The U.S. Army plans to gradually modify the current makeup and
distribution of pre-positioned weaponry and ammunition around the
world.
Driving these changes is the need to make pre-positioned equipment
“easier for consumption” and to make stocks more relevant
to the demands of current and future wars, said Maj. Gen. Wade H.
McManus Jr. He is the commander of the Army’s Operations Support
Command, in Rock Island, Ill.
The command stores and maintains the materiel for the Army’s
pre-positioned stocks. OSC also serves as the Defense Department’s
single manager for conventional ammunition, with responsibility
for producing, storing and demilitarizing ammunition for all military
services. OSC operates in 35 states, Puerto Rico and 14 foreign
nations.
With a $2.7 billion annual budget, OSC issues more than 2,000 contracts
a year worth about $28 billion. Of that amount, $700 million is
for ammunition procurement. The command employs approximately 200
military service members, 7,200 civilians and 8,100 contractors.
The so-called “transformation” of the Army, aimed at
becoming a lighter and more responsive force, is likely to spawn
significant changes in the way the Army pre-positions equipment
overseas, McManus told National Defense.
The introduction of precision-guided munitions, for example, will
require OSC to “simplify packaging ... and re-look at what
needs to be pre-positioned,” he said. The growing popularity
of smart bombs also is likely to result in new business practices
at OSC, McManus suggested. “We will look at what our production
base must do and [we will] come up with a new concept.”
At the core of the new strategy is the notion of “pre-positioning
in support of transformation,” said McManus. To increase the
responsiveness of military units, OSC plans to simplify the packaging
of ammunition, so it can be used on short notice.
“Our pre-positioning strategy has evolved over the years,”
especially after the Cold War, he noted.
Rather than pre-position large stocks in preparation for a large-scale
European war, OSC shifted to a strategy of “global reach,”
spreading the equipment throughout the world, on land and sea-based
locations. Supplies to equip nearly two heavy brigades currently
are afloat, on ships, McManus said. The land-based pre-positioned
stocks are in South Korea, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, Diego Garcia,
Guam, Japan, Israel, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Norway,
Luxembourg, Italy and Germany.
“To increase strategic response, we are taking the APS-2
(Army Pre-positioned Stock in Europe) and transforming it, to be
relevant the European theater,” McManus said. “Some
of the equipment that was not useful in the European theater was
transferred to other stocks.”
The ability to respond to hotspots in widely dispersed corners
of the world depends on having equipment available near the theater
of operations, he said. “We are looking at how we are using
our watercraft and [how we are] re-positioning equipment, to support
[regional commanders] CINCs.”
One stinging issue at OSC today is “ammunition readiness,”
McManus said. A paper published in February by the Association of
the U.S. Army documents shortfalls in ammunition supplies and concludes
both that the Army’s production base is inadequate and that
the service does not have enough high-quality ammunition to fight
wars and train soldiers.
“The AUSA paper is generally accurate,” McManus said.
He noted that OSC recently developed a “munitions readiness
report” that would help the service measure the adequacy of
munitions stocks for various functions. “We have used the
same logic as the Army used to calculate readiness for its units.”
The readiness reports will evaluate, for example, discrepancies
between inventory and requirements, maintenance demands and procurement
priorities, he explained. “It provides a great framework for
the Army leadership to plan programs in the acquisition world, to
more precisely apply funding.”
A draft report was briefed to top Army officials in March. The
plan, said McManus, is to merge the munitions report into the Web-based
“Army Strategic Readiness Reporting System.”
Meanwhile, the war on terrorism has produced a new mission for
OSC: to drastically tighten the security of the Army’s ammunition
plants and depots. “I’m doing things today that I never
had to do before,” said McManus. “The learning curve
is steep and the timeline is short.”