At a time when the advent of quiet, highly capable diesel-electric submarines represents a potentially lethal challenge to U.S. and allied navies--and to commercial shipping--around the world, it is worth recalling that submarines were responsible for sinking more ships than any other platform during World War II.

Information on advanced submarine design and quieting, once kept under wraps by Cold War secrecy, is now readily available on the world market. The modern diesel-electric submarine, with its capability to bottom amid the clutter of the ocean floor or remain undetected while operating on battery at slow speeds in the shallow littoral, can disrupt the maritime operations of even the world's most capable navies.

During a time of crisis, the mere mention that a rogue nation's submarines are underway with hostile intent has the potential to alter, if not shut down, sea-borne traffic in any of a number of the world's merchant shipping lanes. In short, one of the most feared naval weapons of the 20th century is still capable of wreaking havoc at sea in the 21st.

Declining ASW Proficiency

In 1997, a Department of the Navy assessment of its antisubmarine warfare (ASW) capabilities identified a decline in the U.S. Navy's ASW proficiency. The cause of the decline, and the factors contributing to it, are complex. The fiscal difficulties of maintaining a potent ASW force, the availability and proliferation of a variety of advanced diesel-sub technologies, and gains in sound-quieting technology all were listed as contributing factors. Having identified ASW as a top concern, the Navy set a course to improve fleet ASW proficiency using both traditional and cutting-edge methods.

By 1999, the chief of naval operations/fleet commander ASW Integrated Process Team (ASWIP) had developed what is officially called the Integrated Antisubmarine Warfare Roadmap. With the enduring capstone requirement to "prevent enemy submarines from disrupting U.S. missions or objectives in any theater of interest," the Roadmap created a new path for the Navy with the statement that "ASW, like other warfare areas, will capitalize on the benefits of networking." In other words, a 21st-century solution is being applied to counter an emboldened 20th-century threat.

The use of computer networks to find submarines is termed Network-Centric Antisubmarine Warfare (NCASW). Some proponents of network-centric warfare claim that it will immediately transform the battlespace and turn the tables on the threat. Skeptics worry, on the other hand, about an over-reliance on possibly unreliable computer networks to protect U.S. forces and about the allocation of additional scarce resources to network-centric warfare at the expense of other more traditional defense needs.

Regardless of one's personal opinion, though, it is clear that NCASW is not a panacea, nor is it just an expensive experiment. So just what is NCASW, and how is it being used in the fleet today?

Information-Sharing

At its most basic level, Network-Centric Antisubmarine Warfare is about information-sharing. Its goal is to get the right information to the right person at the right time, and in the right format, in order to support sound tactical decisions. In a carrier battle group, the "right person" is the destroyer squadron (DESRON) commander assigned duty as the Sea Combat Commander (SCC).

The responsibility for employing ships, aircraft, and submarines in fighting the surface and subsurface war rests squarely on the shoulders of the DESRON commander and his staff. The 1999 ASW Roadmap states that "there will be an increased responsibility at the DESRON and battle group level to effect sophisticated employment of available assets to ensure force protection and execute offensive ASW."

It follows, therefore, that "successful coordination of those assets will demand a very high level of proficiency in sensor and asset assignment among a diverse mix of available ASW forces to maintain effective surveillance, search, detection, and prosecution."

That being said, it also seems logical to conclude that one of the best ways to improve ASW proficiency is to increase the ASW expertise possessed by the battle group and DESRON staffs by adding experienced ASW personnel to those staffs. Since it is not feasible, given the current Navy-wide manning constraints, to significantly increase the number of staff personnel for the sole purpose of increasing ASW proficiency, the next best way to accomplish the goal is to bring the required expertise to afloat staffs and ships via a secure computer network.

Transformed Communications

That network is much like an Internet service provider, such as America Online. Such features as web browsing, e-mail, posting and sending digital images, and communicating in a chat room in near-real-time are all a part of NCASW. And, just as the Internet has transformed the various ways families, friends, businesses, and academic institutions communicate, NCASW is transforming the ways U.S. naval forces communicate in waging modern ASW.

Just like a civilian Internet service provider, the Navy's Web-Centric ASW Network, or WeCAN, is the primary cutting-edge communication path that provides the means needed for posting data and communicating via several chat rooms from around the world. WeCAN serves as a reliable and secure backbone for NCASW, and it continues to evolve to meet fleet requirements.

With the need for, and the purpose and capabilities of, NCASW apparent, forces at sea are now using it. A recent joint task force exercise (JTFEX 01-3) involving the Norfolk, Va.-based USS Theodore Roosevelt Battle Group and Destroyer Squadron 28 took the concept of NCASW to a new level. Seven surface ships, two submarines (when operating at communications depth), and the U.S. Atlantic Fleet's Maritime Patrol Aircraft Tactical Support Center were linked to an unprecedented depth of experience and range of resources via a secure network as they countered as many as three live "opposition" submarines off the East Coast of the United States.

The central node of the network was a NCASW "Reachback Cell" (RBC) at the Norfolk Naval Base--a ready pool of ASW talent and the latest tools available 24 hours a day so that the DESRON commander could reach back for whatever support he needed. The RBC was staffed with both Navy and civilian ASW experts and used the latest computer and satellite technology to analyze enemy submarine movements and the ocean environment.

The real value of the RBC was the ability of the ASW experts: (a) to sort through and make sense of the vast amount of data available to them; and (b) to develop assessments, analyses, and recommendations based on that data and present them to at-sea commanders in a succinct format that facilitated tactical decisionmaking. In the area of tactical planning, there was a noticeable shift in workload from the afloat staff to the RBC that allowed the DESRON and battle group staffs to allocate more man-hours to developing and evaluating broad tactical options based on detailed assessments, data collection, and the displays generated by the RBC.

