The Logistics Burden in Fully Burdened Cost Estimates

Abstract

Military forces often operate in austere environments, where resources such as fuel and water are not available locally. Certain classes of supply such as ammunition require special and especially costly transportation and handling, and often must be transported thousands of miles into theater using organic assets. Moreover, logistics assets have come under threat in recent conflicts and are expected to come under wider global threat, even at sea. Together, these issues mean that the DoD should develop forces and acquire assets to support efficient organic supply networks and should place a higher value on resource efficiency in its warfighting capabilities than it has in the recent past. This report describes our work modeling the impact of self-sustainment for logistics activities and associated force protection on the fully burdened cost of supply to the warfighter. The purpose is to support better-informed acquisition decisions as well as operational and strategic decisions for the DoN and DoD's future forces.