Moving Target Engagement
March 5, 2025
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This transcript was generated with the assistance of AI. Please report inconsistencies to comms@afa.org.
Steven Wert:
All right, good morning. Welcome to our panel discussion on moving target engagement, a critical capability in Modern Warfare. We’re joined by three industry experts who will share their insights and expertise on the challenges and opportunities on the subject. First, we have Jeff, Vice President of Strategy and business development at Lockheed Martin Space, who brings a wealth of experience in strike deterrence and missile defense as well as global situational awareness. And next we have Kimberly Hicks, Senior Director of mobility, surveillance and bombers at Boeing Boeing’s Phantom Works, who has led development programs for advanced surveillance and strike capabilities including e7 and KC 46 programs. Last but not least, we have Jon Big Dog Rhone from SAIC. He currently leads c5 ISR strategy for the Air Force and combat and command business groups. He’s been with SAIC for four years and has served in the space and Intel business group, as well as the Air Force and Combat Command business group. He served in the Air Force for 24 years as an air battle manager in technical and operational c2 in the combat air force the Joint Special Operations Command and on staff at Air Combat Command. He was a US Air Force weapons school instructor, Director of combat operations division at an AOC, and commanded the US Air Force’s c5 ISR Operational Test and Evaluation Group. So moving target engagement, I was PEO digital at Hanscom. I’m now a recovering PEO, but one of my additional duties was to be a co lead on the Secretary’s operational imperative number three, the ability to find, identify, track and engage large numbers of airborne and ground based targets, simultaneously and at scale, that was the focus of operational imperative. Number three, we very quickly learned the about the challenges of disaggregated, long range kill change that were required but did not exist, insufficient numbers of standoff weapons the needed ground elements, including sensor orchestration, were all gaps and began to get funded as a result of those operational imperatives. So Jeff, let’s start with you. How do you see moving target engagement evolving in response to emerging threats such as Advanced cruise missiles and hypersonic systems?
Jeff Schrader:
Well, thanks for the question, Steve, and thanks to my fellow, fellow panelists, and for those of you who decided to join such an interesting and frankly challenging mission that’s critical to the United States and our joint allies, I think you’ve hit on something that’s really important. The advanced cruise missiles and hypersonic capabilities that we’re seeing. Listen, anything that goes Mach Five or above is game changing. And I think what that will do is stress our integrated air defense capabilities, air and missile defense capabilities, as well as our offensive strike capabilities. To look at bullet on bullet, type of, type of, type of elements, I think, I think hypersonics, and specifically as we go bullet on bullet, anything that goes that fast will require a full multi domain. Look at moving target engagement and and how it’s evolved. And I appreciate the the O i significantly targeting and saying it’s moving target engagement, not just moving target indication. So when you look at the sensors that are required to do the engagement piece instead of indications, you really got to look at, okay, what’s indication doing if you’re not able to actually engage and take out the threat, hopefully earlier rather than later, in boost phases, et cetera. So I think the integrated air and missile defense emphasis that the United States government and our joint allies are doing specifically to target advanced cruise missiles and the hypersonic capabilities is great on the defensive side. Since you mentioned the deterrence element, I think that’s also important to look at when, when we look at deterrence, we’ve also got to have the same type of capabilities, or better, that our adversaries do. So I’ll just throw out a couple numbers. You know, Russia and China already have hypersonic capabilities. We know it. And. Um, they, they’ve been, they’ve been doing tests, etc. There’s other there’s other nations, about eight other nations that are, that are moving and advancing those capabilities specifically for hypersonics and and we got a wake up call several years ago on this, right and so, so the deterrence element is probably just as important on the on the engagement side as anything else. And, you know, we were able to, in December, make a giant leap forward on the hypersonic side, from a deterrence perspective, where, using our production Lockheed Martin’s production ready air rapid response weapon capability, we did a full common live fire test in December for the first of the Long Range hypersonic weapon portfolio with the US Army and US Navy, and pretty proud of that and what that will bring to our to our deterrence element. But, but, Steve, I think the big thing is focusing on the engagement, what, what the what the networks need, etc, is what’s important. Thanks.
Steven Wert:
Well, Jeff, if, if I could follow up on that. When we talk about hypersonics, often we get fixated on speed but but isn’t range really the challenge of desegregated long range kill chains, where it’s a beyond line of sight issue, beyond the radar horizon issue, and you really have to pull together this collection of things in order to be effective.
