The complexity of the future operating environment will increase over the coming decades, driving adaptation in Alliance capability development over the short, medium and long-term. Several key insights are generally shared regarding this environment, including:
- an increasingly transparent battlefield will enable the detection of NATO forces;
- adversaries will be capable of operating and posing a threat in all domains; and
- artificial intelligence and autonomy will generate advantages when incorporated into warfighting systems.
Given this, the importance of interoperable, multi-domain capable and technologically enables forces will be paramount. Maintaining the technological edge will mean understanding and adapting to emerging and disruptive technologies. In turn, this means anticipating the technical developments and understanding their potential strategic and operational implications.
In the NATO Defence Planning Process cycle 22-26, Longer Term Aspects have undergone a significant refresh in an effort to make the document more relevant to the reader. The Longer Term Aspects have been written to inform future requirements at the strategic level. The document is a cross-functional product linking across Allied Command Transformation’s future thinking where each Longer Term Aspect is associated with NATO Warfighting Capstone Concept Warfare Development Imperatives and the Strategic Foresight Analysis.
The Longer Term Aspects are unclassified to allow collaboration with academia and industry. The overall effect is a strengthened connection to the medium term (7-19 years), underpinned by relevant connections to other Allied Command Transformation future thinking.
The Alliance must remain agile despite constant uncertainty and the likelihood of strategic shocks. Consequently, while legal, fiscal and ethical characteristics are not considered, and noting that Longer Term Aspects are not tied to extant policy, the aspects captured in the document are meant to stimulate wider thinking as a way to increase resilience to an evolving future security environment.
The Longer Term Aspects do not provide a complete solution, but instead offer 27 aspects for Capability Developers and Defence Planners to consider. Many of these themes are recognizable as persistent requirements for the future battlefield. In this cycle, greater emphasis has been placed on integrating operations in cyberspace, Artificial Intelligence and situational awareness with new Longer Term Aspects focusing on the exploitation of robotics, autonomous systems, and climate accessibility, thus capturing the need for development in these emerging areas. Wargaming of the Longer Term Aspects has highlighted the need to merge and streamline some to better reflect the future battle-space. For example, in this cycle, the Sea Mines Longer Term Aspect has been merged with Persistent Area Access Control.
The Longer Term Aspect is not a standalone document but a fully cross-functional product supporting not only the defence planning community but also informing national and NATO concept development, national Research & Development, common funded Capability Development, the Science and Technology Community, and the further refinement and solution development for the Main Shortfall Areas.
Finally, it is recognized that elements of the “Potential Areas of Research” within the document are already being fielded at different maturity levels in various NATO nations, and that others are increasing, being captured as qualitative requirements. This is deliberate to ensure that the Longer Term Aspect can act as bridge between the Defence Planning Medium and Long Term Epochs, to mitigate against a potential capability vacuum.