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THE CHALLENGES AND LIMITATIONS OF "NETWORK CENTRIC WARFARE" The initial views of an NCW sceptic A Presentation to the "Network Centric Warfare: Improving ADF capabilities through Network Enabled Operations" Conference Wednesday 17 September 2003 by Aldo Borgu Program Director, Operations and Capability Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI)

Introduction It's both difficult and in fact rare today to come across a speech or article on force structure, military strategy or future capabilities without the virtues of Network Centric Warfare (NCW) being pushed. In fact I think its safe to say that NCW has become the new orthodoxy in military thought, with few people willing to acknowledge and accept the limitations and challenges associated with the concept. But being a NCW sceptic I have the advantage of listing all the challenges to the concept without any responsibility or obligation to address those challenges and come up with the solutions. I'll leave that to its advocates. Simply put NCW is the new fashion in modern warfare. And it’s a fashion that's been highlighted by a couple of "successful" wars. That's not unusual. After Iraq 1991 we had the Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA). After Kosovo we had Effects Based Operations (EBO) as well as Information Warfare (IW). And after Afghanistan and Iraq we have Network Centric Warfare (NCW). All of these concepts predated their respective conflicts but the subsequent military operations served to give substance to the concept, and by virtue of the success of the military operation, gave it validation and vindication as the way to go, more often than not unjustly. The discussion below deals with the challenges facing NCW at a broad strategic and policy level. That's only fair as the concept is largely theoretical and little understood at this early stage. For that reason the challenges I list won't deal with some of the more obvious and technical ones, such as the physical vulnerability of a networked military, as well as questions

2 of bandwidth availability. These challenges are well known and have been well documented and analysed elsewhere. This doesn't mean that many of the principles behind NCW aren't worth pursuing, indeed many of them have roots in military reform and innovation efforts going back decades. After all a joint approach to warfare is all about networking, as is combined arms. But we do need to recognise the limitations and risks associated with elevating and adopting NCW as a central and strategic concept to the possible exclusion of other military innovations.

1. The challenge of distinguishing between the theory behind NCW and how it will actually and eventually be applied in practice As with any theory or concept - or ideology for that matter - the practical application of that concept can have a huge impact on the concept itself, the eventual outcome often distorting the original intent. That's because once you introduce individuals and human nature into the mix it's often a very different outcome. For example, communism may have been great in theory promising freedom and liberation, but in the end all it gave us was Stalinism and its numerous totalitarian offshoots. The same principle applies to the implementation of theoretical concepts of warfare. In theory NCW will result in revolutionary change in the way we think about and conduct warfare. Human nature being what it is in reality it's more likely to result in business as usual, namely incremental, evolutionary changes in military capabilities and doctrine. While NCW theory has us moving from a platform centric to a network centric force, single Service conservatism being what it is its more likely that we'll remain platform centric within a networked force, at least certainly for air and naval forces. That's not necessarily a bad thing. There is, however, a distinct risk that the implementation of NCW into land forces could actually make Army become more platform-centric, particularly if vehicles becomes the nodes in the land force network. More on that later. And the practical application and realisation of NCW can also have other less positive outcomes, such as: •

In theory NCW is a process, a means to achieve a particular ends. In practice its likely to become the ends itself, operating in a network centric environment will be pushed as the ultimate objective, without any clear idea what this means or will result in.

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In theory NCW will result in the development of a single network - virtual or otherwise. In reality its more likely to result in a "network of networks" with all the problems of integration that usually result from such schemes. Reality might also dictate that the "network" won't be a true network, concentrating on operational systems to the detriment of financial, personnel, logistical and administrative information systems.

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In theory the NCW principle of information superiority does not necessarily equate to large quantities of information and/or data. In practice its likely to result in information overload which placed a huge emphasis on how we discriminate between the information we receive. Ultimately more information is not necessarily what's needed, rather it's a better understanding of the information we already have.

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In theory shared battle space and situational awareness should lead to more coherent decision making. In reality having greater access to the same information will not lead individuals to reach similar conclusions about how to better respond to events anymore than it does now, especially between strategic, operational and tactical levels, let alone between individuals within those levels.

