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Concept of operations

About: Concept of operations is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 964 publications have been published within this topic receiving 6845 citations. The topic is also known as: CONOPS.


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Journal Article
TL;DR: Operational planning itself often fails to generate the level of understanding required to embark on wars in complex social settings, and a more collaborative planning process that drew on a broader base of knowledge to better understand the complexity and the conceptual options available is needed.
Abstract: [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] IF "THE FIRST, the supreme, most far reaching act of judgment that statesmen and commanders must make is to establish," as Clausewitz put it, "the kind of war on which they are embarking, neither mistaking it for, nor trying to turn it into, something that is alien to its nature," it is sobering to realize how often they get it wrong. (1) Today, the difficulty that Western political leaders have in articulating clear and coherent aims is a profound problem. No amount of informed thinking about concepts and plans would have prevented the planning shortfalls that bedevilled the occupation of Iraq in 2003. But, beyond the political smoke and mirrors, operational planning itself often fails to generate the level of understanding required to embark on wars in complex social settings. In Afghanistan and Iraq, military planners would preside over inappropriate operational approaches and tactics, and were slow to perceive, understand, and manage transitions. Learning on the job proved a costly business, and strategic aims had to be left by the wayside. In the light of Afghanistan and Iraq, the apparent shortcomings of operational planning have been much discussed. In traditional approaches to planning, commanders often dealt with the conceptual component of operations in rather intuitive ways. The concept of operations was often assumed in the commander's initial guidance and the formulation of objectives. But, in the context of today's wars in complex social settings, the commander by himself is unlikely to know enough about the political context, operational environment, and opponents to make fully informed judgements, and a poorly appraised concept of operations is likely to go straight to the school of hard knocks. What seemed to be required was a more collaborative planning process that drew on a broader base of knowledge to better understand the complexity and the conceptual options available. The U.S. Army addressed the conceptual-deficit with "design," and the Training and Doctrine Command primed work at the Combined Arms Doctrine Directorate and School of Advanced Military Studies to foster a reform discourse and write new doctrine. (2) Design would be institutionalized in Field Manual (FM) 3-0, Operations, and FM 5-0, The Operations Process, and described "a methodology for applying critical and creative thinking to understand, visualize, and describe complex, ill-structured problems and develop approaches to solve them." (3) In comparison to traditional planning, a design-plus process envisaged a far more systematic handling of the conceptual component (Figure 1). Once strategic aims had been handed down by national command authorities and interpreted in the commander's initial guidance, a design team was to review a mass of potentially relevant information about the operational environment, the problem at hand, and the choices of operational approach available. (4) Then, after distilling the key information from the environmental frame, problem frame, and operational approach space, an initial design concept could be synthesized; it was essentially a hypothesis about solving the problem. Thereafter, the design concept was to be rendered into a campaign narrative and visualizations that could be handed on to planners, informing their selection of objectives and tasks (and focusing warfighting functions related to intelligence, force generation, movements, kinetic action, logistics, etc.) through the Military Decision Making Process. [FIGURE 1 OMITTED] Design promised to build a better bridge between strategic problem and desired outcome by better aligning mission aims, purposes, objectives, and tasks. In this sense, if designers generated an understanding of the why and the what of a mission, detailed planners rolled-out the what and the how (Figure 2). (5) However, while the need for design and the process by which it could be undertaken was well described in the emerging discourse and doctrine, a methodology for delivering the products of design was less well developed, leaving designers to jury-rig their own descriptions and visualizations. …

2 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The Naval Surface Warfighting Vision 2030 as discussed by the authors was developed by a small team of naval analysts at the Naval Surface Warfare Center for the purpose of developing future warfighting concepts, which is a strategy-framed, top-down description of surface warfare.
Abstract: The Naval Surface Warfighting Vision 2030 was developed by a small team of naval analysts at the Naval Surface Warfare Center for the purpose of developing future warfighting concepts. The Warfighting Vision 2030 is a strategy-framed, top-down description of surface warfare, which focuses on future warfighting needs. A surface warfare concept of operations is presented and evaluated in several different naval campaign scenarios, which are varied depending on future world geopolitical alternatives. A naval surface force structure is postulated and analyzed in terms of the surface ships and combat systems required to implement the concept of operations. Ship and combat system characteristics are generated for conceptual ship-types. Performance goals are analyzed based on parametric tradeoffs conducted at the operational level of warfare. A mother ship concept, which features smaller scout-fighter vehicles (surface, sub-surface, and air), is presented as a means of performing specialized missions, such as mine countermeasures, special forces operations and shallow water ASW. The “vision” surface force structure is introduced as a way to rebalance and evolve from today's force structure to a more flexible, adaptable, and affordable force for the future.

2 citations

01 Jun 2014
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors look at the possibility of using space-based assets, based on the CubeSat standard, to perform these missions to a higher level of quality, and how this system would be folded into the current space systems operational concept, as well as some recommendations for further study.
Abstract: : Space Situational Awareness and Space Object Identification are vital to discovering and assessing space-based threats. The current ground-based mission architecture and operational concept do not provide enough detailed information on space objects to give planners and strategists a true picture of the space order of battle. This thesis looks at the possibility of using space-based assets, based on the CubeSat standard, to perform these missions to a higher level of quality. How this system would be folded into the current space systems operational concept is analyzed, as well as some recommendations for further study.

2 citations

Proceedings ArticleDOI
05 Jan 2004
TL;DR: The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the system as proposed, detail the concept of operations of theSystem, and summarize the capabilities of the System.
Abstract: The International Space Station (ISS) has several external attach locations to permit space research and observations outside the pressurized volume of the Space Station. To facilitate the installation of small individual payloads, NASA is developing a system that will provide the necessary data routing, power distribution, and structural interfaces, for the accommodation of these small external payloads. The system will be called the Express Pallet and will support 6 small adapter size payloads that can be individually removed and replaced on orbit. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the system as proposed, detail the concept of operations of the system, and summarize the capabilities of the system.

2 citations

Book
17 Oct 2012
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors suggest several alternative approaches for resolving these issues, and assess them systematically against issue-driven criteria, and point to a "composite alternative" (drawing best features from the candidates) as the ideal course of action for building an effective modernization framework.
Abstract: The chief of staff has articulated a vision for the future of Air Force modernization planning, based on a family of effectsand capabilities-based “Task Force Concepts of Operations.” The initiative is slowly gaining momentum as a new “Capabilities Review and Risk Assessment” process takes hold to link program and resource decisions to the desired operational capabilities. Despite the promising start, the new approach must likely be enhanced significantly if it is to evolve into an effective “control system” for modernization. The Air Force must cope with pressures and “boundary conditions” imposed by DoD’s transformation priorities, joint architectures and interoperability policy, spiral acquisition policy, and some directed reorganizations. In order to manage these and leverage them favorably, the Air Force must resolve difficult issues involving stovepipes, misalignment, and lack of accountability in current processes and organizations, and shortcomings in the quality and completeness of information available for planning and decision-making. The paper suggests several alternative approaches for resolving these issues, and assesses them systematically against issue-driven criteria. The results point to a “composite alternative” (drawing best features from the candidates) as the ideal course of action for building an effective modernization framework. The recommended framework emphasizes better architectural definition of Task Force concepts, the need to manage program portfolios in an integrated manner, the importance of aggressive concept innovation within broad strategic guidelines, and the need for a pervasive and common assessment mechanism to facilitate horizontal and vertical integration across both Air Force and

2 citations


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Performance
Metrics
No. of papers in the topic in previous years
YearPapers
202133
202025
201940
201830
201743
201647