Vision of Aerospace Command and Control for the 21st Century

Abstract : This report presents the results of a study chartered by the Air Force Chief of Staff to establish a Vision of aerospace command and control (C2) for the 21st century by evaluating the current state of C2 and developing a migration strategy and process improvements that will allow movement from the current status toward that Vision. The study panel concluded that the fundamental structure of current Air Force C2 is not broken, however, the process of C2 could be made more efficient and effective by the application of information technologies. The panel's Vision for future C2 is simply stated as 'global command and control of aerospace forces throughout the spectrum of military operations by exploiting information to know, predict, and dominate the battlespace.' The mission associated with this Vision is to 'engage aerospace forces to observe, shape, and affect the battlespace and to operate these forces in a joint or coalition environment as directed.' The migration strategy to move toward this Vision focuses on Advanced Concept Technology Demonstrations to initiate operations concept development in concert with developing technologies. The major thrusts of the migration strategy address improvements in C2, communications, reconnaissance and surveillance platform 'right sizing,' data warehousing, and integrated command center information fusion and display. Finally, the panel recommends the establishment of a C2 Enterprise to institutionalize a process to ensure rapid exploitation of technology advances as the Air Force continues to modernize its C2 systems.