When waging battle towards their enemies, historical Greeks typically prayed to the deities Ares and Athena. Ares, the fiery god of battle, was identified for his brute energy and reckless aggression; whereas Athena, the sagacious goddess of knowledge, was identified for her strategic pondering and righteous sense of justice. As a result of it married thoughts with muscle, their partnership was regarded as an ideal pairing for troopers searching for victory.
However wars on this new period of nice energy competitors are totally different from wars then. If the traditional Greeks have been engaged in battle in the present day, one of the best object of their prayers is perhaps Proteus, who in Greek mythology was a prophetic sea god who may unravel the previous, discern the current and foresee the longer term. Though Proteus was omniscient, he didn’t like sharing his secrets and techniques. To keep away from doing so, he would typically change his type to cover from those that sought his counsel, metamorphosing into animals, bushes, and even components like water and fireplace.
To conquer their adversaries, warfighters within the twenty first century should be simply as prescient and adaptable as Proteus. As a result of they’re neither telepaths nor shapeshifters, nevertheless, they have to derive their clairvoyance and flexibility via multi-domain integration: sharing performance and information seamlessly throughout platforms which might be on the bottom, at sea, within the air and—more and more essential—up in area.
That is very true for the US because it prepares for potential conflicts with peer and near-peer adversaries, suggests Kay Sears, vice chairman and basic supervisor of Boeing House, Intelligence and Weapons Methods. “Whenever you go to battle with a peer adversary, the flexibility to work between and amongst domains in what could be thought-about nontraditional methods is what’s going to make a distinction within the combat,” Sears mentioned. “For that purpose, multi-domain integration and multi-domain operations—the flexibility to work between and inside domains—has turn into very important.”
The itch for multi-domain integration is clear. What is required now are the cross-domain instruments, applied sciences, and methods with which to scratch it.
Orbital warfare: House as a warfighting area
The case for multi-domain integration is stronger than ever because of the emergence of area as a warfighting area.
“The area area is the area that’s latest to the combat, and it has created a extremely attention-grabbing dynamic when it comes to how we take into consideration warfighting,” defined Sears, who mentioned the area area has two major warfighting capabilities which might be evident within the mission of the U.S. House Drive that stood up in December 2019. The primary is supporting different domains—for instance, satellites gathering imagery to tell ground- and air-based operations like reconnaissance and missile protection. The second is defending the space-based property that make the primary perform attainable. “Adversaries have discovered that area offers you main benefits in a combat, together with the flexibility to see property shifting round, the flexibility to trace, the flexibility to warn and the flexibility to queue. With our adversaries launching capabilities to take that benefit away, we now should defend ourselves in area in order that we proceed to keep up the excessive floor there.”
The crucial significance of the “excessive floor” places area on the coronary heart of multi-domain operations and capabilities.
Take into account a possible battle within the Pacific area, for instance. “A Pacific combat is exclusive due to how far-off it’s from our infrastructure and due to how an adversary could take into consideration their space of regard … When you image it on a map, how are we going to get shut and be efficient in that warfighting space?” Sears requested. “Multi-domain capabilities can be actually crucial as a result of there can be areas of denial—areas that loads of our property may not be capable of get into as a result of the danger could be too excessive.”
Enter a platform just like the E-7, an early warning and management plane that Boeing is growing for the U.S. Air Drive. “Its job is to color the image for what’s taking place throughout it,” defined Dan Gillian, vice chairman and basic supervisor of Boeing’s mobility, surveillance and bombers division. “I consider the E-7 like the top coach of a workforce: it’s there to assist coordinate all of the assets across the subject. And, it really works with area in a extra built-in means, which is like having coaches up within the press field who’re in a position to look down and get a unique view of the identical factor.”
Within the aforementioned situation within the Pacific, an airborne platform just like the E-7 may work in live performance with space-based platforms to show a fragmented image right into a holistic outlook for navy commanders and warfighters. “The E-7 communicates straight—let’s say line-of-sight—with radar. Because it comes right into a denied space that we name the ‘bubble,’ it’s speaking to satellites and would possibly in the end hand its information off to area. We will then use area to beam that operational image down into the denied space the place the E-7 was working,” Sears mentioned. “That’s only one instance … There are a number of missions that usually could be carried out within the air or on the bottom that we’re going to have to make use of area for due to the place we’re combating.”
