6.
Logistics
Meeting the Army’s need for supplies and equipment has always been a
formidable challenge. The transition from forward positioning to domestic
basing and multiple, often remote, and quickly developing deployments
during the 1990s has not reduced the complexity of meeting the Army’s
requirements for timely, reliable, and cost-effective logistic support.
The Army Materiel Command (AMC) and other agencies continued to
meet those requirements in FY 1999 while developing new systems and
procedures to improve future performance.
Overall responsibility for Army logistics changed during FY 1999
in accordance with Secretary of the Army Louis Caldera’s 16 February
announcement of a secretariat reorganization. The assistant secretary
of the Army for installations, logistics, and environment (ASA-IL&E)
transferred logistics operations to the assistant secretary of the Army for
research, development, and acquisition (ASA-RDA). Although it directly
affected only nine personnel, the shift consolidated acquisition and
logistics policy oversight under a single office to improve efficiency. The
titles of the assistant secretaries, and their offices, changed to match their
new duties. The ASA-RDA became the assistant secretary of the Army for
acquisition, logistics, and technology; the ASA-IL&E became the assistant
secretary of the Army for installations and environment.
In the November 1997 Defense Reform Initiative Report, the
Department of Defense (DOD) established a blueprint for improved
business processes, commercial alternatives, consolidated functions,
and streamlined organizations to modernize the supply and acquisition
process and generally improve the fiscal efficiency of the armed services.
Borrowing from the best practices of major corporations, the DOD
identified working capital funds and electronic commerce as two areas of
potential development.
The Working Capital Funds Policy Board establishes policies at the
DOD level that are then executed within the five funds that collectively
make up the Defense Working Capital Fund (DWCF). In addition to the
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Army Working Capital Fund, the components of the DWCF are the Navy
and Air Force Working Capital Funds, the Defense Commissary Agency
Working Capital Fund, and the Defense-Wide Working Capital Fund. These
funds operate continually without fiscal year limitation and collectively
account for roughly one quarter of the DOD direct appropriations, creating
buyer–seller relationships between the services and within the DOD.
Through the DWCF structure, the Army finances support activities such as
depot maintenance, supply, research and development, transportation, and
information services.
Operations of the DWCF underwent substantial changes during the late
1990s as the Department of Defense sought to establish a more businesslike,
vendor–customer relationship in intradepartmental transactions. DWCF
transactions involve approximately $70 billion annually, as military
units purchase goods, services, and industrial capability from support
organizations. With such a large volume, even minor cost reductions and
efficiencies offer significant savings. The goal of the DWCF is not cost
reduction, however, but an improvement in the way the DOD and the
services execute and document their internal financial transactions.
Electronic commerce is a steadily growing trend in business and,
more recently, in the DOD. It offers both improved documentation and
cost reduction. This application of digital technology to automate and
improve business functions requires the integration of business activities
in all services through common tools and seamless information transfers.
Business affairs within the Defense Department remain expensive and slow
because of their substantial requirements for personnel and paperwork and
the complexities of coordinating the flow of information—situations that
electronic commerce promises to correct. Transferring business processes
to digital systems eliminates the time formerly spent moving paper
documents from one office to the next. Electronic information processing
is inherently faster and more responsive, offering cost reductions and
improved service. For that reason the Joint Electronic Commerce Program
Office, which opened in May 1998, continued to develop a plan to establish
and implement electronic commercial practices, products, and standards
within the Defense Department wherever practical.
The Defense Finance and Accounting Service (DFAS), as the armed
forces’ primary agent for financial management reform, shares those goals.
In FY 1999, the DFAS continued to promote the paperless exchange of
financial information through electronic document management (EDM),
electronic funds transfer (EFT), and electronic data interchange (EDI).
EDM, relying heavily on World Wide Web applications, replaces paper-based
forms and reports with their electronic equivalents to facilitate
control, analysis, and overall efficiency. EFT substantially reduces the cost
of disbursements by paying salary, travel, and contract expenses without
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recourse to paper. EDI improves on EFT by directly exchanging payment
information with vendors.
In addition to funds management, the Defense Reform Initiative called
for a more general overhaul in defense acquisition, with the goal of superior
goods and services faster and cheaper than current practices allowed.
Toward that end, the DOD identified twelve defense acquisition goals to be
met by FY 2000, goals that all of the services pursued during FY 1999. By
achieving those goals, the services can release money for modernization
efforts without requesting an increase in total budget authority.
Army logistics personnel continued to include the goals of the
Defense Reform Initiative in their own efforts during FY 1999. The
complexity that logisticians and administrators confront in reforming
Army business practices is indicated by the Army Audit Agency’s review
of the FY98 Army Working Capital Fund (WCF), completed in FY
1999. Because of deficiencies in Army accounting procedures that were
themselves being addressed, auditors could not verify the fund’s accounts
or otherwise assess its performance, beyond noting its record-keeping and
control shortcomings. The Army could not account with certainty for its
expenditures from the fund.
The Army Materiel Command made progress toward meeting the goals
of the Defense Reform Initiative during FY 1999 despite such obstacles.
Implementation of a Single Stock Fund (SSF) program promised to
streamline purchasing and eliminate the inefficiencies of the WCF by
merging its wholesale and retail elements into a single, nationally managed
fund. Wholesale elements of the WCF furnish goods and equipment for
further distribution, and retail elements provide them for consumption.
Trial programs at Fort Sill (Oklahoma), Fort Lewis (Washington), and
Redstone Arsenal (Alabama) during FY 1999 paved the way for full SSF
implementation.
