ORS
History
Since the Cold War, the world transitioned from a balance of power with two superpowers, to a unipolar world with one superpower, to a volatile world with many actors and rogue states. This changed security posture has led to the emergence of non-traditional, disruptive, and unconventional threats attempting to balance or establish power. There is a rise of legitimate regional dominators, and there is an ever-increasing threat from rouge states. The face of conflict has changed and it is necessary to adapt to globalization and move space into the information age. To move in this direction, the Operationally Responsive Space (ORS) Office was established by the Deputy Secretary of Defense and Executive Agent for Space as a proactive step to adapt space capabilities to changing national security requirements, and to be an agent for change across the community. Additionally, advancements in small satellite technologies and the opportunity to invigorate the United States industrial base (by shortening development timelines) made ORS an attractive part of the solution set to respond quickly to emerging threats and unanticipated needs.
ORS is taking a new approach to risk and mission assurance to rapidly deploy capabilities that are ‘good enough’ to satisfy warfighter needs across the entire spectrum of operations, through peace, conflict, and all levels of crisis. To achieve the desired end state of responding to Joint Force Commanders’ needs in days to weeks, ORS is implementing a new business model that embraces open innovation, and focusing on material as well as non-material solutions. The approach to the ORS concept is a new way of doing business for the DoD that requires clear communication throughout the space community to promote advocacy, share lessons learned, and deploy warfighter effects in a timely manner. To ensure unity of message, developers of the definition and policy and industry communications and strategy experts were hired in the ORS Office and interact directly with the community stakeholders.