Page 36 - Williams Foundation Integrated Force Design Seminar

Designing the Integrated Force: How to Define and Meet the Challenge?

The RAAF is looking at a new UAV to add to the force, and the Air Commodore saw that as best done by
shaping and leveraging the creation of the ISR hub at RAAF Edinburgh. And any new UAV should emerge
from the integrated P-8/Triton efforts from that hub.

“Our new platforms need to plug into a common organization that is thinking broadly about the mission rather
than simply buying a new UAV and handing it to the common organization. Platform acquisition in future
st
clearly will need to be informed by integrative innovations and the 21 century network of warfighters, as
you put it.”

And the RAAF needs to find ways to prepare and promote disruptive change. In part that will be done by
shaping a community, which has confidence in its ability to promote change and work towards a joint effect
from any acquisitions going forward.

“Predicting the future accurately is hard. What we need is to develop confidence in our ability to adapt
quickly as the future changes and evolves in front of us and to be able to respond to those changes. It is about
creating organizational capacity and confidence to be able to respond to an evolving future.”

The Jericho project team is now working on ways for the RAAF to understand and anticipate disruptive
change. They are focusing on a concept called disruptive thinking. We are working with the private sector
and with academia to find pockets of excellence able to come up with new ideas and new ways of using
fielded technology to help with defense’s mission.”

He articulated where he would like the RAAF to be able to position itself in the future.
“I would love to see Air Force become earlier adopters of technology. I think at the moment we wait until
technology is too mature before we bring it into service.

“We live in a region where competitors are clearly innovating rapidly.

“If we're able to bring ourselves forward on that technology acceptance curve, I believe that would be a
really good outcome for us.”

The Point of the Joint Effect: A More Lethal and Survivable Force

The discussion of something like integrated force design can seem to be abstract and metaphysical and more
of a seminar topic than an actual strategic effort by the ADF.

But it is not.

It is about ensuring that your warfighters are more lethal and survivable.

One is working to reduce fratricide, and a more capable and comprehensive use of combat resources at the
point of attack.

At the Williams Foundation Seminar held on April 11, 2017, no presenter more effectively drove home the
point than Brigadier General David Wainwright. He is Director General of Land Warfare in the Australian
Army.

In his concluding slide he provided a series of caveats on force design and brought the audience back to the
core point: “We can not forget that our young men and women will one day be stuck with our conclusions.”

Second Line of Defense

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