Noble Resolve exercises kick-off in Virginia

Man the boats! U.S. Joint Forces Command (USJFCOM) this week launched Noble Resolve, an “experimentation campaign” to help US agencies and organizations develop cooperative methods of deterring and preventing terrorist threats to American interests worldwide. Inspired by the year’s earlier Urban Resolve excercises, Noble Resolve reflects growing understanding at USJFCOM that modeling and simulation are critical to homeland security — from pre-attack planning to post-attack recovery. 125 people from a host of various agencies are particpating, some from as far away as Singapore and Finland, but much of the attention will be placed on Virginia.

That state is concurrently running its own emergency readiness excercise, in which Noble Resolve personnel will feed Virginia officials with information regarding a potential incoming nuclear device while they are dealing with their own problem of an incoming hurricane. The data from that event will then be analyzed according to the models developed by USFCOM. “It’s the first homeland defense and defense support to civil authorities experiment that we’re conducting .. that has a lot of modeling and simulation support and potential that’s going to be built into the Noble Resolve campaign,” said Noble Resolve chief Mark Wolfe.

The next phase in the Noble Resolve/Urban Resolve project will commence in August and will focus on a threat in the Pacific theater. Those involved will include the state of Oregon, the city of Portland, the Oregon National Guard, as well as Joint Task Force Homeland Defense, located in Hawaii.