The Emerging U.S. System-of-Systems

Conclusions The things which give military forces their fighting capability are changing, and these changes point toward a qualitative jump in our ability to use military force effectively. Probably relating to the way we plan, program and budget for these things, we are more adept at seeing the individual trees than that vast forest of military capability (the system-of-systems) which the individual systems are building for our fighting forces. The system-of-systems depends ultimately on well orchestrated contributions of all the military services. This assumes a common appreciation of and adherence to what we are building. Most importantly, it requires joint strategic and operational doctrine by which to organize, plan and carry out military operations. Revolutions Propel U.S. Military Toward Fundamental Change Three simultaneous revolutions are propelling the U.S. military toward fundamental change. The first is the implosion of the Soviet Union, the end of the Cold War and emergence of the United States as the sole military superpower. We are also experiencing a related revolution--the reallocation of resources from defense to domestic programs, which began almost a decade ago and accelerated with the demise of the Soviet Union. The third is what some call the revolution in military affairs (RMA). In part because of earlier investments, particularly in electronic and computational technologies, the things which give military forces their fighting capability are changing, and these changes point toward a qualitative jump in our ability to use military force effectively. It is the RMA which enables us to take full advantage of the opportunities posed by the first two revolutions, without compromising our national security or position as a world leader. What kind of changes are emerging as a result of the American RMA? They fall into three general categories, which, for convenience, we may call intelligence, command and control, and precision force: Intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR), involves sensor and reporting technologies associated with intelligence collection, surveillance, and reconnaissance, as well as the new means by which we are able to keep track of what our own forces are doing. Advanced C4I--command, control, communications, computer applications, and intelligence processing--the realm in which we convert the sensor awareness to dominant understanding of a battle space and convert that understanding to missions and assignments designed to alter, control, and dominate that battle space. Precision force. A broad concept, in which the knowledge and orders generated from the first two areas are translated into action and results. It is easy to miss the powerful synergy which exists between ISR, advanced C4I and precision force. Look at table 1, a cross section of some of the weapons and systems in use or soon to be available to our fighting men and women. We tend to plan, program and budget for these things as if they were discrete capabilities. We are more adept at seeing the individual trees than that vast forest of military capability which the individual systems, because of their interactions, are building for our fighting forces. Fortunately, when you go to sea or into the field where things are actually happening, you can see early signs of how it all fits together. From this you can envision how future systems in the hands of well-educated and trained officers, soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen portend a qualitatively and quantitatively different military force for the country. What is happening, driven in part by broad system architectures and joint operational concepts, in part by serendipity, is the creation of a new system-of-systems. Merging increasing capacity to gather real-time, all-weather information continuously with increasing capacity to process and make sense of this voluminous data builds the realm of dominant battle space knowledge (DBK). …