WAVES OF NETWORK-CENTRIC WARS

(EVERYTHING NEW IS WELL-FORGOTTEN OLD)

Even before his appointment in 1977 as the Chief of the General Staff of the Soviet Armed Forces, Nikolai Ogarkov actively implemented automated integrated command and control systems (AC2S) at all levels from military district down to battalion, battery and squadron. The Marshal of the Soviet Union believed that in the high-tech era, the deep operations doctrine should be supported by combining the capabilities of intelligence, control automation and fire support. The Zapad-81^[1] operational-strategic exercises demonstrated that the Maneuver automated control system made it possible to increase the effectiveness of artillery and aviation weapons almost fivefold. The internal political (or rather, inter-elites) dissent blocked the transition of the Soviet Armed Forces to the information technology level, and as it often happens, the political opponent took the initiative.

In 1998, U.S. Navy Admiral Jay Johnson, Vice Admiral Arthur Serbowski and Pentagon researcher John Garstka published Network-Centric Warfare: Its Origin and Future^[2]. Increased combat power of the joint task groups had to be achieved through creation of an information and communication network (combining information sources (intelligence), control & command (C2) structures (headquarters) and weaponry) and capable to provide reliable, complete, real time information about the battleground environment to commanders of geographically dispersed forces at all levels. In fact, a secure computer network made it possible to transform an information advantage (knowledge gained during an all-encompassing observation of the operational space and possibly a full understanding of the intentions of the command) into superiority on the battlefield.

The doctrine of network-centric warfare (NCW) provides for four main phases of warfare:

To achieve information superiority through the preemptive destruction/suppression of the enemy's intelligence and information support system (intelligence means, network-forming nodes, information processing, as well as control & command centers).
To gain air superiority/dominance through the destruction/suppression of enemy's air defense system.
To destruct the enemy weaponry (missile systems, aviation, artillery, armor) that previously was deprived of control and information means.
To destruct/suppress enemy’s last resistance points.

The US Armed Forces battle-tested the provisions of the NCW doctrine during the Iraq war in 2003. It was supported by several automated C2 systems, most noticeably the Theater Battle Management Core System (TVMS), Force XXII Battle Command Brigade or Below (FBCB2) and Army Movement Tracking System (MTS)^[3].

Troops were connected to communication network, including the air-land segment of EPLRS/SINCGARS and the space segment of INMARSAT. As a result, the commanders of the units on the battlefield were able to exchange data within the virtual network of the tactical Internet and directly require the artillery and tactical (and in some cases strategic) aviation support. At the same time, the effectiveness of these systems was reduced by the low bandwidth of information channels, which often forced American troops to switch to traditional means of communication. Therefore, after the company in Iraq, the automated control system was sent for revision.

The Russian side drew the appropriate conclusions and in December 2014 set the National Defense Control Center of the Russian Federation (NCSO) on round-the-clock combat duty. It is an unified management system for all military units included in the structure of the Russian Armed Forces – from the nuclear triad and military districts (operational and strategic command) down to divisions/brigades. The technical basis of this AC2S are the Acacia-M strategic and operational level l system, its mobile analogue in the troops and the Constellation-M2/Andromeda-D Unified Tactical Management System complexes.

Due to Russian reports during combat trial in Syria this AC2S allowed to achieve:

High efficiency of information exchange (collection, processing and display of information about the tactical situation), which increases the speed of basic C2 performance by 5-6 times.
The continuity of the work of the entire automated control system from the operational-strategic level down to the \tactical link due to the constant collection of data on the situation in the round-the-clock monitoring mode.
Unified hardware and software complexes (including graphical display of situation data) for all levels of control from the private infantryman to the Commander of the Armed Forces.
The ability of the AC2S to quickly restore its operability even if several HQs suppressed/destroyed, which shows a high degree of reliability of the means and elements^[4].

As in the case of the US AC2S, a number of shortcomings was revealed during the actual fighting. In addition, Russian military communications and intelligence satellites are outnumbered by the US INMARSAT, IRIDIUM and DoD satellites. Currently, Russians are making efforts to bridge the gap, which is even more obvious due to the launch of the SpaceX StarLink satellites. The plan is to launch new models of military and dual-purpose satellites with the aim to create the Unified Space System.

In turn, in March 2022, the US DoD signed a plan for the implementation of Joint All Domain Command and Control (JADC2), which assumes seamless interoperability and communication between DoD's various systems (previously each of them used its own tactical network, generally incompatible with the others). All of them will have both defensive and strike systems capable of operating under the control of a single command in a single decision-making and data transmission system. The implementation of JADC2 is based on six guiding principles: designing universal and continuous information sharing at an enterprise level; making it secure with a "layered" and "strong cyber defense"; having an interoperable and standardized data fabric; making it operational and resilient in a degraded environment; improving command and control capability development broadly; and delivering JADC2 capabilities quickly through acquisitions and development^[5].

Besides the technical aspects (formation of a cloud environment for the data exchange transmitted over a variety of communication networks in order to speed up decision-making), special attention will be paid to attracting talented individuals and improving the knowledge/skills level of military personnel: "Command and control in an increasingly information-focused warfighting environment have never been more critical^[6].

Even before generalizing the experience of the use of automated control systems by the parties of Ukrainian conflict, it is possible to predict confidently the growth of the importance of both qualitatively new technological/software components of automated control systems, and increasingly higher requirements for the level of knowledge and skills of personnel at all levels.

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Published: 03/06/22

Updated 12/07/22