A salute to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

By Bll Crane

On November 11, at 11 a.m., whether or not I am able to attend a service or commemoration, I plan to pause and reflect on Veteran's Day on the service and sacrifice by the millions of American men and women who have served our nation in uniform with distinction in each service branch. On occasion, I try to shine a spotlight on that service and in this moment, I salute our U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

The United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) has roughly 37,000 civilian and military personnel (97% civilian). For purposes of comparison, the active duty U.S. Army has a force of 400,000. Our USACE remains one of the world's largest public engineering, design and construction management agencies. Though predominantly located domestically, the USACE also operates in Europe and the Middle East.

Georgia is within the Corps South Atlantic Division, which serves six states. This geographic region also contains one third of the stateside U.S. Army and its bases and one-fifth of the stateside U.S. Airforce. The Corps and this region also contain the world's largest environmental restoration project in The Everglades. The USACE supports the Department of Defense, as well as the Department of Homeland Security and FEMA in security planning, disaster preparedness and emergency response as well as service force protection and research development efforts.

The Corps is headquartered in Washington, D.C. with an annual budget of approximately $8-billion. Though Florida to our south is the land of 1000 lakes, Georgia is a state where most all lakes and larger bodies of water were man-made, most typically under the guidance of the Army Corps or Georgia Power Company. The Corps is also engaged in flood control, beach renourishment along the Georgia coast and waterway dredging to improve waterway navigation.

The Corps engineered and constructed the dams which capture the waters of the Chattahoochee and Chestatee Rivers in north Georgia to form Lake Sidney Lanier in 1950. It took more than six years for the lake to reach full pool. The Corps' work includes marvels of engineering such as the Panama Canal (1914), the channeling of the Los Angeles and Santa Ana Rivers through L.A. via the Flood Control Act of 1941, The Manhattan Project (take that Kuppenheimer), construction of the Pentagon (1943), and the cross Florida Barge Canal, among others.

The Corps' work stands the test of time. A young Lieutenant and West Point graduate, Robert E. Lee, would oversee the early design and construction of Fort Pulaski on a bluff along the intercoastal on Cockspur Island near Tybee Island. In 1829, Lee, an engineer in the U.S. Army Corps at the time, would design the fort's drainage and dyke systems, which survive to this day.

On Memorial Day, we pause and honor the sacrifice of the men and women in each service branch who paid the ultimate price for our freedom. On Veterans Day, we more broadly recognize all service, in times of war and peace, by every member of each service branch, the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard, National Guard and even the more nascent Space Force. While the valor and sacrifice of combat service does further distinguish that service, we should all recall the work to design and build out our railroads, bridges, waterways, power dams and much of the infrastructure that makes America the global economic powerhouse which it also remains today. That in large measure was the work of the USACE

Like the plowshare, the engineer's compass or calculator also immensely contribute to the greatness of the American experiment.  Yes, our USACE is also at times a bit overly bureaucratic, and I may speak to that in another column on another day... Yet today, I will simply again say thank you, and salute the continuing good works of our U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.  Thank you all, civilian and in uniform personnel, for your service to our nation.