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In this episode of From the Crows' Nest, we go back to AOC 2025, where Ken Miller hosted a live panel with Lt. Gen. (Ret.) Kevin Kennedy, Vice President for Defense Strategy & Warfighting Integration at Mantech. Col. (Ret.) Jeffrey Fischer; and Eric Bamford, Branch Chief EW for the Norwegian Armed Forces and AOC Board Member.
Ken poses the question, “Is it time to establish a dedicated EMSO force?” The panelists discuss the value of international and coalition perspectives, debate whether the electromagnetic spectrum should be treated as its own domain, and explore the industry’s role in advancing military capabilities.
We invite you to share your thoughts, questions, or suggestions for future episodes by emailing host Ken Miller at host@fromthecrowsnest.org or visit us on our Instagram @fromthecrowsnestpodcast.
To learn more about today’s topics or to stay updated on EMSO and EW developments, visit our homepage.
Creators and Guests
What is From the Crows' Nest?
Featuring interviews, analysis, and discussions covering leading issues of the day related to electromagnetic spectrum operations (EMSO). Topics include current events and news worldwide, US Congress and the annual defense budget, and military news from the US and allied countries. We also bring you closer to Association of Old Crow events and provide a forum to dive deeper into policy issues impacting our community.
speaker-0 (00:01)
When you look at the spectrum as a domain, it literally makes sense, right? If you look at air, land, sea, and space mediums, just like them, this spectrum existed before man. It exists during man. And should something catastrophic happen to us like dinosaurs, they will all exist after man, right? And cyber does not fit that category.
speaker-1 (00:26)
you
Welcome to From the Crows Nest. I'm your host, Ken Miller from the Association of Old Crows. I don't know about you, but this year has gotten off to one crazy start. I can only hope that it settles down at some point here in winter, but I wanna thank everyone for taking a moment and joining in and listening to another episode of the show. It's great to be here with you. Today, I wanna share with you a panel discussion that I moderated at AOC 2025 back in December.
The topic of the discussion was, it time to establish an MSO force? You've no doubt heard on the show many times our view that electromagnetic spectrum operations is required to achieve any mission or win in any conflict in modern war fighting. You can just take a look at the Venezuela operation last month, an extremely successful mission with MSO on full display through traditional EW, directed energy and other non-kinetic effects. But it also wasn't a contested battle space.
So what happens if and when we face an adversary that challenges our military advantage? We have a unified and comprehensive DOD strategy on MSO, but the implementation has simply failed to close many of these persistent gaps. And this is what we discussed. What should our next steps be as a community? Does MSO need its own service, combatant command, some other structure? There are many ideas out there and we tried to cover some of them and discuss the advantages and disadvantages.
So for the discussion, I was pleased to have with me retired US Air Force Lieutenant General, Kevin Kennedy, Vice President for Defense Strategy and Warfighter Integration at Man Tech. I was also joined by regular guests of the show, retired US Air Force Colonel and AOC Board member, Jeffrey Fisher, and Eric Bamford, who is the Branch Chief EW Norwegian Armed Forces and also a member of the AOC Board.
Additionally, I've appreciated getting to know Mantek over the past few months and the solutions they provide to the warfighter, especially in the area of non-kinetic effects. Given all the showcase of non-kinetic effects over the last month, I wanted to bring to you an extended interview that I had with Jody Grady, Chief Technology Engineer at Mantek. So without further delay, let's listen in to my panel discussion on, is it time to establish a nemso force?
All right, well, welcome to From the Crows Nest Live here at AOC 2025. I'm your host, Ken Miller from the Association of Old Crows. Thank you for joining me. As we get started, people can feel free to come in, take a seat and listen in. We're gonna go for about 45 minutes. And the topic of today's conversation is going to be, it time to establish an MSO force? Throughout the week, we've heard some great presentations on building a strategy, getting the next generation of...
⁓ capability out into the field into the warfighters hand soon. ⁓ This afternoon we discussed counter drone warfare acquisition reform and Eric's ⁓ session on the European theater. So we want to tie all these things together and address this topic because at the end of the day we have a number of persistent gaps that we are trying to close and we have to and we're quickly running out of time to do that.
So I'm proposing this question as is this time to establish an MSO force? And I have a panel of experts here with me to talk about how we would go about that. What does that mean? What are some of the things we have to look out for and some of the challenges and opportunities in that, with that policy option? The idea today is not to take sides, but to have a healthy conversation on things that we need to be looking at. So without further delay, I'd like to introduce my panelists for today.
