Scaling Regional IAMD: Comparing Industrial-Age and Information-Age Approaches
(This is the third in a series on the capabilities and approaches that U.S., allies, and partners need to achieve the security vision described in the 2018 NDS.)
Allies and partners are making significant investments in national and regional Integrated Air and Missile Defense (IAMD) capabilities based on rapid threat developments experienced in 2019. Allies and partners witnessed notable advances in Iranian-origin mid-sized Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) used in the 14 September coordinated attack against Aramco’s Abqaiq oil processing facility, which temporarily disrupted 5% of the world’s oil production and highlighted lessons for IAMD planning and systems. Regional partners will depend on U.S. acquisition systems and industry to deliver the advanced IAMD capabilities needed to defend against these threats. As partners modernize their regional IAMD capabilities, they will face two conflicting approaches to growing IAMD: an approach that starts with developing niche capabilities and then scaling, or an approach that begins with a data-focused IAMD architecture then scales. These two approaches are based on different mindsets about capabilities-development, industrial-age and information-age. While the legacy industrial-age approach is intuitive and natural for professionals with deep experience in delivering hardware-based weapons systems, there are significant benefits to adopting an information-age mindset to develop regional IAMD. This article highlights the benefits of adopting an information-age mindset, then applies this mindset to focus on data as the foundation for IAMD, build an architecture that supports IAMD data requirements, and finally to scale the architecture as hardware and user requirements increase.
Mindsets drive Design Choices
The differences in design approaches stem from differences between industrial-age and information-age mindsets. In the industrial age, hardware mattered most, and developers made bigger hardware by bolting together smaller pieces of hardware. Success in the industrial age depended on leveraging an industrial-age mindset to produce hardware like tanks and airplanes by building parts into pieces, and bolting pieces together in layered processes of assembly. This mindset produced great industrial-age leaps in capability like the F-15, Patriot, and AEGIS weapons systems, but this approach will induce cost and performance deficiencies when attempting to scale to the level of national and regional air and missile defense.
Comparatively, success in the information age depends on sharing increasing amounts of data over common networks. In the information age, data and the speed of sharing matter most, and developers build larger systems by creating common standards and architectures to integrate and scale. Systems development in the information age depends on adopting an information-age mindset, where data matters most, and designers start design processes by understanding data and the networks that will carry it.
The U.S. Air Force and Space Force have shifted to an information-age design approach to develop Multi-domain Command and Control (MDC2), which U.S. joint forces later adopted as Joint All-Domain C2 (JADC2), by changing U.S. developmental “focus from platforms to networks”:
“The most important element of future combat will not necessarily be warships, combat vehicles, aircraft or satellites. It will be a battle network that connects them.” — Air Force Chief of Staff General Goldfein and Chief of Space Operations General Raymond on 27 February 2020
Design with an information-age mindset starts with a focus on the mission requirements of data.
Information-Age Design Step 1: Start with Data
Information-age design of regional IAMD starts by recognizing that IAMD systems depend on shared data, and IAMD design starts with defining requirements for sharing IAMD data to end up with an IAMD solution. In information-age IAMD, U.S., allied, and partner forces share large amounts of data machine-to-machine over networks to link sensors, platforms, and C2. Software tools including AI-enabled tools operate to identify adversary presence and activity in all domains, and coalition C2 operates at each echelon of command on a common operating picture that represents shared understanding. Information-age design recognizes data as the primary asset, and data is shared and stored at echelons of command to enable mission command and independent operations during periods of network attack. Integration of regional hardware and national systems comes from shared access to the same data. This data-centered information-age model is being developed by U.S. military services as “JADC2” to optimize functionality and interoperability.
In a data-centered model, regional integration among IAMD partners is created by building partners into a common IAMD data architecture, rather than bolting separate niche architectures together afterward through cross-domain solutions. As requirements and partners grow, the information sharing systems will change, and new components will have to be “built-in” or “bolted-on.” “Building-in” regional partners into the common IAMD data structure maximizes the data available and speed of access,which is needed for IAMD applications like intercepting maneuvering entry vehicles and hypersonic defense. “Building-in” regional IAMD partners also allows JADC2 designers to lead-turn policy issues controlling where data will be stored, including understanding partner’s sovereign data policy and giving partners the ability to shape their policy to improve outcomes. Designing common data structures maximizes data-sharing among regional partners, while protecting sovereign data and sharing according to sovereign caveats.
Information-Age Design Step 2: Build a Data Architecture to Support IAMD Mission Data Requirements
Design of a regional IAMD continues by designing a regional data architecture that recognizes the important roles played by both regional and national systems. Regional IAMD systems provide regional IAMD partners with shared data and a common operating picture to facilitate regional coordination and the execution of operational contracts among IAMD partners. Meanwhile, national IAMD systems give IAMD partners their own national engagement options under national IAMD engagement authorities.
In the space “between” national C2 systems, the regional IAMD data environment operates as an intermediary, building a regional common operating picture based on regionally-shared assets like regionally-owned satellites and radars, and nationally-owned radars and C2. Regional and national-level C2 and systems share data between them, but data designs must recognize that national IAMD and C2 architectures will begin and remain operating on separate networks and systems, and will depend on cross-domain solutions to link at the national and regional levels.
