The Coast Guard has issued a Request for Information,

“The Coast Guard Futures Development and Integration (FD&I) Directorate is the Coast Guard’s central force design and innovation hub guiding budget priorities by clarifying mission needs and capability requirements. Under FD&I, the Coast Guard Research and Development Center serves as the execution agent for research, modeling & simulation, technology forecasting, and field experimentation. The Coast Guard Rapid Response Rapid Prototype (RAPTOR) team is a barrier-breaking enabler that partners with Coast Guard offices to solve the biggest problems in the service by providing cutting edge capabilities and supporting the deployment of rapid solutions. This Request for Information (RFI) is part of an effort by the United States Coast Guard (USCG) to determine the availability and technical readiness of technologies and/or services that support Maritime Domain Dominance (MDD) Operational Concepts. Operational Concepts articulate unsolved challenges and propose solutions for experimentation and leadership validation before committing to force design or to create formal requirements. The Coast Guard desires unified, real-time MDD solutions that establish a “detect-to-act” pipeline connecting every cutter, small boat, aircraft, unmanned system (air and surface), and sensors (space, air, surface, and shore-based) that are networked to our operators and command centers to facilitate the decisions and actions that follow. The desired outcome of a robust MDD capability is faster, more accurate identification and warning of threats along U.S. borders and maritime approaches, enabling the Coast Guard and its partners to control, secure, and defend those areas. The Coast Guard is not looking for a singular solution to provide the MDD capability, but rather a holistic and/or collection of capabilities to achieve this desired outcome.

This is potentially a multi-use system. Tracking traffic will make SAR easier and help identify sources of pollution. Presumably it will monitor boats involved in illegal immigration from Mexico and Canada, but this also has defense implications.

While it is nice to see that the Coast Guard wants to be able to act on information received, I  wonder why this is not a joint Navy/Coast Guard project. Certainly the Navy has an interest. Really the interest should extend to the “Golden Dome.” Navy P-8 Maritime Patrol Aircraft and satellites should be a major source information.