Navy Stands Up Fleet Cyber Command, Reestablishes U.S. 10th Fleet

FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. (NNS) -- The chief of naval operations (CNO) officially established U.S. Fleet Cyber Command (FCC) and recommissioned U.S. 10th Fleet during a ceremony at Fort George G. Meade, Md., Jan. 29.

At the ceremony, Adm. Gary Roughead, CNO, also named Vice Adm. Bernard J. McCullough III the commander of both FCC and 10th Fleet.

The new FCC and 10th Fleet are headquartered at Fort George G. Meade, taking advantage of existing Naval Network Warfare Command infrastructure, communications support and personnel already in place.

FCC and 10th Fleet have been created as part of the CNO's vision to achieve the integration and innovation necessary for warfighting superiority across the full spectrum of military operations in the maritime, cyberspace and information domains. This initiative will help raise information to the forefront of the Navy's 21st century arsenal.

U.S. 10th Fleet was first established in 1941 as the lead for anti-submarine warfare. During World War II, the United States needed a command in charge of protecting Allied merchant vessels and military convoys and against German U-Boats in the Atlantic, and 10th Fleet successfully fulfilled that mission until it was disestablished in 1945.

Roughead compared the global responsibility of today's 10th Fleet to that of its predecessor, which protected American forces through the use of intelligence and information.

"[Tenth Fleet] had a global responsibility to protect American forces and American trade. It was a command who success depended less on manned and massed fire power than on intelligence and information," he said. "Today, we recommission this fleet to confront a new challenge to our nation's security in cyberspace. It is a mission for which, even more so than before, victory will be predicated on intelligence and information rather than fire power."

Roughead emphasized that the information we use and must protect is markedly different from what we have protected in our past.

"The cyber domain is a domain all its own - one of great opportunity, new discoveries and vexing challenges. It is one into which Fleet Cyber Command must forge boldly ahead," Roughead said.

FCC is responsible for global Navy cyberspace operations designed to deter and defeat aggression and to ensure freedom of action to achieve military objectives in and through cyberspace. McCullough is also tasked with organizing and directing Navy cryptologic operations worldwide, supporting information operations and space planning and operations.

As 10th Fleet commander, McCullough maintains operational control of Navy cyber forces to execute the full spectrum of computer network operations, cyber warfare, electronic warfare, information operations and signal intelligence capabilities and missions across the cyber, electromagnetic and space domains. U.S. 10th Fleet will partner with and support other fleet commanders to provide guidance and direction to ensure coordinated, synchronized and effective preventative and response capability in cyberspace.

"To execute our defined mission we must be able to exercise command and control over our networks with dynamic, real time defense and information assurance enabled by intelligence collection. When called upon, we must be able to provide non kinetic effects in support of regional combatant commanders' assigned missions," McCullough said. "To do this, and do it well, we must work with our sister services, academia, agencies, industry, allies and partners, for the challenge is so large, to go it alone is not possible."

McCullough said we face a situation similar to the early Battle of the Atlantic where we are engaged in a domain under stress – a domain where the potential exists for devastating consequences if the challenge is not addressed.

"Cyberspace is a unique domain with a totally different set of challenges. To operate successfully in this newly defined domain the Navy must first think differently about cyberspace operations," McCullough said. "This world travels at the speed of light and requires real time command and control. We must ensure seamless alignment and integration with fleet operations."

In the same fashion that the historic 10th Fleet enabled the prosecution of the German U-Boat threat and ensured access to the shipping lanes of the Atlantic, FCC and the modern 10th Fleet will enable the prosecution of threats in cyberspace and ensure the Navy has access to it.

For more news from Fleet Cyber Command/U.S. 10th Fleet, visit www.navy.mil/local/fcc10/.