Whether in counterinsurgency (COIN) operations, in larger scale ‘traditional’ battlefield conflict or – increasingly the case – “Operations Other Than War,” tactical conflict in the 21. Century is characterised by one thing above all others: the presence of electronic systems at a level that our forebears in the armed conflicts of the previous century would only vaguely have thought about. Tank and mechanized infantry units work with integrated systems for communications, tactical decision-making, battlefield surveillance and weapons effect synchronisation down to the individual vehicle level. Dismounted troops have unparalleled access to information – and thus enhanced situational awareness – that improves both their effect and their chances of survival in a dense electronic environment. Aircraft, helicopters, coastal patrol craft – all demonstrate the capability for effects-oriented operations that have become the norm for the expectations of Joe Public watching conflict brought to his breakfast table courtesy of CNN.
It is worth pausing a moment, however, to reflect on what this level of devolution and integration means for the defence and security community – and what effect it is likely to have as the lessons from Bosnia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Mali, Chad, Libya, Syria (it is an unending list, isn’t it?) begin to be integrated into tactical doctrine and wider defence and security policy. It is also worth observing that the emergence of the ‘integrated’ network centric soldier, vehicle or helicopter begs the question of what is tactical and what is strategic.
The concept was powerful and to a large degree new. It was a Revolution in Military Affairs in miniature. And it took hold quickly and almost universally. Nobody, however, could have foreseen just how pervasive this idea of command devolving to much lower levels of the armed forces would become. And in part that evolution has been as a result of the power of enabling technologies to drive, support and leverage command decisions for optimal effect. In short, technology has made possible the tactical implementation of swift and effective decision making at the coal face. But how?
Take the individual soldier and the basic operational unit for infantry action – the squad. The last two decades have seen literally tens of millions of dollars devoted to development of so-called ‘future soldier’ technologies. There are at least 40 programmes currently under way worldwide aimed at providing coordinated sensor and communications intelligence to the individual squad member, enabling him (or her, increasingly) to act in an integrated fashion with the rest of the squad, and to do so in a manner that makes the effects of that action – whether those effects are soft or kinetic – more appropriate to the task at hand. The only way this works effectively is by ensuring that systems are integrated, user friendly and robust, capable of routine operation in a hostile environment. In short, integration is the key.
Which is where some of these programmes run into trouble. There are physical constraints at work here – soldiers don’t like to carry anything that isn’t directly relevant to their personal survival – typically, ammunition, water and food. The necessity to carry several kilos of electronic equipment – and the power sources to make them function – brings an associated level of resistance that can often overcome a willingness to recognise the potential benefits. Apart from the physical, however, there is another component that works against efficient use of the capability – information overload. Faced with multiple options based on having a detailed but often confusing picture of the immediate conflict environment, there is a natural human tendency to weigh those options before making a decision, and that can lead to decision paralysis, which is the diametrically opposite situation from that which the system was originally intended to enable.
To a degree, the same applies to the vehicles from which dismounted action emanates. Armoured vehicles such as the BAE Systems CV90 and the General Dynamics SCOUT family of vehicles under construction for the British Army demonstrate high levels of systems integration, ranging from electronic surveillance and communications equipment to weapons sighting and control systems and even intelligent power management systems to increase efficiency and sustainability. Increasing complexity of systems integration, in a net centric environment, certainly leads to the potential for enhanced capability. However, this is sometimes offset by a tendency for some of the more mundane systems, which may have been overlooked in ‘gold plating’ the specification, to go wrong.
The reader should not assume this is intended to criticise the drive to integrate and improve efficiencies at small unit levels. On the contrary, such initiatives are laudable and there are both users and suppliers out there seeking to provide effective, enduring, cost-efficient and sustainable solutions.
One solution – one attracting increased interest for its simplicity of concept, though implementation is a little more complicated – is to provide information to the individual or specific platform on a distributed basis. Rather than employing point to point communications to give each squad leader in a platoon, for instance, the distillation of data from multiple sensors and electronic sources, the drive here is to provide the data to the network for analysis and storage, allowing individual users to access information as the need arises. This has several benefits: in the initial post-collection phase of the intelligence cycle, it frees up communications channels, since data has to be communicated to one repository rather than multiple individual users; it allows for analysis to be conducted once, centrally, rather than once at each user level, thus speeding up the intelligence cycle; and it reduces the potential for data irrelevant to platoon B (as opposed to platoon A which urgently requires it) swamping the platoon leader’s capability to make effective decisions.