On 19 May, the SSF Executive Steering Committee recommended
that certain items not managed by the Army be excluded from the SSF
on the grounds that they are not supported by standard Army information
systems supporting the reform. The AMC implemented the recommended
changes within the Army Food Management System, Clothing Initial Issue
Point System, Fuels Automated System, Integrated Facilities System, and
Theater Army Medical Management Information System. Preparations for
full SSF implementation went forward, with those exclusions, and included
an AMC request for the future funding of a National Business Office to
oversee its administration.
The FY99 transfer of major command retail divisions to AMC control
placed responsibility for all Army retail activities under one command.
This improved the AMC’s ability to overhaul the Army supply system
and implement the SSF program. But the scale of FY99 humanitarian
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assistance missions strained the AMC’s resources as it increased sales
and obligations in some supply activities. The Army’s successful attempt
to seek funding for contingency and humanitarian operations through a
supplemental budget request boosted wholesale (for further distribution)
sales 11 percent above planned FY99 levels. Retail (end-user) sales rose
through the same mechanism, ending the fiscal year at 2.7 percent over
plan. This reduced the wholesale unit cost, or cost per dollar of sales, to
$0.97, one cent below the goal for the fiscal year. Sales volumes that were
higher than anticipated and unexpected turn-ins raised retail cost to one
cent above the $1.00 goal. Despite these fluctuations, the AMC maintained
the highest availability rate in the past three years, averaging 85.6 percent
immediate availability of stocked items.
Other AMC programs included sustainment systems technical support,
the Army mechanism to maintain and improve fielded weapons systems.
The increasing age of major systems, combined with high operating
tempos, strained resources in this area. For example, a shortfall in funding
for contractor logistics support for fixed-wing aviation threatened to ground
a portion of the Army’s aircraft late in the year, mirroring the familiar
problems in funding depot maintenance activities.
To correct such problems, in 1997 the Army instituted a process of
transformation that it labeled the Revolution in Military Logistics (RML).
During FY 1999, the RML continued as the Army moved toward a velocity-based
logistics concept that would be responsive to the needs of the force
across the full mission spectrum. Velocity-based logistics, developed in
the private sector, replaces large and expensive warehouse stockpiles
with a constant flow of goods from producer to end user regulated by the
rate of consumption. While it enables the Army to meet the sustainment
challenges of the National Military Strategy, the RML also addresses the
growing demand for lift, or transportation, capacity. When the program is
fully implemented, it will revise logistics throughout the force and enable
the Army to meet its goal of deploying a medium-weight, brigade-size
force anywhere in the world within ninety-six hours.
Toward that end, the Army expects the RML to create a single logistics
system, promote distribution-based logistics, enable rapid force projection,
create total asset visibility, establish a flexible infrastructure, and reduce
the scale of the Army’s logistical requirements (generally referred to as
its “logistical footprint”). Those lofty goals are being met by applying
information technology and advanced capabilities to the problems of
acquisition, distribution, and management. The RML stands at the heart of
the Army’s efforts to balance readiness and modernization, maximizing the
use of scarce resources. Those resources transcend budgetary limitations,
to include production and transportation capacity, personnel, and facilities.
In addition to the obvious economic benefits, the RML increases strategic
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responsiveness, decreases deployment timelines, ensures joint force
compatibility and support, creates an early-entry force able to operate
without access to fixed forward bases, and reduces sustainment needs.
The Velocity Management (VM) program, which establishes velocity-based
logistics throughout the Army as the core of the RML, is intended to
decrease the Army’s dependence on stockpiled supplies by relying instead
on automation, speed, and transportation to meet its logistics requirements
as quickly as commercial systems meet the needs of industry. As it neared
full implementation within the Army National Guard, VM significantly
improved the flow of repair parts and other items to Guard units in FY
1999. The program continued to identify and resolve delays in the ordering,
procurement, shipping, and receipt of supplies as the total force expanded
its implementation.
As a key contributor to VM, Army Total Asset Visibility (ATAV) is
an operational capability that integrates information from numerous
automated information systems to provide logisticians visibility of stocks
in use, in storage, on hand, and in transit. Bar coding and radio frequency
identification technologies assist the process by facilitating automated
identification and tracking of individual items and containers. ATAV
meets critical management needs to reduce duplicative procurement, meet
mandated cost reductions, and provide logistics system efficiencies.
The Army designated ATAV as the single authoritative database to
provide data to the Joint Total Asset Visibility initiative. ATAV provides
logistics data to all military services and the Defense Logistics Agency.
This information can be used to redistribute critical materiel to meet
emerging requirements. ATAV was used to support Operation JOINT FORGE
(Bosnia-Herzegovina) and Operations DESERT THUNDER and DESERT FOX
(Kuwait) during FY 1999.
Automatic identification technology (AIT) supports ATAV through the
electronic identification and tracking of items as they move through the
logistics system from the factory to their final destination. The AIT equipment
suite being fielded by the Army includes radio frequency identification, laser
optical technology, smart cards, and bar coding. All of these new capabilities
are designed to enable logisticians to monitor cargo movements, divert
shipments, locate critical supplies, and reduce or eliminate human error.
The Army installed radio frequency identification (RFID) equipment
at fifteen continental U.S. installations designated as power-projection
platforms in FY 1999 to provide theater commanders with information
on cargo in transit. This effort began in July 1998 to support deployment
of the 1st Cavalry Division to Bosnia. RFID equipment was used during
FY 1999 to track Patriot missile equipment moving to Kuwait for
Operation DESERT THUNDER and again for equipment moving to Kuwait
for Operation DESERT FOX.
