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NETWORK CENTRIC OPERATIONS
- Definition
Network Centric Operations (NCO)
involves the development and employment of mission capability packages that are
the embodiment of the tenets of Network Centric Warfare (NCW) in operations
across the full mission spectrum. These tenets state that a robustly networked force
improves information sharing and collaboration, which enhances the quality of
information, the quality of awareness, and improves shared situational
awareness. This results in enhanced collaboration and enables
self-synchronization improving sustainability and increasing the speed of
command, which ultimately result in dramatically increased mission
effectiveness. Effects Based Operations (EBO) goes hand and hand with NCO because warfare,
particularly effective warfare, has always been effects-based.
Sun Tzu, Genghis Khan,
Napoleon, Eisenhower, and Schwartzkopf all would be familiar with the principles
that (1) warfare should include all the instruments of national power and that
(2) each instrument should be applied in a way that maximizes its desirable
impact, minimizes undesirable ones, and complements actions taken in other
arenas. These basic principles, which define the essence of EBO occur in a
context that makes them particularly relevant today. First, we have the means to
gather, integrate, and apply more data, information, and knowledge than analysts
and policy makers in earlier eras – we are in the Information Age. The tenets
of NCW address these means and postulate how they can increase mission
effectiveness. Second, we live in a
world that is more tightly coupled than ever before, creating opportunities and
challenges for direct and indirect, desirable and undesirable effects.
NCO includes Networked Enabled Capability (UK, Australia),
Networked-Based Defense (Sweden), and concepts from other nations based upon
operationalizing the tenets of Network Centric Warfare.
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