FORT SHAFTER, Hawaii - Since June 2015, the 8th Theater Sustainment Command's headquarters has taken a hard look at the possibility of leveraging joint solutions to solve the challenging dynamics that come with sustaining land forces across the vast Pacific. As we approach a strategic inflection point, the Army requires innovation like never before to maintain the capability overmatch we have long enjoyed in projecting and sustaining forces, particularly into and through contested operational environments. The Pacific is no exception. Similar to the rest of the force, the sustainment component will be forced into accepting more risk, not less.
From this experience the following problems were identified, defined, and then mitigated by 8th Theater Sustainment Command's recent efforts.
- Too often, the services compete for resources in constrained, uncertain operating environments- leading to unnecessary infighting over missions or duplicative, redundant efforts;
- Improvement to maintaining supply points and distribution lanes requires fresh thinking on how we conduct exercises, develop and maintain relationships, and how we handle positioning.
-Gaps in joint theatre integration to consistently pool and coordinate resources and require a more coherent, resilient, and useful sustainment process.
The Pacific Sustainment 2025 White Paper is intended to stimulate thought, drive discussion, and propose actions on how the Army can enhance its overall unity of effort. Recently endorsed by Gen. Robert B. Brown, the commanding general of the United States Army Pacific, this White Paper offers new thinking from Maj. Gen. Edward F. Dorman III, the commanding general of the 8th TSC, about the projection and sustainment of joint power by focusing on people, posture and processes. These proposals may have greater utility across the Force as all adjust to the unpredictability that comes with a resource-constrained environment.
Resourcing constraints are an inevitable part of the war/peacetime cycle, but rather than tirelessly attempting to influence decision makers to understand the downstream implications, there are significant untapped opportunities to share unique capabilities across organizations. For example, all services have a need and routinely conduct leader development programs. However, why conduct five similar events in five locations when one could suffice for all? Yet, this is the typical practice in the Army. With Pacific Sustainment 2025, the 8th TSC offers three precise recommendations with regard to its people. The concepts implemented and offered by the 8th TSC include:
- instigate earlier, more effective junior and mid-grade leader development;
- develop a more effective long-term vision of talent management towards the needs of the units across the specific theaters; and
- more effectively integrate the reserve component in mission fulfillment.
The easily exportable Young Alaka'i Leader Development Program, recently championed by TRADOC, is the perfect example of developing leaders from across the joint community earlier in their careers. This program, the first of its kind in DoD, invests in leader development by bringing together mid-grade commissioned, warrant, and non-commissioned officers from across the joint, inter-organizational, and multinational community to learn about the operational and strategic level from experts and authorities they would never normally have access to. Once complete, these leaders return to their units better prepared and more regionally-aware as they work toward generating sustainable solutions to influence more precise operational outcomes.
Next, the Pacific Logistician Talent Management strategy provides another exportable concept that goes hand-in-hand with regional leader development programs. Commanders leverage manning cycles, authorities, Army/Service schools, assessments and other opportunities to anticipate future intellectual requirements. They then identify talented individuals whose potential can be developed to fill those needs and enhance force capability. Ultimately, this type of regional-alignment practice could enable any unit from any service to maximize their potential and ensure the best service members get the best training and job opportunities on a rotational basis within the region to foster enhanced regional expertise and interoperability.
Third, the Chief of Staff of the Army, Gen. Mark A. Milley reiterates that Total Force readiness is the Army's number one priority. Too often active duty commanders overlook the capabilities the Reserves and National Guard can provide, and vice versa. In finding new ways to attack problems in a resource-constrained environment, integrating the reserve component is critical to fulfilling operational requirements. In the Pacific, more than 80% of sustainment capability resides in the reserve component -- therefore, any operational plan that fails to integrate these partners will surely shortchange the joint team. Linking specific exercises to drive core mission experience across a regionally-aligned Total Force can achieve sustainment endurance and resilience without duplication of effort. This further facilitates real world operations and prevents the "break glass in case of crisis" mentality.
