Vanguard Magazine

www.vanguardcanada.com OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2019 45 OPINION By LCOL DEAN C. BLACk (REt'D) I n The Lords of Strategy: The Secret In- tellectual History of the New Corporate World, author Walter Kiechel III traces the evolution of corporate strategy from its beginnings to the global fi- nancial collapse of 2008. That so many fi- nancially minded strategy "experts" seem to have gotten everything so very wrong in the lead up to the collapse motivated Kiechel to investigate. Philip Evans came to Kiechel's atten- tion via Evans' 1992 book, Blown to Bits: How the New Economics of Information Transforms Strategy. Underscoring much of Kiechel's analysis is the developing theme of information and the advent of the computer and internet, which understandably connects to the contributions of Philip Evans. It is toward Evans' ideas we lean, in this look at the F-35. Understanding the transformation of strategy is key to acknowledging that the F-35 is much more than it seems. For the same reasons the digital era transformed the business arena's application of strategy, the role of intelligence-surveillance-reconnais- sance (ISR) assets has transformed the legacy fighter aircraft. So far removed is the 5th generation F-35, that anyone opposed to im- plementing capabilities like those in the F-35 in their future air force risks a great deal. The F-35 Lightning II is the latest in a long string of military aircraft innovations. Peter Drucker, management's guru, once said "Innovation is the… act that endows resources with a new capacity to create wealth." Wealth is synonymous with value, and value in a military context encompasses what Evans describes as "rich" information – something every commander needs. Successive innovations, some incremen- tal and others radical, proved necessary throughout the Cold War to help us remain apace or ahead of antagonists. Reductionists only see the F-35 as an incremental innova- tion along a long stream of increasingly ef- fective fighter aircraft. But the F-35 is more akin to a radical innovation along an even longer stream of ISR information-gathering assets – the most effective of which leverage Evans' information ideas. The F-35 is not strictly a fighter, as reductionists see it. It is because of what it can do that the F-35 more readily merits consideration as a platform, a node, or a conduit that, when joined with other similarly capable "nodes" serves as a key component in a tremendously powerful, informative and lethal network. The F-35 is an airborne asset that helps to eliminate duplication in the intelligence cycle, because it functions as an informa- tion-fusion component for the benefit of the commander and everyone implicated in the intelligence cycle. Perhaps most im- portantly, it does all this at what antagonists most assuredly believe to be a very uncom- fortably short distance, owing to advanced stealth technology. Some have reported, "the Lightning II's biggest selling point is its ability to evade enemy radar… [along with] a sensor sys- tem designed to vacuum up information about the airspace around the F-35 with- out giving up its position." It is important to acknowledge how the first capability (stealth) enables the second (information collection). Information is key to what the aircraft and its pilot can do; gather- ing information is ipso facto a manifest function, and sensors make that possible. Stealth puts the F-35 a lot closer to infor- mation sources, exposing to those sensors more critical information for collection than would otherwise be the case. Conse- quently, any requirement to act decisively on the information collected will take less time because the F-35 and, possibly, other connected collaborating assets (other F- 35s and such) are, again, a lot closer to the point-of-delivery. It is difficult to imagine any ally choosing not to be a part of such a powerful collaborative capability. There is a common thread between Kiechel's focus on a "fiercening capital- ism" and Lockheed Martin's characteriza- tion of the future battlefield, to which their F-35 is designed to respond. That thread is strategy, and core to strategy – whether corporate or military – is a grasp of the en- vironment, near and far. Information is key to survival, in the marketplace and on the battlefield. To understand the optimization of information-gathering inherent in the F-35, we consider Evans' conceptualiza- tion of information in terms of its richness and reach. "Reach," according to Evans, means "the number of [nodes] people ex- changing information." Richness, on the other hand, concerns: bandwidth, inter- activity, reliability, security, currency, and "customisability." "Bandwidth" is well-understood. "In- teractivity" concerns the degree to which participants sharing the information are af- forded an ability to deliberate and discuss it. It is the nature of the F-35 network that the number of participants who require the in- formation, or who may be considered stake- holders to the particular mission being pros- ecuted, can be set, selected and modified quite easily to suit the commander's needs. Again, the F-35 is a fusion asset; "fusion is critical…to provide a single coherent pic- ture to facilitate understanding and decision A strAtegIC Asset The F-35 LighTning ii

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