[iwar] [fc:Information.Is.A.Weapon..What.Will.Happen.When.Every.Soldier.Is.Armed.With.It?]

From: Fred Cohen (fc@all.net)
Date: 2001-11-07 06:52:10
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Darwin Magazine
November 2001
The Military and IT
Information Is A Weapon. What Will Happen When Every Soldier Is Armed With It?
By Daintry Duffy
Whether armed conflicts occur in a once-bucolic countryside, mountainous
terrain or urban cityscape, battlefields are confusing places filled with
noise, uncertainty and never enough reliable information. 
From the rear command positions to the forwardmost points of engagement,
decision support suffers from data corruption, knowledge gaps and a
crippling lack of timeliness under dangerous, rapidly changing
circumstances. 
What a modern military wants and needs is dependable real-time intelligence,
shared among networked devices that can help dispel the fog that warfare's
inevitable chaos generates. To that end, the U.S. armed forces are now
jointly developing a battlefield strategy, and sets of systems and mobile
equipment that will turn every soldier into both a gatherer and a consumer
of up-to-the-instant information about the developing environment. 
Welcome to the new world of network-centric warfare, where technology pushes
power up to the command level, and information that would normally be
received via a radio and plotted on a map can be readily seen with the click
of a mouse. This same technology also pushes power down to the battlefield,
to the young Marine who can let slip the dogs of war with the tap of a
stylus. 
In the not-too-distant future, soldiers in combat will use handhelds and
minicomputers to connect to a wireless communications network that tracks
other units on the ground, and military assets in the air and at sea. 
This real-time tracking capability will not only replace the repetitive and
sometimes frantic radio calls to establish a soldier's location but could
also turn infantry soldiers into military strategists. 
With so much information at their fingertips, soldiers in combat will be
able to make field-level decisions about how, where and when to move their
troops. For the commander sitting miles away in the high-tech war room of a
naval vessel offshore, the wall-size, broad-scale version of a soldier's
handheld map will provide a complete tactical picture of the military
operation. This eagle-eyed view of the battlefield will give operation
commanders highly detailed, real-time situational information to make
decisions faster and target their troops and firepower with greater
accuracy. 
Of course, such a new approach to technology raises a number of technical
and cultural questions for the military. What happens when the network that
supports these technologies goes down or is hacked? What happens if the
technology falls into enemy hands? Given the power that information has to
break down hierarchies, how will the notoriously tradition-bound ranks of
the military adapt? Will the brass jealously guard information and the
status it provides, or radically change their training methods to build a
different kind of soldier? What happens when every squad leader in the field
has the same information in front of him that his commander has? Will squad
leaders continue to follow orders without question or will they demand more
input in the decision-making process? 
As corporations have discovered, engaging technology to empower employees,
disperse control of information and flatten the hierarchy can often bring
unexpected-sometimes even unwelcome-ripples of change. In testing out these
new technologies, the Marines and other armed services are focusing
pragmatically on the technology's usability and the challenges of building a
strong, secure network. But to their credit, they are also starting to
explore the domino effect that these technologies may have on long-standing
roles, the new kinds of training that may be required and how the technology
will fit into-and perhaps disrupt-military culture. 
IF THE FERVOR OF Navy and Marine honchos is any indication, the military's
approach to technology is about to change dramatically. In June, 5,000
military personnel from the Army, Navy and Marine Corps converged on Camp
Pendleton, a Marine Corps base near San Diego, for Kernel Blitz-two weeks of
high-tech war games. The purpose of the exercise was to demonstrate that
America's armed forces are on the verge of taking a quantum leap in their
use of technology and to explore its impact on military missions. 
Technologies (such as those described in "Ready, Aim, Wired," right) give
ground troops not only a better sense of where they are but also a highly
accurate perspective of the entire battle landscape-something that until now
even their commanders have been without. Military leaders think the
technology will make the U.S. forces faster, fiercer, safer and more
responsive to the enemy's movements. However, insiders predict that the
technology will also transform the military in other ways-making it more
democratic and entrepreneurial, and less chained to the command and control
ethos that has historically governed every aspect of military life. 
One of the central goals of network-centric warfare is to extend the reach
of military forces inland, while keeping warships-such as the USS Coronado
used in the recent Kernel Blitz exercises-well off the coast and out of
harm's way. The Navy's wide-area-relay network (WARnet) is just one of the
ways the military plans to expand its reach. 