Jeff Schrader:
Yeah, this is, this is a, this is if there is a threat or a or a capability necessary for moving targeting indication it is addressing exactly that the long range, the long range piece of this is what’s really important. And so, you know, if I, if I were to, this is not just a US thing. This is a, this is an allied and joint operation that’s necessary. I think that’s the first piece to look at long range capability. We can’t do everything ourselves, and our allies can’t do everything ourselves, so we’ve got to have this as a joint capability. I think the second thing is, when we look at the domestic part, this is what I like to call title 60. So it’s putting title 10 and title 10 and title 50 together with the intel community as well as the DOD, and then looking at it from a multi domain case, which is looking at what air what air forward units are out there that are that are looking at moving targets. What can space bring? What can ground bring? And bring all three together for a multi domain, full network.
Steven Wert:
Yeah, thanks for that. Jeff, so big dog, as we see operational imperative for these long range kill chains, what do you see are there critical capability gaps that need to be addressed to ensure effective moving target engagement, taking into consideration factors like technical technical advancements, operational constraints and evolving tactics.
Jon Rhone:
Thanks for the question and it’s good to be here. I’ll start with a lot of times we think that a technological solution is the solution. In reality, the people that have to make the decisions are using this to make the decisions. So to answer your question directly, I think there’s two things that are the biggest gaps that I see is, number one, access to data. We have to be able to unlock the data regardless of where it comes from. So the data has got to be available a data centric mindset and capability. There’s got to be some sort of transport layer to get that data to the right people, to the decision makers, so they can make those decisions at the right place, at the right time, to present dilemmas to the enemy. You’ve got to have some sort of of GUI, some sort of interface or some sort of algorithm. But the critical gaps are. One, the data right now, a lot of our applications that we have at the operational level, regardless of service, regardless of domain, are the data is locked in those applications. We got to get those, get the data out of there. Secondly, the people that make the decisions are making decisions based on multiple panes of glass. It wasn’t too long ago that we’re looking at anywhere from six to 13 different panes of glass, different information systems that the human brain has got to process, and that brain has to be the integrator, not possible for hypersonic threat once we get that data unlocked or data centric capabilities, we have some sort of algorithm to integrate and to make sense of that. Now the conversation has to be who makes it makes those decisions with too many times we say that technology is going to help us make decisions faster. It will help it won’t make the decisions. So one of the challenges that we see is we have operators. People are making operational decisions, still having to figure out how to talk to the intelligence professional to get the right information and make the right decisions, as opposed to having those operators and intelligence, whether it’s the people, the systems, whatever it may be, together, and making those decisions together, there is never going to be a dynamic targeting situation, especially when it’s a fast mover, like a hypersonic threat or an operator, is going to make a decision, a general officer, a commander, is going to make a decision without intelligence help. The longer it takes to get access to that intelligence professional and that information and have it formatted in a way that’s easily digestible for a decision, the longer it’s going to be that decision is made. When we’re talking hypersonics, the biggest challenge. Hypersonics is they’re not predictable because they’re maneuverable and they’re fast, so we don’t have time to do it the way we’re doing it right now. So really long answer data, having the professionals, the right people, make those decisions and have access to those decisions. And also, as as we mentioned earlier, as Jade mentioned earlier, it’s the multi level, I’m sorry, it’s access to the coalition multi level security. We’re never going to fight alone. The adversaries are never going to fight alone. So when we have access to that data and those intelligence professionals, how do we make sure we can share that data, protecting what we need to protect, but also allowing access to the other decision makers that are on our team?
Steven Wert:
Well, thanks for that big dog. Thanks for bringing up the operational aspects of this. And as we continue our work, in my current role, we’re working to assess the execution of these numerous things that we put in place to try and build out long range kill chains, and we’re continuing to work with operators to do that. And it came up in conversation, there’s a tendency to defer to operators in those discussions, until someone pointed out no operators actually closed a disaggregated long range Kill Chain yet. So it’s clearly a teaming effort, but, but there’s a lot of work in the dot Mel PF aspects of this. Could you elaborate a little more on that?
