U.S. Begins Packing Its Afghan War Gear for the Movers

Source: NYT

It has taken the United States years to amass the mountains of gear piled up at huge bases like Camp Leatherneck in southern Afghanistan. It is the job of logistics experts like First Lt. Rachel Opperman, 23, to bring it all back home.

As the war here draws to a close and the American military begins to reduce its forces, it also has to send back most of its equipment, an immense logistics effort already under way and spanning half the globe.

Lieutenant Opperman, a Marine from Pittsburgh who is known here as the Queen of the Sort Lot, runs one of the big receiving yards, a dusty, 12-acre lot that is taking in superfluous equipment as bases shrink, close or are transferred to the Afghan forces all over the southwest of the country.

One recent morning here, Marines ranged slowly in the 100-degree heat under her direction, packing piles of supplies into 5-foot-by-5-foot boxes. Forklifts shifted the boxes onto pallets electronically tagged so their journeys could be tracked to Marine bases or depots in the United States and Japan, bringing order to the chaos of a staggeringly complex 24-hour reverse supply chain operation.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/04/world/asia/in-afghanistan-us-packs-war-gear-for-the-movers.html?pagewanted=all