New Tools Available for Network-Centric Warfare

Reservoir Hill writes "MIT Technology Review reports that a new map-based application is the latest tool in the military's long-term plan to introduce what is sometimes called "network-centric warfare." The Tactical Ground Reporting System, or TIGR allows patrol leaders in Iraq to learn about city landmarks and past events and more than 1,500 junior officers in Iraq — about a fifth of patrol leaders — are using the map-centric application before going on patrol and adding new data to TIGR upon returning. By clicking on icons and lists, they can see the locations of key buildings, like mosques, schools, and hospitals, and retrieve information such as location data on past attacks, geotagged photos of houses and other buildings (taken with cameras equipped with Global Positioning System technology), and photos of suspected insurgents and neighborhood leaders. They can even listen to civilian interviews and watch videos of past maneuvers. "The ability ... to draw the route ... of your patrol that day and then to access the collective reports, media, analysis of the entire organization, is pretty powerful," says Major Patrick Michaelis. "It is a bit revolutionary from a military perspective when you think about it, using peer-based information to drive the next move. ... Normally we are used to our higher headquarters telling the patrol leader what he needs to think.""

Comments

Re:You'd think...

[oodaloop]

As a defense contractor who's worked on (and taught) Net-centricity and as a former Marine, I can say that what we're facing is an enemy that is capable of much more speed and agility than we are. The whole point of Net-centric warfare is to move away from top-down Cold War era Command and Control to something more along the lines of what these emergent, adaptive, complex terrorist and insurgent networks use. Intead of wasting time and energy trying to adapt to a moving target, so to speak, these kinds of technologies allow tactical commanders to make faster decisions on the battlespace.