Balancing sustainment priorities for a new Security paradigm in Europe

By Maj. Gen. Duane A. Gamble, Col. Matthew D. Redding, and Maj. Craig A. DanielFebruary 26, 2016

Balancing sustainment priorities for a new security paradigm in Europe
Workers load an M109A6 Paladin onto a trailer at the Port of Klaipeda on Dec. 4, 2015, in Klaipeda, Lithuania. The 624th Movement Control Team, 39th Transportation Battalion (Movement Control), 16th Sustainment Brigade, ensured the Paladin and other ... (Photo Credit: U.S. Army) VIEW ORIGINAL

On the evening of Feb. 23, 2014, the world sat mesmerized by a 2-1/2 hour ceremony that marked the conclusion of the 2014 Olympic Winter Games in Sochi, Russia. What occurred in the days that followed caught the international community off guard.

Less than a week after the ceremonies in Sochi drew to a close, Russian soldiers in unmarked uniforms entered the Crimean Peninsula. Over the next several weeks, nations across Europe watched as Russian soldiers seized key infrastructure across the peninsula, taking control of one of the region's key pieces of geography.

PARADIGM SHIFT

The global security paradigm has shifted dramatically over the past year. European security hangs in a delicate balance and is under pressure on many levels of diplomatic, informational, economic, and military influence. Today, the U.S. Army in Europe is meeting the current security realities with a force structure that was deliberately shaped several years ago when Russia was anticipated to become an active partner within the theater alongside the United States and NATO--a forecast future that simply did not materialize.

The European environment now requires U.S. forces to use all available assets to meet the demands of an ever-shifting security reality. We have been forced to apply overseas contingency operations funding to support a new generation of partnerships and exercises. Regionally aligned forces (RAF) have transformed from a doctrinal concept into an operational reality. We have reorganized our formations and our mission command structures to effectively control units operating in regions that were not familiar to U.S. troops just 24 months ago. We have changed the way we think. We have changed the manner in which we operate. We have changed in order to balance the immediate needs of assurance and deterrence with a sustainable force posture that achieves operational security objectives.

The sustainment contributions to this new security end state include building a theater support architecture for Operation Atlantic Resolve--the series of exercises and operations under which we employ forces to assure allies and deter aggression--to stand alone as an independent area of operations (AO) within the theater.

This AO must be supported by RAF units and enabled by an enduring Reserve component (RC) sustainment footprint. This will allow our assigned theater sustainment command (TSC) forces to return to their theater-level missions of providing support for reception, staging, onward movement, and integration (RSOI), theater distribution management, and theater sustainment. The TSC must also exercise and employ its expeditionary command post and be prepared to open a second AO inside the theater in support of U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) or other contingency requirements. In short, the 21st TSC is focused on simultaneously maturing support for Atlantic Resolve operations while remaining prepared to open and sustain operations within a second AO or joint operations area.

U.S. forces have had to adapt to an operational environment in Europe that was not forecast. We are expanding our capacity and capabilities with RAF units in the near term, and the Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution System dictates that we program and plan to include RC forces in longer-term solutions.

Programmed training exercises offer near-term opportunities to integrate RC forces into our formations using overseas deployment training. But in order to create the endurance and depth required in this new security paradigm, we must deploy Active and Reserve units from the continental United States (CONUS) for longer rotations to Europe.

BALANCING SUSTAINMENT PRIORITIES

A rapidly changing security environment has immediate implications for Army sustainment formations. Many of these implications will persist for the foreseeable future. The ability of the United States to assure allies and deter aggression is largely linked to the Army's ability to deploy and sustain expeditionary forces that will face near-peer military adversaries in a very complex environment.

We know access to seaports and airports will be contested, if not initially denied. We know our data systems will be attacked or degraded. We know we will face saturated commercial infrastructure, competing demands of allied nations, and requests for support to sustain our allies and partners. As daunting as these challenges may be, they are realities we must be prepared to overcome.

The strategic context of European security requires clear operational and tactical sustainment priorities for both assigned and rotational forces. Today's new security paradigm and its associated challenges require a simple, prioritized approach to create warfighting sustainment capabilities and competencies in both leaders and organizations. The sustainment capabilities and competencies required in Europe are being built to support the following operational and tactical sustainment priorities: readiness, anticipation, setting the theater, and leader and force development.

In an increasingly globalized world, the rapid spread of conflict, instability, and a requirement to balance presence with response present strategic and operational planners with complex problem sets. Solving these ever-shifting problem sets requires logisticians to reassess sustainment capabilities and competencies in order to intelligently formulate plans and policies.

READINESS: READY FOR WHAT?

For the past 14 years, the Army's focus has been on sustaining forces in combat, counterinsurgency, stability, and security operations. In the emergent European security paradigm, Army leaders are tasked with training and developing our force for ground combat.