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To meet the current needs of rapid deployment and sustainment, the
Army maintains stocks of pre-positioned equipment at various locations,
including some afloat. One of the seven pre-positioned armor-heavy
brigade sets remains aboard fifteen Navy-operated vessels, including new
large, medium-speed, roll-on/roll-off (RORO) ships. Three of the other
brigade sets are in Europe (Italy, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands), and
the remaining three are in Kuwait, Qatar, and South Korea. Additional
support-unit equipment, mission-specific packages, and resupply sets are
maintained afloat or ashore at overseas or continental U.S. facilities. These
practices enable a unit to fly rapidly from the United States, draw heavy
equipment from pre-positioned stock, and deploy on a mission without
waiting for its equipment to arrive by ship or air from the continental
United States. Pre-assembled resupply sets and mission-specific packages
then simplify sustainment and theater development.
RORO ships are an invaluable component in the United States’ ability
to deploy heavy equipment overseas. These vessels are equipped with
ramps that make it possible to swiftly load or unload vehicles and cargo
with a minimum of shore support. They are, therefore, uniquely suited to
deploying the Army’s heavy forces, and in conjunction with the Air Force’s
C–17 and C–5 cargo aircraft, they play a key role in sustaining joint
operations overseas. The Army maintains a keen interest in these three
systems and the nation’s overall airlift and sealift capabilities.
The 1995 Mobility Requirements Study Bottom-Up Review Update
identified the Army’s sealift requirements to meet the goal of deploying a
five and one-third division force package within seventy-five days. Doing
so will require nineteen large, medium-speed ROROs (LMSRs), thirty-one
smaller ROROs, eight fast sealift ships, six crane ships, two heavy
lift pre-positioning ships, three lighter aboard ships, and two container
ships. Five LMSRs converted from more traditional freighters are already
in service, two of them deployed with pre-positioned stocks. At the end of
FY 1999, six purpose-built LMSRs had been delivered, with nine more
to follow. The program calls for nine of those vessels to support the afloat
pre-positioning program, one for the Marine Corps and eight for the Army,
with the rest assigned to the Navy’s surge sealift program.
During FY 1999, Army logisticians experimented with a new
procedure to capitalize on the streamlining and automation initiatives that
constitute the RML. Anticipating that RML reforms and budget restraints
will inevitably reduce authorized stockage lists, planners developed a
means to meet a unit’s additional stock requirements as it mobilizes for
contingency deployment. The Deployment Stock Package—an automated
process that improves stock visibility, supports planning, and provides
real-time adjustment capabilities—can significantly improve the supply
performance and readiness of a deploying unit. After successful testing
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during unit rotation at the National Training Center, the Deployment Stock Package entered service with units at Fort Stewart (Georgia), Fort Lewis (Washington), Fort Campbell (Kentucky), Fort Carson (Colorado), and, at the end of the fiscal year, in Kuwait. The program is being expanded to expedite corps and theater operations and to create a national-level visibility for deployment stock requirements.
Army depot facilities in the active and reserve components maintain
and, when necessary, rebuild or upgrade the Army’s heavy equipment.
Although they had increased, the levels of full-time support personnel at
reserve-component depots continued to fall short of the Army’s need in
FY 1999. Assets and parts availability hampered depot activities in both
the active and reserve components, but corrective measures to increase
coordination among workloads, workload schedules, and asset and repair
parts requirements reduced the problem as the year progressed. Customer
commands, units or organizations requiring depot services, placed orders
earlier and so permitted the depots to requisition items requiring lead
times earlier in the fiscal year. This ensured their availability or allowed
schedules to be adjusted to correspond to delivery dates.
At the beginning of the fiscal year, commands responsible for
specific commodities assumed management responsibility for the
relevant depots, another step in improving depot efficiency. Thus the
Army Communications-Electronics Command assumed command and
control of the Tobyhanna Army Depot (Pennsylvania). Similarly, Army
Tank-Automotive and Armaments Command took operational control of
the Anniston (Alabama) and Red River (Texarkana, Texas) depots, and
Aviation and Missile Command assumed control of the Corpus Christi
(Texas) and Letterkenny (Chambersburg, Pennsylvania) depots.
Fiscal performance of the Army’s depots is assessed in five categories:
cost per direct labor hour, financial operating measures, customer revenue
rate, capital investment, and cash management. FY99 figures for direct
labor, operating measures, customer revenue, and cash management all
reflected positive trends.
In the case of capital investment, establishing the positive trend
involved several major projects to maintain and improve depot capabilities
by acquiring new equipment and completing minor construction projects.
The automated storage and retrieval warehouse system for bulky materiel
used in fabrication and overhaul activities that consists of man-aboard
lift vehicles, automated guided vehicles, and miniature load controllers
began replacing a similar but obsolete system. The Army Workload and
Performance System, a networked personal computer software suite
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that integrates existing production and financial data, started helping
production and resource managers optimize their resources and activities.
The Standard Depot System/Manufacturing Resources Program, another
software application, began making the Depot Maintenance System
compliant with the Defense Information Infrastructure and Joint Technical
Architecture. When fully implemented, the Standard Depot System/
Common Operating Environment that entered service during the year
will create a common user interface across the AMC, reduce the number
of unique applications in use, and enable AMC personnel to perform all
functions from a single workstation.
Combining functions into a single organizing framework, as Army
depots did through those software initiatives in FY 1999, is a recurring
theme in improving Army logistics. Integrated Sustainment Maintenance
(ISM) currently combines the general support maintenance activities
of Forces Command, Training and Doctrine Command, and the reserve
components into a single resource pool. The facilities within that pool
compete for work, minimizing repair costs and maximizing the Army’s
overall maintenance efficiency. ISM currently operates on a “repair-and-return-to-user” premise. This means that when
a unit sends a particular
piece of equipment in for depot maintenance, the unit will receive that
same piece back when the required repairs, upgrades, and preventive
procedures have been completed. Because the Army has no maintenance
float, or fleet of available short-term replacement equipment, the unit is
without that piece of equipment for the duration of its depot overhaul.
