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Global Reach: Revolutionizing the Use of Commercial Vessels and Intermodal Systems for Military Sealift, 1990-2012
Global Reach: Revolutionizing the Use of Commercial Vessels and Intermodal Systems for Military Sealift, 1990-2012
Global Reach: Revolutionizing the Use of Commercial Vessels and Intermodal Systems for Military Sealift, 1990-2012
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Global Reach: Revolutionizing the Use of Commercial Vessels and Intermodal Systems for Military Sealift, 1990-2012

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Since the 1980s, strategic sealift has been formally designated as a U.S. Navy mission. With over ninety percent of all military equipment and supplies required to support U.S. military forces in combat being delivered by sea, and as globalized interests and risks continue to spread, this mission is vital to the country’s economic and national security. Despite its necessity, sealift is rarely discussed as anything other than an operations adjunct and must be carried out in an environment of unprecedented fiscal constraints. Global Reach provides a unique examination into the development and implementation of more than a century of U.S. national defense sealift policy. Presenting a comprehensive history on the evolution of sealift from the Spanish American War (1898) to Operation Enduring Freedom/Iraqi Freedom (2002–12), Herberger, Gaulden, and Marshall reflect on what has and has not worked in that time from both a legal and operational perspective. As international demands grow and change, so too must the sealift policies that are directly tied to how the nation will address them. With its thorough history and cogent analysis, Global Reach provides the context necessary to understand this complex, important topic, but also lays out a roadmap for how the U.S. can continue to meet and respond to the increasing challenges of the years to come.
LanguageEnglish
Release dateJan 15, 2016
ISBN9781612518565
Global Reach: Revolutionizing the Use of Commercial Vessels and Intermodal Systems for Military Sealift, 1990-2012

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    Global Reach - Ken Gaulden

    Naval Institute Press

    291 Wood Road

    Annapolis, MD 21402

    © 2015 by Global Reach Sealift, LLC

    All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

    Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

    Herberger, Albert Joseph, 1931–

    Global reach: revolutionizing the use of commercial vessels and intermodal systems for military sealift, 1990–2012 / Vice Adm. A. J. Herberger, USN (Ret.), Kenneth C. Gaulden, and Cdr. Rolf Marshall, USN (Ret.).

    pages cm

    Includes index.

    ISBN 978-1-61251-856-5 (ebook)

    1.Military sealift—United States—History—20th century. 2.Military sealift—United States—History—21st century. 3.Merchant marine—United States—History—20th century. 4.Merchant marine—United States—History—21st century.I. Gaulden, Kenneth C. II. Marshall, Rolf. III. Title. IV. Title: Revolutionizing the use of commercial vessels and intermodal systems for military sealift, 1990–2012.

    VC533.H47 2015

    359.9’850973—dc23

    2015025446

    Print editions meet the requirements of ANSI/NISO z39.48-1992 (Permanence of Paper).

    232221201918171615987654321

    First printing

    This book is dedicated to the men and women of the U.S. military and the U.S. merchant marines both past and present whose services since this nation was founded have ensured its strength and freedom and will continue to do so in the future.

    Contents

    Introduction

    Part I. The Past as Prologue

    1Ships Taken Up from Trade

    Part II. The Era of Government Fleets

    2The Spanish–American War and World War I: The Shipping and Merchant Marine Acts of 1916 and 1920

    3The Merchant Marine Act of 1936

    4World War II

    5Strategic Sealift in the Post–World War II Era

    6Vietnam (1960–1975)

    7The Reagan Era

    8National Security Sealift Policy (1989)

    Part III. The 1990s: A Decade of Change

    9The Persian Gulf Conflict (1990–1991)

    10Maritime Reform, 1992

    11Modernizing the U.S. Government–Owned Organic Sealift

    12The Maritime Security Act of 1996

    13The Transformation of the U.S. Commercial Shipping Industry

    14The Maritime Security Act of 2003

    Part IV. Transition to Increased Reliance on the Commercial Fleet

    15Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom (2002–2011)

    16Meeting the Challenges of Sustaining Forces in Afghanistan

    17Supporting the U.S. Military Worldwide

    Part V. The Strategic Sealift Force

    18The U.S. Government–Owned and –Controlled Fleet

    19The U.S.-Flag Commercial Fleet: Maritime Security Fleet

    20The U.S.-Flag Commercial Fleet: Foreign Trading (Non-MSP)

    21The U.S.-Flag Commercial Fleet: Domestic Fleet

    22The Increasing Role of the Commercial Fleet in Sealift Surge Operations

    23Enhancing the Role of the Commercial Industry in Military Sealift

    Part VI. The Benefits of Using Commercial Vessels and Intermodal Systems for Military Sealift

    24Maximizing Sealift Capability, Operational Readiness, and Reliability

    25Providing Immediate Expansion of U.S. Sealift Capability

    26Sustaining the Manpower Pool

    27Cost-Effective Means of Acquiring Sealift Capability

    Part VII. Maintaining Military and Commercial Viability

    28The 2006 Amendments to the Maritime Security Act of 2003

    29Extending the 2003 Maritime Security Act to 2025

    30The Four Pillars of Commercial Sealift Capability

    31Assessing National Defense Sealift Policies

    Conclusion

    Appendices

    1Glossary

    2Summary of All CENTCOM OEF/OIF Cargo (2002–2011)

    3Combined CENTCOM OEF/OIF Cargo by Phase (2002–2011)

    4CENTCOM OEF/OIF Container Cargo by Phase (2002–2011)

    5CENTCOM OEF/OIF Breakbulk/Roll-on/Roll-off Cargo by Phase (2002–2011)

    6Combined CENTCOM OEF/OIF Cargo (2002–2005)

    7CENTCOM OEF/OIF Container Cargo (2002–2005)

    8CENTCOM OEF/OIF Breakbulk/Roll-on/Roll-off Cargo (2002–2005)

    9Combined CENTCOM OEF/OIF Cargo (2006–2008)

    10CENTCOM OEF/OIF Container Cargo (2006–2008)

