Global distributed ISR operations: the changing face of warfare

Joint Force Quarterly, July, 2009 by David A. Deptula, James R. Marrs

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Over the last decade, our joint team has benefitted greatly from a combination of technology and new operating concepts to better leverage warfighting talent around the globe. Nowhere is this progress as evident as in the rapid evolution of distributed intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) operations. Joint and allied forces depend daily on these new capabilities--a result of innovations stemming from our longstanding competencies in ISR, unmanned aerial systems, air, space, cyberspace infrastructure, and both the technology and art of distributed operations. This rapidly evolving paradigm, called distributed ISR operations, links platforms and sensors, forces forward, and human ISR warfighting expertise around the globe in ways that make networked combat operations routine. The criticality of this amalgam of airborne ISR capability to current operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, the geographic combatant commands, and homeland security is not widely known or well understood. The intent of this article is to explain and expand awareness of this global network-centric warfighting capability.

Foundations

A discussion of distributed ISR operations can only begin with an understanding of the architecture that makes the concept possible. The key element of the architecture is known as the Distributed Common Ground System (DCGS), which evolved from the high-altitude manned U-2 and national programs. In the mid-1980s, the Air Force deployed mobile ISR vans to forward locations to allow the U-2 to downlink aerial observation data for exploitation. The U-2 and exploitation vans had to be within line of sight of each other to work. The Air Force continued to develop technology to enable the U-2 to downlink data beyond the line of sight of the exploitation vans. Leveraging multiple communication assets and space systems, and enhancing collection platforms and sensors, the Air Force built an architecture that allowed U-2, Global Hawk, Predator, and Reaper aircraft to transmit regionally collected data to exploitation locations around the globe. The Air Force DCGS system evolved into a Department of Defense (DOD) DCGS program to create a system of systems for the sharing of intelligence across joint and allied forces. Today, each of the military Services has DCGS elements, based on DOD DCGS standards, and tailored for specific aspects of joint and allied operations.

In 2003, after the success of Air Force DCGS during Operation Allied Force, the Service designated the sites and communications architecture of the Air Force DCGS as the AN/GSQ-272 Sentinel weapons system. Each ground station of the system architecture is designated as a Distributed Ground System (DGS). Five sites, known as DGS 1 through 5, constitute the Active-duty force. (1) Air Force DCGS is an exceptional example of a Total Force team. Currently, the Air National Guard operates four additional DGSs, with two more scheduled for activation this year. (2) DCGS crews also rely on the expertise of partner distributed mission site crews normally collocated at National Security Agency/Central Security Service cryptologic centers.

The integrated global Sentinel team continues to grow with the addition of federated partners--enabled by continued investment in a global Sentinel communications architecture. These partners include significant Army, Air Force, and joint capabilities--such as the 513th Military Intelligence Brigade, Fort Gordon, Georgia; the National Air and Space Intelligence Center at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio; DCGS-Army; and the Tactical Exploitation System, Baghdad, Iraq--underscoring the joint collaboration that DOD DCGS standards make possible.

While there are those who characterize technology as not making much difference relative to the human dimension of warfare, the truth is that the appropriate mix of both is what has given U.S. joint forces critical advantages in warfare. The power of this mix can perhaps best be revealed using an example.

The global warfighting partnership in this example begins with an Air National Guard ISR exploitation crew at DGS Arkansas, Little Rock Air Force Base, prebriefing their 12-hour portion of an 18-hour Predator mission over Afghanistan. Essential prebrief background materials were built by the DCGS Analysis and Reporting Team (DART) at DGS-2, Beale Air Force Base, California, whose operational responsibilities include Afghanistan. The prebrief includes operational tasks and supported units for the duration of the mission. The specific lineup associating this Predator to one or more ground units during the airborne mission was decided earlier through a standing process managed by the Joint Information Operations Center-Afghanistan and the regional Combined Air Operations Center (CAOC), while the exploitation crew assignment was tasked by the Wing Operations Center (WOC) at the 480th ISR Wing, Langley Air Force Base, Virginia. In addition, the crew is briefed on major ground operations in progress, joint force commander priorities, as well as other ISR assets available to prepare for cross-cue opportunities and any likely "audibles" that they anticipate as joint operations continue to unfold over the course of the day.