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Megacity Applications of Cyber Effects (MACE)

End State Vignette

_A Violent Extremist Organization (VEO) operating in an area with weak governance has taken over a dense slum as their primary operating and support area. The Host Nation has requested support from the US government, who has deployed a group of US Special Operations Forces (SOF) to work with the Host Nation's military and law enforcement to counter the VEO's activities. As collaboration between the Host Nation and SOF matures, SOF intelligence analysts confirm that a meeting of VEO key leaders is imminent. The Host Nation requests SOF support to conduct a mission to capture and exfiltrate these key leaders to provide further insight into the activities and resources used by the VEO.

Due to the dense, multi-layer nature of the slum, traditional overhead resources such as indirect fire and Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) are unavailable. The VEO has even acquired a jammer that blocks all reception of the various Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) within the slum. Even worse, the VEO is using off-the-shelf cameras and other technology deployed throughout the slum to detect any physical intrusions or any unusual radio communication.

The assault team isn't worried - they have MACE. They enter the slum, move quickly without being detected through the various pathways and alleys until they arrive and capture the key leaders, and immediately move to transition out of the slum - again, undetected._

Concept of Operations

Working from the end state backwards, we can assume the following (nested) items would be needed to enable MACE:

• Operator ability to avoid adversary detection ** Operator ability to disable/disrupt adversary detection capability *** Operator ability to target disable/disrupt actions at specific points in time, space, and mission evolution ** Operator ability to avoid/bypass adversary detection capability *** Operator ability to know the geo-temporal coverage of adversary detection capability **** Operator ability to compare their current and intended locations with the geo-temporal coverage of adversary detection capability ***** Operator ability to have Non-GNSS Navigation

In order to gain more insight into the VEO, the Host Nation sends small, discrete teams into the slum. Each team covers a different area of the slum, using inexpensive and off-the-shelf sensor technology. This survey results in a multi-dimensional data set representing the entire slum.

SOF analysts process this data set using a variety of analytical pipelines to produce an integrated model of the slum. More than just a 3D model of the kind used in video games, this model includes

This model

As SOF operators are reviewing the model, A small SOF team stages next to the slum. Due to the dense, multi-layer nature of the slum, traditional overhead resources such as indirect fire and Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) are unavailable. The VEO has even acquired a jammer that blocks all reception of the various Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) within the slum. As a result, each SOF operator is carrying a small suite of sensors and a computer. The suite feeds fused data in real-time to the computer which compares that data to a local copy of the multi-dimensional model created from the survey data. This allows the computer to provide navigation instructions to the operator