To my left here is Lieutenant General Kevin Kennedy, retired US Air Force. He is the Vice President of Defense Strategy and Warfighter Development at Man Tech. Next to him is retired US Air Force Colonel Jeff Fisher, subject matter expert, friend of from the crow's nest. I have him on the show regularly. Next to him, wait, do you have Zoe?
speaker-0 (04:37)
Zoe is backstage.
speaker-1 (04:39)
Zoe's backstage. Okay. I thought we'd have a fourth panelist here, but ⁓ we might still hear from Zoe by the end of the day. And then next to ⁓ Colonel Fisher is Eric Bamford, who is AOC ⁓ member of the board of directors. He is also the branch chief for EW and the Norwegian Armed Forces. And he's going to give ⁓ a international perspective on this question because as ⁓ we talked about today with Congressman Bacon's ⁓
presentation, every fight is joint, but also every fight is coalition. So any conversation that we have about defense reform in the U.S. has implications for our partners and allies around the world. to begin, I just want to pose the first question to General Kennedy. When we talk about the future of EMSO and the theme for this year is building a strategy to 2035.
speaker-0 (05:19)
before.
speaker-1 (05:34)
What are some of the persistent gaps that you see in the MSO world that we need to focus on ⁓ that we're running out of time to address?
speaker-2 (05:45)
Thanks, Ken. Appreciate you having me on the podcast today. For me, I kind of think through it at the operational level, right? So if we're looking at a clock, you're talking 2035, but let's say there's a clock, you know, there's the Davidson window and that discussion. So let's say we're really looking at a 27 to 30 timeframe to be operational with the capabilities we had and say, okay, what are the gaps that enable us to be successful with the challenges that we're going to see at the operational level? And so we know some of these challenges, fighting from range.
making sense of the environment that we're in, increasing feedback loops to make sure that we are as effective with our force as we can be offensively, as well as being able to husband our force in a way to continue to generate combat power over range. So when you think about that, and specific to the electromagnetic spectrum, it's like, how are we going to do that censoring, that sharing of information ⁓ that enables us to sense making, come up with the awareness and the analysis, and then do
the effector pairing to create the outcome, the battlefield outcome that we need. So that's one. And that kind of leads into, all right, how do we do electromagnetic spectrum battle management type of activities? Because where we are with the technologies now, it's not just protecting our asset or marginal increase of effectiveness of whatever we're trying to accomplish on the battlefield. We can actually shape the spectrum in ways that give us advantage and deny that advantage.
To do that effectively, we have to think through the integration. So for me, it's the cross-domain effects that we're thinking from space all the way to undersea. How do we do that? That's one of the challenges that we have to think through and make sure that we can enable our C2 and our battle management.
speaker-1 (07:23)
Colonel Fisher, Jeff, ⁓ you have long held AOC to account for maintaining an operational perspective on how we view the spectrum. Your background ⁓ with the Air Force, your operational experience has always been something that has helped us understand the direction we need to go in as a community. So we appreciate that. ⁓ From your perspective as a former warfighter, hearing General Kennedy's
discussion on these persistent gaps, know, can we do we have the structure in here in the US in the the military services? Do we have the the structure and organization necessary to actually affect and close some of these gaps? Or are where do we fall short of from that perspective? No. ⁓
speaker-0 (08:10)
Right. So
first of all, thanks for having me on. And look, General Bacon, I excuse me, General and Congressman Bacon. I think he said it best this morning. He's like the the money's not matching the demand. Right. And and the truth is, I laid it out in an article in Jed in September 2011 that basically said the spectrum has to become a domain.
right? And domains get funded. And if you're not a domain, you don't. This isn't conjecture, we saw it was right, eventually Trump finally made space domain and made it a service because the Air Force and other services that would would talk the talk didn't necessarily off also walk the walk, right? So I think when you you know, when you look at the spectrum as a domain, it literally makes sense.
speaker-1 (08:46)
B A ⁓
speaker-0 (09:07)
right? If you look at air, land, sea and space mediums, just like them, the spectrum existed before man, it exists during man. And should something catastrophic happen to us like dinosaurs, it they will all exist after man, right? And, and cyber does not fit that category. That being said, what I think is interesting is cyber fits a category that they the the all the others do fit minus the spectrum and that is
If you choose to dabble in it from a warfare perspective, you assume risk. There's reaction to what you choose. If you choose to fly an F-16 and the S-300 ring, you might die. If you choose to cross a battle line on the ground and you ⁓ go into the enemy's territory, you can die. Same thing at sea. I see the same thing in cyber. If you choose to act in a belligerent way in the cyber domain,
you could die. What's what's the response to someone in the spectrum? Jamming that doesn't hurt. might not be able to navigate, right? I might not be able to talk. But there's literally no risk from a wounding perspective to operate in that domain. And I would tell you that based on my discussion last year, ⁓ and the idea of doing anti radiation at a very low cost, like we brought the cost down of airstrike.
down to $5,000 with a drone and a bomb. If we can get that down to $5,000 with a harm seeker on a quadcopter with a bomb, you now have to make a decision as a commander. Do I really want to transmit and potentially die? Or do I take some level, some greater measure of understanding of should I be in the spectrum? So again, to answer you'd know we're not there.
speaker-1 (10:36)
you
Thank
speaker-0 (11:02)
but I believe operationally, there is going to be a fundamental shift that if you're a brigade commander and you put U.A.V. jammers all around your command post, you've invited a quadcopter with a seeker to come ruin your day really, really fast.
speaker-1 (11:24)
And some of that, what you mentioned, you obviously are looking at the Russian-Ukraine war and what's going on and how that conflict has evolved over the years. ⁓ I want to come to Eric Bamford here to talk a little bit about the international perspective, because as I said in the opening, every fight is a coalition fight. you are a promising voice in the international community in terms of
speaker-0 (11:50)
to
speaker-1 (11:54)
pointing us how we need to think about MSO from a coalition perspective.
