Draft Working Paper
Persistent Intelligence,
Surveillance, and Reconnaissance:
Planning and Direction
Joint Integrating Concept
Version 1.0
29 March 2007
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Draft Working Paper
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
1. PURPOSE
2. SCOPE
2. A. Introduction
2. B. Relation to Other Concepts
2. B. 1. Joint Operating Concepts
2. B. 2. Joint Functional Concepts
2. B. 3. Joint Integrating Concepts
2. C. Assumptions
3. STATEMENT OF THE MILITARY PROBLEM
4. SOLUTION
4. A. Central Idea
4. B. Capabilities
4. C. Illustrative Vignette
4. D. Tasks, Conditions, and Standards
5. RISKS
6. IMPLICATIONS
7. APPENDICES
7. A. References
7. B. Acronyms
7. C. Glossary
7. D. Table of Capabilities
8. PLAN FOR ASSESSMENT
8. A. Limited Objective Experiment
8. B. Recommendations for Further Assessment
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Combatant Commanders (COCOM) consistently identify persistent Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) as a capability gap in their Integrated Priority Lists (IPL). This Joint Integrating Concept (JIC) describes an approach for addressing this shortfall through improving planning and direction of ISR assets in the 2014-2026 timeframe. This improvement will result in better unity of ISR efforts in support of the Joint Force Commander’s (JFC) campaign plan.
JFCs will continue to face a wide range of traditional, disruptive, irregular, and catastrophic challenges from state and non-state actors. From among the many challenges across the Range of Military Operations (ROMO), priority missions are likely to include: finding, fixing, and tracking individuals or small groups that employ sophisticated denial and deception techniques, locating dispersed, mobile and/or deeply buried weapons of mass destruction (WMD) facilities and delivery systems, and monitoring any area on the globe sufficiently enough to detect and correctly interpret meaningful changes in an adversary’s status.
This JIC proposes to improve persistence through integrated, synchronized management in the planning and direction of ISR assets to the benefit of the Joint Force Commander. Five enabling capabilities are needed to implement this concept:
· Integrated planning and prioritization of information needs
· Multi-level tasking of ISR assets
· Global visibility of information needs and ISR assets
· Automated interfaces
· Training and education of ISR managers, operators and analysts
While acknowledging the importance of improving the entire ISR Enterprise to gain persistence, this JIC deliberately focuses on planning and direction. It does not propose new sensors and platforms, centralized collection management or better ways to process, exploit, analyze and distribute sensor data, information, and finished intelligence.
Assumptions:
· A Net-Centric Operating Environment (NCOE), as defined in the NCOE JIC exists and facilitates evolving Core Enterprise Services to include data/information discovery, access and storage, security, messaging, and collaboration capabilities
· Joint Forces will conduct operations in complex, anti-access, and denial and deception environments
· Requisite Command and Control (C2) is established among the theater and national ISR platforms, sensors, exploitation nodes and communications networks.
Finally, this JIC provides a means for the JFC to develop an overarching ISR strategy that lays out the tasks, conditions, and standards necessary to implement the concept. These will form the basis for a capabilities based assessment to more thoroughly explore the concept, identify gaps in needed capabilities, and propose potential solutions.
1. PURPOSE
The purpose of this JIC is to provide an operational-level description of how improvements to ISR planning and direction can provide the JFC with increased persistence in observation and collection against elusive targets of interest across the ROMO. This JIC addresses the need for persistent ISR as identified in COCOM IPLs. Additionally, this document responds to national directives and strategic guidance that call for persistent ISR, including:
· Capstone Concept for Joint Operations (CCJO) mandating the need of the joint force to operate more coherently countering terrorist, insurgency and WMD.
· 2006 QDR direction to establish an “unblinking eye” over the operational environment through persistent surveillance
· Transformational Planning Guidance for intelligence capabilities that persist across all domains and supply near continuous access to our most important intelligence targets.
The concept seeks to improve persistence through integrated, synchronized management of planning and direction of the ISR Enterprise, including all intelligence disciplines, such as human intelligence (HUMINT), imagery (IMINT), signals (SIGINT), measures and signatures (MASINT), open source (OSINT), as well as non-traditional ISR collection capabilities.
