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Network-centric warfare (NCW), now commonly called network-centric operations (NCO), is a new military doctrine or theory of war pioneered by the United States Department of Defense. War is an international relations Dispute, characterized by organized Violence between National Military units Military history is a Humanities discipline within the scope of general historical recording of armed conflict in the history of humanity Prehistoric warfare is War conducted in the era before Writing, and before the establishments of large social entities like States Historical warfare sets Ancient warfare is War as conducted from the beginnings of recorded History to the end of the ancient period Medieval Warfare is the warfare of the Middle Ages. In Europe technological cultural and social developments had forced a dramatic transformation in the character Early Modern warfare is associated with the start of the widespread use of Gunpowder and the development of suitable weapons to use the explosive Industrial warfare is a period in the History of warfare ranging roughly from the start of the Industrial Revolution to the beginning of the Information Age Modern warfare, although present in every Historical period of Military history, is generally used to refer to the concepts, methods and Battlespace is a unified strategy to integrate and combine Armed forces for the Military theatre of operations, including air, information Air power redirects here for electrical and mechanical energy supplied by air movement see Wind power Information warfare is the use and management of information in pursuit of a competitive advantage over an opponent Land warfare, sometimes also called ground combat is the term used to describe military operations eventuating in Combat that take place predominantly on the land surface of Naval warfare is Combat in and on Seas Oceans or any other major bodies of water such as large Lakes and wide Rivers History Space warfare is combat that takes place in Outer space, ie outside the Atmosphere. A weapon is a Tool used either in Hunting, or attack or defence in Combat for the purpose of subduing enemy personnel or to destroy enemy weapons Armoured warfare or tank warfare is the use of Armoured fighting vehicles in Modern warfare. Artillery (from French artillerie) is a military Combat Arm which employs any apparātus machine Biological warfare (BW — known as a germ warfare, biological weapons and bioweaponry — is the use of any Pathogen ( Bacterium The Cavalry (from French cavalerie) is the second oldest of the Combat Arms, and as Soldiers or Warriors who fought mounted on Chemical warfare involves using the toxic properties of Chemical substances to kill injure or incapacitate an enemy. Electronic warfare ( EW) is the use of the Electromagnetic spectrum to effectively deny the use of this medium by an adversary while optimizing its use by friendly The Infantry is the oldest and most numerous of the Combat Arms in the Armed forces, and consists A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from Nuclear reactions either fission or a combination of fission and fusion. The US Department of Defense defines psychological warfare ( PSYWAR) as" The planned use of Propaganda and other Psychological actions Military tactics ( Greek: Taktikē, the art of organizing an army are the techniques for using weapons or military units in combination for engaging and defeating This article is about the military strategy For the Israeli-Egyptian conflict see War of Attrition, for the game theoretical model see War of attrition (game Guerrilla warfare is the unconventional warfare and combat with which a small group of combatants use mobile tactics (ambushes raids etc Maneuver warfare, also spelled manoeuvre warfare, is the term used by military theorists for a concept of Warfare that advocates attempting to Total war is a conflict of unlimited scope in which a Belligerent engages in a total mobilization of all available resources at his disposal Trench warfare is a form of warfare where both combatants have fortified positions and fighting lines are static Military strategy is a National defence policy implemented by Military organisations to pursue desired strategic goals Derived from the Greek Economic warfare is the term for economic policies followed as a part of Military operations during Wartime The purpose of economic warfare is to capture Grand strategy is military Strategy at the level of movement and use of an entire Nation state or Empire 's resources A military organization is a way of structuring the armed forces of a State as a need to offer Military capability required by the National defence policy A military organization is a way of structuring the armed forces of a State as a need to offer Military capability required by the National defence policy Military rank is a system of hierarchical relationships in Armed forces or civil institutions organized along military lines A military organization is a way of structuring the armed forces of a State as a need to offer Military capability required by the National defence policy Military Logistics is the art and science of planning and carrying out the movement and maintenance of military forces This article lists military technology items devices and methods Materiel (from the French "matériel" for equipment or hardware related to the word Material) is a term used in English to refer to the Military supply chain management is a cross-functional approach to procuring, producing and delivering products and services The broad This is an index to articles listing Battles. List of battles (alphabetical gives a global list See also Military History Antiquity Albania Agron ( 250 BC - 230 BC) The first king to unite the Illyrian This is a list of missions operations and projects Missions in support of other missions are not listed independently A Siege is a prolonged Military Assault and Blockade on a City or Fortress with the intent of conquering by force or Attrition See also List of military writers. Friedrich von Bernhardi Ivan Bloch John Boyd, inventor of the OODA Loop This is a listing of lists of Wars, sorted by country date region and type of conflict This article lists and summarizes War crimes committed since the Hague Convention of 1907. There is a bewildering array of Weapons far more than would be useful in list form This is a list of military writers, alphabetical by last name Military doctrine is the concise expression of how military forces contribute to campaigns major operations Battles and engagements It is a guide The United States Department of Defense ( DOD or DoD) is the federal department charged with coordinating and supervising all agencies and functions of the government NCW/NCO seeks to translate an information advantage, enabled in part by information technology, into a competitive warfighting advantage through the robust networking of well informed geographically dispersed forces. [1] This networking—combined with changes in technology, organization, processes, and people—may allow new forms of organizational behavior. Specifically, the theory contains the following four tenets in its hypotheses:[2]

