The CJCS National Military Strategy identifies the need for interoperability in the Dynamic Force Employment (DFE). It states that

Building a strong, agile, and resilient force requires better interoperability and enhancing the combat lethality and survivability of our allies and partners.

In the US Army, Army Futures Command leads a continuous transformation of Army modernization in order to provide future warfighters with the concepts, capabilities and organizational structures they need to dominate a future battlefield. Joint Enterprise Data Interoperability (JEDI-X) is a capability initially developed by the US Joint Staff to ensure data interoperability that will enable DoD to improve lethality and enable similar logistics data interoperability in the Joint and Coalition space, while supporting the concept of DFE.

Lack of interoperability

DoD, like all large organizations suffers from specialization. Commands use jargon, processes and information systems that are tailored to support their specific functional domains such as research, acquisition, operations, sustainment, and resource management. Non-standardized data models, terminology, reporting formats, and siloed networks limit the sharing and reuse of data by other domains within the Services, Joint commands, industry and Multinational partners performing services for the DoD, or similar roles. This lack of access to accurate, relevant data limits the visibility of available Joint, industry and Multinational resources, the effectiveness of current planning or decision support tools, and hinders the reach for advanced analytics such as Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence.

Data Interoperability using JEDI-X

Interoperability is the core of Joint and Multinational Operations. The ability to shoot, move, communicate, protect and sustain as a singular unit with partners improves the effectiveness of the DoD across the spectrum of operations. Using common processes, platforms and information systems is the highest level of interoperability. Being able to use common data for planning and decisions, with the ability to transact common resources while operating in national or service systems is a viable alternative when commonality is not possible. Joint Enterprise Data Interoperability (JEDI-X) enables both for the US Army today.

JEDI-X uses a systems engineering approach to identify and map data across current organizational and functional boundaries to unlock it with the necessary context for re-use. It uses non-proprietary information models to ascribe context in data mappings for ease of maintenance and extensibility of data from source to a myriad of target uses. JEDI-X also provides mediation and translation services across these information systems to support transactions, reporting, and visualization of data across systems that otherwise are isolated and opaque.

US Army JEDI-X Implementations

JEDI-X enables the Army and US European Command to re-use US force deployment data from various systems to populate US data in the NATO Logistics Functional Area Services (LOGFAS) suite of tools for coordinating deployment and sustainment of the combined forces. JEDI-X also re-uses LOGFAS data within a Recognized Logistics Picture (RLP) of the combined force, enabling cross-servicing of logistics resources and sustainment planning. Nexus LCM is working with US Army Europe and HQ, Army G4 to:

  1. Implement the JEDI MNLOGCOP capability as an RLP in the Joint Warfighting Assessment series as an enabler for LOGFAS to support embedded multinational Brigades in US Army Divisions;
  2. Automate feeds of US Army in-theater movement requests to Multinational Movement Coordination Capabilities, while retaining linkages to the Army Resource Management system of record for payment;
  3. Enable data feeds from US Transportation Command and theater movements for an integrated view of movements of units and supplies during deployment and sustainment operations to improve coordination of infrastructure, material handling and transportation assets, ensuring prioritization and efficient initial operational capabilities to the Commander;
  4. Use JEDI-X to integrate an Artificial Intelligence-enabled transportation planning and resourcing tool into NATO operations;
  5. Continue assessment for a JEDI-X enabled capability for operational units to have visibility and transact multinational supplies and order digital/additive manufactured parts, all without leaving GCSS-Army.

Summary

By simply unlocking and linking existing data for re-use in other processes and systems, JEDI-X can eliminate inefficient searching, cleansing and re-entry of data common in today’s DoD. It can improve the velocity and quality of available data to planners, decision makers, advanced decision support tools of choice and technicians in support of their roles through providing contextually accurate data for re-use across information system and organizational boundaries.