Navy Supply Corps (United States)
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| U.S Navy Supply Corps | |
|---|---|
 Collar and Sleeve Insignia of the U.S. Navy Supply Corps |
|
| Active | 23 February 1795 - present |
| Country | United States of America |
| Allegiance |  U.S.A. |
| Branch | U.S. Navy (Active & Reserve Component) |
| Type | Staff Corps |
| Role | Sustain U.S. Navy and U.S. Military Operations worldwide |
| Size | ~3565 Supply Officers |
| Nickname | SUPPOs, Chops, Pork Chops |
| Motto | "Ready for Sea" "Ready, Resourceful, Responsive" |
| Anniversaries | 23 February |
| Engagements | Every U.S. engagement since the 1798 Undeclared Naval War with France - present |
| Commanders | |
| Current commander |
RADM Alan S. Thompson, SC, USN Chief, U.S. Navy Supply Corps |
The Supply Corps of the United States Navy traces its beginnings to February 23, 1795 when the nation's first Purveyor of Public Supplies, Tench Francis, Jr., was appointed by President George Washington. The Supply Corps is one of the oldest staff corps in the U.S. Navy. Supply Corps officers are concerned with supply, logistics, combat support, readiness, contracting and fiscal issues. The official motto of the Supply Corps is "Ready for Sea" -- reflecting the Supply Corps' longstanding role in sustaining warfighting.
Commissioned officers in the Supply Corps are schooled and experienced in a variety of disciplines such as supply management and expeditionary logistics, inventory control, disbursement, financial management, contracting, information systems, operations analysis, material and operational logistics, fuels management, food service and physical distribution.
Supply Corps officers can be members of a ship or shore activity's supply department or can be billeted into supply units/commands -- such as the Navy Expeditionary Logistics Support Group (NAVELSG), Fleet Industrial Supply Centers (FISCs) or Navy Special Warfare (SPECWAR) Logistics Groups which support the U.S. Navy SEALs. While Supply Corps officers are not eligible for command at sea, which is the province of certain unrestricted line officers, they can command supply units. A Supply Corps officer is always the Commanding Officer of a Naval Cargo Handling Battalion -- groups charged with stevedoring and logistics whose constituent companies are led by both Supply Corps and Civil Engineer Corps officers. Supply Corps officers also serve in forward deployed land-based units -- such as the U.S. Navy Seabees -- working right alongside Civil Engineer Corps officers and in a joint capacity with U.S. Marines.
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[edit] Navy Supply Corps School
New Supply Corps junior officers attend the Navy Supply Corps School (NSCS) in Athens, Georgia.
NSCS was first opened as the Navy Supply Corps School of Application in 1921, located at the Navy Department in Washington, D.C. After just three years the school was closed, and for the next ten years supply officers learned their profession on the job, at sea from senior supply officers and through formal, but independent coursework.
A more formal arrangement was achieved when the Naval Finance and Supply School was opened at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard in September 1934, for instruction of regular Navy Supply Corps officers. The training of reserve officers did not become available until 1940, when the Supply Corps Naval Reserve Officers School was established in Washington, D.C. After ten months the two schools were merged, creating the Navy Supply Corps School, located at the Harvard University Business School in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
During U.S. involvement in World War II, 13,000 officers graduated from NSCS at Harvard. In 1944, the Naval Supply Operational Training Center was established at the Naval Supply Depot in Bayonne, New Jersey. It was redesignated the Navy Supply Corps School in 1946, but within a few years it outgrew its facilities. Through the efforts of two Georgia politicians, U.S. Senator Richard B. Russell Jr. and U.S. Representative Carl Vinson, the school was moved to Athens, Georgia in 1954.
The Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) Commission of 2005 decreed that NSCS will be re-located to Naval Station Newport, Rhode Island in 2011.
[edit] Professional Qualifications
Supply Corps officers can earn one or more of four community warfare insignias: the Surface Warfare Supply Corps Officer (SWSCO) pin for supply officers serving onboard a ship; the Submarine Supply Officer pin for supply officers serving on Independent Duty as the SUPPO on a sub; the Naval Aviation Supply Officer (NASO) pin for supply officers serving in the S-6 division onboard a Carrier/Amphib or at a Naval Air Station (NAS) Aviation Supply Detachment (ASD); and the Seabee Combat Warfare Officer pin for supply officers assigned to a Navy Construction Battalion NCB/NMCB units. Officers must complete a rigorous[citation needed] personal qualification standard (PQS) program, demonstrate an extensive practical and applied knowledge of the specialty, and successfully stand before an oral examination board of senior officers (often referred to as a "Murder Board") to earn each warfare pin.
Earning a warfare qualification is often a prerequisite for promotion to senior officer ranks of Commander (O-5) and higher. A Supply Corps officer's future career promotion and assignment prospects can be negatively impacted if he/she served at an operational unit or onboard a ship, but failed to earn a warfare pin.
