home Weapons Infantry Systems C4I System to Improve Battlefield Communications

C4I System to Improve Battlefield Communications

Feb 20, 2020

photo illust US Air National Guard — Tactical air control party specialists with the 169th Air Support Operations Squadron survey an enemy-controlled landing zone before calling in close-air support at Operation Northern Strike in Grayling Air Gunnery Range, Grayling, Mich., Aug. 14, 2014. Northern Strike was a 3-week-long exercise led by the National Guard that demonstrated the combined power of joint and multinational air and ground forces. TACPs with the Air National Guards 169th ASOS from Peoria, Ill., and more than 5,000 other armed forces members from 12 states and two coalition nations participated in the combat training. (U.S. Air National Guard photo by Staff Sgt. Lealan Buehrer/Released)

This post is also available in: עברית (Hebrew)

The battlefield is becoming increasingly digital and connected. Military forces use software-defined radios (SDR) to deliver secure voice, video and data that connects the tactical edge to command centers. The US Army wants to modernize its handheld radio systems over the next four years. The radios are a key element to what the service calls the integrated tactical network, the concept behind the Army’s modernized battlefield network which will incrementally add capabilities units every two years beginning in 2021.

The Pentagon wants to spend $11.9 billion on network warfare systems in fiscal year 2021 — a 17 percent increase over the previous year and the largest such request in more than a decade. “The Department is well underway in transforming and developing new concepts for the conduct of future joint military operations to achieve full spectrum dominance,” defense leaders wrote in documents laying out the Pentagon’s FY2021 budget. “This overarching goal to defeat any adversary or control any situation across the full range of military operations is achieved through a broad array of capabilities enabled by an interconnected network of sensors, shooters, command, control, and intelligence.”

The required radio systems are the 2-channel Leader radio, the Manpack radio and the Rifleman radio, according to c4isrnet.com. L3Harris and Thales are the primary contractors for the radios.

The Army said in the budget request that it plans to test two-channel technologies using the existing Manpack radios to demonstrate of air to ground communication. It also plans to evaluate a single-channel radio that runs an advanced networking waveform.

The Army wants to spend more than $3 billion on the devices, according to budget documents. That’s about $450 million more than Army officials projected they would spend on the radios during the same time period in budget documents last year.