Intermodal Transportation in Military
Student’s Name
Institution Affiliation
Abstract
This essay paper focuses on Intermodal Transportation in the military; intermodal transportation is generally defined as the conveyance of a load from one point to another by a sequence of at least two modes of transportation, the transfer from one mode to another done at an intermodal terminal (Crainic, 2018). Intermodal consignment conveyance is the sector of the Intelligent Transportation Systems program that embraces movements of goods involving the use of two or more transportation modes. Even though intermodal transportation in the military and the public intermodal transportation viewed as natural partners in cargo transportation, many civilians do not understand the background and application of military intermodal transportation. Thus, they do not appreciate the reliance on advancing the partnership of civilians and the military in intermodal transport. Hence the need to bridge this gap in clarity of understanding of military intermodal transportation to provide solutions to both military and civilian transportation problems to ensure successful military deployments with only minimal effects on commercial operations.
Intermodal Transportation in Military
Introduction
Intermodal is the use of more than one mode of conveyance moving freight without any handling while changing ways, and on each stage of shipping, a different carrier manages to load. The method permits shippers to integrate several transportation modes and facilitates the moving of goods from individual transportation mode to another, from the truck to rail or ship. Recognition of the military reliance on civilian transportation systems is fundamental in understanding the interplay between civilian and military transportation (Zeimpekis et al., 2014). The dependence on commercial traffic for military transportation comes at the disruption of private economic disruption. The civilians’ reliance on military protection for domestic national security and external security threats against aggression and the military’s role in protecting public interest shows the interplay between military and civil transportation. In this context, a reflection on intermodal transport in the military forms the basis of this essay.
This essay analyses the background and application of intermodal transportation in the military will help us conclude regarding the military use of intermodal transport and providing solutions to both military and civilian transportation problems to ensure successful military deployments with only minimal effects on commercial operations (McDowell, 2018).
When intermodal is the right choice for shipments
Transportation of units less than 25 tons of intermediate and finished goods
The longer the distance a shipment needs to travel, the more likely it is that intermodal will be the right choice. Freight moving more than 300 miles, or longer than one day by truck, are great candidates for intermodal transportation.
The duration of shipment travel is the longer the distance of shipment travel, such as more than three hundred miles or longer than one day by truck, the need for intermodal transportation.
Cargo with intermediate values is most likely to be moved via intermodal. Other with high values frequently sent through most direct methods, such as air cargo, and low-value shipments transported by rail or ocean.
Need for continuous cargo flow in similar quantities; then, intermodal transportation is the choice (Witoonpan, 2016).
Intermodal Transportation in the Military
Military transportation plays a critical role in the military in guaranteeing the military in accomplishing global force projection and sustain forces in operation through effective and efficient force generation and sustainment.
Military transportation functions as a partner in the defense transport system to deploy, sustain and redeploy forces in all military operations. Transportation delivers critical support to the military across the strategic, operative, and tactical stages of combat. It is an all-in-one system that marries the levels of war with harmonized movement control, terminal operations, and mode operations. Military transportation entails military, commercial, and host nation capabilities.
Military logistics encompasses cautious planning, the protected transport, and conveyance on a global scale involving the organization of heavyweight lift and heavyweight haul mission shipping and under constricted time limits. In military shipping, it is regularly essential to transport consignment to isolated places. These exceptional processes involve the combination of conveyance choices, intermodal transportation, by air, land, sea, waterways, and to complete freight transportation. A vast knowledge, trustworthiness, confidentiality, required pre-vetting of the freight forwarder in the conveyance of military operations for cargo like transportation of helicopters, tanks, fighter planes, and other colossal cargo across the globe.
The three Defense Transportation System (DTS) foundations of the transportation resources and capabilities are namely military (organic), commercial (non-organic), and the host nation. The DTS resources are marine transportation (ocean and coastal ways), inland surface transportation (rail, road, and inland) and air transportation classification, and pipeline transportation. Defense System Integration control networks, combined with the capabilities of inland surface transportation, air transportation, and marine transportation, plus pipeline, improve the practical intermodal use in the provision of greater visibility over movements visibility and global agility ( Brown et al., 2000).
Elements of The Intermodal Freight System
Motor Carriers
The military does surface transport by specialized fleets and also by a partnership with vetted commercial carriers where partnership surface transport capacity is needed.
Rail Carriers
Because of its high capacity, flexibility, and security rail lines as a primary means of transportation during deployment, the military can maintain critical track sections of the feeder network railway lines to main rail lines and purchase railcars.
Inland Waterway Carriers
The military barges transport of military cargo by integrating the inland waterway system by way of technology into a nation’s intermodal system.
Transportation Partners
Pre-vetted commercial assets like commercial barge-towing industry, ocean carriers, truck lines, bus companies, airlines, and railroads are only used by the military when it is practical and prudent to do in the transportation of personnel, equipment, and sustainment (U.S. Department of Transportation, 2018). The commercial assets are also utilized in contingency situations to deploy military personnel and military equipment to and from the theater of operations. Military through various countries Department of Defense (DoD) enter into various intermodal agreements with commercial assets for commercial shipping and intermodal assets in the event of war or national emergency. And these agreements include Intermodal Air Fleet Agreements, Intermodal Sealift Agreements, and Defense Transport System Agreements and Intermodal Payment Procedures Agreements for commercial.
