The Army's Multifunctional Logistics Units: Can They Support the Joint/Combined Warfighting Effort?

Abstract

In the late 1980's, as the budget crunch from the massive modernization effort of the first half of that decade began to take effect, the U.S. Army transitioned its active duty logistics units from single function to multifunctional units. In this process the organization of these units changed dramatically, reducing them in size drastically. At the same time the Army made the smart decision to absorb its troop reduction requirements by reducing the number of its combat divisions but keep the number of trigger-pullers in the division at the prereduction levels. What this meant to the Army's logisticians is that they would have to support the same number of combat troops with these smaller multifunctional logistics units. To permit these units to do more with less , the Army modernized the equipment that these units have to assist in their mission and it revised its doctrine to make the various echelons of logistics support mutually supporting. These units supported their respective divisions and corps well during operation Desert Storm. This paper, however, deals with the future operations that the U.S. Army is likely to participate in around the globe. Most of these are envisioned to be a form of conflict far short of the massive operation that was Desert Storm. They will be military operations that are being called Operations other-Than-War (OOTW) nearly all of which will be conducted in the joint/combined environment.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
May 14, 1994
Accession Number
ADA283442

Entities

People

  • John V. Wemlinger

Organizations

  • Naval War College

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Biomedical
  • Ground and Sea Platforms
  • Human Systems

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Active Duty
  • Agreements
  • Civil War
  • Contingency Operations (Military)
  • Environment
  • Law
  • Logistics
  • Maintenance
  • Middle East
  • Military Operations
  • Military Organizations
  • Nato
  • Security
  • Training
  • Transportation
  • United States
  • Warfare

Readers

  • Economics
  • Maritime Combat Support and Expeditionary Logistics.