The absence of such equipment can become a significant readiness issue
even with the FY99 reductions in depot maintenance backlogs. The SSF
program, once fully implemented, will replace this system with one of
repairing for return to the supply system.
The high operating tempo of FY 1999 led to speculation that supply
and maintenance would suffer, adversely affecting training and long-term
readiness. Although the threats posed by aging equipment, heavy use,
delayed maintenance, and parts or funding shortages were quite real, the
Army met the challenge. Programs like VM helped in meeting the Army’s
maintenance needs and they promise to do more. But preserving the Army’s
long-term ability to maintain deployed equipment and personnel, or to
sustain a high operating tempo without degradation in mission capabilities,
is a problem quite different from routine maintenance.
When the Army deploys away from its permanent bases or otherwise employs its equipment in nontraining missions, its need for logistical support, and the difficulties in providing that support, increase dramatically.
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The challenge grows with the scale and duration of an operation and
with its distance from established support facilities. Sustaining Army
forces under such circumstances requires prior planning and a complex
logistics system.
Equipment readiness is one measure of that system’s effectiveness.
Despite high operating tempos, the Army met most of its readiness goals
in FY 1999. The Army uses the mission readiness rates of its sixteen major
weapons systems as an indicator of equipment readiness trends, and only
two of those systems—the CH–47D helicopter and the heavy expanded-mobility
tactical truck—failed to meet readiness standards. The entire CH–
47 fleet (446 aircraft designated CH–47D, MH–47D, and MH–47E) spent
part of FY 1999 grounded after a scheduled overhaul of one helicopter
revealed cracked transmission gears. The Army’s general success in
mitigating the adverse impact of aging equipment, high usage rates, and
maintenance backlogs is apparent in the overall adequate readiness levels
of the last three fiscal years.
Some of the Army’s major weapons systems experienced minor
declines in readiness during FY 1999, although still achieving readiness
goals. The declines may be attributed to limited assets, parts supply
problems, and changing customer orders at the Army depots. Schedule
conformation reports, which calculated the percentage of major systems
repairs or overhauls completed on schedule, indicated a substantial decrease
in meeting depot maintenance schedules during the fiscal year.
Problems in the delivery of required parts and supplies are a potential
source of decreased readiness and difficulties in sustaining a deployed
force. The VM program is intended to speed the flow of those materials
and prevent unnecessary delays. Although its performance fell short of
the ambitious goals set for FY 1999, VM proved effective in reducing
the time between ordering and receipt of supply items in three priority
groups, measured against the FY95 baseline. Such success would not be
possible without support by other components of the logistics system.
Although parts and supplies pass through the Army’s logistics system with
dramatically increased speed as a result of VM and other components of
the RML, the Supply Management Activity has maintained the availability
of increasingly transient items in its role as the purchaser and warehouse
agent for stocks sold to Army operating units.
Securing and transporting required materiel in a timely and cost-effective
manner is crucial to maintaining the Army’s ability to sustain
even routine operations, a fact that the Army Medical Command
(MEDCOM) addressed with a program to standardize its needs, reduce the
variety of required supplies, and realize volume savings on the resultant
contracts. North Atlantic Regional Medical Command began with an
effort to standardize sixteen product categories in 1998. The MEDCOM
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subsequently expanded that regional effort into a broader medical/surgical
standardization program.
By early 1999, the regional medical commands (RMCs) started reporting
success in standardizing the sixteen categories originally examined by the
North Atlantic RMC. Based on varying clinical and business practices in
the RMCs, the MEDCOM developed a second informal list of categories
for standardization. At the same time, the Department of Veterans
Affairs provided the MEDCOM with contract access to sixteen hundred
standardized medical/surgical items. To facilitate the standardization
process, a Defense Supply Center Philadelphia/lead agent partnership hired
contractors to staff regional business improvement cells. The MEDCOM
business cell staff subsequently analyzed patient databases to develop a
clinical workload-driven list of forty-two standardization categories. Items
in those categories were to be considered for possible standardization
throughout the Department of Defense in FY 2000. These efforts saved the
Army $3 million on medical and surgical items by the end of FY 1999. The
program also reduced the total volume of the MEDCOM’s supply needs,
thereby improving the sustainability of Army medical units.
Efforts to maintain and improve the Army’s ability to sustain its
operations range from the seemingly simple, such as standardizing medical
supply categories, to the highly complex. The Army relies on maritime
transportation for the bulk supplies and heavy equipment that deployed
forces require. But port facilities are not always available when and where
the Army needs them. Part of the Army’s afloat pre-positioned equipment
program includes a port-opening package embarked aboard the vessels
American Cormorant, Strong Virginian, and Gopher State. The vessels
carry enough equipment to turn a bare beach into a functioning port facility
capable of supporting Army logistics over-the-shore operations.
The equipment aboard these vessels requires periodic maintenance
and repair. Every two years the ships are offloaded, and their cargo of
tugboats, landing craft, barges, floating cranes, and other equipment is
overhauled and returned to service. This procedure, and the subsequent
maintenance, are carried out at the U.S. Army Equipment Base, North
Atlantic, in Hythe, England. Strong Virginian underwent the process for the
first time in November 1998. The ship uses its heavy-lift cranes to deploy
four LCU–2000 utility landing craft and a modified LCM–8 command-and-control landing craft. Its roll-on/roll-off
configuration enables Strong Virginian to store and transport 168 motorized vehicles, mostly high-mobility
multipurpose wheeled vehicles and trucks, below deck.