The benefit afforded could be summed up in a single phrase: resilience. “The E-7 is an superior platform by itself. However while you add in an area layer or a sea layer, now you’ve a number of layers of knowledge coming collectively in a single spot to create a a lot better-informed image,” Gillian mentioned. “And if a kind of layers isn’t working or isn’t in a position to be there in the best way that it ought to be, you’ve redundancy in-built as a way to have the identical data shifting round via a number of channels. That’s resilience.”
Subsequent-gen platforms unlock cross-domain capabilities
The E-7 is only one instance of a platform that’s making the necessity of multi-domain integration right into a actuality. One other is the KC-46 Pegasus tanker, whose major missions embrace aerial refueling, cargo transport and medical evacuation.
“At the moment, the KC-46 is speaking with area frequently for beyond-line-of-sight communication, however take into consideration the KC-46 of the longer term,” Gillian mentioned. “It’ll at all times deliver gasoline to the combat, and it’ll at all times transfer cargo round within the theater. That’s what it’s designed to do. However more and more, we see it as a participant within the digital community. It has loads of computing functionality in it, and we’ve got the flexibility to deliver extra assets on board in order that it will probably take part in the identical picture-forming and information-command-and-control loop that the E-7 does … Each of those platforms will be capable of work with area to maneuver data round and construct a extra reliant, resilient and built-in website image with a number of sensors coming collectively to assist inform that image.”
House-based platforms are also driving multi-domain integration, in keeping with Sears, who cited the Twelfth-generation Wideband International SATCOM (WGS) communications satellite tv for pc that Boeing is constructing for the U.S. House Drive. “This isn’t your grandmother’s WGS … It incorporates a number of next-gen applied sciences that can improve the resilience of communication methods, equivalent to anti-jam functionality and sign safety,” Sears mentioned. “It’s going to hold a payload that may course of the Protected Tactical Waveform, which will get at not solely how can we combat and defend ourselves in area, however how can we then present a protected comm hyperlink that may hook up with airborne and maritime platforms, maneuver forces on the bottom, and all the opposite property that require safe comms?”
In relation to satellites, orbital range is a key ingredient that helps multi-domain capabilities. Historically, most satellites have lived in geosynchronous orbit (GEO), which affords persistent protection from fewer spacecraft, but in addition excessive latency. A brand new era of small satellite tv for pc operators, in the meantime, is targeted on placing satellites in low Earth orbit (LEO), which is straightforward to achieve and affords low latency, however calls for a big focus of platforms to mitigate their vulnerability to area- or domain-wide results, together with digital assault—and, due to this fact, a big value. Boeing is an advocate for extremely succesful satellites working in complement with extremely proliferated satellites throughout a number of orbital regimes as a way for fielding resilient and efficient area order of battle. This consists of satellite tv for pc constellations in medium Earth orbit (MEO), which matches LEO when it comes to accessibility and latency, however can obtain extra protection and affords elevated visibility over GEO—the nearer you’re to Earth, the simpler it’s to trace what you possibly can see—with fewer platforms.
“We as a basic aerospace trade have confirmed that you simply achieve resiliency by being in several orbits,” mentioned Sears, who cited superior missile warning methods for example. “Now we have to know what missiles are inbound to the US in an effort to defend ourselves. And for those who take a look at missile warning structure proper now, you’ve had a standard GEO part with SBIRS and Subsequent Gen OPIR, however now the House Drive is trying on the MEO orbit which affords visibility, protection and survivability benefits not achievable from LEO alone.”
“They’re additionally taking a look at placing missile warning payloads on LEO. So, now you’ve acquired a GEO, MEO and LEO missile warning structure, and that’s going to be much more resilient than the place we began with simply GEO,” continued Sears, who mentioned the identical argument holds true for communications satellites. “A number of of us are saying that what we’d like is to proliferate the LEO comm, however for those who poke a gap in that you simply’d higher have some extra comm satellites in MEO or GEO to assist choose up what you’ve misplaced in LEO.”
Having space-based property in a number of orbits that may work in concord with property within the air, on the bottom and at sea doesn’t simply create resilience. By extension, it additionally creates deterrence—which is a major objective of the U.S. navy on this new period of nice energy competitors.
“If you concentrate on how the air layer can work together with the area layer and the ocean layer, that multi-domain communication and knowledge sharing permits you to have all of your assets in the appropriate place. And that coordination is a deterrent in and of itself,” Gillian mentioned.