Network Enabled Capability (NEC) is a term used in the United Kingdom and elsewhere for a similar doctrine. Network Enabled Capability, or NEC, is the name given to the United Kingdom Ministry of Defence intent to achieve enhanced military effect through the better The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK or Britain,is a Sovereign state located In Sweden, one of the first nations in Europe to begin the transformation, the (translated) term is Network Based Defence. [1] The term "netcentric warfare" may be used interchangeably with the term network-centric warfare.

Contents

Background and history

Network centric warfare can trace its immediate origins to 1996 when Adm. William Owens introduced the concept of a “system of systems” in a paper of the same name published by the Institute National Security Studies. Owens described the serendipitous evolution of a system of intelligence sensors, command and control systems, and precision weapons that enabled enhanced situational awareness, rapid target assessment, and distributed weapon assignment. The same year, the Joint Chiefs of Staff released Joint Vision 2010, which introduced the military concept of Full-spectrum dominance. Full-spectrum dominance is a military concept whereby a joint military structure achieves control over all elements of the battlespace using land, air, maritime Full Spectrum Dominance described the ability of the US military to dominate the battlespace from peace operations through to the outright application of military power that stemmed from the advantages of information superiority.

As a distinct concept, however, NCW first appeared publicly in a 1998 US Naval Institute Proceedings article by Vice Admiral Arthur K. Cebrowski and John Gartska. Vice Admiral (ret Arthur K Cebrowski (August 13 1942 &ndash November 12 2005 was a retired United States Navy Admiral who served from October 2001 John J Garstka is the Assistant Director Concepts and Operations at the Office of Force Transformation, Office of the Secretary of Defense, at the United States The concepts were later given greater depth in the book, “Network Centric Warfare” coauthored by Gartska, David S. Alberts (Director of Research, OASD-NII), and Fred Stein of The MITRE Corporation. The mitre (sometimes also spelled miter from the Greek μίτρα, 'headband' or 'turban' is a type of headgear now known as the traditional ceremonial head-dress of Published by the Command and Control Research Program (CCRP), the book derived a new theory of warfare from a series of case studies on how business was using information and communication technologies to improve situation analysis, accurately control inventory and production, as well as monitor customer relations.

NCW was followed in 2001 by Understanding Information Age Warfare (UIAW), jointly authored by Alberts, Gartska, Richard Hayes of Evidence Based Research and David S. Signori of RAND. UIAW pushed the implications of the shifts identified by NCW in order to derive an operational theory of warfare. Starting with a series of premises on how the environment is sensed, UIAW posits a structure of three domains. The “physical domain” is where events take place and are perceived by sensors and individuals. Data emerging from the physical domain is transmitted through an “information domain”. Data is subsequently received and processed by a “cognitive domain” where it is assessed and acted upon. The process replicates the “observe, orient, decide, act” (OODA) loop first described by Col. The OODA Loop (for Observe, Orient, Decide and Act) is a concept applied to the Combat operations process, often at Strategic John Boyd of the USAF. Colonel John (Richard Boyd ( January 23, 1927 &ndash March 9, 1997) was a United States Air Force fighter

