The B-52 Stratofortress—the United States’ oldest active service airplane—is practicing for a new kind of mission. Instead of bombs, the enormous strategic bomber will be dropping military cargo.

The exercise, part of what the U.S. Air Force calls Agile Combat Employment, is a decentralized system of delivering cargo to various locations throughout a combat theater. In a statement, Barksdale Air Force Base,  the location of the recent B-52 exercise, explained that “ACE exercises practice distributed operations from dispersed locations to increase survivability while generating combat power.”

It added that “this defensive posture increases the scope and scale of friendly force locations, boosts deterrence to adversary aggression and assures allies by presenting a credible combat force.”

This decentralized basing and resupply concept has taken on new importance in recent months. The ongoing war in Ukraine—which recently reached the six-month mark—has shown the dangers of highly centralized logistics and resupply.

American-supplied HIMARS, an acronym for High Mobility Artillery Rocket System, has been employed by Ukrainian forces to devastating effect against ammunition dumps deep behind Russian lines. The effect has been nearly immediate as Russia has struggled to move ammunition to its artillery forces thanks to the Ukrainian strikes.

“As we modernize our bomber force and bridge to the future, how we tailor and project our bombers will ultimately help assure our allies and partners and deter U.S. adversaries,” Maj. Gen. Andrew J. Gebara, Eighth Air Force and Joint-Global Strike Operations Center commander, said in the U.S. Air Force statement.

The statement also explained that the “B-52 On-Board Cargo System, or BOCS, is a cargo container that connects to the operational bomb bays inside the aircraft.” It added that “the cargo system is capable of holding up to 5,000 pounds of maintenance and support equipment. Each deploying B-52 can carry two BOCSs for an airlift capability of 10,000 pounds total and can decrease, or even possibly eliminate, the need for en-route cargo support.”

Barksdale explained that “unlike some large-scale Bomber Task Force missions, bomber ACE operations would not alert locals and adversaries to upcoming missions. The use of BOCSs on ACE missions decreases the large footprint and avoids exposing mission preparation activities.”

“Thanks to their efforts, we have proven the ability to put significant firepower on target without the large footprint we are used to seeing and the adversary is used to seeing well in advance of our operational movement,” Major General Andrew Gebara explained.

Caleb Larson is a multimedia journalist and defense writer with the National Interest. A graduate of UCLA, he also holds a Master of Public Policy and lives in Berlin. He covers the intersection of conflict, security, and technology, focusing on American foreign policy, European security, and German society for both print and radio. Follow him on Twitter @calebmlarson.

Image: Flickr/U.S. Air Force.