382 Journal of the Spanish Institute for Strategic Studies N. 4 / 2014 1996 the latter published its first white paper, titled Operational Maneuver From the Sea: A Concept for the Projection of Naval Power Ashore,17 offering its view on how amphibian operations in littoral warfare should be conducted. Having taken on the principles identified in Forward…From the Sea, the report reaffirmed the Marine Corps’ expeditionary vocation. In addition it detailed its new modular composition (based on Expeditionary Units with a ground, air and support component and the capacity for additional larger Brigades or Expeditionary Troops), its special ability in joint combined operations and its recently developed doctrines to efficiently engage in any kind of stabilising and support task : from the rescue of non-combatants and humanitarian aid to peacekeeping and crisis response missions. 3. THE NAVY JOINS THE REVOLUTION In November 1997, the Navy Chief of Staff published the Navy Operational Concept: Operating Forward…From the Sea.18 Presented by its authors as an adaptation of the 1994 roadmap to the new revolutionary context, deemed by many to be the Navy’s tacit acceptation of the RMA,19 this work is much more moderate and conservative than one might suppose. In effect, it was drawn up a year after the Joint Vision 2010 (1996) established the pillars of the U.S. Revolution in Military Affairs and eight months after the first Quadrennial Defence Review politically admitted the existence of the revolution and proclaimed that network-centric warfare would guide the transformation of the Navy;20 and at a moment when important sectors of 17 Department of the Navy: Operational Maneuver From the Sea: A Concept for the Projection of Naval Power Ashore, Washington DC: GPO, 1996. 18 Department of the Navy: Navy Operational Concept: Operating Forward…From the Sea, Washington DC: GPO, 1997. 19 DOMBROWSKI, Peter: “Transforming the Navy: Punching a Feather Bed?”, Naval War College Review, vol. 56 nº 3, 2003, pp. 103-123 and TANGREDI, Sam: “Assessing New Missions”, in BINNENDIJK, Hans (ed.): Transforming America’s Military, Washington DC, National Defense University, 2002, pp. 9-13. 20 In effect, the Quadrennial Defence Review stated that: “The Navy has embraced an RMA concept called network-centric warfare, the ability of widely dispersed but robustly networked sensors, command centres, and forces to have significantly enhanced massed effects. Combining forward presence with network-centric combat power, the Navy will close timelines, decisively alter initial conditions, and seek to head off undesired events before they start.(Department of Defense DoD: Quadrennial Defense Review 1997, Washington DC: GPO, 1997, p. 11).
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