13 octobre 2020 | International, Aérospatial, Terrestre
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Army's ambitious first Project Convergence, an exercise that measured the progress of the service's modernization strategy within its future operational concept, concluded last month, but the service already has a sense of what it wants to accomplish in 2021.
The series of exercises and experiments that made up the Project Convergence “campaign of learning” took place at Yuma Proving Grounds, Arizona. The event, held over a six-week period in the harsh desert at America's southwest border, was deemed the most important Army event outside of global operations, and future annual iterations are expected to continue shaping the future force.
“We're going to have even further transformation of the battlefield geometry,” Brig. Gen. Wally Rugen, who is in charge of future vertical lift modernization, told Defense News in an Oct. 6 interview ahead of the Association of the U.S. Army's annual conference.
“We want to go deeper. We made it to 61.9 kilometers, across the forward line of troops in the scenario we fought in 2020,” Rugen said. “We will want to go farther than that.”
The Army will also join forces with all of the other military services in 2021, according to Gen. John Murray, the head of Army Futures Command. It will be up to those other services the kinds of capabilities and technologies they each bring to the equation, but the intention is to have the Air Force's F-35 fighter jet integrated into the architecture of the operation.
Earlier this month, the Army and the Air Force signed a two-year collaboration agreement to develop a concept for Joint All-Domain Command and Control, or JADC2, which carries over the Army's future war-fighting doctrine, “Multi-Domain Operations” — which is still in the concept phase — to the world of joint operations.
JADC2 essentially connects sensors to shooters — which was the bread and butter of Project Convergence this year — across the joint force. The exercise involved about 500 people at Yuma; most were data collectors. The event represented a platoon-sized operation.
But in 2021, according to Murray, an entire operational headquarters element will be brought in to drive the learning in terms of how “we organize and how we fight the capability in the future.”
Additionally, the Army wants to bring in a multidomain task force from Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington state, which would likely be the centerpiece of Project Convergence 21, said Brig. Gen. John Rafferty, who leads the Army's long-range precision fires efforts, which is the service's top modernization priority.
There will also be other operational units brought in “to help explore and to help test on a larger scale,” Rafferty told Defense News in an interview this month.
Starting in 2021, the exercise will have a foreign flavor. The United Kingdom signed on to participate next year, Murray said, and Australia may join. In 2022, the focus of the exercise will build significantly in terms of involving coalition forces.
The Army also plans to tie Project Convergence to other exercises happening at roughly the same time. For example, since the event has an objective to operate in denied and degraded environments, the Army's Position Navigation and Timing Assessment Exercise will likely be a part of Project Convergence in 2021.
In its first year, the Army had elements from the modernization teams focused on future vertical lift, long-range precision fires, the next-generation combat vehicle, the network, and positioning, navigation and timing. Next year, more teams will join, including those dedicated to air and missile defense, soldier lethality, and the Synthetic Training Environment.
The Army also plans to involve its developmental missile, meant to replace the Army Tactical Missile System for a long-range shot.
The Precision Strike Missile — a weapon with an expected range of 500 kilometers — will likely have a test shot that aims to surpass that during Project Convergence. The missile has an aggressive test schedule next year.
The Extended Range Cannon, or ERCA, which participated this year, will have new technology rolled in by 2021, Rafferty said.
The service also plans to demonstrate the Excalibur Hit-to-Kill capability, which is one of the competitors for the Dual-Purpose Improved Conventional Munition replacement effort. “That really is the lethality component of ERCA at extended ranges,” he added.
The future vertical lift team will bring its 20mm gun planned for its future attack reconnaissance aircraft to the event as well as its Modular Effects Launcher prototype, which will carry both lethal and nonlethal effects to deploy from the air, Rugen said.
The Army has begun firing live rounds from the gun, and will fire roughly 285,000 rounds through it this fiscal year.
The Air-Launched Effects, or ALE, capability played a critical role in Project Convergence this year, and is to return with increased capability and improved technology.
“The lower tier of the air domain is decisive,” Rugen said. “I think '20 proved that yet again like it did in '19. We need a broader acceptance of that from the joint force and from defensewide. There is a capability to show up at the time and place of our choosing with vertical lift from relative sanctuary and have operational effects, and that's really what we intend to show in '21.”
