By Robbin Laird

The Norwegians are reworking their defense systems to shape a 21^stcentury capability which can enhance their own capabilities but importantly work those capabilities into allied ready combat forces.

It is about shaping an effective 21^stcentury combat force which when combined with allies provides a very credible deterrent force.

And given the proximity to Russia and the lack of strategic depth, it needs to be deterrence in depth back through the North Atlantic and continental Europe.

The Norwegians are adding new capabilities, like the F-35, the P-8, a new tanker, new missiles and other combat capabilities.  But they are reworking their infrastructure as well to work more effectively in both the national and NATO interests.

One aspect of this is reworking the C2 systems within Norway, including building new or rebuilding older, whichever way, one wants to put it, within the Norwegian Joint Headquarters.

According to the Norwegian Ministry of Defence:

The Norwegian Joint Headquarters plans, conducts and leads the Norwegian Armed Forces’ operations in times of peace, crisis and war.

​​​​​​​The Norwegian Joint Headquarters (NJHQ) operates day and night, and has the overall command and control of all military activity in Norway. It also commands the Norwegian military personnel abroad. 

NJHQ is located in a mountain complex about 22 km from the city of Bodø in Northern Norway. From its joint operation centre, experienced officers continuously monitor the activity in Norway’s vast land and sea territories.

This is possible thanks to our many sensors such as radars, the Coast Guard and the maritime surveillance aircraft P-3 Orion. The headquarters gathers all the information and makes a complete picture of the current situation.

This picture is shared with other departments in the Norwegian Armed Forces, and with NATO.

The NJHQ Commander is the Chief of Defence’s most important advisor in questions concerning military operations and activity.

NJHQ M​AIN TASKS:

• Keep an eye with Norway’s vast sea and air territories, and have a current understanding of the overall situation.
• Exercise sovereignty in Norway’s land, sea and air territories – and exercise national jurisdiction in these areas.
• Be present, and be able to handle crisis of any kind.
• Support civil society.
• Plan and lead military exercises.
• Provide control and suppo​rt to Norwegian forces in international operations.

The operations center is located in a mountain facility and is focused on providing a common operational picture for the forces and for NATO as well as building modern C2 capabilities as well to leverage the changes underway to provide for enhanced situational awareness as well.

Recent Russian exercises have highlighted the importance not only of having rapid acquisition of an accurate combat picture but an ability to rapidly respond with the right force in the right place to defend Norway.

The Russians have been simulating attacks against Norway over the past couple of years. Thomas Nilsen in article published by the Barents Observer on March 5, 2018 provided an overview on recent Russian actions.

“Less than a year ago, on March 24th, Russian bombers were flying tactical flights towards the intelligence service’s installations in Vardø. The bombers were conducting offensive profiles before they returned to bases on Kola. A total of nine aircraft participated in the operation,” said Lieutenant General Morten Haga Lunde in his annual speech at Oslo Military Society….

Two months later, Russian bombers were again simulating an attack against targets even further west in Northern Norway, the intelligence director could tell.

“Also, on the 22nd of May last year were Russian aircraft again flying tactical flights towards a fleet of NATO vessels exercising in the Norwegian Ocean. They conducted offensive operations before they returned to different bases on the Kola Peninsula,» Morten Haga Lunde explained. 

“A total of 12 aircraft participated in this operation, including MiG-31, Fencer [Su-24], Fullback [Su-34] and Backfire [Tu-22M]…..”

Russia’s simulated offensive operations against Northern Norway did not stop with that, the intelligence director told.

“Less than a week later, on May 27 was a similar mission directed towards our military installations in the Bodø area. This happened in connection with a larger allied air force exercise led by Norway in cooperation with Sweden and Finland. Nine [Russian] aircraft participated in the operation…”

Talking about Russia’s largest military exercise last autumn, the Zapad-2017, Haga Lunde said Iskander missile systems were moved to an area close to the Norwegian border. 

“Another significant element in connection with Zapad it that the missile system Iskander was transferred to the high north, specifically to the Pechenga valley, less than 40 kilometers from Storskog, approx. 15 kilometers from Korpfjell, not far from the border to Norway…..”

At Bodø Airbase, I had a chance to meet with Brigadier General Jan Ove Rygg and to discuss the geographical situation facing Norway as well as the changes being made to enhance the operational picture and to improve crisis management capabilities going forward.

CV Jan Ove Rygg (English)

The map below provides one with a sense of how Norway looks at the Russian challenge.