WARnet is a wireless digital communications network that provides
ship-to-shore and unit-to-unit connectivity in a 100-by-200-mile area of
operations. The WARnet connections are made through a series of sea- and
land-based mobile nodes and airborne radio relays. These links allow the
same operational picture to be displayed in command centers aboard the
Coronado offshore, in mobile command centers onshore and on computers
carried by Marines engaged in combat. 
Unlike an office network where a user has to plug a laptop in to a network
connection, WARnet is a wireless network, transparent to its users, that
dynamically reconfigures itself as the nodes-think miniature cell phone
towers-move around the battle area. Airplanes, helicopters, ground vehicles
and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) carry the nodes, or packages in military
jargon. The Dragon Eye, a UAV that was tested at Kernel Blitz, is a
4.5-pound aircraft with a 4-foot wingspan that can be dispatched to provide
real-time pictures and data on enemy movement and targets in over-the-hill
areas that a Marine ground unit can't see. 
Information flows into the WARnet from a variety of sources: from a unit
commander calling for fire on a handheld, to a battalion commander sending
intelligence information via an instant message on his minicomputer, to
enemy location information transmitted by a UAV. The epicenter of that data
flow is an offshore headquarters (referred to as the ECOC: experimental
combat operations center) aboard the Coronado. Here in a dimly lit,
high-tech work center in the belly of the ship, the combat commander can
gather information from across the battle space-air, land and sea-and make
decisions based on the constantly changing elements of the operation. 
During Kernel Blitz the GPS receivers carried by each Marine allowed Lt.
Gen. Michael Hagee, the commanding general of the I Marine Expeditionary
Force, to watch a simulated attack from the ECOC in incredible detail. "We
could see the helicopters move and folks coming out of them and moving on to
the objective," he says. "Based on enemy intelligence, reporting and UAVs,
we could see where the bad guys were as we watched the whole thing unfolding
on the ground." 
While Marines on land have to make on-the-fly decisions about how to move
and where to fire, the officers in the ECOC will often be able to see the
enemy approaching before the ground unit does. Not only will they be able to
share that information with them by entering it into the WARnet, they can
anticipate the unit's needs by sending backup or aerial firepower even
before it is requested. 
NEW MILITARY TECHNOLOGIES have always outpaced advances in military tactics.
In the Civil War, the interior grooves of the new rifled musket caused
bullets to spiral when they were fired, making them more accurate at longer
ranges. However, soldiers were accustomed to gathering en masse and charging
their opponents, waiting to fire until they were in close range. Because
they were never trained to change their tactics along with their weaponry,
they couldn't take advantage of the new rifle's capabilities. 
Similarly, technologies such as WARnet and the gadgetry at Kernel Blitz will
be wasted unless the tactics they support are also examined. 
While experiments like Kernel Blitz are helpful, some experts believe that
the armed forces will need more than the occasional large-scale experiment
to fully understand the forces of change at work within this technology.
They will need to fundamentally rethink the structure of their reporting
relationships from command and control to one that is more flexible and less
hierarchical. 
It's a concept that retired Lt. Gen. Paul K. Van Riper of the Marine Corps
refers to as "being in command but out of control." He likens the military
of the future to a society of ants or termites that perform tasks like
gathering food and building structures with no apparent hierarchy. The key
is for the whole organization to understand the intent of the operation and
organize itself to accomplish that task. 
Thus, if you have Marines who understand their mission and purpose, they
will organize themselves to accomplish it, and the commander's role is to
give feedback as to how well they are accomplishing the task rather than to
control every step of the operation. The real fear in employing
network-centric warfare is not that troops will do too much with the
information that is given to them-dropping missiles at a soldier's whim-but
that they might do too little, still waiting for orders rather than taking
the initiative themselves. 
The burden of making this new technology reach its full potential will not
be felt in the labs where next-generation technologies are being developed
every day, but in the classrooms and on the training fields where an
advanced version of the prototypical U.S. soldier will have to be built.
"They're going to have to have longer service [with the military], and be
more professional in terms of their education and experience," says Van
Riper. 
Instead of a young sergeant armed with a handheld, the military may want a
more seasoned military strategist-perhaps even someone with an advanced
degree who can think about what he is seeing in the field within a larger
context and keep the technology in perspective. As Van Riper, a
self-proclaimed technology skeptic, pronounces, "I'd rather have an expert
with a pencil and paper than an idiot with a computer." 