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In theory NCW's concept of situational awareness should lead to speedier decision making. In practice the more information a commander has at his disposal the more time he could take to make a decision - not least due to always wanting more information before deciding.

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In theory NCW should continue with existing trends towards decentralised command and control. In reality it could easily result in far greater centralisation of command at both political and military levels.

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In theory NCW will lead to far greater situational awareness. In practice we should remember that the innovations of our opponents do not remain static. For example, we need to consider what impact an opponent's use of deception techniques will have on that situational awareness and the degree to which it might distort it.

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In theory NCW as applied in Australia will result in a priority on joint interoperability within the ADF. In reality NCW is more likely to result in the individual services of the ADF being more networked with their respective sister services in the US military than with each other.

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In theory NCW encompasses not only technology but also doctrine and organisational structures much as the RMA once did. In reality NCW is likely to become technologycentred and driven, resulting in the focus being more on the network than on the networking. Despite the rhetoric the human dimension in warfare is more likely to be ignored at the expense of the network.

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In theory NCW should result in making relatively small military forces far more capable, a point with particular relevance and necessity to Australia. In reality it's likely to result in even smaller forces than we have now. So while the theory should allow for greater effectiveness it's more likely to be used as a means of gaining greater efficiencies.

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In theory NCW should result in larger numbers of smaller, less complex and less costly platforms/systems operating as nodes in a wider network. In reality it's more likely to result in a smaller number, of more complex and more expensive platforms and systems. DEPSEC Strategy says NCW is not necessarily more expensive. That's fine for the theory the reality is likely to be otherwise. That means were more likely to have to decide what to give up in order to gain a NCW capability.

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In theory NCW should give us the means to develop an ADF responsive to the new challenges Australia faces, not least asymmetric warfare. In practice NCW could end up limiting the military response options we have to deal with insurgency and terrorism. But in any event the more successful NCW is, the more asymmetrical the response of our opponents will be, in ways that we haven't even conceived of yet.

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2. The challenge of defining what NCW is, what we want of it, and what it can and can’t deliver. While networking is nothing new to the military the NCW concept as we know it has its origins as a commercial business concept. It was initially applied to the military dimension as a naval concept of warfare in the late 1990s, and it’s only in the past few years that the concept has been accepted more widely. Those factors don't in themselves negate the value of NCW but it should make us a little more cautious in accepting its principles as the one and only solution to the challenges we currently face. But in any event, as is the case with any theoretical concept, NCW can be and is so many different things to so many different people. In the United States the term "Network Centric Warfare " is used which is characterised by the ability of geographically dispersed forces to create a high level of shared battlespace awareness that can be exploited via self-synchronisation and other network centric operations to achieve commander's intent. NCW supports speed of command and the conversion of superior information to action. In the United Kingdom, they use the term "Networked Enabled Capability" (NEC) which is defined as encompassing the elements required to deliver controlled and precise military effect rapidly and reliability. At its heart are three elements: sensors to gather information; a network to fuse, communicate and exploit the information; and strike assets to deliver military effect. Under the UK concept the key is the ability to collect, fuse and disseminate accurate, timely and relevant information with much greater rapidity to help provide a common understanding among commanders at all levels. In Australia we began to use the term "Network Enabled Operations " (NEO) which was defined in ADF Force 2020 as deriving its power from effectively linking different elements of the organisation to conduct warfare more effectively. Under NEO platforms are treated as nodes of a network and all elements of the network collect, share and access information. This shared information is used to create a common, real-time battlespace picture which in turn allows a greater level of situational awareness, coordination and offensive potential than is currently the case However we now have seem to have dropped the use of the term Network Enabled Operations and have now adopted the US terminology, namely Network Centric Warfare. So we now identify "network centricity" as the way ahead which will supposedly help us to link national, ADF and coalition sensors, engagement systems and decision-makers into an effective and responsive whole. The ADF's NCW concept states that at its core, NCW seeks to provide the future force with the ability to generate tempo, precision and combat power through shared situational awareness, clear procedures and the information connectivity needed to synchronise our actions to meet the commander's intent. Now some people might think that there's not appreciable difference between NCW, NEC and NEO. But I believe the distinction, while subtle to some, is far more substantive and is actually indicative of quite different approaches to, and understanding of, the issue.

