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• No current option had all the characteristics that would be required by the Army's interoperability system.

The National Defense Strategy (NDS) emphasizes the need for U.S. forces to be interoperable with capable allies and partners. To support the NDS, the U.S. Army develops and executes doctrine and guidelines for how its units can achieve interoperability with partners. The Army identified a need to develop an overarching concept for interoperability that includes explicit links between current Army multinational interoperability doctrine and mission command doctrine. Concurrently, it wanted an enduring and standardized way to measure levels of interoperability achieved as a result of major training events. To that end, the Army asked RAND Arroyo Center to conduct an analysis of alternatives (AoA) of interoperability measurement systems.

Researchers looked at eight different approaches, gathering and analyzing data from a review of materials provided by representatives for each approach and information from multiple rounds of interviews with representatives. No single approach addressed all dimensions identified as important for a future system, so a completely new approach was proposed, drawing on strengths and eliminating weaknesses from other approaches analyzed. The Army decided to develop a new system — the Army Interoperability Measurement System (AIMS), which includes a quantitative instrument for measuring interoperability levels, a qualitative component to enable capability gap analysis, an automated approach to connect and analyze the data, and exploitation panels that convene immediately following a training exercise.

The authors document their AoA, present the supporting evidence for their measurement system recommendations, and details the early development of AIMS.

• Chapter One

  Introduction

• Chapter Two

  Considerations

• Chapter Three

  Analysis of Alternatives

• Chapter Four

  Recommendations from the Analysis of Alternatives

• Chapter Five

  Early Stages of Army Interoperability Measurement System Development

• Chapter Six

  Concluding Remarks

• Appendix A

  Analysis of Alternatives Questions List

• Appendix B

  Completed Questions List for All Considered Alternatives

• Appendix C

  ART Level I and Level II Tasks Included in AIMS Instruments

• Appendix D

  Interoperability in Army Mission Essential Tasks

• Appendix E

  Computing Priority Force Area Interoperability Levels