Network Operations

The novel 2034 by James Stavridis and Elliot Ackerman perpetuates a fundamental misunderstanding of how technology should be employed and managed in future conflicts.

The continuing narrative is that we should purposely degrade our systems in a conflict with a peer competitor because of the possibility of a degraded spectrum, cyber attacks, space-based detection and jamming. But if we preemptively degrade our technology in a peer conflict, we will lose.

In the novel, after a conflict with the Chinese Navy in which the U.S. technical systems were incapacitated, U.S. ships preemptively disabled “any interface with a computer, a GPS or [any interface] that could conceivably be accessed online.”

General Dynamics Information Technology Inc., Fairfax, Virginia, was awarded a $14,303,431 modification to contract W91QUZ-06-D-0012 for combined mission command network operations and maintenance information technology services. Work will be performed in Seoul, Republic of Korea, with an estimated completion date of July 31, 2019. Fiscal year 2018 operations and maintenance (Army) funds in the amount of $14,303,431 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army 411th Combat Support Battalion is the contracting activity.