Strategic sealift ships

PFC William B. Baugh docked at Port Canaveral, Florida, in 2008
USNS PFC Dewayne T. Williams, USNS Dahl, and USNS Maj. Stephen W. Pless anchored off the coast of Saipan in June 2011

Strategic sealift ships are part of the United States Military Sealift Command's (MSC) prepositioning program. There are currently 17[1][2] ships in the program, strategically positioned around the world to support the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Defense Logistics Agency. Most are named after Medal of Honor recipients from the service they support.[2][3][4] The ships are assigned to two[5] Military Prepositioning Ship (MPS) squadrons[6] located in the Indian Ocean at Diego Garcia and in the Western Pacific Ocean at Guam and Saipan.

The MPS ships in each squadron have sufficient equipment, supplies and ammunition to support a Marine Air-Ground Task Force for 30 days. The MPS ships are self-sustaining, with cranes to unload at sea or pierside. MSC chartered the first two ship classes in the MPS role (the Corporal Louis J. Hauge Jr. and Sergeant Matej Kocak classes) from civilian shipping lines and converted them. Later ships were purpose-built.

  1. ^ "Prepositioning (PM3)".
  2. ^ a b "Military Sealift Command Ship Inventorydate=". United States Navy Military Sealift Command. Retrieved 2 March 2012.
  3. ^ Chilcoat, BGen Robert A.; Henderson, Maj David S. (Spring 1994). "Army Prepositioning Afloat" (PDF). Joint Force Quarterly. Washington, D.C.: National Defense University: 51–57. Archived from the original (PDF) on 16 November 2001. Retrieved 2 March 2012.
  4. ^ "Army Prepositioned Stock (APS-3)". GlobalSecurity.org. Retrieved 2 March 2012.
  5. ^ "MPSRON ONE is disestablished". United States Navy's Military Sealift Command. November 2012. Retrieved 26 April 2018.
  6. ^ "Prepositioning (PM3)". United States Navy's Military Sealift Command. Retrieved 26 April 2018.