How would that affect coalition warfare? ⁓ what are some of the challenges that have come to coalition warfare as EW evolves that makes it difficult to work with the United States because of how it's structured and organized?
speaker-0 (12:15)
So I'm just going to do a political on you here. I'm going to kind of balance out what Fish just said. Why can it not be a domain? It's a common. You cannot make it a domain because then you take it away from those that are already using it and you're putting it into somebody else's responsibility box. So it's a common and it's an operating environment, but it shouldn't be a domain because everybody will be connected.
speaker-2 (12:22)
Thank
speaker-0 (12:40)
If you're going to make it a domain, you have to make it the centerpiece of multi-domain operations or joint all domain operations because this is where they all meet up. Not going to fly an F-35 with a fiber cable ⁓ behind it like you do with the drones that has 40 kilometers range. And you've got the other portion on this and that is the sovereignty of the spectrum. Spectrum is sovereign to the national state.
It is a in peacetime. is a it's an it's an income for the for the sovereign state. They auction it out to the telecom providers for a period of time. They have tax revenues coming in from the spectrum. So it is dynamic from peace through the transition into crisis and war. And talking about the international perspective, the European and NATO specifically,
NATO has already made plans to militarize the spectrum. If you go and read the NATO crisis response measures manual, there is already a specific task to militarize the spectrum like you do with airspace. You militarize the airspace. If you look at the Ukraine today, there's nothing commercial flying. It is a militarized airspace, but it's also a militarized spectrum to...
speaker-1 (13:52)
Theeee
speaker-0 (14:04)
quite a large degree as we learned upstairs earlier on today as well. But on the question on do we need an EMO force or MSO force, I'll just say that we are currently drafting a Nordic, a regional Nordic ⁓ EMO concept. The challenge we have is one, spectrum is sovereign. Two, it's a common. Three, the territories on the Nordic Peninsula are aligned north to south.
Norway is north to south, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, all north to south. Even the Gulf of Finland is north to south. And any operation, any adversarial operation will be east to west and a counterattack will be west to east. So that means that you need to coordinate and de-conflict at least three to four different sovereign spectrums plus an international commons in the Gulf of Finland.
Yes, you do need an MSO force that can do that deconfliction. So it's not ⁓ on domain commands to do that separately. In the Baltic Ocean right now, NATO MARCOM is doing the ⁓ maritime surveillance of seabed infrastructure. AIRCOM is doing the Baltic air policing.
And then you have Joint Force Command Brunson is currently commanding the joint, the enhanced forward pressing land forces on the Russian border in the Baltic nations. That means that you have three different commands that are operating in the same sovereign spectrums and the commons, but they're not coordinated. So yes, you do need an MSO force to do this. When it comes to your question on the...
international view on ⁓ US as well and interoperability. I think that ⁓ Chris Brose, security advisor for John McCain, in his book Kill Chain, he states it very well. ⁓ Some of the exquisite spectrum capabilities that the US have held back and not sold to the nations or the European nations specifically.
was because the US had a they perceive that one of the European nations would be emboldened and challenged Russia and drag the US into a war that the US wouldn't like to be in. What's happened now is that they've taken away the these exquisite spectrum capabilities, denying deterrence, effective deterrence. So you might end up being dragged into a conflict you don't want to be a part of anyway. And with the
current administration that might, you what came out last week on the national security strategy. There's an ambiguity in this as well in this new strategy. It says, we want you to buy our stuff. We're not going to go and play with you if you need us. You know, that's, there's an ambiguity in this because why would I buy anything US if you're not going to, if I don't need to be interoperable with you? Why shouldn't I then?
speaker-1 (17:11)
But-
speaker-0 (17:24)
go and buy all that stuff that's coming out of Europe because there's masses of really good EMO, which is the NATO terminology for MSO, stuff being built in Europe. So if I can control my lines of ⁓ logistics in support of the future EMO battle, I would prefer that from a European perspective.
speaker-1 (17:44)
are further.
So part of the conversation that I want to talk about now is this conversation obviously requires input from our entire community. So if you have a question, please feel free to come to the mic. We'll call on you in turn throughout the conversation. And we just ask that you say your name and where you're from to identify yourself. However, because we are going to air this at a later date, we are going to take off names so you will not be identified.
