The Global Logistics Command: A Strategy to Sustain the Post-War Army

: Following the end of combat operations in Afghanistan and the drawdown of U.S. forces, the Army s likely future missions will consist of small-scale combat operations in increasingly remote corners of the world and humanitarian response missions in the western hemisphere. This small-footprint operating environment, coupled with an increasingly continentally-based Army requires a new kind of logistics mission command system with ability to deploy, employ, sustain and redeploy the full spectrum of sustainment capabilities from echelons above brigade (EAB) tactical logistics soldiers to prepositioned equipment. Additionally, this system must be capable of maintaining sufficient capabilities in the United States to provision the Army in garrison, support homeland defense, and in a humanitarian crisis, provide support to relief operations in the western hemisphere. To best support this Army, the Army of 2020 and beyond, the Department must transform the Army Materiel Command (AMC) and establish a Global Logistics Command with both an operational and strategic support capabilities. This command s smaller size and focused subordinate organizations maximize the Army s leaner logistics force structure and support the Army s reduction in operational-level headquarters.