Using Computers and Rifles at the Same Time
By Captain Christopher S. Tsirlis, U.S. Marine Corps
The Marine Corps prides itself in being the most adaptive and effective fighting force on the planet. Our strength has always been seeing potential weaknesses of our enemy and exploiting them to the fullest. The current DOD buzzword is network-centric warfare, an attempt to leverage America'senormous technological capability against potential adversaries "by networking sensors, decision makers, and shooters to achieve shared awareness, increased speed of command, higher tempo of operations, greater lethality, increased survivability, and degree of self synchronizations."1
In other words, to fight most effectively, all entities must be connected in some capacity. This idea has merit, and services are now focused on realizing it. As a Marine, my primary concern is how the Marine Corps can maximize our use of the changing information age.
Our trade includes some fundamental realities that we keep in mind at all times, and we are suspicious when entities outside our institution hatch new concepts that focus too much on technology and theory. But in the case of network-centric warfare, it actually may help on the ground. It could create better battlefield awareness, speed of command, and force responsiveness to threats.
Computers Are Changing Reality
In the future, computer systems will be fully integrated into the Marine Corps. Young Marines grew up with technology at their fingertips, and most already receive their information real-time, in the form of their favorite Web sites and music. Many send photos or videos in real-time.
On the battlefield, this technology takes the shape of blue forces' position and realtime video from an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). The capability to pass digitized voice and data over the same system, capturing every word for replay and later debriefing of events, is around the corner.
But few in the Corps are concerned with the implications in terms of hierarchal leadership structure, because we are still focused on platforms for data delivery. Systems can instantaneously deliver information to battalions, which can use collaborative tools to deconflict and maneuver in asymmetrical battlespace.2 What does this say about the need for regimental staff functions or the traditional flow of information in the organization?
Better information flow flattens the organization. Iraq is a good example: most battalions have had to make several organizational changes while fighting a counterinsurgency. As all entities require smart information flow to their various echelons-and as the fusion of intelligence happens at some of the lowest levels of our organization-infantry company headquarters have had to increase their level of sophistication to accommodate all of the different sensors on the battlefield.
In short, many units have had to adjust their organizational structure to ensure that decision making is more lateral than hierarchal.
Future Scenarios
At some point, a rifle platoon commander will be likely have a dedicated data pipe. He will tap into the vast amount of information available at the other end. This raises the question of what information-and when. Smart information flow will be not only pulled, but pushed to the platoon commander at the right time.
This could be while on the move, conducting a foot movement, or at a vehicle checkpoint when he is informed of the latest be-on-the-lookout report (BOLO). With such scenarios even remotely possible, changes need to occur in our organization to better facilitate our use of new technology.
New Needs
We need an intensive investment in software-programmable platforms that can be easily configured to accommodate multiple waveforms. Our equipment must be adaptable. We need to drive units to incorporate digital technologies at the lowest levels by making it part of their everyday business. This means a full-court press on fielding technologies, passing these on to companies and platoons, and setting up small tactical networks in garrison.
This way the technologies will become common and real. Advanced communications technology should become part of the regular workday, to help ingrain basic concepts and familiarity.
Units must be able to pick up their computers (decision support systems)literally-and move into combat areas seamlessly. To do so requires extensive training and investment in power requirements and networks.
Therefore, units should be forced to run and execute daily tasks using a variety of current technologies. Battalions should incorporate these into their day-to-day business while in garrison, which will lead to workable standard operating procedures for the field environment or for combat.
Local system administrators must have the power to develop and train for dataintensive skills. The Navy Marine Corps Intranet does not help our communication Marines run networks. In fact, communication Marines' skills often atrophy without constant, day-to-day training on the complexities of running a local area network. We should return certain aspects of the enterprise network to local administrators (S6s) to help mitigate this loss of expertise.
Changes in the Table of Organization should accommodate the technology that is being fielded to our forces. This means incorporating tactical data network teams (of three to five people) to install, operate, and maintain networks down to the company level. Currently the Marine Corps' battalion Table of Organization is WWII/Korea vintage, and the C2 (command and control) Table of Equipment does not support today's battlefield.
A battalion communications platoon is structured and trained for an analog world. However, the past four years have shown that Marines are very adaptable and have accomplished their mission regardless of Table of Organization and Table of Equipment problems.
Fog of war, friction, and chaos of battle can be mitigated by constant and continuous information flow. It is apparent now that every Marine needs to be connected via some kind of voice or data net. We should focus less on who gets connected and more on who gets to talk.
