Rising from the ashes of decline, the Naval security Group (the Navy's cryptologic community) is seeing the benefits of its transformation from a legacy signals intelligence (SIGINT) collection, analysis, and reporting organization to a truly multi-faceted "information operations" organization capable of living up to its maxim of providing "Maritime Information Dominance For America." The Naval security Group, which celebrated its 70th anniversary on 11 March 2005, is once again a revitalized naval and national asset. Rear Admiral Andy M. Singer, Commander, Naval security Group Command, and his force of 16,000 officers, enlisted, civilians, reservists, and contractors are seeing to that.
The Naval Security Group traces its historical origins to OP-20-G, the Navy radio intelligence organization established in the early 1920s by Laurence F. Safford, the "Father of Navy Cryptology."1 Tasked with providing communications intelligence (COMINT) on the Japanese Navy, the unit is credited with breaking the Japanese code JN-25 and changing the course of the war at the Battle of Midway in the Pacific during World War II. Thus, the Naval security Group has a long and rich history of providing essential knowledge of enemy intentions to national and naval leadership in every conflict for the last eight decades.
Even with this tradition of participating in nearly every naval and national success across the intelligence community, the Naval security Group has been hindered by its insistent hold on legacy missions. There can be no argument—Navy cryptology was a community in decline. The efficacy of cryptologic collection operations on board ship has been a topic of debate for more than 20 years. But that is changing quickly and, not unexpectedly, the community is experiencing the institutional and cultural pain associated with any kind of change. Rear Admiral Singer described the need for "deep change"2 in one of his frequent updates to the cryptologic community.
New Rating Structure
Historically, our dedicated enlisted cryptologic technicians have been the foundation of the Navy cryptologic community. That will not change. However, the Sea Warrior component of the Chief of Naval Operations' Sea Power 21 vision is driving dramatic and far-reaching changes in our enlisted rating structure. In October 2003, we saw the merger of the electronic warfare technician (EW) and cryptologic technician technical (CTT) ratings into a single CTT rating. In 2004, the Secretary of the Navy approved the cryptologic technician networks rating and over 240 new CTNs were selected for conversion from a strong group of Navy enlisted computer network professionals.
In the future our cryptologic technician maintenance (CTM) and cryptologic technician communications (CTO) ratings will merge with other similar Navy ratings (CTO with information technology and CTM with electronics technician (ET) and information system technician (IT)). The CTA rating is intended to merge with the yeoman (YN) rating; those plans are still being finalized.
Change is rarely quick and often occurs in small increments. Complete transformation of the cryptologic community is overdue, but has been underway for quite some time. The origins of the previously mentioned electronic warfare technician (EW)-cryptologic technician technical (CTT) merger can be traced back to the early 1990s during Rear Admiral Thomas F. Stevens' tenure as Commander, Naval security Group Command. A catalyst, however, can expedite the process and, arguably, the CNO's Sea Power 21 vision has added a sense of urgency.
In Sea Power 21, the CNO stated, "Among the critical challenges that we face today are finding and allocating resources to recapitalize the Navy. We must replace Cold War-era systems with significantly more capable sensors, networks, weapons, and platforms if we are to increase our ability to deter and defeat enemies."3 While the Naval security Group was not the target of his comment, our cryptologic community is recapitalizing its rating structure to leverage the best of each technical rating and discarding the legacy functions the Navy and the nation no longer require. As mentioned before, these are not superficial changes. These are changes at the core; exactly the kind of "deep change" that Rear Admiral Singer has insisted upon.
The transformed enlisted cryptologic community will retain four cryptologic technician ratings in our new core group:
* Cryptologic technician interpretive (CTI)—global language skills
* Cryptologic technician technical (CTT)—electronic warfare/intelligence
* Cryptologic technician collection (CTR)—complex non-voice communications
* Cryptologic technician networks (CTN)—information system network attack, exploitation and defense
Guidelines for professional and personal development, professional military education and leadership, certificates and qualifications, and professional performance for these ratings are well-developed and understood by our sailors.
