ThePointblank wrote: [
Incorrect; the Stryker brigades were meant for increased strategic mobility compared to the rest of the US Army force. Remember that the bulk of the US Army's ground combat vehicle force is tracked; this means that if you intend on moving tracked vehicles long distance, you are forced to make sure that either:
1. You have enough prime movers and trailers to load the vehicles and carry them that way;
2. be close to a rail head and transport the brigade via rail;
3. If you have absolutely no options, run on the road, and accept significantly increased wear and tear requiring frequent halts for maintenance and dramatically increased fuel usage, assuming your tracks don't tear up the roads in the first place.
In contrast, a Styker brigade can be self-deployed as it is a primarily wheeled force; it can run on the roads and highways with little need for halts for maintenance. It can also get to a location quicker as a result, and deploy its assets as a fast rapid reaction force that's more heavily armed and protected than just a light infantry brigade that is travelling via unarmoured Humvees. In fact, all of the Stryker brigades are converted from light infantry or cavalry units that didn't have any armoured vehicles as part of their force; at best, they got unarmoured Humvee's and trucks to move soldiers around in.
So with a SBCT, you had a force with none of the virtues of light infantry and all of the logistics requirements of mech infantry (Strykers need gas and maintenance, too) with none of the firepower of a mech force (the 105 MGS was stillborne, and everyone knew it, leaving a 50 cal or Mk19 as the prime fire weapon) with next to no fires (mortars and I think two sections of 777s), no real ADA, limited CBRN and two maneuver and one recon element.
A SBCT has all of the liabilities of a Soviet Motorized Rifle Regiment and none of its virtues. The Stryker itself was designed to fit in a C-130 per its mobility requirement, but can't do it with any fight from the ramp capability like fuel, inflated tires or survival add-ons like an RPG cage. So, its really not much more protected than a MRAP/HMMWV. Really, what the grunt gets from the Stryker is some really Gucci comms and sensors.
Like I said, the scenario you posit is Bosnia, and maybe Panama, and not anything like a forced entry or MCO against anything like a peer adversary. That's not surprising as most of the pedigree of the SBCT and the Stryker itself was from the limitations of the 1980/1990s heavy/light mix of US Army combat formations. Army officers looked at the LAV and at the MEUs inherent mobility and fires and said, "lets make a 'fight from ramp' capability except our ramp is the -130."
Senior Army leadership didn't like it when they were told by their own analysts "The US has a fight from the ramp capability with near global mobility, called airborne and Rangers, and near follow-on with light armor and organic fires, Role III medical, area ADA, etc. called the MEU. Follow on to the MEU is the MPF. Why are we replicating this capability?"
Lots of C-130s were helped along the procurement trail with the idea we can move SBCTs with them (along with the requirement to support like the Army's likely grossly oversized airborne capability.)
Now, there might be an argument that the overall size and economy of scale of the C-130 is its greatest virtue, regardless of how we got there. Frankly, if I had to CHOOSE between a -130 and -27J fleet, I'd be hard-pressed to chose the -27J (as much as a partisan I was of the project) if I could see myself doing everything from basic trash-hauling to HARVEST HAWK type COIN stuff to Major Combat operations with the same airframe with basically turn key support.
