Introduction: How does a planning conference occur virtually with participants from 8 countries without traveling?
To provide examples of what cooperation means, UNITAS, Latin for “unity”, is the longest-running, multi-national maritime exercise in the world. This sea exercise with US Naval Forces Southern Command and US 4th Fleet provides in-port training, involving North, South and Central America. UNITAS LXI hosted by Ecuador focused on interoperability at sea with warfighting exercises. For participating forces to come together to operate as a multi-national force, unique communication tools were required.
Challenges: Multinational collaboration on a single shared platform.
Rear Adm. Don Gabrielson, commander, US Naval Forces Southern Command / US 4th Fleet stated, “This team has an important mission. We are an example to our countries and the world of what cooperation means. We are the unstoppable force and will come together to succeed even under difficult conditions.” Planning conferences are most often held in person; however, due to COVID19, a global pandemic, UNITAS 21 needed to be virtual because of travel restrictions.
Solutions: Real-time communication with multi-national translation service.
APAN was utilized to virtually organize and collaborate with exercise planners for the UNITAS LXI Initial Planning Conference. More than a dozen Adobe Connect rooms were utilized. Some Adobe Connect rooms were utilized as “breakout rooms” for a variety of different topics and conversations. Announcements provided the latest information and instruction to conference attendees. Documents were uploaded to document libraries specific to each conference and subject. Chatrooms provided real-time communication that was translated between English, Spanish and Portuguese to eliminate language barriers.
Results: Over 70 planners from eight countries were able to perform virtual operations
Over 70 planners from Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Jamaica and Peru joined representatives from the US Navy, US Marine Corps, US Coast Guard and US Army to conduct virtual meetings to refine the UNITAS LXI concept of operations, schedule of events, and assigned roles and responsibilities. All participating navies utilized APAN to attend the planning conference virtually.