Marine Corps to test prototype autonomous vessel tasked with cruise missile resupply

SAN DIEGO -- The Marine Corps is preparing to test a semi-submersible, autonomous vessel prototype designed to covertly resupply ground forces with missiles, the head of Marine Corps Combat Development Command said today.

According to Lt. Gen. Karsten Heckl, the service has been developing a prototype “Autonomous Low-Profile Vessel,” or ALPV, over the past year, and will test the vessel in an operational setting for the first time during the upcoming Project Convergence Capstone 4 exercise this spring.

The ALPV is specifically designed to carry two Naval Strike Missiles for the Navy/Marine Corps Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System (NEMESIS) -- a robotically controlled, anti-ship missile capability consisting of a medium-range cruise missile launcher mounted on a Joint Light Tactical Vehicle.

The ALPV will rely on its stealth and low signature to avoid detection and deliver missiles to forward-deployed Marines, Heckl said during the West 2024 conference here. The platform’s goal, he said, is to enhance lethality and strengthen supply logistics.

While the Marine Corps has practiced deploying and recovering the ALPV from multiple surface vessels over the past year, Project Convergence will mark the first time it is tested within the operational context of an exercise.

According to Heckl, the Marine Corps found inspiration for the ALPV in an unlikely place: drug trafficking.

Government Counter-narcotics bodies, like the Florida-based Joint Interagency Task Force South, struggle to detect similar vessels used to smuggle drugs into the United States via the ocean, he said.

Like the developing Landing Ship Medium, the ALPV is part of the Marine Corps push to strengthen its logistics networks as part of force design modernization. While the effort is still in its early developmental stages, Heckl said the Marine Corps envisions eventually procuring a variety of low-cost ALPV variants customized for specific payloads.