The Hythe shipyard—the only facility of its kind—maintains the
Army’s forward-deployed watercraft and other seaborne assets, such
as those aboard the Strong Virginian, in a small corner of the port of
Southampton. Its mission includes materiel and maintenance support for
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thirteen additional pre-positioned equipment ships and maintenance of
smaller vessels such as the one hundred–foot Army tugboat it converted to
carry firefighting equipment for the Military Traffic Management Command
in the spring of 1999. That conversion was the first of three that the Hythe
shipyard will soon complete to enhance the Army’s firefighting capability.
The facility and the 270 watercraft it supports are an important component
in the Army’s ability to conduct and sustain remote operations.
The Army initiated an ambitious restructuring of its watercraft fleet in
FY 1999. The 270 landing craft, tugboats, floating cranes, barges, causeway
systems, and utility craft maintained at Hythe were being upgraded and
restructured in compliance with warfighting requirement timelines. When
complete, the program will create a globally responsive, modern, forward-positioned
fleet capable of sustaining over-the-shore operations in sea state
3 (waves three to five feet high) anywhere in the world.
The Army’s ability to handle cargo at both sea and aerial port facilities
is becoming ever more important as units increasingly deploy to remote
locations on contingency and humanitarian missions. Although ships
remain important, Force XXI and the Army After Next will feature reduced
heavy-lift needs and smaller logistical requirements. Air cargo delivery,
already vital, will become increasingly important in Army logistics. Units
once primarily responsible for unloading and loading ships now handle
aircraft and rail transit as well.
With that in mind, the Army’s stevedore units, officially designated
terminal-service companies, have been redesignated as cargo-transfer
companies. The shifting nature of that community’s mission was
acknowledged in FY 1999 when the name of the annual Master Stevedore
Rodeo, intended to recognize and promote mastery of cargo-handling
skills, changed to the Master Cargo Handler Rodeo. This minor change in
nomenclature reflects the social transitions that accompany the growing
complexity of the Army’s logistic operations.
The Army provides security assistance to allied and friendly nations in the form of foreign military sales, training, and education. Security assistance supports the Army mission by promoting U.S. foreign and defense policy and helping other countries develop or maintain their own defensive capabilities. These efforts support regional and global stability, reduce the likelihood of direct U.S. involvement in contingency or peace enforcement missions, and increase the capabilities of current or potential coalition and alliance partners and their interoperability with U.S. forces. As an added benefit, security assistance helps maintain the defense industrial base and reduce the cost of weapons systems and other materiel.
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Such activities are administered by the deputy under secretary of
the Army for international affairs (DUSA-IA) in accordance with the
August 1997 revision of General Order 10 that reorganized the Army
secretariat. The Office of the DUSA-IA made substantial progress in
regularizing its activities and updating relevant Army regulations during
FY 1999. For example, its Security Assistance Division updated AR 12-1, Security Assistance and International Logistics
Support Policy and
Responsibilities, and AR 1-75, Administrative and Logistical Support
of Overseas Security Assistance Organizations. The new version of AR
12-1 incorporates the provisions of General Order 10 that delegated
responsibility for the Army’s international affairs functions to the DUSAIA.
Circulation of the new regulations solidified the DUSA-IA’s authority
over the conduct of such functions.
The promulgation of the Army’s policies for exporting weapons
systems to friendly foreign governments holds an important position
among the international affairs functions of the DUSA-IA. In FY 1999, the
DUSA-IA released policies defining the configurations and capabilities of
several systems approved for export. These systems included the Javelin
missile, the Suite of Integrated Radio Frequency Countermeasures,
M56/58 Smoke Generator, AH–64D Apache, Suite of Integrated Infrared
Countermeasures, and Patriot Advanced Capability-3 missile system. The
DUSA-IA also represented the Army in the Arms Transfer Policy Review
Group (ATPRG) that the deputy secretary of defense established in FY
1999 to evaluate the arms-transfer process. In its first year of operation,
the ATPRG examined the sale of the AH–64D to Kuwait and Singapore,
foreign participation in development of the Joint Strike Fighter, transfer
of the HARM antiradar missile system to Egypt, and an Arms Transfer
Decision Framework to govern future decision making.
The DUSA-IA led the development of the Army’s own decision
support system for formulating positions on the transfer of Army property
and classified technologies to foreign governments. Work on the creation
of that system, a relational database of technology transfer policies, data,
and actions, continued throughout FY 1999. When complete, the system
will streamline the analysis, review, and processing of requests to transfer
classified data, systems, and ordnance to foreign nations. The Air Force
and the Navy recognized the value of such a system and adopted that of
the Army, thereby consolidating government records into one emerging
integrated system.
Such international transfers can actually save the Army money. By
releasing excess defense articles (EDAs) to foreign military forces, the
Army can reduce inventory and avoid the cost of disposing of surplus goods.
The EDA release process has become quite slow, often requiring more than
a year between offering an item to a friendly nation and actually delivering
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it, absent an urgent political need. In FY 1999, the Army recommended
EDA allocations to thirty-one countries, with a value of $1.14 billion.
Substantially less equipment was actually transferred. Deliveries to six
nations, worth approximately $158 million, were completed. Another $22
million worth of equipment was rejected by eight countries because of its
poor condition or because the recipient government lacked funds to pay
for repairs and shipping. Much of the Army’s foreign security assistance
takes the form of training. In FY 1999, the Army provided instruction for
7,623 international students from 142 countries. The Army deployed 273
training teams, totaling 562 personnel, on overseas instructional assistance
missions. Despite the size of that effort and the activities of other training
centers, the United States Army School of the Americas (USARSA),
housed at Fort Benning, Georgia, remained the Army’s premier venue for
delivering training through its security assistance program. Title 10, U.S.