The last publication dealing with the developing theory of network centric warfare appeared in 2003 with “Power to the Edge”, also published by the CCRP. Power to the Edge is a more speculative work and easily the most revolutionary in terms of its implications for military operations. It suggests that modern military environments are far too complex to be understood by any one individual, organisation, or even military service. Modern information technology permits the rapid and effective sharing of information to such a degree that “edge entities” or those that are essentially conducting military missions themselves, should be able to “pull” information from ubiquitous repositories, rather than having centralised agencies attempt to anticipate their information needs and “push” it to them. This would imply a major flattening of traditional military hierarchies, however. It is not yet clear whether the vision of Power to the Edge is realisable, although Alberts and Hayes argue in the book that the establishment of the Global Information Grid is the first step to accomplishing it. Power to the Edge refers to the ability of an organization to dynamically synchronize its actions achieve command and control (C2 agility and increase the speed of command The Global Information Grid (GIG is an all-encompassing communications project of the United States Department of Defense.

Power To The Edge's radical ideas had been under investigation by the Pentagon since at least 2001. In UIAW, the concept of peer-to-peer activity combined with more traditional hierarchical flow of data in the network had been introduced. For other uses of the term see Peer-to-peer (disambiguation For peer-to-peer networks used for file sharing see File sharing Network topology is the study of the arrangement or mapping of the elements ( links, nodes, etc Shortly thereafter, the Pentagon began investing in peer-to-peer research, telling software engineers at a November, 2001 peer-to-peer conference that there were advantages to be gained in the redundancy and robustness of a peer-to-peer network topology on the battlefield. Network topology is the study of the arrangement or mapping of the elements ( links, nodes, etc Colonel Robert Wardell said "You have to empower the fringes if you are going to. . . be able to make decisions faster than the bad guy". [3]

Network-centric warfare/operations is a cornerstone of the ongoing transformation effort at the Department of Defense initiated by former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. The United States Secretary of Defense ( SECDEF) is the head of the U Donald Henry Rumsfeld (born July 9 1932 is a United States Businessman, Politician, the 13th Secretary of Defense under President It is also one of the five goals of the Office of Force Transformation, Office of the Secretary of Defense. The United States Office of Force Transformation (OFT was established October 29 2001 in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, United States Department The Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD is part of the United States Department of Defense and includes the entire staff of the Secretary of Defense.

See Revolution in Military Affairs for further information on what is now known as "defense transformation" or "transformation". The Military concept of Revolution in Military Affairs ( RMA) is a theory about the future of Warfare, often connected to technological and

Related technologies and programs

The US DoD has mandated that the Global Information Grid (GIG) will be the primary technical framework to support NCW/NCO. The Global Information Grid (GIG is an all-encompassing communications project of the United States Department of Defense. Under this directive, all advanced weapons platforms, sensor systems, and command and control centers are eventually to be linked via the GIG. A weapons platform is generally any structure or system on which a Weapon can be mounted A sensor is a device that measures a physical quantity and converts it into a signal which can be read by an observer or by an instrument Command and control can be defined as the exercise of Authority and Direction by a properly designated Commander over assigned and attached Forces The term system of systems is often used to describe the results of these types of massive integration efforts. System of systems is a Moniker for a collection of task-oriented or dedicated systems that pool their resources and capabilities together to obtain a new more complex 'meta-system'

The topic Net-Centric Enterprise Services addresses the applications context of the GIG. Net-Centric Enterprise Services (NCES is a Department of Defense program managed by the Defense Information Systems Agency, to develop Information technology

A number of significant U. S. military programs are taking technical steps towards supporting network-centric warfare. These include the Cooperative Engagement Capability (CEC) of the United States Navy and the Future Combat Systems (FCS) program in the United States Army. Future Combat Systems (FCS is the United States Army 's principal modernization program The United States Army is a military organization whose primary mission is to "provide necessary forces and capabilities.

Net-Centric Enterprise Solutions for Interoperability (NESI) provides, for all phases of the acquisition of net-centric solutions, actionable guidance that meets DoD Network-Centric Warfare goals. NESI, or Net-centric Enterprise Solutions for Interoperability is a joint effort between the United States Navy ’s Program Executive The guidance in NESI is derived from the higher level, more abstract concepts provided in various directives, policies and mandates such as the Net-Centric Operations and Warfare Reference Model (NCOW RM) and the ASD(NII) Net-Centric Checklist. Net-Centric Operations Warfare (also referred to as NCOW, NCOW-RM, or Net-Centric Operations Warfare Reference Model) describes how the United States Department

