OCTOBER 19, 2020 – The Army’s senior sustainer joined military and civilian leaders from across the materiel enterprise to discuss the incredibly delicate balance between maintaining Army readiness and modernization during the Association of the U.S. Army’s 2020 virtual Annual Meeting and Exposition.
Army Materiel Command’s top leader Gen. Ed Daly set the stage for an AUSA Contemporary Military Forum discussion on “Balancing Readiness and Modernization across the Sustainment Warfighting Function,” Oct. 15.
“We are in the midst of transformational change, and the Secretary and Chief’s priorities are clear — people, readiness and modernization,” Daly said. “The time is now to transform how we care for our people, our doctrine, our organizations, our training, our equipment and how we compete in order to protect our way of life.”
Daly highlighted that central to winning is the sustainment warfighting function, which provides effects from forts and factories in the Strategic Support Area to tactical points of contact worldwide.
“Sustainment enables military operations by extending our operational reach, allowing for freedom of action and prolonging endurance,” he said.
Joining Daly in the military forum was Maj. Gen. Rodney Fogg, commanding general Combined Arms Support Command; Maj. Gen. Charles Hamilton, AMC deputy chief of staff for logistics and operations; Maj. Gen. Todd Royar, commanding general Aviation and Missile Command; Maj. Gen. Chris Mohan, commanding general, 21st Theater Sustainment Command; and Dan Reilly, deputy director, support operations Army Sustainment Command.
Together, the group of Army sustainers discussed efforts to balance current tactical and strategic readiness with future modernization through the Army’s Aim Point 2035.
“To truly be successful, we must able to support the fight and sustain readiness today, which is currently at its highest state, while simultaneously developing the functional concept for sustainment that is linked to the Multi-Domain Operations concept,” Daly said about how sustainers are balancing the two requirements. “We are absolutely, unequivocally looking deep, well beyond the next terrain feature.”
The panel members provided further insight to how their commands are working to meet both of the Army’s priorities.
Hamilton highlighted how the AMC campaign plan is focused on seven lines of effort to enable both readiness and the ability to respond to a threat or aggression on short notice. His listed four efforts to central this-
- The Army requires a modernized and flexible organic industrial base that maintains capability and capacity for fielded systems, maintains pace with modernization efforts and has a planned surge capability.
- The Army must modernize sustainment in stride with maneuver units in order to support future Multi-Domain Operations.
- The force must enable the Strategic Support Area by ensuring the Facilitates Investment Plan is synchronized with emerging requirements to facilitate rapid power projection.
- The service must continue to support additive and advanced manufacturing to give units the ability to produce components at the point of need.
“We are postured to sustain readiness both now and in the future through the employment of technology, information and innovation,” Hamilton said.
An example of integrating technology, information and innovation was highlighted by Royar about AMCOM’s partnership with the Department of Defense, academia and industry to create a virtual model – or digital twin – of a UH-60L Black Hawk helicopter.
While this effort helps the Army’s sustainment of the enduring fleet, Royar said it is important to make sure sustainers are looking towards the future and ensuring they are integrated in every step of the Army’s modernization efforts.
“We know the majority of a system’s cost is after procurement, so we must integrate sustainment early and often,” said Royar about how AMCOM is working closely with the Future Vertical Lift Cross Functional Team.
At the tactical point of need, Fogg discussed how CASCOM is working to drive sustainment transformational change. He highlighted a few efforts, including shifting from bridge centric sustainment to division centric sustainment, focusing on fuel distribution and materiel management, and how to conduct mobility maintenance at echelon.
“We are working to close the most challenging gaps, as we see sustainment requirements continue to grow,” said Fogg. “We want sustainment to help commanders see and understand the battlefield better and enable decision making at the point of combat.”
Daly praised Fogg and CASCOM’s efforts and work to stay lock-step with the Army’s Training and Doctrine Command.
“They are making sure logistics continues to be an enabler and not a restriction in the battlespace going forward,” said Daly.
Story by Megan Gully
U.S. Army Materiel Command