Mathematically modeling munitions prepositioning and movement

The Air Forceʹs ability to deploy, employ, and sustain operations in forward operating locations is a key to mission success. An integral part of this new strategy involving forward operating locations is equipment prepositioning, to include: vehicles, aircraft support, consumable inventory, and munitions. Proper prepositioning strategies provide a means to deploy forces rapidly without resorting to an increased overseas presence. This research focuses on defining and developing a mathematical model to aid decision makers with a strategy for positioning and configuring prepositioned assets. This research places particular emphasis on the strategic, global prepositioning of the afloat prepositioning fleet (APF), the configuration of these ships with respect to precision guided weaponry, the development of a transportation plan in response to modeled contingencies, and a port selection and distribution strategy once the APF ship is tasked to support a contingency. In addition to the APF assets, the model considers U.S.-based supply points used to augment on-hand and APF-provided munitions assets. The primary objective is to minimize the overall response time involved with offloading these ships and transporting their cargo (the munitions) to the intended point of use. e-Po model developed is a mixed integer program, implemented using the general algebraic modeling system (GAMS), solved using the XA solver package, and tested against a realistically stressing planning scenario. Analytical results and insights are presented along with avenues for further work.