Commercial firms have operated on the battlefield in support of combatants since antiquity. This monograph examines the efficacy of current US Army doctrine and practice for contingency contracting. The Army's contingency contracting program is called the Logistics Civil Augmentation Program (LOGCAP). The primary research question is: Does the Logistics Civil Augmentation Program (LOGCAP) effectively leverage the private commercial sector at the tactical level of war? This Monograph concludes that in order to achieve tactical synergies, the Army should transform LOGCAP into a strategic outsourcing relationship. Battlefield outsourcing in the US Army began with the War of Independence. This tradition accelerated in the 20th century, especially during the Vietnam conflict. The US Army today relies on system contractors to maintain and support increasing numbers of end items of equipment on the battlefield. Since 1992, contingency contractors have been alerted and deployed on contingency missions in Somalia, Rwanda, Haiti, Italy, and Bosnia to provide a broad range of combat support and combat service support to US and allied forces. The LOGCAP concept attracted Congressional interest in 1996 when cost over-runs in Bosnia under Operation Joint Endeavor exceeded $111 million. The Government Accounting Office (GAO) criticized the program for lacking doctrine and guidance. Recent Army efforts to improve LOGCAP doctrine are mixed. These efforts lack a basis in organizational theory, are generally mechanistic, and partly disingenuous. Contemporary competitive business practices involve the identification of core competencies that deserve management's undivided attention. Non-core functions are outsourced not just to economize, but to gain the synergy of managerial focus. Strategic outsourcing goes even further by trying to innovate across core and non-core functions between two separate but partnered organizations. Army doctrine does not discuss synergies because the doctrine is not rooted in any organizational theory of outsourcing. The Army does not generally articulate a vision of outsourcing beyond a mechanistic view of filling holes in force structure, and thus is less likely to achieve tactical synergy with LOGCAP. This monograph proposes four initiatives to continue the evolution into a true public-private sector partnership that can create and harness tactical synergies. The four initiatives are: 1) Garner and signal senior leader commitment. 2) Focus on core competency identification. 3) Develop a strategic relationship between the Army and the LOGCAP contractor. 4) Create incentives for agents in the relationship to focus on tactical synergies. The Nineteen recommendations offered to implement these initiatives may require significant legal and cultural shifts, but they are similar to the techniques used in the private sector today to meet the challenges of globalized competition.

ADA 366278 Approved for public release; Distribution is unlimited. The opinions and conclusions expressed herein are those of the student-authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College or any other governmental agency. (References to these studies should include the foregoing statement.)