In line with the chief of staff of the Army and the U.S. Army Europe (USAREUR) commander's priorities, the 21st TSC has refined its sustainment focus to provide a warfighting level of readiness that highlights tactical and operational sustainment functions. Achieving warfighting readiness while providing sustainment to assigned and RAF units operating across Europe is currently stretching USAREUR's assigned sustainment force structure.

High operating tempo and extended lines of communication are the realities of Operation Atlantic Resolve. RAF rotations in support of Operation Atlantic Resolve have logged nearly twice the number of miles and range time experienced during rotations at CONUS combat training centers.

RECAPTURING READINESS

The European theater was optimized for efficient operations in western Germany and designed to support training rotations to Grafenwoehr and Hohenfels. Years ago, when Russia was viewed as a partner in the global security environment, entire echelons of support and enabling structures were reinvested into CONUS-based force structure and the remaining structure and capabilities were optimized for theater security cooperation based on a stable regional security framework.

Now U.S. forces operating in Europe must come ready to execute doctrinal missions under arduous field conditions; there simply is no safety net of echeloned support left in Europe to reinforce tactical commanders who are simultaneously performing theater-level sustainment and theater-setting tasks.

Expeditionary formations deploying to Europe must rely on their organic, tactical sustainment. Forces must be able to deploy, move tactically, and operate under constant pressure from conventional and hybrid threats. When asked, sustainment forces must be ready for the most extreme test of capability against a potential state-level aggressor.

Units deploying to Europe will have to be ready to fight their way into their AO. Sustainment plans and functions must use tactics and techniques that are resistant to enemy fires, observation, and cyber capabilities. Sustainers' field craft and organic logistics skills have atrophied in an era of contracted sustainment, forward operating bases, and Army Force Generation cycle force pools.

Generating true warfighter readiness with assigned forces has been taxed by a requirement to sustain operations across vast distances for extended periods of time. The readiness of each unit must account for its training tasks, modified table of organization and equipment, and common table of allowance equipment that enable tactical operations against the most sophisticated potential adversaries.

Future security plans incorporating rotational forces must account for sustainment. Formations must train and deploy with their full range of capabilities, and they must be resourced to endure long-term field conditions that test their ability to operate in a contested battlespace.

SUSTAINMENT MISSION COMMAND

The ability of units and leaders to provide sustainment mission command over large areas has become a focal point of the 21st TSC. Operating and synchronizing sustainment across multiple AOs is an emergent necessity. No longer can we view the European area of responsibility as a single AO.

Planning for and rapidly incorporating rotational sustainment capability is critical to USAREUER operations at the strategic and operational levels. Posturing forces with adequate organic sustainment and then augmenting that support with contracted or echeloned support from the theater base or allied nations are complex tasks.

The 21st TSC currently employs the 16th Sustainment Brigade, which has a single movement control battalion (MCB) and a single combat service support battalion (CSSB), in an AO that arguably should be supported by two sustainment brigades, two MCBs, and multiple CSSBs.

The robust organic sustainment capacity of RAF and assigned brigade combat teams are challenged by the wide dispersion of units and operations, the lack of pass-back combat vehicle capability, and the thinly stretched echelons-above-brigade (EAB) sustainment assigned to the 21st TSC and USAREUR.

Additionally, mission command over several theater enablers, such as military police, engineer, and medical units, and the integration of national-level logistics, create additional planning and readiness challenges. Supporting small formations across a widely dispersed AO places a premium on distribution, traffic management, and materiel management functions.

ALLIED OPERATIONS

Today, the balance of power in Europe is fragile and NATO is focused on supporting and deterring aggression from locations in Western Europe. With recent expansions of NATO, allied nations have expanded the frontier of freedom and prosperity. That expansion has also led to a larger sustainment AO. Assigned and rotational forces must be prepared to operate with allied forces.

NATO executed over 40 battalion-level training exercises with U.S. forces in 2015 and will increase that number in the future. Tactical sustainment functions and interoperability will remain major points of emphasis for assigned and rotational forces.

SPEED MATTERS

Speed matters when it comes to movement because operational forces are located away from existing supply sources. But speed and proficiency also matter in diagnosing maintenance faults, detecting changes in the AO, reporting, and developing a sustainment common operational picture. Deploying and reinforcing our allies depends on unit deployment and march discipline within every echelon; we all compete for the same resources.

European supply and distribution lines of communication are largely "exterior" lines, spanning multiple international border crossings and requiring detailed and efficient coordination to ensure the seamless transit of supplies over extended distances. NATO and its allies face significant freedom of movement challenges not experienced by Russia.

