JADC2 Concept All About Moving Data, Air Force Chief of Staff Says

The Air Force chief of staff reports seeing momentum among the military services on the joint all-domain command and control, or JADC2, concept as dialogues between the branches and the Joint Staff continue. 

Speaking at a Defense Writers Group roundtable Wednesday, the Air Force’s Gen. Charles Q Brown, Jr., said the Joint Staff is working on defining data standards and digital architectures that the “services all need to line up behind” to enable the JADC2 concept. 

“That's what's going to really empower us to be able to connect like we talk about with JADC2,” Brown said. 

Brown said he talked with the Chief of Naval Operations, Adm. Michael M. Gilday, last week to discuss efforts in this area as well. Senior leaders should engage in dialogue on a more regular basis to ensure accountability on the JADC2 front, Brown said. 

JADC2 is about how data gets moved, Brown said, referencing the Defense Department’s enterprisewide data strategy, which was released in October. Joint all-domain operations is one of the strategy’s three main focus areas, and the document states data standards and interoperability requirements for JADC2 “directly support military readiness.” 

“All our chief data officers from all the services are coming together,” Brown said. “So what we see is a lot more dialogue between the services on data, how we move information, and the connectivity, and how we have some level of standards so we can plug in and move the data back and forth very quickly.”