Worldwide Information Control System (WICS)
A Research Paper
Presented To
Air Force 2025
by
Capt Scott R. Maethner
1Lt Brian I. Robinson
1Lt Gregory E. Wood
April 1996
2025 is a study designed to comply with a directive from the chief of staff of the Air Force to examine the concepts, capabilities, and technologies the United States will require to remain the dominant air and space force in the future. Presented on 17 June 1996, this report was produced in the Department of Defense school environment of academic freedom and in the interest of advancing concepts related to national defense. The views expressed in this report are those of the authors and do not reflect the official policy or position of the United States Air Force, Department of Defense, or the United States government.
This report contains fictional representations of future situations/scenarios. Any similarities to real people or events, other than those specifically cited, are unintentional and are for purposes of illustration only.
This publication has been reviewed by security and policy review authorities, is unclassified, and is cleared for public release.
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The authors would like to acknowledge several individuals for their contributions to this effort. We'd like to thank the auxiliary team members Capt Gerry Ashby, Capt Darren Buck, Lt Bob Carneal, and Capt Jim From for their participation, good ideas, helpful suggestions, and words of encouragement during the early days of this project when we were encouraged to discontinue our efforts. We are grateful to Dr Byron Welsh, Dr Chris Hall, and Maj Mike Roggemann for their reviews. We would also like to acknowledge Lt Col Stu Kramer and Capt Ed Pohl for their wisdom and unrestrictive advisement.
Information is crucial to warfare. To the war fighter, the right information at the right time and in the right format can be a tremendous military advantage. When information flows correctly it can provide a clear understanding of the developing operation. This allows commanders to make effective decisions and direct forces in a manner to meet specified objectives. Maintaining this order of battle requires a system for managing and communicating information. Today, the system is called command, control, communications, computers, and intelligence (C4I) and is often seen by those who are familiar with it as inhibiting and unresponsive. This paper develops a concept for tomorrow's system: the Worldwide Information Control System (WICS). WICS can overcome the deficiencies of today's system and can provide a revolutionary command and control capability for military operations in the possible futures of 2025. It will be capable of automatically gathering data, processing it, and presenting useful information products to the users in time for them to take appropriate actions. WICS is designed to be flexible and responsive, adapting to 2025 technologies, and providing information products that are tailored to individual users.
Introduction
There has been a lot of discussion about what is needed in a data fusion system. This paper answers the question of how by presenting an architecture for an information control system that can probably be fully operational by 2025.
A military command and control system should provide the commander with a clear understanding of the developing operation so that forces can be directed in a manner to meet a specified objective. Such a system surveys the battlespace, assesses what actions to take, and uses available resources to implement those actions. Maintaining this order of battle involves managing and communicating information.
The current command and control system is basically an inventory function; keeping track of what assets go where and what the capabilities of each are all while maintaining communications among force levels. John Boyd's OODA Loop is a standard model for the decision-making process used in the current C4I system. 1 OODA stands for Observe, Orient, Decide, and Act, the parts of a four-step framework for command and control.
Figure 1-1. OODA Loop - A Paradigm for Command and Control
Unrestricted information flow up and down the chain of command has always been essential, as is apparent in the 1939 writings of Maj Gen J. F. C. Fuller.
If intercommunications between events in front and ideas behind are not maintained, then two battles will be fought-a mythical headquarters battle and an actual front line one, in which case the real enemy is to be found in our own headquarters. Whatever doubt exists as regards the lessons of the first war, this is one which cannot be controverted. 2
Even today the system is characterized as slow, incomplete, and unresponsive. Evidence of this is apparent as recently as Operation Desert Storm, where there were examples of a communications breakdown between intelligence gathering and command and control. For example, target information collected from United States intelligence systems had to be delivered to the theater by way of secure telephone. 3
Many familiar with command, control, communications, computers, and intelligence (C4I) procedures and capabilities view the current system as limited, unresponsive, and improperly utilized. During peacetime operations, data is poorly distributed and processed. Commanders are often forced to make decisions without access to all available data. The system is inefficient and often results in long delays in transferring vital data. During conflict, this problem is compounded because of limited communications at deployed locations and the confusion inherent in any mobility effort. C4I channels become flooded because of the large number of sorties and special requirements for each type of weapon system. Airborne sorties in a rapidly changing environment are sometimes effectively cut off from their commanders.
