DMOC helps Army, Air Force work together

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Jessica Smith
  • 705th Exercise Control Squadron
One of the most important Department of Defense objectives is well-integrated joint operations. While this concept is put into practice at deployed locations, most organizations desire increased joint training opportunities. The Air Force's Distributed Mission Operations Center here provides joint training prior to deployment.

The DMOC has the capability to link distributed joint units together so the individual units can play with other services while still at home station. Training through DMOC saves both deployment time and travel costs. Since 1991, DMOC has been providing a virtual environment to train air defense artillery soldiers at Fort Bliss, Texas, to include 11th, 31st, 35th and 108th ADA Brigades.

Lessons learned from Operation Iraqi Freedom focused on the need for increased communication between the Army air defense and Air Force command and control prior to deployment. In response, the 32nd Army and Air Missile Defense Command and DMOC met in 2004 to enhance training to help increase communication between Army air defense artillery fire control officers and Air Force Command and Reporting Center personnel. The Air Force CRC acts as an air traffic controller for the air war. These meetings led to the development of a joint kill chain event. The first joint kill chain event occurred in December 2004 with participation from the 729th Air Control Squadron at Hill AFB, Utah, and 32nd AAMDC at Ft. Bliss.

As a result of these events, an Army ADAFCO now operates from a CRC van and communicates with the Army Patriot Information Control Center and CRC personnel to reduce the potential for fratricide and increase the Patriot's air defense effectiveness against hostile air and missile threats. To date, personnel have participated in this training.

Additional events in June 2005 and November 2006 have been so valuable that the event has been certified as a Joint National Training Capability and funded by Joint Forces Command. Fort Bliss is utilizing the joint kill chain event to certify their students as part of the ADAFCO training.

This combined venture has resulted in the formulation of new training techniques and procedures that can be used in a joint combat environment.

Chief Warrant Officer John Fallin of the Army Air Defense Artillery School said that the joint kill chain event to be the best training available short of combat.

"The joint kill chain training is the only opportunity for our soldiers to work with CRC personnel prior to deployment," said Chief Fallin. "Without the training we waste precious time overseas getting familiar with the CRC systems when we should be hitting the ground running."