• Military Menu                       

• Introduction
• Systems
• Facilities
• Agencies
• Industry
• Operations
• Countries
• Hot Documents
• News
• Reports
• Policy
• Budget
• Congress
• Links

• WMD
• Intelligence
• Homeland Security
• Space

Voluntary Intermodal Sealift Agreement (VISA)

The Voluntary Intermodal Shipping Agreement initiative is intended to make commercial, intermodal, dry cargo capacity and supporting global infrastructure available to meet contingency deployment requirements of the Department of Defense. Modeled after the US Air Force Civil Reserve Air Fleet (CRAF) program, VISA will allow carriers to provide ships and trained crews in three stages depending upon the severity and expected duration of the contingency. VISA calls for comprehensive and integrated peacetime planning and exercises by the Maritime Administration, US Transportation Command, the Navy's Military Sealift Command, and the US intermodal ocean carrier industry.

The Voluntary Intermodal Sealift Agreement (VISA) program is an initiative to provide assured access to commercial shipping and intermodal facilities during contingencies, and will benefit both commercial industry and DoD. It commits carriers to provide shipping capacity, rather than a specific number of ships, to support DoD requirements. It also allows shippers to carry military cargo alongside commercial cargo. DoD's peacetime business with a carrier will be tied to the level of that carrier's commitment of assets and services.

All major U.S. carriers have approved and joined the VISA program and its Joint Planning Advisory Group (JPAG). An interagency, government-industry forum for joint planning, JPAG has formally convened and is now working on concepts of operations for sealift support of major defense contingency plans.

Jointly sponsored by MARAD and USTRANSCOM, VISA will provide pre-negotiated contracts, guaranteed access to needed sustainment assets, contracts for capacity and intermodal resources in exchange for cargo business and a tailored sealift force to meet the specific needs of a contingency. It also will permit industry and USTRANSCOM to plan responses together before a contingency begins.