NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The challenge for naval expeditionary forces in the emerging threat environment is how to integrate all the elements operating in a distributed role when they may not be able to control the communications domain, a panel of experts said Tuesday. All the challenges of mobility, survivability and combat effectiveness in distributed expeditionary operations are aggravated by the threat of cyberspace interference, the panel told a Navy League Sea-Air-Space forum.

“We’ve been talking about distributed ops for a long time,” but doing that in a large geographic area “introduces serious challenges to our architecture on how we knit that together, particularly in a distributed environment where we may not control the spectrum. … We may not control the cyberspace environment,” said Gregory Breazile, a retired Marine colonel, now CEO of Breazile Cyber & C4I Solutions. “We want to dominate, but we have to work through that competitive space,” and it becomes more complicated, Breazile said.

But industry is working to bring capabilities, including artificial intelligence, that can help overcome those challenges, Breazile said. The good news, he said, “is that AI is making it able to bring things together. … All these AI capabilities are there.”

Navy Capt. Jeff Morganthaler, Maritime Operations Center director at the Navy Expeditionary Combat Command (NECC), and Col. David Odom, director Expeditionary Warfare on the Navy staff, also cited the emerging capabilities, including artificial intelligence and unmanned systems, that can ensure the integrated, multi-domain operations they are working to achieve.

Morganthaler listed the ability to supply integrated information and communications systems among the capabilities that NECC brings to the integrated expeditionary operations. In talking about assured command and control, “I’m confident of what we have today.”  But for the future, “I don’t need it bigger. I need it smaller and more capable.” He described a proposed communications and intelligence system that could be flown in on a MV-22 Osprey and mounted on an unmanned vehicle.

Among the other advances the expeditionary forces need, Odom mentioned bringing the fifth-generation F-35 capabilities to the big-deck amphibious ships, the less expensive but capable LPD Flight II amphibs and the proposed light amphibious ships. The challenge for the smaller amphibs, he said, is to make them “affordable, so we can get as many as possible. We are working with industry to bring what we need.”

National Harbor, Md. — The mission systems on the first MQ-4C Triton unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) equipped with a signals intelligence capability functioned well on the first test flight, a Navy official said.

The first MQ-4C equipped with Integrated Functional Capability-Four (IFC-4) made its first flight on July 29, mainly to test the aerodynamic characteristics of the new configuration. The test team, while evaluating such aspects as stability and control, also checked out the performance of the mission systems and sensors. The IFC Triton featured more antennas than the baseline IFC version.

“The sensors and systems are performing better than expected,” said Capt. Dan Mackin, the Navy’s Persistent Maritime Unmanned Aircraft Systems program manager, speaking Aug. 3 at the Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space expo at National Harbor, Maryland.

The IFC-4 hardware and software configuration introduces a signals intelligence capability to the Triton. It will enable the Triton to become an integral part of the Navy’s Maritime Intelligence, Surveillance, Reconnaissance and Targeting (MISR&T) transition plan. As such, it will eventually replace the Navy’s EP-3E Orion electronic reconnaissance aircraft beginning in the fall of 2023 when the first full orbit is established. The IFC-4 upgrade also includes the Minotaur mission system now used on the EP-3E.

Mackin said the Navy expects to introduce artificial intelligence and machine learning capabilities during later upgrades. Other upgrades planned for 2025 include Wideband Tactical Targeting Network Technology, enhanced radar identification modes, protected satellite communications. M-Code and counter-electronic attack.

Upgrades planned for 2027-2028 include enhancements to enable the Triton to perform without access to the GPS and satellite communications. These include command from afloat units, more robust navigation and communications, increased power, among others.

Mackin said that when the IFC-4 configuration joins the fleet, the mission control centers will be modified with special compartmented intelligence facilities for protection of intelligence and its sources and methods.  

The Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) is partnered with the U.S. Navy on the Triton program and has accelerated its acquisition of three MQ-4Cs to keep the production line going during the U.S. gap in production, said Doug Shaffer, Northrop Grumman’s’ Triton program manager.