Cryptologic Community Reorganization
Along with the changes in the cryptologic community's ratings, the organizational structure and mission of the Naval security Group is also changing dramatically. Since 1992, the Naval security Group has established, restructured, combined, reduced, or decommissioned more than 40 separate command elements. In September 2004, several Naval security Group commands in Hawaii were combined to form the Naval security Group Activity Hawaii. Beginning in the fall of 2005, Naval security Group activities around the world will be renamed Navy Information Warfare Commands.
Re-subordination or realignment of all other Naval security Group activities and detachments are underway. The transition will see the renaming of most commands from Naval security Group Activities to Naval Information Operations Commands. Efforts to fully integrate the reserve element of the Naval security Group into the active structure have been realized with the reserve commander serving as the vice commander to the active duty commander, Naval security Group Command. Linkage between the active and reserve components has never been stronger or more visible.
Changing the name of the officer community designator from Special Duty Officer-Cryptology to Special Duty Officer-Information Warfare has been approved by the Chief of Naval Personnel. Naval security Group has changed its organizational relationships with Naval commanders in the Pacific, Atlantic, and Europe. The Naval security Group and the Navy's cryptologic community have changed from monolithic organizations and structures focused primarily on the former Soviet Union to a much leaner organization capable of fully engaging with our Joint Service and allied partners in the Global War on Terror and other conflicts around the world. On 1 October 2005, Naval Security Group (active and Reserve) was integrated into Naval Network Warfare Command as the Information Operations (IO) directorate. Rear Admiral Singer will be assigned as Director of Information Operations and, as the Navy's senior information warfare officer, he will continue to function as head of the Navy's Service Cryptologic Element.
The infrastructure to support training of cryptologic technicians and cryptologic officers has seen similar dramatic change, beginning with the CNO's Task Force Excel which transformed the entire Navy training establishment in early 2000. On 28 April 2003, the Naval Technical Training Center (NTTC) Corry Station Pensacola, Florida was disestablished and the Center for Cryptology (CC) Corry Station was established. In January 2005 that also changed when the Center for Cryptology was combined with the Center for Information Technology and renamed the Center for Information Dominance.
The center manages initial skills training for information warfare officers and enlisted personnel, enlisted information technician and officer information professionals as well as specific joint service and allied training requirements. The Center for Information Dominance includes more than 24 learning sites and various detachments throughout the United States and others outside the continental United States, which provide training for approximately 3,000 students daily from each of the military services, as well as allied forces.4 Full implementation and realization of the merger of the Center for Cryptology Corry Station, Pensacola with the Center for Information Technology (CIT) San Diego, California into the single Center for Information Dominance (CID) at Corry Station proceeds with some urgency.
We don't need to rely on legend to see the Naval security Group or the Navy cryptologic (now information warfare) community return to its former prominence. The organizational construct, training, and infrastructure has changed. What will not change is the value of each sailor's contribution to the success of the Navy in current and future conflicts.
1 "The Battle of Midway: How cyrptology enabled the United States to turn the tide in the Pacific War," A Precarious State of Affairs, http://www.nsa.gov/ publications/publi00023.cfm, Patrick D. Weadon.
2 "Deep Change" is a concept put forth by John Quinn. He suggests that deep change is about creating new ways to get things done, rather than just changing old ways of doing business. It examines how work is done, who does the work, where it is done, when it is done, and whether the work should even be done at all.
3 Admiral Vern Clark, "Sea Power 21: Projecting Decisive Joint Capabilities," U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, October 2002.
4 Navy News, 25 August 2004.
Captain Lambert enlisted in the Navy as a cryptologic technician in 1975 and received his commission in 1982. He has served in a number of Naval Security Group billets throughout his career and is currently the Staff Director on the Office of the Secretary of Defense's Detainee Task Force.