5 Interestingly the UK explains the difference in their approach relative to that of the US due to the knowledge that the UK's ability to go down the NCW path will be resource limited. Therefore they say they've put the emphasis not on wholesale transformation of the forces but rather on the "key enablers" of operational effectiveness. Under the UK concept the network is not centric to what they are trying to do. They don't start with a network, rather they start with the weapons, the command centers, the sensors and they attempt to link them together in ways that make operational sense. UK officials also explain their approach as being reflective of "a less enthusiastic approach to all-embracing technology as a way of solving a lot of problems." I also believe the particular terminology used goes to the heart of whether we perceive and accept NCW as a strategic war fighting concept and doctrine or whether we see it being more applicable at the tactical or operational level. And that then defines how we will ultimately implement the concept into practice. NCW seems to be most useful as a tactical concept. Reference to NEO seemed to accept this fact and this is where its efforts should be focussed. Principles of situational awareness, information superiority, speed of decision making, and the shared operational picture as proposed by NCW all would seem to have particular relevance and application at the tactical level - though they do have a place higher up. It's also at the tactical level where NCW realistically can probably achieve the most in the short to medium term. It’s when politicians and policymakers seek to elevate the importance and relevance of NCW to the strategic level of warfare and as the central organising principle for the modern military that its limitations and risks become more apparent. Particularly when it might be used as the primary guiding principle for all future ADF capability development. If we elevate NCW to a strategic level concept then we run the risk of promoting and accepting its application to all types of military operations universally and to all three Services equally. Clearly that just won't work. Our adoption of US terminology also underlines the pitfalls of benchmarking ourselves against the US and that we should be looking at smaller countries like the UK as possible examples to follow. The fact that the US is at the moment operating in a budget environment resulting in dramatically increased defence spending - not a situation Australia faces – should be enough reason not to look to the US for guidance in this area.

3. The challenge of applying the NCW concept to operations other than war In fact one of the reasons why the UK prefers the term "networked enabled capability" rather than "network centric warfare" is they feel NCW, being just about "warfare", does not allow enough emphasis on the numerous types of operations modern militaries must undertake that don't quite fit into a traditional "warfare" construct. And NCW's applicability or otherwise to operations other than war (OOTW) - such as peacekeeping, peace enforcement, counter-insurgency, nation building and the like - is one of the more common criticisms levelled at the concept, namely that it is far more applicable to conventional state on state military conflicts.

6 We need to remember that NCW did begin as a naval concept of warfare and OOTW obviously don't figure highly in the way that navies organise, equip, train or fight. But the theory behind some elements of NCW - such as principles of situational awareness, speed of command and precision warfare - are just as applicable to counter-insurgency as they are conventional military operations. In some respects these ideas hold even more relevance to OOTW. Guerrillas operate in small groups, which when coupled with the need to maintain the support of the domestic population, calls for the discriminatory and precise use of force. Guerrillas also traditionally disperse quickly after striking which calls for speed of information, command and decision. NCW's application to phenomenon such as modern urban warfare, however, remains far more uncertain. However the major problem we face in NCW's applicability to OOTW - and practical implementation - is that the ultimate seduction of the NCW concept to politicians and policymakers alike is that it offers the possibility of a smaller force structure and less numbers of troops overall. That has attractions for reasons of both savings costs and potential casualties. At the ADF NCW Conference this year the VCDF highlighted that NCW could influence our future force structure, for example, by allowing us to use fewer platforms or units to achieve the required effect. The father of NCW retired Admiral Arthur Cebrowski states that one of the strengths of NCW is its potential, within limits, to offset a disadvantage in numbers, technology or position. That principle might be applicable in air and naval warfare, it also might be applicable in major conventional combat. But the risk associated with that principle becomes far more real when you start applying the principle of "doing more with less" to OOTW and to land forces in particular. In this respect even the UK may have lost the plot. The UK House of Commons Defence Committee Report on the New Chapter to the SDR, stated that "UK forces have the advantage of extensive experience in handling low-intensity operations, where networking can be highly effective." No arguments from me there. But it went on to state that networking "can help relatively small numbers of troops or platforms to cover large tasks or geographical areas through rapid and flexible deployments". That proposition is far more debatable and certainly is not backed up by the US experience in either Iraq or Afghanistan In Afghanistan it's widely accepted that the lack of substantial numbers of US combat troops on the ground allowed Osama Bin Laden to make good his escape from US attacks. And its certainly debateable whether the coalition has adequate numbers of troops in Afghanistan - let alone Iraq - to do anything more than contain and manage the current situation. In Iraq the US certainly had enough troops to defeat the Iraqi military and overthrow Saddam's regime. And in some cases it could use technology to offset its lack of numbers. This was demonstrated particularly in Northern Iraq, where the US used a combination of small numbers of Special Forces and light airborne troops coupled with air power and surveillance to partly compensate fore the absence of 4th Infantry Division. In the south they used air power to assist in the speed of advance and to compensate for the lack of troops that might ordinarily be deployed protecting lines of communication and resupply.