Often decision making at the small unit level is not regulated by billet or rank, but rather by who has contact with the enemy. The impact of connecting all Marines is important because those who are connected in a passive sense still can facilitate the information flow of active participants. Whether active or passive, all Marines should have the ability to send information across their battlespace if they feel it is needed.
The communication devices that one Marine wears may help move information for others. This may be a powerful way for Marines to have an ad hoc network that is truly mobile, regardless of the surrounding infrastructure.3 The mobility of such a network is a tenet of our maneuver warfare philosophy. Therefore, we should pursue technologies that create mobile networks on the battlefield.
Who Does the Talking?
Just being in the loop helps everyone understand and focus better on their environment. When a platoon or squad moves through the battlespace, the ability to have constant "combat chatter," in which key individuals report what they see and don't see, helps others in the immediate area have a better assessment of their surroundings. The ability to talk to all entities within a distributed area is a fundamental C2 function in asymmetric operations.
The information needs of a small unit leader are simple. Because of clear commander's intent and mission type orders, Marines understand what they need to do and why. Decision making is pushed down the chain of command. Interfacing with C2 systems should convey to each Marine a few important things:
* Tell me where I am and where the enemy is.
* Help me see what I can't see around me.
* Help me share what I see with others.
* Give me tools to tailor my information needs.
* Give me enough quantities of a system where I can better accomplish my mission.
These functions seem intuitive, but often our systems make them difficult to accomplish. Marines will simply use what works and drop technologies that don't.
Time to Bridge the Technologies
Marines should embrace C2 on the move. Vehicles should become equipped with situational awareness systems, and leaders must become proficient in passing and receiving data over this medium. Collaborative tools such as chat, and other tools like digital imagery, UAV feeds, and the latest intelligence summaries all need to be available while a unit is mounted up and on the move.
The ability to facilitate this type of smart information flow greatly increases the speed and tempo of operations. These changes are already happening, to varying degrees, across the DOD and in the Marine Corps.
The sooner we develop our methods of employment, doctrine, and best practices, the sooner we can shape our future. Rather than waiting for the latest and greatest, let's as an organization set the trend in employment of these technologies and how they can shape the close fight. We must keep in mind the benefits of network-centric warfare-and the interoperability of our systems must fit with those who operate around us.
If we are going to embrace the idea of network-centric warfare, we must focus not only on the technology, however important that is, but also on development of our organization to use new technology. The best systems in the world are not effective if the infrastructure used to support them is not adaptable to the environment. The Marine Corps must decide: Will we embrace the concept of network-centric warfare or not? If we don't, then our enemies may force us to act reactively rather than proactively.
1. David S. Alberts, John J. Garstka, Frederick P. Stein. Network Centric Warfare: Developing and Leveraging Information Superiority. CCRP Publications 2005, p. 2.
2. The term deconflictls used to describe several units in the same battlespace so they won't interfere with each others' missions. Asymmetric operations refers to battlefield operations with no clearly defined frontline.
3. Here, ad hoc means establishing a network quickly, with no or little infrastructure in place to support it.
Captain Tsirlis, a communications oltlcer with 17 years ol service, Is currently assigned to HQMC C4, RF Communications, Washington, DC. His two most recent operational tours were In Iraq, 2002-05, with 2d Battalion 5th Marines, 1st Marine Division. He holds a degree In Joint Command and Control, Computers and Intelligence (JC4I) from the Naval Post Graduate School.
Composeable FORCEnet Becomes Reality
By Jeffrey Clarkson; Jeffrey Grossman; Jay Martin; and Commander Paul Shigley, U.S. Navy (Ret.)
Composeable FORCEnet (CFn) began as a vision of command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (C4ISR) to demonstrate the value of network-centric warfare to every warfighter. In 2003, while visiting SPAWAR (space and naval warfare) Systems Center, San Diego, Admiral Vern Clark, then Chief of Naval Operations, said it was "the best example of FORCEnet" he had seen, adding: "We need that and we need it now."1 He challenged us to make CFn available to the Fleet as soon as possible for experimentation. CFn became a mainstay of Seventh Fleet operations. Now advances in technology are forcing CFn to evolve, and many in the Navy can contribute to this new vision.
Today, a system's capabilities often drive the decision needed at the moment. Tomorrow's advanced technologies will allow decision-problems to automatically drive the C4ISR system. This evolving CFn concept is becoming known as Intelligent Composeability.
The New Operating Environment
A fundamental characteristic of military operations in the 21st century is unpredictability. Future threats will continue to be asymmetric; the enemy will probe for vulnerabilities and exploit them. To operate in this environment, the U.S. military must create capabilities, organizations, and tactics and doctrine "on the fly," as the situation demands.