Crossing borders, customs, and hazardous materials regulations require detailed expertise in this "pre-war" security environment. The ability of NATO forces to generate "interior line" effects will help balance the European security posture.

The paradox of micro logistics over macro distances is a growing challenge in Europe. Sustaining company-sized maneuver formations in widely dispersed locations has forced our sustainment organizations to morph into nondoctrinal roles and use nondoctrinal procedures. Warfighter readiness requires a deep and broad immersion in our doctrinal sustainment functions and the integration of both Active and Reserve capabilities.

The Army Materiel Command recently established the strategic European Activity Set, which includes equipment and capabilities to rebuild an echelon of strategic sustainment. Priority planning also continues for Army pre-positioned stocks. Integrating sustainment and theater-opening functions into these future requirements will add depth and complexity to the many tasks required of sustainment units. Understanding how to move and receive personnel and equipment is pivotal in developing speed and reducing response time.

FUTURE SUSTAINMENT DESIGN

The next phase in addressing the enduring and emergent requirements is to establish centralized sustainment mission command in the European theater. Over the past decade, the 21st TSC has inactivated 50 percent of its force, and a once multi-echelon and robust theater-level support command has been reduced to a fraction of its historic peak of over 70,000 personnel.

The expansion of NATO operations and AOs have not been met with increased logistics, military police, medical, or contracting forces to support the increased footprint.

Maturing sustainment in the Atlantic Resolve AO is critical for long-term success. This will depend on the RAF brigade combat team's ability to deploy its full sustainment capability and on the Army to source a tailored sustainment brigade for the Atlantic Resolve AO. This tailored sustainment brigade would give the 21st TSC the depth and capacity required to provide sustainment to both theater assigned and RAF forces.

Simultaneously, this brigade will enable the TSC to reinvest in generating sustainable readiness model training for assigned forces and allow them to focus on their RSOI and theater sustainment competencies to set the European theater.

Current theater sustainment structure cannot fully meet all requirements with the assigned single sustainment brigade headquarters and CSSB. The 21st TSC has dedicated the 16th Sustainment Brigade, its only sustainment brigade, to sustainment mission command of the Atlantic Resolve AO.

The 39th Transportation Battalion (Movement Control) adapted to perform the functions of a CSSB headquarters and separate MCB functions inside the Atlantic Resolve AO. The near-term operational risk of assigning mission command for the Atlantic Resolve AO places the burden of managing theater sustainment on the TSC staff--instead of on an already stretched sustainment brigade--until a rotational EAB sustainment capability is resourced and aligned to the Atlantic Resolve AO.

TSC planners have begun incorporating expeditionary sustainment command headquarters in planning discussions about how to rapidly open and close new and multiple AOs. The integration of subordinate sustainment command echelons is a growing operational imperative.

Developing a deliberate means to train, assess, and incorporate CONUS and RC expeditionary sustainment command and sustainment brigade capabilities into our enduring force posture will greatly enhance our support to NATO and the next spiral of policy development for the NATO Readiness Action Plan.

Echelons of equipment and the subsequent doctrinal employment of a sustainment mission command headquarters will solidify the TSC's ability to rapidly open, set, and sustain multiple AOs from the theater sustainment base. We need to expand the role and deepen the participation of the RC. The European theater relies upon the RC's ability to rapidly mobilize and deploy essential sustainment, transportation, maintenance, medical, and engineering capabilities. A portion of our theater sustainment plan focuses on capabilities not inherent to the Active component and that cannot be contracted in an active theater of war.

SETTING THE THEATER

We are defining theater opening and setting the theater in USAREUR. In Europe, the theater has been "opened" for 70 years, but it has been decades since it was set for the RSOI of corps and divisions of expeditionary, CONUS-based forces. Decades have elapsed since USAREUR and the 21st TSC have practiced in the art of opening AOs within the USAREUR area of responsibility, particularly in Eastern Europe.

Shaping the security environment and developing the capacity needed to gradually or rapidly expand military operations is a complex and demanding task. The Combined Arms Support Command has been diligently exploring Army warfighting challenge #16, "Set the Theater, Sustain Operations, and Maintain Freedom of Movement." It is developing doctrine, organization, training, materiel, leadership and education, personnel, facilities, and policy concepts to meet this warfighting challenge.

Linking comprehensive war games to the needs of opening and setting the theater sustainment base (to include engineer, signal, military police, air and missile defense, and movement control assets) will be essential as we consider how sustainment is integrated into force flow, expeditionary base operations, and long-term force design.

The sustainment community will compete for resources in future total Army analysis cycles, and we must ensure we have the depth to mobilize, equip, and sustain future operations.

