To stay ahead of the threat, the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) is collaborating with its commercial space partners to ensure that warfighters are provided with satellite services and capabilities designed to outmaneuver and outlast the adversary. Last December, I had the opportunity to attend the DoD Commercial SATCOM Workshop, a special event – hosted by U.S. Space Command – where military and satellite industry leaders came together and tackled some of the DoD’s most pressing satellite communication (SATCOM) challenges, including how to ensure resilient connectivity and assured comms throughout special operations and warfighting missions.

DoD’s SATCOM Goals
One goal that the DoD is looking to achieve is quickly ramping up SATCOM services for special operations within hours of deployment. But with adversaries deploying space capabilities designed to degrade and deny connectivity and comms to the warfighter, the DoD wants to ensure that special operations SATCOM services are backed up with spectrum agility. When warfighting missions become more agile spectrum-wise, it becomes increasingly difficult for an adversary to narrow down its attack calculus.

Another goal that the DoD is getting after is to provide warfighters with SATCOM services that support multi-path communications in remote locations or extreme environments that lack terrestrial networks. Leveraging multi-path comms when executing operations in austere environments helps to ensure redundant, uninterrupted communications in the event an adversary was to breach, degrade, or deny any level of a mission’s PACE Plan.

Industry Answers the Call
A solution that the commercial industry is ready to put forward to support the DoD’s spectrum agility and multi-path comms goals is multi-orbit SATCOM. Providing the DoD with access to multi-orbit services that can switch spectrums mid-mission would ensure that warfighters are supported with resilient connectivity options and redundant communications pathways. Multi-orbit satellite capabilities would also give the military a competitive advantage in the space domain by making it increasingly difficult for adversaries to target and degrade an operation’s connectivity and comms services.

Last March, SES Space & Defense, Hughes, and ThinKom, successfully demonstrated these multi-orbit SATCOM capabilities. Together, the three companies proved their ability to effectively roam between SES’s satellite networks in Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) and Geostationary Orbit (GEO).

When executing warfighting operations, if it becomes clear that an adversary is attempting to jam or attack a mission-critical satellite, having the flexibility to transfer mission services and capabilities over to another satellite in a different orbit guarantees connectivity resiliency and comms redundancy.

DoD Adopts Multi-Orbit Services
The DoD has taken notice of these multi-orbit solutions and plans to integrate them into its communications architecture. Last September, it was announced that the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory awarded SES Space & Defense with a multi-year contract to conduct tests to integrate space broadband services across a multi-orbit satellite network that would support the Defense Experimentation Using Commercial Space Internet (DEUCSI) program. The DEUCSI program intends to leverage commercial space internet (CSI) constellations with the ability to alternate between Geostationary (GEO), Medium Earth Orbit (MEO), and Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites.

“An integrated multi-orbit, multi-band satellite architecture is a requirement in today’s contested and congested environment,” said Jim Hooper, SES Space & Defense’s Senior Vice President of Space Initiatives. “The DEUCSI program is a great example to showcase…multi-orbit, multi-band holistic approaches to deliver seamless interoperability to the U.S. Air Force to achieve unparalleled situation awareness and strategic advances for mission success.”

Last September, the DoD made another step towards adopting and integrating multi-orbit services when the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) awarded indefinite delivery indefinite quantity (IDIQ) contracts to satellite operators and integrators – including SES Space & Defense – for Proliferated Low Earth Orbit (PLEO) satellite services. Embracing PLEO services will deliver resiliency and assuredness benefits to DISA by having satellite capabilities that are both multi-band and multi-orbit.

“Today, the military is facing near-peer adversaries that have demonstrated their ability to disrupt, deny, and degrade our communications networks,” said Ben Pigsley, Senior Vice President of Defense Networks at SES Space & Defense. “Both multi-orbit and multi-band network solutions offer an elevated level of resiliency and increase availability to government customers.”

Events like the DoD Commercial SATCOM Workshop provide the private sector with opportunities to learn about the military’s top satellite and space challenges directly from DoD leadership. As the military and industry continue to foster this open dialogue, the private sector will be better equipped to redirect its attention and efforts toward developing and producing SATCOM solutions and services to support the DoD in reaching its goals.

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This announcement by AFRL is the third award under the DEUCSI CALL 003 Program seeking experimentation for use cases in the Artic region and airborne communications.