[edit] Additional Information
Supply Corps officers are sometimes called "SUPPOs", which is incorrect nomenclature except when referring to those officers who hold a department head billet. Aboard submarines the Supply Officer is known as the "Chop". While the term "Supply Officer" or SUPPO is a specific role which an officer may fill, there are also many other positions open to Supply Corps officers as this is an inherently multi-disciplinary career field. Enlisted ratings that comprise the Navy supply community are: SHs (Ship's Servicemen), who assist Supply Officers in managing shipboard retail and service activities; SKs (Storekeepers), who assist Supply Officers in managing inventories of parts and supplies; PSs (Personnel Specialists, a recent merger of the former Disbursing Clerk (DK) and Personnelman (PN) ratings), who assist with the disbursement of funds; CSs (Culinary Specialists, formerly known as Mess Management Specialists (MSs)), who manage and execute all food service operations; and PCs (Postal Clerks), who assist in the management of fleet postal activities). Supply Corps officers are nicknamed "pork chops" for the resemblance their distinctive oak leaf insignia is said to bear to that dish. If more than one Supply Corps officer is attached to a command, then the junior Supply Corps officer or officers are nicknamed "lamb chops".
Statistically, members of the Supply Corps have been involved in more intra-military criminal acts of misappropriation than other branches of the U.S. Navy, due to the exposure Supply Corps members have to large amounts of cash, goods, and other untraceable assets.[citation needed] A well known case in the 1980s had a U.S. Navy Supply Corps officer disappearing from the USS Kitty Hawk with close to five million dollars while the vessel was on deployment.[citation needed] Navy Supply Corps officers have also been robbed and murdered for the cash in their custody. Since that time, strict security countermeasures have drastically reduced the number of misappropriation and embezzlement incidents in the U.S. Navy Supply Corps.
The Navy Supply Corps Museum is located at the Supply Corps School in the historic Carnegie Library Building in Athens, Georgia.
[edit] Navy Supply Corps Leadership
Rear Admiral Alan S. Thompson is currently the highest ranking Supply Corps Officer in the U.S. Navy.
As of February 2008, RADM Thompson is the 44th Chief of the Supply Corps. RADM Mark D. Harnitchek is Director of Plans and Policy for U.S. Transportation Command (USTRANSCOM). The commanding officer of the Navy Supply Corps School is Captain Brian D. Sheppard, in command since June 2004.
Holding three stars, the highest ranking Supply Corps officer in U.S. Navy history is retired Vice Admiral Justin D. McCarthy. Until February 2007, VADM McCarthy was Director of Material Readiness and Logistics (N4) on the OPNAV Staff at the Pentagon, a position responsible for the strategic planning for all U.S. Navy Fleet readiness and logistics programs.
[edit] Notable U.S. Navy Supply Corps Officers
- Roy A. Anderson — CEO, Lockheed Corporation
- Eddie Carlson — CEO, United Airlines
- Benjamin Edwards — CEO, A.G. Edwards, Inc.
- A.G. Edwards — Former President, Chairman, CEO, A.G. Edwards, Inc.
- Roger Enrico — CEO, Pepsico
- Andrew Giordano — Chairman, JoS. A. Bank Clothiers
- Paul N. Howell — President and CEO, Howell Corporation
- A.G. Lafley — CEO, Procter & Gamble
- Bruce Laingen — U.S. Ambassador to Malta
- Melvin R. Laird — Secretary of Defense, 1969-1973
- Leonard Lauder — CEO, Estee Lauder
- Kenneth Lay — CEO, Enron
- Robert S. Levanthal — Dean of the University of Washington Business School/CEO of Western Union
- Keith Lippert — Director, Defense Logistics Agency, 2001-2006
- Bill Marriott — CEO, Marriott Hotels
- James J. Mulva — CEO, ConocoPhillips Oil Company
- Richard M. Nixon — 37th president of the United States
- Regis Philbin — Television personality
- Roger Staubach — Dallas Cowboys Quarterback, two-time Super Bowl Champion, NFL Hall of Famer, Exec. Chairman, The Staubach Company
- Ed Straw — COO, Estee Lauder
- John P. Durkin — CFO, Vodafone KK (2001-06), Nikko Cordial Financial Group (present)
- Toby Switzer — CEO and President, PWC Logistics Services KWC
[edit] Famous Quotes about Logisticians and Supply Officers
"The tactics, no, amateurs discuss tactics... Professional soldiers study logistics."
Tom Clancy, Author of Red Storm Rising
"You will not find it difficult to prove that battles, campaigns, and even wars have been won or lost primarily because of logistics."
General Dwight D. Eisenhower, U.S. Army
"I don't know what the hell this 'logistics' is that Marshall is always talking about, but I want some of it."
Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King, U.S. Navy
"The essence of flexibility is in the mind of the commander; the substance of flexibility is in logistics."
Rear Admiral Henry E. Eccles, U.S. Navy
"Logistics...in the broadest sense, the three big M's of warfare: material, movement, and maintenance. If international politics is 'the art of the possible,' and war is its instrument, logistics is the art of defining and extending the possible. It provides the substance that physically permits an army to live and move and have its being."
James A. Huston, Author of The Sinews of War: Army Logistics 1775-1953
"Logistics: the practical art of moving armies"
Antoine-Henri Jomini, French Army General and Military Theorist
"My logisticians are a humorless lot...they know if my campaign fails, they are the first ones I will slay."
Alexander the Great
[edit] References and External Links
- U.S. Naval Supply Systems Command - Mechanicsburg, PA - official site.
- U.S. Navy Supply Corps School - Athens, Georgia- official site.
- U.S. Naval War College - Newport, Rhode Island - official site.
- WWW Virtual Library: Logistics
- Naval Logistics Library - official site.