The network underpins everything at Project Convergence, and improvements will continue to be made so the network that shows up in 2021 is more robust and geared beyond what it was originally designed to do, which is to support a tactical brigade.
“I think you'll see better discipline on our data management and message traffic, message formats, which, again, is going to help that machine-to-machine targeting,” Rugen said. To further improve the ground and air assets connectivity, there will be a few more waveforms incorporated “to see if they can produce the bandwidth we need.”
The Army wants the mesh network established through ALEs to be “more resilient and have greater goals on distance,” he added.
FIRESTORM is also expected to return next year. The system uses artificial intelligence to help select the optimal shooter for engagement.
Surrogate robotic combat vehicles and an optionally manned fighting vehicle will continue to play a major role as well.
The hope is also to bring in the Army's Integrated Air and Missile Defense Battle Command System, known as IBCS, which is currently undergoing development to connect sensors and shooters for the purpose of countering missile threats. The system recently completed a by-and-large successful limited-user test and will head into its initial operational test and evaluation in 2021.
Murray noted that if the test and evaluation conflicts with the Army's schedule, the system will not participate in next year's Project Convergence, noting that the evaluation is a top priority for the program to remain on track.
The Army is also hoping the Integrated Visual Augmentation System — which will provide soldiers with AI-enhanced goggles that assist with navigation, targeting, and advanced night and thermal vision — will be ready for next year's experimentation.
Overall, the Army has collected “70-plus technologies” — to include a few capabilities from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency — that it might incorporate into the event, Murray said, noting not all 70 will end up participating.
19 octobre 2023 | International, Terrestre, C4ISR
The European Commission has picked the consortium to implement a prototype service-oriented innovative solution for distributed synthetic training and decision support.
29 juin 2020 | International, Aérospatial
By: Burak Ege Bekdil ANKARA, Turkey — Turkey's inability to produce a fully indigenous engine is harming some of the country's otherwise successful domestic defense programs, according to industry and government officials. “We had it 15 years ago, we had it 10 years ago and we are still having it,” said a former defense industry chief. “It's our chronic engine problem.” A government procurement official agreed, telling Defense News that “at best the problem causes major delays, and at worst it can be an existential threat [to programs].” The Altay, a multibillion-dollar program for the production of Turkey's first indigenous tank, has long been delayed due to difficulties surrounding the engine and transmission used to power the new-generation tank. BMC, a Turkish-Qatari joint venture that in 2018 won the serial production contract for the Altay, said in October 2020 that the tank would be fielded within 24 months. The original target was to have the Altay in the field this year 2020. Today, procurement officials and industry sources say even 2022 is an optimistic deadline. Western countries with power pack technology, particularly Germany, have been reluctant to share technology or sell to Turkey for political reasons. “Lack of a feasible power pack [engine and transmission] is depriving the program of any sensible progress,” noted an industry source. Turkey also needs an engine for the new-generation TF-X fighter jet as well as indigenous helicopter models in the making. At the center of these engine efforts is Tusas Engine Industries, a state-controlled engine maker. TEI announced June 19 that it successfully tested its locally made TJ300 miniature turbojet engine, which the company produced for medium-range anti-ship missiles. The engine features a thrust rating of 1.3 kilonewtons. Company officials say the TJ300 engine's more advanced, future versions could power larger anti-ship cruise missiles and land-attack cruise missiles. Turkey hopes to power its anti-ship and land-attack cruise missiles with locally developed engines. “The effort is about ending dependency on imported designs,” a TEI official said. Turkey currently imports miniature air-breathing engines from Microturbo — a unit of French company Safran — to power its domestically developed cruise missiles. Separately, Turkey's Kale Group is developing a larger, albeit miniature turbojet engine called the KTJ-3200. It has a 3.2-kilonewton thrust rating, and will power the Atmaca and SOM missile systems. On a much bigger scale, Kale Group has ambitions to develop an engine to power the TF-X. In 2017, Kale Group and British company Rolls-Royce launched a joint venture to develop aircraft engines for Turkey, initially targeting the TF-X. But the £100 million (U.S. $124 million) deal was effectively put on hold due to uncertainties over technology transfer. In December, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavusoğlu said the government is keen to revive talks with Rolls-Royce. When asked for an update on negotiations, a Rolls-Royce spokesperson told Defense News: “We submitted an engine co-development proposal to Turkey, but the customer has not elected to pursue this to date.” A year before the Kale Group-Rolls-Royce partnership, Turkish Aerospace Industries — a sister company of TEI — signed a $125 million heads of agreement with U.K.