SUSTAINING NATO

Planning for when and how to integrate expeditionary, CONUS-based forces, linking them to existing NATO and allied capabilities, and planning for joint and combined logistics support to unified land operations is a daunting task. Key components in the 21st TSC planning effort are incorporating theater-level tabletop exercises (TTX) and sustainment terrain walks, and integrating multiple Department of Defense and multinational allies and partners.

Through TTXs, the 21st TSC has been able to use current and anticipated operational scenarios to link our strategic sustainment providers to theater war planners in a series of structured vignette-based war games. These conceptual exercises highlight the roles, responsibilities, gaps, and mitigation plans related to various military scenarios.

These TTXs have proven effective in shaping our discourse and planning efforts with allies because we are able to highlight areas such as bulk commodity consumption, the magnitude of movement, and engineering assets required to sustain future NATO planning efforts and the time lines associated with executing these efforts.

Wargaming sessions and TTXs bring together strategic leaders and joint, multinational, and theater-level planners to collectively discuss real and perceived capacity, capability, and throughput constraints. These exercises have led to a renewed focus on NATO standards for operations and logistics, freedom of movement initiatives, and the development of acquisition and cross-service agreements required to facilitate a rapid reinforcement of our allies.

DEVELOPING LEADERS

Warfare throughout history has changed little over time. It is a struggle of wills, the extension of politics by other means, and a crucible in which violence, character, and courage collide. Leader development for our military and civilian workforce needs to be grounded in the study of warfare, the science of logistics, and the practice and art of leadership.

The star by which we need to set our path is one of training leaders and units in high-end combat operations. Full-spectrum conflict requires unit capability built upon Soldiers who possess competence in their warfighting and sustainment tasks. Only by teaching and exposing our junior leaders to the realities of combat will we be able to properly resource the collective echelons of command.

Army leaders must be ready for the crucible of combat. Leaders inside our sustainment community need to prepare for war and to prepare their units to perform their missions with the highest level of competence.

Providing anticipatory sustainment to dispersed assigned and RAF units executing Atlantic Resolve provides tremendous opportunities for unit training, but this alone falls short of the full-spectrum training required to achieve warfighter readiness.

The Army's sustainable readiness model has to account for the need to program rotational forces for NATO exercises and the need to build and exercise European scenarios into combat training center and mission command training program warfighter exercises.

Building a bench of leaders who understand the complexities of European security, and how to operate inside NATO, will have strategic importance in the future. Expanding our interoperability and deepening our ties with NATO allies requires a dedicated and institutional approach beyond what the assigned forces in Europe can currently manage.

The European security environment has dramatically changed in recent years. The rapid manner in which our Army has responded to this emergent condition has been remarkable. By focusing on readiness and striving to achieve warfighter readiness, we will be able to build strategic deterrence against potential aggressors. The strategic impact of our Army is the solid knowledge that we have trained for the crucible of combat and can integrate our formations with allies in any future scenario.

In the future European theater of operations, readiness will be built upon anticipated requirements that will set the theater of operations. Sustainment formations will need to operate in a secure network, under a missile defense shield, and have sufficient and dispersed stocks of ammunition, fuel, and water to execute a campaign across time and distance. The ability to anticipate future requirements is directly linked to properly aligned strategic and operational assets that force a potential adversary to pause.

The bedrock of our force is the adaptive and responsive leaders who have reflexive competence in their military skills--leaders that understand doctrine and how their formations integrate into the larger whole and who are decisive in the face of uncertainty. These leaders must ensure their units are practiced and ready for near-peer warfare. The uncertainty surrounding the location and time of the next security threat demands that we prepare now.

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Maj. Gen. Duane A. Gamble is the commanding general of the 21st Theater Sustainment Command (TSC) in Kaiserslautern, Germany. He has a bachelor's degree in business economics from McDaniel College, a master's degree in logistics management from the Florida Institute of Technology, and a master's degree in national resource strategy from the Industrial College of the Armed Forces. He is a graduate of the Ordnance Officer Basic and Advanced Courses, the Army Command and General Staff College, and the Industrial College of the Armed Forces.

Col. Matthew D. Redding is the chief of staff of the 21st TSC. He has a bachelor's degrees in government and philosophy from Saint Lawrence University, a master's degree in supply chain management from the Smith School of Business, and a master's degree in Strategic Studies from the Marine Corps War College. He is a graduate of the Air Defense Artillery Officer Basic Course, the Combined Logistics Advanced Course, the Army Command and General Staff College, and the Marine Corps War College.

Maj. Craig A. Daniel works in the Commander's Initiatives Group of the 21st TSC. He has a bachelor's degree in criminal justice from Radford University and an MBA. He is a graduate of the Quartermaster Officer Basic Course, the Combined Logistics Captains Career Course, and the Army Command and General Staff College.

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This article was published in the March-April 2016 issue of Army Sustainment magazine.

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