Throughout our Navy careers, paths often cross in ways we don’t anticipate. This is precisely how our journey unfolded. Two supply officers (SUPPOs) with varied experiences in special warfare, contracting and amphibious operations. We first met in Virginia Beach supporting special operations forces (SOF), then reconnected five years later in Hampton Roads as part of amphibious ready group USS Bataan (LHD 5), tackling the contested logistics environment of the COVID-19 pandemic during an unplanned deployment shift to U.S. 5th Fleet responding to Iran-incited protests at the U.S. Embassy in Iraq.
Our careers – divergent yet deeply intertwined – recently converged again when we both attended the Maritime Advanced Warfighting School (MAWS) at the Naval War College, though not simultaneously. Despite the gap between our graduations, we now find ourselves serving in parallel roles as planners – Lt. Cmdr. Harmony at U.S. Indo-Pacific Command (USINDOPACOM) and Lt. Cmdr. Diaz at U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM). At this point, we share insights from our transformative journey through MAWS and how it advanced our understanding of joint logistics operations.
Beyond the Waterline
Historically, the Navy has been less “jointly minded” than our Army counterparts. Army officers routinely plan and execute support to other services as the executive agent, while many SUPPOs focus primarily on shipboard logistics, including underway replenishments (UNREPs) and sustainment port-to-port.
This service-centric approach, though tactically sound, becomes a liability at the higher levels of war and as we transition to Joint Staffs, where logistics planning must simultaneously account for land, sea, air, space and cyberspace. A plan must sustain not only the task forces assigned to the theater Joint Force Maritime Component Commander, but also all other component commanders, land, air and special operations.
At the combatant command level, logistics planners must orchestrate a symphony of capabilities. Our job isn’t just to ensure adequate supplies exist; it’s to tune operational plans for feasibility and sustainability through the lens of the Joint Logistics Enterprise (JLENT). This means understanding logistics command and control structures across services, optimizing inter- and intra-theater transload locations and identifying opportunities to eliminate duplicative efforts to build joint efficiencies across components.
MAWS Transformation
Enter MAWS – sometimes called “Saltwater SAMS” – in reference to the Army’s prestigious School of Advanced Military Studies. This intensive 13-month resident program at the Naval War College operates under the motto “Strike Effectively First,” but for logisticians, it might better read “Think Jointly First.”
MAWS differentiates itself significantly from traditional Joint Professional Military Education (JPME), moving beyond foundational joint concepts to expertly train officers in operational art: planning and executing operations at the operational level of war. Our experience at MAWS felt akin to earning a master's degree in geopolitics and advanced problem-solving, immersed deeply in strategic and operational military challenges. The curriculum demanded far more than logistics fluency; it pushed us to analyze evolving geopolitical dynamics, decipher joint and coalition force structures and develop campaign plans that aligned with strategic guidance. Just as important, MAWS honed our ability to convey complex operational ideas to senior leaders – an essential skill as we moved from executing logistics tasks to shaping decisions at the combatant command level. This grounding set the stage for one of the program’s core strengths: a deep, practical understanding of operational art.
What is operational art? Think of it as the intermediary layer between strategy and tactics. It’s how we translate broad theater strategic objectives and national desired end states into specific operational objectives, then connect those down through tactical employment of forces. Operational art bridges the gap between what we want to achieve politically and how individual units execute missions on the ground. For logisticians, this means understanding not just what supplies are needed, but how logistics interconnects through all levels of war to enable operations and extend operational reach. It’s the difference between moving pallets and enabling campaign effects – transforming logistics from a reactive function into a strategic capability.
Requirements-Based to Capability-Focused
Traditional Navy SUPPOs operate in a requirements-based environment. Tactical units – ships, aircraft, or components thereof – submit demands and we fill them. This reactive approach – while necessary at tactical levels – proves inadequate at operational and strategic levels where we must anticipate needs and build sustainable support frameworks.
MAWS – combined with combatant command experience – transforms this mindset. Instead of simply responding to requirements, we learn to embrace the uncomfortable unknown of building concepts for logistics support frameworks that enable tactical units to sustain themselves in contested environments capitalizing on the JLENT.
This shift is profound. For example, at USINDOPACOM, logistics planning centers on strategic posturing and sustaining forces across vast distances. Success requires intermediate staging bases across multiple nations, sophisticated prepositioning strategies and robust theater distribution networks that can function under enemy fire and adapt to changes in access, basing and overflight. Traditional Navy logistics training – focused on blue-water operations – provides little preparation for these challenges.
