This paper describes the research conducted by NATO STO CMRE (North Atlantic Treaty Organization Science and Technology Organization Centre for Maritime Research and Experimentation) on the development of an architectural framework based on standards that bridge the Robotics, Command, Control and Communication (C3) and Modelling & Simulation (M&S) communities. The use of autonomous systems in real operations, in particular in the underwater domain, requires preliminary phases of testing (Does it work?) as well as experimentation and analysis (How does it work?) under accurate and realistic scenarios. CMRE is answering these questions with interoperable M&S. This work uses interoperable M&S to fill a cultural and educational gap in the underwater autonomous system operational communities, preparing the way for new concepts such as serious gaming for the analysis of the human decision-making process and “M&S-based training environments for robotics�, by including machine-learning algorithms in the loop. CMRE’s work has addressed the development of multi-layer interoperable High-Level Architecture (HLA) federations to support operationally relevant research and engineering activities for cooperative and collaborative teaming of autonomous systems in the maritime domain. The use of HLA federations also enables Live, Virtual and Constructive simulations following the Distributed Simulation Engineering and Execution Process (DSEEP) standard. To date, the federations consist of ROS (Robotic Operating System) based underwater autonomous systems (hardware- and software-in-the-loop), virtual simulators to display and manage interactions among assets, and federates for the environment, communications, dynamics as well as mission-specific federates. Furthermore, the architecture supports over-the-internet distributed experiment, embracing the Service Oriented Architecture concept. The paper presents the result of the work done to support the experimentation on autonomous collaborative algorithms for Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUV) for Mine Counter Measure (MCM). Currently the team is focusing on Anti-Submarine Warfare scenarios and on the design of new application of Augmented and Virtual Reality for surface and underwater to enhance situational awareness by the integration of multiple layers of information.