Literature Survey on Network Concepts and Measures to Support Research in Network-centric Operations

The United States Navy and its joint partners continually seek to maintain a responsive, agile, and effective fighting force well suited to combat present-day threats to national security. As a result, U.S. forces are currently undergoing force transformation to adopt an organizational structure capable of supporting this mission. This new organizational structure is known as Network-Centric Warfare. The purpose of this research is to analyze any performance metrics, measures of effectiveness, or analytical methods used by existing organizations engaged in networkcentric operations that would assist the Navy and joint forces along with their transformation process. This research will be done in the form of a literature review, examining existing material written on communication, economic/business, and social/organizational networks. In addition to identifying quantitative and qualitative metrics, an emphasis will be placed on the methodologies used for network assessment. Final sections relate findings from each resource to Network-Centric Warfare and address matters relevant to the future of force transformation.