U.S. Navy

UNREP Ships

Underway replenishment is America's single greatest naval advantage — the ability to sustain carrier strike groups at sea indefinitely without returning to port. Ammunition ships, combat stores ships, and fast combat support ships deliver fuel, ordnance, food, and spare parts to the fleet at sea, in any weather, at speed. From Service Force Pacific winning WWII to Supply-class AOEs keeping today's carriers on station — logistics is the war.

World War II - Service Force Pacific 1941 - 1945

Service Force Pacific

The Fleet Train That Won the War

Service Force Pacific Fleet was the largest mobile logistics operation in the history of warfare. Over 600 ships — oilers, ammunition ships, store ships, fleet tugs, repair ships, hospital ships, and tenders — sustained the Pacific Fleet across an ocean that stretched 5,000 miles from Pearl Harbor to Tokyo. At Ulithi Atoll, the fleet train assembled the largest anchorage in the world: a floating city of support ships that kept the Fast Carrier Task Force at sea for months without returning to port. Japan lost the war when it lost the ability to supply its fleet. America won it because it never did. Read more

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Mount Hood-Class

Ammunition Ships

Ammunition ships that carried every type of naval ordnance — gun projectiles, powder charges, bombs, torpedoes, depth charges, mines, and rockets — to the fleet at sea. The most dangerous ships in the Navy. One hit to the cargo and the ship ceases to exist. USS Mount Hood (AE-11) exploded at Manus anchorage on November 10, 1944 — detonating with such force that the ship was completely disintegrated. Forty-five ships were damaged. Two hundred ninety-six men were killed instantly. No identifiable remains were ever recovered. Read more

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PROVISIONS + CARGO

Stores Ships (AF/AK/AKS)

Refrigerated Stores & Cargo

Refrigerated stores ships (AF) kept the fleet fed with fresh and frozen food. Cargo ships (AK) carried replacement parts, equipment, and general supplies. Stores issue ships (AKS) were floating warehouses stocked with everything from engine bearings to toothpaste. And all of them carried mail — the single most important cargo for morale. A sailor who gets mail fights better. The stores ships that kept three million men fed, equipped, and connected to home across the largest ocean on Earth. Read more

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Cold War — One-Stop UNREP 1961 - 1991

Sacramento-Class

Fast Combat Support Ships

Fuel + Ammo + Stores

The one-stop UNREP ship. Sacramento-class fast combat support ships carried fuel, ammunition, and dry stores in a single 53,000-ton hull capable of 26 knots — fast enough to keep pace with carrier battle groups. Before the AOE concept, a carrier had to refuel from an oiler, then rearm from an ammunition ship, then replenish from a stores ship — three separate evolutions. Sacramento combined all three. One ship, one alongside, everything the battle group needed. The concept that transformed underway replenishment from a scheduling nightmare into a single evolution. Read more

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Suribachi & Nitro-Class

Cold War Ammunition Ships

Ordnance Storage

Purpose-built to handle the Navy's expanding guided missile inventory alongside conventional ordnance. Suribachi and Nitro-class ships could store, maintain, and transfer Terrier, Tartar, and later Standard missiles along with gun ammunition, torpedoes, and air-dropped ordnance. The magazines were climate-controlled and specially configured for missile stowage — a capability WWII ammunition ships never needed. The guided missile revolution demanded new logistics, and these ships delivered it. Read more

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Last Navy Ammunition Ships

The last dedicated ammunition ships built for the U.S. Navy. Kilauea-class ships could handle every weapon in the fleet inventory — from 5-inch gun rounds to Harpoon missiles to VLS canisters for Tomahawk and Standard missiles. Fast cargo handling systems using tensioned highline rigs transferred ordnance ship-to-ship at sea in any weather. Several were converted to MSC civilian-manned ships (T-AE). The last was decommissioned in 2012. No direct replacement — the ammunition mission was folded into the Lewis and Clark-class dry cargo ships. Read more

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Combat Stores Ships

Dedicated combat stores ships that carried food, spare parts, and general supplies to the fleet at sea. Mars-class ships could transfer dry stores via helicopter vertical replenishment (VERTREP) and connected replenishment (CONREP) simultaneously — helicopters lifting pallets to flight decks while highlines swung loads between ships steaming side by side at 15 knots. Seven ships kept carrier battle groups supplied from the Mediterranean to the Western Pacific for three decades. Replaced by the Lewis and Clark-class, which combined the stores and ammunition missions into one hull. Read more

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Military Sealift Command Era 1990 - Present

T-AOE-6 - T-AOE-10

Fast Combat Support Ships

Fuel + Ammo + Stores

The Sacramento replacement — MSC-crewed fast combat support ships capable of 26 knots with small Navy detachments for helicopter operations and weapons handling. Four ships carry fuel, ammunition, and dry stores for the carrier strike groups. USNS Supply, USNS Rainier, USNS Arctic, and USNS Bridge — each one a floating Walmart and gas station and ammunition dump, steaming alongside nuclear carriers at speed and transferring everything the battle group needs to keep fighting. The Supply-class is aging with no funded replacement for the one-stop UNREP mission. Read more

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T-AKE-1 - T-AKE-14

Lewis and Clark-Class

Dry Cargo/Ammunition Ships

The workhorses of the current UNREP fleet. Lewis and Clark-class ships replaced both the ammunition ships (AE) and combat stores ships (AFS) with a single hull that carries ordnance, provisions, and spare parts. Fourteen ships, MSC-crewed, shuttling between combat logistics force stations and carrier strike groups worldwide. They pick up cargo at shore depots, sail to the shuttle point, and transfer it to the Supply-class AOEs or directly to combatants at sea. The backbone of the Navy's at-sea logistics chain. Read more

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Underway Replenishment

The American Advantage

Connected Replen

Vertical Replen

THE US CAN DO THIS

The United States Navy invented underway replenishment and remains the only navy that can sustain carrier strike groups at sea indefinitely. The first alongside fueling at sea occurred in 1899. By WWII, the Navy had perfected the tensioned highline rig, the span wire, and the probe-and-drogue fueling system. VERTREP — using helicopters to transfer pallets between ships — was developed in the 1960s. Today, a carrier strike group can fight for weeks without touching port, resupplied entirely at sea by UNREP ships. No other navy on Earth can do this at scale. It is America's single greatest naval advantage, and it is entirely dependent on having enough replenishment ships in the right place at the right time. Read more

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200+

UNREP Ships

AE/AFS/AOE

Ship Types

125+

Years of UNREP

Supply

Wins Wars