BY STEVE GEARY, EDITOR AT LARGE
DEFENSE
specialreport
without
a pilot
supply
Roadside bombs and anti-aircraft fire have made supply
missions into Afghanistan a perilous venture. But the
Marines think they have found a better way.
PHOTO COUR TES Y OF BOEING CO.
FOR AS LONG AS THERE’S BEEN WAR, THERE’S BEEN THE CHALlenge of military supply—making sure that the men and women on the
front lines, the people in harm’s way, have what they need when they need
it. The art and science of logistics grew up around that problem, and the
work to develop faster, better, safer methods continues to this day.
In recent years, escalating threats to supply lines in Southwest Asia have
lent urgency to that mission. Concerns about enemy attacks have led the
U.S. military to step up efforts to reduce the risks that come with moving
cargo across often hostile and unforgiving territory. Those efforts have
yielded a number of innovative tactics and technologies aimed at protecting lives. They include a robotic lift truck designed for use in high-risk environments (see “robotic forklift could be a lifesaver,” August 2010,
www.dcvelocity.com) and initiatives to conserve water and fuel at operating
bases in Afghanistan in order to reduce the need for supply convoys (see “for
U.S. military, going green can save lives,” May 2010, www.dcvelocity.com).
But there’s more to come. Within the next year, the military expects to put
its latest technological breakthrough into action: unmanned helicopters
capable of carrying pallet-loads of supplies to posts in remote locations.
Infrastructure “almost nonexistent”
To understand what’s driving this initiative, it helps to know a little about
the supply challenges the military faces in Afghanistan. One of the biggest
difficulties is the country’s limited infrastructure. In most parts of the