Challenges
Government Fleet Readiness
Sealift fleet ability to rapid delivery of equipment and supplies during major contingencies impaired by repairs to older equipment and aging systems requiring shipyard periods lasting longer and costing more each year.
Commercial Fleet Viability
Privately-owned commercial vessels operating under the host nations flag augment the capabilities of the respective government’s fleet in delivering supplies and equipment to deployed forces and service members and their families stationed overseas during steady-state operations and essential sustainment during long military deployments continue to decline in numbers thereby reducing host nation’s ability to unilaterally project and sustain our forces during the war ( McDowell, 2018).
Port Infrastructure
Congestion resulting from more significant volumes of military freight could lead to growing delays and failures in the supply chain that hurts the domestic industries and citizens’ life. Thus, host nations need to increase capacity and handle cargo more efficiently as it is key to the health of many local industries (U.S. Department of Transportation, 2018).
Availability of Mariners
Inadequately qualified staff mariners to crew government vessels on the need basis hampers the host nations’ military operations in times of urgency (McDowell, 2018).
Emerging Automation
Joint Logistics Advanced Concept Technology Demonstrations are developing and drifting interoperable web-based joint logistics decisions to support tools to the Global Combat Support System by providing specific domain capabilities over the fast application of emergent technologies.
The Advanced Logistic Program, an exertion to design, advance, and establish an end-to-end DoD prototype logistics system based on a distributed intelligent architecture to managing the logistics pipeline for DoD to enable the combat fighter to have the right material in the right place at the precise period with reduced dependence on extensive DoD inventories.
Analysis of Mobility Platform and Force Projection Modeling system is a unified imitation that captures movement over the defense transport system at the specific consignment item level of detail. It assesses the collaboration of infrastructure and carriage systems with the comprehensive transportability features of the deploying force.
The innovative computerized military apparatuses are time-stepped, discrete incident, stochastic imitations of deployment operations that determine throughput, notice restraints, and compute authorization periods for positioning units at the line-item level. They will interface with a varied assortment of linked databases, which vary from geographic information systems to live information feeds (Baykasoğlu, 2019)
Summary
The military must increasingly rely on the efficacies and capabilities offered by transportation technologies in the civilian sector. On the other hand, an individual’s military transportation requirements pose a unique set of problems that differ from those of the commercial world. The most crucial issue is the need for rapid planning and execution of a complex set of activities including coordination, assignment, and scheduling and routing of land, air, and sealift resources; effective use of crews and support resources; coordination with users; and the integrated use of both military and commercial resources. Effectiveness and efficiency are critical (Chairman, U. S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Joint Doctrine for The Defense Transportation System, n.d).
As proposals made to improve military transportation, the various legislative Committees on Military Transportation must endeavor to promote a balance between effectiveness and efficiency. In a world of decreasing military force structure and increasing commitments, the Department of Defense of various nations must maintain access to sufficient commercial transport capacity and take advantage of developing technology, especially automation. Department of Defense of different countries have recognized this need and have established partnering relationships with private carriers involving multiple modes of transportation. However, the reduction in excess civilian capacity increases the need for close coordination. Perhaps more important is that the military needs real-time access to financial and research resources. The goal is to get more out of the existing transportation infrastructure (Movement, A. O. Chairman of The Joint Chiefs of Staff Instruction, n.d)
Technology is emerging as a force multiplier with the potential of enhancing the lift asset capability available to the military.
Finally, relevant legislative Committees on Military Transportation should provide a mechanism for bringing the military, commercial, and research communities together. These mechanisms provide solutions to both military and civilian transportation problems that ensure successful military deployments with only minimal effects on commercial operations.
References
Baykasoğlu, A., Subulan, K., Taşan, A. S., Dudaklı, N., Turan, M., Çelik, E., & Ülker, Ö. (2019). Development of a Web-Based Decision Support System for Strategic and Tactical Sustainable Fleet Management Problems in Intermodal Transportation Networks. In Lean and Green Supply Chain Management (pp. 189-230). Springer, Cham.
Brown, S. E., Bennett, H. M., & Honea, R. B. (2000). U.S. Military Transportation. TRB, A1B11: Committee on Military Transportation.
Chairman, U. S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Joint Doctrine for The Defense Transportation System.n. d
Crainic, T. G., Perboli, G., & Rosano, M. (2018). Simulation of intermodal freight transportation systems: a taxonomy. European Journal of Operational Research, 270(2), 401-418.
McDowell, J. (2018). Combat Cargo: The Challenges of Military Logistics – Inbound Logistics. Inboundlogistics.com. Retrieved 18 June 2020, from https://www.inboundlogistics.com/cms/article/combat-cargo-the-challenges-of-military-logistics/.
Movement, A. O. Chairman of The Joint Chiefs of Staff Instruction.n. d
U.S. Department of Transportation, U. (2018). Maritime Transportation: Opportunities and Challenges. U.S. Department of Transportation. Retrieved 18 June 2020, from https://www.transportation.gov/testimony/maritime-transportation-opportunities-and-challenges.
Witoonpan, S. (2016). Developing a conceptual model of intermodal freight transport choice: a case study of Thai rubber exporters (Doctoral dissertation, Northumbria University).
Zeimpekis, V., Kaimakamis, G., & Daras, N. J. (Eds.). (2014). Military Logistics: Research Advances and Future Trends (Vol. 56). Springer.