Aerospace and Defense eNewsletter
Volume 6 Issue 1 - March 2006
Information and Decision Superiority: Sharing and Security
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Information superiority is the core of Defense Department plans for military transformation. Statements such as Joint Vision 2020 in 2000 from the Joint Chiefs of Staff and, more recently, the February 6, 2006, Quadrennial Defense Review define the way the government will use information technology to support all aspects of military operation in its pursuit of full-spectrum dominance.
The nature of its global interests and responsibilities in the twenty-first century demands that the United States be prepared to operate at the highest levels of effectiveness with multinational forces. Participating forces from around the world have very different levels of technology; yet the success of operations relies on the ability to work smoothly with all of them. Interoperability has been the foundation to accommodate the full spectrum of needs. It allows diverse actors to interface and share information that is critical to their missions. U.S. forces have made significant progress toward interagency interoperability, and innovation, fostered by the Joint Chiefs vision of the year 2020, will enable the same kind of progress with multinational forces.
Because of the intricate U.S. role in world affairs, partnerships with multiple forces will increase in the years ahead. Global responsibilities draw U.S. forces and their allies into troubled regions, and information is the foundation of success in those operations. Commanders must be able to rely on information product to provide them with a thorough understanding of their partners as well as the region’s characteristics, its culture, politics, and military capabilities. Only with deep knowledge of the operation’s context can commanders exercise their best judgment and arrive at decision superiority against which the enemy is unable to defend.
To minimize information security risk, restraints control the flow of sensitive information and protect its sources. As the information environment evolves, attacks within the information domain will become more frequent and more sophisticated. Adversaries who have inferior weapons capability will seek asymmetric means to disrupt multinational operations. Information assets will be prime targets. Protection of information is essential, as is the ability to quickly share it with multiple decision makers in the battle-space. In order to create a coherent operational picture, relevant information must be delivered to the right people at the right time, while keeping in place restrictions to safeguard it.
Information security is complicated by the necessity of outsourcing. The U.S. military outsources numerous tasks, from maintenance and repair of aircraft to assembly of new weapons systems, which places knowledge of our capabilities in the hands of people all over the world who are outside of the U.S. military structure. Since the end of the draft in 1973, the number of active duty personnel in the U.S. armed forces has dropped from 3 million to less than half that, 1.4 million today. In order to maintain operations, the military has outsourced many routine jobs, such as cooking, cleaning, doing laundry, and repairing vehicles, and outsourcing those duties frees soldiers to fight. Other jobs are less mundane. Civilian contractors have been given responsibilities as profound as administering computer systems and Internet access, training local troops and police forces, and interrogating prisoners. These contractors, not all of whom are U.S. citizens, are not subject to the Uniform Code of Military Justice, and therefore, they cannot be court-martialed. While overseas, it is not certain that they are subject to the laws of the host country or of the United States, and so an additional layer of information security vigilance is required.
As U.S. forces make strides in transformation, the ways in which they share information in collaboration with multinational forces and non-military personnel will evolve. Innovations in information processing, tagging, and sharing will shape and be shaped by the shifting information environment.
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