The military's approach to testing offers hope that the armed forces will
bend the technology to their will rather than simply be led by it. The
strength of network-centric warfare, as Adm. Dennis Cutler Blair, commander
in chief of the U.S. Pacific Command at Camp Smith in Hawaii, conceives it,
is that it is driven from the bottom up. The individuals who have the
greatest influence on choosing the most effective technologies to pursue are
not the white-coats in the labs but the soldiers in the field who give a
great deal of feedback about their needs, how the technology fares and the
glitches they encounter. 
WHILE WARNET IS STILL prone to spotty network outages, of greater concern is
the potential for deliberate outages caused by enemy hackers. Most of the
network has been NSA Type 1 certified, which means that it meets the highest
government standard of encryption. However, the Navy is not taking any
chances and has put the network through a series of penetration tests where
internal expert hackers try to bust in. So far none have been successful. 
Maintaining the security of the handhelds and minicomputers will be more
challenging. In the confusion of combat, they will undoubtedly fall into
enemy hands, and without adequate security, it would be easy to send out
false data or reports. 
The various problems created by technology are going to introduce a new set
of needs and roles within the military. For example, instead of soldiers
with mechanical experience, units will need individuals trained as
electrical engineers who can fix handhelds and computers that have gone on
the fritz. One of the pitfalls of relying too heavily on technology is that
it can give the user a false sense of superiority. During the conflict in
Mogadishu, Somalia, U.S. troops had all the advantages of technology and
weaponry on their side but were still unprepared for the tactics of the
tribespeople because they didn't understand their culture. "There's a
certain arrogance about the advantages that technology gives you," Van Riper
says. What was needed in that situation was not more advanced technology but
fighting forces that could think like cultural anthropologists. 
The understanding that most senior officers currently have of what this
technology will mean to the armed forces is limited to sound bites and
bumper sticker slogans, according to Van Riper. "[They say], 'If you see the
battlefield, you win the war. That's like me saying, 'If I see the
chessboard, I win the game,' when of course a master would still beat me." 
While the battle between the technology and the culture of the armed
services is far from over, there is some hope-particularly in the Marine
Corps, where there's a lot of thought being given to technology and the
future of the armed forces. It's a future, says Col. Russell C. Woody,
operations officer for I Marine Expeditionary Force, for which the Corps'
values of honor, courage and commitment has prepared them. "Even though we
live by traditions, the Marine Corps is accustomed to change," he says.
Kernel Blitz 2001 -- The military is testing new technology in real-time
From June 18 to June 28, 5,000 military personnel from the 13th Marine
Expeditionary Unit, the Navy's amphibious Squadron Three and an Army assault
brigade from the 25th Division in Hawaii participated in two weeks of war
games-Kernel Blitz-out in the dusty fields of Camp Pendleton in southern
California and aboard the USS Coronado off the California coast to test how
these technologies-and its users-would fare. These are some of the major
exercises they conducted. 
Fleet Battle Experiment India
Putting network-centric warfare concepts into practice by building and
maintaining a wide-area-relay network that links both ships and small ground
units to facilitate a military attack. Sponsored by the Navy Warfare
Development Command 
Capable Warrior Advanced Warfighting Experiment
Examining how technological improvements affect over-the-horizon
communications, precision-targeting, reconnaissance surveillance and target
acquisition, and small unit logistics within to a Marine infantry battalion.
Sponsored by the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory 
Extending the Littoral Battle Space Advanced Concept Technology
Demonstration
Enhancing the robustness, interoperability and security of wireless
networking technology at the small unit level. Sponsored by the Office of
Naval Research 
Commander-in-Chief 21st Century Advanced Concept Technology Demonstration
Focusing on visualization and knowledge management-putting the right
information in front of the right decision maker at the right time to
enhance force effectiveness. Sponsored by the U.S. Pacific Command and the
Office of Naval Research 
Joint Medical Operations-Telemedicine Advanced Concept Technology
Demonstration
A casualty management exercise using wireless technology to report, track
and manage injuries. 
Ready, Aim, Wired -- Lab experiments can only prove so much. The battlefield
is where technology is put to the ultimate test. 
