Mr Doug Sizelove, Assistant, Deputy Under Secretary of the Army (Operations Research) (DUSA(OR)), substituting for Mr Walter W. Hollis, FS, DUSA(OR) and Sponsor of MORS, presented Photo 1 the 2001 Dr Wilbur B. Payne Memorial Award for Excellence in Analysis on 10 October 2001 at the opening session of the 40th Army Operations Research Symposium held at Fort Lee, Virginia 9-11 October 2001. This award is named for Dr Wilbur B. Payne, the first to hold the office of DUSA(OR). He served a distinguished career as an Army operations analyst, starting in the mid 1950s. Dr Payne often served on the review panel for candidate papers, contributing significantly to the criteria now used to judge papers for the award. He has been referred to as the "founding father of the Army Operations Research analysis community. For the first time in the history of the Payne Award presentation, one agency, the Center for Army Analysis (CAA) located at Fort Belvoir, Virginia, received both the "Individual Analyst" and the "Group Category" awards in a given year.

The recipient of the award for the "Individual Category" was LTC Michael E. Woodgerd for his work entitled "CargoLifter Aerial Transport System (CATS)." This study started as an internal CAA initiative that was subsequently sponsored by the HQDA Deputy Chief of Staff for Logistics. It examined the military utility of Ultra Large Airlifters (ULAs) and provided an assessment of Lighter-Than-Air (LTA) technology use for military operational employment role. CargoLifter (CL-160) airships being built by a CargoLifter AG, a German civilian company, were analyzed to determine the value added to force closure in a major theater war (MTW) or small scale contingencies (SSCs), its cost, locations in the world it can reach, and its survivability. Historical lessons learned and Civil Reserve Air Fleet (CRAF) suitability were also addressed. The analysis showed that there is significant military potential for short-term gain with low technological and commercial risk.

The "Group Category" award winning analysis also addressed strategic mobility alternatives that will assist the Army in meeting the Chief of Staff, Army deployment goals for flexible response to a range of global contingencies. The Enabling Strategic Responsiveness (ESR) CAA study team award recipients Photo 2 were LTC Keith D. Solveson, LTC William J. Tarantino, Mr Reginald V. Burks, Ms Keisha King, Ms Margaret Loudin, Ms Doris J. Futrell, Mr James F. Keller, Jr., Dr Sean P. O'Brien, Mr Mark Ricks and Ms Belinda H. Scheber. Other contributors were Dr Terry Harrison and Dr Elena Katak of Pennsylvania State University and Mr Ron Bailey, Mr Ricky Capone, and Mr James Weiss of the Logistics Management Institute. The ESR study focused on the prepositioning element of the strategic mobility triad and further enhanced its contribution by also addressing the airlift and sealift options and alternatives for meeting deployment goals and flexible response capability. The analysis addressed the capability to rapidly deploy both legacy and future forces (Interim Brigade Combat Team, Interim Division) using existing and potential new lift assets. This broad-based examination of response capability and flexibility provided an excellent assessment of current capability that serves as a benchmark for measuring needed improvements and force design changes to meet Army force projection objectives in future contingencies. The major breakthrough in making this analysis particularly critical in terms of impact on Army and DoD force decisions is that the prepo site alternatives are based on both potential areas of US military involvement and on site effectiveness. The unique approach of combining and integrating the results of simulation, mathematical optimization and country instability estimation modeling across a wide spectrum of Dynamic Commitment countries, different weighting schemes and cost considerations resulted in a comprehensive assessment for screening and ranking potential prepositioning sites.