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The U.S. military is counting on the information superhighway in its march toward continued battlefield supremacy. As outlined in two recent studies describing future force goals, network-centric warfare is at the core of plans to ensure that military domination is maintained. The aim is for information to be the primary tool enabling U.S. forces to respond to and overcome any military challenge in any arena worldwide.

AFCEA International is fast approaching its keystone event, TechNet International. For many years, this show has been the primary forum for accomplishments from AFCEA's field and a showcase of technology for its corporate associates. The entire AFCEA family looks forward to this event, as both active volunteers and geographically diverse members make plans to come to Washington, D.C. These activists, who include regional vice presidents, chapter officers and Young AFCEANs, participate in daylong business meetings and offer advice to the AFCEA headquarters staff.

The U.S. Marine Corps is working a new combined arms team approach to address the challenges posed by fighting in an urban environment. This focus emphasizes training Marines to fight in a new mix of armor and infantry that support each other without sacrificing maneuver warfare capabilities.

The U.S. Marine Corps is developing battlefield management software and advanced communications tools that will help future commanders make critical decisions by filtering incoming information and suggesting courses of action. This incoming data and the corresponding orders will be broadcast through lightweight satellite communications devices and will reach all echelons from brigade to squad level.

Tactical network software may enable deployed U.S. Marines to share data about numerous targets without the bandwidth constraints or large space requirements of other systems. As the principles of network-centric warfare continue to drive the development of military command and control doctrine, this central component network could provide answers to the challenges of system extensibility and interoperability.

Network monitoring tools, long the purview of the U.S. Defense Department logistics community, now are moving to the warfighting environment to support future military operations. The technology continuously examines the health of networks, then reports this information to a central location. It also can prevent system slowdowns by predicting problems and offering solutions.

An advanced personnel-location and communications system will allow U.S. and allied air forces to more easily locate downed pilots and crews. The technology consists of a warfighter-worn personal transceiver with a global positioning system capability and a signal interrogator carried on a search aircraft to query the beacon, and it could expedite efficient wartime aircrew recovery.

The U.S. Joint Spectrum Center is developing and will maintain an extensive set of databases to directly support both the spectrum management and electromagnetic environmental effect communities. To accomplish this task, the center has established the Data Quality Metrics Program, which will monitor and enhance the quality of its databases.

What began accidentally could be the foundation for a revolutionary approach to optical data storage. By enhancing and controlling fluorescence exhibited by nanoparticles, scientists can rapidly switch the particle colors on and off, creating robust nanoscopic storage elements that can pack a large amount of data in a small amount of space.

The Swedish armed forces and the U.S. Marine Corps are collaborating to develop a design for the possible command post of the future. The goal is to bridge the gap between operational knowledge and technological solutions.