Defexpo 2020: UVision Announces a Joint Venture with Aditya Precitech for the Manufacture and Marketing of its Loitering Munitions in India

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  9 octobre 2019 | International, C4ISR

  How airmen can work together for persistent ISR

  By: Brig. Gen. Gregory Gagnon and Lt. Col. Nishawn Smagh There is always a next war. Great power competition is here. Now is the time, while the United States maintains a position of strength, to ensure we are not outmatched, out-thought, or out-witted. Rapidly and realistically positioning the Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance enterprise for first-mover advantage in today's data-driven environment is beginning with purposeful urgency. The past paradigm: crew-to-aircraft model During our careers, the Air Force ISR enterprise grew in both capability and capacity. In the late 1990s, the Air Force operated an ISR enterprise dominated by manned aircraft, each with their own specialized team operating unique systems that turned data into initial intelligence. Only a few organizations could turn raw airborne sensor data into intelligence in near-real time. We were only beginning to move data to the analyst, versus deploying the analyst to the data. As battlefield demand of ISR grew, we scaled up. We were fortunate to help build and execute airborne intelligence operations on a global scale, connected via a global network — we called them “reachback” operations. Reachback operations were the first step in transmitting ISR sensor collection across the globe in seconds. Even today, few nations can conduct this type of ISR operational design. The enterprise has continued to advance, achieving fully distributed operations around the world. We also made it possible to remove humans from aircraft, allowing missions to fly nearly three times longer and expand the data available to exploit. Correspondingly, the Air Force increased the number of organizations that could accept data and create intelligence. Following 9/11, our nation's needs changed; the fight necessitated the Air Force grow its capacity to deliver intelligence for expanded operations in the Middle East. We bought more unmanned vehicles, trained more ISR Airmen, and created more organizations to exploit data. Collection operations were happening 24/7 and most sorties required multiple crews to fly, control sensors and turn collection tasks into intelligence. As reachback operations grew, they became the Distributed Common Ground System and developed the ability to exploit aircraft sensor data. This growth was significant, but at the tactical level we employed the same crew model and simply grew at scale. This resulted in manpower growth, but also in disparate, distributed crews working similar tactical requirements with little unity of effort or larger purpose. This limited the ability of ISR airpower to have broader operational effects. While suitable for counter-terrorism, history tells us this approach is ill advised for great power conflict. Observe and orient: the data explosion and sense-making The traditional crew-to-aircraft model for exploitation must fast forward to today's information environment. The Pentagon has shifted its guidance to this new reality. The Defense Department recently declared information a seventh core function, and the Air Force's formal ISR flight plan maps a course for digital-age capabilities to turn information into intelligence. This “sense-making” must be able to handle both the complexity of a diverse information environment and scale to contend with an exploding volume of data. Access to expanded data sets, from diverse collection sources and phenomenology, is near and urgently needed. The Department's focus on artificial intelligence and machine learning in this realm remains stable and necessary. The next step is to retool how we task, organize, and equip both intelligence collection and analytic crews. As the Pentagon focuses on open architectures, artificial intelligence and machine learning, and data standards, the field is rapidly moving out. Air Combat Command , the Air Force lead command for ISR, is attacking the crew-to-aircraft model to test a sensor-agnostic approach using multiple data sources to address intelligence requirements. Cross-functional teams of Airmen are now assigned broader operational problems to solve, rather than a specific sensor to exploit. This will change joint and service collection management processes. ACC is tackling this future. We are supporting Air Force commanders in Europe and the Pacific with a pilot project that allows Airmen to explore these sensor-agnostic approaches. An additional element to our future success is partnering with our joint and allied partners, as well as national agencies, to bring resources, tools, and insights to bear. As we field the open architecture Distributed Common Ground System, we are shifting the focus from airmen operating specific sensors to airmen leveraging aggregate data for broader analysis. Headquarters Air Force and ACC are installing technologies to ensure readiness for the future ISR enterprise. Cloud technology paired with artificial intelligence and machine learning promises to speed human-machine teaming in generating intelligence across warfighting domains at the speed and scale necessary to inform and guide commanders. Underpinning this effort is a new data strategy and agile capability development for rapid prototyping and fielding. The Defense Department and the Air Force must continue to prioritize this retooling. Our adversaries see the opportunities; this is a race to the future. Situational awareness in the next war will require the development and fielding of AI/ML to replace the limited and manpower-intensive processes across the Air Force ISR enterprise. Employing AI/ML against repetitive data exploitation tasks will allow the service to refocus many of its ISR Airmen on AI/ML-assisted data analysis and problem solving. ISR and multi domain command and control ... enabling decide and act A headquarters-led initiative, with eyes toward a joint capability, is the creation of a collaborative sensing grid that operates seamlessly across the threat spectrum. Designs call for a data-centric network of multi domain platforms, sensors, and airmen that work together to provide persistent ISR. Equipped with manned and unmanned platform sensors capable of computing via AI/ML, these capabilities will link commanders to real-time information, plus tip and cue data from sensors-to-sensors, joint commanders, and weapons. This collaborative sensing grid is a foundational element for multi domain command and control . The vision of MDC2 is to outpace, outthink and outmaneuver adversaries. Creatively and rapidly applying new technology to operational problems is a long-held characteristic of airmen. Our DCGS airmen are no different. Non-material solutions deserve as much attention as hardware. This pilot project is our vanguard initiative to prepare for rapidly changing future systems environments. https://www.c4isrnet.com/opinion/2019/10/08/how-airmen-can-work-together-for-persistent-isr/

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  16 octobre 2020 | International, Terrestre, Sécurité

