New Enterprise C2 Program Office to Enhance Commander Decision-Making

Enterprise C2 Suite to Better Implement Combined Joint All Domain Command and Control Strategy

As emerging technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) are increasingly adopted to streamline and enhance command and control, the Department of War is expected to announce a new program office that will coalesce and coordinate information and communication pipelines that will empower commanders to make more timely and effective decisions. While an official announcement from the Department of War is forthcoming, DefenseScoop recently reported that the new Enterprise Command and Control (C2) Program Office will oversee current AI and data platforms like Maven Smart System and Edge Data Mesh as part of a pending program of record for Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control (CJADC2). Collectively, this “Enterprise C2 Suite” will provide the latest iteration of technologies and tools available to commanders for command and control.

Air Vice Marshal (Ret) Mark Chappell, Executive Partner at Elara Nova, said “Systems that facilitate command and control have evolved over time to help warfighters in an ever complicated battlefield. Now, modern technology like artificial intelligence and machine learning can effectively harness and process terabytes of data to improve the real-time understanding and decision-making for a commander.”

The Evolution of Multi-Domain Operations

Up until the 20th century, commanders oversaw military operations within a single domain. But as technologies advanced and operational domains became more integrated, commanders had to adapt.

“Blitzkrieg tactics in World War II changed the nature of command and control as multi-domain operations emerged,” Chappell said. “This increased during the Cold War when the Soviet forces outnumbered Western allies, so the Army and the Air Force had to develop new intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance technologies to identify enemy locations, concentrate firepower and limit an adversary’s numerical advantage. Over time, these new systems also brought in the other domains to include space and cyber as the operational spheres expanded.”

Effective use of systems and technologies to facilitate command and control goes beyond just gathering information on the adversary.

“Our ability to sense what is going on across domains has become fundamental to how we operate,” Chappell said. “But that’s only the starting point: once you get all of that data, it needs to be processed quickly such that a commander can use that timely and high quality information effectively to make better, quicker decisions.

JADC2 and the Need for Integrated C2 Networks

Toward this end, each military service began developing their own tactical network to facilitate command and control. But each network was not necessarily compatible with those of the other services.

So in early 2021, the Department of War announced the Joint All-Domain Command and Control Strategy (JADC2) to better coordinate information-sharing and command and control functions across the Pentagon.

“The JADC2 concept was created to connect sensors from all of the military services into a single network across the 11 Combatant Commands to ‘sense, make sense and act,’” Chappell said. “It’s critical that all domains and services can communicate with each other effectively given the way we fight today. So this new JADC2 network further connects sensors with weapon systems while also using artificial intelligence algorithms to help improve decision-making for commanders.”

The JADC2 strategy lays out five Lines of Effort.

Data Enterprise
Human Enterprise
Technology Enterprise
Integrating with Nuclear C2 and C3
Modernizing Mission Partner Information Sharing

“Data Enterprise is about the need to discover and access data from all warfighting domains at all levels of warfare, which brings with it a significant standardization challenge,” Chappell said. “The Human Enterprise means commanders within the military need training to fully harness the Technical Enterprise, which enhances information-sharing and cross-domain awareness in what’s often referred to as ‘the single pane of glass.’ The nuclear enterprise will naturally have to be included, and then modernizing mission partner information-sharing is required for effective joint force and coalition operations.”

Further, the complexity of effective command and control is increasingly expanding to include coalition partners from other nations, as well. Consequently, even the JADC2 concept has had to evolve.

“While JADC2 was initially conceived as a U.S.-only concept, it has inevitably changed to Combined JADC2 to acknowledge the integration of different nations into a coalition force,” Chappell said. “Different coalition partners will bring different capabilities to the fight, but they’ll also have different policy permissions delegated by their government. The best way that we can address those challenges is to exercise and operate together using the systems that we’re going to fight together with.”

Emerging Technologies: Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning

Altogether, the effort to address the complex challenge of collecting, digitizing, standardizing, processing and visualizing information for a commander on operational timelines is what Chappell refers to as ‘digitized C2.’ It’s also where emerging technologies like AI/ML can both improve and accelerate decision-making.

This imperative prompted the Department of War to initiate one of its earliest artificial intelligence programs in 2017, Project Maven.

“The central motivation to Project Maven was to use AI to sense and process the massive volumes of data to support human intelligence analysts working in targeting flows,” Chappell said. “Known as Maven Smart Systems today, it’s become a scalable and deployable AI system which works across multiple missions and data types. So rather than just be an assistant to an analyst, MSS now embeds AI across the whole enterprise.”

Another innovative capability is the Edge Data Mesh (EDM) technology stack, which completed its first successful demonstration in an exercise last year.

“EDM facilitates access to a cloud-like environment where the data is processed to deliver results,” Chappell said. “There’s also built-in resiliency within it: it will have multiple lanes of communication such as a SATCOM link, a 5G link and a suite of transmission systems to get around jamming and other disruptions at the tactical frontline, which is increasingly being referred to as ‘the edge.’ The warfighter needs to access all of this information just like a commander does, so EDM is experimenting on how that [capability] might be delivered given that warfighting is going to be conducted in a heavily degraded environment.”

These tools will be essential to any modern or future military conflict, not unlike the one that has played out in recent weeks in the Middle East.

“In what has essentially been an ‘Air Tasking Order’ war in the Middle East, AI capability is central to identifying targets and determining how to most effectively and efficiently prosecute them,” Chappell said. “But with all the benefits that come from automation and AI within warfighting, it also brings a degree of risk and we need to make sure that we understand and manage that risk properly by keeping a human in that decision-making loop.”

The Forthcoming Enterprise C2 Suite

Now, both Maven Smart System and EDM will be combined and expanded under the
under the new “Enterprise C2 Suite,” a forthcoming Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control program of record. The Enterprise C2 Suite will be under the purview of the future Enterprise C2 Program Office.

“The Enterprise C2 Program Office will be able to better integrate the more fragmented elements of command and control to improve the coherence of its outputs,” Chappell said. “It’s also going to place CJADC2 and AI-supported warfare strategies onto a program of record, which will include governance structure and funding to bring that forward. The growing focus on real-time analysis and AI integration sets the stage for a more dynamic and responsive military strategy in the face of what is a proliferation of more complex and challenging threats. Ultimately, this is about commanders making better decisions at a faster pace.”

But in order to develop and deliver these systems that will enable better command and control, the Department of War will have to communicate and collaborate directly with its industry partners.

“We always need resilient systems that can improve a commander’s decision-making, especially because a battlefield is not a permissive operating environment,” Chappell said. “In a digitized battlespace, standardization of disparate information is going to be key and the Enterprise C2 Program Office is exactly what is needed for this task. It will provide industry direction, along with the necessary funding to make this cohesion and integration of information systems possible.”

That’s also where Elara Nova’s Aeronautics & Mission Systems (AMS) sector has direct experience in both government and industry that can better support the development and adoption of systems for command and control.

“Elara Nova’s AMS sector is uniquely placed to assist both industry and governments to maximize the potential that comes with digitized C2 and that vaunted single pane of glass,” Chappell said. “Elara Nova’s AMS partners know firsthand the challenges and decisions faced by the warfighter every day. So we can guide industry partners in the development of their systems, and similarly assist governments in developing their digitized C2 policies, architectures and the tactics, techniques and procedures to go with it.”

Elara Nova is a trusted guiding partner that builds tailored teams to illuminate unseen opportunities and deliver impact across every domain. Learn more at https://elaranova.com/