The C4ISR environment, in this unpredictable and dynamic reality, should be able to exploit every source of information, provide a shared situational awareness and understanding, mitigate the effects of uncertainty, and permit precise execution to achieve national objectives. Flexibility and agility in the composition of the C4ISR environment will be the keys to success.
A New Acquisition Paradigm
Achievement of FORCEnet, the C4ISR foundation of Sea Power 21, requires a fundamental departure from the systemcentric development and deployment approach. Experience has proven that interoperability within and across military services is extremely difficult to achieve for stovepipe applications and for those that depend on system-by-system integration, or even a system-of-systems integration concept. The cost rises exponentially with the number of systems, integration must be done on a case-by-case basis, and the process is difficult to sustain.
For similar reasons, the commercial world is moving to a service-oriented architecture approach that achieves interoperability by focusing on Web services and interface standards. This simplifies design, integration, deployment, and maintenance of capabilities. CFn demonstrates the power of these plug-and-play concepts to create flexible and agile C4ISR.
The Composeable FORCEnet Concept
CFn is a framework of Web services based on commercial open standards; it enables composition and re-composition of hardware, software, and Web-based services to create new functional capabilities. It also permits new organizational structures and innovative tactics and doctrine, again without re-engineering the underlying C4ISR environment. When Admiral John Nathman saw it, he redefined the concept as plug and fight.2
CFn is a multi-tiered architecture, which today includes layers of data, business logic, and representation. Through the combined use of standard Web service interfaces and legacy system interfaces, access to any potential source of information is possible. The business logic layer can provide normalization, information brokering, security, distributed information management, and communications services.
The representation layer provides rendering, an intuitive user interface, and collaboration services. CFn presents, and collaboratively shares, a multi-dimensional operational picture using a geospatial reference environment-that is, the map metaphor.
The map was chosen as the foundation for the user interface because commanders primarily use maps to acquire and maintain situational awareness. Of course, situational awareness goes beyond maps and tracks, so CFn provides for representation and display of functional/operational information (documents, spreadsheets, images, Web pages, etc.) and temporal information.
Users can add content by placing on the map objects that are linked to relevant information. In addition, CFn can geo-register high-resolution maps (including 3D), elevation data, and imagery on locations of interest. A particularly useful feature of CFn allows warfighters to organize and manage information into customized views based on mission needs. No longer is it necessary to access data on stovepiped, disparate sources that must be displayed in separate, unrelated, and inconsistent visualizations.
CFn provides shared situational awareness through its ability to collaborate via a network. Users can share maps, geo-referenced objects, and hyperlinks. They can annotate the information on the map using a comprehensive drawing capability, and they can amplify and discuss the information through chat.
How to Transition Technology
The Navy supports these advanced technologies because their application may lead to improved warfighting. However, the acquisition process frequently resists novel concepts because they represent disruption and risk.
Technologists who want to influence the direction of Navy command and control face a formidable task. Understanding how to transition technology from the laboratory to the Fleet is as essential to success as the technical ideas themselves.
The path that we followed was similar to what one would expect of a commercial startup venture; in this way it was similar to current business practices. Our approach went beyond current DOD acquisition processes, and some activities were controversial. We learned that the following steps were essential:
* Persevere. We believed strongly in our ideas and refused to give in to critics.
* Find a champion. We found several respected Navy leaders who understood the implications of the concepts for warfighting and took action.
* Develop venture capital. The first demonstration was internally funded.
* Leverage other projects. We built on other projects to make progress.
* Don't be constrained by documented operational requirements. We found that operational requirements were general enough to permit our technical approach. Moreover, significant new technologies often result in the definition of new requirements.
* Build a prototype. We allowed decision makers to experience the conceptthis was a powerful marketing technique. Making the prototype portable ensured the widest audience.
* Participate in operational experiments. Fleet operators were critical to identifying the operational value and shortcomings.
* Take advantage of every opportunity. We were willing to take on difficult challenges, such as deploying unproven software to the Fleet in less than six months, to prove the capability.
* Adapt. We were open to anything that made the concept more useable, useful, desirable, or understandable. We wanted to solve someone's problem.
* Embrace constraints and roadblocks as opportunities to focus efforts.
* Don't chase technology for its own sake. We did not change just to suit personal interests or points of view.
* Names are important. CFn "brand recognition" was critical to widespread acceptance inside the government.