Other nodes in the network included the DESRON Commander's Planning Cell and ASW Module aboard USS Theodore Roosevelt, key watchstanders aboard other battle group ships, the P-3C Orion Maritime Patrol Aircraft Tactical Support Center in Jacksonville, Fla., the Naval Oceanographic Processing Facility (NOPF) in Norfolk, the Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) in Suitland, Md., and various elements of the Navy's Meteorological and Oceanographic (METOC) community.

All of the players in the network communicated and, most importantly, collaborated in near-real time to collect, process, display, and present information relevant to the ASW effort. The DESRON commander and his staff provided requirements, direction, and feedback to the RBC, which in turn produced a variety of finished products and recommendations to support tactical decisionmaking.

Informed Assessments

As each node in the network feeds its contribution into the ASW Module and Planning Cell on the carrier (or other flagship), the Sea Combat Commander's watchstanders can make not only informed assessments of the course of the ASW battle but also the sound tactical decisions needed to influence that course. Among the examples of the products rapidly communicated via NCASW are an analysis of historical and recent opposition-force submarine-operating patterns, the range of possible enemy courses of action, ASW-force stationing recommendations (based on search-area effectiveness and the probability of detection for different dispositions of ships), recommended air-asset employment (including recommended search areas and the use of sonobuoys, the continuous analysis of ship sensor performance against the latest environmental models, and a cumulative plot of acoustic and nonacoustic submarine detections that was used to identify "adversary" operating patterns).

All of this information, which was available to the afloat DESRON commander via a secure network, represents a vast increase in the amount of tactical information used in the traditional practice of ASW.

Understanding the ocean environment is critical to success in ASW. To meet this need, NCASW provided an avenue for sharing a wide variety of environmental information, including data on bathymetry, ocean currents, fronts and eddies, Gulf Stream analysis, bioluminescence, three-dimensional models of the detection ranges of noise from different ships and submarines, and a constantly updated sound-velocity profile (a measure of how sound travels in a specific part of the ocean). It became readily apparent that the volume and quality of environmental information available to the SCC is far above that which would be available to the SCC without the network.

For the employment of maritime patrol aircraft (MPA), the network was centered at the Tactical Support Center ashore, which was responsible for coordinating all P-3C Orion missions in support of the SCC. MPA pre-flight and post-flight mission briefs and debriefs were uploaded to WeCAN, and "chat" was used to report aircraft launches and arrivals on station. This procedure allowed the SCC ASW Module, the ship designated as the Aircraft Control Unit (ACU), and the watch teams on the various ships to receive the same brief that the P-3C air crews received.

The result was a clearer understanding of MPA tasking by all units and a more efficient check-in process when the P-3C arrived and established communications with the ships conducting ASW operations. Streamlining the check-in process resulted in more aircraft mission time available to search for submarines, and less time required to pass large volumes of information over a radio circuit. This is yet another example of the gains in efficiency made possible by a networked approach to ASW.

The Click of a Mouse

Another benefit provided by NCASW is the ability to link watchstanders on different ships and encourage collaboration as everyone tries to piece together the ASW puzzle. One of the primary means of doing this was via the chat rooms--which were used for, among other things, contact reporting, comparisons of contact information, suggestions to improve ASW defenses, and requests for helicopter and/or MPA assets.

The exchange between sonar operators of contact and track data (including the submarine contact's position, course, speed, and classification, the sensor holding contact, and acoustic signature information) proved to be a major advantage. The ability to centralize data and present a common picture of the ASW fight to all nodes at the click of a mouse is a particularly powerful aspect of NCASW.

Net-centric warfare as it currently applies to the antisubmarine battle is less about the development of the common operating picture and more about the use of off-ship expertise to "virtually" augment a shipboard staff and to provide both high-quality ASW information and a method for sharing that information. One danger, outlined by Dr. Thomas Barnett in a 1999 Naval Institute Proceedings article ("The Seven Deadly Sins of Network-Centric Warfare") still applies, though. The gargantuan overload of information, which is an inevitable fallout effect of interconnectivity, has "the potential for inundating all participants with an ever-increasing flow of data masquerading as information."

Clearly, as the 1999 ASW Roadmap states, "we must not confuse the technical ability to relay or process additional information with the need to do so, lest the ensuing deluge of data become the next 'fog of war.'"

Having developed, evaluated, and employed NCASW, the Destroyer Squadron 28 staff appreciates the fact that the web of ASW expertise linked via computers and satellites represents a powerful tool in solving the ASW problem, but is not a "solution" in and of itself. ASW, like all forms of warfare, is a thinking man's art that must be assisted, but cannot be subsumed, by technology.

There is no silver bullet in the complex, methodical, and often perplexing search for enemy submarines. What NCASW does is bring the knowledge and expertise that is already available and make it more accessible to the people who need it most--the commanders, watch officers, pilots, and Sailors at sea. The end result is a net increase in the capability of the battle group to employ ASW assets efficiently.

If an analysis provided by a Reachback Cell ashore is enough to prompt a change in plans that keeps ships out of the range of enemy torpedoes on just one occasion, then NCASW will have proved its worth. If a single chat transmission is enough to help a sonar operator recognize the sound signature of an enemy submarine--particularly if that detection leads to the submarine's demise--then NCASW will have been worth every dollar spent in its development.

One of the fundamental rules in ASW is to employ speed, deception, and maneuver consistently to frustrate an adversary and eventually cause the enemy commander to make a mistake that will give away his position. With the advent of networked ASW forces that can take full advantage of a web of tactical and technical expertise, the decisions made by U.S. at-sea commanders who have to apply this rule will be much better informed and more effective--and will better serve the goal of protecting U.S. and allied naval forces and ensuring freedom of the seas.