Analytic Support For Maritime Domain Awareness and Counter-Piracy (Unclass)

The security environment of today includes a wide range of targets that the United States and Canada must track: potential terrorists, pirates, smugglers, paramilitary naval forces, etc, both on the domestic and international fronts. Dealing with this security environment requires an awareness of the maritime domain; often referred to as Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA). Generically, MDA can be defined as:

The effective understanding of anything associated with the maritime domain that could impact the security, safety, economy, or environment of a nation.

The challenge of achieving MDA is of a particular concern to the US Department of Defense and to the Canadian Department of National Defence. Consequently, there is a real need for the military operational research and analysis (OR&A) community to provide the necessary analytic support to ensure that MDA generation efforts mature in support of our national objectives.