an even bigger challenge.

A pillow fight between freshman cadets at the United States Military Academy took a violent turn when cadets swung pillowcases packed with hard objects at each other.Thirty cadets were injured, including 24 that suffered concussions, the New York Times reported

Source: 30 cadets injured in bloody pillow fight at West Point

Fifteen years ago, when I finished reading Patrick O’Brian’s magisterial 20-novel Aubrey-Maturin series for the first time, I remember thinking, damn you, Horatio Hornblower. C.S. Forester’s renowned nautical protagonist was at the time enjoying the starring role in the British TV series Hornblower, and given the close similarities to O’Brian’s oeuvre—both concern the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic era—it seemed unlikely bordering on inconceivable that anyone would try to adapt the latter for television.

Source: ‘Aubrey & Maturin’ Is the Next ‘Game of Thrones’ (If Only Someone Will Make It) – The Atlantic

Mr. Orr is correct that such a series would be expensive, but also likely quite remunerative. As an added bonus, HMS Surprise, Lucky Jack Aubrey’s favorite frigate, has just come out of a refit in San Diego.

British television shows tend to run for about 90 minutes, and have four episodes a season. That’s a format very well suited for telling the story of a single novel. In essence, they make a book into a six hour movie.
While it’s unlikely any US network would adapt that format, I suspect it would be difficult to make a very strong adaptation of any single novel in the normal US hour long episode. Perhaps a 13 episode season could tell three novels?

Assuming Crowe and Bettany are out, who would you like to see as the seafaring compatriots?

He’s got a blog where he tells how it was done, and how long it took. He’s also got several other videos showing how he made the axe and other tools.

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/participate/send-your-name/insight/?action=getcert&e=1&pid=3&cn=924002080696

The U.S. military has ordered its nearly 3,500 troops stationed in Iraq to reacquaint themselves with their chemical weapons suits due to evidence that the Islamic State has obtained chemical weapons and used them on multiple occasions.“It is a precautionary measure,” a defense official told Fox News, acknowledging the order.During a briefing Thursday, the Pentagon would not publicly confirm the order but reassured reporters that the military is prepared to handle a chemical attack by ISIS.“The commanders in the field are making sure their troops are adequately prepared for the threats they may face,” Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook said when asked about the new preparations.

Source: US military ordering troops in Iraq to dust off chemical weapon suits | Fox News

Oh, joy. There’s nothing like the fun of getting into full MOPP4 on a hot day.

While tensions over the South China Sea often prompt headlines, attracting a great deal of attention by analysts, the dispute over Gibraltar has a much smaller presence in the media and specialized publications. However, given its location at a vital chokepoint, the conflict over the Rock cannot be ignored by naval and maritime observers. Furthermore, for the student of comparative conflict at sea it is interesting to look at some of its features, including disputes over the law of the sea and resort to non-lethal asymmetric warfare, which we also find elsewhere. A third reason is Gibraltar’s role in the air reinforcement strategy for the defence of the Falklands, an issue that China watchers are increasingly paying attention to, given Beijing’s growing interest in the South Atlantic, including Namibia.

Source: Gibraltar: Legal Advice on Innocent Passage

Here’s an interesting look at the low level asymetric operations of the Spanish government against the British colony of Gibraltar, and its implications in the South China Sea and elsewhere.

I wonder what Eaglespeak thinks about it.

Four American and two Multinational Force and Observer peacekeepers were injured Thursday in two explosions in Northeast Sinai, the Pentagon said. The troops were hurt in two improvised explosive device explosions, said Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, director of press operations for the Defense Department, in a statement. Davis did not identify the injured service members in his statement, but did refer to them as “soldiers.” The Army has about 750 soldiers deployed to the Sinai peninsula. The injured troops were flown to a medical facility, where they were being treated for injuries that are not life-threatening.

Source: Four American troops injured in IED attacks in Sinai

The US committment to MNFO is usually one battalion task force, often supplied by the National Guard. Part of the 1977 Camp David Accords was our commitment to be observers there, to act as an honest broker to assure Israel that Egypt was not militarizing the Sinai peninsula for the purposes of another attack along the lines of the 1973 Yom Kippur War.

And for the most part, the quiet deployment of US troops has been without incident.  Egypt, however, now faces radical Islamists operating in the Sinai. They’ve staged an increasing number of attacks on those Egyptian forces in the area.*

But those radical Islamists have, previously, targeted Egyptian forces, and avoided US forces. This appears to have changed.

Worryingly, the Obama administration is floating the trial balloon of pulling our commitment to MNFO. While we of course do not wish to see US troops placed at risk needlessly, we also believe the US should stand up for its treaty commitments. Both Egypt and Israel would see a withdrawal of US troops as an abandonment of them, and further cement a perception of the last 7 years that the US is untrustworthy as an ally, and committed to supporting only its enemies.

The other two troops wounded were Fijian.  Fiji has a small army. Basically the Fiji army exists to supply the occasional battalion to MNFO or other peacekeeping operations. The remuneration they receive in return from either MNFO (mostly the US) or the UN pays both the cost of the Fiji army, and a modest profit, and provides a decent means of employing military aged males from the island.

*