    11CENTCOM OEF/OIF Breakbulk/Roll-on/Roll-off Cargo (2006–2008)

    12Combined CENTCOM OEF/OIF Cargo (2009–2011)

    13CENTCOM OEF/OIF Container Cargo (2009–2011)

    14CENTCOM OEF/OIF Breakbulk/Roll-on/Roll-off Cargo (2009–2011)

    15CENTCOM Cargo by Routing (July–December 2011)

    16CENTCOM OEF/OIF Cargo Retrograde (2010–2011)

    17EUCOM Cargo Deployed/Retrograde (July–December 2011)

    18Total PACOM Cargo (July–December 2011)

    19PACOM Cargo Deployed (July–December 2011)

    20PACOM Cargo Retrograde (July–December 2011)

    21CENTCOM, EUCOM, and PACOM Cargoes (July–December 2011)

    22Enhancing the Roles of Commercial Vessels and Intermodal Systems in Military Sealift

    23VISA Dry Cargo Ships/Capacity Distribution by Participating Carrier Category

    24ODS Foreign-Flag Charters by Flag State and Vessel Type

    25The Wilson-Weeks Agreement

    26National Security Directive 28 on Sealift

    27Benefit-to-Cost Analysis

    28Active U.S.-Flag Vessels in Agricultural Preference Trades

    29Proposed Ready Reserve Force Drawdown

    Notes

    Index

    Introduction

    Since its birth as a republic the United States has subscribed to the belief that a strong merchant marine is vital to preserving U.S. national and economic security interests. Indeed, one of the first bills enacted in 1789 under the newly adopted Constitution was "An Act for Registering and Clearing Vessels, Regulating the Coastwise Trade, and for Other Purposes . " ¹ The statutory objectives of U.S. maritime policy, as stated in the Jones Act, reflect that same belief today: It is necessary for the national defense [national security] and the development of the domestic and foreign commerce [economic security] of the United States that the United States have a merchant marine. ²

    Over the course of the more than two centuries that have elapsed since the founding, the choice of maritime policies to best achieve that goal has been debated. From 1789 forward, opinions have varied greatly as to (1) what characteristics should define the U.S.-flag merchant marine, (2) what makes it strong, and (3) how that merchant fleet contributes to U.S. national and economic security.

    The United States grew up on the water and remains a maritime nation to this day.

    On the Water, Smithsonian National Museum of American History Maritime Exhibition (2013)

    U.S. Maritime Policy and the U.S.-Flag Merchant Fleet

    U.S. maritime policy and the U.S.-flag commercial merchant fleet are commonly spoken of as if they are simple entities. In fact, both are complex entities that comprise diverse and dissimilar parts.

    U.S. MARITIME POLICY

    The rationale for a U.S. merchant marine expressed in the Jones Act highlights the two sides to U.S. maritime policy: national security and economic security. Although the two are interrelated—national security requiring a strong economy and economic security requiring a strong national defense—they should be viewed as separate and distinct for purposes of understanding U.S. maritime policy and the roles the U.S.-flag commercial fleet plays in meeting those policy objectives (figure 1).

    FIGURE 1. U.S. National and Economic Security

    FIGURE 1. U.S. National...

    Section 50101 of title 46, U.S. Code, defines those parallel objectives in more specific terms:

    (a)Objectives. It is necessary for the national defense and the development of the domestic and foreign commerce of the United States that the United States have a merchant marine

    (1)sufficient to carry the waterborne domestic commerce and a substantial part of the waterborne export and import foreign commerce of the United States and to provide shipping service essential for maintaining the flow of the waterborne domestic and foreign commerce at all times; [and]

    (2)capable of serving as a naval and military auxiliary in time of war or national emergency.³

    This statement of objectives implicitly sets forth both the standards against which the present-day merchant fleet can be evaluated—is it strong in each of these respects?—and the criteria with which proposed changes to U.S. maritime policies and practices should be compared—would the proposed change contribute to that strength in any respect?

    THE U.S.-FLAG COMMERCIAL FLEET

    The U.S.-flag commercial fleet contributes to U.S. economic security by providing the domestic and international economic shipping required to keep the U.S. economy running. At the same time, the commercial fleet contributes to national security by providing national defense sealift capability—historically its role as a naval auxiliary—and, to a lesser extent, by operating U.S. government–owned vessels performing military missions other than sealift (e.g., afloat prepositioning and oceanographic research and surveillance), by helping to sustain the U.S. national shipbuilding and repair industrial base, and by providing the manpower pool required to crew U.S. government–owned sealift vessels activated from reserve status.

    Although our analyses in this book focus primarily on the national security role of the U.S.-flag commercial fleet, the fleet’s economic and national security roles are in many respects interrelated. For example, a segment of the commercial fleet such as the domestic fleet whose principal role is contributing to America’s economic security by providing domestic transportation services at the same time plays a significant role in national security in the broader sense.

    Contributions to National Security

    The contribution of the U.S.-flag commercial fleet to national security is similarly complex. While the term naval auxiliary as it appears in the formal statement of U.S. maritime policy may be somewhat dated, from the early years of the twentieth century to the present the contribution of the U.S.-flag commercial fleet in its role as a naval auxiliary has evolved to provide the lift capability required to deploy and sustain U.S. and allied military forces engaged in protecting U.S. national interests worldwide in peacetime as well as in times of war or contingencies. The commercial vessels employed may at times have been truly naval auxiliaries in the sense that they were mobilized for wartime service under U.S. military control and provided direct support to the U.S. Navy’s battle forces. At other times, however, the vessels performing that role were privately owned U.S.-flag commercial vessels operating either under voluntary charter to the government or in active commercial service.

    Important as the naval auxiliary role of the U.S.-flag commercial merchant marine may be, the national security role of the fleet as a whole is much broader, including such essential functions as helping to maintain the national shipbuilding and repair industrial base that is vital to America’s ability to build and maintain a navy second to none in the world and providing skilled and experienced seafarers to activate and crew government-owned sealift assets maintained in reserve or reduced operating status.

