Research On Network Centric Warfare Concepts And Its Grid Architecture Model

Network Centric Warfare is an information network architecture, which connects the information, supervisory and reconnaissance system, communication system, command and control system and weapon system seamlessly together, through which campaign participants can communicate their information, understand battlespace situation, superintend and implement actions. The ISR sensor network, linking the sensors in the levels of strategy, battle and tactics, can provide "battlespace situation picture". The command and control network consisting of all the command organizations, can coordinate to manage battlespace and make decisions speedly. The shooter network including main weapon systems, can make precision engagement. The communication network works as a nerve center to support the former three ones. The units networked in the battlespace can speed information flowing, allow dispersed forces to share information, transfer information advantage into cognitive advantage, and then coordinate military operations to maximize effects.This paper summarizes the origin of Network Centric Warfare, and introduces the meaning of research on it. NCW is defined at the basic level, the four domains it influences and the relevance among them are expounded, then the core operational conceptions and the conceptual framework of Network Centric Operation are detailed. Based on the summary to the development and the implementation of the American army, navy and air forces, this paper analyzes the operational pattern and sums up the operational characteristic of NCW. The architecture of NCW is focused in the thesis, and logically divided into four parts: the foundation grid, the sensor grid, the command and control grid and the shooter grid. The functional grid model of NCW is presented after the past status and the development goal of each grid being discussed. Based on the study of CoABS grid architecture, Net-Centricity Enterprise Architecture and Oracle's NCW Architecture, OGSA-Based NCW Architecture is provided. In the end, the application to NCW, the future developing steps and the challenges it faces are explored.