Our current canvas-top high mobility multi-purpose wheeled vehicles lack the hardtop version's ring-mount for automatic weapons. Many of the soft-top vehicles are full of communications gear and their lack of armament makes them lucrative targets. This problem can be fixed by bolting a machine gun pintle or ring mount onto the canvas-top version or modifying the canvas-top slightly, to carry an M249 squad automatic weapon or M60E4 machine gun. An in-house solution is feasible using local machine shop assets.

The overall solution is to reemphasize that all marines are infantrymen first, break out our old .50-caliber M2-MB Browning machine guns, and mount them on all high mobility multipurpose wheeled vehicles not already armed. A crew-served weapon should be included in the tables of organization and equipment for every vehicle in the corps so that units can train with these weapons during every field exercise.

A crew-served weapon should be assigned to every vehicle likely to face enemy contact, which in modern combat with few clearly defined lines could be anywhere.

Simply maintaining a vehicle is demanding, and the addition of a crew-served weapon would be another burden. But I am convinced most marines would welcome an addition that would increase their prospects for survival and victory in the next low-intensity conflict. The weapons should fire only live rounds, dry-firing drills should replace blanks for training. All hands should become thoroughly familiar with the care and cleaning of the vehicle's weapon by hands-on learning and aiming drills, not be cleaning carbon caused by firing blanks. Valuable skills can be gained by tracking aircraft as they fly over and estimating the proper leads. Aiming while the vehicle maneuvers, and allowing marines being carried to take turns manning the weapon also will increase the expertise of marines likely to use the weapons in combat.

Mounting a crew-served weapon on every tactical vehicle provides:

--Counter-ambush/self-defense capability
--Basic anti-aircraft fire.
--Improved protection for support units from the rear area threat (Soviet-style operational maneuver groups, Spetsnaz, etc.)

Many marine corps vehicles have in-board-facing seats that inherently hinder observation and discourage vigilance. In contrast, many armies actively engaged in low-intensity conflicts have their men face outboard in centerline seats. Outboard-facing seats allow troops to observe signs of the enemy. This arrangement also allows them to conduct reconnaissance by fire and to return enemy fire while dismounting. Back-to-back seating is used extensively by the South African Defense Force in various wheeled tactical vehicles; it is a combat-proved technique.

The stowage of packs and large weapons such as mortar tubes, base plates, and tripods is a problem. Throwing this gear into the open center of the truck clutters the space and hinders marines as they dismount. Stowage directly under the seats keeps the pathways for exit clear but it takes time to remove them--time that may not be available. Strapping packs to the outside of the pickets, as is done at Twentynine Palms, solves the exit problem but still requires too much time.

The storage problem can be solved by the addition of storage bins bolted to the outside of the five-ton truck's side-walls, allowing marines to stow their gear and quickly retrieve it.

When was the last time we hardened a vehicle with sandbags for a field exercise? Is this another technique that will have to be reintroduced in battle?

Sandbagging and placing anti-decapitation bars in the front of vehicles diminishes the effects of small arms and booby-trap attacks. A single sandbag will stop a 7.62mm round. The down side is that sandbags are heavy, slow the vehicle down, and hurt fuel economy. It would be impractical to adorn our vehicles with sandbags on a day-to-day basis. But why not have each vehicle made combat-ready once a year for training?

Every marine corps vehicle should receive the "combat readiness treatment" each year, to prove that it can be done, that individual marines know how to do it, and to refine the art. The addition of outward storage bins would facilitate errecting a layer of sandbags to shield marines from small-arms attack. The anti-decapitation bars should already be in place.

Sandbagging a form of natural armor protection, can be added to vehicles after coming ashore so that lift assests do not have to carry the extra weight of armor permanently attached. Tactical vehicles should have provisions in their designs to exploit the use of natural armor protection using sandbags. Every vehicle should carry an adequate number of empty sandbags for hardening-they are as essential as camouflage netting.