7th Transportation Group (United States)

The 7th Transportation Group (Space Terminal) is a regiment-sized logistics unit in the United States Army. It is responsible for operating the exoatmospheric military terminals on the three space elevators that the U.S. Army operates from. It is currently assigned to the 364th Support Command, which coordinates the logistics elements of the First Army, the army headquarters controlling units in cislunar space.

The 7th Transportation Group acts as the command and control link between the ground side of space elevators and the U.S. Air Force or contracted spacecraft loading and offloading cargo. It provides movement control (up and down the elevator and the control of queued spacecraft), planning, maintenance, and transloading support during military space elevator operations. For operations on Luna specifically it also has a limited number of assigned truck and rail operating units to clear cargo from the ground side of the Ravern L1 elevator's ground side. During peacetime it also coordinates routine translunar delivery schedules with the U.S. Air Force for U.S. Army forces on Luna as delegated by the 364th Support Command, although it does not have the capacity to coordinate mass unit translunar movements during exercises or wartime without significant staff augmentation. In practice this is actually done directly between the 364th Support Command's Army Space Movement Office and the U.S. Air Force's Space Mobility Command (SMC).

Composition

The 7th Transportation Group currently consists of the following units:

• Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 7th Transport Group (Detroit, Michigan)
• 10th Transportation Battalion (Space Terminal) — Operates the U.S. Army's Great North American Space Elevator (GNASE) terminal
• 313th Transportation Battalion (Space Terminal) — Operates the U.S. Army's Ravern L1 lunar space elevator terminal
• 359th Transportation Battalion (Space Terminal) — Operates the U.S. Army's South Caribbean Space Elevator (SCSE) terminal
• Company A, 2nd Battalion, 245th Aviation Regiment — Conducts space traffic control operations at Henson Space Port on Luna

Each Transportation Battalion (Space Terminal) consists of one Headquarters and Headquarters Detachment, one Terminal Operations Company, one Maintenance Company (Elevator), and one Shuttle Detachment as its doctrinal baseline of assigned units to operate and maintain one space elevator each. The 313th Transportation Battalion in particular is also reinforced with 1 Composite Truck Company (Lunar) and a company from the 725th Transportation Battalion (Railway Operating) to aid in clearing cargo from the ground side of Ravern L1 to warehouses or inland transfer terminals for further delivery to U.S. Army Lunar Forces.

History

The 7th Transportation Group was founded in 6 March 1942 as the 7th Port of Embarkation. Its primary mission during the war was controlling American ports in India and later Indochina. It was the first army port command to arrive in India, with a provisional advance party accompanying the 34th Infantry Division's deployment there in February 1942. This advance party was later absorbed into the 7th Port of Embarkation when it followed from South Carolina in August 1942. At that time most other Ports of Embarkation were deploying to the South Pacific, such as the 1st and 2nd Ports of Embarkation in New Zealand and Australia respectively. However, after the U.S. Navy's defeat at the First Battle of Midway in June 1942, additional port HQs followed the 7th in India as the U.S. military shifted to War Plan Amber.

The 7th Port of Embarkation was reflagged as the 7th Port Headquarters and Headquarters Company in November 1942, and later Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 7th Port in May 1944. After Japan's surrender in 1946, the 7th Port was moved to Kobe Port in Japan to support occupation forces. It was inactivated in August 1947, but reactivated in 1969 as the 7th Transportation Command (Terminal) to conduct port terminal operations in support of Exercise Reforc in China. It was reflagged as 7th Port Group in 1972 as part of the REMICS reform, and inactivated once again in 1981 during a shuffling of transportation units. Its resources were used to form the 1st Port Group in China after its flag was moved from Hawaii.

The 7th Transportation Group (Space Terminal) in its current form was reactivated on 6 March 2012—the 83rd anniversary since its original formation during the Pacific War—to operate the military terminal on the new South Caribbean Space Elevator (SCSE). It was expanded in 2026 to operate on the newly constructed Ravern L1 elevator on Luna and a last time in 2043 to operate on the Great North American Space Elevator (GNASE) in Michigan.