Seapower/Maritime

Sea Power, Jan 2002

Mission. The Maritime Administration (MARAD), an agency of the Department of Transportation, administers federal laws that foster and maintain a U.S. merchant marine capable of meeting the nation's shipping needs for domestic and international waterborne commerce and national security. MARAD also seeks to ensure that the United States enjoys adequate shipbuilding and repair services and possesses efficient and adequate port capacity complemented by effective intermodal water and landside transportation. The agency promotes the use of U.S.-flag vessels, manages an active reserve of ships in the Ready Reserve Force (RRF), maintains an inactive inventory of ships in the National Defense Reserve Fleet (NDRF), and ensures the availability of a pool of highly skilled merchant marine officers and seafarers through its operation of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy at Kings Point, N.Y., and its support of six state maritime academies (in California, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York, and Texas).

With expanding economic globalization, a massive increase in international trade and cargo-and the corresponding growth in both environmental impacts and congestion of landside transportation-MARAD has sharpened its focus on logistics, ports, intermodalism, environmental activities, and international trade practices. Ensuring environmentally sound transportation to meet future U.S. national-security and commercial needs requires a well-- planned and truly integrated multimodal transportation system. Moreover, international standards have become increasingly important in maintaining the integrity of U.S. commerce and the competitiveness and strength of the U.S. maritime industrial base.

Strategic Planning and Performance Feedback

MARAD's Strategic Plan sets out a course of action for managing and carrying out MARAD's vision for the maritime transportation system. The plan also serves as a framework for reporting important annual performance information, which is used by MARAD officials, the president, Congress, and interested members of both the public and maritime industry to judge the effectiveness of MARAD.

By creating a strong link between mission, strategic objectives, resources expended, and subsequent performance, MARAD hopes to show what is being accomplished and why it is important, and yet also promote accountability and demonstrate the cost effectiveness of its accomplishments. MARAD officials and staff will use performance information and customer feedback to improve future operations and plan future efforts.

Historical Perspective

The United States is a maritime nation. America has long relied heavily on its merchant marine and maritime industries to establish and maintain its preeminence as a major economic power as well as to provide for its defense. Even in early colonial times America's merchant marine was an important auxiliary to the British Navy. As ties between the mother country and the 13 colonies strained and ultimately broke, America's merchant marine played a vital role in the war for independence and the peace that followed.

International Trade. By the late 1780s, the upstart Yankee nation had added the West Indies and India-as well as Baltic, Mediterranean, and African ports-to its already flourishing trade with England, France, and China. It took only a generation of Yankee ingenuity and persistence before the American-flag fleet was carrying nearly one million tons of cargo to ports around the globe. By 1826, U.S.-flag merchant vessels transported 92 percent of America's foreign trade.

Today, 95 percent of the nation's huge overseas trade still moves by water, but only about three percent is carried by the U.S.-flag fleet. This downward spiral has disturbing implications for America's national security and economic vigor. Without a U.S.flag fleet, the nation's foreign commerce and its auxiliary sealift capability would depend exclusively on foreign-flag ships.

Oceangoing jobs did employ nearly 16,000 U.S. citizen-mariners as of 1 January 2000. Maritime-related shore-- side activities engage thousands more. During 1999, U.S. corporations earned approximately $3.8 billion in freight and charter revenues from the operations of U.S.-flag liner vessels, contributing millions of tax dollars for federal, state, and local governments.

United States Shipbuilding. Well-- endowed with resources, the United States stood alone as the undisputed world leader in shipbuilding until the 1850s. World Wars I and II further increased output during the 20th century. However, the nation's surplus of vessels amassed after World War II dampened world demand for new construction and forced the shutdown of most U.S. shipbuilding capacity.

Later, the Cold War spurred new naval construction. Large and sustained investments in core technologies, coupled with continuing major efforts in research and development programs, pushed the industry to new heights, and American shipbuilders again assumed a preeminent position, producing the world's most sophisticated, capable, and complex warships. The sheer strength of domestic (primarily U.S. Navy) demand in this industry provided sufficient activity so that American shipbuilders did not have to compete in the international market.