In some ways this reflects the increasing complexity of modern warfare. Planners over the last decade or more have focused a great deal of attention on ensuring that everybody knows everything relevant. But there is a subtle amendment that needs to be considered – which is the fact that in a huge majority of cases it is the individual who knows far better what is relevant to his specific situation. By allowing the user to access centralised information and make decisions based on intelligence that he sees is clearly relevant in his case, therefore, better and, arguably, more timely decisions can be made.
If the concept of the strategic corporal is to truly come into its own, then giving him the ability to make decisions at the micro level – which, after all, is what the concept is all about in the first place – by accessing ‘packaged’ information rather than drowning him in superfluous detail would seem to be a fare better iteration of network centric warfare at the tactical level.
Put simply, GVA posits that all land platforms – ranging from tanks and armoured vehicles to outposts, infantry equipment and logistics support systems, must in future meet common standards. This sounds too good – and too simple – to be true. But the power behind GVA lies in two facts.
First is that commonality means commonality. Too many NCW ideas have fallen foul of the hurdle of integrating legacy systems, because nobody has the resources, finances, time or even will to start again from scratch. Trying to force integrated capability by building patches and bug fixes to make legacy systems talk to each other is niot the answer. So by starting from a ‘point in time’ and dictating that henceforth all systems will share common characteristics, GVA is already streets ahead in terms of potential capability enhancement.
Second is the fact that MoD has taken a radical step – some might say almost too radical – of publishing the entire open architecture code for industry to obtain, integrate and implement. Not only does the standard dictate the style that future equipment must adhere to at the platform level, it also stipulates the common nature of any add-on or replacement system to be procured in the future. In other words, given the life span of say, 30 years for an armoured vehicle family, whatever technological advances make possible in the future in the capability presented by, say, ground radar sensors, any future replacement ground radar must be designed from the get go to fit the requirements of GVA and the generic platforms that will then be in service.
None of this should be taken to infer that what has happened to date is bad, or that significant progress in the ‘tacticalisation’ of NCW has not been made. The capabilities of the infantry squad today to gather and analyse intelligence, to decide and communicate, to enhance individual and unit situational awareness – in short, to fight effectively in a modern conflict are streets ahead of what they were even twenty years ago. And the signs are that the evolution of capability will progress at an even more rapid rate – particularly given moves made by the increasingly savvy customer to ensure that best practices are ruthlessly imported and exploited from other areas of human endeavour.
In the entertainment industry, the capabilities of computer games and simulations have been increasingly leveraged into constructive simulations for the training of military and security forces. The so-called ‘serious games’ component of military training programmes is now firmly embedded in the community’s psyche, as witness the near ubiquitous use of game engines like Bohemia Interactive Simulations’ VBS-3. As the engine has been used by more and more armed forces around the world, so Bohemia have continued the never-ending process of adding niche capability or modifying existing procedures to cater for the subtle variations in national doctrine or equipment characteristics.
There is a lesson here we should sit up and take not of. If NCW is to work – and with the best will in the world, we are not there yet, despite what protagonists will tell you – we need to be better at defining exactly what it is we want to do and we need to ensure we develop flexible, on-point training and education solutions in order to enable the strategic corporal – and his subordinates, peers and superiors – to use the undoubted power of integrated, networked combat capability to maximum effect. We ignore one salient point at our peril. NCW is not about electronics, not about distributed data, not about next-generation weaponry, lethal or non-lethal. It’s about people.
It is worth pausing a moment, however, to reflect on what this level of devolution and integration means for the defence and security community – and what effect it is likely to have as the lessons from Bosnia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Mali, Chad, Libya, Syria (it is an unending list, isn’t it?) begin to be integrated into tactical doctrine and wider defence and security policy. It is also worth observing that the emergence of the ‘integrated’ network centric soldier, vehicle or helicopter begs the question of what is tactical and what is strategic.
