NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. –
For the past 30 to 50 years, the United States has had freedom of maneuver to sustain the fleet anywhere it wants, but that’s not going to cut it in a contested environment, the deputy chief of Naval Operations for Installations and Logistics said at the Sea-Air-Space 2025 Expo at the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center April 8.
“What makes the Navy great is the adaptability and flexibility of the professionals that support the logistics from the supply corps officers all the way through the Joint Force,” he said. “They made a lot of herculean maneuvers to get us sustained, proving that it does not take long for the machine to turn – we turned it on a dime.”
Navy’s Chief of Legislative Affairs Rear Admiral Marc Miguez
“We are operating on a just-in-time, pull-supply system that is efficient. Instead, we need a just-in-case, push-supply system that is effective,” said Navy Vice Admiral Jeff Jablon. “To do this, we must change the Navy’s logistics enterprise and execute our Maritime Sustainment Strategy to ensure we can sustain the fleet and the joint force in a contested environment.”
The Defense Logistics Agency director and senior Navy officers discussed contested logistics challenges and future sustainment opportunities in the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command during the Sustaining Global Contested Operations panel.
The Navy’s Chief of Legislative Affairs Rear Admiral Marc Miguez highlighted past sustainment success during naval operations in the Red Sea to kickstart the panel discussion. Panelists provided insights on how they overcame contested logistics challenges during previous naval operations in the region. They also highlighted the communication, technological and geographical challenges in that area before recommending solutions to maximize the Navy’s advantage in a potential conflict with Pacific adversaries.
Miguez, a former carrier strike force group commander during the Hamas invasion of Israel in October 2023, faced several unintended logistics challenges. What was supposed to be a presence mission turned into a combat mission when the adversary interrupted and targeted innocent maritime traffic and warships in late November 2023. He described how the adversaries’ actions forced him and his team to set up and sustain logistics operations in a contested operational environment in the Red Sea for eight months. He said the Navy had not done this before but came close to it after sustaining a strike force for two weeks during Desert Storm.
“What makes the Navy great is the adaptability and flexibility of the professionals that support the logistics from the supply corps officers all the way through the Joint Force,” he said. “They made a lot of herculean maneuvers to get us sustained, proving that it does not take long for the machine to turn – we turned it on a dime.”
With help from the Navy’s joint partners and combatant commanders, Miquez said his team developed the necessary aviation and ground sustainment network to provide fuel, missiles, ordnance and subsistence to his sailors.
“The State Department weighed in, giving us the agility to do ordnance reloads in the Red Sea,” he said. “This was a game changer – reducing the time I needed to reload ships and sustain the fight from roughly two weeks to five days.”
Strategic partnerships
U.S. Pacific Fleet’s Director of Logistics Fleet Supply & Ordnance Navy Capt. Brian Anderson reminded the audience that the landscape in which logistics navigates today is quite different than how they grew up. He also said when referring to “partners” as allies or foreign partners, the Department of Defense needs to change the way it looks at them. He said partners could be domestics partners, like U.S. Transportation Command and DLA, as valued partners in sustainment.
“In this space, we have to be able to transfer material from our allies and our partners with the assumption that we all have one common goal – to sustain our forces – by ensuring that we have the right stuff, in the right place at the right time to support the correct weapon systems we have,” he added. “This requires us to forecast properly and submit the correct demand signals to DLA.”
DLA’s support to the Navy
DLA Director Army Lt. Gen. Mark Simerly said when thinking about contested logistics, status quo is not a course of action. He also said the Navy’s Maritime Sustainment Strategy aligns with the four transformation imperatives of the DLA Strategic Plan.
“In this space, we have to be able to transfer material from our allies and our partners with the assumption that we all have one common goal – to sustain our forces – by ensuring that we have the right stuff, in the right place at the right time to support the correct weapon systems we have,” he added. “This requires us to forecast properly and submit the correct demand signals to DLA.”
U.S. Pacific Fleet’s Director of Logistics Fleet Supply & Ordnance Navy Capt. Brian Anderson
“We will be tested at a greater scale in future conflicts, which is really where we have to calibrate our supply chains and support to sustain in a protracted fight,” he said. “This requires putting in place state-of-the art tools that allow us to think smarter and faster than our adversaries. We must be precise, have people who are warfighter-informed with the data skills and deep supply chain expertise to ensure material is postured around the globe in advance of need.”
Simerly said DLA requires a stance that enables the agency to project and protect capability at the same time. He also stressed the importance of working with the agency’s strategic partners, the Joint Force and industry to accelerate integration.
“Our partners are essential for capability that we might require, or we may be able to offer,” he said. “All of our capability emanates from industry. This partnership allows them to achieve greater capacity and responsiveness through advanced lead times in our end-to-end supply chains.”