Pilot Course Aims to Build Marines’ Skills as Communicators for the Future Fight - USNI News

Expeditionary communicators will be critical to the command and control of small Marine Corps units dispersed across far-flung islands in contested terrain, service officials say.

Those Marines will need to travel light, be nimble and have the capability to provide their commanders with continuous and seamless communications and networks, even in the face of threats and under fire.

The future fight won’t have the fixed, forward operational bases that deployed units over the last 20 years of conflicts relied on for support. Communications Marines will find themselves in a markedly different environment – and with a lot more responsibilities on their shoulders.

“You need somebody who can do lots of things” and who can think on their own, is physically fit and is innovative, Paul Stokes, the Marine Corps Communication and Electronics School’s deputy operations officer, told an audience earlier this month at the WEST 2023 conference, hosted by the U.S. Naval Institute and AFCEA. “Those are all skills that have to take time to develop … We’re talking about somebody who can operate in any kind of domain.”