Jon Rhone:
Absolutely. I mentioned algorithms or artificial intelligence, if there’s probably some operators here I saw General Jackson, I’m willing to bet I’ve been out of the Air Force for four years now. I’m willing to bet that our training is not aligned with the things that we want to do. In other words, if you have somebody sitting in an air operations center, or somebody who is at the edge wearing a G suit, or in a bomber or in an AWACS, we are not training on how to use those algorithms and how to use AI and how to begin to trust AI to make those decisions faster. We are still doing the same things, and if I’m wrong, please call me on it. We’re doing the same things. We’re training the same way we’ve trained for the past 567, years. Even though the technology is advancing, we just cannot make those decisions fast enough on our own, until we start to train and we embed that trust, it’s going to be very difficult in conflict or even competition to use those capabilities efficiently and effectively. Decisions are still made by people right now, and that those people’s decisions will be augmented by those artificial intelligence capabilities by those algorithms, by access to intelligence that we’re not used to seeing. So until we can train to that, I think we’re going to be chasing we’re going to be lagging the fight.
Steven Wert:
Okay. Thank you. So for Kim, what are the most pressing hurdles in developing and deploying these kind of long range kill chains we’re talking about, and how can we best overcome them?
Kimberly Hicks:
Sure. Thanks for the question. Thanks for having me. I think big dog you hit on some of this as well. Rarely do our systems. Are we able to take the information coming from the systems and put them into a single Battle Network to where the information can talk across domains, or even within a single domain. So when you simply put, you can’t really our systems don’t really do well talking to one another. So how do we take and how do we continue moving forward and taking systems that traditionally are linear, manual, they’re not very dynamic, and move them to a place where they can be more dynamic, more agile, and able to move at the speed of battle, and able to integrate across those domains. And you know, simply put, they need to be more adaptable. And how do we do that? You have to be able to take all of these systems and design and have flexibility for the unknown. In order to have that adaptability. I think that first starts with having, like, fully OMS and gra compliant systems that allows hits on what what you said, in terms of taking the data, being able to fuse them, and taking systems and using them in non traditional ways, and taking what its traditional purposes, and repackaging that data and sending it across multi domains, and then moving it at the speed of the fight. And when you start doing that, then you can start layering in machine learning and doing that real time and getting data and having it be actionable, and doing that real time. And then you start having a real force multiplier across all of our systems, and that adaptability is the key to kind of really unlocking that force multiplier across all of our systems and within a single domain and across multi domains, and then that, then you really start having something to really enable us to move faster and unlock every single aspect of the kill chain at real time. Yeah.
Steven Wert:
Thanks, Kim. I have a follow up in just a minute. But I wanted to mention how much this, this new aspect of closing long range, kill change, changes many business aspects as well. So it is what was behind the secretary naming a PEO, c3, VM, and for an example, in my current role, aqx is really, really good at assessing program execution, a program execution, and we’re now at the front end of working on, how do we assess where we are in putting together the various developments that are required to actually close the long range Kill Chain, let alone at scale. So as a follow up, what does the Department of the Air Force need to do better in working this challenge with industry?
Kimberly Hicks:
I think one of the things industry and the department can continue to build upon, is partnering together and also working with our foreign partners and allies to collaborate together and understand, you know, what the war fighter needs when you need it, and be able to let industry know this is, this is what you need and when you need it. Because if you need if we know that, then we can prioritize investments and then come and understand how industry can provide that, and come up with creative solutions at how we can provide that, and thinking outside of the box to how we can provide it faster. When you have that trust and that open collaboration, then we can all move forward together to answer the call faster, and it takes that collaboration to really move faster, and it’s going to take all of us to do that at pace.
Steven Wert:
Thanks for that. Larry, back to Jeff, what do you believe are the most critical cross domain challenges hindering effective moving target engagement?
