U.S. Marine Corps Amphibious Combat Vehicles Face Congressional Scrutiny Over Drone and Anti-Armor Threats.

The U.S. Marine Corps is facing new questions over whether its 608 planned Amphibious Combat Vehicles can survive drones, loitering munitions and anti-tank weapons, according to an updated Congressional Research Service assessment published October 6, 2026. The concern is whether the ACV can remain combat-effective after landing Marines ashore. CRS points to lessons from Ukraine as it examines whether the ACV needs stronger protection against modern precision threats. With the fleet reduced from 1,122 vehicles to 608, survivability and availability will be increasingly important for amphibious and land operations.

The U.S. Marine Corps faces new scrutiny over whether its planned 608 Amphibious Combat Vehicles can survive drones, loitering munitions and anti-tank weapons during combat operations ashore (Picture Source: USMC)

Scrutiny is intensifying over whether the U.S. Marine Corps’ newest amphibious armored vehicle can remain survivable against the rapidly evolving threats reshaping modern land warfare. The Amphibious Combat Vehicle, or ACV, is replacing the long-serving Assault Amphibious Vehicle as the Marines’ principal ship-to-shore armored transport and a key platform for operations ashore. On October 9, 2026, those concerns are gaining renewed attention as armed drones, loitering munitions and anti-tank guided weapons demonstrated in Ukraine create a threat environment markedly different from that in which the program was originally conceived. The Congressional Research Service formally raised these questions in its updated October 6, 2026 assessment of the ACV program, report IF11755.

The central congressional question is no longer simply whether the ACV can move Marines from amphibious ships onto a hostile coastline, but whether it can survive after arriving there. The eight-wheeled vehicle is designed to provide ship-to-shore and shore-to-shore mobility, transport infantry and deliver organic direct-fire support, while the ACV-30 adds a 30 mm cannon to increase combat power ashore. CRS points to lessons from Ukraine showing armored vehicles exposed to anti-tank guided missiles, armed uncrewed aerial systems and loitering munitions, and explicitly asks how vulnerable ACVs could be both during amphibious operations and while supporting Marines on land. It also asks whether the Marine Corps is considering additional survivability modifications based on those lessons. Importantly, CRS does not conclude that the ACV is unable to survive these threats; it identifies vulnerability and potential protection upgrades as issues for congressional oversight.

Related Topic: U.S. Marines Expand Amphibious Combat Vehicle Role Beyond Ship-to-Shore Operations

The survivability debate comes as the size of the planned ACV fleet has fallen sharply from the program's original objective. The Marine Corps initially envisioned acquiring 1,122 vehicles, but Force Design modernization reduced that objective to 608, leaving the current plan 514 vehicles below the earlier figure, a reduction of about 45.8%. According to information provided by the Marine Corps to CRS, the planned fleet consists of 389 ACV-P personnel carriers, 33 ACV-C command-and-control vehicles, 152 ACV-30 gun variants and 34 ACV-R recovery vehicles. The smaller acquisition objective gives added weight to questions about fleet availability because operational formations, training organizations, maintenance requirements and modernization periods will all draw from a much smaller overall vehicle pool than originally envisioned.

That smaller force could itself become an issue if Marine Corps manpower expands. CRS notes reported plans to grow the service by more than 6,500 Marines by 2032, with some of that growth adding personnel across 19 infantry battalions and two Littoral Combat Teams, and asks whether congressional approval of such an end-strength increase could create a requirement for additional ACVs.

The question has important force-generation implications: a 608-vehicle inventory must support deployed formations, training, maintenance cycles and future upgrades while potential growth in infantry units could increase demand after planned vehicle procurement winds down. The Marines awarded BAE Systems a $230 million contract modification on September 30, 2026, for 32 ACV-R recovery vehicles, completing the planned acquisition objective for that variant, with work expected to conclude in November 2028. The Navy's FY2027 budget request also includes $237 million in discretionary procurement funding for ACV family platform upgrades, placing future investment increasingly on modernization rather than additional planned vehicle production.

Survivability improvements also confront a physical problem: the ACV has limited margin for continually adding equipment without affecting other performance characteristics. The vehicle has a gross weight of about 35 tons, while a Navy technology effort has established a minimum target of removing 2,000 pounds from ACV variants to improve fuel efficiency, buoyancy characteristics and overall performance. Navy reports also makes clear that protection cannot be sacrificed to achieve the weight-reduction target.

The Marine Corps must simultaneously manage the demanding maritime environment for which the vehicle was designed. Following 2022 surf-zone mishaps, operations resumed under an interim four-foot breaker-height limit, while Marine leadership has acknowledged work with BAE Systems to improve readiness and prevent corrosion affecting vehicle struts and shocks. This creates a complex engineering trade: armor, sensors, electronic-warfare equipment and other defensive systems can increase protection, but they can also consume weight, electrical power, cooling capacity and physical space on an amphibious vehicle whose performance in water is closely connected to vehicle configuration and buoyancy.

The Marine Corps has already begun responding directly to the drone threat. On September 11, 2026, Marine Corps Systems Command awarded Anduril Industries a $15.71 million sole-source, firm-fixed-price delivery order to procure counter-small unmanned aerial systems for the ACV family, with the official award notice published on September 24. Procurement documentation identifies Anduril's Pulsar-Lite, or Pulsar-L, as the system selected to address the urgent requirement. Pulsar-L is a platform-integrated soft-kill system intended to combine sensing and electronic attack capabilities against radio-frequency-dependent Group 1 and Group 2 small drones.

That capability adds an organic defensive layer, but it should not be interpreted as a complete answer to the wider survivability problem identified by CRS. Anti-tank guided missiles, loitering weapons and other precision systems create separate attack pathways, while the continuing evolution of drone navigation, communications and autonomy points toward a broader requirement for layered protection combining sensing, electronic warfare, signature management, tactical dispersion and other defensive measures. For Marine forces preparing to operate across dispersed islands and coastal terrain in the Indo-Pacific, the survivability challenge increasingly concerns not only how an ACV reaches the shore, but how long it can remain mobile, concealed and combat-effective once it begins operating there.

The latest congressional scrutiny places the Amphibious Combat Vehicle at the intersection of two competing realities facing the Marine Corps: the service needs a mobile, protected amphibious vehicle capable of moving infantry across contested littorals, while drones and precision-guided weapons are making armored formations easier to locate, track and attack. The challenge extends beyond protecting 608 vehicles from small unmanned aircraft. Congress may increasingly have to assess whether the planned fleet is large enough for future Marine force structure, whether new defensive systems can be integrated without degrading amphibious performance, and whether the ACV's protection architecture can evolve at the same pace as the threats it could encounter. For a platform intended to connect naval maneuver with combat operations ashore, its future credibility may depend as much on its ability to adapt to a rapidly changing threat environment as on the protection built into the vehicle itself.

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Written by Teoman S. Nicanci – Defense Analyst, Army Recognition Group

Teoman S. Nicanci holds degrees in Political Science, Comparative and International Politics, and International Relations and Diplomacy from leading Belgian universities, with research focused on Russian strategic behavior, defense technology, and modern warfare. He is a defense analyst at Army Recognition, specializing in the global defense industry, military armament, and emerging defense technologies.