Similarly, at USSOCOM, logistics planners must balance global force deployment cycles, tailored sustainment packages and rapidly adapt to dynamic operational environments across multiple geographic theaters simultaneously. The traditional SUPPO toolkit of UNREPs and supply requisitions becomes woefully inadequate.
Two Different Worlds, Same Foundation
Though both USINDOPACOM and USSOCOM are joint combatant commands, their operational environments differ dramatically, illustrating the breadth of challenges that joint logisticians must master.
USINDOPACOM operates as a geographically aligned command with a clearly defined area of responsibility spanning the vast Indo-Pacific region. Here, logistics planning emphasizes strategic deterrence against peer adversaries, requiring the coordination of allied and partner nation logistics capabilities across multiple time zones and thousands of miles of ocean. The challenge is sustaining large-scale conventional forces across the world’s largest theater, where every supply line stretches thousands of miles and operates under the constant threat of interdiction.
USSOCOM functions as a hybrid organization – both a functional combatant command responsible for special operations forces globally and a service-like headquarters managing specialized capabilities. Unlike USINDOPACOM’s geographic focus, USSOCOM logistics planners must coordinate simultaneous operations across all geographic combatant commands through theater Special Operations Commands like Special Operations Command Pacific at USINDOPACOM. The complexity involves managing small, specialized force packages with unique requirements while maintaining the agility to respond to crises anywhere in the world within hours.
These contrasting environments – one focused on large-scale deterrence in a single theater, the other on agile global response – demonstrate why traditional service-specific logistics training proves insufficient for modern joint operations. Despite these differences, our shared MAWS education provides the common foundation for approaching complex problems in both commands. The advanced operational design concepts learned at MAWS inform planning scenarios involving integrated deterrence, contested logistics and joint operations regardless of the specific command structure.
SUPPOs As Key Operational Enablers
One key MAWS takeaway is the imperative for logisticians to think beyond traditional supply chain paradigms and recognize the vital role SUPPOs play in enabling operations. The future security environment demands logisticians who understand strategic intent, operational art and warfighting beyond a supporting role.
Lt. Cmdr. Harmony serves in the logistics strategy and war plans division of USINDOPACOM. As the sustainment operational planning team (OPT) lead for the premier OPLAN, he guides more than 135 personnel in refining sustainment strategy crucial to the operational readiness and future security of the Indo-Pacific theater against peer adversaries. The specialized training of MAWS has synergized stakeholders from across the Joint Staff, DLA, TRANSCOM and multiple service components to validate resource allocation and optimize OPLAN sustainability and feasibility.
Lt. Cmdr. Diaz led the rewrite of USSOCOM’s Campaign Plan for Global Special Operations (CP-GSO) while serving in the J5. The CP-GSO serves as the foundational plan for a 70,000-person formation conducting SOF operations, activities and investments in competition to prepare the environment short of conflict. The operational art tools taught by MAWS were essential in guiding an OPT of more than 75 personnel to synthesize the National Defense Strategy and Joint Strategic Campaign Plan into a globally integrated SOF campaign – critical to USSOCOM’s global mission.
These examples demonstrate how MAWS education challenged us to break away from comfortable tactical logistics perspectives and develop comprehensive operational approaches essential to senior-level planning roles.
From Observers to Shapers
For SUPPOs considering advanced military education, understand this: the future fight will be joint, contested and unforgiving of service parochialism. Traditional Navy logistics approaches – while foundational – are insufficient for the complex operational environments we now face.
Looking back, our MAWS experience was genuinely transformative. It broadened our perspectives, sharpened our analytical thinking and prepared us to advise senior leaders at the highest levels of operational and strategic decision-making. As Supply Corps officers serving in distinct but equally critical roles, we now apply this education to enhance our commands’ readiness, resilience and ability to respond across the full spectrum of operations. At the combatant command level, that foundation doesn’t just inform – it enables real-world impact, turning planning into power.
MAWS equips logisticians to transcend service boundaries, embrace joint and combined thinking and drive strategic outcomes in support of national security objectives. It transforms requirement-fillers into capability-enablers – and passive observers into deliberate shapers of the fight. If you want to shape outcomes – not just watch them unfold – plan hard, think deep and make logistics matter. MAWS is where that transformation begins.
(Stock image above is of a past MAWS course. Courtesy image from the U.S. Naval War College.)