Tactical Operations, Strategic Effect
It was at the very end of the last century that US Marine Corps General Charles Krulak promulgated the concept of the ‘Strategic Corporal.’ At the time, one of the popular concepts driving doictrinal development was the ‘Three Block War,” – the idea that peacekeeping, humanitarian assistance, disaster relief and counter-insurgency operations (which remain the principal thrust of military planning post Cold War) would take place in areas denoted by three city blocks, rather than the open countryside environments beloved of the “herds of armoured vehicles sweeping majestically across the Fulda Gap” school of military thought. Gone are the days when divisional commanders can have a tight grip on the minute by minute evolution of an evolving combat. In steps the Strategic Corporal – the section or squad leader whose tactical decisions and actions can have an effect that is arguably strategic in the context of a Three Block War.The concept was powerful and to a large degree new. It was a Revolution in Military Affairs in miniature. And it took hold quickly and almost universally. Nobody, however, could have foreseen just how pervasive this idea of command devolving to much lower levels of the armed forces would become. And in part that evolution has been as a result of the power of enabling technologies to drive, support and leverage command decisions for optimal effect. In short, technology has made possible the tactical implementation of swift and effective decision making at the coal face. But how?
Integration is the Key….
The simple answer is through the development of net centric warfare technologies, disciplines and doctrines. Providing a holistic environment in which information is gathered, analysed and acted upon in short order shortens the ‘kill chain,’ leads to effects-oriented action brought to bear at the point of interest swiftly and efficiently (at least in theory) and means that higher echelon command can concentrate on exploiting the opportunities brought about by such action rather than becoming enmeshed in the minutiae of directing and controlling the action, which is better done by the guys who can ‘smell the coffee’ and ‘see the whites of their eyes,’ without the necessity for referral up the line to get a decision. Does that sound too ‘warm and fuzzy?’ It shouldn’t.Take the individual soldier and the basic operational unit for infantry action – the squad. The last two decades have seen literally tens of millions of dollars devoted to development of so-called ‘future soldier’ technologies. There are at least 40 programmes currently under way worldwide aimed at providing coordinated sensor and communications intelligence to the individual squad member, enabling him (or her, increasingly) to act in an integrated fashion with the rest of the squad, and to do so in a manner that makes the effects of that action – whether those effects are soft or kinetic – more appropriate to the task at hand. The only way this works effectively is by ensuring that systems are integrated, user friendly and robust, capable of routine operation in a hostile environment. In short, integration is the key.
Which is where some of these programmes run into trouble. There are physical constraints at work here – soldiers don’t like to carry anything that isn’t directly relevant to their personal survival – typically, ammunition, water and food. The necessity to carry several kilos of electronic equipment – and the power sources to make them function – brings an associated level of resistance that can often overcome a willingness to recognise the potential benefits. Apart from the physical, however, there is another component that works against efficient use of the capability – information overload. Faced with multiple options based on having a detailed but often confusing picture of the immediate conflict environment, there is a natural human tendency to weigh those options before making a decision, and that can lead to decision paralysis, which is the diametrically opposite situation from that which the system was originally intended to enable.
To a degree, the same applies to the vehicles from which dismounted action emanates. Armoured vehicles such as the BAE Systems CV90 and the General Dynamics SCOUT family of vehicles under construction for the British Army demonstrate high levels of systems integration, ranging from electronic surveillance and communications equipment to weapons sighting and control systems and even intelligent power management systems to increase efficiency and sustainability. Increasing complexity of systems integration, in a net centric environment, certainly leads to the potential for enhanced capability. However, this is sometimes offset by a tendency for some of the more mundane systems, which may have been overlooked in ‘gold plating’ the specification, to go wrong.
The reader should not assume this is intended to criticise the drive to integrate and improve efficiencies at small unit levels. On the contrary, such initiatives are laudable and there are both users and suppliers out there seeking to provide effective, enduring, cost-efficient and sustainable solutions.
One solution – one attracting increased interest for its simplicity of concept, though implementation is a little more complicated – is to provide information to the individual or specific platform on a distributed basis. Rather than employing point to point communications to give each squad leader in a platoon, for instance, the distillation of data from multiple sensors and electronic sources, the drive here is to provide the data to the network for analysis and storage, allowing individual users to access information as the need arises. This has several benefits: in the initial post-collection phase of the intelligence cycle, it frees up communications channels, since data has to be communicated to one repository rather than multiple individual users; it allows for analysis to be conducted once, centrally, rather than once at each user level, thus speeding up the intelligence cycle; and it reduces the potential for data irrelevant to platoon B (as opposed to platoon A which urgently requires it) swamping the platoon leader’s capability to make effective decisions.
