Photographs by Scott Gourley

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2 Photographs by Scott Gourley.S. Army brigade combat team (BCT) modernization achieved another critical milestone in late August, when soldiers from the 5th Brigade, 1st Armored Division (Army Evaluation Task Force [AETF]), began limited user testing (LUT) of the initial capabilities package at White Sands Missile Range, N.M. Until this year, Future Combat Systems (FCS) was really the cornerstone and the core of Army modernization, said Paul Mehney, a spokesman for the Army s evolved BCT modernization effort. The chief difference between the LUT and the FCS efforts was one key thing: Army Evaluation Task Force commander COL Randy Lane deployed his brigade tactical operations center to support limited user testing (LUT) at White Sands Missile Range, N.M. By Scott R. Gourley November 2009 ARMY 65

3 SPC Joshua Whiteland, Company C, 2nd Combined Arms Battalion, maneuvers a small unmanned ground vehicle (SUGV) Block 1 during village operations. Scott R. Gourley, a freelance writer, is a contributing editor to ARMY Magazine. FCS was dedicated to providing the full suite of military hardware including vehicles, robots and sensor platforms all connected by a network. And that was going to go to 15 brigade combat teams. The Army currently has 73 brigade combat teams, he continued. Only 15 of those were originally going to get the full suite of FCS equipment, but the Army has taken a look at a lot of the lessons learned from Iraq and Afghanistan and realized that we need advanced intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance (ISR) and lethality capabilities. We realize that we also need network capabilities to allow units all the way from squad to brigade levels to communicate across the battlefield. Those capabilities provided the focus for the September LUT and are the critical element of the BCT modernization effort. As currently projected, this modernization package, followed by others of increased capabilities, will be applied to all 73 U.S. Army brigades between calendar years 2011 and 2025 (the initial capabilities package will be applied to the first seven Infantry BCTs between 2011 and 2014). The initial LUT capabilities set included: the non-line-ofsight launch system (NLOS-LS), tactical unattended ground sensors (T-UGS), urban unattended ground sensors, Class 1 unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) Block 0, small unmanned ground vehicle (SUGV) Block 1 and a network integration kit (NIK). The NIK, for example, is designed to provide increased functionality in battle command by providing the introduction of the FCS network and fusion of current-force capability with the future force. Elements of the kit include the joint tactical radio system (JTRS) ground mobile radio, integrated computer system; multiband antenna and range extension relay to provide extended range for the T-UGS information, provided over the JTRS handheld, manpack, small formfit radio running Soldier Radio Waveform, back to the NIK and then forward to tactical operations centers. The capabilities within this set were derived from the Future Combat Systems program and have been in testing for the better part of a year and a half at Fort Bliss, Texas, with soldiers from the Army Evaluation Task Force, Mehney said. They ve been working on the equipment, establishing tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs). More importantly, they have also been looking at how the equipment has matured, whether it is reliable, whether it works in operational constructs that include offensive, defensive and stability operations, and whether this capabilities set matches those needs for the Army. During this period, the foundation for LUT was built on early company-sized situational training exercises in which members of the 1,125-soldier AETF began to flesh out TTPs as well as force development test and evaluation, a Training and Doctrine Command evaluation to help validate doctrine and emerging TTPs and to certify the unit as trained to enter LUT. C alling LUT a key test, Mehney cautioned, All of our equipment is not in final configuration yet, so we are going to have a few more tests in But this LUT, which is an independent test conducted by the Army Test and Evaluation Command (ATEC), will help prove whether this technology not only works in an operational environment but is also technically mature enough to advance through stages of production to start getting this equipment out to soldiers. We re the Army s only independent tester, said COL Steve Duke, who led the LUT data-collection effort for ATEC with a team of 265 soldiers, Department of the Army civilians and civilian contractors. The ATEC team members were divided into four primary skill sets, including instrumentation, data collection and processing, command and control, and subject-matter experts/observer-controllers. The LUT blue force participants focused on a battalion-minus sized element from the AETF. The unit s 2nd Combined Arms Battalion (2 CAB) provided command and control, and 2 CAB s Charlie Company with two Humvee-mounted weapons platoons and two dismounted platoon elements was supported by a reconnaissance 66 ARMY November 2009

