SLAAD Division
The Strike, Land Attack, and Air Defense (SLAAD) Division of the National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA) traces its heritage to 1982 with the founding of the Anti-Air Warfare (AAW) Committee of the National Security Industrial Association (NSIA). Upon the merger of the NSIA and the American Defense Preparedness Division (ADPA) in March of 1997 to form the NDIA, the AAW Committee was renamed as the SLAAD Division of the NDIA.
From 1997 until the merger with the Precision Strike Association (PSA) in December of 2019, the SLAAD Division served as an open and objective channel of communication between the Department of the Navy, DOD, Industry, and academia on a range of issues relating to strike, land attack, and air defense, as well as related command and control and battle management capabilities. Over the 27 years of its existence, SLAAD Division conducted nearly a hundred significant NDIA industry-government studies for the Department of the Navy related to its mission. The reports (classified and unclassified) are stored at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (JHU APL).
Regular Quarterly Meetings were held by SLAAD Division to support the products produced. The Winter and Spring meetings were hosted by Executive Committee member companies, the Autumn meeting was typically held at fleet headquarters as part of the Annual Fleet Visit. The Summer meeting was hosted by JHU APL as the Annual Meeting and held in conjunction with the annual classified NDIA SLAAD Division Symposium, which was typically attended by a couple hundred leaders from the defense industry, military, and defense civilians. For the final ten years of SLAAD Division existence, SLAAD Division teamed with the NDIA Missile Defense Division to conduct a series of ten classified symposia on the subject of “The State of Integrated Air and Missile Defense (IAMD).”
The Annual Fleet Visit alternated each year between the Atlantic and Pacific Fleets. The purpose of the Fleet Visits was for the members of the SLAAD Division Executive Committee to gain firsthand knowledge of current operating fleet issues, helping members to incorporate relevant, timely Navy concerns into their studies.