As the Army moves to a smaller, expeditionary force, Army logisticians will play an essential role. In Army G-4, we have established a roadmap for recapturing our ability to support an expeditionary Army, which I will lay out on these pages. The roadmap begins with leader development, requiring leaders at all levels to think smarter about the most efficient and effective ways to open theaters and establish distribution networks; to increase materiel readiness; and to field innovative logistics processes and technologies.
The transition from recent experiences to an ability to support an expeditionary Army won't be easy. Today, a staggering eight out of 10 officers and enlisted personnel joined the Army after 9/11, so they have not had to execute expeditionary logistics operations. These officers and Soldiers are exceptional; they are seasoned, intelligent, and combat-proven. Many successfully deployed multiple times to Iraq and Afghanistan. However, they are accustomed to predictable rotations and operating from mature Forward Operating Bases, where contractors handled maintenance and other sustainment functions.
Compounding the challenge is that the two out of 10 officers and NCOs who joined before the 2001 terrorist attacks have not had to support Army formations across great distances or perform tasks like a Refuel on the Move (ROM), for at least the past 10 years. In short, the expeditionary knowledge and skills of our experienced Soldiers and leaders have atrophied. Civilian expeditionary skills have also eroded; as with their military counterparts, whether deployed or at home station, they have not had to execute the myriad of deployment or sustainment tasks that were executed by contractors.
With the days of predictable rotations over, and new missions arising all over the world, logisticians must prepare to support an Army 2025 force that is smaller, but more responsive to contingencies in austere environments worldwide. Here is how we will restore our ability to sustain an expeditionary Army.
LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT
Leadership development is the keystone. We must ensure logistics leaders at all levels receive the training, education, and experience necessary to enable them to support an expeditionary Army. If we do not, we will fail to develop an expeditionary mindset in our leaders, and one day we will not be ready when our Nation calls.
I am on a Logistics Leader Development Board, along with the Army Materiel Command (AMC) Deputy Commanding General and the Combined Arms Support Command (CASCOM) Commanding General. We are conducting whiteboard sessions, looking at logistics doctrine, force structure, education, exercise, and assignments. We are asking strategic questions, such as: does logistics doctrine meet the needs of likely future operations? Do we have the right logistics force structure in the right places? Are logisticians taught what they need to know? Are we training logisticians for the next war or the last one?
We are making progress, with one initial result being a comprehensive logistics leadership development campaign that we have been rolling out in recent weeks.
OPENING THEATERS
In addition to quality leader development, an expeditionary Army needs improved ways to set up and sustain a theater. No doubt, emerging enemy technologies and techniques will be designed to obstruct our power projection and limit our freedom to access future theaters. That is why earlier this year, the U.S. Army Sustainment Center of Excellence carefully examined sustainment roles, responsibilities, and capabilities of Army 2025 formations during a Theater Opening Rehearsal of Concept (ROC) Drill. They analyzed a difficult scenario; the findings were extensive and require immediate attention on strategic, operational, and tactical levels, including:
• Leveraging Joint Capabilities: Given the reductions to logistics formations and a resource-constrained environment, we must intensify our learning and understanding of Unified Action partner capabilities.
• Mission Command Relationships: Establishing mission command and support relationships is a critical element of the operational design of the Theater/Joint Operations Area. Are we all using the same playbook? Are we updating our OPLANs and CONPLANs to ensure that we have clear mission command and support relationships established? When we are called to deploy, it is too late to open the playbook for the first time.
• Operational Contract Support and Financial Management: As we saw in Operation United Assistance, setting up funds to establish contracts early on needs to be synchronized at the Global Combatant Command and Army Service Component Command levels. Both operational contract support and financial management are critical elements for setting, opening, and sustaining a theater of operations.
• Reserve Component Availability and Deployment Timelines: The vast majority of theater opening capabilities are in the Reserve Component; therefore, we need to better integrate them with the Active Component to perform theater opening functions. Additional resources are needed so they will be prepared for those tasks.
During the past year, the G-4 worked to improve port opening capabilities. We collaborated with the Joint Staff to broaden the apportionment of logistics forces to include many of our port and terminal operations units. We are exploring avenues to better staff, train, and equip the Army's Rapid Port Opening Elements to support expedited logistics operations.
We also have expanded the Army Prepositioned Stocks (APS) Program, our go-to-war assets strategically placed around the world. This year we used APS equipment in training exercises with our allies. Next year, we will distribute Activity Sets across multiple sites in Central and Eastern Europe and the Baltics to expand U.S. Army presence there. Over the next few years the Army plans to build several more activity sets for sustainment and humanitarian assistance in the Pacific, Africa, and South America, and for special operations in the Middle East. These sets create "angles," forcing our enemy to account for the potential presence of U.S. forces, even when we are not in the same vicinity as the equipment.
