element1loop wrote:...
"... and simplifies much data sharing and number crunching, and provides for a far more graceful drop in capability,[sic] in the event EA and cyber are more or less effective, in battle, at attriting Data-Power. ... "
You wan't to put all your eggs in the network basket? And hope the network is not degraded or data flow tacticaly constricted or slowed?
Seems like a really bad idea to me. Tactical digital stovepiping.
This is certainly true in hub and spoke, critical point of failure type of systems. Here the adversary simply targets weak links in the kill chain.
What the F-35 (and other 5th gen nodes) brings to the table is a mesh network, like a fishing net, where there is no there there, at the individual knots of the net. But if a hole is punched it still functions to catch all the fish, though perhaps with some "leakage" where the failure is.
Now the F-35 takes this mesh view a step further. It empowers the node (a single aircraft) to connect and rebuild its own net environment as links are denied. It acts like a net, but when a hole is punched ... there is also a "there there." There is no stove piping, digital or otherwise. Think the Stargate replicators. That's the fifth gen goal. It's tough to find a spot to shoot at when there really isn't a kill chain.
An example might be in the deployment of the Bee by the Marines. An enemy can use long range capabilities to attack Air Refueling, AWACS, carriers, runways, bases, ... hoping to break the kill chain. But the Marine unit is a "collections of ants."
It moves the V-22 austere field package off of the "about to be sunk" LHD, changing it's support base to an ESB or LSD or ... and sets up a refueling/rearming station in a forest, on a deserted island, with a couple of F-35s that didn't make it back because the tanker went down. It spawns a mini air base in the middle of no where. And the rest of the Marine unit does that all over the battle space. The F-35 refueling hot on the ground gets battlefield data from the airborne F-35 that is as good as the AWACS, that was shot down. The challenge becomes a "Whack-a-Mole" game for the adversary.
That is not a stove pipe.
MHO,
BP