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2017 | Book

Information Sharing in Military and Security Operations Read chapter Read first chapter

Information Sharing in Military Operations

Editors: Irina Goldenberg, Joseph Soeters, Waylon H. Dean

Publisher: Springer International Publishing

Book Series : Advanced Sciences and Technologies for Security Applications

Part of: Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" , Springer Professional "Technik" , Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

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About this book

This volume explores the interpersonal, organizational, and technological enablers and barriers to information and intelligence sharing in multinational and multiagency military, humanitarian, and counterterrorism operations. To this end the contributions present case studies and other empirical research. UN and special operations headquarters are studied, along with multinational operations in Mali, Iraq, and Afghanistan by the UN and by U.S. Central Command. Perennial themes are the need for a holistic approach to information sharing—one that incorporates all the above enablers—and the importance of learning from experience, which should be the basis for operational planning. There is still considerable ground to be gained in enhancing the efficacy of information sharing in the context of defense and security, and the present book contributes to this goal.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter
Chapter 1. Information Sharing in Military and Security Operations
Abstract
Information sharing is vital to the success of multinational and multi-agency military, humanitarian, and counterterrorism operations. This introductory chapter discusses the importance of information sharing to the success of such operations and the reasons for sharing and for not sharing information. The various organizational and administrative levels through which information sharing takes place are also discussed in order to contextualize the chapters in this volume.
Joseph Soeters
Chapter 2. Information Fusion: Intelligence Centers and Intelligence Analysis
Abstract
September 11, 2001, marked a major turning point for domestic and international information sharing among militaries and civilian security services. The U.S. Department of Defense, for one, transformed itself from a Cold War fighting force to one tailored to fighting global terrorism and terror-sponsoring regimes. The international character of terrorism required new information technology and new sources of information. The variety and volume of information also required an organizational structure to overcome the compartmentalization of intelligence. Fusion centers became the solution. This chapter summarizes the existing literature on information and intelligence fusion in both civilian and military fusion centers. It recounts the development of civilian fusion centers intended to deal with domestic terrorist threats and examines how the concept has been applied in military organizations. The paper reviews different models that have been used to develop fusion centers.
Victor Catano, Jeffery Gauger
Chapter 3. Oh, Didn’t Anyone Tell You? The Importance of Intra-Organizational Information Sharing
Abstract
Informational justice, a component of organizational justice, measures how employees perceive the quality of information they receive about the organizational decisions that affect them. Informational justice has been shown to impact personnel outcomes, including performance and retention. This chapter examines perceptions of informational justice and their effect on key outcomes in survey data from 6503 Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) personnel. We found that informational justice was related to perceptions of organizational justice, organizational and unit leadership, career management, trust in the CAF, and psychological withdrawal. Mediational analyses indicated that perceptions of informational justice were related to commitment and leave intentions, even after controlling for other variables, such as perceptions of overall justice and satisfaction with leadership. Implications for information sharing within military organizations are discussed.
Irina Goldenberg, Mathieu Saindon, Jumana Al-Tawil
Chapter 4. Information Sharing in Contemporary Operations: The Strength of SOF Ties
Abstract
The complexity of contemporary operations makes efficient information sharing one of the key challenges for multinational cooperation. Today’s operations are conducted by military personnel from diverse backgrounds, often operating in a foreign culture alongside host nation military and police forces. In this chapter, we examine the special operations forces command centers involved in counter-network operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. We found that by flattening their command structures, leveraging state-of-the art technology, and replacing the “need to know” with the “need to share” mindset, these organizations have achieved shorter sensor-to-decision time. We suggest that military organizations can learn important lessons about information sharing from special operations forces headquarters—especially from their management of the human dimension of information sharing.
Delphine Resteigne, Steven Van den Bogaert
Chapter 5. Information Sharing Among Military Operational Staff: The French Officers’ Experience
Abstract
