Foundation for U.S. Ballistic Missile Defense System Modernized

The system of systems that enables the disparate elements of the Ballistic Missile Defense System (BMDS) to function as a complete global defense network has been revolutionized.

The modernized Command, Control, Battle Management and Communications (C2BMC) system significantly improves collaborative Ballistic Missile Defense planning and provides global and regional combatant commands with rapid operational response capabilities.

Operationally fielded in 2004, the C2BMC network is extremely complex. This system links traditionally autonomous space, sea and terrestrial sensors and their associated systems, gleaning the best target data from each to provide the highest probability of intercepting ballistic missile threats directed against the United States, its deployed forces, allies and friends.

"Truly integrated ballistic missile defense can never be static," said Dr. Rob Smith, vice president of C4ISR Systems for Lockheed Martin. "C2BMC must maintain pace and be flexible to changes in technology, capability improvements and adversarial conditions."

A Lockheed Martin-led team that includes Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, Boeing, and General Dynamics modernized the entire C2BMC global network, which is deployed at numerous locations throughout the world. The team developed, tested and deployed sophisticated track processing, sensor and battle management algorithms to optimize how C2BMC processes data from all the BMDS elements, providing increased capacity to handle larger and more complicated threats.

C2BMC's modernization is predicated on a new open, flexible architecture that eases the integration of new capabilities, increases system reliability, substantially reduces the overall hardware footprint and lowers total system life cycle costs. From an information assurance perspective, the new architecture has been cyber hardened to mitigate threats to the network and systems.