Doctrinal tenets of network-centric warfare

The doctrine of NCW for the United States armed forces draws its highest level of guidance from the concept of "team warfare", meaning the integration and synchronization of all appropriate capabilities across the various services, ranging from Army to Air Force to Coast Guard. This is part of the principle of joint warfare. Joint warfare is a Military doctrine which places priority on the integration of the various service branches of a state's Armed forces into one unified

The tenets of NCW (Alberts, 2002, pp. 7-8) are:

Some architectural and design challenges

International activities

There is significant need to harmonize the technical and operational aspects of net-centric warfare and net-centric operations among multiple nations, in order to support coalition activities, joint operations, etc. STANAG (STANdard AGreement) is the coordinating vehicle for establishing shared technical standards among NATO nations. STANAG is the NATO abbreviation for Standardization Agreement, which set up processes procedures terms and conditions for common Military or technical The North Atlantic Treaty

See also Partnership for Peace for information on extending coordination efforts to non-NATO nations that are keen to support MOOTW (military operations other than war) activities, such as international peacekeeping, disaster response, humanitarian aid, etc. Partnership for Peace (PfP is a North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO program aimed at creating trust between NATO and other states in Europe and the former Military operations other than war ('MOOTW' is a concept in United States military doctrine that refers to the use of military capabilities across a range of operations

Supporting comments

"With less than half of the ground forces and two-thirds of the military aircraft used 12 years ago in Desert Storm, we have achieved a far more difficult objective . An army (from Latin Armata "act of arming" via Old French armée) in the broadest sense is the land-based Armed forces . . In Desert Storm, it usually took up to two days for target planners to get a photo of a target, confirm its coordinates, plan the mission, and deliver it to the bomber crew. Now we have near real-time imaging of targets with photos and coordinates transmitted by e-mail to aircraft already in flight. In Desert Storm, battalion, brigade, and division commanders had to rely on maps, grease pencils, and radio reports to track the movements of our forces. A battalion is a Military unit of around 500-1500 men usually consisting of between two and seven companies and typically commanded by a Lieutenant Colonel A brigade is a Military unit Echelon: is A division is a large Military unit or formation usually consisting of around ten to thirty thousand soldiers Today, our commanders have a real-time display of our armed forces on their computer screen. Commander is a Military rank which is also sometimes used as a military title depending on the individual customs of a given military service " [4] -- Vice President Richard Cheney . Richard Bruce "Dick" Cheney (born January 30 1941 is the forty-sixth and current Vice President of the United States.

"Net-centric warfare's effectiveness has greatly improved in 12 years. Desert Storm forces, involving more than 500,000 troops, were supported with 100 megabit per second (Mbit/s) of bandwidth. In telecommunications Bit rate or Data transfer rate is the average number of Bits characters or blocks per unit time passing between equipment in a data transmission Today, OIF forces, with about 350,000 warfighters, had more than 3,000 Mbit/s of satellite Bandwidth, which is 30 times more bandwidth for a force 45 percent smaller. U. S. troops essentially used the same weapon platforms used in Operation Desert Storm with significantly increased effectiveness. " [5]

Contradictory views

Our incipient NCW plans may suffer defeat by [adversaries] using primitive but cagey techniques, inspired by an ideology we can neither match nor understand; or by an enemy who can knock out our vulnerable Global Positioning System or use electromagnetic pulse weapons on a limited scale, removing intelligence as we have construed it and have come to depend upon. Basic concept of GPS operation A GPS receiver calculates its position by carefully timing the signals sent by the constellation of GPS Satellites high above the Earth The term electromagnetic pulse ( EMP) has the following meanings Electromagnetic radiation from an Explosion (especially a Nuclear Fighting forces accustomed to relying upon downlinks for information and commands would have little to fall back upon.

—Charles Perrow, Information Assurance, National Defense University, May 2003

The aspiration of the Australian Defence Force (ADF) to embrace NCW is outlined in the document ADF Force 2020. The National Defense University (NDU is an institution of Higher education funded by the United States Department of Defense, intended to facilitate high-level training The Australian Defence Force (ADF is the military organisation responsible for the defence of Australia This vision has been criticized by Aldo Borgu, director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI). By developing interoperability with U. S. systems, in his view, the three arms of the Australian Defence Force could end up operating better with their sister United States services than with each other. [6]

Network Centric Warfare is often criticized by proponents of Fourth Generation Warfare (4GW) doctrine. Fourth generation warfare (4GW is combat characterized by a blurring of the lines between War and Politics, soldier and civilian peace and conflict battlefield These criticisms are often based on a perceived focus on technical solutions, expensive and “legacy” (Cold War era) platforms, and transformation policies; allegedly at the expense of ignoring current operational needs and funding.

