U.S. Marines with Information Group, II Marine Expeditionary Force (II MIG) participated in a HAM Amateur Radio General Licensing Course as part of the group’s High Frequency Auxiliary Initiative on Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, Jan. 27-31.
The course, taught by members of the Brightleaf Amateur Radio Club out of Greenville, North Carolina, helps Marines learn the principles of high frequency radio operations as a contingency against a peer-to-peer adversary in real-world operations.
Throughout the duration of the course, Marines learned HAM radio frequency and propagation theory, frequency band allocation, conventional and field-expedient antenna theory in addition to HAM radio operations and control.
So just like the US Navy (and others) have re-introduced training with sextants, so does ham radio find its niche in the world of reliable communications when everything else is failing. To this day ham radio operators are acting in support of rescue teams the world over because modern communications do not operate everywhere. Modern satellite technology is not cheap to operate, and we have already seen one country knocking out a satellite in space. So like the Boy Scouts say "Be Prepared" and their training is based around this. The middle of a disaster is the wrong time to hear you don’t have a backup plan.