National Defense > Blog > Posts > Air Force Official: U.S. Strategy Undermined by Vulnerability of Fuel Supplies

4/13/2010

Air Force Official: U.S. Strategy Undermined by Vulnerability of Fuel Supplies
The Defense Department’s strategy for fighting future enemies is based on the notion that the U.S. military will have “access.” The assumption is that forces will be able to stage operations from foreign bases, fly in other countries’ airspace and sail in international waters.

But the strategy tends to ignore a potentially devastating weakness that could make it easier for enemies to deny the United States such access. The Achilles’ heel is this case is the military’s growing dependence on fuel supplies that are susceptible to disruption, says Oliver Fritz, the Air Force’s assistant director of strategic planning.

Fritz spoke about this issue at a seminar last month hosted by the Mitchell Institute for Airpower Studies, in Arlington, Va.

“The way fuel is supplied to bases” is a problem, he says.

Fritz says he studied how bases in U.S. Central Command are provided fuel. “It’s a pretty helter-skelter organization,” he says. “Lots of contractors, lots of overland travel. We are also flying in the fuel. Those are all nodes that can be disrupted.”

The Air Force, particularly, should harden hangars and fuel lines.

“We also need to rethink the way we consider energy in our force planning,” doctrine and weapons acquisition, says Fritz. The “energy performance” of the Defense Department in many ways has gotten worse, he says, because fuel requirements continue to increase. “So we’re more dependent on those fuel lines,” he says. One of the Air Force’s critical staging areas for access to the Pacific, the island of Guam, is a case in point. “Getting fuel to Guam is a hard and fast vulnerability. That’s no secret,” says Fritz.

Another concern for the Air Force is how to protect bases from enemy attacks. Traditionally the Army has provided security for Air Force bases but that practice may disappear, Fritz says. In Iraq and Afghanistan, the Air Force has handled its own security “as the Army’s willingness to defend our bases, for whatever reason, has not been there,” he says. “We’ve been forced to take that on ourselves. … It’s a good thing the Air Force had the adaptability to do that.”

The Air Force still expects the Army’s missile-defense units to help safeguard bases from enemy ballistic and cruise missiles. Fritz says the Air Force worries that there may not be enough Patriot anti-missile systems to protect bases in the future. “Are we making clear that this is a requirement for the future projection of military power?” he asks. “Are we vocal enough? This is not just protecting the Air Force, but a node for joint power projection."

Blue-suiters also worry that the Air Force will see resources dwindle as budgets get tighter. The service has lost political clout in recent years with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan being primarily ground based. Defense Secretary Robert Gates scolded the Air Force's top officials two years ago for not focusing on current conflicts, instead of planning for hypothetical future wars. He fired the Air Force’s senior civilian and military leaders for publicly opposing Gates’ decision to end production of the advanced F-22 fighter.

Bruised from these confrontations, Air Force officials are keeping a low profile, but some fret that leaders should be more actively promoting the value of air power in U.S. military operations.

“As airmen, we need to be able to talk about air power and to express what it does, its importance. I’m not sure as airmen we’re doing as good of a job as we should be doing,” says Air Force Lt. Col. Kelly M. Martin, a senior military fellow at the Center for a New American Security, in Washington, D.C.

Pentagon strategists talk about the “number of wings” the Air Force should have, but not many people know what that means, Martin says at the Mitchell Institute event. Members of Congress, especially, need to be better educated about this issue, she says. “As service members, we need to better articulate what we bring in terms of combat power.”
Posted at 8:36 AM by Sandra Erwin | Permalink | Email this Post | Comments (1)

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Re: Air Force Official: U.S. Strategy Undermined by Vulnerability of Fuel Supplies

Great article.  Useful information.  Please visit my military surplus stores website for all your supplies.  http://bestmilitarysurplus.com
Craig Kent at 7/2/2010 3:32 PM

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