Also, since Network Centric Warfare focuses so much on distributing information, one has to be wary of the effect of false information entering the system, be it through enemy deception or simple error. Just as the usefulness of correct information can be amplified, so can the repercussions of incorrect data entering the system achieve much greater consequences.

See also

References

Alberts, D. Battlespace is a unified strategy to integrate and combine Armed forces for the Military theatre of operations, including air, information British Military Intelligence Systems in Northern Ireland is a term used to describe various HUMINT, ELINT, and SIGINT systems used by the RUC and British The Command and Control Research Program (CCRP within the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense (NII focuses upon (1 improving both the state of the art and the state of the practice The Joint Functional Component Command Network Warfare ( JFCC-NW) is a subordinate component command of the United States Strategic Command ( USSTRATCOM) Joint Task Force-Global Network Operations ( JTF-GNO) is a subordinate command of the United States Strategic Command. Net-Centric Enterprise Services (NCES is a Department of Defense program managed by the Defense Information Systems Agency, to develop Information technology A network-centric organization is a Network governance pattern emerging in many progressive 21st century enterprises Network science is a new and emerging scientific discipline that examines the interconnections among diverse physical informational biological cognitive and social networks The United States Office of Force Transformation (OFT was established October 29 2001 in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, United States Department For other uses of the term see Peer-to-peer (disambiguation For peer-to-peer networks used for file sharing see File sharing Sensemaking is the ability or attempt to make sense of an ambiguous situation Swarming is a behavior in which autonomous or semi-autonomous units of action attack an enemy from several different directions and then regroup Situation awareness, or SA is the perception of environmental elements within a volume of time and space the comprehension of their meaning and the projection of their status in the S. , Garstka, J. J. , Stein, F. P. , (2000) Network Centric Warfare: Developing and Leveraging Information Superiority, CCRP Publ. , 2nd Edition (Revised). Aug 1999, Second Print Feb 2000.

Alberts, D. S. , (2002), Information Age Transformation: Getting to a 21st Century Military, Washington, DC, CCRP Publications. First published 1996.

  1. ^ Department of Defense. The Implementation of Network-Centric Warfare. Washington, D. C. , 2005, p. 4.
  2. ^ Department of Defense. The Implementation of Network-Centric Warfare. Washington, D. C. , 2005, p. 7.
  3. ^ Walker, Leslie. Uncle Sam Wants Napster! The Washington Post, November 8, 2001
  4. ^ STSC Crosstalk
  5. ^ "Net-Centric Warfare Is Changing the Battlefield Environment", Lt. Gen. Harry D. Raduege Jr. , Defense Information Systems Agency
  6. ^ Max Blenkin, AAP General News (Australia), 9/17/2003

External links

  1. IDGA's Network Centric Warfare
  2. The OASD-NII Command and Control Research Program (CCRP)
  3. NCOW Wiki Network-Centric Operations Warfare Wiki
  4. Net-Centric Enterprise Solutions for Interoperability (NESI)
  5. Network centric warfare and wireless communications
  6. Network Centric Warfare Solutions - Aeronautics Defense Systems
  7. NCW related article on Crosstalk - Defense Software Engineering Journal
  8. Army War College article: Principles of Warfare on the Network-Centric Battlefield
  9. http://www.globalsecurity.org
  10. NCW Topics on Defense Update
  11. C4I.org - Computer Security & Intelligence
  12. Network Centric Warfare on APA
  13. Network-Centric Operations Industry Consortium (NCOIC)
  14. Ericsson white paper: C4ISR for Network-Oriented Defense
  15. Understanding Network Centric Warfare
  16. Launching a new kind of warfare
  17. High-Tech Military in Due Course
  18. U.S. Air Force prepares to fight in cyberspace
  19. Swedish Defence Materiel Administration, includes published technical documentation. The Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA formerly known as the Defense Communications Agency) is a combat support agency of the United States Department of Defense
  20. THE IMPORTANCE OF NETWORK ENABLED CAPABILITIES FOR 21st CENTURY DEFENCE AND NATIONAL SECURITYArticle by Air Marshal Subhash Bhojwani

International links

  1. NATO Network Enabled Capabilities (NNEC)
  2. NETWORKING IN THE INDIAN SCENARIO
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