2. SCOPE
Figure 1 – The Intelligence Process
2. A. Introduction
Figure 1 portrays the intelligence process as depicted Joint Publication 2-01. Functionally, the scope of this JIC is the planning and direction of ISR assets in pursuit of the JFC’s operational objectives. While acknowledging the importance of improving the entire ISR Enterprise to gain persistence, it deliberately focuses on planning and direction. It does not address the technical capabilities of individual sensors, processing and exploitation of sensor data, analysis and production of intelligence products, or the dissemination of data, information, and finished intelligence. While it is not possible, or appropriate to divorce other elements of the intelligence process, other processes are mentioned only as they relate or respond directly to integrating ISR planning and direction processes. It should also be noted that within this document, global visibility will provide a mechanism to enhance dissemination of information and provide for real-time feedback to the commander, but does not comprehensively address the processing and exploitation section of the intelligence cycle.
It would be highly prudent for DoD to investigate the other elements of the ISR process to fully realize persistence in ISR activities. For example, the development of a Persistent ISR: Collection JIC is needed to focus on the sensor capability requirements and the need to address protection and survivability aspects of the sensors.
Nothing in this document should be construed as infringing upon the Combatant Commander's Collection Management Authority (CMA) to manage and employ the ISR assets which are organic to his assigned forces, or allocated to him from national level for employment in his theater of operations. To the contrary, the thrust of this document is intended to bolster the ability of the Regional Combatant Commander to more effectively employ ISR.
Operationally, this JIC focuses on specific JFC missions that cover the expected ROMO in the 2014-2026 timeframe; these missions will require persistence to find, identify, track and determine intent of elusive adversary targets. Adversaries will exercise sophisticated denial and deception techniques and will use complex environments to their advantage.
Organizationally, this JIC focuses on the JFC and his mission in the overall context of global ISR asset availability. Thus, this JIC seeks to improve the JFC’s ISR performance in a global context that considers all intelligence needs, from the national strategic level to his tactical subordinates. With this global perspective, and within physical and policy constraints, this JIC seeks a more effective alignment of ISR assets to information needs.
2. B. Relationship to Other Concepts
2. B. 1. Joint Operating Concepts
All Joint Operating Concepts: Major Combat Operations, Homeland Defense and Civil Support, Military Support to Stabilization, Security, Transition and Reconstruction Operations, and Deterrence Operations depend to varying degrees upon a persistent ISR Enterprise extending across the entire ROMO. It is a key enabler for JFC decision making. The intelligence estimate and the answers it provides to Commander’s Critical Information Requirements (CCIR), Priority Intelligence Requirements (PIR), and Essential Elements of Information (EEI) provide the foundation for operational and tactical actions.
2. B. 2. Joint Functional Concepts
Battlespace Awareness (BA)
A successful ISR Enterprise enables comprehensive BA and the capability to conduct persistent ISR collection greatly increased the odds of ISR success. The ultimate measure of the success of an ISR campaign is whether it provides the JFC with the right information at the right time to make sound tactical and operational decisions. It allows the JFC to predict future enemy activities and influence the enemy's decision cycle into taking action favorable to friendly operations. Intelligence Process activities correspond directly to Tier II Joint Capability Areas (JCA) organized under the BA Tier I JCA and further articulated in the BA Joint Functional Concept. JFC demands to achieve persistence on the battlefield are one of the primary goals of the enterprise.
Joint Command and Control (C2)
The persistent ISR Enterprise facilitates, and is facilitated by C2. The results of persistent ISR activities provide the JFC operational and tactical decision-points. However, Operations DESERT STORM and IRAQI FREEDOM taught us that the speed at which ground forces advanced far exceeded the rate of production for certain types of intelligence. As a primary input to the decision-making process; joint C2 using CCIRs, PIRs, and EEIs should drive the activities of the ISR Enterprise. A persistent ISR Enterprise allows JFCs the opportunity to better influence the responsiveness of the intelligence process via dynamic visualization and feedback mechanisms to ensure collection capabilities can be allocated/reallocated as needed.
Net Centric Environment (NCE)
The persistent ISR Enterprise cannot exist without a trusted NCE. The NCE is a framework for human and technical connectivity and interoperability allowing users and mission partners to share the information they need, when they need it, in a format they can understand and act upon, and protects information from those who should not have it. The continued development of the NCE facilitates the integration of ISR collection resources, cross-cueing, and fusion of multi-INT/multi-source information, and timely visualization of that information to JFCs. Additionally, the information sharing capabilities of a NCE will promote interaction and convergence of various ISR reports into single actionable products available to anyone, at any time. This environment will set and enforce data standards and security protocols that all ISR information must adhere to, and will drive the development of future capabilities toward conformity within those standards. NCE will leverage standards from approved sources such as Networks and Information Integration (NII), National Security Agency (NSA), National Geospatial Intelligence Agency (NGA).
