Adaptive Plan Monitoring Systems for Military Decision Support

As military tactics evolve toward hyper-tempo operations, the ability to analyze vast amounts of mission relevant data is essential to command-and-control decision-making. Plan Monitoring (PM) systems provide mission status decision support to military commanders by correlating execution observables against an operational plan. The primary challenges faced by PM systems in the military domain are threefold. First, execution data is often distributed in disparate data stores connected by lowbandwidth, ad-hoc networks. Second, plans are not permanent entities but dynamic, evolving structures that are frequently modified to reflect the changing operational requirements of the commander. Third, the monitoring behavior – how the elements are to be monitored – must adapt to the needs of the commander as well as the changing tactics and entities within the operational domain. Over the past five years Lockheed Martin Advanced Technology Labs (LM ATL) has developed two PM systems that meet these challenges. Our prototype PM system, Vigilant Advisor, provides operational support for Army maneuver and logistics operations, while our current effort, an Air Campaign Monitor, provides effective monitoring of continuous air campaign operations.