Former Air Force acquisition boss joins drone maker Volansi

On the same subject

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  October 30, 2019 | International, C4ISR

  Army’s plan to field its network could collapse under an extended continuing resolution

  By: Jen Judson ABERDEEN PROVING GROUND, Md. — Critical fielding plans for major elements of the Army's revamped network could fall apart if Congress does not reach a budget deal soon, according to service leaders in charge of network modernization. Should Congress opt to extend the current continuing resolution, which funds the government at fiscal 2019 budget levels, past the Nov. 21 deadline, the Army will struggle to get more capable radios and other elements of its new and improved network to units. While a shorter extension would be less painful, a yearlong continuing resolution, or CR, would derail the efforts. “The whole fielding plan will collapse without a budget,” Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy said during a recent trip to Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland, where he was briefed on the service's efforts to deliver a modernized network to the force. “The longer [the CR] goes, I think it can definitely impact the schedule. If it bleeds into the next calendar year, you can look at a day-for-day slip” until a budget is passed, he said, adding that the longer a CR exists, the more likely the Army will have to reformulate its fielding plan because the units originally intended to receive the equipment won't be available to test the new capabilities and train with them. The Army is scheduled to conduct three major test events next year of its network. The 1st Brigade of the 82nd Airborne Division will assess the first capability set of the new Integrated Tactical Network, or ITN, in February. The manpack and leader radio operational test, which is part of the Handheld, Manpack, and Small Form Fit radio program, is scheduled for the third quarter of FY20. Furthermore, at next year's Defender Europe military exercise, the Army will use the Command Post Computing Environment, the Tactical Server Infrastructure and a number of ITN's initial capabilities to assess interoperability with partners and allies. If a CR extends past the first quarter of the fiscal year, the Army will be unable to test radios with a new waveform, known as TSM, as part of its HMS radio program. The current plan is for the 1st Brigade of the 82nd to test the radios in the third quarter of FY20. The TSM waveform is critical to a modernized network because it provides greater capability than what is currently fielded. The radios with the TSM waveform are more secure, can connect a larger number of radios on a single network, can easily tie into coalition partners' communications, and can more effectively push voice and data. If the Army is faced with a yearlong CR, the HMS radio program would be limited to a $3.7 million budget out of $35.6 million requested in FY20. Without the funding, the manpack and leader radio operational test won't happen until FY21, and the Army will likely have to shift to a different unit to conduct the test because of the operational tempo of the 82nd, according to Maj. Gen. Peter Gallagher, who is in charge of the Army's network modernization. Additionally, if testing can't begin until FY21, the Army's full-rate production schedule will slip. “We're confident that our radios will support the waveform, but we're talking about maybe a situation where we couldn't ramp up production to meet the capability set fieldings without essentially ordering stuff in the absence of that operational test, which is not exactly a best practice,” Gallagher said. The Army is planning to field the radios to four units in 2021: the 1st Brigade of the 82nd; the 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team; the 3rd Brigade of the 25th Infantry Division; and the 2nd Brigade of the 82nd. A long-term CR would also prevent the procurement of critical ITN communication enhancement equipment that will also be delivered to the four planned brigade combat teams in FY21. Without the equipment, the Army would have to delay communication patches for light infantry formations. A yearlong CR would affect the fielding of the Tactical Server Infrastructure, or TSI, which is also facing a potential FY20 budget cut. The Senate Appropriations Committee's Defense Subcommittee cut its procurement line by more than half, and it's unclear whether that decrement will survive conference committee. The TSI would only have 26 percent of its funding under a yearlong CR, which means the procurement of TSI servers, both small and large versions, will be delayed. A $45.86 million reduction in FY20 would prevent the fielding of 101 large variant servers and 184 small variants, which means two corps, three divisions and 10 brigade combat teams — including units like the 18th Airborne Corps, the 1st Cavalry Division, the 101st Airborne Division, III Corps and 4th Infantry Division — wouldn't get the updated server hardware needed to run the Command Post Computing Environment, Gallagher said during a briefing with McCarthy. And because the servers used to run the Command Post Computing Environment will be delayed, so will the rollout of the CPCE itself. Units like the 10th Mountain Division and the 335th Theater Signal Command have requested accelerated fielding of the CPSE and TSI capability. Currently fielded servers are cumbersome to initialize and are not appropriately protected to deal with emerging cyberthreats. The Tactical Defensive Cyber Operations Infrastructure capability, which protects the servers, will also be delayed. As the Army's first capability set due for fielding in 2021 would be delayed under a CR, its next capability set slated for 2023 would also be pushed back. The Army wouldn't have the funds to conduct experimentation and soldier evaluation because those are considered new start programs with no funding lines in FY19. Those efforts include experiments with low-Earth and medium-Earth orbit constellations, data management, new waveforms, command post mobility, and network management tools. This early research and development is meant to inform preliminary design and further larger-scale experimentation leading up to 2023. https://www.c4isrnet.com/2019/10/29/army-network-fielding-plan-could-collapse-under-extended-continuing-resolution/