Mackin said the RAAF Tritons will be in the IFC-4 configuration and will be identical to those of the U.S. Navy.

Less than 30% of youth today are available for military service, said Michelle Godfrey, senior advisor for diversity and inclusion, U.S. Coast Guard. As the nation becomes more diverse, one of the keys to attracting and retaining that scarce talent is to foster equity and inclusion efforts, said Godfrey and other panelists during the Aug. 3 session on Inclusion and Diversity as a Force Multiplier.

“The data backs it up — the more diverse team you have, the higher your performance,” Godfrey said.

In the Navy, diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts help foster warfighting readiness, said Vice Adm. John Nowell Jr., deputy chief of naval operations for manpower, personnel, training and education and chief of naval personnel.

“If you want to outfight the enemy, you have to outthink them, and the way you do that is by leveraging diverse and inclusive leadership,”  he said.

Nowell said the Navy is currently implementing 56 recommendations from a DEI task force. For instance, recruiters now look at applicants’ whole personality rather than just quantifiable measures like SATs. Navy leader trainer development is taking DEI into account and is looking at bias in terms of decision science. Navy classrooms are also using a bias mitigation tool. The key, Nowell said, is to use data analytics while still being able to rely on intuition as well.

The Marine Corps is modernizing its manpower system, including talent management, said

Brig. Gen. A.T. Williamson, director, Manpower Plans & Policy Division, U.S. Marine Corps. Along with ethnic inclusivity, diversity of thought, experience and background also helps build a cohort of inclusive teams, he said.

The Marine Corps is currently working on and vetting a DEI framework, Williamson said. It’s also conducting a survey to see if there’s bias within the personnel evaluation system, and asking questions about inclusion during exit surveys.

The Coast Guard has a DEI action plan with 36 distinct actions, Godfrey said. The organization has completed a women’s retention study and expects a study to be published this month on recruitment and retention of underrepresented minorities. In April, the Coast Guard deployed a virtual mentoring program that helps foster DEI efforts. Close to 1,000 people have signed up for the program’s mentoring app, she said.

The Coast Guard also offers tools on how to have DEI conversations, Godfrey said. It’s trained more than 100 diversity and inclusion change agents, who offer coaching for various DEI situations. Performance appraisals also include diversity and inclusion competency.

The Department of the Navy has exceeded its social and economic DEI goals for the past six years, said Jimmy Smith, director, Office of Small Business Programs, Department of the Navy. During the last fiscal year, it spent $17.3 billion on small businesses that were in diverse socioeconomic categories, he said. It’s also working with historically black colleges and universities on recruitment efforts.

“We’re fighting to attract talent,” Smith said. “We’re spending money in places we haven’t before.”

In terms of equity, only some companies can perform jobs like shipbuilding, Smith pointed out. But the Department of the Navy is committed to doing a better job of enforcing how those companies are distributing funding to their subcontractors.

“We need to change our bias from always going to certain places to get certain things done,” he said. “We need to create more competition. At the end of the day, it’s all about fairness.”

All of the speakers emphasized that DEI efforts encompass more than just race, religion, age and sexuality. They also include factors like inclusivity of education and viewpoints, and diversity of thought and problem-solving.

Smith believes DEI initiatives should be deeply personal as well. “Being a father of three girls, there are things women in our workforce go through today that I never want to see my girls ever have to go through,” he said.

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — Vice Adm. Jeffrey Trussler, deputy chief of naval operations for information warfare and director of naval intelligence, said cybersecurity threats to the United States are such that “frankly, where we sit today in 2021, we ought to be having one of those Pearl Harbor moments without the Pearl Harbor.”

Trussler spoke on a panel at Sea-Air-Space 2021 panel on “Cyber Today’s Fight, Tomorrows Capabilities,” along with Rear Adm. Michael Ryan, commander of U.S. Coast Guard Cyber Command, Karen Van Dyke, director for positioning, navigation, and timing and spectrum management at the Department of Transportation, and Ryan Roberts, senior manager of cyber and strategic risk at Deloitte.