CFn Operational Development
Based on the CNO's elucidation of a priority Navy need, we composed an instantiation of CFn for theater antisubmarine warfare (TASW) at CTF-74 in Yokosuka, Japan. This capability provided access and integrated visualization of battle-space management products that had previously been available only from independent, nonintegrated systems.3
Seventh Fleet developed and published the first concept of operations for the use of CFn in TASW operations, with the installation of CFn at CTF 72, CTG 72.2, and on the USS Blueridge (LCC-19), Kitty Hawk (CV-63), Ronald Reagan (CVN76), and Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72). They adopted CFn as one of the essential components to TASW in the Pacific.
Although the first operational impact was in TASW, CFn has been applied to other mission areas. It was installed at the Hawaii Regional security Operations Center for intelligence analysis and distribution, and Marine Forces Pacific experimented with CFn to demonstrate the value of flattening the information flow throughout the chain of command.
Moving CFn from a laboratory concept to an operational experiment and then a prototype operational capability involved several complicated steps. Administrative, operational, and security requirements had to be fulfilled; installation and sustainment plans had to be developed. After all that, the capability had to be developed to the point where it could function in a robust, stable manner. The effort was particularly difficult because CFn was a Fleet initiative and not an acquisition program.
And yet it has been programmed for prototype installation on the remaining aircraft carriers and selected task force commanders, beginning in Fiscal Year 2008. CFn has already demonstrated its value to command and control by making more information available to more people via Web applications. As Admiral Gary Roughead remarked, "We have Composeable FORCEnet that allows for a broader distribution of the types of information we need to go after the [opposition's] submarines."4
The Next Level: Intelligent Composeability
As CFn moves ahead, many issues need to be addressed. If the military is to take full advantage of its promise, security, bandwidth, policy and legal roadblocks, business rules, even cultural issues must be resolved. Beyond these concerns, the exponential growth in available information, Web services, and distributed expertise requires new thinking about how the network can help warfighters discover the best solutions to a given problem. These problems can only be solved through the efforts of people at all levels, from many disciplines, in and out of the Navy.
CFn parallels the evolution of Web 2.0, which is characterized by services (rather than software), re-mixable data sources, software that transcends a single device, and harnessing of collective intelligence.
Intelligent Composeability will parallel Web 3.0, providing truly open Web services enabled by semantic Web technologies such as natural language, machine learning and reasoning, and autonomous agents and gadgets. It will depend on new technologies that make it easier to write the problem query; new techniques for integrating information, services, and expertise; and especially on understanding how humans process information and make decisions.
But unlimited access to information may be too much of a good thing. The future will be about a system that undemands what you need and delivers it when you need it. Intelligent Composeability will create systems based on the way people think, rather than on the way computers think.
1. Admiral Vern Clark, CNO remarks to SPAWAR Systems Center. San Diego, during CFn demonstration, 15 May 2003.
2. Admiral John Nathman, OPNAV (N6/N7) Warfighting Requirements and Programs, Chief remarks to SSC San Diego during CFn demonstration, 25 August 2003.
3. Examples of battle-space management products currently used are IMAT, AREPS, GALE Lite, GCCS-M.
4. Admiral Gary Roughead, Commander, Pacific Fleet, Navy and Marine Corp News interview, 3 March 2007, http://www.news.navy.mil/management/ videodb/player/video.aspx?ID=8853
Mr. Clarkson Is a research scientist at SPAWAR Systems Center, San Diego (SSC-SD), heading the C4ISR vision team and leading the design lor the new Command Center of the Future demonstration facility. He served as a naval aviator for more than 10 years, achieving the rank of lieutenant commander.
Mr. Grossman served as the deputy executive director for Science, Technology, and Engineering at SSC-SD (2004). He was head of the Command Systems Division at the Naval Personnel Research and Development Center (1985-88), responsible lor research on distributed simulation, automated decision support, advanced display hardware and software, human-computer Interaction, and neuroscience.
Mr. Martin has served lor more than 35 years at SSC-SO and its predecessor organizations, Including as head of SSC-SD's Simulation and Human Systems Technology Division. His experience encompasses C4ISR systems and their related technologies.
Commander Shigley is an analyst at SSC-SD, currently the deputy U.S. national lead tor the Technical Cooperation Program, Maritime Action Group 6, which is completing a three-year study on "Implications of FORCEnet on the Coalition." He served as a naval aviator for 21 years.
Unite the LCS Team: Divided, We Squander Capital and Careers
By Lieutenant Commander Rob Brodie, U.S. Navy
The littoral combat ship (LCS), highspeed vessel (HSV), joint high speed vessel (JHSV). and Sea Fighter (FSF-1) programs should all be consolidated under the LCS Class Squadron (CLASRON). All the building, manning, training, and equipping lessons from the HSV and Sea Fighter programs-bought with U.S. tax dollars-could then be used to refine the modular, affordable, shallow draft combatant for which there is a large demand signal (identified need). This move would also help each program's shortfalls while better meeting combatant commander requirements.