The DEUCSI program is intended to establish communications with military platforms via multiple commercial space internet (CSI) constellations in Geosynchronous Orbit (GEO), Medium Earth Orbit (MEO), and Low Earth Orbit (LEO) utilizing a common user terminal with the ability to alternate between space broadband providers.

“An integrated multi-orbit, multi-band satellite architecture is a requirement in today’s contested and congested environment for a network-centric military,” said SES Space & Defense Senior Vice President of Space Initiatives, Jim Hooper. “The DEUCSI program is a great example to showcase SES Space & Defense’s multi-orbit, multi-band holistic approach to deliver seamless interoperability to the U.S. Air Force to achieve unparalleled situation awareness and strategic advances for mission success.”

As the industry’s leading COMSATCOM integrator, SES Space & Defense, a wholly-owned subsidiary of SES focused on delivering satellite network solutions for the U.S. Government, will demonstrate multi-orbit, multi-band solutions that seamlessly switch among commercial space broadband services in different frequency bands to access favorable spectrum or failover between constellations.

In doing so, SES Space & Defense will leverage common hardware elements to communicate with commercial space broadband constellations and military communications systems to provide greater flexibility in communication paths while minimizing the deployment of constellation-specific hardware.

The post SES Space & Defense to Demonstrate Multi-Orbit, Multi-Band Satellite for the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory appeared first on SES Space and Defense.

Penney began the forum by explaining that today’s Air Force warfighters employ a fixed set of capabilities and software that were decided upon “at least five years ago, if not longer.” But to outpace U.S. adversaries, Penney argues that “warfighters must have the ability to tailor their systems and networks to optimize their force package for any given objective.”

One of the key findings of Penney’s study is that there is a need for rapid adaptation of “blue forces” in order to accelerate change. Through her research, she was able to identify three principles that would facilitate this adaptive change.

The first is speed. Adaptation must be faster than “old blue,” and outpace U.S. adversaries’ levels of speed and adaptation.

The second principle is that adaptive changes must provide real operational benefit. Penney stated, “It doesn’t have to be perfect. Just better.” She also explained that operational benefits must be relevant to the competitive context.

The final principle Penney’s research identified was that adaptive change must “impose confounding effects upon the adversary and confer resilient complexity to friendly forces.” Adaptive changes must block effective targeting of blue forces by U.S. adversaries.

Penney pointed out that future operational concepts like multi-domain or all domain operations and Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2) seek to harness these principles. According to Penney, the key to harnessing these principles can be found in how the Air Force uses weapon systems and aircraft in “new and creative ways.”

Additionally, operational architectures, how the Air Force fights, what they have in the battle space, and their interdependencies will be the main points of adaptive advantage. Battle networks and data links are the base of how the Air Force fights. And, according to Penney, “This will only increase in the future.”

The Air Force will also need to be able to adapt its architectures faster than U.S. adversaries can attack them. And at the heart of this adaptation are mission integration tools.

Unfortunately, there is one major barrier standing in the way of fully realizing this adaptation and mission integration. Penney explained that the primary roadblock to being able to field these software tools is bureaucratic policy.

According to Penney the “color of money,” is the first bureaucratic policy barrier. She explained, “The funding categories are fundamentally ill suited for the pace of software development. The rate at which we obligate money for different activities, and the limitations we have on who can spend what for what prevents us from fielding software tools.”

We must address these bureaucratic barriers to fielding mission integration software tools that can provide our forces an adaptive advantage.” – Heather Penney

The second barrier is a lack of a dedicated system program office. Data links are typically managed as part of the overall capability package of the major weapon system. Penney explained, “They’re subjugated to those developmental and monetization timelines and program priorities. Too often, mission integration falls below the cut line.”

The final barrier to adaptive change is the need for data link architecture to reflect operational concepts. Because different kinds of data links are incompatible, there is a need to translate and optimize heterogenous connectivity. And due to network terminals being static, change is difficult.

To accelerate change, Penney argued, “We must address these bureaucratic barriers to fielding mission integration software tools that can provide our forces an adaptive advantage.”

Currently, the Air Force builds its network through systems engineering, which figures out how to best fit these fixed systems together. Instead, the Air Force should focus on moving towards a mission integration approach. According to Penney, there must be a shift from a “What can we do?” mindset, to a “What do we want to do?” approach. And the software tools that enable this adaptive approach already exist.

The first tool is DARPA’s System-of-systems Technology Integration Tool Chain for Heterogenous Electronic Systems (STITCHES) program. STITCHES enables message translation across different systems without changing message formatting or losing data, and it does not require a common standard.

