The Battle Control System (BCS) by ThalesRaytheonSystems, is the primary air defense/battle management system for North American Air Defense (NORAD) and the U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM). The interoperable, open architecture air defense and command and control platform supports the U.S. and Canadian Homeland Defense and drug interdiction missions. BCS processes, integrates, displays and distributes data from multiple sensors, data links and other C2 agencies to maintain situational awareness, decision support and combat identification for the United States and Canada.

BCS employs commercial off the shelf (COTS) hardware and open source software, including a Linux operating system and a highly flexible, customizable user interface.

With five air defense sectors in CONUS, Canada, Hawaii and Alaska, the system supports up to 200 radars and is capable of tracking all radar-detectable threats over CONUS from a single sector. Through spiral development, BCS delivers continuous improvement as technologies evolve, including special support for missions in the National Capital Region (NCR) and automated machine to machine processing of Air Task Order/Airspace Control Order
(ATO/ACO) information generated by the Air Operations Center (AOC).

BCS has been operational 24/7 since 2006, providing a single integrated air picture to defend against airborne threats