Rear Adm. Robert Conway, who turned over command of Navy Region Hawaii to Adm. Barry McCullough today, will head the military's latest fighting experiment to create a mobile but lethal Marine strike force. Pearl Harbor admiral
to head strike groupBy Gregg K. Kakesako
gkakesako@starbulletin.com
Conway will head the U.S. Pacific Fleet's Expeditionary Strike Group, which will be headquartered in San Diego but whose staff of 15 is expected to work out of the USS Peleliu, an amphibious assault ship, as it prepares for its first western Pacific deployment this summer.
COURTESY PHOTO
Robert Conway: He will have new headquarters in San Diego for a new expeditionary strike group
The Peleliu resembles a small aircraft carrier and carries a fleet of 12 CH-46 Sea Knight helicopters, four CH-53E Sea Stallion helicopters, six AV-8B Harrier attack jet fighters, three UH-1N Huey helicopters and four AH-1W Super Cobra helicopters.
Currently, the Navy and the Marine Corps' war-fighting is built around an aircraft carrier. The carrier, with its 75 jets and its flotilla of destroyers, cruisers, submarines, tankers and frigates, provides the fire power and reconnaissance. The Marine Corps' share involves an amphibious ready group made up of an amphibious assault ship, like the Peleliu, which carries nearly 2,400 Marines; a dock landing ship; and an amphibious transport dock ship.
For the coming year, the Navy will be testing whether a modified amphibious ready group can work alone if it is given its own complement of cruisers, destroyers, submarines and P-3C Orion sub hunters. Conway will head the Pacific Fleet's part of the experiment.
Among the seven warships in Conway's expeditionary strike group will be the Pearl Harbor-based cruiser USS Port Royal and the nuclear attack submarine USS Topeka.
Conway's expeditionary strike group will draw 2,300 Marines from the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit at Camp Pendleton.
If the expeditionary strike group concept were employed in the current Iraqi war, Conway said "it would be very complementary to the carrier battle groups. It would give the combatant commander additional capabilities that currently aren't there. ... Its mobility and agility coupled with lethality is what I think the combatant and regional commanders would gain. It would increase their flexibility."
