Logistics (military)

Sometimes, in very informal military discussions, someone will offer a toast: "Amateurs talk tactics. Dilettantes talk strategy. Professionals talk logistics." Obviously, the toast was offered by someone with a bias toward logistics, but there is much truth to it. Strategy determines why to fight, the form of one's forces, and where to fight. Tactics defines how the fight is conducted once begun.

Logistics, however, make it possible for to be ready to fight, and have the materials to conduct and sustain the fight. Napoleon is said to have observed "an army marches on its stomach", meaning that no army can function without a supply of food, and making sure that food is available, in adequate quanities, is a basic part of the supply discipline of logistics. A different discipline, transportation, ensures the food gets from the port where it arrives on a ship, to the cooks that will prepare it. Both operational procedures and research have places in research, just as combat forces have their rules on how to encircle a military force with a helicopter-borne (i.e., air assault) unit, logisticians worked out the procedure by which a short-ranged helicopter can be refueled at each jump closer to its target.

In the United States military, chosen here because it tends to write down more about the way it does things than any other military, logistics is:

The science of planning and carrying out the movement and maintenance of forces.

In its most comprehensive sense, those aspects of military operations that deal with: a. design and development, acquisition, storage, movement, distribution, maintenance, evacuation, and disposition of materiel; b. movement, evacuation, and hospitalization of personnel; c. acquisition or construction, maintenance, operation, and disposition of facilities; and d. acquisition or furnishing of services

— Department of Defense Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms

NATO logistical doctrine recognizes each nation will have its unique approach, but "NATO's principles reflect the additional requirements of operating together in a multinational Alliance." NATO has a useful abstraction of the orientation both of the logistical aspects of obtaining, as well as delivery thereof.

Logistical resources	Logistical delivery
Production Logistics (also known as: acquisition logistics	Cooperative Logistics
Consumer Logistics (also known as: operational logistics)	Multinational Logistics

The primary manual on U.S. logistical doctrine goes further, and defines its scope as "the integration of strategic, operational, and tactical sustainment efforts within the theater, while scheduling the mobilization and deployment of units, personnel, equipment, and supplies in support of the employment concept of a ... commander. The relative combat power that military forces can bring to bear against an enemy is constrained by a nation’s capability to plan for, gain access to, and deliver forces and materiel to the required points of application across the range of military operations."

Logistical service	Functions that make logistics practical
Materiel	Contracting and procurement
Supply	logistical planning and research
Maintenance and repair	logistical planning and research
Transportation	distribution
Civil engineering	sustainment
Health services	procurement and contracting
Mortuary services	disposition and disposal
Explosive ordnance disposal	Budget and finance

History

Napoleon Bonaparte made significant advances in logistics. While he did not have a full general staff organization in the modern sense, he still had officers moving ahead of his armies, being sure they would have the appropriate resources from the local area, as well as weapons and other supplies from the rear. Napoleon's campaigns, however, were directed against the defeat of armies in the field. In the American Civil War, a major strategic emphasis shifted to destroying the enemy's logistics, destroying the ability of armies to continue fighting. In such a situation, Carl von Clausewitz would describe logistics as a center of gravity.

Changing centers of gravity from combat forces to logistics was partially the result of technological advances such as railroads and the telegraph. Another key aspect was the increased lethality of repeating and rifled weapons, such that a prepared defense could be nearly invulnerable to direct attack, as tragically demonstrated by Pickett's Charge at the Battle of Gettysburg. Doctrine had not yet evolved to make use of breakthrough techniques, such as was seen by the failure of the Battle of the Crater.]

William T. Sherman attacked logistics in several ways, starting with the destruction of railroads and telegraph lines. Sherman's March to the Sea demonstrated destroying the means of production.

Civil engineering and facility procurement

Beans and bullets do not last well if they are kept in the rain. Logisticians have to have transportation routes from the source of supply, to the warehousing and distribution points, to the supported units. Minimally, this means that things such as roads, airfields, docks and warehouses need either to be built by civil engineers (contrast with combat engineer)s, or perhaps it will be possible to locate, rent, and customize warehouses and other facilities.