Most have been Congressional mandates and started with a single focus in restricted regions of the country.SOSSEC has identified many of these programs and enlisted the sponsors to become part of the SOSSEC comprehensive strategy. SOSSEC strategy draws upon the unique technological, programmatic, and organization capabilities of the Department of Defense and its partners in Industry and Academia, working in close collaboration with civilian organizations at all levels to meet critical Homeland Defense challenges. SOSSEC strategy is centered around six (6) major elements:
Architecture:
A flexible, inherently evolutionary Enterprise Architecture, based on the Federal Enterprise Architecture Framework (FEAF) and exploiting commercial standards and practices. This permits “loose” integration of individual capabilities, employing potentially diverse systems and technologies, while preserving essential information sharing and collaboration among diverse communities and across a full operational spectrum. The architecture mirrors and complements the Global Information Grid, and effectively integrates people, processes, information, and technology for maximum effect.
Program Plan:
A program plan that achieves early critical mass of integrated capabilities. Spiral development of regional capabilities, punctuated by a series of demonstrations at key milestones, will establish momentum, facilitate and encourage continual expansion of the integration process, and provide a natural path for migration of pilot programs to full implementation.
Operational Model:
An operational model that facilitates cooperation among “federated”, yet independent, developers and stakeholders responsible for the individual participating programs. This transformational organization will act as a catalyst to accelerate programs addressing Force Protection/Homeland Defense / Homeland Security and Emergency Management.
Campaign:
A promotion and outreach campaign to ensure effective application of resources and the incorporation of additional SOSSEC participants to ensure execution of FP/HD/HS/EM goals and objectives.
Performance:
Addressing issues of human performance that are not addressed by the industry or the responder community.
Evaluation:
Independent product evaluation against rigorous user generated SOSSEC facilitated requirements.
Linking individual projects together within an effective integration framework expands the capacity to mitigate and quickly address terrorist attacks or other disasters having national, regional or inter-regional impact. Collaboration and cooperation is enabled horizontally, between geographically dispersed peer organizations and vertically, between local, state, regional, and federal organizations. Both horizontal and vertical dimensions are critical requirements needed to prepare for and respond to large-scale events. These essential capabilities are addressed in addition to the original individual project goals. The results are greater, more enduring impacts on security and preparedness, higher return on investment, and a clear path for establishment of fully-funded follow-on implementation and operations programs at local, state and federal levels.
Successful execution of SOSSEC initiative delivers significant benefits to multiple stakeholders as follows:
Military Services:
The military will gain enhanced warfighting and force protection capabilities through readily replicated security solutions.
HD/HS practitioners:
Practitioners (e.g., emergency managers, first responders, planners, and follow-on support organizations) will gain new levels of operational capabilities to anticipate, protect against, and respond to emergencies resulting from terrorist actions or natural or man-made disasters through participation in DoD technology transfer.
Military and civilian (dual) users:
Both groups will receive an economic benefit by using state-of-the-art technology at significantly reduced costs. The ongoing integration process, including conducting demonstrations and training readiness exercises, accelerates identification and adoption of best practices and best of breed technologies. Industry and Academia: Both groups will benefit from broader exposure and operational application of their products, technologies, and concepts, deeper understanding of operational requirements, and an expanded network of partnerships and alliances to support business and research interests.
Government agencies and political leadership:
Both groups will gain benefit from a greater return on investments made in participating programs. As critical mass is achieved, and the integrated regional SOSSEC approach expands, the transition of pilot/demonstration projects to major, programmed implementation is greatly facilitated. Spiral development and demonstration provides the forum for an opportunity to evaluate what works and assist in defining and establishing a firm set of requirements for system and product development.
Constituents of the served communities:
They will benefit from markedly higher security from hostile actions and/or man-made or natural disasters by establishing a firm “bottoms up” requirement set for prediction, identification, mitigation and response and recovery by engaging participants.
