AMO Members On Sealift Stand-By As U.S. Launches War On Terrorism

AMO Members On Sealift Stand-By As U.S. Launches War On Terrorism

      U.S.-flagged merchant ships and the AMO members aboard them were on high alert at press time, awaiting the call to strategic sealift service as the U.S. launched a military response to the Sept. 11 airborne terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Arlington, Va., just outside of Washington.
     "As always, the men and women of AMO are ready to go," said the national president of the union as the U.S. began bombing strategic sites and suspected terrorist encampments in Afghanistan. "Many of them are aboard ship waiting for the word. Many others are calling in while on vacation, asking about assignments to ships in the U.S. Ready Reserve Force. I am proud of this membership--I know they will do whatever is asked of them without hesitation during this national emergency." He stressed that, while there was increasing vessel activity in Diego Garcia, the British island base in the Indian Ocean, there were no signs of a full-scale mobilization.
     AMO represents the engine and deck officers on scores of ships carrying defense cargoes or providing other services for the Navy's Military Sealift Command. These include large medium-speed roll-on/roll-off ships (LMSRs), roll-on/roll-offs prepositioned in Diego Garcia and the Far East, fast sealift ships, tankers, surveillance vessels, oceanographic survey ships, combination container-roll-on/roll-off ships, the world's largest semi-submersible heavy-lift ship, dry cargo and break-bulk freighters.
     AMO also represents the licensed officers aboard 39 of the 76 government-owned ships of the Ready Reserve Force, which are held by the Maritime Administration in varied readiness states for use by MSC in national security emergencies. All but one of the AMO-manned reserve vessels are identified for wartime break-out in the shortest time--four days.
     In addition, AMO represents the officers aboard seven of the 47 roll-on/roll-off, container, and lighter-aboard ships enrolled in the Maritime Security Program, which was authorized for 10 years at a total cost of $1 billion in the Maritime Security Act of 1996. Each of the 47 ships draws an estimated $2.1 million a year in government aid to help it compete against lower-cost foreign-flag ships in commercial foreign trade. In exchange for the stipends, the ships, their crews, and all intermodal and logistics support equipment owned by the participating companies are available to MSC as needed for defense purposes.
     MSP is administered by MARAD in conjunction with the larger VISA (Voluntary Intermodal Sealift Agreement) program. According to MARAD, there were 55 U.S.-flag shipping companies--many of them under AMO contract--participating in VISA as of May 1, 2001. The VISA fleet includes 114 ocean-going ships and 397 tugs, barges and other vessels available to the Department of Defense for wartime use.
     "We also have a large Jones Act fleet operating along the coasts, on the Great Lakes, and along the inland waterways," the AMO national president said. "The Jones Act fleet is a reliable source of ships--everything from container, trailer and roll-on/roll-off vessels to tankers to barges--that would be available to DOD. The Jones Act fleet is also a dependable source of the skilled seagoing labor the U.S. needs in defense emergencies."
     Meanwhile, published reports said MSC was scouting the world market for foreign-flag roll-on/roll-off ships, containerships, and other vessels it may want to buy or charter to use in any wide-scale military operation resulting from the terrorist attacks. One account from London said MSC had asked shipbrokers in Europe to provide information on all cargo ships due to arrive at U.S. East Coast ports by the end of this month. Another report from Paris said MSC was considering buying at least one multipurpose containership from a French firm.
     The crisis brought new focus on U.S. sealift capabilities and deficiencies, the first hard look at the picture since Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm in the Persian Gulf in 1990 and 1991.
     In Washington, military officials said U.S. sealift had improved since the Gulf war with the purchase, construction and conversion of roll-on/roll-off tonnage, improvements in the Ready Reserve and fast sealift fleets, VISA, and the MSP. But others said the U.S. remains short of suitable tonnage, and they pointed to a persistent shortage of civilian seagoing labor. Adding to the dilemma was the uncertainty about the type of military action taken against terrorist cells worldwide. Limited commando raids would be less dependent upon ocean transportation than a full-scale mobilization.
     "As in past crises, we will have to rely on ships to carry quite a bit of the beans and bullets and petroleum," retired Navy Vice Admiral Al Herberger told JoC Week magazine. "In Desert Storm, we ended up with a significant amount of sealift, and data showed 95 percent of the material had to go by sea," said Herberger, a sealift specialist in the Navy and the head of the Maritime Administration from 1993 to 1997. "That has been true in all conflicts."
     Clinton Whitehurst, an author specializing in maritime policy and a professor at Clemson University, advised relying on foreign-flagged and crewed ships only as a last resort. He noted that, during Desert Shield and Desert Storm, there were several documented cases of foreign crews refusing to bring MSC-chartered ships to Saudi Arabia and other war zone points.
     Noting that there are fewer than 9,000 U.S. seafaring jobs on U.S.-flag ships engaged in commercial trade, Whitehurst said it will be increasingly difficult to man sealift ships in a long war.
     Whitehurst said the sealift manpower problem will worsen when the International Maritime Organization's Convention on Standards of Training, Certification, and Watchkeeping for Seafarers (STCW) goes into effect in February 2002. STCW will prevent retired mariners from filling sealift jobs during the war, as they did in the Gulf 10 years ago, and it will prevent active but uncertified officers from taking sealift assignments outside the U.S. boundary line, Whitehurst explained.
     "If foreign-flag ships are not available, our sealift assets could be insufficient, particularly if we are fighting on two fronts," Whitehurst warned.

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