The Naval Undersea Warfare Center has unveiled Mastery of the Seas at All Depths 2035, a 10-year strategic vision that aims to drive the adoption of new technologies and strengthen industry partnerships to accelerate the delivery of capabilities to warfighters. Marie Bussiere, who has been serving as technical director for the NUWC Division Newport since November 2023, presented the strategic vision during a panel discussion at Southeastern New England Defense Industry Alliance’s Defense Innovation Days.
“We must become stronger and more agile partners to rapidly respond to fleet demands and identify the capabilities that must be developed to meet those demands,” the official said. “Together, we must define new paths to innovate, deliver and sustain capabilities in our fleet as fast as possible.”
NUWC Capability Focus Areas
During the panel, Bussiere shared new capability focus areas in the strategic vision where Division Newport is involved, such as weapon lethality, undersea sensing, subsea and seabed warfare, assured communications, platform defense and survivability, undersea warfare command and control, undersea robotics and autonomous systems, tactical oceanography, and cybersecurity.
She revealed that the division has developed technology roadmaps that identify key program sponsors and performers within the organization and external partners to execute the mission.
“We encourage you to join us, leveraging your independent research and development as appropriate, as we move forward with opportunities for you to develop capabilities and prototype technologies within these areas,” she stated.
Navy’s SSW Challenges
The panel also covered the subsea and seabed warfare, or SSW, challenges the Navy faces, and areas where industry can offer its assistance.
Mark Vaccaro, SSW director at NUWC Division Newport, explained that the Navy needs to expand its presence in places that manned platforms cannot reach. These remote locations, although they offer potential military advantage, are challenging due to what he called the five Ds: deep, dark, dangerous, difficult and denied.
According to the official, the Navy requires systems with “super autonomy capabilities” and long endurance to swim through straits. The systems must also be able to carry out intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions in GPS-denied environments.