Due to the present tempo of operations, a major frustration in the current C4I arena is the knowledge that whatever information required is available but not accessible. Commanders cannot make well-informed decisions because they do not have the most current data from all possible sources. Present data networks do not allow for information to flow between all sources in a systematic and user-friendly manner. Commanders need to be able to assess any aspect of a situation they desire in a timely manner without being overloaded with extraneous data. Current C4I systems such as the Worldwide Military Command and Control System (WWMCCS) provide decision makers with data. Commanders need to see this data after it has been processed into a logical, simple, recognizable, and complete format. Information may be defined as data that has been collected, systematically processed, and put into a format that is easily understood by the user. This process is known as data fusion.
The current system allows commanders to utilize only a fraction of the potential information sources. This problem exists because these systems exist as separate entities rather than as a cohesive network. The individual systems are poorly integrated and separately tasked, and their output supports separate user bases 4.
Recent improvements to the current C4I system have expanded the type, quality, and distribution of information. At the same time, there have been dramatic advances in the speed and lethality of weapon systems. As a result, the decision maker is now forced to assimilate and act upon information in an even shorter time.
As we have learned from experience, "Nearly always it is the evolutionary follow-on of a new concept that produces a revolutionary capability. 5" In 2025, weapon systems will have advanced to the point where even today's third world countries may be capable of launching theater-range ballistic missiles and detecting aircraft that utilize current stealth technology. Access to space will be available to any country that can pay for it. Most countries will be on the same technological level in the war-fighting arena. With the technological edge diminished, the US must focus on developing ways to best gather and distribute vital information; on a global scale, in near real time.
The United States armed forces must develop a global information control system capable of automatically gathering data, processing it, and presenting the resulting information to the user in a concise manner. This system, the Worldwide Information Control System (WICS), would provide a means for global data collection, intelligent processing, and instant global communications with enough flexibility for both peacetime and contingency operations. The concepts of data fusion and a global information network may not be new, but the methods of implementing them are.
The key to implementation in the year 2025 will be to transform the current paradigm of Boyd's OODA Loop. Command and control in 2025 must go beyond the limitations of the OODA Loop. The time available to make critical decisions will be drastically reduced in the future. Fractions of a second will be critical in all aspects of a military campaign-not just the "fighter pilot scenario." Because of this, the four-step OODA Loop must be refined into a more timely and automated process. A natural progression of the OODA Loop and the drive for in-time command and control information will require the military of the future to react faster than an opponent can operate its decision-making process. 6
This was also discussed in "The Man in the Chair," an Air Force 2025 white paper which describes how the OODA Loop has continuously shrunk throughout the history of warfare and will continue to shrink. 7 In the future, the OODA Loop will be transformed into a format where its four components will seem to occur simultaneously. Inherent speed and accuracy limitations in human information processing abilities point to the need for automation by a data fusion system that is capable of making decisions based on a global, cohesive information infrastructure. A human interface must remain in the loop to have a final "vote" in the decision process. However, a "smart" architecture will be essential to collect, filter, and disseminate the pertinent information in time for the war fighter to make well-informed decisions in a timely manner.
Such a system must continually perform the future equivalent to today's "observe" and "orient" processes. When tasked, it should also be capable of expediting the "act" phase of the OODA Loop by providing in-time communications to commanders and war fighters. To the future war fighter, today's OODA Loop will be reduced to decision making based on a condensed global representation of all pertinent information.
Current upgrades and improvements to the C4I process are steps in the right direction but are evolutionary in nature and represent only a fraction of the capabilities of the system that will be needed by 2025. What is really needed is a revolutionary system that can assemble, maintain, and distribute information in time for the warfighter to make effective decisions.
The word "revolutionary" is often used when describing new or future war-fighting systems, but what does it really mean to be "revolutionary"? Webster's New World Dictionary defines revolutionary as "bringing about or constituting a great or radical change." When viewed in this light, few systems actually deserve to be called "revolutionary." Among these are the tank, the submarine, the airplane, the satellite, and perhaps a handful of others. Systems such as the global positioning system (GPS), while often spoken of as being revolutionary, are actually, upon closer inspection, evolutionary systems. For example, GPS evolved from the US Navy's Transit positioning satellite system, which itself is an evolution from shore-based radio navigation systems and techniques. What is revolutionary about GPS is the capability it unlocked. WICS itself may be considered an evolution of current C4I efforts, but by providing the "God's eye view" commanders have always longed for, it would bring about a revolution in the manner in which forces are managed.
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