CNO Joins Maritime Leaders at RSS 2012

VENICE (NNS) -- Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) Adm. Jonathan Greenert was the Chairman of the 9th Regional Seapower Symposium (RSS) first session which focused on "Recent operational experiences and their influence on future platforms," Oct. 17.

In CNO's opening remarks, he talked about the importance of RSS and how it benefits the international maritime forces who attended.

"This is a perfect forum to bring together mutual issues that we can talk about," said Greenert. "It is an opportunity to build relationships, share lessons learned and to build some concepts of operations for [potential] world events in the future."

CNO then outlined the session's focus.

"We [panel members] will talk about recent operations and what those implications may be for future operations, both in ship construction and concept of operations," said Greenert.

CNO went on to discuss recent operations which proved to have significant influence on informing future operations and construction. As examples, Greenert drew from lessons the Navy learned during Operation Unified Protector, the International Mine Counter Measure Exercise (IMCMEX12) and Operation Active Endeavor. Each of these evolutions increased the Navy's knowledge on unmanned vehicles, cyber, and counter terrorism measures.

He gave detailed examples of how the Navy is integrating old and new technologies into today's missions as demonstrated by USS Ponce during IMCMEX12 and how Firescout was used on an older surface ship in the Mediterranean during Operation Unified Protector.

"These are insights of current operations and things we're doing today [older vessels/platforms with new technology/payloads]" said Greenert. "We don't need sophisticated solutions [to be effective]."

Additionally, CNO spoke about the importance of communicating with partners and allies and how information needs to be shared. He emphasized the need for a common operational picture and how information needs to be accessible to cooperating maritime forces.

Following Greenert's remarks he introduced other panel members which included maritime leaders from Germany, Greece, Netherlands, United Kingdom and NATO and a presenter from Fincantieri, an Italian ship-building company.

The RSS, hosted by the Chief of the Italian navy, was held at the Italian Naval War College in Venice. It was attended by 39 navies operating in the wider Mediterranean and beyond, as well as representatives from 12 international organizations.