    Characteristics of the U.S.-Flag Commercial Fleet

    Just as its contributions to national security are multifaceted, so too is the U.S.-flag commercial merchant fleet itself, which consists of numerous distinct components based on the trades in which they are employed. These components include the U.S.-flag fleet in the foreign trades, of which vessels enrolled in the Maritime Security Fleet (MSF) and those operating in foreign trade outside the MSF form distinct subparts; and the U.S.-flag fleet in the domestic trades, of which oceangoing vessels in the noncontiguous and coastwise trades, vessels employed on inland waterways and rivers, and vessels plying the Great Lakes form separate subsets. These distinctions are important when considering the roles the U.S.-flag commercial fleet plays in supporting U.S. national and economic security because, as the chapters that follow illustrate, different elements of the fleet contribute in different ways, and no single element contributes in every respect.

    Maritime policy further influences the U.S.-flag commercial merchant fleet by defining the characteristics of each element of that fleet, including the application of U.S. laws governing vessel ownership and operation based on the trades in which employed. For example, for more than a century following the 1789 act referred to above, it was generally believed that a strong U.S.-flag privately owned commercial merchant marine must be U.S. built, wholly U.S. citizen owned, and U.S. citizen crewed. Today only one of those factors remains: the U.S.-flag commercial fleet still has U.S. citizen crews, with only a few exceptions: up to 25 percent of the unlicensed crew may be aliens admitted for permanent residence, and the hotel staffs on large oceangoing passenger vessels need not be entirely composed of U.S. citizens.

    U.S. National Defense Sealift Policy

    This book describes and analyzes the role of the U.S.-flag commercial merchant marine in providing sealift to deploy and sustain U.S. forces worldwide in support of U.S. national security, and the formulation of U.S. national defense sealift policy—how the United States has acquired that sealift capability. It focuses almost exclusively on the ocean transportation of U.S. military dry defense cargoes (e.g., equipment, munitions, supplies of all types, and construction materials) as opposed to liquid refined petroleum products. The latter are equally vital to the overall defense mission, of course, but the scope of that side of the logistics mission is such that it would require a separate book to address in requisite detail.

    FACTORS INFLUENCING SEALIFT POLICY

    Like the witches’ brew in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, national defense sealift sourcing strategy at any point in time is the product of the interaction of convergent forces. They include (1) the government’s maritime policies and its capability to implement those policies given existing resources, constraints, and political will; (2) the military’s requirements for lift capability, capacity, and global reach; and (3) the prevailing state of the commercial industry’s technologies (e.g., containerization) and economics (e.g., globalization) (figure 2).

    Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

    —William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act 4, scene 1, 10–11

    None of these forces is dominant, and a change in any one can force, and at some point in our history has forced, changes in sourcing strategies. This interplay of forces in the formulation of U.S. national defense sealift strategy will be a recurring theme in this history.

    FIGURE 2. Derivation of U.S. National Defense Sealift Strategy

    FIGURE 2. Derivation...

    The Evolution of U.S. National Defense Sealift Policy

    Over the last century the United States has tried virtually every option or combination of options to acquire the sealift resources necessary to fulfill the naval auxiliary aspect of national security sealift, leaning at one time toward a government-owned and -controlled sealift capability and at other times trying more commercial options.

    There are four basic options for sourcing national defense sealift, each of which is discussed in greater detail in the chapters that follow:

    U.S. government–owned—U.S.-flag vessels owned by the U.S. government but may be operated by U.S. commercial operators

    U.S.-flag commercial charters—U.S.-flag vessels owned and operated by U.S.-based commercial carriers chartered by the U.S. government for defense cargoes

    U.S.-flag commercial in commercial service—U.S.-flag vessels owned and operated by U.S.-based commercial carriers simultaneously serving commercial and military customers

    Foreign-flag shipping—generally, foreign-flag vessels chartered from commercial owner/operators based overseas.

    Figure 3 tracks the evolution of U.S. national defense sealift sourcing strategies over eight conflict scenarios from the 1898 Spanish–American War through Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom (OEF/OIF) in 2012, depicting the share of sealift each of the four options contributed.⁴ Most striking in this depiction is the incredible expansion of the role played by the U.S.-flag commercial fleet—rising from being virtually incapable of supporting the U.S. military during the Spanish–American War to providing more than 95 percent of the lift capability for OIF/OEF from 2009 onward, largely as a result of the ability of the U.S. military to effectively utilize the capabilities of U.S.-flag commercial vessels operating in regular commercial liner services post-2000.

    FIGURE 3. Sourcing U.S. Sealift 1900–2015

    (Data from chapters 2, 4, 6, 9, 15)

    FIGURE 3. Sourcing...

    As U.S. sealift sourcing strategies have evolved over the last fifty years, the United States also has experienced dramatic changes in the nature and composition of the commercial industry from which required sealift resources were acquired. Over that time it has transitioned from almost complete reliance on U.S. government–owned or –controlled sealift assets to the use of commercial resources, which in turn have transitioned from being provided almost entirely by U.S.-based, U.S. citizen majority–owned commercial carriers to almost entirely U.S.-based carriers linked to major international carriers.