Trussler said cyber attacks — such as the one that disabled the Colonial Pipeline, affecting the flow of oil along the East Coast and Southeast — shows that the threat is no longer just about defense and security, but “you could be impacted personally from anywhere around the world, based on our dependency on technology … I’m worried that enough people aren’t hearing, wow, it’s a new world.”

Ryan said the Coast Guard is issuing an update to its Cyber Strategic Outlook and wants to embrace innovation on the cybersecurity front, which is where industry can help.

“We understand the value of partnerships, particularly with those in the room,” he said.

Van Dyke said from her point of view, a big fear is the jamming and spoofing of Global Positioning System signals.

“It’s a weak signal coming from space,” she said of GPS, and “it doesn’t take much power to jam GPS over a wide area.”

Jamming is a temporary threat, but spoofing can actually permanently disrupt communications, as a GPS user might lose access to their receiver for good.

“This is an increasing concern,” Van Dyke said, and DoT is working with the Department of Defense to counter these and other threats.

Roberts said automation will take on a larger role when responding to future cyber attacks, as eventually humans will be too slow.

If a major attack happens “and we convene a committee to decide what we’re going to do, we’ve already lost,” he said. “Over time, we’re going to have to remove that human in the loop and get to autonomous decision making.” It’s a scary thought, but “humans are not going to be able to respond quickly enough.”

Interagency cooperation is key to fighting cyber attacks, the panelists said. Trussler said he learned new things just by being on the panel, and said “Sea-Air-Space has done a really good job” in bringing together different viewpoints.

Ryan said the Coast Guard is already working with commercia shipping ports to assess their facilities so they can harden their infrastructure.

That’s a niche area for the service, he said, “but reflective of the fact this is a joint fight.”

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — A top Navy air warfare official said Aug. 3 the service opposes the addition of F/A-18E/F Super Hornets to the budget — which Congress wants to do this year as it done in many previous budgets — because the new buys would take the aircraft deep into the 2050s, when it would be no longer viable.

As they have done for years, lawmakers are once again seeking to add more F/A-18E/F Super Hornets to the Department of Defense’s budget to help close a gap in strike fighter capability. Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Michael Gilday said Aug. 2 at the Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space 2021 the Navy is opposed to this move, and the next day Rear Adm. Andrew Loiselle, director of the air warfare division (N98), said Gilday opposes it because the Navy doesn’t want fourth-generation fighters that many years into the future.

He pointed out that the last Super Hornet to be bought under this proposal would last 30 years, which “takes us out to 2055. There isn’t a lot of analysis out there that supports fourth-generation viability” that far into the future, Loiselle said.

Instead, the Navy is focused on continuing F-35 buys and managing the service lives for current Super Hornets, he said.

Additionally, Loiselle addressed what he described as incorrect interpretations that the Navy is reducing its F-35 program of record by decreasing the number of F-35s in an air wing to 14.

“Some interpreted that as a reduction in the program of record,” he said. “That is not the case. There has been no change to the program of record for the F-35.”

NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — Huntington Ingalls Industries announced Aug. 2 that it is making significant progress in the compartment and systems construction of the aircraft carrier John F. Kennedy (CVN 79).

Newport News Shipbuilding division recently eclipsed the 20% mark on compartment completion, turning over to the ship’s crew more than 500 of the total 2,615 spaces. It also has installed more than 8 million feet of cable — or more than 1,500 miles — of the approximately 10.5 million feet of cable on Kennedy.

The most recently completed spaces include berthing, machinery and electrical. This allows Sailors assigned to the pre-commissioning unit to continue training on the ship while final outfitting and testing progresses.

“We are pleased with the progress being made on Kennedy,” said Lucas Hicks, vice president of the Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) and John F. Kennedy (CVN 79) aircraft carrier programs. “We are in the very early stages of systems testing and look forward to successfully executing our work on equipment, systems and compartments that brings us closer to delivering the ship to the fleet.”

