A boom operator, assigned to the 340th Expeditionary Air Refueling Squadron, prepares to refuel an aircraft from a KC-135 Stratotanker above Southwest Asia, July 20, 2017.

A boom operator, assigned to the 340th Expeditionary Air Refueling Squadron, prepares to refuel an aircraft from a KC-135 Stratotanker above Southwest Asia, July 20, 2017. US. Air Force / Staff Sargent Trevor McBride

Syria is a ‘Laboratory’ for the Air War of the Future

U.S. airmen are rapidly developing and remixing new technologies and techniques in the fight against ISIS, but sometimes you can’t beat the tried and true.

ISIS doesn’t have an Air Force, but the Syrian skies are nevertheless a rapidly evolving “laboratory” for air warfare, said U.S. military leaders, who described how the U.S. is fusing cyber attacks with real bombs and using open-source intelligence to find and strike targets.

Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Harrigian, who leads U.S. Air Forces Central Command, described a “dynamic targeting tool” that lets analysts and airmen at al Udeid Air Base in Qatar send the latest targeting information to airborne pilots and ground-based commanders alike. “The tool pulls together everything from the intelligence background to show me all the data on that target. Where did that target generate, how many times have we looked at it? And how do we communicate that, ultimately.”

As described, the targeting tool — now in its third iteration — sounds a bit like the original vision for the infamous Distributed Common Ground System, but without going billions over budget and without crapping out at the worst possible time.

“You’ve got to get [real time data for targeting] into a format so that the commander, or whoever is making the decision on that specific target, has all the data fused and is ready to make a decision. That is what this provides. If we are going to stay in front of the enemy these are the types of tools that will be very helpful…particularly in a very dynamic situation,” Harrigian said at the Air Force Association’s annual conference in Maryland.

Developed with the Defense Innovation Unit Experimental, the targeting tool replaces “a bunch of different applications,” from publicly available (but modified) apps like Google Earth to more exotic ones. Crucially, it runs on a single computer, replacing apps that ran on several physically separate PCs. Analysts and airmen “basically had to go air-gapping from one system to another. You can imagine the amount of risk we were buying with respect to coordinates being passed, elevations, that sort of thing, that are critical to executing the actual execution of a target” said Harrigian.

A much more agile data targeting system is essential as the Air Force incorporates a greater variety of data into targeting and mixes live fire with cyber operations. “One of the things we’ve talked about — we have to accept it’s out there now — is how do you use that publicly available information” for targeting and operations in real time, said Harrigian. “I can tell you inside the [combined air operations center,] we are being very aggressive about monitoring what’s happening in social media and then leveraging that from a reporting perspective or do some analysis about what’s going on with the enemy.”

What does that look like? The Air Force first began talking about their push to incorporate social media analysis into targeting in 2015 when Air Combat Command’s Gen. Hawk Carlisle described how analysts fighting ISIS were “combing through social media and they see some moron standing at this [ISIS weapons depot]… So they do some work — long story short, about 22 hours later through that very building, three JDAMs take that entire building out.”

Last week, Gen. Joseph Votel, who leads U.S. Central Command, described what that looks like in 2017. Speaking at the Billington Cybersecurity Summit in downtown Washington, D.C., Votel described a highly co-ordinated strike that involved several government agencies and international military partners, who shut down ISIS communications with a cyber offensive, then dropped real bombs to add, in military-speak, “lethal effects.”

“We had a recent success in coordinating the lethal effects of our special operations and air components with highly targeted and effective cyber operations,” Votel said. “This model for success is being replicated for planning in future operations and will be used to maintain pressure on these enemy networks, be they located in Iraq, or Syria, or on servers around the world. With time and effort, we hope to expand the duration of impacts on adversarial capabilities.”

The Phone Where the United States Calls the Russians

Technology aside, the air mission over Syria is also growing increasingly complicated as Russian and Syrian forces converge on ISIS’s remaining strongholds. Over the weekend, a Russian fighter targeted a group of Syrian Defense Forces working from the same base as U.S. advisors. The strike prompted an urgent phone call from U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

In Syria itself, a single telephone — the “deconfliction line” — remains the main tool for averting catastrophic collisions with Russian forces On Monday, Harrigian gave a rare glimpse into life next to Putin’s army, which gets better or worse depending on whether the Russians are replacing seasoned troops with newbies.

“What I would tell you is as [the Russians] rotate in forces, there is typically a change in behavior. That’s something that we are keen to, now,” he said. “Oftentimes, when some of the inappropriate behavior occurs, we will get on the hotline immediately…Our airmen are the unsung heroes, interpreting and translating for us. They give us incredible context to what the Russians are trying to do. We get these young airmen, bring them in, they’ve never been in a [combat area] in their life, but they perform just superbly. They play a key role in making sure that we can manage what has often been a tenuous relationship with the Russians.”

It goes to show, all the technology in the world sometimes can’t substitute for a good phone call.

X
This website uses cookies to enhance user experience and to analyze performance and traffic on our website. We also share information about your use of our site with our social media, advertising and analytics partners. Learn More / Do Not Sell My Personal Information
Accept Cookies
X
Cookie Preferences Cookie List

Do Not Sell My Personal Information

When you visit our website, we store cookies on your browser to collect information. The information collected might relate to you, your preferences or your device, and is mostly used to make the site work as you expect it to and to provide a more personalized web experience. However, you can choose not to allow certain types of cookies, which may impact your experience of the site and the services we are able to offer. Click on the different category headings to find out more and change our default settings according to your preference. You cannot opt-out of our First Party Strictly Necessary Cookies as they are deployed in order to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting the cookie banner and remembering your settings, to log into your account, to redirect you when you log out, etc.). For more information about the First and Third Party Cookies used please follow this link.

Allow All Cookies

Manage Consent Preferences

Strictly Necessary Cookies - Always Active

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Sale of Personal Data, Targeting & Social Media Cookies

Under the California Consumer Privacy Act, you have the right to opt-out of the sale of your personal information to third parties. These cookies collect information for analytics and to personalize your experience with targeted ads. You may exercise your right to opt out of the sale of personal information by using this toggle switch. If you opt out we will not be able to offer you personalised ads and will not hand over your personal information to any third parties. Additionally, you may contact our legal department for further clarification about your rights as a California consumer by using this Exercise My Rights link

If you have enabled privacy controls on your browser (such as a plugin), we have to take that as a valid request to opt-out. Therefore we would not be able to track your activity through the web. This may affect our ability to personalize ads according to your preferences.

Targeting cookies may be set through our site by our advertising partners. They may be used by those companies to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant adverts on other sites. They do not store directly personal information, but are based on uniquely identifying your browser and internet device. If you do not allow these cookies, you will experience less targeted advertising.

Social media cookies are set by a range of social media services that we have added to the site to enable you to share our content with your friends and networks. They are capable of tracking your browser across other sites and building up a profile of your interests. This may impact the content and messages you see on other websites you visit. If you do not allow these cookies you may not be able to use or see these sharing tools.

If you want to opt out of all of our lead reports and lists, please submit a privacy request at our Do Not Sell page.

Save Settings
Cookie Preferences Cookie List

Cookie List

A cookie is a small piece of data (text file) that a website – when visited by a user – asks your browser to store on your device in order to remember information about you, such as your language preference or login information. Those cookies are set by us and called first-party cookies. We also use third-party cookies – which are cookies from a domain different than the domain of the website you are visiting – for our advertising and marketing efforts. More specifically, we use cookies and other tracking technologies for the following purposes:

Strictly Necessary Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Functional Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Performance Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Sale of Personal Data

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.

Social Media Cookies

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.

Targeting Cookies

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.