C4I ENABLING TACTICAL INTERCOM SOLUTIONS
The Future, Austerity, BRIC Countries and ‘The Pivot to Asia’ Meredith Llewellyn, Lead Contributor “It’s not clear how the Army plays in the pivot to Asia. It’s not clear what their role would be.’’ Todd Harrison, Senior Fellow, Defense Budget Studies, the Center for Strategic Budgetary Assessments (2012)
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Defense Secretary Gates warned that, in this age of austerity, the Defense Department could not afford to support programs based on overly ambitious or unrealistic assumptions regarding the maturity of key enabling technologies
ITH THE pivot to the Asia-Pacific region, the approaching end of the military commitment to Afghanistan in 2014, and deep cuts in current spending and future procurement, it is even more difficult than usual to look to the future. This article is written at a time when it is unclear whether Obama will win a second term. If Romney were to win, his commitment to increased levels of defense spending might not survive his arrival in office in 2013. In 2010 former Defense Secretary Gates warned that, in this age of austerity, the Defense Department could not afford to support programs based on overly ambitious or unrealistic assumptions regarding the maturity of key enabling technologies. The result has been that the ground forces now need to extend the service lines of existing systems and acquire off the shelf solutions, but only after spending vast amounts of time and money on overly ambitious programs that failed to meet the development timelines.
Maximising Adaptability How should the Department of Defense in the United States and other European ministries of defence deal with such high levels of uncertainty? Some argue that surprise will not be entirely unavoidable, so defense planners and vehicle makers and industry need to maximize the adaptability of new and recapitalized vehicles. This will enable ground forces to hedge against the possibility, indeed the likelihood that vehicles will need to be modified or upgraded to perform new or altered missions and meet new operational requirements as they emerge.
The Lego Analogy The former Secretary of the Navy, Richard Danzig, offers a thoughtful analogy of how both industry and the Pentagon should think about adaptability. In “Driving in the Dark: Ten Propositions about
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Prediction about National Security”25 he argues that, at the simplest level, the ideal is the Lego set with its universal snap-in interface. Lego pieces need to be matched in only three spatial dimensions…while, of course, complex systems require compatibility in many domains. Still, he favours open architecture systems and being counter-intuitive to engineers’ aspirations to add additional features. Indeed, he argues that there is a case for Antoine de Sainte Exupery’s maxim that “perfection is reached not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take-away.” A growth path for platforms and systems needs to be built in to cope with geopolitical and military-technical uncertainty.
Looking to the BRIC Economies – Brazil, Russian, India and China The countries where there is geopolitical uncertainty, but crucially higher defence budgets to meet the challenge are Brazil, Russia, India and China. Some analysts include South Africa in the list. What do they have in common as defence markets? Each is large both in terms of size and population, and each has an expanding economy; and finally, each is undergoing a military modernization effort aimed at preserving their strategic interests. A case in point is Brazil26 whose economy has continued to grow and, despite a small hiccup during the global economic slowdown of 2009, is expected to expand by 7.5 percent this year. As its economy has grown so too has the recognition by government officials that a major military modernization is in order if Brazil is to underwrite its claim to hydrocarbon deposits outside its traditional offshore border and gain a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. Brazil would like to be seen as the pre-eminent power in South America. Since 2005, the Brazilian defense budget has grown by 5 percent per year and the government approved
