Military organisations and emerging technologies – How do unmanned systems find a role in future navies?

Fewer qualified platforms and reduced personnel within the navy are the reality for many nations, although operational requirements might have remained the same or increased over time. At the same time, research is advancing in unmanned and autonomous systems, which have also found application in military use. Therefore, navies need to develop approaches for effective technological transformation. To fulfil this need, this study aims to identify and describe the relevant research from different disciplines and their respective relation to the design of future navies. The study commences with a literature review related to knowledge support for understanding how emerging technologies, such as maritime autonomous systems (MAS), find their place in a military organisation. The findings suggest that the armed forces should be categorised as a sociotechnical system, built of systems-of-systems that together enable capability, and that it is as a capability enforcer that the overall system should be developed. This highlights the importance of structural and organisational changes in making the best use of the technology, as well as in making the sociotechnical system as efficient as possible. Therefore, the armed forces need to be learning organisations, exercising joint planning, where there is room for knowledge sharing and flexibility within the organisation despite different hierarchical layers.