U.S. military officials said today that for responding swiftly and effectively during crises real-time data is now as critical as boots on the ground — and that’s why military services are making data management a top priority, aiming to enable smarter decisions, sharper resource deployment, and clearer communications when it matters most.
Speaking today at the Google Geo for Gov conference in Washington, D.C., senior officials from the U.S. Coast Guard and U.S. Army detailed how their organizations are evolving data strategies to meet the growing demands of real-time crisis operations.
Use Cases Over Data Lakes
The Coast Guard is moving away from collecting vast amounts of unstructured data and instead focusing on clearly defined, mission-critical use cases – an approach that prioritizes executive needs and targets specific data to support key decisions, according to Captain Daniel Rogers, deputy chief data and artificial intelligence officer for the Coast Guard.
“We started out with this whole idea that you can just throw everything in the lake and then go fishing later and [use] a little AI for more efficiency,” Rogers said. “Well, that’s not [working] or how we want to do it at all.”
Instead, Rogers described a strategy that elevates data teams to work directly alongside executives, enabling the identification of trusted data sources tailored to specific decision points.
“What would make a difference in your decision if you had better data? That’s the question we start with,” he said, adding that this approach improves how the Coast Guard sources, organizes, and applies its data — ultimately leading to faster and more accurate responses during emergencies.
Army Confronts AI Expectations
George Ohanian, product director at the U.S. Army Geospatial Center, echoed Roger’s assessment of AI in data usage, adding that while AI tools can accelerate decision-making those tools are only as effective as the data they use.
“If your data is not structured well, and it’s not accessible and it’s not shareable, then no matter what AI tool you have, you’re only going to get the same answer no matter how you ask the question,” he said. He added that the Army Data Board is currently leading efforts on standardizing and structuring data across domains — a critical step before large-scale AI implementation.
Ohanian also highlighted another core data challenge for the Army – and the Department of Defense as a whole: data ownership and accessibility.
“We’re attacking the data problem side in terms of cleaning it up, making sure it’s viable, accessible, all those nice abilities that you need, not an easy task, because organizations own the data … No matter what tool you deploy, you’ve got to literally take that autonomy away from them,” he said.