The Pentagon has lots of weapons systems that should be able to “talk” to each other but can’t.
Despite years and billions of dollars spent to develop networking technologies, some major weapon systems today still lack basic connectivity to exchange information with other systems. And many of the communications, command-and-control networks employed by the military services are incompatible with other systems.
Nearly a decade ago, the Defense Department began a multibillion-dollar effort to bring about a new generation of networking technology that would render all the existing systems obsolete. But the next generation has been slow to arrive — because of a combination of technology setbacks, management problems and budget cuts.
The cornerstone programs that were to deliver unprecedented connectivity to military forces anywhere in the world include the joint tactical radio system, or JTRS; the transformational satellite constellation, or TSAT; and the global information grid, or GIG.
But heightened uncertainty about the future of these programs prompted Defense Department senior leaders to assemble a group of technologists and direct them to find ways to improve existing “legacy” networks.
A case in point is the Air Force F-22 fighter jet. The aircraft, which by all measures is the service’s showpiece for dominance of the skies, has no capability to transmit data to other aircraft via the
military’s widely used Link 16 command-and-control network. “The F-22 is a major data collector but has no Link 16 transmit capability,” said John Young, director of defense research and engineering. “We need everyone to contribute to the common picture.”
In an attempt to fix network shortfalls that are found throughout the services, Young is sponsoring two initiatives. One is a $40 million program called “airborne network gateways.” The gateways are networking hubs to integrate various systems in a combat zone. Another effort — estimated to cost $190 million during the next five years — is to analyze, model, and develop protocols and technologies to allow military forces to communicate while on the move — without a transmission tower, as is commonly used for cell technology. Under this project, the Defense Department also will seek to improve the use of the available frequencies, known as spectrum management.
A team of analysts under Young’s watch has been studying these issues for months, he said in an interview. The overwhelming consensus among these experts is that many of the weapon systems used today could benefit from Internet-protocol connectivity and additional bandwidth, for example, and cannot afford to wait for JTRS or TSAT.
“It will take a long time to reach the new era of command-and-control and communications,” Young said. “We have not made investments in systems [such as Link 16] because we assumed we’d have JTRS, TSAT, GIG and other tools … We want to understand what we have and what investments can take us to greater net-centricity.”
The holy grail of military networks for several years has been the global information grid. But the ambitious undertaking has been plagued by confusion and disjointed management, according to the Government Accountability Office, a congressional watchdog agency.
In a 2006 report, GAO noted that the Defense Department plans to spend up to $34 billion through 2011 on the GIG, which is intended to provide Internet-like capabilities to Defense Department users worldwide. The Pentagon also intends to integrate existing systems into the GIG. The department’s “decentralized management approach for the GIG is not optimized for the development of this type of joint effort, which depends on a high degree of coordination and cooperation,” the report said. “No one entity is clearly in charge of the GIG or equipped with the requisite authority, and no one entity is accountable for results.” The budgeting process is “not flexible enough to accommodate … the rapidly advancing information technologies that are characteristic of command, control and communications systems.”
Young said his plan would incorporate “whatever elements of the GIG are available.” One major shortfall so far in the global network is that it cannot reach deployed troops to the “last tactical mile,” he added. “The GIG provides tools for advantaged users — who have access to fiber — but it is not reaching disadvantaged users.”
By combining portions of the current GIG with commercial communications, Young asked, “can we improve our existing radios and create linkages? We should have made these investments sooner. A moratorium on investments while we wait for the new systems was not the best strategy.”
While Young’s staff continues to work on these projects, John Grimes, the assistant secretary of defense for networks integration and information, is overseeing plans to reorganize the GIG effort and has turned over the management of the project to the Defense Information Systems Agency.
Cheryl Walton, director of policy and standards at the office of Navy’s chief systems engineer, said it would be helpful for the Defense Department to clarify the path forward for GIG users and to define how the GIG should be employed. “All of it is now in a state of chaos … There is a lot of confusion in the policies,” she said in an interview. “At the Defense Department level, they are establishing policies, putting forth concepts and implementing concepts sometimes before they are even ready. They’re getting pushback on some of that,” Walton said. “There are a lot of good ideas out there but they are coming from different directions.”
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