Military leaders need to protect information to maintain strategic superiority over the enemy, but they also need accurate and timely information to make good decisions. This chapter reports on an empirical study among French operational headquarters staff that analyzed how officers perceive and implement the need-to-share doctrine, which has only recently replaced the need-to-know doctrine. My findings suggest that interoperability trails technological advances, such that new technologies are the source of many interoperability problems. I observed no insurmountable tension between protecting and sharing information, but each level of operations (strategic, operational, and tactical) seems to face specific information sharing problems.
Barbara Jankowski
Chapter 6. Trust and Information Sharing in Multinational–Multiagency Teams
Abstract
International responses to humanitarian disasters, terrorism, criminal activities, and pandemics have increasingly involved integrated multiagency civil–military teams whose success depends on their ability to effectively share information. Trust is critical to effective collaboration and information sharing in civilian, military, and multiagency teams. This chapter defines trust and its essential characteristics, and then specifies the variety of ways in which trust can affect information sharing. We also outline the array of challenges faced by most multinational and multiagency teams that can undermine the trust–information-sharing relationship. We conclude by outlining principles that promote trust and some ways in which trust may be developed and maintained in the demanding context of multinational–multiagency missions.
Ritu Gill, Megan M. Thompson
Chapter 7. Information Sharing at United States Central Command
Abstract
Underlying the United States Central Command’s (CENTCOM) manage–prevent–shape strategy is its “need to share” approach to information sharing. Information is sent and received to and from its partners, which include other branches of the U.S. military, civilian government agencies and departments, coalition and partner countries, and non-governmental organizations. This includes information about defense, intelligence, vendors, contractors, the demographic details of populations for health and education program planning, and urban planning information for reconstruction programs. This chapter discusses the origins, inner workings, and thought processes behind CENTCOM’s information-sharing strategy.
Glen Segell
Chapter 8. How Information Sharing Improves Organizational Effectiveness in Coalition Operations
Abstract
Information sharing is important to the organizational effectiveness of multinational operations. This chapter examines the role of information sharing and its enablers and barriers through the model of organizational effectiveness for NATO Headquarters developed by the NATO Research and Technology Organization, Human Factors and Medicine Research Task Group 163. We suggest that common cultural training and education across all ranks, improved language skills at all levels, and information platforms and opportunities for social networking promote team cohesion and trust and therefore encourage the exchange of information.
Andrea Rinaldo, Esther Vogler-Bisig, Tibor Szvircsev Tresch
Chapter 9. Information Sharing Between U.S. and Japanese Forces Before, During, and After Operation Tomodachi
Abstract
Operation Tomodachi was a massive joint-relief effort by U.S. and Japanese forces following the earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan on March 11, 2011. The U.S. military—especially the III Marine Expeditionary Force headquartered in Okinawa Prefecture—and Japan’s Self-Defense Forces each had a wealth of experience responding to natural disasters and even collaborating with one another before Operation Tomodachi, although primarily in defense-related exercises. This chapter explores information sharing between U.S. and Japanese forces and looks at both the positive effects of the disaster on the U.S.–Japan security relationship and some of the outstanding issues in disaster cooperation. I argue that it was primarily these pre-existing relationships that made successful cooperation possible and that the absence of prior relationships may have contributed to some missed opportunities.
Robert D. Eldridge
Chapter 10. Conditions for Effective Intelligence and Information Sharing: Insights from Dutch–Japanese Cooperation in Iraq, 2003–2005
Abstract
Dutch and Japanese forces were deployed together in Al Muthanna province in Iraq from 2003 to 2005. This chapter investigates intelligence and information sharing between the forces, including during the pre-deployment phase on the Japanese side. Dutch–Japanese intelligence and information sharing remained lopsided throughout the deployment, a situation that can be attributed to Japan’s lack of readiness to conduct operations in a region remote from its direct defense interests and to the likelihood that it was not producing security-related intelligence beyond its areas of mandate and operations. The inadequacy of the campaign authority that the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) received from its political masters was such that its own effectiveness, as well as the Dutch operation, depended on the “goodwill” of the Dutch forces tasked to assist the JSDF, especially with regard to information and intelligence.
Chiyuki Aoi
Chapter 11. Information Sharing in Military Organizations: A Sociomaterial Perspective
Abstract
Over the past decade, studies in military science have used different perspectives to investigate and explain the phenomenon of information sharing. The focus has been on individuals and elements, on documents, and on technologies and environments. Information sharing, however, is not limited to either the social or the material world. Information sharing in military organizations takes place between soldiers, sailors, and airmen as well as between headquarters, task forces, and units, but is inevitably affected by directives, plans, and procedures, by reports and assessments, as well as by radios, telephones, command and control systems, databases, and computer networks. My objective in this chapter is to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the phenomenon of information sharing by proposing a sociomaterial perspective. Studies that adopt a sociomaterial perspective consider the social and the material world as inextricably related and focus on specific entanglements, rather than on particular entities. To demonstrate the applicability of a sociomaterial perspective, I provide some examples from a study on information sharing in the International Security Assistance Force in southern Afghanistan.
