A new report has revealed that the temporary pier the US military deployed to Gaza was more dangerous than previously known. The Pentagon’s inspector general’s office released a report that said a total of 62 people were injured during the deployment.
The pier, called Joint Logistics Over-the-Shore (JLOTS) was ordered by the White House to be sent to Gaza in March of 2024. It was supposed to help deliver humanitarian aid.
From the beginning, it was obvious this was a bad choice. The forces lacked training and equipment for the mission. The US Army is supposed to be responsible for the capability to deploy a floating pier.
However, the army watercraft for the mission was not ready. There were only 64 vessels due to the downsizing of this capability.
But instead of telling the Pentagon and the president that it was ill-prepared, the army went ahead anyway. This wasn’t a place and time for heroism. The US wasn’t fighting a war. This also wasn’t an aid mission to a hostile place. This was a mission to Gaza, which is controlled by Israel.
Therein lies the core question: why did the US need to send vessels thousands of miles across an ocean, which took months to reach Gaza's coast, carrying humanitarian aid that could have been delivered by trucks across the border?
Israel at the time had cut off most of the land crossings to Gaza. If the US wanted to send aid, why didn’t it just make an arrangement with Israel to deliver it via trucks from Ashdod? In fact, that is what eventually happened. The pier was not necessary. Nevertheless, it set sail and was erected in May but only functioned for a few weeks due to bad weather.
It turns out that there was no real study conducted to see if weather conditions and Gaza's coastline were appropriate for the mission.
A report at Marine Executive noted that “In addition, the Army and Navy pontoon systems were different and resulted in damage when used together.
"They were designed with different amounts of freeboard, and Army boats would ram into and puncture the sides of taller Navy pontoons. After challenges experienced in a previous exercise, the services had concluded that these systems could not be used together - but they were still deployed and combined for the operation off Gaza.”
The long list of problems makes it clear how badly this mission was planned.
“In the run-up to the deployment, planners also failed to take beach conditions and sea states at the site under consideration - a profound and inexplicable error for this particular system. Certain elements of the JLOTS pier and pontoon system are rated for surface conditions of sea state at three or less, equivalent to a gentle breeze and waves of less than four feet," the Marine Executive noted.
"These conditions could be expected in a sheltered bay or harbor, but the operating site was on an exposed beachhead facing the sea. One bout of rough weather tore the pier structure apart and scattered pontoon sections along the beachfront, and after this experience, the operating units were forced to remove and withdraw the structure to the shelter of a nearby port whenever the forecast called for higher waves,” it added.
Lessons to learn from the pier incident
There should be many lessons learned here. The US should not send soldiers on missions that they are not ready for, unless it is absolutely necessary. It also shouldn’t need to supply humanitarian aid to an area that is under the control of an ally, such as Israel.
Instead, the US should work with countries like Israel to have aid trucked in. Why should US soldiers be deployed thousands of miles away when Israel receives support from the US and can coordinate this kind of mission?
The fact that more soldiers were injured than previously known is also a red flag. It illustrates that the previous US administration was not forthcoming about this failure and that no one spoke up at the time.
I saw part of the pier in 2024 when it washed ashore after a storm on the coast. It had to be pulled off the beach. It was clear at the time how much this mission was a struggle. It would have been better to learn the lessons at the time rather than have to wait a year.