Transportation and Logistics (Formerly Global Agility) –
The United States (U.S.) must reexamine its transportation and logistics industrial base, specifically, the underlying assumptions that the U.S. can credibly project power, stabilize and strengthen the global economy with a robust transportation and logistics infrastructure, and protect the international order. The U.S.’s transportation and logistics industrial base (air freight, trucking, railroad, warehousing, inland waterways, ports, and deep-sea shipping) is an interconnected web of public and private efforts. Decentralized and uncoordinated investments in these enterprises, coupled with centrally planned near-peer global investments (e.g., BRI), undermine cohesion and negatively impact the ability to mobilize military forces in response to contingencies. Well-intentioned laws and regulations have not increased transportation readiness or resiliency; rather, they created a framework of dependence on foreign competition from the People’s Republic of China (PRC), which is challenging to navigate and discourages industry participation in government programs. The supply chain disruptions caused by strategic inflection points such as the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, the Red Sea, Panama Canal, and Baltimore Bridge collapse exemplified the deterioration of the U.S. transportation and logistics industrial base over time. The U.S. military mobilization mechanisms exhibit fragility in uncontested environments and can no longer plan for uncontested deployments and sustainment of forces during an era of renewed great power competition (GPC).
The U.S. must invest and update policies to bolster supply chains and promote order within the chaotic transportation and logistics industrial base. Industries must cooperate to avoid zero-sum competition within the industrial base. First, there must be coordinated efforts to enact policies and investments addressing immediate infrastructure concerns in ports, the inland waterway system, warehousing, and railway systems. The U.S. must address labor issues such as quality of life and qualification constraints in maritime and rail industries warehousing and logistics strategy and planning, and coordination with partners and allies to maximize U.S. asymmetric advantages.
Second, like the focus on the Defense Industrial Base (DIB), the White House should appoint a senior special coordinator to integrate the interagency and drive long-term transportation industrial base development strategy toward national priorities. This position must have implementation authority, not simply advisory and coordinating functions. The U.S. must confront the reality that success in these endeavors is limited without the integration of allies and partners. A concerted effort for reciprocal technology exchanges must be pursued to build and enhance logistical networks in peacetime. To remediate the U.S.’s inability to project power in a sustainable, agile, survivable way, the U.S. must partner with like-minded allies and partners, resolve major infrastructure issues, and utilize technology and innovative labor policy to stimulate its deteriorating transportation and logistics industrial base.
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