Jeff Schrader:
Well, there’s a lot of them, but I think we’re working on all of them. I think that’s the positive piece. I think there, as I said before, this is a multi domain, multi multi coalition effort. And I think the thing there’s a couple things that are hindering it right now, sharing of classification is a problem with our joint ally, allies and partners. We, we talked to Goddard yesterday about this, and continue to, from a US Space Force perspective, it’s a known issue. We’re working it hard. Industry is helping. I think that’s the thing I’d like, or our allies, to take away. I think, I think there’s a couple other things we’ve been at. You know, a lot of the multi domain aspects, and setting up C, 3b, M, and all of the items that were that are necessary to really fuse this, what I call neural network of capabilities to get after the moving target engagement challenges. And I think that’s really the challenge between governments, between organizations. And if we can break down some of those brick walls a bit, as we’re seeing with some of the some of the domestic pieces, and definitely with some of our some of our international allies, I think that’s the big thing. Is more dialog, more talk, and opening that up to understand what the what the capabilities are. Lockheed Martin’s working very, very diligently on an airspace integration play. I think there’s a lot in the air and space integration that is necessary for this mission set, multi phenomenology are enabled when you actually look at aeronautic the aeronautic picture, as well as what space can bring across those multiple phenomenalogies, when you look at RF, when you look at IR, when you look at when you look at radar, you don’t have to have everything on one system if You actually have a multi domain case, and I think that’s the important thing that we’ve got to work on. I think, I think the other thing on this is we’ve got to actually see the demand signal. And Kim, Kim brought this up, and I just got to say it, if we see the demand signal and we see moving target engagement funding coming in, that’s going to unlock our industry capabilities, where we’re not just focusing on the technology, but we’re focusing on the entire mission, versus, as you described, Steve, looking at this just program by program, I think we’ve got to look at this from a full model, full multi domain aspect, and get the whole of government and our whole of our allies to get after this threat.
Steven Wert:
Thanks for that. In as a quick follow up, is industry seeing the demand signal.
Jeff Schrader:
We are to some degree, we hear a lot of the threats right. General Gagnon spoke at the classified event about about the threats and we understand them. I think the demand signal and the stability of the funding that comes with this, this major challenge, is a big deal, right? So there was, there was a lot of of impetus on ground moving target, and indication over the last several years, well, now they’re, now we’re talking about air moving target engagement, and I think that’s the real that’s the real piece, because that those two, those two capabilities, are. Lastly, different. And I think when we can start seeing the full picture of what what efforts are going on, who is going to be lead, who’s going to be following, who’s going to be the partnerships, I think that’s what we need to unlock, what we do on the modeling side, to help, to help with our, with our, with our government and international allies, to really unlock what the real capabilities are.
Steven Wert:
I appreciate that. Yeah, thank you. I mean, personally, I see this as, without being overly dramatic, sort of the challenge of our time, this integration of capabilities to be effective in moving target engagement. So back to Kimberly. How can we accelerate the development and fielding of these capabilities, and what role can rapid prototyping and experimentation play in that process?
Kimberly Hicks:
I think, you know, I think Jeff actually hit it square on the head. I think it is that demand signal. Industry really has to see that demand signal, when you have a stable demand signal, then industry can prioritize investments. We can make sure that we’re getting getting the capability out to the war fighter when you need it, and when you when you have that and you have that, that flexibility and that adaptability, then you can really make sure that that that enables everything else, that enables the rapid prototyping that enables experimentation, that enables you to go out and get capability out there to the war fighter faster, because then you’re able to have that larger architecture and picture in mind and build in the adaptability so that you can easily integrate in future capability, future sensors, and then thinking about a multi domain approach, you’re able to quickly adapt across each domain or within the same domain, and plan for that ahead, but we have to have a clear and stable demand signal in order to do that, once you have that, the rest of it comes naturally.
Steven Wert:
So Kim you brought up architecture, and that was part of the discussion in operational imperatives. And the reason that PEOC three BM was appointed was the feeling was we were asking industry to build pieces of this, but we didn’t have, actually a blueprint for the house itself. And so do you think C, 3b, M and Dr Tipton are making good progress on that front?
Kimberly Hicks:
Yeah, I think everything that we’re starting to see there, we are making progress. I think we have a, you know, more more homework to do and more to go, but I think we’re taking the steps in the right direction. I think all of us are collectively are, you know, gelling towards that, that right direction. But we definitely have further further to go towards that. And how do we actually, again, think about what is that common, common language that we are all, we are all going to talk through, and how do we actually make sure that we are all able to connect across the domains, across same domain, and then across multi domain, so that we can go faster, and so that we can prioritize within the department, within industry, and so that we can all get there together, so we can also do that across our foreign partners and allies, because it’s going to be a team effort.