  Army signs $87 million deal for latest tank killer

  Mike Glenn The Army signed an $87 million deal with Saab to arm its soldiers with the latest version of the Swedish manufacturing company's powerful 84mm bunker-busting, Carl-Gustaf anti-tank weapon. The seven-year contract calls for Saab to provide an indefinite number of the shoulder-fired weapons, designated as M3E1, to the military. They will be used by the Army, Marine Corps and elements of U.S. Special Operations Command, company officials said. “The lightweight and effective recoilless rifle ensures readiness on the modern battlefield with multi-role capabilities through a wide array of munitions,” Erik Smith, president and CEO of Saab in the U.S., said in a statement. The latest version of the Carl-Gustaf is 28 percent lighter than its predecessor. The system has been popular with U.S. troops as a combined anti-tank, anti-personnel weapon system since it was first fielded in the late 1980s. The Army decided it would acquire the latest version in 2018. https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/oct/15/army-signs-87-million-deal-latest-tank-killer/

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  22 septembre 2020 | International, Terrestre, C4ISR

  Laying the groundwork: US Army unveils rough plan to formalize robotic combat vehicles effort

  Jen Judson WASHINGTON — The U.S. Army is preparing to enter into programs of record for light- and medium-class robotic combat vehicles in a few years, with plans to award separate contracts for a lead systems integrator for each program, according to the service's robotic combat vehicles product manager. The service wants to field a light, medium and heavy robotic combat vehicle, and it is experimenting with technology and how the vehicles might fit into future formations through the Army's Next-Generation Combat Vehicle modernization office. Developing NGCV capability is the second-highest priority for the Army. The plan is to make a decision to move the Army's RCV-Light out of technical maturation and into the engineering and manufacturing development phase in the second quarter of fiscal 2023. The service would do the same with the RCV-Medium program in FY24, Lt. Col. Chris Orlowski said Sept. 10 during a conference hosted by the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International. Orlowski noted that the potential RCV-Heavy program of record would fall behind the start of the medium and light programs by “a pretty significant margin.” At the same conference during a separate keynote presentation, Bruce Jette, the Army's acquisition chief, said decisions were made that “put pieces in place that will establish a formal program for robotic systems with the [program manager], not just following the tech base but in fact being the centerpiece for building light and medium systems inside of an architecture that fits within the entire operational vehicle architecture. In fact, it will leap over into the aircraft as well. It will be everything from driving to operations of the vehicle to visual sensing to probably a broader array of technical capabilities that you may not have even thought possible.” The Army plans to award a contract to a lead systems integrator that will combine the RCV's control station, network, platform, software and payloads, Orlowski said. Anticipated government-furnished equipment for the programs would include autonomy software, radios, war-fighter machine interface software, aided target recognition software and lethality payloads “minus the turret,” according to Orlowski. Other potential government-furnished equipment could be a tethered drone; assured position, navigation and timing technology; hostile fire detection; and other vehicle protection systems, he said. As the Army ventures into developing robotic vehicles that don't just do the dull, dirty and dangerous work, “the biggest thing is going to be software development, improving autonomous and automation software,” he added. “Teleoperation is nice; it works OK if you've got the right radios and the right environments, but long term, when those environments become tested, I think teleoperation will be less viable and we will have to really push the automation and autonomy on these platforms. But also, that being said, there is always going to have to be some soldier interaction with the platforms. How do we improve that interaction for the soldiers, reducing that cognitive burden?" he said. “I know everybody likes cool, big, awesome robots, but it's really a software thing that is going to make these things go, so anything that is kind of tied to software I think is a critical technology in my view,” he added. The Army's rough acquisition strategy for the robots calls for a first unit to receive RCV-Light vehicles in FY28 and a first unit to receive RCV-Medium in FY30, according to a slide from Orlowski's conference presentation. The Army recently wrapped up its first phase of experimentation with RCV-Heavy surrogates fashioned out of M113 armored personnel carriers at Camp Red Devil on Fort Carson, Colorado, which added complexity to an ongoing evaluation of the government-developed platforms. The Army also awarded contracts to a Textron and Howe & Howe team to build an RCV-Medium prototype, and to a QinetiQ North America and Pratt & Miller team to build the lighter version late last year and early this year. Those are being built now. Orlowski stressed those prototypes are being built “primarily to support future planned experimentation” in FY22 and FY24 and “in support of defining and informing requirements for the RCV program of record.” He added there is no plan to transition any of those systems into any type of limited fielding. “They are not designed for that. They are designed for a campaign of learning,” he said. Now that the first major experiment is done, the Army plans to build up to a company-level operation in the first quarter of FY22 at Fort Hood, Texas, with four RCV-Medium and four RCV-Light prototypes. While the experimentation at Fort Carson with RCV-Heavy was focused on cavalry operations where the robots served more in a scout mission and proved they could be effective in a reconnaissance and security role, the experiment in FY22 will move the robots into more of an attack-and-defend role. While the Army has to officially complete a critical technology assessment from the Fort Carson experimentation, Orlowski said the autonomy software “needs to improve.” The experimentation in FY22 will focus on improvements and the Army will work with industry partners to “improve that tether,” he said. “It needs to be robust in contested environments, which we haven't fully explored yet.” The service will also need to look at some alternate communications pathways between the control vehicle and the robots. Aided target recognition needs more maturity, Orlowski explained, “especially on the move to support the platforms.” Anything that reduces the soldier interaction with the platforms will also be incorporated, “and there are other things that soldiers asked for, which when we are ready to release we will. [The ideas from the feedback] were pretty perceptive," he said. "So how critical that becomes, we will see.” https://www.defensenews.com/land/2020/09/21/laying-the-groundwork-us-army-unveils-rough-plan-to-formalize-robotic-combat-vehicles-effort/