The Navy moved a couple of steps closer to completing the outline for its path toward force transformation this past summer with the publication, in June, of a "campaign plan" for implementing FORCEnet-the fourth component of Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Vern Clark's "Sea Power 21" strategic vision. In mid-July, the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command's chief engineer released a FORCEnet "architectural vision."
Defining precisely what FORCEnet consists of has been challenging. The three operational pillars of "Sea Power 21"—Sea Strike, Sea Shield, and Sea Basing—translate directly into weapons, sensors, and platforms already fielded or in development, but the guidance document says FORCEnet "integrates the power of warriors, sensors, weapons, networks, and platforms."
The campaign plan describes FORCEnet as "the architectural framework for naval warfare that aligns and integrates warriors, networks, sensors, command & control, platforms, and weapons into a globally networked, distributed combat force." The architectural vision document calls it "the Naval force's extension and implementation of the joint architectural constructs."
The Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command, which will act as the lead systems command for fielding and managing FORCEnet, also has released a draft "standards and architecture" document. When completed this fall, the final architecture document will describe how the Navy will cooperate with the other services to achieve a genuine and credible joint data-management architecture.
A draft FORCEnet roadmap, published by the Navy Network Warfare Command in July, lays out schedules and milestones for planning for insertion of new science and technology. A couple dozen other FORCEnet documents are pending in coming months, including a FORCEnet materiel plan expected in April 2004.
Rear Admiral Michael Sharp, Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command's vice commander, speaking at a panel at the Office of Naval Research's Navy-Industry Research and Development Partnership Conference in August, may have said it best. "FORCEnet usually is shown as gratuitous cloud charts with lightening bolts," he said. "So far we've failed to put meat on the bones behind it."
FORCEnet, he said, "is about interoperability—it's about boxes and wires and ones and zeros, protocols, frequencies, bandwidth, and linking things together."
He cited the evolution of capabilities since the 1983 invasion of Grenada, when an air controller called in air support using a pay phone. During Operation Desert Storm in 1991, the public could see video of weapons homing in on targets. Operation Enduring Freedom produced authentic knowledge management, with the Carl Vinson (CVN-70) battle group in late 2001 using worldwide web-based knowledge-management tools to share operational data. Operation Iraqi Freedom demonstrated further FORCEnet-like processes.
Panelist Captain Robert Whitkop, director of the Navy Network Warfare Command's FORCEnet division, added that "FORCEnet Block 0 already exists in the fielded Navy networks operated by [Navy Network Warfare Command] that serve some 7,000 personnel."
The FORCEnet effort is driven by critical fleet needs for bandwidth efficiency and for the savings gained through the use of commercially developed hardware and software, not only for tactical operations but also for logistics, training, and administration. FORCEnet at some point will encompass nontactical networks, including the Navy-Marine Corps Intranet, the massive effort run by the program executive office for information technology to link shore sites through a common network.
Sharp, Whitkop, and others at the conference stressed that FORCEnet requires a joint-service architecture achieved through the use of common standards and protocols. "All the services want to be linked," said Sharp. "They have to push the joint arena. Everyone is doing C4I [command, control, communications, computers, intelligence]. They need a Joint Forces Command to force them to work towards a common architecture."
Navy Network Warfare Command is responsible for delivering FORCEnet requirements to Fleet Forces Command for validation with a FORCEnet "innovation continuum" process, followed by approval for Navy and joint use by the Space, Information Warfare, and Command and Control division (N61) in the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations. FORCEnet development also will represent the Navy component of the Secretary of Defense's Global Information Grid bandwidth extension that is intended to support joint forces information transfer. The Global Information Grid by itself will not address all Navy requirements for remote links among Navy battle group elements dispersed at sea.