Colonel Usaf John M Lanicci

Weather Operations in the Transformation Era: Maxwell Paper No. 29 Colonel Usaf John M Lanicci

Publisher Marketing: In "Weather Operations in the Transformation Era," Col. John M. Lanicci USAF, takes a compelling look at future weather operations. His hypothesis is that a consolidated battlespace picture integrates both natural and man-made elements, which is totally consistent with USAF transformation efforts. He points out that the way ahead is easier said than done and offers several cogent reasons why the weather operations portion of information-in-warfare has not caught up with current USAF doctrine. One such example is our historical tendency to look at weather as a somewhat isolated, tactical problem. Significant advances in information technology and advent of effects-based operations are propelling the USAF weather community away from traditional, single-inject stand-up briefings towards continuously updated advice to war fighters at every step of campaign/mission planning and execution. This technological momentum will make it necessary to fundamentally change data collection, analysis, prediction, and product tailoring. The author outlines these changes in a concept called weather, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (WISR), a term first used by the Air Staff to describe the total integration of natural and man-made environments for predictive battlespace awareness (PBA). The WISR concept is based on substantially increasing the volume of weather data collected intheater by using the same airborne assets being proposed for PBA, persistent ISR, and time-critical targeting. It proposes the creation of a four-dimensional database that can be used to integrate the natural environment into the common operating picture. The WISR concept also advocates transmitting real-time weather information to the cockpit as a means to optimize the "kill chain" by allowing rapid redirecting of sorties based on continuously updated weather information. Contributor Bio:  Press, Air University Walter Gary Sharp Sr. serves as a senior associate deputy general counsel for intelligence at the US Department of Defense, where he advises on legal issues related to intelligence, covert action, intelligence and counterintelligence policy, intelligence oversight, information security, information sharing, security classification policy, information operations, and computer network operations. Prior to his appointment, Dr. Sharp served as an associate deputy general counsel for international affairs at the Department of Defense; the director of legal research for international, comparative, and foreign law at the Law Library of Congress; the director of global and functional affairs within the Bureau of Legislative Affairs at the State Department; and a principal information security engineer at The MITRE Corporation. A veteran with 25 years of service, Dr. Sharp retired as a decorated US Marine Corps lieutenant colonel with prior enlisted service. His military assignments include commanding officer of a field artillery battery, senior prosecutor, deputy legal counsel to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and international law adviser for the commanding general of the Unified Task Force in Somalia during Operation Restore Hope. Dr. Sharp's military decorations include the Defense Superior Service Medal, and his many awards for writing excellence and academic achievement include the Judge Advocate General's School Alumni Association Annual Professional Writing Award and an American Bar Association Award for Professional Merit. Dr. Sharp is the author of numerous articles and three books: UN Peace Operations (1995), CyberSpace and the Use of Force (1999), and Jus Paciarii (1999). He serves as an adjunct professor of law at Georgetown University Law Center where he currently teaches a counterterrorism course, The Law of 24. He has also taught graduate-level seminars on United Nations peace operations and international peace and security. He lectures internationally in universities and other diverse public forums on wide-ranging topics of international law and national security law, such as international peace and security, conflict management, and peacekeeping operations.