Subsequent steps: Enabling the cross-domain future
Whereas Boeing already is growing platforms that deliver multi-domain operations to fruition, authorities and trade can additional improve and speed up multi-domain integration by pursuing a number of crucial shared targets.
The primary is collaboration. “We want a extremely tight relationship with our clients,” Sears mentioned. “We’re actually stressing that as they conduct their wargames, develop their ideas of operations, and pressure designs. We’re asking for trade to be concerned in these actions so we will see how they really play the items—how they use our property and what we have to change and tweak … Nobody is aware of our merchandise and our capabilities higher than us, so we need to be part of the planning to higher perceive what trades our clients are making and the way we will deliver our investments to bear.”
The second shared objective on which authorities and trade should companion is within the improvement of open methods. For instance, Boeing subsidiary Millennium House Methods lately accomplished the small satellite tv for pc VICTUS NOX for the U.S. House Drive’s House Methods Command. On the platform is a devoted space reserved for late-breaking payloads provided not solely by Boeing, but in addition by different its friends and rivals.
“We may actually be packing issues as much as go to the launchpad and combine an incoming payload from a unique firm addressing a unique menace,” Sears mentioned. “We imagine in designing merchandise to obtain payloads that may come from anyplace— open methods within the truest sense so you possibly can leverage all of trade’s greatest capabilities.”
Echoed Gillian, “We’re actually dedicated to open structure as a result of it permits data and data to move freely. That’s how we assist our clients do their job one of the best.”
A 3rd precedence is cybersecurity. “We take into consideration cybersecurity in two methods,” Sears mentioned. “One, we’re vigilant internally about defending our community with requirements that exceed DoD necessities. So, there’s a cybersecurity mannequin and audit, and we do very effectively when it comes to defending our personal data. Second is the cyber wrapper that we construct into our merchandise … issues like pink/black structure when you concentrate on a communications satellite tv for pc or a missile warning satellite tv for pc. We’re very used to constructing these sorts of methods.”
A last and extra sophisticated piece of the puzzle is procurement. “When you concentrate on multi-domain operations, the Division of Protection is beginning to sort out the query of how they’ll work collectively throughout domains and hyperlink capabilities, however they’re not but altering how they purchase,” Sears mentioned. “They could outline a system that goes via totally different domains, for instance, however they’re nonetheless shopping for it on a piecemeal foundation based mostly on what area it intersects … That’s a problem dealing with multi-domain operations that we’re going to want to deal with.”
Boeing’s area agenda: Alignment, structure, acquisition
Boeing has developed a strategic strategy to growing multi-domain warfighting capabilities. It revolves round three foundational pillars that echo the aforementioned priorities: alignment, structure and acquisition.
“The alignment piece actually has to do with trade and our clients,” Sears mentioned. “We need to perceive the evolving menace and the way our clients are eager about the programs of motion obtainable to them so we will fine-tune our investments.”
That alignment then allows the design and improvement of modern, open system architectures to deal with mission wants with tempo in actual time with cost-informed options. “Alignment with our clients results in an structure resolution that all of us perceive as a result of we’re taking a look at protection in-depth collectively,” mentioned Sears.
Merely put: When trade and authorities get on the identical web page about mission priorities from the get-go, they’ll ship improved capabilities at a quicker cadence.
The ultimate ‘A’—acquisition—is the lever that results in activation and execution. “The largest inhibitor to us investing our capital and our research-and-development {dollars} is inconsistent messaging and inconsistent funding from the Division of Protection. So, the alerts our clients ship are actually essential as a result of they influence how we leverage the assets that we’ve got,” Sears continued. “I imagine these three As—the alignment on what we have to do, the structure that’s designed, and the alerts from our clients that they’re really going to accumulate it—put us as a nation on a path to work in lockstep. And if we’re working in lockstep, we’re going to get issues carried out.”
It’s that angle that can give the US the “Protean” benefit it must win future conflicts, Gillian mentioned. “We perceive that the longer term combat is a multi-domain combat,” he concluded. “At Boeing, we’ve got contracts and platforms throughout all layers—land, sea, air and area—and we’re actually pleased with that. Fascinated by air and area, specifically, we’ve got the aptitude in the present day to combine domains in actual time, and we all know we will construct on that even additional if we construct to open requirements in a means that permits all people to deliver their greatest package and tools ahead for our clients.”
Sears echoed his sentiment. “There’s a sense of urgency to all this and Boeing stands ready to drive these cross-domain options.”