In some ways this reflects the increasing complexity of modern warfare. Planners over the last decade or more have focused a great deal of attention on ensuring that everybody knows everything relevant. But there is a subtle amendment that needs to be considered – which is the fact that in a huge majority of cases it is the individual who knows far better what is relevant to his specific situation. By allowing the user to access centralised information and make decisions based on intelligence that he sees is clearly relevant in his case, therefore, better and, arguably, more timely decisions can be made.
If the concept of the strategic corporal is to truly come into its own, then giving him the ability to make decisions at the micro level – which, after all, is what the concept is all about in the first place – by accessing ‘packaged’ information rather than drowning him in superfluous detail would seem to be a fare better iteration of network centric warfare at the tactical level.
….but Implementation is the Secret
If distributed data is one key element to making tactical NCW work, then it is arguable that broader – perhaps one might even say strategic – approaches to implementation may provide the ‘secret sauce’ to make the whole concept more palatable. The UK MoD has embraced an approach to standardisation of land platforms that speaks to just this issue in adopting Def-Stan 23-03, more popularly recognised as Generic Vehicle Architecture or GVA.Put simply, GVA posits that all land platforms – ranging from tanks and armoured vehicles to outposts, infantry equipment and logistics support systems, must in future meet common standards. This sounds too good – and too simple – to be true. But the power behind GVA lies in two facts.
First is that commonality means commonality. Too many NCW ideas have fallen foul of the hurdle of integrating legacy systems, because nobody has the resources, finances, time or even will to start again from scratch. Trying to force integrated capability by building patches and bug fixes to make legacy systems talk to each other is niot the answer. So by starting from a ‘point in time’ and dictating that henceforth all systems will share common characteristics, GVA is already streets ahead in terms of potential capability enhancement.
Second is the fact that MoD has taken a radical step – some might say almost too radical – of publishing the entire open architecture code for industry to obtain, integrate and implement. Not only does the standard dictate the style that future equipment must adhere to at the platform level, it also stipulates the common nature of any add-on or replacement system to be procured in the future. In other words, given the life span of say, 30 years for an armoured vehicle family, whatever technological advances make possible in the future in the capability presented by, say, ground radar sensors, any future replacement ground radar must be designed from the get go to fit the requirements of GVA and the generic platforms that will then be in service.
None of this should be taken to infer that what has happened to date is bad, or that significant progress in the ‘tacticalisation’ of NCW has not been made. The capabilities of the infantry squad today to gather and analyse intelligence, to decide and communicate, to enhance individual and unit situational awareness – in short, to fight effectively in a modern conflict are streets ahead of what they were even twenty years ago. And the signs are that the evolution of capability will progress at an even more rapid rate – particularly given moves made by the increasingly savvy customer to ensure that best practices are ruthlessly imported and exploited from other areas of human endeavour.
In the entertainment industry, the capabilities of computer games and simulations have been increasingly leveraged into constructive simulations for the training of military and security forces. The so-called ‘serious games’ component of military training programmes is now firmly embedded in the community’s psyche, as witness the near ubiquitous use of game engines like Bohemia Interactive Simulations’ VBS-3. As the engine has been used by more and more armed forces around the world, so Bohemia have continued the never-ending process of adding niche capability or modifying existing procedures to cater for the subtle variations in national doctrine or equipment characteristics.
There is a lesson here we should sit up and take not of. If NCW is to work – and with the best will in the world, we are not there yet, despite what protagonists will tell you – we need to be better at defining exactly what it is we want to do and we need to ensure we develop flexible, on-point training and education solutions in order to enable the strategic corporal – and his subordinates, peers and superiors – to use the undoubted power of integrated, networked combat capability to maximum effect. We ignore one salient point at our peril. NCW is not about electronics, not about distributed data, not about next-generation weaponry, lethal or non-lethal. It’s about people.
Tim Mahon
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