Jaspreet Gill covers defense networks, C4ISR and emerging technologies for Breaking Defense. She previously worked as the senior technology reporter and an associate editor for Inside Defense, where she reported on emerging technologies, cybersecurity and the US Army, focusing on the service’s modernization priorities and acquisition programs. Jaspreet, an upstate New York native, is an alumna of Syracuse University’s renown S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, where she received a master’s degree in journalism.
The Marine Corps knows it can’t “solve JADC2 for everybody,” in part because the service doesn’t have the money or the amount of people to do so, according to an official.
Which specific systems have been selected haven’t been publicly announced, a “very deliberate” strategy from the Pentagon, Navy Capt. Alex Campbell, director of the Defense Innovation Unit’s (DIU) maritime portfolio, said today.
“Those are the next steps that are going to be most challenging because … people are messy, right?” Navy cyber advisor Scott St. Pierre said. “Everybody’s like, ‘No, that’s mine. I don’t want to touch it.’ … What we really need to do is help everybody understand that we’re all in this together.”
“The challenge now is to take the capabilities developed during DIU 2.0 and apply them with the focus, scale, and speed necessary to deliver the strategic effect required,” according to the strategy. “This is what DIU 3.0 is all about.”
The service branches aren’t mandated to use the up-to $9 billion services, but the Army and Navy are getting into the game with some secret-level and wargaming-related programs, according to service documents provided to Breaking Defense.
Although slim on details, Heidi Shyu told reporters today that DoD will conduct a Technology Readiness Experimentation event sometime this year with its Australian counterparts and will conduct a new sprint of RDER with them next year.
“We’ve proven this works, we’ve proven the goodness,” Scott Belanger, capabilities integration team lead for Boeing Global Services, told reporters. “Now, where do we take it? How do we really scale it?”
“Right now we’re going through dealing with some of the security challenges,” Steve Wallace told Breaking Defense. “So I’m hoping the first half of this calendar year. The sooner … the better.”
The Pentagon achieved a minimum viable capability for its Joint All Domain Command and Control effort through the recent Global Information Dominance Experiment, Deputy CDAO Margaret Palmieri said.
The Atlantic Council’s Commission on Defense Innovation Adoption acknowledged in a new report that there were “broader, strategic matters” that “will take time to reach full implementation.”
The service is also currently developing a risk management framework for Project Linchpin, the Army’s first program of record to help build out a trusted artificial intelligence/machine learning pipeline, according to Jen Swanson, deputy assistant secretary of the Army for data, engineering and software.
“Each of the services nominated capabilities for consideration in the selection process, based on a warfighter-centric set of criteria,” a Pentagon spokesman told Breaking Defense.
“I think that there’s a recognition that the sorts of norms we’re trying to promote are things that all countries should be able to get behind,” Pentagon emerging capabilities official Michael Horowitz said.