In murky darkness, a dozen Marines scramble through tall grass toward an
enemy camp barely visible 200 yards ahead. Somewhere out on the unfamiliar
terrain, two other small units are closing in, flanking the enemy on either
side. A young lieutenant motions for his group to halt and ready their
weapons. But before giving the order to fire, he pulls out a small
handheld-sheathed in standard-issue camouflage-and quietly pulls back its
cover. On the screen, tiny blue icons dot a map to show the exact location
of all the Marines in the area. Tapping on any of the individual icons
reveals the identity and exact location of a Marine. Even though he can't
actually see the soldiers, the lieutenant knows exactly where they are and
can direct his men to aim their fire away from those areas to avoid friendly
fire casualties. In the morning, he'll be able to use the same tool to
gather status information on supplies and injuries. 
At least that's how the military will conduct itself in the future. Today,
however, amid the deafening noise and destruction of combat, the bedlam of
battle can make it impossible for a ground soldier to assess a combat
situation. And although the information technology used by the military has
evolved significantly over the years, it has happened only in disparate
pockets of the individual armed forces. Moreover, the gadgets and the
networking tools of today usually can't talk to one another, and the
quickest way for a Marine to find the rest of his unit is simply to pick up
a radio. 
On a tactical level the military hopes that new breakthroughs in information
technology will lift "the fog of war," giving U.S. troops the advantage. "If
you are able to detect the enemy at longer ranges, know where you are and
where they are better than they do, that's a tremendous advantage," says
Andrew Koch, Washington bureau chief of Jane's Defense Information Group. 
According to training officers, 75 percent of a Marine's time has
historically been spent trying to make sure he knows where his fellow
Marines are so that the operation doesn't endanger them. The ability to
track the Marines using GPS could potentially cut down on friendly fire
casualties-the cause of 50 percent of the USMC losses in the Gulf War. 
Moreover, with navigational information in a common database, squad and
company leaders can filter out information they don't want to see,
localizing the picture so that they don't become paralyzed by information
overload. 
Using PDAs, Marines can also submit reports, do instant messaging and call
for fire by marking a hostile target anywhere on the map. 
While all those functions are useful in a theoretical way, the Marines are
still figuring out what kinds of handhelds they'll need-whether they should
be styled like a PalmPilot or perhaps worn on the wrist-and how they will
fit into their normal combat activities. For instance, some laptop-style
equipment can add 17 pounds to a Marine's standard issue gear, which can
already weigh up to 80 pounds. That's a cumbersome load to carry when you're
out in the field for long periods and have to move quickly. "Will corporals
or sergeants want to keep their head down looking at their Buck Rogers watch
while they're getting shot at?" asks Adm. Dennis Cutler Blair, commander in
chief of the U.S. Pacific Command at Camp Smith in Hawaii. "Or do they need
to be looking up because the information that might save them is [in the
field]?" 
First Lt. John Allsup encountered that problem when using his wearable
minicomputer during a recent military exercise. "We did have better
situational awareness," he concedes. "But when I'm looking down at the
computer, it's hard to control my platoon and fight against the enemy."
Ground Control to Major Tom -- A peek inside WARnet's floating headquarters 
Deep in the inner workings of the USS Coronado, a combat commander awaits
information from the front lines as it flows into WARnet, the military's
wireless digital communications network. Built into the commander's
wall-size digital view of the combat area are so-called smart agents that
pop up onscreen if a threat is identified. The commander can then consult
with the Marine Corps and Navy watch officers who combine the tactical
pictures into a common operational picture. As targets surface and the
commander sees that action is not being taken, he can interject and assess
the problem. 
Nearby is the JTF (joint fires) network, which provides WARnet with overall
guidance on possible targets in the combat area. Computer stations there are
divided into two different technical areas: the EXECUTION SYSTEMS (where a
determination is made as to which pilot or ground force is best positioned
to take on a particular mission), and THE INTELLIGENCE SYSTEMS (where
incoming field reports can be examined and vehicles dispatched to check out
possible targets). In the center is a knowledge board-a wall with multiple
screens-capable of displaying any number of pieces of information on
targeting priorities, history on target sites and objectives. 
The command center showcases the greatest strides that have been made in
network-centric warfare and is a particular source of pride to Adm. Dennis
Cutler Blair, commander in chief of the U.S. Pacific Command at Camp Smith
in Hawaii. As the senior U.S. military commander in the Pacific and Indian
Ocean areas, he understands the traditional boundaries between the services
that this technology is going to have to overcome. Blair points out that
now-instead of walls covered in acetate charts and yellow Post-it notes-you
see information starting to flow digitally across traditional boundaries.
"What we're really trying to do is unlock all the combat potential that we
have and create a joint task force [of Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines] so
that we can use it in nontraditional ways," he says.

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