7 But applying the principle that networked forces can adequately do the job previously undertaken by numerically superior forces goes against our acceptance of the "three block war" concept. As former USMC Commandant Charles Krulak put it. "In one moment in time, our service members will be feeding and clothing displaced refugees - providing humanitarian assistance. In the next moment, they will be holding two warring tribes apart - conducting peacekeeping operations. Finally, they will be fighting a highly lethal mid-intensity battle. All on the same day, all within three city blocks. It will be what we call the three block war." Advocates of NCW actually highlight the fact that the past emphasis on warfare was far too sequential in its phases of preparation and execution, and that NCW would provide a greater degree of near concurrency in operations. That should apply to the post war phase equally which can't be separated from the more conventional phases. Iraq demonstrates that in the current guerilla war the US faces, technology and information is no substitute to having the adequate numbers of boots on the ground. Running the war on the cheap might be fine for the conventional phase but it ultimately ensures that you are not adequately prepared for the post war phase with all of its particular and peculiar challenges. The US may not need relatively large numbers of forces to invade, fight and win conventional conflict, but it does need them to stabilise and nation build countries once invaded. We shouldn't kid ourselves that a networked company-sized group of soldiers has the same capabilities as a good old-fashioned - but unfashionable - battalion of infantry, or a networked battalion the same capabilities as a legacy brigade and so on. As one commentator put it, "an information-driven US military will be no more effective in dealing with these problems (OOTW) than traditional militaries - but it will be smaller, more expensive, and more thinly stretched". Advocates of NCW often state that the concept is all about the moving from an approach based on the massing of forces to one based upon the massing of effects. I would suggest that the massing of forces, indeed "mass" itself, has an unique effect all of its own and can't be discarded altogether. Mass also still has a role to play in force protection rather than relying more on speed of information and command and situational awareness to provide greater survivability. By the same token we shouldn't get carried away with our obsession with precision strike. And the war in Iraq has some salient lessons there as well. While pre-war prediction estimated that at least 80-90% of munitions dropped would be precision-guided, that figure ended up being 68%, not unlike the figures for the Afghan campaign. The US obviously realised that sometimes you need a B-52 dropping a full load of unguided bombs to get the desired and necessary effect. Dumb bombs still have their value not least against area targets, a lesson Australia would do well to remember. Information is not a substitute for numbers or weight, it complements it and can compensate for it to a certain degree, but it is no substitute. Size and mass have a redundancy factor built in, I'm not sure you can say the same for networking.

4. The challenge of applying the NCW concept to land forces The applicability of NCW to OOTW also raises the issue of its potential impact on land forces. And here it's more of an issue than just simply playing the numbers game. In many ways the application of NCW to the Army has the potential for the greatest impact across any