Second, is DARPA’s Adapting Cross-domain Kill-webs (ACK) vision integration tool. ACK is a decision software that can analyze thousands of potential cross-domain kill webs to recommend the best mission-specific kill chain.

The last tool that Penney cited was DARPA’s Dynamic Network Adaptation for Mission Optimization (DyNAMO) program. DyNAMO is a program that automatically routes data to the user who needs it in real-time, and manages the flow and prioritization of data so that lower priority does not create a traffic jam for higher priority data.

Penney explained that the Air Force could start fielding these tools immediately, but bureaucratic policy roadblocks still stand in the way.

One bureaucratic policy barrier that Penney discussed was Congress’ creation of the Budget Activity 8 (BA 8) funding category, which is intended to capture the full lifecycle of software in one category. But, unfortunately, BA 8 cannot be applied to broad area announcements, which are critical contractual means for research agencies.

Another layer of complication is that research agencies are prevented from using any budget activity beyond BA 4. Essentially, research agencies like DARPA and the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) are constrained in how they can fund the development of software programs.

Mission integration tools also have challenges of their own pertaining to their transition to an operational community. Penney explained that the adaptive nature of these programs has been defined by General Counsel as research and development (R&D) or as Penney put it “3600 money.” She explained, “…3600 money cannot be programmed or obligated by an operational command like the Air Combat Command.”

In essence, the “color of money” is hindering speedy software development and is blocking these tools from reaching the warfighter. As a result, Air Force networks remain static and predictable, enabling the adversary’s strategy for victory.

No war was ever won by spreadsheet. It’s time we make the bureaucratic changes that will accelerate our operational change.” – Heather Penney

To remedy these challenges, Penney argued that research agencies need access to this funding, and they must have the option to do so using a broad area announcement.

Research agencies must also be able to streamline these software programs to the operational community “without necessarily requiring a full and open competition that extends the timeline to field and may not deliver the same code.”

Lastly, Penney called for operational commands to have a similar budget activity – like BA 8 – that enables them to “employ, sustain and evolve mission integration tools at the speed of software.”

“We need mission integration tools because they can connect and be the bridge between our legacy force, our current force, and our future force,” said Penney. “These mission integration tools can enable these kinds of operations today.”

She explained that the Air Force risks losing its ability to deter and win when in peer conflict due to bureaucratic policy. “We’re letting bean counters and administrative processes guide what we can field and how we can fight, not combat requirements,” said Penney. “No war was ever won by spreadsheet. It’s time we make the bureaucratic changes that will accelerate our operational change.”

To hear more from Heather Penney watch the Mitchell Institute event on-demand here!

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In her current role as the scientific advisor to the Air Force Chief of Staff and the Secretary of the Air Force, she stands at the intersection of where government and industry meet, and she is ready to get after identifying and analyzing the technical challenges facing the Air Force today.

On May 18, 2021, Dr. Coleman sat down for a one-on-one interview during the Mitchell Institute’s Aerospace Nation to discuss the Air Force’s science and technology landscape, how the current microelectronic shortage is impacting the Air Force, and the importance of protecting the branch’s digital infrastructure in light of recent cyberattacks.

Dr. Coleman opened the forum by discussing the critical challenges her team is facing, as well as her top priorities going into the future. Throughout her entire computer science and technology career, Dr. Coleman has been trying to inch closer to fusing research into practice. When she started out in academia, she would become frustrated that the work that was being done in the lab would never see the light of day.

Because of this, she thinks a lot about the context and the technology environment within which the Air Force pursues its mission, which has changed in subtle ways over the years. Dr. Coleman commented that most of the innovation that the Air Force depended on used to come from the Defense Industrial Base (DIB). But today, the Air Force’s technology landscape operates differently.

Dr. Coleman explained that today’s Air Force is heavily influenced and shaped by retail and consumer technology. As a result, the branch has trouble satisfying its needs with the science and technology that comes from the private sector. And Dr. Coleman believes that it’s twice as difficult if the technology comes from consumer marketplace.

U.S. competitors on the world stage do not have this problem, Dr. Coleman explained. For instance, China has the Military Civil Fusion (MCF) which Chinese President Xi Jinping personally oversees. MCF’s objective is to make sure that every single innovation that happens in the private sector is harnessed to support China’s drive to become the premier military power in the world.

