Chapter
Name: The Hague (The Netherlands)
By: Air Cdre RNLAF retd. Ir. Gerrit Schoonderbeek
Summary of Meeting:
On 28
October 2009 Afcea Chapter The Hague held its ICT Matinée at the Prinses
Julianakazerne in The Hague, the Netherlands. The topic of the meeting was
“National Operations / Intensifying Civil-Military Collaboration (ICMS)”,
sub-divided into “The importance of Information Management” and “I-Bridge:
Bridging of the(information) Gap”.
After the opening by Chapter President, Rear Admiral LH RNLN (ret) Willem
Voogt, the session was started by LtCol RNLA Marcel Duvekot, Chief of Staff of
the Regional Command West. After a short introductory film, he discussed the
role of the Regional Command West during National (Emergency) Operations.
National Operations of the Ministry of Defense can be sub-divided into
structured and not-structured tasks.
|
Structured
tasks include: |
Not-structured
tasks include:
|
The Netherlands has been sub-divided in a number of Security Regions. Here the
military works closely together with civilian organizations as fire brigades,
police departments, medical disaster aid organizations and municipal officials. LtCol Duvekot
finished his interesting presentation with a short film about a large country
wide military-civilian exercise, called: “Waterproef” concerning the (simulated)
flooding of great parts of the Netherlands.
The next speakers were Col RNLAF Rob Boots, Program Manager at BG IVENT and Mr.
Vincent Hoek, Advisor at BG IVENT. Col Boots introduced the concept of
Intensifying Civil-Military Collaboration: During combined civil-military
exercises it turned out that in the military a good insight was available and
good use was made of the capabilities of Command & Control and Information
and Communication systems. In the civil environment a lack of available, useful information and the sharing
of this information was discovered. It was then decided to start a Network
Centric trial project.
Mr. Hoek then followed with a more detailed description of the I-Bridge
concept. The aim is to provide all participants with a common (operational)
picture, consisting of voice, text and geographic information and to better use
the available information from the public domain. The I-Bridge concept consists
of 5 different components: Voice harmonization, geo-visualization, access
control, logging and scenario plotting and secure ad-hoc online collaboration.
For this last component use is made of a concept called Suphice: this enables
the connection of systems/networks with different security levels. I-Bridge
uses commercial off-the-shelf hardware and software as much as possible and it
includes mechanisms to continue to operate in a degrading environment. It is
not (yet) an operational system but a proof-of-concept, the future however
looks very promising!
The ICT Matinée was closed with the traditional lunch, during which the members
could make or renew contacts with the other participants.
Definition of used acronyms:
ICT = Information and Communications Technology
ICMS = Intensifying Civil-Military Collaboration
LH = Lower Half
RNLN = Royal Netherlands Navy
ret = retired
RNLA = Royal Netherlands Army
NL = the Netherlands
BG IVENT = Information and Technology Division
Guest Speaker(s):
|
Speaker’s Full Name |
Position |
Rank |
Branch of Service |
Organization |
|
Marcel Duvekot |
Chief of Staff |
LtCol |
RNLA |
RMC West |
|
Rob Boots |
Program Manager |
Col |
RNLAF |
BG IVENT |
|
Vincent Hoek |
Advisor |
Civilian |
|
BG IVENT |
|
Photograph #1: |
Photograph #2: |
|
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Chapter The Hague President, Rear Admiral LH (ret) Willem Voogt welcoming the attendees at the ICT Matinée |
The interested audience during one of the presentations |
|
Photograph #3: |
Photograph #4: |
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|
|
|
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Mr. Vincent Hoek, Advisor at BG IVENT, during his presentation on I-Bridge: “Bridging the Information Gap” |
Photograph #5:
|
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Chapter The Hague President, Rear Admiral LH (ret) Willem Voogt, presents a Certificate-of-Appreciation to LtCol RNLA Marcel Duvekot, Chief-of-Staff of Regional Command West for his briefing on National Operations |
||||||
|
Position |
Full Name |
Rank |
Branch of Service |
Organization |
|
|
|
Left |
Willem Voogt |
Rear Adm LH (ret) |
RNLN |
President Afcea Chapter The Hague |
|
|
|
Right |
Marcel Duvekot |
LtCol |
RNLA |
RMC West |
|
|
Photograph #6:
|
Col RNLAF Rob Boots, Program Manager at BG IVENT, receives a token of Appreciation for his presentation from Chapter The Hague President Rear Admiral LH (ret) Willem Voogt |
|
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|
Position |
Full Name |
Rank |
Branch of Service |
Organization |
|
|
|
Left |
Willem Voogt |
Rear Adm LH (ret) |
RNLN |
President Afcea Chapter The Hague |
|
|
|
Right |
Rob Boots |
Col |
RNLAF |
BG IVENT |
|
|
Photograph #7:
|
|
Chapter The Hague President, Rear Admiral LH (ret) Willem Voogt, presents a Certificate-of-Appreciation to Mr. Vincent Hoek, Advisor at BG IVENT for his briefing on I-Bridge: “Bridging the Information Gap” |
||||||
|
Position |
Full Name |
Rank |
Branch of Service |
Organization |
|
|
|
Left |
Willem Voogt |
Rear Adm LH (ret) |
RNLN |
President Afcea Chapter The Hague |
|
|
|
Right |
Vincent Hoek |
Civilian |
|
BG IVENT |
|
|