    MILESTONES IN THE EVOLUTION OF SOURCING STRATEGIES

    Key administrative and legislative milestones in the evolution of the role of the U.S.-flag commercial merchant fleet in U.S. national defense sealift policy include the following:

    1904Requirement that all supplies for U.S. military be transported by vessels of the United States

    1912Elimination of the U.S. build requirement for U.S.-flag vessels in the foreign trades

    1920Merchant Marine Act formalized U.S. maritime policy objectives and required U.S. documentation, construction, and ownership for vessels in the domestic trades

    1936Merchant Marine Act adopted direct subsidies as the primary means by which to sustain a U.S.-flag merchant fleet in the foreign trades

    1954Wilson-Weeks Agreement established commercial first, liner first as U.S. policy for acquiring sealift capability

    1989National Security Directive 28 formally adopted the Wilson-Weeks principle of relying first on the U.S. commercial fleet for sealift

    1996Maritime Security Act established a Maritime Security Fleet (MSF) of forty-seven vessels and provided the operating flexibility for enrolled vessels essential to competing in the foreign trades

    2003Maritime Security Act expanded the MSF to sixty vessels and increased roll-on/roll-off vessel capacity desired by the U.S. military

    2009Maritime Security Act authorization extended ten years, from September 30, 2015, to September 30, 2025

    Telling the U.S. Sealift Story

    This book traces U.S. national defense sealift policy over the past century and the eight conflicts during which the U.S.-flag commercial merchant fleet was called up to deploy and sustain U.S. forces in combat overseas. Part 1 offers a brief history and description of the practice of taking up commercial vessels from trade to serve the military, long a mainstay of U.S. national defense sealift policy. Part 2 tracks the evolution of those policies from the Spanish–American War in 1898 through the Vietnam era, leading to the promulgation of a national security sealift policy in 1989. Of particular interest are the times when the experiences of the past were used to advantage as a new conflict arose versus the times in which they were forgotten or ignored. Part 3 opens with the 1990–91 Persian Gulf conflict, which exposed the need to reassess existing sealift policies, and then follows the efforts over the next decade to address this need for change. Part 4 documents the results of that reassessment and the role the commercial fleet played in the context of OEF/OIF in 2002–12.

    Based on the OEF/OIF experiences during that period, part 5 examines in greater depth the performance of each of the elements of the U.S. sealift force, both government and commercial, focusing on its effectiveness in meeting the needs of the U.S. military during those operations and the prognosis for its future role. Part 6 details the many benefits of the commercial option, including the use of vessels in regular commercial service, to the military and the U.S. taxpayer. Part 7 looks to the future and the challenges that must be met to ensure the continued availability of the sealift capabilities developed during OEF/OIF to meet the future needs of the U.S. military.

    Woven into the narrative are five subtexts, each of which enhances and adds depth to the story of how U.S. sealift policy reached the point where it is today and why:

    1.The capability of the U.S.-flag commercial fleet itself to meet the needs of the U.S. military in each of those conflicts (chapters 2, 4–6, 9, and 15–17)

    2.The administrative and legislative milestones that produced those capabilities (chapters 2, 3, 5–8, 10, 12, 14, 28, and 29)

    3.In-depth analyses of the performance of each of the several components of the U.S. sealift force, including U.S. government–owned or –controlled components, in those conflicts and the state of each today (chapters 11, 13, and 18–23)

    4.The benefits of the commercial option for sourcing sealift capabilities (chapters 24–27)

    5.Applying the lessons learned through this process to the challenges of sustaining those capabilities to meet the future needs of the U.S. military for sealift (chapters 30–32).

    This book tells the story of how the United States achieved the goal of meeting the military’s need for commercially sourced sealift by developing a robust, commercially based sealift capability in which the costly public option is kept to the minimum necessary to meet military needs in an emergency and in which the great majority of its requirements are met by U.S.-flag commercial vessels operating in commercial liner services. By 2009, with Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom in Iraq and Afghanistan in full swing, U.S.-flag vessels in commercial services were transporting more than 96 percent of all equipment and supplies required by the U.S. military. By forging a partnership between the U.S.-flag carriers, the maritime unions, and the U.S. military, and capitalizing on the capabilities of the U.S.-flag commercial fleet in international commercial services and the changed nature of the maritime industry generally both here and abroad, the United States revolutionized its national sealift strategy and capability. This is the story of that revolution.

    Part I

    The Past as Prologue

    From time immemorial nations have faced the challenge of carrying the fight to an enemy (or a territory) on a planet whose surface is 75 percent covered by water when that enemy (or territory) could not be reached by land. The challenge became even greater as armies required more and more equipment and supplies and could no longer expect to live off the land. Nor need the distance be great. The English Channel is only twenty miles wide, and yet only Julius Caesar and his legions in 55–54 BC and William the Conqueror and his Norman knights in 1066 have crossed it successfully. The much more powerful Wehrmacht failed to reach England in 1940 when opposed by air and naval forces.

    For several millennia the solution has been to go by sea. How does a nation acquire (source) the shipping (sealift) capability to do that? Should the vessels be (1) owned by the sovereign and operated as part of its military, (2) owned by the sovereign but maintained in reserve until needed, or (3) obtained from a privately owned commercial fleet either by using commercial vessels taken up from trade to serve the sovereign or using vessels in commercial trade to carry military as well as commercial cargoes? The third, commercial option sounds good in theory, but it works only if the nation possesses a merchant fleet that is both commercially viable and militarily useful. If not commercially viable, it would not survive economic competition in the international trades, and if not militarily useful, it would be of no help to a military seeking to deploy and support armed forces in distant lands.

    The rise and fall of sea power and the wealth of nations have always been linked with commercial and military command of the sea, with navies growing as needed to protect commercial trading fleets.¹ Not coincidentally, those commercial fleets also provided a ready source of ships and seafarers on which the military could draw to deploy its forces—not always with the shipowners’ willing consent—and, as it became increasingly difficult for armies to live off the land, the equipment and supplies required to sustain them in combat.

    1

    Ships Taken Up from Trade

    The origin of the acronym STUFT (Ships Taken Up From Trade) to refer to the practice of taking up privately owned ships from commercial trade for military service may be lost in time, but the practice has existed for centuries as a means by which a nation whose military lacks the inherent capability to deploy and sustain its forces over long distances can acquire the sealift capacity necessary to project and protect its national interests. It has endured in some respects as a principle of national defense sealift policy in the United States and worldwide for more than two hundred years.