2. B. 3. Joint Integrating Concepts
The Net-Centric Operational Environment (NCOE) JIC and C2 JIC are the implementation directives for their corresponding functional concepts via specified tasks, conditions, and standards. Fully integrating the ISR Enterprise to achieve persistence means adherence to NCOE principles of knowledge management, network management, and information assurance as well as C2 principles of Unity of Command and Accountability of Commanders. The ISR Enterprise relies heavily on the capabilities inherent in the NCOE and C2 concepts to provide a pervasive communications environment, and to synchronize execution of operations.
2. C. Assumptions
The Persistent ISR JIC assumes:
· Existence of a NCOE as defined in the NCOE JIC, which will facilitate evolving Core Enterprise Services to include data/information discovery, access and storage, security, messaging, and collaboration capabilities
· Joint Forces will be required to conduct operations in complex, anti-access, and denial and deception environments
· Requisite Command and Control (C2) is established among the theater and national ISR platforms, sensors, exploitation nodes, and communications networks.
3. STATEMENT OF THE MILITARY PROBLEM
During the 2014-2026 timeframe, the JFC will be endeavor to counter both state and non-state actors, drug cartels, terrorist organizations, or anyone else who desires to do harm to America and her allies. From across the ROMO, high priority JFC missions are likely to include:
· Detecting, identifying, tracking, and targeting intelligent and responsive adversaries that employ sophisticated denial and deception techniques in complex operational environments
· Determining adversary organizational structures, capabilities, plans, and intentions
· Observing any area on the globe to detect and correctly interpret meaningful changes in environmental, cultural, and adversary activities.
The need for persistence implies a need to detect, identify and characterize change in the structure, status and behavior of an elusive target. Persistent ISR is the ability to provide the JFC with access to the target with the timeliness and precision required to achieve objectives. The capability for conducting Persistent ISR against time-sensitive or sporadic enemy activity significantly increases the likelihood that the JFC will obtain the intelligence information required to achieve objectives. The rate of detectable change generated by an object being observed will drive update rates at which the ISR process will be required to operate. Targets described above, such as individuals or vehicles, change location rapidly, driving the need for a high degree of persistence that is currently lacking. Furthermore, when the target uses denial and deception, and hides in complex environments, he essentially lowers the strength of his detectable signatures relative to his environment. This amplifies the need for persistence in order to detect more subtle changes. The nature of the JFC’s objective will also affect the requirement for persistence. If the objective is to determine the general location of an individual, then a lower update rate may be acceptable. On the other hand, if the objective is to closely monitor or target a moving target, then there will be a premium for persistence to ensure up-to-date information.
4. SOLUTION
4. A. Central Idea
The central idea of this JIC is that persistence against an elusive target can be increased through the integrated, synchronized management of ISR planning and direction. Planning and direction is a Tier II joint capability within the Battlespace Awareness JCA. It is the ability to develop intelligence requirements, coordinate and position the appropriate collection assets, from the national to the tactical level to ensure robust situational awareness and knowledge of intended domains is gained. The integrated, synchronized management of planning and direction is achieved through five enabling capabilities: integrated prioritization, multi-level tasking, global visibility, automated interfaces, and capable collection managers.
The foundation for integrating ISR planning and direction is the information network, including the appropriate ISR services and applications oriented toward the JFC’s needs. The global scope of the network is the key enabling function. By combining global visibility of available information and intelligence needs with the tools to maximize platform/sensor/target management, the network will improve efficiency and maximize persistence. Inherent within this concept is the idea of integrating and synchronizing a mix of sensing systems and platforms rather than relying on a single system. This concept therefore envisions complete coverage (both spatially and temporally) available from the entire mix of sensor systems and their associated processing and exploitation capabilities. The second concept embedded within this concept is the ability to capture the activity/information as it occurs rather than forensically reconstructing after the fact. This requires the ability for the JFC to adjust collection priorities (including revisit rates) of the entire collection suite to a level appropriate to the activity of interest. Individual sensors, platforms and exploitation nodes will become more efficient as part of an integrated system. Implementing this fully integrated ISR Enterprise will result in improved persistence, and ultimately better ISR for the warfighter.