US Army Pacific has stood up a new command, called Multi-Domain Command-Pacific, which combines the Stryker Brigade Combat Teams of the 7th Infantry Division with the long-range precision fires, air defense and intelligence capabilities assigned to the 1st Multi-Domain Task Force “to break adversary area denial networks, such as those fielded by China,” as USNI News puts it.
“Our division will employ capabilities such as unmanned surface vessels; long-range, one-way attack drones; and launched effects to penetrate the adversary’s anti-access/area-denial network,” Maj. Gen. Bernard Harrington, commanding general of the new formation, said Thursday during the designation ceremony.
According to Harrington, the Multi-Domain Command will lead efforts to refine the Cross Domain Contact Layer concept, a plan that envisions dispersed Army units capable of detecting, targeting and destroying enemy forces while operating within the area denial networks. The command will use artificial intelligence to decrease the amount of time needed to process commands for troops, he said. What this techno-Pentagon-speak adds up is that the US Army has formed a division-sized unit specifically organized to overcome China’s clear superiority in long range fire power, all as part of self-styled “Secretary of War” Pete Hegseth’s strategy to contain China within the First Island Chain.
Meanwhile, TASS, citing Japan’s Nikkei News, reports that following the conclusion of joint military exercises in Japan, US Typhon land-mobile missile launchers–capable of firing Tomahawk cruise missiles–will be relocated to a US base for storage starting in mid-October. Japanese military officials claim, however, that this does not constitute a permanent combat deployment.