Code, Section 4415 charges the Army, through the USARSA, to develop
and conduct professional military education using the Spanish language
for the military personnel of Central America, South America, and the
Caribbean region. In FY 1991, section 541 of the Foreign Assistance Act
established an Expanded International Military Education and Training
(EIMET) authority that allowed the USARSA to accept civilian personnel
and police officers. Under that authority, civilians professionally involved
with military matters could receive training from the USARSA or other
U.S. military sources in four areas: defense resource management, civilian
control of the military, cooperation between law enforcement and military
agencies, and military justice systems and human rights.
During FY 1999, public and media attention focused on continuing
allegations of human rights violations by graduates of the USARSA and of
the USARSA’s role in promoting those alleged violations. After examining
the accusations and the USARSA’s record, the Army leadership issued a
strong endorsement of the program. But the unsubstantiated claims that
the USARSA promoted human rights violations, and subsequent public
outrage, caused the House of Representatives to include a measure in
the FY00 Foreign Operations Appropriations Act prohibiting security
assistance funds from being used at the USARSA—a move that effectively
would have closed the school. A conference resolution restored the funds
but required, before they could be spent, that the secretary of defense certify
that instruction and training at the facility were consistent with training
and doctrine (particularly in human rights) provided at other defense
department institutions that trained primarily U.S. military personnel.
Since 1993, a number of legislators have supported efforts to close the
USARSA in response to its alleged role in promoting human rights abuses.
In FY 1999, Massachusetts congressman Joseph J. Moakley and Illinois
senator Richard C. Durbin introduced bills to repeal the school’s statutory
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authorization. Army leaders responded with an education and information
campaign intended to counter the school’s negative image. As the fiscal
year approached its end, the secretary of the Army directed the DUSA-IA
to develop a long-term strategy to ensure the school’s continued viability.
The August 1999 Report of the Board of Visitors, an external committee
responsible for reviewing the USARSA’s academic program, noted the
exemplary nature of the school’s human rights training.
FY 1999 was a busy year for international cooperative research
and development projects. The DUSA-IA’s Cooperative Research,
Development, and Acquisition Division established fourteen project
agreements and eleven data exchange agreements, arranged four loans, and
pursued eighteen additional proposals in those categories. Such activities
provide the Army with different perspectives and lines of research that it
cannot pursue alone and they strengthen ties between the United States
and other nations.
Ties between the Russian Federation Army and the U.S. Army
weakened in FY 1999 in response to North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(NATO) operations in Serbia. As one example, the Russian procurator
general had settled on the U.S. Uniform Code of Military Justice as the
best available model for reforming the Russian military justice system. The
Office of the DUSA-IA strongly supported the Russian interest, seeing a
means to support Russian development of improved democratic rule of
law in military affairs. Unfortunately, the strained relations postponed a
scheduled visit to the United States by the Russian Main Procuracy to
discuss the reform.
Relations with the Chinese People’s Liberation Army suffered a
similar setback. A May 1999 China Engagement Workshop hosted by
the DUSA-IA developed a schedule of exchange events, including a visit
to China by the superintendent of the United States Military Academy,
a language exchange visit by Academy cadets, and a possible military
history exchange. Planning came to a halt, and all military ties with China
were severed, as a result of the 7 May accidental U.S. bombing of the
Embassy of the People’s Republic of China in Belgrade during NATO air
strikes targeted against the Yugoslavian government.
In accordance with the 1997 Defense Reform Initiative, the
international emergency planning function of the Office of the Secretary
of Defense transferred to the Army. The DUSA-IA assumed responsibility
for the function—known as civil–military emergency planning (CMEP)—
on 11 March 1999, and executed its first CMEP event in September 1999.
The Earthquake Preparedness Workshop for Southeastern Europe Defense
Ministerial (SEDM) nations met in Varna, Bulgaria, to discuss database
development and communications needs in planning for shared response
to major earthquakes. In a concurrent session within the SEDM, the
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five Partnership for Peace (PFP) members discussed sustained regional cooperation in civil protection. The PFP is a program that promotes practical security cooperation between NATO and former Warsaw Pact nations. Bulgaria introduced a proposal to establish a CMEP Council for the five PFP and three NATO nations of the SEDM.
Research, Development, and Acquisition
The reconfiguration of the Army from the Cold War force, through
Force XXI, to the Army After Next is partly a response to the technology-driven
revolution in military affairs. To fully exploit the capabilities that
digital information technologies, advanced materials, and parallel changes
in business and operational practices offer, the Army continues to invest
heavily in the development and production of new systems and the revision
of old policies.
A sample of the potential this process offers may be found in two
comparatively small, complementary programs: the Army fuel privatization/
outsourcing initiative and the procurement of alternative-fueled vehicles
under the Army energy program. In November 1998, the Army replaced
thirteen government-owned and -operated fuel facilities at Fort Bragg,
North Carolina, with two contractor-owned and-operated facilities. In
February 1999, a single privately owned and operated facility replaced
the government fuel facilities at Schofield Barracks, Hawaii. Those two
contracts will save the Army an estimated $3 million over a twenty-year
period. Seventeen other Army facilities are under consideration for this
program, which reduces government-owned infrastructure and associated
personnel costs while maintaining a vital support activity.
During FY 1999, the Army’s alternative-fueled vehicle (AFV) program,
involving energy sources such as propane, liquid natural gas, and electricity,
accounted for 32 percent of all acquired or leased general service vehicles.
Although still short of the 75 percent goal of the Energy Policy Act, the
1,365 AFVs in service decrease the Army’s thirst for petroleum products
and help meet environmental goals. In conjunction with fuel privatization,
AFVs offer the potential to significantly alter transportation on Army
facilities without requiring extensive government investment in alternative
fuel infrastructure.