⁓ from the questions. just please say your name, but just know that that will not make the final cut of the episode. And if you would like to have a t-shirt for your troubles of asking questions, ⁓ my podcast manager is down here on the front row and she can give you a t-shirt. So to continue with the conversation, General Kennedy, this morning with Congressman Don Bacon's presentation, one of the points that he made was that the money doesn't match the requirement too often.
Or often enough. And one of the reasons, one of the challenges is we need leadership with authority and resources. Your career in the military, you were a three-star general. You had authority and resources. Talk to us about the importance of identifying the right leadership structure that we need and how we can close the gap between requirements and funding and get that problem owner support at
the three and four star level more so than we have today.
speaker-2 (19:19)
Yeah, well, Ken, first I'll say, yes, I may have had the authorities. I never had enough resources.
speaker-0 (19:24)
⁓
speaker-2 (19:26)
To kind of talk through a little bit, or Fish and Eric were saying too as well, so if you think, okay, I think sometimes we conflate separate service, domain equals service, vice force. And so I think the separate service aspect, I think completely aligns with your partner. There's overhead, timelines, things I think I would put that over here.
whether or not, you know, agree with fish, whether it's a domain or not, you this is a debate we had when we were talking about Cyber Command coming on and everything else like that. Cyber is unique in that it's manmade, right? I completely agree that the spectrum is not, it can be man influenced, you know, things happen, but you know, it's still going to exist if we weren't on this planet or not. I completely agree with Fish on that. So when you think through it's like, okay, so how, if I'm not gonna make a service, but I want a force, what are the aspects that are service that we're really talking about? So the first one is generally,
You know, if I wanted a separate thing, does it have separate war winning effects? Separate by himself, war impactful effects. We could argue about that for another half an hour, but you could say, OK, maybe adjacent, but most likely it's going to have to be combined with a different domain and a different force. ⁓ The second one, you say, OK, do I have a do I have a means to advocate for the capabilities that can employ in this domain? And do I have a means to develop the talent? OK, and.
there are different models that we can do in that. One of them is a separate service. One of them is a designated force. And then you think, so who has that leadership? But the last one is what you brought up here. Who controls the resources? And the way the structure in the department, know, the services have historically and currently have, you know, the requirement to bring it forward. So I've been on the Air Force side of things, I haven't do that. I've been on the department staff with the secretary to do the same thing.
Right. And so I actually had this spectrum was in the portfolio that I was responsible for helping run. And so the governance structure we put in line had governance authority, which means that we would come in and grade your homework. If you were there for some brought in, we'd grade your homework. How well were you doing? But it was mostly post activity and it was mostly, okay, do a little more of that, but it's on the edges. Right. I've seen many chiefs of staffs of different services come in and say, realize
I don't have that much, you how much control do they really have in the budget? And when they come down to analysis, it's, you know, you think you have a pie this big and it's actually just the crust. ⁓ So in this case, it's like, okay, so how do we actually control the resources? My, I've seen this execute, like we're trying to execute the cyber command, it's early on. I've seen it successfully executed with Socom. Right, they're able to execute what they need, but they also have an interesting model where the services bring the baseline.
Where I think we need to do is empower a joint command. So this is where Joint Forces Command used to live. And right now, STRATCOM has this responsibility in the United States military. So how do we empower that structure where they have input previously? So as we're designing new platforms, the Air Force platform, let's take the F-47, were they able to designate a requirement, this structure? Now, requirements add costs that the service can have to do, but that is kind of where I think we have to think through how we give those authorities and responsibilities.
and then go through the secretary's staff in some way where you have oversight of the final resourcing that gives them some real budgetary authority over a portion of what's happening in the service budgets by service. ⁓ That's how I've seen it somewhat execute. That's kind of the SOCOM model with the same, but I do think that empowering a STRATCOM in some way through the secretary's staff.
early in the PBBS process to kind of go through that with the JSONs being redone. This is an opportunity, I think, to really structure that in a way we can.
speaker-1 (23:16)
So, Jeff, ⁓ in your second job, you're ⁓ an author of military fiction. I would highly recommend any of Jeff Fisher's books. You can check them out. They're great. earlier in the year, we did a podcast series looking at the role that fiction can play in advancing really complex ideas in a way that doesn't elevate risk too much. If we start talking about establishing a military service, you instantly will have people
concerned about what that means for their portfolio or what have you. But when you write or do fiction, you can kind of explore that a little bit more open. That's the lead into this question on domain, because you mentioned domain and how EMS is a domain.
