The Air Force Interoperability Council or AFIC is an organisation tasked with enhancing

coalition A coalition is a group formed when two or more people or groups temporarily work together to achieve a common goal. The term is most frequently used to denote a formation of power in political or economical spaces. Formation According to ''A Gui ...

military aviation amongst the "

Five Eyes The Five Eyes (FVEY) is an intelligence alliance comprising Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States. These countries are parties to the multilateral UKUSA Agreement, a treaty for joint cooperation in sig ...

" countries, which consist of

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by to ...

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island coun ...

, the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and ...

and

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

. The organisation has a permanent management committee based in

Washington DC ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

.The Management Committee consists of five members, one from each member nation and a small admin staff. The MC members are both an international representative of the AFIC secretariat (thus with no national executive authority) and also act as Chair for at least one Working Group, managing and co-ordinating that WGs actions and progress both during and between meetings. Each MC member is also assigned a secretarial function for another WG. AFIC focuses on improved war-fighting capabilities, by maximizing

interoperability Interoperability is a characteristic of a product or system to work with other products or systems. While the term was initially defined for information technology or systems engineering services to allow for information exchange, a broader defi ...

, such as the capability for particular aircraft types to be cross-serviced. AFIC's primary publication outputs are Air Standards, Advisory Publications and Information Publications, which seek to increase operational effectiveness by describing common technical specifications, interoperability objectives and/or Tactics, Techniques and Procedures (TTPs).

History

In 1942, Captain Frank T. McCoy, a USAAF intelligence officer attached to

Technical Air Intelligence Unit Technical Air Intelligence Units (TAIU) were joint Allied military intelligence units formed during World War II to recover Japanese aircraft to obtain data regarding their technical and tactical capabilities. The first such unit, known later ...

–

South West Pacific Oceania (, , ) is a geographical region that includes Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Spanning the Eastern and Western hemispheres, Oceania is estimated to have a land area of and a population of around 44.5 million as of ...

, invented a system of reporting names for Japanese aircraft, to improve and speed-up secure communications and intelligence-sharing. The system was eventually adopted by the

Western Allied The Allies, formally referred to as the Declaration by United Nations, United Nations from 1942, were an international Coalition#Military, military coalition formed during the World War II, Second World War (1939–1945) to oppose the Axis ...

air forces throughout Asia and the Pacific. Following the end of World War II, the Air Standards Coordination Committee (ASCC) was formed in 1948 by the air force chiefs of staff of Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States. ASCC was expanded to include the US Navy in 1951, the RAAF in 1964 and RNZAF in 1965. During the

Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because t ...

, the most prominent task assigned to ASCC was the creation of reporting names – sometimes known, erroneously, as "NATO reporting names" – for aircraft originating in the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

, other

Warsaw Pact The Warsaw Pact (WP) or Treaty of Warsaw, formally the Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance, was a collective defense treaty signed in Warsaw, Poland, between the Soviet Union and seven other Eastern Bloc socialist republi ...

countries and the

People's Republic of China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, most populous country, with a Population of China, population exceeding 1.4 billion, slig ...

. An external review of the ASCC was undertaken in 2004 to examine the organisational processes and structures. As a result of this review in 2005 the ASCC was restructured, downsized and renamed Air and Space Interoperability Council (ASIC). In 2016, the Air Chiefs of the Five Eyes nations recommended that in order to increase ASIC’s operational relevance. As a result, in 2017 ASIC reviewed and amended its operating concepts and procedures, refocused its activities to concentrate on interoperability, and changed its name to Air Force Interoperability Council. AFIC consists of representatives from the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) an ...

(RAF),

Royal Australian Air Force "Through Adversity to the Stars" , colours = , colours_label = , march = , mascot = , anniversaries = RAAF Anniversary Commemoration ...

(RAAF),

Royal Canadian Air Force The Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF; french: Aviation royale canadienne, ARC) is the air and space force of Canada. Its role is to "provide the Canadian Forces with relevant, responsive and effective airpower". The RCAF is one of three environm ...

(RCAF),

Royal New Zealand Air Force The Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF) ( mi, Te Tauaarangi o Aotearoa, "The Warriors of the Sky of New Zealand"; previously ', "War Party of the Blue") is the aerial service branch of the New Zealand Defence Force. It was formed from New Zeal ...

(RNZAF),

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Si ...

(USAF) and the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

(USN).

Related organisations

AFIC maintains close links with other interoperability fora, harmonizing activities and working in collaboration on major projects. These include: *

ABCANZ Armies ABCANZ Armies (formally, the American, British, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand Armies' Program) is a program aimed at optimizing interoperability and standardization of training and equipment between the armies of Australia, Canada, New Z ...

AUSCANNZUKUS AUSCANNZUKUS is an abbreviation for the naval Command, Control, Communications and Computers (C4) interoperability organization involving the Anglosphere nations of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States. It is a ...

(navies) *

Combined Communications Electronics Board The Combined Communications-Electronics Board (CCEB) is a five-nation joint military communications-electronics (C-E) organisation whose mission is the coordination of any military C-E matter that is referred to it by a member nation. The member na ...

(communication-electronics) *

(intelligence) * The Technical Cooperation Program (technology and science) *

UKUSA Agreement The United Kingdom – United States of America Agreement (UKUSA, ) is a multilateral agreement for cooperation in signals intelligence between Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The alliance of intellig ...

(signal intelligence) As three of the member nations also belong to

NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO, ; french: Organisation du traité de l'Atlantique nord, ), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance between 30 member states – 28 European and two N ...

, cross functional networking with this organisation is ongoing.

Notes and references

{{Reflist

External links

* http://www.aerospaceweb.org/question/history/q0070.shtml - Soviet aircraft codenames Anglosphere Space science organizations Royal Air Force Royal Australian Air Force Royal Canadian Air Force Royal New Zealand Air Force United States Air Force Military standardization

History

Related organisations

See also

Notes and references

External links