FORT BELVOIR, Va. –
An international crisis halts the production of key medical supplies at the exact moment there is a spike in demand. What do you do next?
At the Defense Logistics Agency, questions like this are being asked and answered by a small team of strategic planners using wargames, simulations and experiments to prepare for future logistics challenges.
With more than 120 federal and private industry partners in attendance, DLA facilitated a week-long wargame that stress-tested the nation’s medical supply chain beginning July 7. The Assured Resupply for Medical Operations Readiness Wargame challenged participants to navigate a series of logistics scenarios against the realities of a highly contested, protracted conflict.
Federal civilians and military members worked through a set of predefined problems alongside healthcare executives, academic researchers and medical professionals to identify supply chain bottlenecks, resource constraints, risk-driving foreign dependencies and production limitations in both the government and commercial medical industries.
DLA Logistics Operations Director Air Force Maj. Gen. David Sanford opened the wargame by highlighting the fundamental importance of wartime planning ahead of conflict.
Sanford added that candid conversations between federal agencies and industry partners would be essential to improving the contracting, forecasting, and optimization of medical supply stocks to sustain the Joint Force in crises.
“Small, incremental steps are not sufficient,” Sanford said. “We need to do the planning now and drive substantive change so we can be ready to go if there is a crisis.”
Sanford also recalled the military mindset of President George Washington, who established the War Department in 1789, with a quote from his First Annual Address to Congress: “to be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.”
In small teams, wargamers discussed weaknesses in commercial and military medical logistics operations. They identified friction points in the production, distribution and positioning of medical supplies that could hinder sustained combat operations and readiness.
To help optimize stock positioning, wargamers recognized the need to have real-time data sharing between federal and commercial entities in informing a complete picture of medical inventory availability “upstream” in the supply chain.
Finding ways to mitigate these issues now ensures greater resilience across the nation’s medical industrial base so it can move quickly before the next health emergency arises—for civilians and warfighters alike.
The insights garnered from this wargame enable DLA to more effectively contribute to the National Defense Strategy’s line of effort to supercharge the U.S. defense industrial base, underpinning the strength of the U.S. Joint Force as well as that of our allies and partners.
Additionally, findings from DLA wargames have helped inform lawmakers of more targeted requirements for industry investments and offered policymakers more resilient acquisition strategies and procurement options across the military’s classes of supply.
DLA will leverage the outcomes of the ARMOR Wargame to more precisely determine how and where to prioritize investments in resources, data, and interagency agreements that will ensure the durability of the medical supply chain before the next crisis occurs.
Sanford concluded his remarks recognizing participants’ extensive range of knowledge and experience and the potential outcomes the ARMOR Wargame could produce with the collective acumen that had been assembled before him.