Steven Wert:
Thank you. Let me go back to Big Dog. Another aspect of this challenge is engagement at speed and at scale, and what are the most crucial questions and concerns surrounding the development deployment, and you touched on it earlier, any ethical use of AI ml in this critical operational area,
Jon Rhone:
As I mentioned, I think that we have to be able to trust the AI. We have to be able to understand how the AI can help, and we’ve got to be able to do that that quickly. Think one of the things that we we lack. We have a one of the smartest people that I’ve ever met is our chief data scientist named Jay Neal. But Jay will sit home on the weekends and develop things, and that’s his fun. I don’t understand it, but he does it, and it’s pretty amazing to see. But one of the things that is that’s challenging is, I think, that we we lack an incentive to collaborate. So if Jay builds his thing, I guarantee that if Jay comes and talks to Jeff or to Kim’s team, and ahead of an RFP or ahead of any sort of requirement, and we put something together, that we could present that to industry, we could present that to the government, and it’s ready made for what they need. Sometimes the war fighters have ideas, and I call them needs, not requirements, and those needs don’t necessarily match the requirement priorities that we see. So I think the speed with which we can develop rapid capabilities and innovative ideas that, as Kim said, is a force multiplier, and that that speed. It is the things we have to take to to to finding how to collectively find fix left of launch, things like hypersonic threats, most of the threats that we have in the Indo, Pacific region. I don’t all make up a country and call it China, once those launch we’re hurting. I think that it’s not a big secret that we have to find a way to find all of these left of launch, put them on the spot. I was talking to one star outside, and once we find out that AJ 20 or a truck with this or a tell with this license plate number or serial number is moving, and we keep that object identified and tracked that’s going to help us. One of the most difficult things to do at the operational and tactical level is to identify and and truly identify with the combat identification that meets all the rules of engagement thresholds to engage that thing. We spend more time to confirm the ID, to minimize collateral damage and all the things that we don’t want to see in the news. But once we have industry together coming up with these great ideas. We identify this thing, this object, left of launch, and kill it, left of launch. Now we’ve increased our chances and opportunities to win this fight.
Steven Wert:
Thank you for that. So I’m going to go open question whoever, whoever wants to attack it, and multiple folks can can try and answer it. So let me pose a question. This way, a long range kill chain that matters will have many elements and therefore a large attack surface. So how do we? How do we, how do we get after this, but ensure that we’re not building something that’s incredibly fragile?
Jon Rhone:
So I’ll start. I’m a history major, so I’m about to get out of my lane right now. One of the things that we don’t talk about often enough is our cyber effects and our cyber capabilities, for all the obvious reasons. But if we have a cyber effect, we talked about all domains and multi domains, that helps us get left of launch, we also now have to protect that same capability. So I to answer your question directly. The things we have to consider is, from a cyber perspective, how do we protect ourselves? How do we minimize our footprint? How do we reduce that, that that attack surface? I don’t know the answer to that, but I feel like we don’t have enough conversation about cyber when we’re talking about these things.
Jeff Schrader:
Yeah, I’ll pile on a little bit on that being one of the domains, cyber domain. And I think I agree with you, big dog. I think, I think the other thing that we need to think about is, and we talked about multi demanding. It’s almost like this, this objective that we have. But really what that allows is, actually we need to be able to share with everybody what the capabilities are, and pick the right one, regardless of which office has it, which organization is contracting for. You know, we this is a this is a very large, complex problem, and I think one thing that we should do, big dog talked about trusting AI. I talked about multi phenomenalogies. What an AI engine can do nowadays is the technology is there. It’s we need to remove a bit of the bureaucracy, both in the industry and in the government, to really get after this challenge. And I think the AI is there to do things like a multi phenomenal phenomenology, multi amp picture, where you’ve got this neural network of sensors, where if you stub a toe in one part of the network, it goes directly to the brain, and you engage some other part of the neural network of this multi domain, moving target engagement, battle plan and battle picture. And I think that’s where we need to get. We need to we can model it. We have the capabilities now we just got to get after fielding it at scale.
Steven Wert:
So Kim, as any thoughts on how we build this out to be resilient?
Kimberly Hicks:
I think the resiliency is going to come with being having that adaptability, right you, if you get to you know exactly what, what Jeff and big doc said, if you have that and you start trusting, having those layers of AI and machine learning, you begin to do this at at pace, at speed, you start connecting all the that phenomenology. And when you when you do that, that that’s inherently resilient, then you can start, you know, connecting all of those dots. You have other means to be resilient as well, and we shouldn’t discount those, but I think a lot of that resiliency will also come with just knowing what we know and connecting what we know across the different systems. If you have that and you put that together across those different systems, I think you really do have a lot of built in resiliency within our systems to do that, but you we have to start and build in that flexibility and that adaptability and be able to move more quickly as the threats evolve. The threats continue to evolve at pace, and we have to be able to keep up with that. And the only way that we’re going to be able to do that is to. A, you know, like, like Jeff and big dad say, we have to be able to remove some of the bureaucracy to to include that AI and ML, and start layering that on to our sensors, to be able to process the data more quickly, be more agile, and get that across our sensors. Thank you.
