The final steps of family readiness activities and sustainment training alone, keeps Soldiers thoroughly occupied just prior to their deployment. But for an expeditionary unit, becoming acclimated with the situational intelligence of the area of responsibility to which they will deploy is critical.
The virtual environment in the Army's Global Network Enterprise Construct (GNEC) will allow them to do so from the convenience of their own pre-deployment headquarters.
During these last strides towards deployment, these Soldiers can log on locally through a virtual connection to view updates to the Common Operating Picture of the battle in which they will partake. Access is based on security clearance level. This will allow them to "remain intellectually and culturally aware of the evolving situation in the expeditionary environment," said Brig. Gen. Jeffrey G. Smith Jr., commanding general, of the Army's 5th Signal Command (Theater) in Germany.
The unit will be reunited with its equipment once it lands in its strategic Sea Port of Debarkation (SPOD) or Aerial Port of Debarkation (SPOD) to disembark for its mission, Smith said. Once power is established, the equipment is connected to the operationally-based GNEC. It is also immediately refreshed with Common Operating Picture information, so there is only a minuscule gap in knowledge.
"What this means is that you are building combat power even before you depart," Smith said. "And combat power being defined as increased knowledge of the situation you are about to go into. That is a first."
Today, the delay in situational understanding for a Warfighter of the location to where they will deploy might range from 3-5 weeks, Smith said.
"The GNEC transforms all of that, so that you are building combat power every step of the way," Smith said. "You land in theater, you're culturally aware, you're aware of your situation and you're ready to modify it; but based on actual participation in the fight."
During interviews at the Network Service Center Operations Validation (NSC OPVAL), in Grafenwoehr, Germany, Smith and Lt. Gen. Jeffrey A. Sorenson also provided insight into the manner in which GNEC will contribute to the Army's transformation to a construct in which one combat formation can be relieved by another by replacing a unit's Soldiers rather than equipment.
Though the Army provides information technology services and support at numerous locations throughout the world and more than 440 domestic sites; in the next few years, 80 percent of it will be located in the United States, according to the CIO/G-6.
Over the next three years, GNEC will support the Army's effort to consolidate its information technology enterprise to less than five Network Service Centers (NCS) located across the globe.
Resident on the GNEC will be electronic identification of Soldiers, their units, along with their information systems and requirements, Smith said. The construct will allow users to rapidly tailor and task organize humans and their information requirements - both of which are essential needs for a brigade combat team's mission, he said.
As they extend into expeditionary environments, units will be able to reconnect to a central repository to gain and re-establish access to their identifications and information requirements, from any location.
"So, if you have a brigade combat team that is employed, established in an area of responsibility and is going to be relieved in place by another brigade combat team; that incoming team simply assumes the exact same computers," Smith said. "And then from a central location the identities are re-established with the incoming brigade combat team."
Thus, the rapidity at which one organization can transition to the next will increase significantly, he said.
"In the old days, we had to essentially replace the entire infrastructure with a brand new one," Smith said.
Upon deployment, brigade combat teams will still be required to bring their own information services such as a server set, Smith said. They must provide their own capability to be disconnected from the operationally-based GNEC.
Sorenson likened the GNEC experience to that of a Blackberry, on which users can communicate by telephone or e-mail from anywhere in the world without replacing a phone number or Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) card. SIM cards can be switched among multiple phones, so that a user can retain their personal identity information, cell phone number, phone book, text messages and other data.
"The analogy I would give you is: it's like your own personal home, where you have one provider giving you a phone; you have another provider for television or cable and you have another provider of Internet," said Sorenson, the Army's Chief Information Officer/G-6. "Many companies today, such as Verizon, are packing all of those together and it essentially gives you that same capability for a reduced cost."
Everything over Internet Protocol (EoIP) has made this possible for these providers by converging data, voice and communications capabilities over the Internet, he said.
"I will say that we are kind of leveraging that into the future with respect to what we're going to do with the GNEC," Sorenson said.
During the Network Service Center Operations Validation (NSC OPVAL), held from April through May, the 18th Fires Brigade successfully simulated a scenario of leaving its server equipment behind while notionally traveling from its headquarters of Fort Bragg, N.C., to its area of responsibility at Grafenwoehr, Germany.
Under the GNEC, a BCT preparing for phase one or two of an early fight, can essentially have its tactical network replicated inside an Area Processing Center (APC).
An APC is a concentration point for interconnectivity among installations, a location for common servers and enterprise services, and an entry point into the Army enterprise through an enhanced security gateway, according to the Program Executive Office for Enterprise Information Systems (PEO EIS).
Prior to deployment to a yet-to-be established location, a unit can load its equipment, execute its local training and then connect to the GNEC through an APC. This allows them to attain their services, even as they move from garrison, then local training and then onto a national training center in preparation for deployment, Smith said.
"This means that their information systems are always being updated with information that is flowing in from the rest of the world," Smith said. "The intelligence picture, the operational picture, the sustainment picture and also their understanding of the environment in which they are going is constantly being updated."
As their equipment is packed on a strategic lift and moved by boat to the location of their expeditionary mission, Warfighters can log into GNEC from their garrison for intelligence updates of their next location.
"So even though they are moving strategically from one location to another; the minute they get there and connect to the network, suddenly they are completely up-to-date on the enemy situation and the friendly situation," he said.
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