    Most recently the term was popularized in connection with the 1982 Falklands War between the United Kingdom and Argentina.¹ To deploy and sustain its military forces in the distant Falkland Islands following their seizure by Argentina, the United Kingdom mobilized and deployed a force of fifty vessels drawn from its commercial merchant marine. These vessels performed such diverse functions as transport of British troops to the Falklands and Argentine prisoners of war on return voyages, amphibious and vertical assault, towing and salvage, hospital care for wounded, shore support for deployed forces, helicopter and vertical takeoff and landing fixed-wing aircraft transport, and supply of fuel and water to forces ashore and at sea.²

    Privately owned commercial vessels time-chartered by the U.S. military today are technically STUFT. The option of taking up ships from commercial trade appeals to sealift planners because it appears to be potentially less costly than maintaining a government-owned fleet or paying retention subsidies to commercial vessels, and to offer more control than relying on vessels in commercial service for military cargoes. But the seductive option may not always be the best option!

    Factors Influencing the Utility of STUFT as a Sealift Sourcing Strategy

    A number of factors influence the utility of STUFT for military service as a national defense sealift policy including: (1) the existence of a national-flag commercial fleet, (2) the question of whether the taking up is on a voluntary or a compulsory basis, (3) the cost to the government, (4) the availability of national defense features in the available commercial vessels, (5) the risk of loss or damage to the shipowner, and (6) the nature and composition of the commercial fleet itself.

    Cunard containership...

    Cunard containership Atlantic Conveyor en route to Falkland Islands with RFA Oiler. (Imperial War Museums UK FKD 161)

    EXISTENCE OF A NATIONAL-FLAG COMMERCIAL FLEET

    The existence of an adequately sized national-flag commercial fleet from which vessels may be taken up for military service is the indispensable and essential condition for a STUFT-based sealift sourcing strategy. For example, during the Spanish–American War (1898) and both world wars, the United States found itself with a national-flag commercial fleet too small to fulfill the military’s requirements and had to rely on foreign vessels under voluntary charters or massive government merchant shipbuilding programs (see chapters 2 and 4). The more recent expansion of the PRC-owned China Ocean Shipping Company (COSCO) to include a broad range of militarily useful merchant vessels may have been tailored to fill this role for the Chinese military. According to a report issued by the U.S. House of Representatives Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare, although presented as a commercial entity, COSCO is actually an arm of the Chinese military.³

    Conversely, requisitioning non-national-flag commercial vessels for military sealift is possible only under very restricted circumstances. Such vessels may be ships of a belligerent that have taken refuge in national ports or have been seized on the high seas, or ships used under special arrangements such as the effective U.S. control (EUSC) fleet (see chapter 13).

    COMPULSORY OR VOLUNTARY

    In practice, STUFT may be voluntary (commercial carriers offering vessels for military time or voyage charters) or compulsory (e.g., the mobilization of commercial fleets to meet wartime demands as occurred in World War I and World War II). U.S. law authorizes the requisitioning of U.S.-flag or U.S.-owned vessel: for government services During a national emergency declared by Presidential proclamation, or a period for which the President has proclaimed that the security of the national defense makes it advisable, the Secretary of Transportation may requisition or purchase, or requisition or charter the use of, a vessel owned by citizens of the United States, a documented vessel, or a vessel under construction in the United States.

    STUFT provides the greatest certainty from the government’s perspective if implemented on a mandatory basis as under the U.S. law cited above—the king’s sword being more persuasive than the king’s gold—but presents the greatest economic risk for the shipowner. Even if the term of government service passes without incident, a shipowner may lose commercial customers to competing shipping lines during a vessel’s period of government service. The other problem is that requisitioned vessels, particularly those that have been operating under foreign flags, may come without crews and may be located far from U.S. load ports when needed.

    Implementing STUFT on a voluntary basis is preferable from the perspective of the commercial shipowners/operators because the economic decision remains in their hands. But voluntary STUFT works only under circumstances in which there is excess capacity in the commercial fleet either overall (e.g., a dock strike on the U.S. East Coast freed up commercial vessels for Vietnam sealift), for the type of vessel being sought (e.g., increased containerization in the late 1960s and early 1970s made commercially obsolete breakbulk vessels available for Vietnam sealift), or for that shipowner/operator in particular. Voluntary STUFT can at times benefit a shipowner by providing employment for excess tonnage no longer commercially viable. For example, during the early phases of OIF, TOTE, a U.S. domestic operator of vehicle carriers between the Pacific Northwest and Alaska, was able to charter to the government an older roll-on/roll-off vessel that had been replaced in commercial services by TOTE’s newly constructed Orca-class roll-on/roll-off vessels. The downside of voluntary STUFT from the government’s perspective, however, is that shipowners as a rule do not offer their newest, most commercially valuable vessels for military charter.

    Further, few commercial operators would voluntarily offer for government charter a vessel that is fully employed in commercial services. This issue of commercial/economic withholds arose in response to the U.S. government’s request for increased commercial charters during the Vietnam War (chapter 6) and again during the Persian Gulf conflict (chapter 9), when objections raised against requisitioning under the Sealift Readiness Program (SRP) led to the termination of that program by the Maritime Security Acts of 1996 and 2003 (chapters 12 and 14).

    COST

    Whether implemented on a mandatory or a voluntary basis, STUFT as a strategy for sourcing commercial sealift resources for military use appeals to the government because it avoids both the up-front acquisition costs of building or purchasing vessels for sealift and the ongoing costs of maintaining those vessels when not actively employed in the sealift mission. The cost benefit fades rapidly, however, when some form of retention subsidy is required to ensure the continued existence of a national-flag fleet from which vessels may be requisitioned or voluntarily offered for charter (chapter 3).

    NATIONAL DEFENSE FEATURES

    STUFT works best if subscribed to on a long-term basis that allows for national defense features to be incorporated into vessel designs and new construction; for example, strengthened ramps and decks on vehicle carriers to allow use for heavier military equipment or, as with the Queen Elizabeth II during the Falklands War, the incorporation of fixtures permitting the rapid installation of troop berthing (six bunks) into passenger staterooms. The United States has such a program in that monies from its National Defense Sealift Fund (NDSF) may be used for the installation and maintenance of defense features for national defense purposes on privately owned and operated vessels that are constructed in the United States and documented under the laws of the United States.

