Military Communications and Information Technology: A Trusted ...

Chapter 3: Information Technology for Interoperability and Decision...
325
• Multinational – in this scenario CID Servers from different countries and
systems can exchange information with each other and enable CID when
forces from various countries cooperate on battlefield.
The use cases described above are presented on the next picture.
Figure 3. CID Server use cases
C. CID server application in NATO operations
Since the idea of CID Server has grown during Afghanistan mission, its usability
in NATO operations is the main motivation for its development. Different
nations have various CID capabilities, both cooperative and non-cooperative,
that are specific and not based on NATO standards. This capabilities cannot be
used in multinational environment. It would be very non-efficient to replace this
national solutions and create new ones dedicated for NATO missions. Therefore
creation of one solution – CID Server – that will mediate between different solutions
from different vendors and countries, will simplify the goal of unification
and cooperation of NATO forces. Such an application of CID Server might be
a goal in a long term.
In a short term CID Server will use already proven solutions like NFFI and
Link 16. This will be still very valuable for improving CID capabilities of joint
forces NATO operations.
Another important capability is an ability to exchange information between
different CID Servers. This can be made using already existing NATO standards
and protocols (like NFFI) however STANAG document can simplify this task.