By Peter A. Buxbaum, AJOT
Distribution is the buzzword that best describes the approach the military now takes to transportation. Distribution goes beyond earlier concepts of transportation and logistics by suggesting an end-to-end approach that delivers material from the factory to the foxhole more effectively and at lower cost than before. This evolving effort, which is going full tilt in supplying US military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, has required military organizational changes and new relationships with private industry.
The key organizational change that inaugurated the military's new distribution approach came in September 2003, when Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld vested the commander of the United States Transportation Command (USTRANSCOM) with authority as Distribution Process Owner, or DPO. USTRANSCOM thus became responsible for all strategic movement activities and policies for the Department of Defense. Working with the service transportation organizations, USTRANSCOM procures commercial transportation and provides Defense Department-owned transportation on a consolidated basis.
During the 1990s, the Pentagon studied how it could depart from older concepts of stockpiling supplies and emulate private industry concepts of lean inventory management. This involved wrestling with the problem of how to supply quick-moving, forward-deployed forces. Consolidation under TRANSCOM was designed to achieve that end with streamlined organization and operations.
"The idea is to have one command that has the authority to drive how the money is spent," said Col. Ed Fortunato (USA-Ret.), vice president for government business development at Crowley Marine in Alexandria, VA, and former deputy commander of TRANSCOM. "Before, this function was performed by various individuals instead of one organization."
Providing TRANSCOM with overarching authority over transportation was designed to eliminate the stovepipes that had developed among individual service-specific transportation agencies. "Our observation has always been that the system was disjointed," said Eric Mensing, the Washington-based vice president for government and military markets at APL, a US-flag ocean carrier. "We deal in a world of end-to-end logistics. We understand that in the military world, the warfighter calls the shots, but there is the potential for suboptimizing the network by having systems that are not end-to-end."
"A flow of cargo without breaks"
The new emphasis on end-to-end service has allowed commercial carriers to unleash the capabilities they have been developing over a period of years for the benefit of the military. "We used to carry cargo to the port and then the warfighter would take over," said APL's Mensing. "In Afghanistan, we go right to the foxhole. The handoffs are among our own units and it goes smoothly. Our system is set up to provide for a flow of cargo without breaks."
The fact that the Pentagon's transportation activities have been consolidated under TRANSCOM facilitates APL's design and execution of end-to-end solutions, according to Mensing. "We move cargo from the factory or base in the US or Europe and the Department of Defense doesn't even see it until it hits Kandahar or Kabul," he said. "It is blended with the commercial cargo that we carry. That is a real positive development from our perspective." On the downside, Mensing acknowledges that APL has suffered causalities among its in-theater personnel.
Maersk Line Ltd., the US flag component of the Netherlands-based global transportation provider Maersk-Sealand, also provides deliveries directly to the warfighter in Afghanistan. Ken Gaulden, the company's Washington-based senior vice president, noted that Maersk has been serving Afghanistan since the 1920s. "One of our great capabilities is our global footprint," he said. "If you take a look at our offices in 125 countries, it mirrors very well the footprint of the US military and government."
Gaulden