    RISK OF LOSS OR DAMAGE

    As Britain’s employment of privately owned vessels from commercial trades during the Falklands conflict graphically demonstrated, the viability of STUFT as a sourcing strategy for sealift has to take into account the risk of loss or substantial damage to the vessels. Commercial vessels employed in military sealift may even be exposed to hostile action resulting in the loss of the vessel. Similarly, military service can simply be hard on a commercial vessel employed in this manner, resulting in the need for extensive postemployment shipyard repairs and refurnishing.

    P&O passenger liner...

    P&O passenger liner SS Uganda taken up from cruise service and converted into a hospital ship by Royal Navy Dockyard in Gibraltar for service in the Falklands War. (Imperial War Museum UK FKD 796)

    Cunard containership...

    Cunard containership Atlantic Conveyor sinking following an attack by Argentinian aircraft. (Imperial War Museum UK FKD 217)

    P&O passenger...

    P&O passenger liner Canberra during the transfer of 5 Infantry Brigade from the Cunard liner Queen Elizabeth II at South Georgia; the effects of the South Atlantic/Falklands weather on the Canberra are clearly visible (1982). (Imperial War Museum UK FKD 340)

    The Changing Commercial Shipping Industry

    Ultimately, STUFT will likely fail as a long-term solution for sourcing commercial resources for national defense sealift as a result of changes in the commercial industry from which STUFT resources are drawn. STUFT works best with vessel types that operate efficiently without extensive pierside facilities—breakbulk, roll-on/roll-off, and heavy lift. For the first seventy-five years of the twentieth century, a commercial fleet comprised almost entirely of breakbulk vessels provided the ideal environment for STUFT to succeed—commercial fleets contained thousands of such vessels, often in excess of commercial needs. The post-1970s rise of containerization within the commercial industry replaced those fleets with modern containerships that are faster, larger, and more commercially efficient, but which operate most efficiently in fixed liner services and require increasingly more complex intermodal facilities for loading and discharging cargo. How to best source commercial sealift from this changed industry ultimately has proved a challenge to U.S. military transportation planners.

    Part II

    The Era of Government Fleets

    During the Spanish–American War (1898), the United States for the first time faced the challenge of transporting and supplying large numbers of troops over great distances. To obtain the necessary lift the U.S. military relied on U.S.- and foreign-flag vessels taken up from commercial trade by charter or purchase.

    With the outbreak of World War I in Europe, the United States realized that taking up ships from commercial service could meet only a part of the challenge of transporting military equipment and supplies to major conflicts overseas, even with the assistance of such British commercial vessels as could be spared from meeting that country’s own needs, military and civilian. This change in approach from almost total reliance on commercial vessels for sealift to the need for large numbers of both commercial and government-owned vessels represented the first major shift in U.S. sealift strategy and led to the massive government shipbuilding programs that accompanied World War I and World War II. The result was an era in which large fleets of U.S. government–owned cargo vessels, tankers, and troop transports dominated U.S. strategic sealift, although vessels activated from the reserve fleet constituted an ever smaller share of the government’s sealift force (table 1). While the role of U.S. government–owned sealift increased with the OIF surge, that increase reflected the improved lift capability of the U.S. Navy’s sealift assets resulting from the modernization efforts undertaken in the 1990s rather than a return to the earlier role played by the reserve fleets.

    TABLE 1. Decreased Reliance on Reserve Fleets

    TABLE 1. Decreased...

    Sources: See chapters 5, 6, 9, and 15.

    The era of government fleets lasted almost seventy-five years, although from the early 1970s onward the role of government-owned sealift has declined gradually, reaching its earlier levels only during the OIF initial surge. The resulting shift in U.S. sealift sourcing priorities from government to commercial was signaled in 1989 with the promulgation of a national security sealift policy by President George H. W. Bush that embodied the commercial first principles first set down by the 1954 Wilson-Weeks Agreement.

    2

    The Spanish–American War and World War I

    The Shipping and Merchant Marine Acts of 1916 and 1920

    During the early years of the republic, America’s wars were mostly home-grown affairs. To the extent necessary for the ocean transportation of troops, equipment, and supplies, the United States relied primarily on commercial vessels taken up from domestic trades. With the Spanish–American War (1898), the United States for the first time faced the challenge of transporting and supplying large numbers of troops over great distances. When the U.S. commercial merchant marine proved insufficient for the task, the United States had to rely on foreign charters, largely British, and purchased foreign vessels for the sealift mission.

    The outbreak of World War I in Europe brought with it the realization in the United States that taking up U.S.-flag vessels from commercial trades could meet only a small part of the challenge of transporting military equipment and supplies to major conflicts overseas, even with the assistance of British commercial vessels. This change in approach from almost total reliance on commercial vessels for sealift to the need for large numbers of both commercial and government-owned vessels represented the first major shift in U.S. sealift strategy and led to the massive government shipbuilding programs that accompanied both world wars.

    The Spanish–American War

    Although John Hay, the U.S. ambassador to Great Britain at the time, characterized the conflict as a splendid little war, the performance of U.S. military and commercial sealift during the Spanish–American War of 1898 was somewhat less than splendid. The U.S. military’s only previous large-scale ocean movement had been the Vera Cruz expedition during the Mexican War in 1847, but that, as in the Civil War that followed, had been largely a coastwise movement employing vessels drawn from the U.S.-flag coastal trading fleet in the Gulf of Mexico and, with a force of just under nine thousand men, was on a significantly smaller scale.¹ With the 1898 expeditions to Cuba and the Philippines, the U.S. military faced the entirely new challenges of projecting military force across long distances, including the transportation of large forces and their equipment and supplies great distances over large bodies of water—challenges that would come to define American military power projection during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.²

    SOURCING SEALIFT FOR CUBA AND THE PHILIPPINES

    Faced with the challenge of sourcing adequate sealift for the Cuba and Philippine expeditions, the U.S. military discovered that its need for U.S.-flag sealift capability collided head-on with existing U.S. maritime policy. Only U.S.-built vessels were eligible for documentation under the U.S. flag, but the changed technologies and economics of the shipping industry in the foreign trades as steam and steel replaced wind and wood for vessels in those trades, combined with the lower costs of foreign construction, meant that much of the U.S.-owned fleet in foreign trades was built and operated under foreign flag. With the three factors determining the ability of the United States to source sealift from the U.S.-flag commercial fleet—the U.S. military’s lift requirements, U.S. maritime policies, and the state of the U.S. commercial fleet—no longer in balance, U.S. military planners were forced to look to foreign fleets for the capabilities they needed.