But alternative fuels and environmental protection are only two aspects
of the Army’s ongoing efforts to develop and procure more effective and
efficient systems to facilitate its mission. During FY 1999, the Army
ordered the reorganization of the offices responsible for those efforts. On
18 November 1998, the vice chief of staff approved the 1 October 1999
consolidation of Army developmental and operational testing under a
single command, the preexisting Army Operational Test and Evaluation
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Command (OPTEC). That command’s name was slated to change to Army
Test and Evaluation Command when the consolidation occurred.
Army research and development did not halt to await the restructuring
scheduled for the first day of FY 2000. The OPTEC, originally formed as
an independent Army agency, pursued an extensive list of projects during
FY 1999 in cooperation with other Army agencies and civilian contractors.
Those projects were guided by the Army Development, Acquisition, and
Fielding Strategy (DAFS), a 1999 statement supporting the Army Science
and Technology Master Plan and the Army Modernization Plan. In
accordance with the DAFS, the Army is moving away from the traditional “stovepipe” model of linear research,
development, and acquisition of individual systems to a system-of-systems approach. That concept
recognizes every piece of equipment, soldier, and system as part of a larger
system for performing the Army mission. It stresses integration, cooperative
development, and component commonality. Spiral development, in which
the combat developer, materiel developer, contractor, and warfighter
work closely to advance a project from requirements, through design, to
implementation and testing, complements this system-of-systems approach
to speed the process and ensure its focus on the warfighter’s needs.
New Army systems, in accordance with the DAFS and Army practice, advance through four phases in the development, acquisition,
and fielding process. The first phase, concept exploration, marks the transition between basic research and systems development.
It consists of competitive, parallel, short-term studies to define and evaluate alternative concepts. In the program definition
and risk-reduction phase, programs are identified as specific concepts and approaches. Alternatives are assessed and risks
identified. During the engineering and manufacturing development phase, the most promising approach is translated into a
stable, interoperable, producible, supportable, and cost-effective design. Manufacturing processes are validated, and the system
’s capabilities are tested to identify necessary fixes or upgrades. In the final phase—
production, fielding/deployment, and operational support—the system achieves operational status, fulfilling mission
requirements. Remaining difficulties are identified and resolved, and systems in this phase retain
the potential for further development.
The Army’s publication Weapons Systems 1999 identifies ongoing
projects within those four phases. It also links systems with the relevant
pattern(s) of operation defined in Army Vision 2010. Those patterns provide
a template for Army development and identify the role that specific systems
will play in the overall system of systems. The patterns of operation are
these: project the force, protect the force, gain information dominance,
shape the battlespace, conduct decisive operations, and sustain the force.
Specific projects however, may be better understood in the broader mission
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categories of information dominance, force overmatch, essential research,
recapitalization, and contributing capabilities.
The Army pursued a number of projects intended to enhance
information dominance in FY 1999. Many of those programs were already
in the production, fielding/deployment, and operational support phase of
development. These included the Advanced Field Artillery Tactical Data
System, Analysis and Control Team Enclave, Army Airborne Command
and Control System, Army Key Management System, and the Digital
Topographic Support System. These systems, and those in the engineering
and manufacturing development and other phases (like the Force XXI Battle
Command Brigade-and-Below system) collect, process, and disseminate
information on the digital battlefield.
Such systems are part of the infrastructure of the Army Battle
Command System (ABCS), the overall concept for a system of systems
integrating information from various platforms and sensors. Their
continued development in FY 1999 supports the emergence of the ABCS
as an operational reality. As it nears full functionality, the ABCS will
link automation assets, communications media, and operational forces to
support the Army’s command, control, communications, and intelligence
capabilities in real time. The potential impact of such a rapid, integrated
flow of communications, enabled by information technology, is the driving
force behind the Revolution in Military Affairs.
Knowing where and how to employ force does little good if the
Army lacks the fire power and robustness to accomplish its mission. The
Army avoids this obvious pitfall by maintaining force overmatch—the
combination of lethal, mobile, and survivable weapons systems that
enables its units to seize and exploit the advantage provided by information
dominance. Most of the high-profile systems under development during
FY 1999 fell under this general category. But the dividing line between
information dominance and force overmatch is not entirely clear because
the two mission categories interact closely and frequently coexist within
the same unit or piece of equipment.
This ambiguity in mission categorization is embodied in the RAH–
66 Comanche helicopter, which remained in the program definition and
risk-reduction phase during FY 1999. The Comanche, as a stealthy armed
reconnaissance helicopter, contributes to both information dominance and
force overmatch. Its digital information suite will facilitate communications
among flight crews, Joint Surveillance and Target Attack Radar System
aircraft, and other ground-based and airborne weapons platforms and
command-and-control facilities. Advanced electro-optical sensors and
target recognition capabilities will allow the Comanche to add information
to the battlespace network. And its low radar signature and armament of
air-to-ground missiles and rockets, air-to-air missiles, and 20-mm cannon
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enable the Comanche to exploit that information on deep, precision-strike
missions as a potent ingredient in force overmatch.
The first Comanche prototype returned to the skies in late October
1998 after the installation of various improvements. The second prototype
completed its first flight test on 30 March, and both aircraft continued
to operate throughout the year. The testing proved successful enough
that the Boeing Sikorsky RAH–66 Comanche Joint Program Office
delivered a $3.1 billion proposal to the Army on 23 August. The proposal
recommended the construction of thirteen more RAH–66 helicopters for
continued Army testing and evaluation and the initiation of the engineering
and development phase of the Comanche program in early 2000.