We have had a number of different strategies through at EW over the years, we've kind of, we have not handled the question of a domain as well as we should have. I think the current strategy that we're working under calls it a maneuver space. It falls short of the domain threshold. If we were to establish it as a domain and therefore,
have that forcing function that might create an opportunity to whether it's an MSO force and MSO service, ⁓ a combatant level function. As an author, what are some of the things that you would explore that would help ease some of the risk that we would face by bringing up these complex ideas?
speaker-0 (24:51)
Sure. So it's an interesting question, right? Because if you, know, my, in my most recent book, Russian puppeteer, I lay out the concept of, of aviation, ⁓ going all the way back to world war two and looking at light gliders and being able to have gliders fly in supplies to the Ukrainians in the front line, because on the ground, everything's getting destroyed by drones. Maybe that's happening now. And I wrote the book a year and a half ago. So I didn't see anything.
speaker-1 (25:18)
I really really did.
speaker-0 (25:20)
But I now know why you put me in the middle seat. The knives come out pretty quick. Butter knives and wine, baby, butter knives and wine. Look, you know, when we talk about domain, I sometimes get frustrated because I think that, you know, my colleague here, he's laid out arguments that are well known, right? That this idea that...
speaker-1 (25:28)
It's all about strategy.
speaker-0 (25:47)
You know, if it's just going to create another stovepipe, you're going to split apart the military even further. And I would tell you that I think that those kind of arguments are misinformed. And they're not they're wrong, but they're not wrong because I think someone's belligerent or they're trying to create rice bowls. I think that they're wrong because people don't understand. And I'll give you an example, right? ⁓ Our president's in the front row, big army guy right here.
and he'd be the first to tell you that the Army has more airplanes than the Air Force, and it's got more boats than the Navy.
doesn't seem to be bothering the Air Force and the Navy too much. You're pretty proud of it. I know. And you're going to say going to go go army this weekend. I get it. It's fine. Plains don't have jets. Fair enough. That being said. But but here's the bigger point, right? It's not so much that it's, you know, the army decides to have way more toys than we get, which kind of bums us out. It's this. In the Pentagon, service chiefs, when they get to a point, that's a friction point.
they will have a thing called warfighter talks, right? So the air chief and the army chief, when they're talking about the forward line of support coordination, will sit down and they will bring their position to that on what's the Air Force position and what's the army position and how do we come to an agreement at the four star level. And the service chiefs walk away and say, the deal is done. Who's doing that for the MSO, for the spectrum?
I mean, when does the Air Force guy go to another four star and say, Hey, we're we have a friction point here on how you're providing me support in the spectrum and what you want to do in the spectrum from an electronic attack perspective and you want to make it a domain in which you can conduct warfare. The the Air Force chief, the Navy chief and the army chief, God bless him, I'm not making fun of them. They just look at the spectrum as something to use and they're going to get away with using it.
speaker-1 (27:41)
you
speaker-0 (27:51)
because there's no four star to push back and say, no, your forward support coordination line's way too far. You don't get to draw it with an ATAC of 170 miles deep. You get 10 miles and that's it. There's no full four star to do that. So I'm not talking about creating silos. I'm talking about having a rep that can defend and advocate at this at war fighter talks, which happened every year, right? Air Force has to, Navy has to, and
And this is kind of the point. Now, actually, they have three now, right? Because you've got the service chief for the space, I believe, right? And he gets to have his warfighter talk. So Air Force just doesn't get to use space the way it wants to. The Air Chief and the Space Chief, they get to sit down and they hammer out a plan. And that chief, even though he doesn't have a lot of money, you're right, they don't get to manage a lot of the money, right? Right. But I would tell you this, I'll close with this.
I was in the Pentagon going to warfighter talks as the exec to the A8, and I know that General Mosley as the chief of staff did not get all the F-22s that he wanted. Got it, he got a number. I want to say it was around 80%.
DoD is satisfied with less than 50 % of the CUPmas calls that by JSON's definition are required. f***. Where's the service chief advocating for that? So it's not a silo issue. It's not. And we can keep going on. I'll end there. Thanks.
speaker-1 (29:24)
I think that's an interesting point though, because one of the challenges that we've had repeatedly is we have people recognizing it's a problem. know, like you said, there's a requirement that we have 21 compass call aircraft. If you're not going to provide 21 compass call aircraft, then either you have to change the requirement or justify how you're going to mitigate that risk that materializes.
what are some of the other options that we have in the short term? Because if we're gonna say here, well, we need to establish a service or some sort of hedge force concept where we were at the ready and we can deploy as a team, what are some of the other options that we have that we can do this quickly? Because throughout this whole week, we hear, hey, we've run out of time.
speaker-0 (30:18)
30 seconds, I can answer. And it's not a joke, but it is a joke. Don Bacon needs to be the president. And I say that only because when Trump came into office, it was only the president. Our military has grown so powerful. Our military and industrial complex, God bless them, we need them, is so powerful that any kind of maneuver or push that would create a space force was just killed, killed, killed, killed, killed. Trump came in and said, I'm the president. I'm going to create a space force.