The Russians are building out infrastructure in the High North and even if the primary purpose not might be military, the build out of infrastructure does provide for presence, engagement and can host the operation of dual capable systems.

And the vast maritime zones surrounding Norway provides another challenge to ensure that threats can be identified monitored and dealt with.

With significant shipping in the area, determining anomalies and threats to be dealt with is an ongoing challenge.

It is clearly not a zero sum game with the Russians, as Norway works with Russia on a number of issues, such as fisheries.  The two countries collaborate on ensuring that fishing in the maritime zones is regulated and “farmed” rather than exploited.

The goal is to have a sustainable fisheries industry and the two countries cooperate closely on this commercial and environmental objective.

In other words, a major demand is to be able to provide the military and civilian authorities with accurate and timely information through progress in situational awareness capabilities.

Brigadier General Rygg: “Everything that flies in Norway to support the government is operated by the air force.

“This means that we work closely with civilian authorities to provide for capabilities such as search and rescue and coast guard activities.”

With the coming of new ISR capabilities, such as P-8 and F-35, it will be an opportunity to leverage these new systems to enhance the situational awareness picture and to provided targeted information to decision makers to support cricis management efforts as well.

Brigadier General Rygg“I do not want to turn the F-35 into an ISR asset but it can cleaelry contribute to our efforts.

“More generally, the question how do we work ISR and C2 with the new assets?

“How do we use them in ways that inform us and not a potential adversary?”

The High North for Norway is a way of life, not some future scenario of activity being opened by global warming.  As such, this means that activity needs to be supported and monitored.

Brigadier General Rygg: “The maritime situation is changing as the Arctic changes and we are seeing significant growth in tourism.

“The problem is that with the large cruise ships, if there is an accident, we will be called upon to contribute assets, which we will do.

“But the best form of working rescue if a large cruise ship goes down will be another ship.”

The change in our ISR capabilities will flow into our National Joint Headquarters.  And we need to work those evolving capabilities with evolving C2 capabilities as well.

Brigadier General Rygg: “We are building out new C2 capabilities within the National Joint Headquarters.  It is about technology and reworking the workflow.

“We are bringing the key players into a close working relationship within the mountain to provide for better crisis management support as well.”

As infrastructure changes, the focus will as well to provide for crisis management support.

Brigadier General Rygg: “We are shifting from a classic joint targeting approach to a joint effects approach.  Every time that you do something with the military, you are creating an effect.

“We are fielding new systems, which provide capabilities we have not had in the past.

“How do we use these systems to create the appropriate joint effect?”

The kind of C2 system needed is clearly an agile, scalable and flexible one.

Brigadier General Rygg: “We may need to provide for mission control where the autonomy of key systems will be maximized.

“We may need to have a tight hierarchical C2 system.

“It depends on the threat; it depends on the mission and on the crisis management situation.

“But we need to build in redundancy and flexibility from the ground up.

“And we are.”

The featured photo shows the Norwegian Joint Headquarters. Credit: Norwegian Ministry of Defence

 

By Robbin Laird

Recently, I had a chance to visit Portsmouth, UK and talk with senior Royal Navy officers about the coming of the carrier and did so after talking with the team of senior RAF and Royal Navy officers standing up F-35 at RAF Marham.

Those interviews will be published in the next few weeks.

But getting a chance to see HMS Queen Elizabeth again and to talk with the RAF and the Royal Navy about her as well provided an opportunity to think about the context in which the carrier is being launched and about its impact on that context.

I have just finished a new Special Report which focuses on the approach of the Nordics to the strategic shift and the need to operate in what a senior Norwegian official referred to as the “new normal,” namely, dealing with the impact of Russian capabilities and behavior on the defense of the North Atlantic.

This has had a major impact on the UK, which the Chief of the Royal Air Force highlighted during his presentation earlier this year in Canberra at the Williams Foundation seminar on the strategic shift:

Let me offer some examples of how this feels at the moment from a British perspective. Just over two weeks ago, a foreign country, Russia, used military-grade nerve agent in an attempt to murder people on the streets of the United Kingdom. 

Not only an extraordinarily aggressive and reckless act, but the first offensive use of a nerve agent in Europe since 1945.

Russia’s also illegally annexed Crimea, the first time since the Second World War that one sovereign nation has forcibly annexed territory from another in Europe. This is in addition to the appalling destruction, which has been visited on the Syrian civilian population by the Russian military itself, and the criminal activities of the Russian state under Putin in cyberspace and elsewhere; they’re well known.

So the post-Second World War consensus that has provided the basis of the rules-based international order and, I might say, peace in Europe, is being challenged and undermined.