Steven Wert:
I want to ask another open question, and be a little bit provocative about it. So when we when we look at this challenge of building out long range kill chains on the government side, we realized that we needed a program executive officer focused on it, created c3, BM, and that program executive officer actually has authority to impose that architecture across PEOs, including air and space. So the question is, do we need a different construct on the industry side of this equation? I’ll go a little bit of history.
Jeff Schrader:
Steve and I met when I was in the rapid Capabilities Office, where we actually had the incentives on programs like the common mission control center, which Lockheed Martin is still a, still a large, large part of, where we actually had competitive mates that got together, and we were incentivized to actually work across those bounds to develop open architectures that we need, and we continue to see in operations now at Bucha or you pick your pick your location. I think the I think we need more of that. We need effective consortiums that work. And one of the challenges that I thought I saw when, when we stood up, when the Air Force stood up, ABMS was, there was 189 people on that. IDIQ, how’s a How’s a government organization going to, going to, going to respond to 189 proposals every time. And so I think there’s a, there’s a bit of coalition of a willing to be able to to work together across industry, very similar to what c3 BM has now stood up and kind of, kind of shrunk that down a bit. I think at the time, when I was in, when I was in the RCO, Dr Brian Tipton was the architect there, and I think he’s bringing some of that to see three BM. And I love seeing it. He spoke at the classified session earlier on Monday, too. And I think we need more of that. Folks on the panel here, we work together. In fact, all three of us were on those consortiums. So I think there’s more of that that I think is a good thing for both industry and government to copy and take the best practices and the lessons learned.
Jon Rhone:
I think that we as a system integrator, system a system integrator, we often say that we’re OEM agnostic or vendor agnostic, but we are vendor opinionated. There are people out there or companies out there that we like to work with. I mean, Jeff and I, He probably hates being on stage with me. Love him to death. Drink a beer throw my haters company, right, but it’s a kidding. But I think the government also has opinions, and I think that they’re vendor opinionated. I think sometimes, and I understand the rules and the laws, a more open and transparent dialog about who the front runners are, or who the best the benchmark setters are, helps one. We’re all here to make money and provide for the warfighter. It helps us to be more efficient in the things that we do. Jeff mentioned the consortiums. I was on active duty as a group commander when CMCC was stood up, and one of the things that we had to do was figure out from the consortium who’s going to do what and when. If you’re not playing the right game or bringing the right skill sets on the depth chart, then you got to go, I think sometimes we’re a little slow in doing that on the industry side, industry to government side. So I think the other thing that we do for the consortium is, how do we incentivize the experimentation? The more times we can experiment, the more reps we get, the better product we’re going to provide. And I think sometimes our experimentation is hamstrung by the fiscal side of it, so incentivizing companies to whether it’s reimbursement later. I don’t know what the construct is, but the answer, I think, is that c3 BM, and I’m not sure if General crop is around, but we’ve talked about this before, is companies have to figure out a way to get the return on investment if we have a consortium, if we’re putting together an experiment that is an operationally representative experiment, not something that we white card, that’s going to take time, that’s going to take money, and oftentimes, right now, we need to prove to the government that we can do things, we can integrate before we get an award. I think sometimes that chicken or egg discussion needs to probably be refined a little bit.
Kimberly Hicks:
I echo the same thoughts, and I think, you know, to kind of pile on top of that. I think along with that, I think it needs to, you need to have that incentivization to be able to collaborate and work together. But you also we need to leverage, how do we set up the those contracting mechanisms and structures, and I mean, and that also takes ask industry, how can it, you know, what are the drawbacks to those contracting structures and mechanisms that prohibit that, that collaboration across from, you know, competitive mates and and, you know what? Makes it the things that are inherently punitive, like, how do you, how do you get around those types of of things so we can, again, go, go faster and work, work together, and not talking about on the execution side, this is really on the consortium side. So you’re bringing in the the best ideas and able to collaborate and bring those to the warfighter and to field faster.
