There's also the gutting of tube artillery with the replacement HIMAR rocket launchers not necessarily set up for ground support (being trained and equipped for anti-shipping).
The more worrying thing is the Marines are trying so hard to become a one trick pony.
And that one-trick is rather dubious:
1. Sail very slow virtually undefended ships built to civilian specs across the various China seas past China's massive littoral navy and massive minefields (China loves sea mines).
2. Land on some critical yet undefended island that overlook key Chinese areas of naval operations.
3. Blow the Chinese ships and subs up with missiles.
4. Sneak away.
5. Rinse – repeat as needed.
I think after drinking a ton of peyote, popping a few acid tabs and going on a spirit quest, General Berger and his cronies made the following assumptions:
a. China's navy will sit in ports and not sortie out until it's too late. All those hundreds of corvettes, patrol ships, FACSs, coastal submarines etc will sit in port.
b. Similarly aerial and satelite Chinese reconnaissance assets won't spot any slow USN ships chugging along at bulk freighter speeds towards them.
c. In case of crisis China will not deploy any of its 60,000-100,000 sea mines.
And then if it does USN's puny fleet of 8 MCM ships and some barely functioning sleds towed by short range helicopters will clear a path with ease.
d. Chinese cartographers are unaware of these islands. And even if they were aware of islands, Chinese never deploy military forces to islands – PROVEN FACT (drop another tab of acid).
e. Once the Chinese send their navy it will be completely unaware those sneaky Marines have deployed batteries of anti-ship missiles on islands guarding key navigation routes.
f. BOOM! BANG! SMASH! DESTROY! The USMC does what it does best and sinks the entire Chinese fleet without losses, all whilst smoking cigars, high fiving each other and saying cool one liners that would make Arnold Schwarzenegger and Bruce Willis envious.
g. General Berger and his bong are awarded mega kudos, Congressional Medal of Honour, gets to flip the Army, Navy and Air Force off and he goes down with Nimitz, Nelson, Hein, Togo (of Tsushima fame), John of Austria as the meanest, bestest ship killing admiral of all time.
Note that to make sure this concept was flawless, Berger announced disbanding of all wargaming/concept testing units except the one that supports his concept.
Nothing breeds success like sticking ones head in the sand and pretending other options don't exist.
was going to do the rifle teams next, but he forgot something… 