Gijs Van den Heuvel
Chapter 12. Information Sharing in Multinational Peacekeeping Operations
Abstract
Information sharing can be difficult in multinational coalitions because different cultures introduce different languages, norms, national interests, and even different leadership styles. One approach to bridging the cultural divide is creating a hybrid work culture formed from the cultures that compose the coalition. The big question is how this hybrid culture can be brought about. In this chapter, we argue, first, that pre-deployment training in foreign languages, soft skills, common meetings, and an overarching ideology facilitate a hybrid culture and thus effective information sharing. Second, we propose that one of the most important “soft skills” needed to bridge cultural difference is the willingness and the ability of individual members of different cultures to engage in negotiation. We support our contention with a case study of peacekeepers’ perceptions of the challenges with information sharing and collaboration in building a hybrid organizational culture.
Ünsal Sığrı, A. Kadir Varoğlu, Ufuk Başar, Demet Varoğlu
Chapter 13. Stovepiping Within Multinational Military Operations: The Case of Mali
Abstract
Information sharing within multinational military operations presents challenges for the intelligence process. This chapter draws on intelligence, military, and organizational studies to analyze information sharing in the intelligence process of the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali. This mission consisted of 41 different African, Asian, and European countries. Three clusters of issues—technological, organizational, and politics and policy—emerged to render information sharing between militaries suboptimal, though the main problem was stovepiping: information that should have been shared remained compartmentalized. Mutual distrust and turf wars resulting from unfamiliarity, different practices, and a suboptimal level of interoperability made sharing information a liability rather than a means of improving the quality of the intelligence assessments. Several remedies for these information sharing challenges are proposed.
Sebastiaan Rietjens, Floribert Baudet
Chapter 14. Managing the Media During the War in Mali: Between Restriction and Pragmatism
Abstract
Winning the communication battle is an important part of winning the war. Numerous external communications targets must be defined, including media, public opinion (domestic and foreign), political and military partners, and enemy combatants. This paper examines the French Ministry of Defense’s (MoD) communication strategy during the first weeks of Operation Serval, part of the UN-initiated African-led International Support to Mali in 2012–2013. Based on readings (press, official communications), a content analysis, and semi-structured interviews with MoD public affairs personnel (military and civilian), this paper looks at the traditional information-sharing communication challenges of armed forces during operations, including the balance between the need for secrecy, especially during frontline combat, and the (French) people’s right to be informed. The main thesis of this paper is that the armed forces are a pragmatic institution, which has a wide range of tools to manage the media, in spite of the media’s inevitable criticism.
Saïd Haddad
Chapter 15. The War at Home: Putin’s Information Strategy Toward the Russian Population
Abstract
Russian president Vladimir Putin is pursuing a return to great-power status for Russia. In order to achieve his goal, Putin is using several information strategies to persuade the population to accept an escalation in military spending and the use of military force. These strategies have been called hybrid or information warfare, because they involve manipulating information available to the general public by controlling television networks and the Russian media. The media presents the Russian population with an “us against them” narrative where the “genuine and clean” Russian moral values are contrasted with the “depraved, immoral and decadent West.” This battle of values is depicted in the national media as an existential struggle that requires the support and expansion in the use of military force.
Nina Hellum
Chapter 16. Enablers and Barriers to Information Sharing in Military and Security Operations: Lessons Learned
Abstract
The contributors to this volume have identified organizational, technological, and human factors that enable and hinder information sharing in military, humanitarian, and counterterrorism operations. This concluding chapter is a synopsis of the recurring enablers and barriers to information sharing raised by the authors. Reciprocity, trust, interoperability, language proficiency, and common pre-deployment training come up in almost every contribution. These enablers and barriers are also widely attested in the literature.
Irina Goldenberg, Waylon H. Dean
Backmatter
Metadata
Title
Information Sharing in Military Operations
Editors
Irina Goldenberg
Joseph Soeters
Waylon H. Dean
Copyright Year
2017
Electronic ISBN
978-3-319-42819-2
Print ISBN
978-3-319-42817-8
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-42819-2