-based firm BAE Systems to collaborate on the first development phase of the TF-X. Turkey originally planned to fly the TF-X in 2023, but aerospace officials are now eyeing 2025 at the earliest. TEI is also developing the TS1400, a turboshaft engine it intends to power the T625 Gökbey, a utility and transport helicopter developed and built by TAI. The Gökbey currently flies with the CTS-800A turboshaft engine supplied by Light Helicopter Turbine Engine Company, a joint venture between American firm Honeywell and Rolls-Royce. The Gökbey made its maiden flight in September. TEI says it successfully tested the “core” of its TS1400 turboshaft engine and plans to deliver the prototype to TAI in late 2020. But analysts remain cautious. “These efforts may eventually fail to materialize without meaningful foreign know-how,” said a London-based Turkey specialist. “Or they may come at costs not viable for mass production.” Andrew Chuter in London contributed to this report. https://www.defensenews.com/industry/techwatch/2020/06/26/turkeys-chronic-engine-problem-is-harming-defense-projects-warn-officials/
3 juin 2019 | International, C4ISR, Autre défense
For the second year in a row, DARPA is convening the electronics community to discuss the ambitions and achievements of its five-year, upwards of $1.5 billion investment in U.S. microelectronics advancement. Attendees at the second annual Electronics Resurgence Initiative (ERI) Summit – being held July 15-17 in Detroit, Michigan – will hear from commercial and defense leaders as they share their insights on the domestic semiconductor industry and the applications driving next-generation electronics. The Summit will close on July 17 with 11 public workshops designed to demonstrate program accomplishments, shape future areas of research, and provide insights into working with DARPA as well as transitioning technologies to use. “Continued collaboration across industry, defense, and academia is critical to creating the next wave of microelectronics innovation,” said Dr. Mark Rosker, director of DARPA's Microsystems Technology Office (MTO). “Last year's Summit allowed these groups to come together and collectively work towards creating a more specialized, secure, heavily automated, and DoD-available electronics industry. This collaboration contributed to the formation of six new DARPA programs. With this year's expanded roster of workshops, we are again asking the community to share their perspectives, provide guidance, and foster the connections that will help define the future of an innovative and competitive domestic electronics enterprise.” In areas ranging from security and privacy to rapid circuit design, ERI's programs are already working to address both commercial and manufacturing realities as well as the needs of the defense enterprise. Several “Ongoing Efforts” workshops will provide updates on these active research efforts, including presentations on secure hardware and software architectures for high-risk transactions; trusted-by-design components and their impact on supply chain security; and novel atomic clock architectures. Attendees will also experience live demonstrations of autonomous chip design tools as well as open source IP and verification technology in development on two ERI programs – IDEA and POSH. Both programs are addressing the complexity and cost barriers that have limited the competitive field for circuit design by exploring novel approaches to automated circuit design and IP sharing. Shaping the future of microelectronics innovation requires research and development across a vast number of technical areas and applications. Several “Emerging Concepts” workshops will explore potential future areas of investment, and will seek input from the community to help define the most critical challenges to address. These workshops will focus on enhanced security for commercial hardware; energy-efficient computing for distributed machine intelligence; and novel approaches to designing and verifying distributed systems. A four-hour workshop will also focus on the challenges facing heterogeneous integration – a critical area of exploration for an emerging wave of alternatives to traditional transistor scaling. The workshop will cover problems associated with dense digital integration and mixing silicon with compound semiconductors, as well as potential solutions and paths forward. Finally, two “Enhancing Collaboration” workshops will provide guidance to attendees who are new to working with DARPA or are interested in transitioning DARPA-funded inventions out of the lab and into the commercial world. During the “DARPA/MTO Collaboration 101” workshop, Rosker will provide both a history of the agency and information about how to work with DARPA in the future. The deadline to register for the ERI Summit is Monday, June 24, 2019 at 11:59 PM EST. Registration information as well as a full agenda and workshop descriptions are available at www.eri-summit.com. All attendees must register in advance. Workshop headcount limits will be pre-determined based on attendee interest. https://www.darpa.mil/news-events/2019-05-31