8 of the Services of the ADF. Land forces have the prospect of every individual soldier being part of the network, this is not a situation that air or maritime forces have to consider. The transition to, and application of, NCW is easiest when moving from a platform centric force. That’s why NCW is particularly applicable to air forces and navies and somewhat easier to implement - though it is still likely to remain a technical and cultural challenge nevertheless. But Army is different. Army is far more people centric than platform centric. And the land environment is far more demanding and complicated than either air or maritime environments. It has cities, buildings, mountains, jungles and of course civilians. As evidenced above, the conflict spectrum is that much wider for land forces. And we need to bear in mind that nothing NCW may promise will eliminate the probability of close combat between individuals remaining a fundamental factor in future warfare. The current Chief of Army has highlighted his vision of the combined arms team as the basic ground element of a networked force where targeting information and intelligence will be shared in real time. Ultimately the individual soldier will become a node in this network and the nodes of the network will be organic to Army’s vehicles. What this vision will mean in practice is yet to be determined, but it does hold the possibility that Army will become more platform-centric than people-centric in its approach. Furthermore, as one RAND analyst recently remarked, in contrast to the US Air Force and Navy, NCW and defence transformation is forcing the US Army to actually rethink the nature of its platforms, particularly the main battle tank. By the same token there's also the possibility that we’ll increasingly look at the individual soldier in same way as we look at our existing air and naval platforms and systems. The decentralisation of increased lethality down to the individual soldier level and the existence of projects of looking at the individual soldier as a combat system reinforce that possibility. I think the jury is still out on whether these are positive developments or not, let alone what it might actually mean for the way Army does its business.

5. The challenge of divorcing the concepts behind NCW from the conflicts associated with its validation. The experiences in Iraq highlighted above are just some of the reasons why advocates of NCW shouldn't be too hasty in using the 2003 Gulf War as either validating or vindicating their concept's approach to modern warfare. But it's not only in relation to the failure of the networked US force to deal with the "post-war war" that is at issue here. To test the theory of validation further we also need to analyse how and why the US actually won the 2003 Gulf War. In his address to the ADF NCW Conference earlier this year, the CDF, in criticising the armchair generals who were disparaging the US approach to the war - particularly in terms of the lack of numbers of US troops on the ground - said that what all of these critics did not include in their assessments was the "Coalition's significant - no, war winning - lead in NCW over the Iraqis".

9 I think the nature of the post-war war has put that statement in its proper context but the enthusiastic advocates of NCW also need to remember the following points that place the US victory in some considerable perspective. •

The Iraqi army was half the strength it was in 1991 and realistically it had no air or maritime capability worth considering.

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Some twelve years of sanctions meant Iraq couldn't restore or rebuild any of its previous military capability which left it with severe shortcomings in both modern combat equipment and logistical support.

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US and UK aircraft have been hitting the Iraqi air defence network for well over a decade prior to the initiation of hostilities and had total air superiority during the campaign.

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Iraq's overall strategy and quality of leadership - both political and military - was poor and deeply flawed.

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Operationally the Iraqis performed likewise with ground forces - particularly the Republican Guard - remaining relatively massed and easily and substantially destroyed from the air.

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Iraqi command and control capabilities were suspect to begin with. While we're still unaware of how much damage we did to Iraqi C2, it debateable whether they would have performed any better even if they had a functioning system - assuming they didn't.

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The Iraqi military had more experience in killing its own citizens and fighting against poorly equipped regional neighbours that it did fighting a modern combat force.

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The much discussed asymmetical strategies of urban warfare defence, SCUD missile launches and the use of chemical and biological weapons simply didn't occur. And it wasn't speed of manoeuvre that negated such tactics, they were never attempted in the first place. Even Iraqi attempts at guerilla warfare were poorly executed.

We shouldn't fall into the trap of thinking that information superiority is now the primary element to achieving victory in modern warfare, though it is an important element. It's extremely doubtful that Saddam could have won the war if he had more information at his disposal given the flawed and disjointed strategy he pursued or the weak application of any strategy into the actual military operations conducted. And the US was still able to win despite the fact that they had not established total information superiority over their opponents. In fact it's to the credit of coalition commanders in the Iraq war that they didn't wait for information superiority or total battle space awareness to act, and in some cases they acted with a fair degree of risk and uncertainty. We can't afford to become so dependent on information superiority that we substitute it for daring and risk taking. Information superiority is also no substitute or compensator for bad decision making or having a poor strategy to begin with. Even how the media reported the war has certain lessons about the risks associated with NCW's applicability to the modern battlefield. With all the embedded journalists in coalition military units on the front line we were inundated with information at the tactical level,