Huh? And until, I mean, now we got five services. How are we gonna sixth? Cyber, seven, right? Unless Don Bacon or our president becomes the president, right? You're not running for president. ⁓ shit. ⁓
speaker-3 (31:05)
And I will go on and.
speaker-2 (31:06)
Italy.
speaker-1 (31:08)
So
speaker-2 (31:10)
So
just one. So Jeff, on the point that the assumption is that if the argument is made, then the number is going to change, right? Just because of equal. And that's not necessarily true. So, you know, it's bad form to comment. the EC 130 was in my last command when I retired. So I'm not going to comment a lot of it. What I will say is there was advocacy and discussion. Right. And then there are trades made and the trades aren't necessarily kept internal. I mean, the combatant commands have an opportunity to weigh in right that are most impacted by that.
So just because we go with, let's say, a separate service or force, it wouldn't necessarily translate into the outcomes ⁓ that we're aiming for, because then there are trades within that too that become the primary. So I would just be careful of just saying, well, if we have that, then we'll get everything we need.
speaker-0 (31:57)
So I didn't mean that we'll get we'll get more nobody gets you said it nobody gets ever. Go to the world you go to war with the with the the unit. Yeah, not what you want. So yeah, I agree.
speaker-2 (32:00)
Right.
And
to piggyback a little bit on Eric's point though on the the function needs to be done. Yeah. Right. And right now where does the function live? My recent experience is it lives in the AOC and it's mainly deconfliction. Right. It's not coordination. It's not integration. It's not saying true. And it's not all those words. It's mainly deconfliction to make sure that we don't. You know, I've been deployed where we have, you know, caused TV links and guidance links to go offline. Right. And so and I think we're in the Pentagon at the same time. Yeah. But
So, but the function needs to exist and it needs to be robusted, right? To really gain out of that. That's what I thought.
speaker-1 (32:42)
So, sorry, I want to come to you next and you can comment. I just want to ask you a little bit. One of the another topics raised this week was the national security strategy. Of course, you know, whenever if you're going to go down this path of changing the way you're organized, need a strategy for doing that. How has the national the national security strategy been received overseas? And how does that help or how does that how can we use a strategy, whether it's this one or later one?
to as a forcing function for change.
speaker-0 (33:14)
Yeah, I'm not sure I'm going to answer that one. I left Europe just as it came out. ⁓
speaker-2 (33:20)
But you might.
speaker-0 (33:22)
Ask
that question to Lance Landrum tomorrow. He was in Brussels when that one came out. he was there with the foreign ministers. Did you say he was physically ill? No, came out there. It's I think to what was said here as well with starting off the deconfliction, but because I'm going to return your question, starting with the deconfliction and then moving up to coordination.
speaker-2 (33:28)
He was physically
speaker-1 (33:42)
with.
speaker-0 (33:51)
So kind of growing into something that is then ⁓ deconflicted but also coordinated. again, I'm not going to do a ping pong with fish here, but it's... The thing about the approach of doing this as a domain and kind of the...
speaker-1 (34:05)
the
speaker-2 (34:07)
You
speaker-0 (34:15)
what he alludes to as well with it works with the Air Force and Army and Navy having ⁓ air capabilities. But that is geographically spaced. There is geographically spacing between them ⁓ in the spectrum. cannot, you can allocate a corridor ⁓ for transition through an Army airspace. You can allocate a corridor for the Air Force to fly through a
a carrier groups airspace. So you can segregate this with corridors and so on. But you cannot do that in the spectrum. cannot say HF belongs to the army, UHF belongs to the, it is going to be channeling more than corridors in the spectrum because they all need the characteristics. They need to exploit the characteristics of all those different parts of the spectrum. So it is much more kind of
intertwined than operating a battle space deconfliction in the spectrum. Because the second you move into ⁓ software-defined and cognitive capabilities that are sniffing availability, instead of having a ⁓ deconflicted battle space, you're putting this on the autonomous end of ⁓
speaker-1 (35:40)
of the
speaker-0 (35:42)
accessibility more than de-confliction. ⁓ You already have it on some types of radio or radars and it's, you know, there is a fear within like the spectrum management community that you will have a bit error rate because you're going to have collisions in the spectrum space. So they will have certain parts of the spectrum that they allocate for frequency hoppers.
and they allow them to utilize the algorithms freely. But other parts, you will have a taboo list that is like, don't step in here. you know, it's, I think it's, need to also use the maneuver language to kind of delineate and how we separate and do battle space management in the spectrum. But again, it's not the same because it is so intertwined because of the different characteristics on different parts of the spectrum that everybody has
has a necessity to access and exploit at some means. ⁓ domain versus a commons, it is forever gonna be a commons, I think.
speaker-1 (36:49)
We have a question from the audience.
speaker-0 (36:52)
Yeah, Glenn Carlson powder, past president of the AOC, ⁓ currently retired. ⁓ Retired, retired. Retired, retired. Thanks, Eric.