    Following the Civil War, in an effort to create demand for U.S.-built vessels (and not incidentally to aid the shipbuilding industry in Maine, home state of the leading advocate of the prohibition on foreign construction), Congress had barred the return to U.S. flag of hundreds of vessels engaged in the foreign trades that had transferred to foreign flag during the conflict so that they could continue to trade with foreign nations favoring the Confederacy (e.g., Great Britain). With U.S. steel production at the time devoted largely to the westward expansion of U.S. railroads, U.S. shipbuilders continued to produce primarily only wooden sailing vessels for the U.S.-flag foreign trading fleet. By 1905 Great Britain had a foreign trading fleet of 11,365 ships, of which less than 20 percent were sail powered, while 73 percent of America’s 1,333 ships in foreign trades were still sail powered. For every steam-driven ship in the U.S. merchant fleet there were twenty-five such ships flying the British flag.³ To remain competitive in the foreign trades, U.S. shipping companies were forced to invest in foreign-built vessels that under U.S. law could not be documented under U.S. flag. By 1901 vessels operating under foreign flag constituted by far the largest part of the American-owned tonnage engaged in foreign trade.⁴

    With Congress opposed to granting U.S. registry to foreign-built vessels, the Army was limited to chartering U.S. vessels involved in the Atlantic and Gulf coastal trades or acquiring foreign-flag vessels by charter or purchase to mount the Cuba expedition. By July 1, 1898, the Army’s Quartermaster Department had chartered forty-three transports, four water boats, three steam lighters, two ocean tugs, and three decked barges for the expedition. When that was not enough, the Army purchased fourteen steamships and quickly outfitted them to carry troops to Cuba and Puerto Rico.

    The vessels thus acquired were not always well suited for the task at hand. For example, the vessels on which the Army’s V Corps under Maj. Gen. William R. Shafter embarked for Cuba had been obtained under the assumption that the landing would be at Mariel, less than two days’ sail away, rather than at the southeastern tip of the island, one thousand miles and almost a week’s voyage from Tampa. Matters were further complicated when U.S. planners adopted a British formula for space per man that was intended for use with troop transports rather than the converted freighters and passenger vessels available to Shafter’s force. As a result, many more soldiers were placed on board each vessel than it could carry without endangering their health, especially if they were on it for many days. Conditions were cramped, uncomfortable, and unsanitary, and the lack of onboard cooking facilities led to an unfortunate overreliance on canned beef.

    In the Pacific, a small American squadron under Commo. George Dewey completely destroyed a Spanish naval force in Manila Bay on May 1, 1898, a victory made possible only by the Navy’s purchase of two British colliers in Hong Kong to accompany Dewey’s squadron and provide coal for the warships. Having won the Battle of Manila Bay, Commodore Dewey immediately recognized that although he could now compel Manila’s surrender, he could not occupy the city without a strong force of soldiers. He also soon became aware of the dual risks of a Spanish relief expedition and intervention by another power.

    By this time the United States was already planning to take control of the Philippines, and the War Department responded eagerly to Dewey’s request for ground forces, planning to send about 11,300 troops to Manila under the command of Maj. Gen. Wesley Merritt by July 25, 1898. As with the Cuba expedition, the Army faced a serious problem in obtaining enough transports to carry the troops, a problem the Quartermaster Department again solved by procuring, mostly by charter but in a few cases by purchase, virtually all of the available vessels on the Pacific Coast—initially fourteen transports, with more chartered or purchased in July and August. The vessels employed for the Philippines, however, were generally better suited for transoceanic transportation than the Cuba ships because that was how they had been employed commercially before being taken up for military service. Onboard accommodations were generally more comfortable and, most important, included galleys for cooking.

    Transport City of Peking...

    Transport City of Peking departing San Francisco with U.S. troops en route to the Philippines on May 25, 1898. (Naval History and Heritage Command)

    Three groups of soldiers were sent to the Philippines as rapidly as they could be gathered and trained. The first contingent of 2,500 men left San Francisco in the transport City of Peking and 2 other transports on May 25 and arrived in Manila Bay at the end of June. Another 4 transports with 3,500 men steamed through the Golden Gate on June 15, arriving on July 17. The third group, with 4,800 men embarked in 6 ships, departed on June 27 and reached Manila Bay at the end of July. More soldiers and Marines were sent after the war’s conclusion.

    Despite the challenges posed in sourcing adequate sealift capability for the Cuba and Philippines expeditions, the job did get done. But there remained considerable doubt as to whether that would have been the case had the Army not been able to draw on foreign merchant fleets—particularly the British—for vessel charters and purchases.

    EFFICIENT SEALIFT REQUIRES EFFECTIVE ADVANCED DEPLOYMENT AND EMBARKATION PLANNING

    A second lesson learned from the Spanish–American War experience was that the strategic speed advantage sealift provided could easily be squandered by delays in the deployment and embarkation process before the forces involved had even left the United States. The U.S. military’s lack of experience in this type of operation almost proved to be a more serious obstacle than the Spanish army.

    On the eve of the war, the Regular Army comprised only 28,183 soldiers. Once war was declared, men rushed enthusiastically to enlist. By the end of May 1898, 163,626 enlisted men had been mustered into service. By the end of the war in August 1898 the Army had 274,717 soldiers on duty, including 58,688 in the Regular Army and 216,029 volunteers. But no one in that large Army had experience in large overseas movements. Even the relatively short move to Cuba required creation of a port of embarkation, coordinated movements of troops and supplies to the port, and placement of units on ships. In the absence of advanced planning, the War Department selected Tampa as that port, despite its limited rail lines. Early on, the expedition was reduced to utter chaos as uncontrolled units rolled down the single-track railway and became hopelessly entangled at the ill-equipped facility.

