U.S. Army Europe prepared for the closure
of the transit center at
Manas Air Base in
Kyrgyzstan by establishing a new transit center
in Romania.
A
s operations ended at the
passenger transit center at
Manas, Kyrgyzstan, U.S.
Army Europe (USAREUR) planners had an opportunity to shape the
fight in Afghanistan and prepare for
future force projection contingencies
while working through resourcing
constraints.
In August 2013, the U.S. European Command (EUCOM) directed
USAREUR to establish a passenger
transit center at Mihail Kogalniceanu (MK), a small community with an
international airport near Constanta,
Romania, along the eastern coast of
the Black Sea.
The location in Romania already
had a remote forward operating site
adjacent to the MK International
Airport. A small U.S. Army presence
kept the site minimally operational
in anticipation of a contingency operation, for which it could increase
base operations if necessary.
The Army used the site to exercise
several small-scale proofs of principle that tested the Army’s ability to
transload deploying and redeploying
personnel. Those exercises, however,
did not increase the infrastructure or
establish a permanent mission command for a larger, enduring transload
mission. Planning, establishing, and
executing a passenger transit center
proved to be an extremely significant
effort.
Intermediate Staging Base
Current Army doctrine defines an
intermediate staging base (ISB) as a
secure staging base established near,
but not in, an area of operations. An
ISB is task-organized to perform
staging, support, and distribution
functions as specified or implied by
the service support plan or annex in
support of the combatant commander’s war plan or operation order.
Although joint doctrine discusses the concept of the ISB, it lacks
a framework for planning. Once an
ISB is established, the theater logistics headquarters continues to assess
the ISB’s mission and adjusts its organization in view of sustainment
20 Army Sustainment
requirements and available resources.
For operations at MK, the only requirement was for passenger transload from commercial-to-military
and military-to-commercial aircraft.
This significantly reduced the requirements for materials-handling
equipment and staging areas needed for vehicles and containers at a
typical staging base. The scope of
personnel required to manage and
operate the site also could be scaled
down.
Predeployment activities typically performed at the transit center at
Manas would not be transferred to
MK. By eliminating all equipping
and training activities, the transient
time on the ground was reduced to
no more than 48 hours. The existing
MK infrastructure allowed for flexibility, but the ISB needed to expand
or its limits would create serious
congestion.
Initial Planning
With fewer than 150 days until
the initial operating capability milestone, the USAREUR operational
planning team (OPT) established a
rigid planning timeline. The timeline
focused efforts on site visits, engineering efforts, and course of action
(COA) decisions linked to mission
command, manning, and equipping
to meet the minimum initial operating capability (IOC) requirements.
The planning timeline also included
a rehearsal of concept drill and a key
leader terrain walk.
The October 2013 government
shutdown created a planning gap of
more than two weeks. As planning
transitioned into COA development,
fiscal realities created a forcing function to look for the most responsible solutions that met requirements
within the time constraints to IOC.
Within 30 days of the warning
order, action officers from EUCOM, the U.S. Central Command
(CENTCOM), the U.S. Transportation Command (TRANSCOM),
and USAREUR met at MK for a site
visit and initial planning conference.
Representatives from the Romanian