One of the things, if I can just take a minute to comment on what error can fish. Having been around since with the AEA AOA and we've talked about battle management and spectrum management. It's a similar problem as to the space maritime cyber land fight, and they do intertwine. Even those domains intertwine.
I've been an advocate for the domain because I think it should be and I think we do need to manage it that way. And I think it's one of those, it is a big problem to get your arms around, but I think it's an achievable problem. my main, so my question more is, we're setting up an MSO force, how do we ensure we have the capability in EW and well, in the Air Force and Navy, we've...
gone down these niche and exquisite capabilities and EW loves exquisite capabilities. How do we make sure that we get the capability that's good enough and don't focus on such an exquisite that once we use it, it's done, that it can be lasting and enduring.
Was that to me? ⁓
speaker-2 (38:32)
I just want to go back to you know, so I think Brian Clark and the Hudson Institute came out. ⁓
speaker-0 (38:37)
with a paper just
fairly recently where he challenges the word exquisite because he says, you know, the second you expose it, how it going to be exquisite anyway? You look at the turnaround of meshes versus counter meshes in the Ukraine, we're talking, you know, you are down to days, weeks. That's how long you manage to stay exquisite. it's again, it's I think I just want to say something about
speaker-2 (38:45)
is
speaker-0 (39:07)
Going back to the US approach to this as well, we had a discussion the other day on going back, there's a lot of good EW being done or produced in Europe, but there's been a protectionism in the US side by industry, not necessarily by the government, but driven by industry. Propriety solutions that go into these exquisite platforms like the F35 and so on.
Commercial contracts that blocks who you collaborate with, everything has to go via the joint program office to be approved for who you collaborate with across these different platforms and so on. So kind of lifting that, taking that away.
speaker-1 (39:53)
would both
speaker-0 (39:54)
enable ⁓ a larger part of the community and take away a bit of the exquisiteness and make it more survivable, I believe, more flexible, more dynamic. ⁓ We have coming from a nation, ⁓ the smallest nation that has a reprogramming lab on the F-35. We have a focused, we have a mission tailored mission data set. ⁓ We fly next to ⁓ US platforms that come with a
global mission set. We have less ambiguities. We can use all the different lines in the reprogramming to focus on the adversary that is in front of us, not the adversary that is potentially just there. there are philosophies, there are approaches to how we do this. again, it's exquisite is a
speaker-2 (40:40)
You know that?
speaker-1 (40:49)
you
speaker-0 (40:50)
that's gonna die fairly quick when you get exposed. It is. I'm not sure if I answered your question.
speaker-1 (40:57)
Anyone
want to share?
speaker-2 (40:59)
Sure, I've got a... So one of the ways I think about this, sir, is so inside of information warfare and EW and inside of that is like, okay, why do you have the capability? Right? And so if you have it to deter, you want to reveal that capability. If you want it to defeat, you generally conceal the capability. When we think about exquisite capabilities, generally there's two reasons. One, they're taking advantage of a vulnerability in our adversary that we want to conceal to defeat.
or two, it's a fragile capability that's easily defeated. So we want to conceal it to defeat it. And as we think about with that paradigm, it's like, okay, I don't want to put all this capital into something if it's fragile, but if it's something that can exploit a large scale adversary for a significant advantage, well, then I do. So that's kind of how I would think if I saw a capability come to me, I'd use that framework to kind of think through that about how we're going to do that because
Like we've talked about, you only have so many resources and that is the way we go. But I do agree is if we chase exquisite, they're generally fragile and they're generally easily, you know, we're on the wrong side of the cost curve.
speaker-1 (42:03)
you
speaker-0 (42:09)
pair.
speaker-1 (42:09)
Yeah.
Sir, another audience question.
speaker-3 (42:13)
Hello, Devin Martin. I wanted to ask ⁓ some of the other presenters here have discussed that ⁓ MSO is a lot of non-kinetic systems and I think that's one of the big problems with it is it isn't quite as obvious when it's in effect and things like that. ⁓ And I wanted to know your opinions on if you think visualizations of RF space might help in that respect or if we should be comparing MSO advancements to other non-kinetic.
systems how those have been incorporated.
speaker-0 (42:44)
You mean visualization and like current ops from an op cell perspective, like creating a map, a heat map or something? One example, okay. so yeah, I love what the wing is doing down in Eglin, right? And this whole idea of creating MSO battle, you know, EW battle managers. I think that's awesome, right? But I'll tell you, and this goes to Eric's point, right?
speaker-3 (42:52)
So that would be one example is. Color.