    Failure to establish priorities on shipments and to ensure that shipments were labeled properly compounded the transportation problems. Loaded railcars filled the sidings all the way from Tampa to Columbia, South Carolina, and important shipments were detained while unnecessary supplies were unloaded. Between May 18 and August 31, the depot at Tampa handled 13,239 carloads of supplies and equipment as well as railcars transporting 66,000 soldiers (with baggage) and more than 15,000 animals.

    After many delays, and in an atmosphere of the utmost confusion, the embarkation of troops began on June 11, 1898, and lasted four days. The first men to board suffered greatly because of the heat and poor ventilation, the woolen uniforms not appropriate for extremely hot weather, the monotonous travel rations, and the inadequate water supply. Although allowed off the ships in detachments for exercise, troops were not permitted to remain on shore because there was no satisfactory campsite near the harbor. The Cuban expedition that sailed from Tampa on June 14 was loaded on board thirty-eight vessels accompanied by Navy ships. Poor estimates of carrying capacity meant that the transports could move only about 17,000 soldiers, however, not the 25,000 originally planned.

    Roosevelt’s Rough...

    Roosevelt’s Rough Riders leaving Tampa on board the transport Concho heading for Cuba. (State Library and Archives of Florida)

    Managing the men and materiel converging on San Francisco and destined for the Philippines was a smoother process. San Francisco had better rail connections and harbor facilities, and the San Francisco depot was able to expand quickly to accommodate the more than 30,000 soldiers who would eventually arrive there.

    THE EMERGENCE OF MILITARY SERVICE–OWNED AND –OPERATED SEALIFT

    The experiences with sealift during the Spanish–American War and America’s acquisition of island territories following the war prompted the U.S. Army to develop its own fleet of seagoing ships to support Army forces overseas. This fleet became known as the Army Transport Service (ATS) and fell under the direction of the Quartermaster General. The ATS operated shipping services from the Pacific Coast to the Philippines, an inter-island service in the Philippines, and other support to overseas stations. The Army maintained these services until World War II, except during World War I, when the Navy Department assumed responsibility for water transportation.

    Similarly, the U.S. Navy had come to realize the importance of having controlled auxiliary shipping to support fleet deployments, leading ultimately to the establishment of the Military Sealift Command’s Combat Logistics Force, which today includes thirty-two Navy-owned, civil service–crewed oilers, ammunition ships, fast combat support ships, and dry cargo/ammunition ships.¹⁰

    MARITIME POLICY REACTS TO THE WAR EXPERIENCES

    The Spanish–American War demonstrated how ill-prepared the U.S. military and U.S. commercial merchant marine were to sustain military operations in distant theaters of war in support of national security. Just a year later the lesson was to be repeated on the economic side of the equation. As Britain prepared to dispatch and sustain an army some six thousand miles away to South Africa to fight the Boer War against Dutch settlers, it pressed into national service many of the ships that normally carried American commercial commerce. The sudden loss of those ships demonstrated the vulnerability of the U.S. economy to the disruption of shipping services provided by other nations and how much it depended on such services. The sudden reduction in available tonnage drove freight rates through the roof and seriously disrupted the North Atlantic trades, forcing Americans to acknowledge that their economy was not nearly as self-sufficient as they had believed.¹¹

    A congressional committee later complained that the inflated rates American exporters had been forced to pay to those British ships that remained in the Atlantic trade had offset Britain’s cost of waging this war.¹² While that may have been an exaggeration, the arousal of congressional interest in the state of the industry led to four pieces of legislation targeted to enhance the roles of the U.S.-flag merchant fleet in support of U.S. national and economic security: the Military Cargo Preference/Military Transportation Act of 1904, the Panama Canal Act of 1912, the Shipping Registry Act of 1914, and the Shipping Act of 1916.

    However well intended this legislation may have been, a core question remained: would it really meet the objective of enhancing and helping to grow the U.S.-flag commercial fleet, or was it simply Congress’ knee-jerk reaction to the reliance on foreign-flag shipping during the Spanish–American War and immediately thereafter?

    Military Cargo Preference Act/Military Transportation Act of 1904

    The act of April 28, 1904—popularly referred to as either the Military Cargo Preference Act or the Military Transportation Act—requires that only vessels of the United States [U.S. flag] or belonging to the United States may be used in the transportation by sea of supplies bought for the Army, Navy, Air Force, or Marine Corps (10 U.S.C. §2631(a)). Virtually unchanged since 1904, this statute remains a core tenet of U.S. maritime policy.¹³

    The absence of an adequate naval auxiliary was again underscored when President Theodore Roosevelt sent the U.S. Navy’s Great White Fleet around the world between 1907 and 1909. Intended to demonstrate America’s naval might and ability to deploy its Atlantic Fleet to the western Pacific as a message to Japan following that nation’s defeat of Russia in 1905, the venture almost turned into a fiasco when the Navy proved unable to support the fleet so far from its home base. Once again, hasty purchase or charter of a ragtag collection of foreign tramp steamers to either trail along with the fleet or meet it along the way saved the day.

    Thus, early on the 1904 act became a textbook example of the adage that an act of Congress does not in itself make a functional policy. The relatively simple act of Congress in setting the requirement for U.S.-flag shipping did not produce the ships needed to make it happen. Congress also needed to either appropriate the funding to build a government-owned sealift/naval auxiliary or to provide sufficient economic incentives for commercial shipowners to operate their vessels under U.S. flag, from which they would be available for military use.

    ENDING THE U.S. BUILD REQUIREMENT FOR FOREIGN TRADING SHIPS (1912)

    To remain competitive in the foreign trades, U.S. shipping companies had increasingly invested in foreign-built vessels, which under U.S. law could not be documented under U.S. flag. These American companies included the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad (through its common ownership with J. P. Morgan’s International Mercantile Marine),¹⁴ W. R. Grace, and the Anglo American

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