History
In 1995, the DoD Command and Control Research Program (CCRP), within the Office of the Secretary of Defense, held the first International Command and Control Research and Technology Symposium (ICCRTS) at the National Defense University in Washington, D.C. This meeting built upon a series of meetings during the 1970s by the Office of Naval Research and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology that brought together interested researchers to exchange ideas on command and control (C2), its measurement and assessment, and the impact of new technologies on C2 processes.
The initial meeting was modest in size (63 participants) and included only a handful of non-U.S. participants. ICCRTS venues have included the United Kingdom, Sweden, Australia, Canada, and Denmark. Participation has grown substantially, to include hundreds of participants from dozens of nations. The Symposium provides an unparalleled opportunity for professional researchers, academics, active duty and reserve officers, and policy makers to interact with one another, understand the state of the art of C2, and influence the state of the practice with the United States and among its coalition partners.
The ICCRTS has consistently focused on leading-edge issues involving (a) new concepts in C2 (b) new technologies and their potential impact on C2, and (c) feedback and evidence from experiments, exercises, and real-world operations. The Symposium is also an important forum for discussion of coalition and collective C2 issues and for examining the complex endeavors (stabilization, operations, disaster relief) involving a variety of entities including military, civilian, government, international organizations, PVOs and NGOs.