Crusader, like Comanche, was in the program definition and risk-reduction
phase during FY 1999 as a program contributing to the Army’s
ability to overmatch an opposing force. As the premier indirect fire
support system of Force XXI, the Crusader is a notable advance over the
M109A6 Paladin and M992 ammunition supply vehicle combination it
will replace. Improvements include extending the new howitzer’s radius
of fire more than ten kilometers beyond the Paladin’s thirty-kilometer
maximum, a sustained rate of fire of ten to twelve rounds per minute
compared to the Paladin’s one round per minute sustained rate or three-minute
burst of four rounds per minute, and the ability to launch a
simultaneous impact strike of four to eight rounds with a single gun.
The new 155-mm howitzer also offers automated ammunition handling,
automatic resupply and refueling from the system’s integral support
vehicle, and a remote multi-option fuze capability, all improvements over
the older system. A Crusader’s three-man crew is one person smaller than
the Paladin’s and, as a result of the range and rate-of-fire improvements,
it commands combat power surpassing that of three of the older Paladin
artillery pieces combined.
A March 1998 in-process review determined that the Crusader program
was ready to proceed from the design stage into the construction of initial
prototypes. The prototypes were to be delivered in December 1999, but
in the FY99 Defense Authorization Act the legislature withheld funding
for the Crusader until five critical issues could be resolved. The Army
responded to those concerns in a February 1999 report that asserted the
new system would be the first American 155-mm howitzer since the First
World War that could claim superiority over other self-propelled 155-mm
systems. The Crusader, clearly a revolution in tactical artillery systems,
would fill an urgent requirement, provide critical support for the Army and
Joint Vision 2010, deliver an optimum blend of cost and performance, and
satisfy the requirements of the Force XXI campaign. With those concerns
resolved, the program continued, but it remained behind schedule for the
rest of the fiscal year.
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In addition to programs providing information dominance and force
overmatch in the near to mid-term, the Army supports essential research
and development projects seeking both incremental improvements in
existing systems and leap-ahead technologies. Careful management of the
service’s limited science and technology funding is vital to the success of
these efforts, which also seek to leverage the advances of other services,
government agencies, industry, and academia. Funding for these programs
is guided by a set of more than two hundred science and technology
objectives that establish specific, measurable advances to be achieved in
each fiscal year.
The Brilliant Antiarmor submunition (BAT) and the Tactical High-
Energy Laser (THEL), which were in the engineering and manufacturing
development stage that immediately precedes production, were among the
most mature research projects the Army pursued during FY 1999. The BAT
submunition completed production qualification and received approval
for initial production before the end of the fiscal year, while design and
testing of its first scheduled product improvement upgrade continued.
The upgrade will possess improved target acquisition capabilities, adding
millimeter-wavelength radar to the acoustic and infrared seekers of the
original BAT submunition, and will feature an enhanced warhead. The
THEL, a cooperative project of the DOD and the Israeli ministry of defense,
is intended to provide local and theater-level protection from short-range
artillery rockets. With the Space and Missile Defense Command as its
U.S. executive agent, the THEL successfully demonstrated its target
identification and tracking capabilities and achieved “first light”—the first
firing of its weapon-strength laser—during FY 1999. On 7 July, the Joint
Requirements Oversight Council approved the Joint Theater Air and Missile
Defense Mission Needs Statement, identifying the need for the capabilities
that the THEL, as an advanced-concept technology demonstration project,
promises to develop.
Such efforts to develop future systems and technologies cannot ignore
the need to adapt and improve existing Army systems to maximize their
capabilities and extend their useful operational life spans. Identifying such
potential developments is part of the Army’s research and development
strategy. Overhauling, updating, and modifying existing equipment is the
purpose of the Army’s recapitalization effort.
The Army recapitalized a number of systems during FY 1999. For
example, during the second quarter of FY 1999, managers of the high-mobility
multipurpose wheeled vehicle program completed their analysis
of alternatives, the basis of the strategy that will guide the program’s
modernization efforts through FY 2023. The product manager of the
M113 family of vehicles derived from the basic armored personnel carrier
continued to purchase upgrade kits to convert older variants of the tracked
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vehicle into new configurations, completing 230 such modifications during
the fiscal year. Full-rate production of the M109A6 model of the Paladin
self-propelled howitzer ended on 25 June, whereas the Army continued
to pursue upgrades such as the Automatic Fire-Control System XXI to
increase the weapon’s capabilities. National Guard artillery battalions in
New Mexico, South Carolina, Utah, West Virginia, and Wisconsin received
the howitzer during FY 1999 as the Army continued to upgrade the existing
M109A2/A3 Paladins to the M109A5 model.
Finally, the Army also develops and acquires capabilities that support
the patterns of operation identified in Army Vision 2010 but do not fit into
any of the clearly definable patterns of operation. Such systems fall into
the general mission category of contributing capabilities. They improve
the mobility and lethality of Army forces, enhance their survivability, or
otherwise promote their mission performance.
During FY 1999, those projects included continuing research into
the environmental restoration of Army facilities and tele-engineering, the
Army Corps of Engineers’ initiative to support deployed engineers by
providing them with the capability to teleconference with, and otherwise
draw on, the knowledge and capabilities of subject matter experts located
elsewhere. Army medical researchers continued development of the fibrin
bandage in conjunction with the American Red Cross, and contracted to the
University of Cincinnati (Ohio) the development of a means for extending
the shelf-life of blood stores. The first project will save lives by including a
clotting agent in bandages, and the second will enhance the Army’s ability
to maintain blood supplies in remote locations.
Through such research, development, and procurement programs the
Army maintains its current and future ability to fulfill its mission under the
National Military Strategy. Army logisticians manage the flow of goods and
services to the active and reserve components; provide for the maintenance
of equipment and facilities; sustain Army forces in the field; assist friendly
nations with their security and emergency response requirements; and
direct the Army’s research, development, and acquisition programs. They
provide Army personnel with the supplies and tools required to put doctrine
and training into practice.
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