speaker-1 (42:56)
you
speaker-0 (43:13)
spectrum. A signal doesn't show up at an enemy's border, or at any border, and just stop. It doesn't go hot dog red and go, Oh, my God, I can turn around, right? They just keep going. They dissipate in power. And I tell you, I can tell you, I get it, right. But here's the crazy thing, right? The general talked about air operation centers, and they're they're phenomenal, right? You got the A1 with 1015 people and the Intel guys with 1015 people and
current ops guys sitting on the ops desk and maybe 20, 30 guys, and then you get to plans, which is really the point. Now you're maybe a hundred. We're talking about 200, 300 people at a combined air operations center running 24 hour ops. And that's what the air force has validated. And that's what's needed to go do combined air operations. I get it. I don't disagree with that. But if, if solving a air problem is a four dimensional issue,
And what I mean by that is an airplane can be in XYZ position in a grid and then time. So XYZ in time. Okay. In the spectrum, it's actually five dimensions because you've got the XYZ grid. Then you can have zero to 18 gigs at that location and then time. So if it takes hundreds of people to manage the air operation center, why
in the EW battle management section of the AOC are there only 10 guys? I mean, they must be really good if they can do five dimensions versus four. And the truth is, that's a joke, right? It's more than that. It's really, really hard to get after. Yes. So just to follow up on this, there are plans on going down that path that you're describing. In the US, the GEMSOC tool is looking at some kind of
speaker-1 (44:46)
We like 10 guys.
speaker-0 (45:10)
⁓ heat mapping of what is then NATO is paralleling this. So the gem stock tool that has been kind of provided by the guy stand at the Duke in San Antonio versus what has been built by NATO that is called C2VW. ⁓ They are looking at something called the recognized ⁓ picture, the ramp that will reinforce ⁓ all existing or all recognized pictures.
speaker-1 (45:12)
of
speaker-0 (45:38)
into a common operational picture. So the way this was done between US and NATO was that ⁓ one of the key persons at the Duke ⁓ working the requirements for this was also part of the NATO EW working group. we, myself and that person co-chaired the requirements building for REMP. So this is going to be a
speaker-1 (45:47)
One of the
speaker-0 (46:08)
something that is real, visible and available to decision makers into future. And then you have, think Brett Eddinger has been a speaker here today as well. is running an R &D project for NATO called 348, real time EMB. And in that real time EMB that started so many years ago, NATO was actually looking at something that you will find in the Ukraine today.
⁓ On your phone, you have an app and hashtag PNT jamming. You will get based on the proximity to the base station you are at, you will get alerts on GPS jamming down to the individual level. And in that there's a mid-year report, a meekening intrusion jamming and interception report that you then fill in and you continuous building of that REM.
speaker-2 (46:45)
You know.
speaker-1 (47:03)
support the
speaker-0 (47:07)
It is just like when you drive your car and you get a car accident up ahead and then you get on your display, is this is there still an active accident as you drive past that car? You get that when you drive on the motorway motorway here. So everybody contributes to kind of maintaining this recognized ⁓ picture as they.
speaker-2 (47:19)
You
speaker-1 (47:30)
Observe,
observe.
speaker-0 (47:32)
Interference, deliberate or undeliberate.
speaker-1 (47:38)
So after doing the podcast for about four years, it still astounds me how quickly 45 minutes goes. So ⁓ we are nearing the end of our time, but I do have another question and I'll start with you, General Kennedy. From an industry perspective, we spend a lot of time talking about how industry has to respond to getting technology into the field faster than the war fighter and obviously scale it up to wartime. do we need to think about this?
from an industry perspective and what are some of the challenges and opportunities that we have to consider because we can talk all we want about what's happening in the Department of War and the individual services, but you still need the industry piece. Share with us the industry perspective.
speaker-2 (48:21)
Yeah, I think on one element that we could address from an industry perspective is like, okay, so going fast is an operational necessity as well as where the department's at right now. And so you think through, okay, a lot of our electromagnetic spectrum operations doing physical testing is difficult. So if we need to bring the environment, the digital environment forward in a way that we can quickly develop tests.
field capabilities to minimize that time when we have to find physical ranges to test these out. And one of the key parts of that is, so we need that environment developed in and available, and we need to share across industry in ways that we might be uncomfortable, but that's going to be necessary. And part of the sharing is anything that's developed should have a digital twin that's available for some type of licensing rather than having everyone to have to redo it. Right, so if I wanted to use a platform, it's a digital, and I'm the aircraft manufacturer.
and you want to do some now, so I have it and it's a reasonable license fee, you can bring it into your environment, not have to recreate it or no, have to come in and get a portion of the thing. So I think that's some areas that we could look.
speaker-1 (49:25)
Any thoughts on from what he said? Okay, perfect. He's right. No, it's yes Well with that I want to thank everyone for attending the episode here today and thank you for the questions I appreciate it. That's all the time that we have for today I do want to thank my guests and general Kennedy Jeff Fisher Eric Bamford for joining me here on stage For this conversation. We have one more day and we look forward to seeing everyone tomorrow. That's it for now. Thanks for joining us
That will conclude this episode of From the Crows Nest. As always, please take a moment to share and subscribe to this show. We always enjoy hearing from our listeners, so please take a moment and let us know how we're doing. That's it for today. Thanks for listening.