Commandant of the Marine Corps on hand at MCA Ground Logistics Awards Dinner to honor Corps' top Logisticians
General James T. Conway, Commandant of the Marine Corps served as the guest speaker and award presenter for the 3rd Annual MCA Ground Logistics Awards Dinner on 13 September 2007. Co-hosted by HQMC, Installations and Logistics department and the Marine Corps Association, the dinner serves as the annual event to honor the Corps’ top logistics performers during the previous year. The Dinner specifically recognizes the achievements of the Marine officer, enlisted and civilian logisticians of the year and also the Marine logistics unit of the year.
Following some introductory comments by MajGen Les Palm, President and CEO of the Marine Corps Association and a color guard ceremony by Marines from the Marine Barracks, 8th and I, the dinner guests settled down for a great meal of Chicken Mandarin. As the guests finished an enjoyable desert of rich tiramisu, MajGen Usher got up and briefly introduced guest speaker General Conway.
Opening with a humorous anecdote, General Conway said that he had recently been the guest speaker at an aviation dinner and had led off his comments with remarks about the all encompassing importance of logistics, which caused several aviators in the audience to respond with wry faces and agitated body language indicating that they thought the Commandant might have possibly forgotten at which dinner he was speaking. His point in focusing on logistics during an aviation dinner illustrated the enduring primacy of logistics in military operations regardless of military community.
Stating that he wanted to talk a bit about Operation Enduring Freedom and also about the future, General Conway pointed out that our current logistics capability was rooted in a disastrous past. Referring to the failed effort to rescue American hostages seized at our embassy by the Iranians in 1979, the General accurately pointed out that with our limited logistics capabilities of the time, there was not much we could do to effectively respond to the international provocation then. A lot was learned and a lot was done since then the General stated. Now with Marine maritime pre-positioning ships and even more substantial Army pre positioning assets acquired since the Desert-One incident, the American military is very capable and able to project substantial power world wide. General Conway perceptively noted that the U.S. victories in the Gulf War and in Operation Iraqi Freedom-I were essentially logistics victories and that no other forces on earth has the logistics capabilities to have pulled off those operations successfully other than the U.S. military. Elaborating on the complexity of OIF-I he recounted impressive statistics about the Air Wing and CSS efforts including the rapid and well organized establishment of 19 major operating air bases, 23 forward operating positions for rearming and refueling and the establishment of a 60 plus mile long hose reel system to rapidly and safely transport high volumes of fuel to forward operating forces. Citing these efforts as “logistical initiatives” the General reiterated that logistics was of supreme importance and that the Marine Corps is well served by its highly creative and thoroughly dedicated logisticians.
Turning to current events in Iraq, the General started by saying that he was immensely proud of the sailors, soldiers and Marines serving our country in Iraq. He expressed sadness at the recent death of a key Sheikh in Al-Anbar province who bore much of the responsibility for working out agreements between U.S. and Iraqi Sunni population to quell the violence in that troubled region.
Addressing the long term logistics picture in Iraq as it relates to a projected force draw down there, he posed a number of rhetorical questions to frame the issues in consideration by logistics staffs. As the force leaves, do they leave the old gear or take it with them? Due to great maintenance people, the gear is running well across the board and is consistently at 94% availability level in spite of the constant use in hard terrain, so that it might make sense to return it to the U.S. when our Marines finally leave Iraq.
He said he was driving his logistics staff crazy looking at billeting plans for a significantly expanded Marine Corps. Asking them to look to a 175,000 strong Corps, he now has the I&L staff looking at billeting and equipping a force of 202,000 Marines.
Further on the subject of force reductions in Iraq and how they would be implemented, he advised that he would not get pulled into the argument of whether logistics drives operations or that operations drive logistics. He quipped that would be like having MRE’s without Tabasco sauce or Beavis without Butthead or the love scene in the movie Deliverance without the banjo music. Addressing the question of how quickly Marine forces could leave Iraq, he said there are basically 3 viable courses of action, each with a different time-table:
They leave and take all their equipment with them taking about 28 months.
They leave all their equipment in Iraq taking about 8 months to depart.
They leave some of their equipment and take some allows them to leave Iraq in about 20 months.
Speculating about what to do with the Marines in Iraq he speculated that we could and probably should precede the Army in a retrograde and that it was better not to keep pace with the Army in a proportional draw down because those courses of action were really not supportive of the Marine Corps expeditionary mission. He said the idea of changing the status of our forces and sending an expeditionary force to help in the troubled Afghan campaign is being actively explored. He noted that each course of action has a very heavy logistics tail to consider.
In his closing comments, the General said he was from Missouri – the “Show Me” state and that “Just in time” logistics is an interesting concept but that he had to shown that it works before he will risk his Marines relying on it. He then stated with great feeling and sincerity that he would continue to challenge his logisticians but that they have no stronger advocate.
Following his remarks General Conway assisted in the presentation of the 2006 Marine Officer, Enlisted and Civilian Logisticians of the Year Awards and also the Marine Logistics Unit of the Year.
The Marine Corps Association is sincerely grateful to General Conway for taking the time from his busy schedule to address the guests with his unique perspective and to present the year’s top logistics awards.
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 MSgt Tommy Lazenby winner of the 2006 Marine Corps Enlisted Logistician of the Year Award. Award Sponsored by:  |
 Mr. Christopher Tipper winner of the 2006 Civilian Logistician of the Year Award. Award Sponsored by:  |
 Maintenance Center Albany winner of the 2006 Marine Logistics of the Year Award. Award Sponsored by:  |
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Special Thanks to our Wonderful MCA Staff! |
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Thank you to our MCA Ground Logistics Awards Dinner sponsors:
Gold
Silver
Bronze
Program Sponsor: SAIC
Wine Sponsor: IR Technologies
Name Badge Sponsor: Columbia Research