10 coupled with an absence of information at the wider operational level. This ultimately led to giving us misleading impressions of what was really happening with the war as a whole. Translate that problem to the conduct of the battle itself and the risks become apparent. So while some American commentators have gone so far to state that it was US speed of command and action which made the Iraqis appear to be incompetent, I rather choose to believe that it was the Iraqi's incompetence that actually made them both appear and act incompetent. As for whether the war validated NCW I'll have to agree here with the historian Frederick Kagan who noted that "the bottom line is that the coalition forces could probably have demonstrated the validity of just about any concept of war against such a opponent." And in all probability half of the US military force that battled Saddam in 1991 could have done just a good a job. One of the major lessons for Australia in all of this, however, is that in sharp contrast to the US, all future war for us will not necessarily be so asymmetrical. Given the size and capabilities of the US military and its defence budget, it's easy to say all of America's wars will be asymmetric, as no one can possibly compete with them. But Australia faces a number of possible and feasible threats across the capability spectrum over the next 10-20 years and beyond. In other words we will face a wide range of threats and capabilities and in contrast to the US, we cannot be assured of military superiority across that wide range of threats. So for conventional warfare at least, that can make elements of NCW even more relevant to Australia.

6. The challenge of NCW’s impact on interoperability Before closing I’ll just say a few words on the impact of NCW on interoperability from a strategic perspective. There are two broad issues to consider. The first is that the question of interoperability is not so much a challenge of widening gulf in military capability, differing levels in respective defence budgets or access to technology though they all have an important part to play. The greater challenge - and one which doesn't get much attention - is the US willingness or otherwise to let us into the network. Even in the recent Gulf War – where Australia was only one of three countries to substantively support the US in its efforts of remove Saddam’s regime in the face of wider international isolation – the ADF still faced numerous obstacles in getting access to US classified operational networks, even when it may have affected our ability to properly execute our mission. Even the international effort to combat the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan was characterised by the US knocking back the contributions offered by a number of NATO countries. While most commentators have focussed on the lack of specific military capabilities by those NATO countries as the reason for the knock back, I believe US unwillingness to complicate their own decision making had a far greater impact and influence.

11 The second issue relates to the degree that coalition interoperability will ultimately drive our efforts to implement our vision of NCW. The ADF NCW Concept states that our highest priority is to create joint interoperability and that the next priority is to develop appropriate force options to operate within an international coalition for tasks that support our wider interests. The most important aspect of this priority will be the further development of the ability of selected ADF units to operate with current and future US forces. Despite that rhetoric we still run the ultimate risk that in the end the individual services of the ADF will become more networked with their respective sister services in the US military than with each other. Our contribution to the war in Afghanistan and Iraq underlines this possibility. Our contributions may have been balanced but they were not joint in operation. In fact we operated more jointly with US services in Iraq and Afghanistan than with each other. If, as the Government’s 2003 Strategic Update suggests, such operations will increasingly become the norm then we could end up further entrenching the situation. In evidence to a House of Commons study, one UK military official recently stated that if UK forces are going into an operation there can only be one network. He said you cannot have a series of different ones that do not connect with one another otherwise you defeat the objective. A fundamental tenet of networked-enabled capability is that there can only be one network of operation. Sensible words, but they do highlight the possibility, some may say probability, that the "network" we eventually adopt will be the US network. We need to work out whether that will be desirable or not. Conclusion There are other challenges to consider. Such as while we're busy developing an NCW concept were investing substantially in what could turn out to be future legacy systems with no guarantee that they’ll be able to be satisfactorily networked. We still have to get our minds around NCW's impact on training requirements, let alone its impact on logistic support. I might leave those for another time. Don’t get me wrong. I don't so much have a problem with the theory of NCW - once you accept many of its limitations - but I don't believe that a lot of it is realisable and more importantly it’s the likely application of that theory that holds considerable risks. In his address to the ADF Network Centric Warfare Conference held in Canberra on 20 May 2003, the Minister for Defence made the point that "there is no doubt that NCW, effectively implemented is a huge force multiplier". I would agree. My point today is to highlight the risks and challenges of NCW being ineffectively implemented.