We must respond, collectively, to reassure our citizens that hostile acts by Russia against our countries, our interests, and our values, will not be tolerated. And closer to home here, we can see many of these same issues and concerns being played out in relation to, for example, North Korea.

The UK like several other liberal democracies are responding to the strategic shift by transforming their military capabilities.

But the UK has another strategic dynamic at play, namely, the negotiation of it new relationship with the European Union, known as Brexit. 

A key aspect of defining a post-Brexit Britain is clearly reworking the nature of the UK defense relationship with Europe as well sorting out how UK defense transformation relates to a post-Brexit UK defense narrative.

The new UK carrier is coming into this strategic context, which is complex enough, without the considerations of operationally standing up the carrier.

And the new carrier is itself a trigger or magnet to a UK force transformation process.

In the recent update published this year by the UK government of its earlier 2015 defense review, the carrier was highlighted a centerpiece of joint force transformation.

“The Joint Force that we are building will need to be versatile and agile.  It will need to be effective in the full range of environments and across all five domains – land, sea, air, space and cyber.

“It will be international by design, routinely exercising and operating with allies and partners.

“It will be credible and capable of addressing state and non-state threats both alongside other nations and on our own.”

“Notably, the report then identified the major elements of defense modernization designed for Joint Force 2025 to meet these criteria and with little surprise the first one identified was as follows:

“A maritime task group centered on a Queen Elizabeth Class aircraft carrier with F-35 Lightning combat aircraft.”

Most of the analysis of the new carrier really focuses on the platform and what is necessary to get that platform operational but that is far too narrow an approach. 

The carrier is a centerpiece, trigger or magnet for broader UK defense transformation within a unique historical context, namely, the broader strategic shift to dealing with higher end operations and the coming of Brexit.

From a force structure transformation piece, the focus on the carrier can be approached in several ways.

The first way is to look at the workups and training associated with getting the carrier ready for its 2021 maiden deployment.

This is a significant challenge and the focus of attention of the Royal Navy and its industrial partners and a major element of my discussions while at Portsmouth.

From this point of view, the integration of the aircraft to fly on the carrier is a major challenge as well, and includes three new aircraft, the F-35, Commando Merlin, and the Crow’s Nest.

The second way is to look at the impact of the new carrier on the Royal Navy as it shifts from a single ship deployment focus to reshaping the Navy as a maritime task force navy. 

And given how different the new UK carrier is from the US large deck carriers, this maritime task force will draw upon US experience but shape a new approach as well.

The shift to a maritime task force requires other changes as well with new shapes and capabilities coming to the fleet, new aircraft, new missiles and ultimately directed energy as well to the force.

The third way to look at the carrier is how the coming of the F-35 to the RAF and Royal Navy will intersect with the global partners also flying the aircraft, and notably the partners within Europe. 

With the UK flying the same aircraft as the Northern Europeans, including the Dutch, this shapes new opportunities and capabilities as well.

And the close working relationship with the US Navy and Marine Corps will be evident as the HMS Queen Elizabeth comes this summer for F-35 integration training off of the Virginia Coast and when the Marines operate off of the ship, including next year during further ship trials off of the British coast as well.

The fourth way to look at the carrier is the impact of distributed decision-making, distributed operations and mobile basing upon the concepts of operations which the carrier will enable and participate in.

Put in another way, the concepts of operations being shaped 21^stcentury combat forces are in transformation, a transformation which is built around distributed capabilities, distributed C2 and flexible or agile basing.

The new carrier both supports and interacts with all of these trends.

How will the carrier both contribute to and learn from these broader macro allied military transformation dynamics?

The fifth way to look at the coming of the carrier is to examine its intersection with and contribution to the transformation of airpower more generally.

The F-35 is a multi-domain flying combat system, rather than being a legacy multi-mission aircraft.

This provides an opportunity to both leverage and reshape multi-domain capabilities, as other aircraft are modernized or new assets added to the air combat force.

Clearly, the modernization of Typhoon is being done in close alignment with the coming of the F-35 and provides a significant plus up of the overall air combat force.

The coming of the P-8 to RAF Lossiemouth will provide as well a maritime domain awareness strike aircraft, which will provide a significant capability, which will be part of the operational envelope of the new maritime task force navy being forged around carrier.

In short, one can take a picture of the carrier.

But what one is not seeing is the tissue of relationships being reshaped by what you see in that picture.

It is a multi-domain warfare asset, which can only be understood as a driver for change within an overall UK defense transformation process and the new strategic setting.