U.S. Air Force intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance is relinquishing its separate identity and becoming an integral part of air combat operations. Sensor advances and the advent of network-centric warfare have both increased the discipline's importance and compressed the time required to carry out its mission taskings.

The U.S. Air Force is spearheading the joint community's pursuit to meet the need for speed-in a realm other than aircraft. A Web-based system developed by the service is providing the boost that commanders and intelligence specialists need to attain the goal of striking a target within seven minutes of a command to attack.

Future U.S. Air Force sensors will serve multiple roles as detectives, guards, messengers and avengers. New active and passive systems will network, exchange information, formulate opinions and even lead the fight against adversaries on the ground and in the air.

Autonomous batwing aircraft, boomerang-shaped surveillance vehicles, hypersonic exoatmospheric bombers and rapid-turnaround space launchers may be leading Air Force wings in this new millennium. As the F-22 becomes operational and the Joint Strike Fighter undergoes selection testing, Air Force scientists are pursuing extraordinary new vehicles that reflect the service's maturing mission as well as revolutionary capabilities.

Military, government and information technology professionals from the United States and 21 European countries attended the 19th Annual AFCEA TechNet Europe symposium and exposition in October to discuss the enlargement of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. The event provided a forum for intense dialogue on the effects of internal adaptation and restructuring of the organization as it applies to its communications and information systems requirements.

One year after surviving the year 2000 problem, computer users may be blessed with huge leaps in processing speeds and capabilities. Researchers at semiconductor manufacturers are developing new generations of chips that, in just three years, will offer 15 times as many transistors and compute several times as fast as today's models.

Central Europe's efforts to open the economy to free enterprise are dramatically affecting the electronics and telecommunications industries. Nowhere is the emerging response to free competition more crisp than in the Czech Republic. There, new commercial and military communications system advances are stimulating rapid domestic and export growth.

Federal agencies have formulated aggressive campaigns to recruit skilled employees during an era of increased need for information technology professionals. Forced to compete with private industry, these agencies are changing employment packages to lure qualified professionals into the public sector and meet departmental requirements.

The critical shortage of available technical talent has added a new wrinkle in the realm of proprietary information for corporations. Once reserved for the blueprints of jet fighter aircraft or new software programs, closely guarded secrets now include techniques used to attract the best and the brightest with education and experience in information technology sciences. In addition, the new corporate landscape is being shaped by policies and programs that encourage current employees to stay put, and congressional legislation is allowing more foreign workers to enter the U.S. work force.

Overall funding for programs in the U.S. military command, control, communications, computers and intelligence market is projected to remain relatively unchanged through fiscal year 2003, according to a new study. Spending is expected to only rise from $7.06 billion in fiscal year 1996 to $7.07 billion in fiscal year 2003. However, total funding for programs in the defensewide support systems market segment, comprising operational space systems and associated activities, is projected to rise strongly during this period.