Listen to the 'Command and Control' podcast by Peter Roberts

Everyone understands that civil agencies and institutions do not operate in the same way as military organisations. The culture, aims, objectives and funding models are different, as is the way they run activity. Sowhen militaries and these agencies interact, a sense of fiction and misunderstanding often emerges. A small group of military staff stand between the behemoths of civil and military leaders - the CIMIC staff; it is their understanding of both sets of cultures that smooths activity in the 97% of military activity that is not combat operations. Kathleen Porath, academic advisor at the NATO CIMIC COE, talks about areas for improvement, the impact of technology, and the investments needed to improve relationships for the future.

Nuclear Command and Control (NC2), and Communications (NC3) is a world apart from C2 for conventional forces: it underpins strategic stability between nuclear armed states. With the emergence of a ‘3-body problem’ in Great Power Competition, there is a risk that Western leaders (political and military) simply try and transpose Cold War theories onto the problems of today, and add some AI/ML to make it look pretty.

Professor Andrew Reddie from the Berkeley Goldman School at the University of California, explains why this would be foolhardy in a remarkably accessible way. That’s not easy given the emotion, biases, and vitriol that surround any discussion on NC2/NC3.

Fast reflections of the annual NATO C2 Centre of Excellence (C2COE) conference in the Hague with the centre’s commanding officer, Meitta Groeneveld. The challenging issues of Multi Domain Operations and Synchronisation, and the implications of that doctrine on command and control, were the conference’s planned themes.

Peter and Mietta also had a conversation about the Cross Domain Command Concept, data and the human, the need to share, the lessons from Ukraine on C2 about adaptation of C2, the community of interest (the “we”), the political (and societal) will to change, the journey towards and beyond C2 in MDO, and the Babylonian Confusion over doctrinal terms. A lot to cover in just 45 minutes!

The military sometimes promote and appoint leaders who are truly terrible. Sometimes this isn’t their fault, they are not always narcissistic or toxic: sometimes they are just not up to the job. But the issue for staff is how to handle poor leaders. Professor William Scott Jackson from Oxford University is perhaps the foremost researcher in this field, and he brings with him a wealth of experience and lessons from the private and commercial world – much of it translates into the military world without much imagination.

In this episode he talks about succession management, micro solutions for bad leaders, decision-making, the importance of thinking time, differentiated capability theory, and Blue Ocean Strategy. You decide how much of this translates to the Profession of Arms.

If there is some unresolved tension in the ideas of mission command and synchronisation – particularly within the MDO concept – then it could be more useful to think about the USMC idea of Coupling; of providing linkage between warfare activities that are needed to execute a task and/or mission.

Instead of simply connecting everything because it’s possible, the Corps advocates for an approach that provides the means on a case-by-case basis. Interestingly, it is explained best in MCDP5 (USMC Planning) penned back in 1997, and signed off by the legend who is General Charles C. Krulac.

Talking about C2 (reality and theory) is best done with a marine and Peter was joined for this discussion by Sean Welch, a marine with the intellectual and operational credentials to offer some really important perspectives.

Imagine sitting on a battlefield and trying to figure out what is happening with only your ears to guide you; your guidance is based on orders written weeks or months ago, and the last time you got an update of where your own forces where was a day old (at best). That, in essence, is submarine warfare. There is no constant information flow for situational awareness and communication (of any kind) endangers your existence; so submarine commanders are required to make decisions based on a series of assumptions about a myriad of variables and use their experience, judgement, advice from their team, and a deep understanding of their adversary. 

Building people who can do this – so different to most other warfare experiences – requires a special process: The Perisher. Peter talks to Phil Titterton about command and control of submarines, his experiences in the Royal Navy’s submarine service, and about waterspace management (submarine control measures). Now you can open your eyes.