Steven Wert:
Great. Thank you. Another open question, and by the way, we’re way beyond any any prepared questions that we had. But one of the striking things we learned very quickly is we needed long range standoff weapons that that we clearly do not have, and it appears that the industrial base around weapons has significantly collapsed and and there are limited sources, limited suppliers for various elements. So what is unique about munitions from an industry perspective, and what can the DAF do to really expand the defense industrial base in that area?
Jeff Schrader:
Alright, so I got two things. The first is, and we already said it, strong, stable budgets, effects we’ve seen in the Ukraine war. Just you know, those who have, those who have effects, whether it be rocket engines, whether it be warheads, they’re, they’re moving about as fast as they can, and really exercising the industrial base to get after, after the challenge of the scale. I think the other piece is identifying the critical long lead items that are in there. When we build aircraft, we have multi year advanced procurement kinds of things, right? I think we need to do that for space based programs too. I don’t know of a multi year, multi year program that is in the space domain right now, which is kind of interesting, right? We do these ones, 2z kind of things. And there’s not a multi year procurement where we can actually have that stability to move after works the exact same with with long range weapons. We know exactly what the key technologies are and the long lead times that are needed to really exercise the supply chain. So that’s the first piece. The second piece is we’ve got to break down the barriers on bringing in our international allies that enables a supply chain and the collaboration that’s necessary to not go out not only go after the moving target engagement challenge, but to actually bring in the mass supply and the business that circles around that to to enable, to enable our international partners in that industry to bring into our supply chains.
Kimberly Hicks:
Those are my two and I completely agree with with that wholeheartedly, along with the only other thing I would add to that is also bringing industry in on what are the plans, what are the needs, and when do you need them? So we can prioritize investments, so we can meet those, those needs, you know, and prioritize the supply chain, and have things staged for for when you need it. I think that’s, that’s, that’s good, but we have to be able to see when those needs are, and have that open conversation dialog, and have that partnership and collaboration.
Steven Wert:
So you brought up stable budgets. I, for one, would like stable budgets as well. Here we are in FY 25 continuing resolution. So let me just go completely open so on in this subject area, what do you think is the most important thing that the government can do to bring this all together?
Jon Rhone:
I’d say that to summarize, we have to focus on going to a data centric mindset, regardless of the type of data, we have to have ubiquitous access to that data. That data has got to be presented in a format that is easily digestible by decision makers, regardless of where where they are. And then we have to apply the right algorithms, artificial intelligence, to make sense of the data and to help aid the decision makers, I would say, take a chance.
Jeff Schrader:
We don’t have to be 100% all the time. This is a massive threat in our and our allies. Don’t, don’t wait till they’re 100% so when, when somebody invests in something, we’re investing significantly in a radar demonstration for space that you. That we’re really excited about, that has government watching very closely, take a chance on how that technology is advancing and move along the lines, instead of waiting five or six or seven years to advance it. And then when somebody has actually fulfilled on doing programs under budget, on schedule or ahead of schedule, reward them for it, versus versus other things that you can do. And I think those two things, one, lock the power of the banks of industry, as well as as well as really get after what we need to do for this challenging area.
Kimberly Hicks:
I think again, we need to be able to have, you know, those fully OMS, GRE compliant systems so we can unlock the data, we can communicate across those domains, fuse the data properly. We need to really be able to push, push our systems to be able to do that and across, you know, systems that are not, you know, just a single, a single contractor needs to be able to go across all the entire architecture. We need to be able to do that at speed as the threat evolves. We need to be able to have that flexibility. We need to be able to adapt. And we need to be able to do that at pace, and be able to trust and start layering and faster AI and ML to do that, and so that we could really unlock the power of the sensors and the technology that’s out there. I think there we have the the technology it’s out there. I think the the key to doing this is in how we unlock the technology that’s out there. There’s so much more that we can we can bring with the technology that’s out there, if we, if we simply reimagine how we do that through through things like a, i, M, L, and how we how we employ that across domains and link those across our systems.
Steven Wert:
So thank you very much. I really appreciate the thought of taking a chance, and I think we’re already at the point where we could build out, you know, a case and string something together and demonstrate the ability to do this. I think the remaining challenge, of course, is scaling that out, which will be much more complicated. I appreciate all three of your thoughts. Thanks for sharing on this important topic, and I want to thank the audience for attending. Thank you very much. Applause.