Kennedy is more than 80% complete overall and is scheduled to be delivered to the Navy in 2024.

Hudson, N.H. — BAE Systems, Inc. has developed an advanced version of its combat-proven APKWS guidance kit that offers enhanced strike distance and precision strike lethality, the company said in an Aug. 2 release. The upgrade improves the effective range of APKWS guided rockets by up to 30%, allowing warfighters to engage targets from a greater standoff distance with improved survivability. 

APKWS is the U.S. government’s only program of record for guiding 2.75-inch laser-guided rockets, providing an efficient, low-cost weapon in the U.S. arsenal of precision munitions. Initial production of APKWS block upgrade guidance kits will start in the third quarter of 2021. 

“Our customers’ precision strike needs are changing,” said John Watkins, vice president and general manager of Precision Strike & Sensing Solutions at BAE Systems. “We’re focused on evolving APKWS guidance kits to provide them with a more capable low-cost product that’s easy to use and known for its accuracy.” 

APKWS block upgrade guidance kits create an optimized flight trajectory that enables the rocket to engage targets at a steeper angle of attack, providing improvements in range and lethality. The optimized attack trajectory improves first-shot success against stationary and moving targets. 

The enhanced guidance kits also provide logistics and training benefits to customers. A single variant of the weapon is now qualified for rotary-wing and fixed-wing aircraft across the U.S. armed forces customers, easing stock management and reducing the cognitive load on pilots. An upgrade to the surface danger zone logic also provides better training range options in certain conditions, allowing crews to improve their proficiency at home stations. 

BAE Systems’ APKWS guidance kits are manufactured at the company’s production facility in Hudson, New Hampshire. 

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — Raytheon has developed a version of its Joint Precision Aircraft Landing System (JPALS) designed for expeditionary airfields, which it is proposing as ideal for Marine Corps expeditionary base operations.

JPALS is a landing system based on differential Global Positioning System navigation. It is installed or being installed on the U.S. Navy’s aircraft carriers and amphibious assault ships and U.K. and Italian navy aircraft carriers. JPALS was first deployed in 2018.

CJ Jaynes, executive technical adviser, Precision Landing Systems for Raytheon Intelligence, Information and Services, speaking at the Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space Expo in National Harbor, Maryland, said the company has developed vehicle-portable JPALS that could be deployed to a forward base for providing precision landing for aircraft fitted with the JPALS avionics.

The expeditionary JPALS consists of a user display, antennas, and for processing racks, and a power generator. It can be carried in a vehicle such as a Humvee or Joint Light Tactical Vehicle. The system can be set up on site in 60-90 minutes by one or two personnel.

The JPALS uses triangulation to provide precision landing data to aircraft from a distance of up to 20 nautical miles. It can provide information to a fixed-wing aircraft while at the same time it provides the landing data to a helicopter within range.

The system does not rely on precision approach radar or an instrument landing system, said Brooks Cleveland, Raytheon’s senior aviation adviser for Precision Landing Systems.

Aircraft currently configured for JPALS include the F-35A/B/C strike fighters and the CMV-22B Osprey carrier-onboard delivery aircraft and will be installed on the MQ-25A Stingray unmanned aerial vehicle. Installation on the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet is planned for the 2026-2027 time frame.

The JPALS suite for aircraft includes the JPALS waveform, a reprogrammable radio, and computer power.

Raytheon demonstrated its expeditionary JPALS for three weeks in June at Yuma, Arizona. Marine Corps F-35Bs made 50 approaches.

Jaynes and Cleveland said the land-based system at the outlying field also was praised by Marine Corps F-35B pilots because it gave them practice using the system that would enable them to be more ready for shipboard deployment.

JPALS was first deployed on the amphibious assault ship USS Wasp for use by Marine Corps F-35Bs. The USS Carl Vinson deployed Aug 2 as the Navy’s first aircraft carrier to deploy with JPALS. The ship carries the F-35C and CMV-22B on their first deployments.

Raytheon built 12 engineering and manufacturing development versions of JPALS and has delivered 10 of 26 production versions. Raytheon expects to deliver the rest by 2023.