This baked-in partnership between industry and military doesn’t exist in the same form within the United States. This has created a challenge for Dr. Coleman and her department. However, during her remarks, she made it clear that this is a struggle that she anxious to overcome, looking forward to bridging that gap in absorbing technology into her department’s mission.

When speaking about the Air Force’s Science and Technology (S&T) strategy, she proudly boasts that it’s the most well-structured strategy that she’s seen in a long time. To her, the S&T strategy that the department put forward in 2018 is an exemplar of what a strategy should be, and that it goes beyond just simply listing accepted technologies.

Dr. Coleman believes that the strategy does a fantastic job of putting the technology in context of how it is used in the Air Force. And when there isn’t a technology that is available, the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) will build out the necessary capabilities. Dr. Coleman explained that the S&T strategy plays a critical role as the Air Force aligns its resources and efforts to make innovation happen and matter.

When asked about the Air Force’s main technological opportunities and hurdles that it needs to overcome, Dr. Coleman said that they are hoping to achieve change in five different domains:

• Global persistence awareness
• Resilient information sharing
• Rapid effective decision-making
• Complexity, unpredictability, and mass
• Speed and reach of disruption and lethality.

She said that she thinks about the “how” behind executing those goals quite often. She believes the answer is that they can achieve it by building out transformational cross-cutting capabilities.

Now that she’s on the inside, Dr. Coleman is encouraged to see how much change has already taken place, and how mindful and deliberate the change has been on behalf of the “how” component. She explained that the Air Force has a massive mission. They have to train, organize, and equip for today and for tomorrow with a massive set of missions. And they must be smart in how they can effectively approach all of the needs that they have.

When asked how the current microelectronic manufacturing crisis is impacting the Air Force, Dr. Coleman responded by saying that microelectronics are the driving force behind the execution of Air Force missions. She explained that the Air Force needs advanced components that are available, performant, trustworthy, and affordable.

“We can’t execute the missions that we need to execute without high-end microelectronics in those systems,” she said. “We really don’t have an option. We can’t operate with antique parts and expect the levels of performance or support the missions that we know we need to fight, without making those components available.”

She said that in order to secure these components for the Air Force, it takes partnerships within the Department of Defense (DoD). The Under Secretary for Research and Engineering (R&E) and his counterparts in Acquisition and Sustainment (A&S) have made microelectronics their number one priority. In the past three or four years, they’ve put together a significant roadmap to produce mission-critical parts in order to secure, grow, and revitalize the domestic fabrication capability.

When asked if the Air Force is ready to begin fielding the technologies to enable human-machine teams, Dr. Coleman responded by saying that—in many ways—the Air Force has been operating human-machine teams for many years. Her personal assessment is that the way to deploy more human-machine teams is through more experimentation.

She said, “When we think about how we form human teams, how do we do that? …We form teams by building trust in each other. And we build trust in each other… by working together. By watching each other in action.”

She believes that human-machine teams will be no different, and that trust will be built in the machines once they see them in execution. And that the team that deploys, experiments, and learns more about each other will be the teams that succeeds. She explained that she has a cast iron belief that in order to produce big, transformational systems, one must “build a little, test a little, and field a little.”

When the conversation turned to the Advanced Battle Management System (ABMS), she admitted that she is hardly an expert on the subject. She did say that she doesn’t think that within the Air Force, the ABMS meets the standard requirements of what a program is. She believes that it’s a very advanced concept, but that it’s not a program.

She described ABMS as a very ambitious effort, and though she hopes it will succeed, she doesn’t know if it will. Returning to her motto, she said that having grand visions is important, but they must also deliver capability incrementally.

When asked about the importance of protecting the Air Force’s network infrastructure in light of recent cyberattacks, Dr. Coleman said, “I think that a lot of the infrastructure that we use will eventually need to come out from the commercial sector. From the world out there that has built it, has deployed it, has scaled it, has operated it, and has learned what works and what doesn’t work.”

She explained that if the approach is to custom-build it for themselves and avoid the pitfalls the private sector has encountered, then “we are kidding ourselves.”

According to Dr. Coleman, one of the worst aspects of the inability to field new science and technology in the department is that when they deploy it, it can take years to close vulnerability gaps and loopholes. She said that there are no systems that have zero vulnerabilities, and the longer they have it out there without addressing exposures, the more time the adversary has to find all of those vulnerabilities and exploit them.

To hear more from Dr. Coleman watch the Aerospace Nation forum on-demand here!

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