MATERIEL READINESS
In an Army of reduced predictability and reduced equipment levels, materiel readiness is also a key factor. We must create and sustain materiel readiness so leaders have visibility of equipment and can more effectively meet maneuver commanders' requirements.
One central element of materiel readiness is property accountability, and we have seen dramatic improvements in this area since the winding down of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Since 2010, the Army has brought to record $12 billion in Army property that was previously not recorded in an accountable system of record. This equates to equipping four heavy Brigade Combat Teams. The Army also has internally redistributed $311 billion in equipment to fill internal command shortages due to changes in organizational structures and returned $71 billion in equipment back to the depots to fill Army shortages.
Another central element is maintenance. Army depots played a critical role over the last decade, surging their repair capabilities and deploying forward to support Combatant Commanders' wartime requirements. Last year, the depots reset more than 73,000 major end items, to include combat and tactical vehicles, small arms, communications equipment, and aircraft. During both wars the Army relied heavily on contractors to do maintenance tasks that Soldiers previously had performed. We could not have done the job without them, but we need to return to Soldiers maintaining their equipment, and to leaders being fully responsible for that equipment.
Fielding of the major new automated information system, the Global Combat Support System-Army (GCSS-Army), will improve our materiel readiness. The system is now operational at more than 250 Army Supply Support Activities; and this year we started fielding it in supply rooms, motor pools, and property book offices across the Army.
GCSS-Army enables an expeditionary force by allowing leaders to move rapidly while building and maintaining unit readiness. The 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division, which received GCSS-Army this year, successfully fielded it just prior to using it at the Joint Readiness Training Center in a combat-like expeditionary environment. GCSS-Army proved itself capable of helping leaders to quantifiably see and measure equipment and supply chain readiness.
CONCEPT-DRIVEN INNOVATION
The final road map item I mentioned earlier is innovative logistics processes and technologies. As we seek to leverage innovation for Army 2025 and beyond, I am a big believer that the concept should drive technology, and not the other way around. Too many times people come to the Army having developed an interesting technology, and now are looking for a purpose for it. For an expeditionary Army we need innovations that give the Army flexibility to go into operations quick and light, and that help us ramp up and ramp back down just as quickly.
A prime example of this is energy-efficient technologies for the battlefield. Combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan demonstrated how difficult it is to deliver energy in an operational environment. On average, it took about 22 gallons of fuel to sustain one Soldier's daily energy footprint in Iraq and Afghanistan. In World War II, the average requirement was less than one gallon per Soldier per day.
The Army is investing in operational energy initiatives to reduce energy demand, improve operational flexibility, reduce costs, and reduce risk to Soldiers. By leveraging new technologies, the Army is fielding more fuel-efficient generators with smart-grid power distribution technology, solar panels, and waste-water recycling equipment. The Army also has developed a more efficient and more capable engine for helicopters, and more efficient transmissions and auxiliary power generators for ground combat vehicles. Advances in battery technology are providing lighter, more powerful batteries that can be recharged forward and used again and again. This new focus on operational energy compliments the tenants outlined in Force 2025, shaping the Army to be more agile, adaptive, autonomous, and lethal.
Innovation does not always have to be in the form of a new technology. It can also be an improved process, such as our ongoing efforts to analyze the use of Army rail. The Army has used rail since the Civil War, but today we have an aging fleet and track that is costly to replace and maintain. We recently developed a strategic plan so we have a consistent, Army-wide approach. This involves divesting costly excess rail cars, and encouraging public-private partnerships to provide expeditionary deployment support with the potential of decreasing costs.
POSTURED FOR THE FUTURE
While much remains to be done, we are making progress on the strategic level toward recapturing our ability to support an expeditionary Army. We are rolling out the plan to ensure military and civilian logisticians have the training, education, and experience necessary to do this. We are better preparing our leaders in analytical skills and in using insights and information garnered from new tools like GCSS-Army. We are fostering innovation in both processes and technologies.
I am confident that with the engagement of logistics leaders at all levels, we can accelerate our transition to an expeditionary Army and be postured to support the Army of 2025 and beyond.
LTG Gustave F. Perna is Deputy Chief of Staff, G-4. Previously, he served as Deputy Chief of Staff, G-3/4, U.S. Army Materiel Command; Commander of the Joint Munitions Command and Joint Munitions and Lethality Lifecycle Management Command; Commander of the Defense Supply Center Philadelphia, Defense Logistics Agency; and Commander of the 4th Sustainment Brigade. Key staff assignments include: Director of Logistics, J4, U.S. Forces-Iraq, and DISCOM Executive Officer and G4, 1st Cavalry Division. He is a graduate of Valley Forge Military Academy, the University of Maryland, and the Florida Institute of Technology.
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