While setting the theater in the Pacific traditionally equates to operational positioning in benign, high visibility locations such as the Republic of Korea, Japan and Guam -- the methodology to do so is typically formed through standing forces, pre-existing footprints, and partner-nation agreements. However, the opportunity to conduct enhanced Steady State exercises on a rotational basis in traditionally immature geo-strategic locations in South and Southeast Asia displays progress for enduring multilateral possibilities with our strategic and joint partners in the years ahead. Capitalizing on these opportunities would contribute to finding sustainable solutions to persistent problems. While some of the White Paper's recommendations on this topic are theater-specific, others are widely applicable, and studying the reasoning behind the partner-nation recommendations and prove valuable for any theater.
For example, the 8th TSC is proposing a Theater Access Sustainment Exercise to identify and develop U.S. defense investments across the theater that must be reviewed, measured and maintained. With alternate funding streams available and offered in the document, there is an opportunity to align this type of exercise directly to current service exercises already being conducted in theater. This proposal would further USPACOM's projection of power, persistent presence and pursuit of emerging areas of engagement.
Second, the 8th TSC believes the most important element of posture starts with relationships. The existing U.S. joint and service mission command structures can cause complicating factors for theater opening. Thus, the emphasis on relationships should not be understated. Pacific Sustainment 2025 proposes an organization that does not necessarily require ownership of a capability to influence action. The ability to anticipate requirements, balance capabilities, forecast demands, and facilitate long-range planning ensures the type of integration and relationships required for the joint community as a whole. As the lead synchronizer for theater sustainment in the Pacific, a heavy emphasis is placed on coordinating and strengthening relationships through service, joint, and multinational operations, actions, and activities to best link training plans across multiple echelons. These relationships create a forum for greater shared understanding and a common operational picture for senior leaders to make better informed decisions.
Finally, geography plays an important role in how we operate, communicate, and conduct mission command in the 21st century. Unfortunately, not all units in the Pacific are forward stationed for myriad reasons, mostly political. Those units east of the International Date Line (IDL) are no different in many ways from Army units stationed in the Continental United States: both are days away from a potential crisis, whether moving by surface or by air. Greater strategic positioning would equate to greater readiness. Posturing and testing readiness west of the IDL would shorten delivery times, enhance rapid transition and capability in a crisis, and reduce the burden of the tactical operator in theater. From an operational standpoint, having the land component TSC situated west of the IDL in a location such as Japan, would better synchronize sustainment from an intermediate staging base in theater, as well as nest with one of our most capable alliance partners. While understanding this is more than just a military decision, this potential solution offers one headquarter's operational perspective. This line of thinking can serve as a possible model for considering the prospects of partnering through other nations to balance military logistical needs with the needs of the political climate.
The problems that come with insufficient resourcing in theater might be mitigated by coordinating efforts across multiple organizations to pool our combined resources -- which, at the very least it would add a menu of options for commanders. For example, in August 2015 following a typhoon that struck Saipan, the Army's 7th Engineer Dive Team from the TSC was called upon to recertify the local ports in support of disaster relief operations. Based on the lack of dedicated strategic lift assets in the Pacific for disaster relief, critical Dive Team equipment was forced to travel by surface, resulting in an anticipated response time of 19 days. Fortunately, an opportunity to transfer the appropriate, on-hand equipment from a forward stationed Coast Guard unit directly to the 7th Dive Team provided enhanced operability and shortened any additional delivery time. Operational-level sustainment coordination and communication proved vital.
With real-world scenarios like these in mind, the 8th TSC conducted individual engagements and office calls with Pacific Service Sustainment Partners to open up an intellectual dialogue on the potential for a theater sustainment concept that supports the joint force as a whole, rather than just the Army. The concept centered on a coordination-centric entity, rather than a command-centric entity. While there was some debate regarding the details of joint sustainment, every service agreed there is a need for greater visibility over sustainment-centric practices and processes.
Nested with the regional and national strategy, Pacific Sustainment 2025 offers a theater-level option as a joint sustainment component coordinating command. This entity could accelerate decision making for senior leaders, improve response times, and deliver desired effects with greater precision through the process of unifying efforts.
While offered from the viewpoint of a sustainment headquarters in the Pacific, many of Maj. Gen. Dorman's proposed concepts were designed to create options and enhance readiness in the Joint, Inter-organizational, Multinational and Commercially-enabled (JIM-C) environments of a complex world -- which makes them applicable and exportable across the Total Force to be able to fight tonight, in 2025, or beyond.
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