Army Merging Electronic Warfare, Cyber Ops.

• Position: Algorithmic Warfare

* In order to tackle growing cyber threats from around the globe, the Army is beginning to integrate cyber, electronic warfare, signals intelligence and military intelligence operations, service officials have recently said.

"You need all of those to come together if you're really going to deliver the effects that you need," said Maj. Gen. John B. Morrison Jr., commanding general of the Army's Cyber Center of Excellence at Fort Gordon, Georgia.

Over the past year, the service has been at work fusing these elements, he said during a panel discussion at a recent cybersecurity event hosted by the Association of the United States Army's Institute of Land Warfare.

"If we had been up here last year we wouldn't have had a whole lot of things to tell you about. But, boy, what a difference a year makes," Morrison said.

In that timeframe, the Army decided to move forward with transitioning electronic warfare professionals into its cyber branch. That will be completed Oct. 1, he noted.

"It's a process that is already ongoing," he said. "The reality is that we're already moving in that direction now and we'll start doing mobile training teams for our electronic warfare professionals" starting in early 2018.

Brig. Gen. Neil S. Hersey, commandant of the Army's Cyber Center and School, said soldiers studying electronic warfare would be transitioning into the school over the next year.

The service has also validated necessary requirements and is beginning to field new capabilities into the force, such as the electronic warfare planning and management tool, Morrison said. Additionally, the Army is employing cross-functional teams and is facilitating the rapid prototyping of new systems.

In December, the service received approval from the Joint Requirements Oversight Council--which greenlights projects--for the ground-based portion of the next-generation terrestrial layer intelligence system, or TLIS, he said. That will fuse signals intelligence with electronic warfare, giving commanders the option to employ both of those effects at the tactical level, he added.

The program is fully funded. An airborne component was still pending approval at the time of the event, he noted.

As the Army worked to develop the TLIS requirements, it was initially stovepiped and fragmented, Morrison said.

"You had our intel brothers and sisters over here developing their own requirements document," he said. "We were at Fort Gordon in happy bliss developing our electronic warfare...