The ships are inexpensive in terms of both hull cost and personnel: LCS cost $300 million with a core crew of 40; HSV cost $50 million for a five-year lease, with a core crew of 40. They are ideal for expanded maritime interdiction operations, theater security cooperation (TSC), CNO initiative Global Fleet Station, counter-narcotics operations, and bilateral and multinational training such as cooperation afloat readiness and training deployments.
Additionally, they can handle warfare area-specific tasks supported by mission modules designed using standard 20-foot shipping containers, inside of which reside the control equipment. All are capable of operating aircraft and launching the SEALs' 9-ton rigid-hull inflatable boats (11-meter RHIBs).
They can achieve high speeds in favorable sea and load conditions, and they draw between 12 and 20 feet of water. With core crew sizes around 40, even the smallest TSC ports will not be overwhelmed with Sailors.
The HSV has proven that the blue/gold crew concept (two crews sharing the same hull) can work as well with surface combatants as it does with ballistic missile submarines. It has remained almost continuously deployed overseas since the 2005 Indonesian tsunami relief efforts and operated during that time under every Fleet.
Individual Troubles
Even though they are very useful and economical platforms, the modular corvette programs are in danger of cancellation, termination, or underutilization. The 55-ship LCS program is in trouble because costs of the first two hulls, expected to be $220 million each, have reached the upper $300 million range. This has forced the cancellation of hull three and possibly hull four.
The HSV program, while successful, is based on leasing of foreign vessels. By law, these leases cannot exceed five years. The lease of the final and most refined of the HSVs, Swift (HSV-2), ends in July 2008.
The Sea Fighter, a domestic HSV, ran parallel to all the other programs and is currently operated by a skeleton civilian crew. It can be leased to support experimentation, but not combatant commander missions. The JHSV is to be a domestically produced HSV, but it may not have the multi-mission utility of Swift, because the other services may not desire the aviation capability.
Combined Solutions
Each of these platforms has its strengths and weaknesses. Therefore, the end user-the combatant commander-should be the one who guides their development and makes the decisions about capabilities and limitations.
In addition to the combatant commanders who have generated the demand signal, the Bureau of Naval Personnel is also a stakeholder. It must manage the careers of the LCS crews without ships and the pipeline that was to sustain a 55-ship class. JHSV crew composition has not been determined. Commissioning Sea Fighter as an LCS would immediately take care of two crews and be ready for combatant commander tasking within months.
The HSV and its two crews are already performing the LCS mission for the combatant commanders, making them an operational and lessons-learned gold mine for the CLASRON. Personnel assigned to LCS crews without hulls could relieve HSV crew members at individual rotation dates to best capture expertise and transition personnel to an already operational platform.
Leasing additional HSVs could be a short-term option. Swift's five-year lease cost approximately $50 million. A slightly modified high-speed car ferry, Swift was converted by adding a removable flight deck where the aft passenger compartment normally resides, and a helicopter hangar in the central passenger area. Communications gear and machine guns were added with minimal impact to the original design.
The whole process took 10 months from contract signing to deployment, because the catamaran hulls, engines, and generators were already built. Delivery of a new HSV without an existing hull would take 24 to 30 months. The timeline is based on the availability of large marine diesel engines-of which there is currently a shortfall.
Divide or Unite?
LCS and its crews face an uncertain future as hull three is canceled and hull four's costs and delays mount. LCS I will not deploy until after Swift's lease expires. Swift's crews wait in limbo while the Surface Warfare Enterprise scrambles to maintain the HSV capability.
As a special mission platform, Swift's COs may do almost four-year tours if reliefs are not selected at the December 2007 board and the HSV program extends beyond Swift's July 2008 lease end!
By consolidating all these ships with similar capabilities under the LCS CLASRON and considering them all LCSes, the strengths and weaknesses of each can be evaluated against the combatant commanders' demand signal. A solution can be found that best benefits the Surface Warfare Enterprise while simultaneously taking care of our Sailors.
Lieutenant Commander Brodie is the executive officer of HSV-2 Swift (Blue Crew), deployed in Central America and the Caribbean as part of the CNO initiative Global Fleet Station. He has operated in every Fleet area of responsibility. He holds a BS in History from the U.S. Naval Academy and an MA in National Security Affaire from the Naval Post Graduate School, where he completed Joint Professional Military Education Phase I.