Regional IAMD designs should incorporate tiered storage and access controls that fully integrate regional IAMD partner data at all levels of operation. Tiered data storage places mission-essential data in a tiered structure at each echelon of command to enable regional coordination of partner regional IAMD operations under a C2 concept of mission command, where each command echelon has the authorities and data needed to execute the commander’s intent. Data at echelon includes data stored in cloud environments as well as data pushed forward to enable mission command of tactical-level operations when cut off from operational-level and strategic-level data.
Regional IAMD designs should also implement access controls that allow partners to define who accesses their sovereign data. The regional IAMD data environment should use strong identity and attribute-based access control (ABAC) to tailor data flows to and from partners according to national-level agreements. For example, country A may agree to share the data with only the U.S. and country B. Access controls built into the architecture must guarantee that although country C is integrated into the same network, country C cannot access data country B put into the network. As the U.S. Air Force develops Joint All-Domain Command Control (JADC2), the new Advanced Battle Management System (ABMS) will be centerpiece for the sharing information, and allies and partners are designed as integral part of the architecture. Together, up-front design and implementation of a common regional data architecture with tiered data storage and attribute-based access controls will maximize regional IAMD effectiveness and the effectiveness of national systems to defend each participating nation.
Information-Age Design Step 3: Scale the Architecture as Hardware and User Requirements Increase
Information-age design of regional IAMD concludes by scaling the architecture to accommodate growth in hardware and user requirements. Starting with a data-focused IAMD architecture, regional assets such as radars, space-based sensors, and C2 may be integrated into the existing IAMD architecture as regional capabilities grow. Similarly, as regional partners are added their national systems may be tied into the regional architecture without affecting the existing information exchange infrastructure. Taken together, by first building a data-centered regional architecture to support IAMD data requirements, regional IAMD can be easily scaled on the existing regional network while maintaining high levels of fidelity, operating speeds, and security.
Caution: Design of Regional IAMD with an Industrial-Age Mindset will Lead to Important Choices that are Difficult to Reverse
Alternatively, an industrial-age design approach builds and scales regional IAMD C2 by building separate IAMD components and stitching them together later. Design with an industrial-age mindset takes an IAMD component, like Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) or SHORAD, develops that IAMD component into a regional capability, and later adds other IAMD components to the system to result in a combined capability. The industrial-age application of “assemble-build-bolt-on” adds to overall complexity as each new “component” is bolted to the “frame” of the system, which increases cost and risk while decreasing overall system performance. As capabilities are added, there is no way to remove the increased complexity from the system unless the component is removed, or the underlying frame is replaced.
Meanwhile, IAMD in the information-age is about sharing data over a common network to facilitate shared understanding and engagement according to cooperative contracts. To end up with effective regional IAMD, designers need to build the data and network requirements around IAMD, not niche capabilities. Therefore, starting design based on IAMD requirements is essential. By planning for the full range of expected IAMD and C2 operations, including national and regional capabilities, the underlying information sharing infrastructure — the “frame” of the system — can be designed to encapsulate all the needed complexity to support those missions. Designed properly for building-in new partners, policies, and evolving capabilities, the information sharing infrastructure is then infinitely horizontally scaled to add additional hardware and partners.
Most significantly, design decisions made early are difficult and expensive to reverse. BMD data architectures are effective for BMD, but are limited in application to other areas of IAMD C2, will result in long-term system complexity at the sake of near-term capability. Bolting air and SHORAD components onto a BMD-based infrastructure will introduce cross-domain solutions that will complicate and slow the overall data flow, inhibit the operation of AI-enabled software tools, and adversely affect tactical-level operations of national systems that depend on accurate data for engagement. If planners fail to design IAMD data requirements into regional architectures, the region may end up with an “accidental” architecture that does not perform its mission is difficult and expensive to fix. As noted by IBM software designer Grady Booch,
“Architecture represents the significant design decisions that shape a system, where significant is measured by cost of change.” — Grady Booch
As a result, an approach that “starts with BMD” misses the key features of data and network design that will be needed to scale to regional IAMD. Instead, designers need to start with a focus on IAMD data in an information-age approach, and build an architecture that supports IAMD data requirements before scaling the architecture to a regional level.
Conclusion
U.S. partners will depend on Department of Defense (DOD) acquisition agencies and U.S. industry to deliver the advanced IAMD capabilities they need to defend their nations and regions against modern threats. In delivering these systems, it will be critical that DOD agencies and industry adopt an information-age mindset to develop, deliver, and scale regional IAMD capabilities, and avoid making early decisions with industrial-age mindsets that will be difficult and expensive to reverse. By focusing on shared data as the foundation for IAMD, U.S. industry can build architectures that supports regional IAMD data requirements, scale the architectures as hardware and user requirements increase, and deliver the IAMD systems our partners need to defend their nations and regions.
For further reading, other articles in this series include Data as the Foundation of JADC2, Interoperability and Interdependence, and three articles on IAMD including rapid evolution of threats, the need to adopt a comprehensive IAMD approach, and challenges with Foreign Military Sales (FMS).
