By Carlo Munoz
Navy senior leaders are looking to integrate portions of the service’s surface warfare directorate into its intelligence and communcations shop, in an attempt to foster additional synergies in the field of unmanned system development, according to a top service official.
“At some point, I think we are going to see a further synergy,” between the information dominance and surface warfare groups, Rear Adm. Matthew Klunder, director for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities at the N2/N6, said yesterday.
“I think we are just about to turn the corner on this,” the ISR chief said of the ongoing efforts.
Currently under review by Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Gary Roughead, the proposed reorganization would take elements from the surface warfare division (N86) tied to unmanned system development for the surface fleet, and put them under the information dominance (N2/N6) banner, Klunder said during an Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International symposium in Washington yesterday.
The N2/N6 has been tasked as the overall Navy authority concerning UAS program coordination and development, specifically airborne and sumbersible unmanned platforms, according to Klunder. However, he did note a number of proposed UAS platforms and operations are tied to surface warfare ships and missions.
That said, the idea to fold in parts of N86 into the information dominance sector would be a logical progression to reduce duplicative efforts on UAS development and to ensure the Navy’s future UAS enterprise remains able to take advantage of budgetary and programatic synergies across the directorates over the long term.
“Let’s face it, it all comes down to funding,” he said. “You have to have some money behind your thoughts and innovations.” Additionally, the potential integration of N86, in some form or fashion, into the N2/N6 would also bring about more service focus on the development of unmanned surface vehicle development, he said.
The information dominance organization was borne out of a decision to join the Navy’s intelligence and communications groups a year ago to tackle, in part, the challenges involved in UAS development, he said.
But due to the relative youth of his organization, as well as the division between N2/N6 and N86 in terms of UAS development for air, surface and underwater platforms, Klunder noted that his directorate has been primarily focused on air and undersea vehicles.
However, the two shops have already been coordinating on unmanned surface vessels, accoring Capt. Duane Ashton, program manager for the Navy’s Littoral and Mine Warfare division.
Officials from his organization have already briefed a business case for USV development to both N86 and N2/N6, he said at the same conference. Ashton’s shop have also briefed a number of USV concepts “and look at where they fit” in the service’s long-term UAS plans, according to Ashton.
Should the two directorates merge in the near future, both shops would then be able to focus their mapower and resources into all UAS efforts across all domains equally, according to Klunder. “We are there,” he added. “We are just not 100 percent there, but we are trying to make strides there.”