Air Force studying the future of coordinated air, space, cyber ops

By: Mark Pomerleau

The Air Force is on the cusp of completing a 16-month study that could serve as a blueprint for how the service will operate in the 2030s and seamlessly coordinate between air, cyber and space.

All of the military services are re-organizing to better prepare multi-domain battle, which involves seamless coordination of effects and operations across the five domains of warfare.

Multi-domain command and control, known as MDC2, has been a top priority for Air Force chief of staff Gen. David Goldfein since his confirmation hearing in June 2016. The Air Force for the last 16 months has been working a highly anticipated study on the subject.

In fact, the team has nearly completed the multi-domain command and control (MDC2) study and will brief the Air Force's senior leaders Nov. 27, Brig. Gen. Chance Saltzman, director of current operations and the lead on the project, said during a breakfast hosted by the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies Nov. 17.

Why the change?

Many military leaders have stressed that changes in organization, concepts and doctrine are due to the perceived threat environment of the future. The Air Force's pursuit of MDC2 is no different.

While the Air Force has been conducting operations in multiple domains for years, the threat picture in 2030 — to include anti-access area denial, anti-satellite weapons, directed energy weapons, computer network attack — is necessitating this change. Moreover, future battlefields will include urban, multi-regional, multi-domain, multi-component, joint, multi-national and will unfold at unprecedented speeds.

One of the primary conclusions of a recent study on Air Superiority 2030 was that the Air Force's structure in 2030 would struggle against this type of threat unless the service moves to multi-approach to operations, Saltzman said,

Full article: https://www.c4isrnet.com/c2-comms/2017/11/17/air-force-wrapping-up-study-on-how-to-use-air-space-and-cyber-in-the-2030s/