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  July 14, 2024 | International, C4ISR, Security

  DarkGate Malware Exploits Samba File Shares in Short-Lived Campaign

  DarkGate malware uses Samba file shares in a short-lived campaign targeting North America, Europe, and Asia.

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  April 26, 2018 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security

  Defense intelligence chief: ‘A lot of technology remains untapped’

  by Sandra Erwin Kernan: Project Maven so far has been “extraordinarily” useful in processing intelligence but more capabilities are needed. TAMPA, FLA. — Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence Joseph Kernan, a retired Navy vice admiral, is rarely seen or heard at public events. But he decided to step on the stage and address the nation's largest gathering of geospatial intelligence professionals to relay a message that the military is in the market for cutting-edge technology. “The reason I agreed to speak is that a lot of capacity and technology remains untapped,” Kernan said in a keynote speech on Monday at the GEOINT symposium. DoD collects loads of data from satellites, drones and Internet-of-things devices. But it needs help making sense of the intelligence and analyzing it quickly enough so it can be used in combat operations. It needs powerful artificial intelligence software tools that the tech industry is advancing at a past pace. The most promising AI effort the Pentagon has going now is Project Maven. Military analysts are using Google-developed AI algorithms to mine live video feeds from drones. With machine learning techniques, software is taught to find particular objects or individuals at speeds that would be impossible for any human analyst. Kernan said Project Maven only started a year ago and so far has been “extraordinarily” useful in overseas operations. “I would have liked to have had it in my past,” said Kernan, a former special operations commander. There is such heightened interest in AI that the Pentagon got Project Maven approved and under contract in two months. More importantly, said Kernan, the “capability was tested overseas. Not in the Pentagon.” For AI algorithms to be valuable to the military, they have to produce relevant intelligence, he cautioned. “Don't be developing capability to serve warfighters while sitting in the Pentagon. Make sure you address their needs by working with the forces out there. That's key to Project Maven. It works with users.” Software, no matter how advanced, will not replace human analysts, said Kernan. “It's about enabling analysts to use their cognitive process so they don't have to jam and finger push things into a computer.” What annoys Kernan? “That we really haven't taken all the advantage we can of technology.” That may be about to change as DoD ramps up AI efforts. Defense procurement chief Ellen Lord said the Pentagon will start bringing together AI projects that already exist but do not necessarily share information or resources. “We have talked about taking over 50 programs and loosely associating those,” Lord told reporters. “We have many silos of excellence.” Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering Michael Griffin will oversee a new AI office that will bring in “elements of the intelligence community,” he said. But many details remain to be worked out. The speed at which the Pentagon moved with Project Maven is “truly groundbreaking,” said Mike Manzo, director of intelligence, threat and analytic solutions at General Dynamics Mission Systems. The company provides training and advisory services to the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. “This community is not accustomed to rapid acquisition, and rapid deployment,” Manzo told SpaceNews. “I applaud the Project Maven staff, the government, and everybody who is involved with that.” Another reason Project Maven is “disruptive” is that it shows that analysts are beginning to trust new sources of intelligence and nontraditional methods, Manzo said. “What's encouraging is that the outputs of these systems are being trusted by the users,” he said. “A machine comes up with an answer and the human gives the thumbs up or down,” he said. “If DoD is trusting this, it's a tremendous step.” Even though a human is supervising, the focus doesn't have to be on “making sure the machine is doing the things I asked the machine to do.” None of this means decisions are being made by computers, Manzo said. “But these technologies help optimize the human analyst to do what they are really good at: intuition.” As the Pentagon seeks ways to bring AI into the battlefield, “Maven has a lot of promise.” http://spacenews.com/defense-intelligence-chief-a-lot-of-technology-remains-untapped/