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — In addition to cooperating with each other and maintaining a physical presence at the top of the world, Arctic nations need to consider what technologies will still be needed when there’s less ice to negotiate, according to a panel discussion on the Arctic domain.

“The demand for heavy ice breakers is going to decrease” in the not too distant future if the Arctic becomes “an ice-free zone,” Richard Jenkins, CEO of unmanned surface vessel (USV) maker Saildrone said Aug. 2 at the Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space expo in National Harbor, Maryland. 

“Unmanned systems are not a replacement for manned systems,” Jenkins said during the panel discussion, Arctic Domain Readiness. However, he added manned-unmanned teaming could reduce the need for humans to be present 24/7 in the harsh Arctic environment, with USVs or aerial or undersea drones keeping watch and alerting military, Coast Guard or scientific teams to changing situations. 

With no year-round ports for large ships, ice breakers like the Coast Guard Cutter Healy, which recently began a four-month deployment to the Arctic have to pack enough food and fuel for an extended stay in the region, Jenkins said. The changing environment may be “an opportunity to rethink how to design our ships going forward,” he added. 

Dr. Alyson Azzara, international trade specialist with the U.S. Department of Transportation, noted that new international regulations to address climate change will ban heavy fuel oil use by ships starting in 2024 and global fuel sulphur cap. Replacement fuels “will be, presumably, zero emission and low carbon fuels. And those fuels don’t exist yet,” she said.

In addition to concerns about the spread of pollution with increasing maritime traffic crossing the Arctic as melting sea ice opens more transit channels, scientists have noticed underwater noise pollution is on the rise. “The volume has doubled in under 10 years,” Azzara said.

“That’s important for the environment, for marine mammals,” she said, “but it’s also important for anything operating or listening or recording under the ice, under the water.” 

Operating in the Arctic “becomes more difficult when there’s more noise” under the water said Vice Adm. Andrew Lewis, commander of the U.S. 2^nd Fleet, another panel member. 

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The rapid development of a vast array of new technologies is changing the fundamental character of war and if the U.S. military fails to adapt, it could mean future generations would suffer massive casualties in the next major power conflict, the nation’s top military officer said Monday.

About 40 to 50 new technologies will evolve very rapidly in the next 15 to 20 years and will fundamentally change the character of war, Army Gen. John Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a luncheon audience at the Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space expo. He cited unmanned systems, artificial intelligence, 5G technology and other concepts that will be available to all major powers. The nation that masters those technologies “is likely to have a distinct advantage,” he said.

Recalling the heavy military casualties that America suffered due to its lack of preparation for both World War I and II, Milley said, it is the responsibility of the current leaders to make the right investments “so that future generations of Americans don’t have a disadvantage in the next war.”

“It’s not about the amount of money we’re spending, it’s what we’re spending it on,” he said.

Milley said he has “a great deal of pride” in the Navy because both of his parents served in the Navy during World War II — his father as a Navy corpsman with the Marines in the bloody battles in the Pacific and his mother as a Wave. He noted that America has always been a maritime nation and the Navy has played a major role in the nation’s military power with its mastery of sea control and power projection.

“That is the role of the Navy and no one has ever done it better. … The Navy today is the best in the world and we want to keep it that way,” Milley said.

 “The decisions we are making today — which are mostly economic — will determine the future of the U.S. Navy, and how we mange sea control and power projection,” he said.

In addition to the challenges of the rapidly changing technologies, Milley said the international order, which has been relatively stable since the end of World War II, “is under tremendous stress” because of international terrorists, crime cartels and the rise of new national powers. He singled out the growing economic and military power of China, which has developed “a world-class navy … China will be a major agent of change to the current international order, there is no doubt,” he said.

Milley said the U.S. military currently is ready for combat and “we have to maintain that readiness. But we most also modernize. Preparing for war is very expensive. But even more expensive is losing a war. … Our task as the military is to prepare for war,” because if war breaks out, “we must be prepared,” he concluded.