4 SGT Garrett Haverkost operates a Class I Block 0 unmanned aerial vehicle, one of four that Charlie Company tested. platoon from battalion headquarters, providing the primary operational maneuver forces. In addition, the brigade s fires battalion provided an NLOS-LS platoon, fire-support element and other fires personnel. The additional supporting units facilitated the testing of the enabling technologies. In the case of Class 1 UAVs, for example, Charlie Company would normally have two air vehicles. Two additional UAVs, however, entered the test from the additional battalion reconnaissance platoon. LUT opposing forces were drawn from the AETF s 1st Combined Arms Battalion and included a mechanized infantry platoon, tank platoon and paramilitary forces. Opposing force (OPFOR) capabilities included tank decoys, indirect fire (mortars) and signals intelligence capabilities. The presence of 21 role-players serving as civilians on the battlefield provided additional realism and tactical challenges. The LUT featured a series of 96-hour missions; each incorporated offensive, defensive and stability operations. The iterations were separated by single pause days, primarily used for equipment reset and after action review. The pause day allows us to do a quick check on our data-collection processes to make sure they re still on track, that we re doing what we need to do, and to see whether we might need to increase the tempo of missions or slow the tempo down a little bit, COL Duke said. The AETF commander, COL Randy Lane, also deployed his brigade tactical operations center to support the LUT. Along with providing brigadelevel command-and-control input to the participating 2 CAB forces, the tactical operations center served the high-control function for OPFOR and myriad other test personnel. We try to control [the inputs] and meet a lot of objectives, COL Lane said. For the test objectives, we want to make sure that we are getting the data on all of these systems. So we construct an exercise that gets at multiple objectives and then try to play a little bit of the puppet master to make sure they are all met, while at the same time allowing free play so that it is a valid test with blue forces and red forces going against one another. We don t always make it happen sometimes they miss each other or miss what we were after. That s why we do multiple iterations. A few dozen miles to the west, one of those LUT free-play actions was taking shape as elements from 2 CAB s Charlie Company began a cordon-and-search operation focused on White Sand s Adobe Village training site. S ummarizing the operation for a group of observers, COL Lane referenced the Class 1 UAV droning overhead, noting that the asset could look into the village and tell you how many people are there and give you a good read on whether they have weapons or not. My OPFOR has gotten kind of cagey, he observed. They lay their weapons down when the Class 1 is coming, which is probably how it would play out [in actuality]. They would not want to be seen with a weapon in their hands and be targeted. We can t take a shot at them or put indirect fires on them [when they are unarmed]. Then they pick them back up at a later time. It becomes a sequencing challenge of when the ISR assets are on station and when they re not, and then we will try to keep eyes up above us continuously once the forces start to close on the objective. With approximately 40 minutes time on station for each of the Class 1 UAVs, these sorts of sequencing chal- 68 ARMY November 2009

5 An LUT observercontroller moves forward with Charlie Company elements. (Note soldier-developed external rucksack configuration for SUGV.) lenges are just some of the initial-capabilities-package modernization issues being addressed in a wide range of soldier-driven TTPs and tactical lessons learned. Many of the TTPs reflect the combat experiences of most members of the AETF. Following the conclusion of village operations, SPC Joshua Whiteland, an SUGV operator with Charlie Company, described a recent change to the mobility pack design. We ve changed the way that we strap it on the rucksack the soldier is carrying, SPC Whiteland said. They gave us a rucksack to put the bot in, but they really didn t have a plan for how we were going to carry it. We were dropped off a couple of miles away, and we moved by foot to the objective. You can t just carry the bot by hand [versus carrying a weapon] because you lose some security. So we now basically strap it to the outside of the pack using a winch strap. That way I can press the button to power it on while we are still in movement. When we get there, I can just release it and off we go. That s one of the new TTPs we ve developed. While many of the emerging TTPs address specific aspects of system employment, for CPT Darius Anania, Charlie Company commander, the new systems are having a broader impact. They re part of my planning cycle where I employ certain systems, where I can mitigate risk, and where I can economize forces, he said. Asked about operational complications with the new equipment, CPT Anania said, It comes down to tempo. When the tempo is fast when it s really fast it s hard to use the spin outs [initial capabilities package]. When it slows down, that s when you can use them. Sometimes you have to slow the tempo down in order to use them. I learned that the hard way a couple of times, slowing down in order to use a spin out when I probably shouldn t have slowed down. Even in raiding this objective today, you would want a violence of action from your last covered and concealed position to the foothold. Then, once you get to the foothold, that s when you can employ your spin-out gear. But sometimes you don t leave your attack position; instead, you deploy your spin out first, in order to check out a possible improvised explosive device, then you continue. So it all comes down to tempo. While the initial capabilities package is opening the doors to dramatic changes in the tempo of unit tactical operations, some things remain the same. It doesn t really change anything from my perspective, said Charlie Company s first sergeant, MSG Miguel De Los Santos. I handle issues such as unit casualties, so there are no changes for my job. I still run things the same way. These new capabilities are mainly for our young warfighters. Noting that he hears all the feedback, positive and negative, he added, We re here to test the new equipment that the Army wants us to test, and that s what we do. As for the results of that testing, Jerry Tyree, director of integration for the AETF, explained that the ATEC limited user test data-collection results including everything from hours and reliability to performance measures will be incorporated into a report, likely to be released this month, that will support the Milestone C decision process (allowing system entry into low-rate initial production) now scheduled for December. The question is not whether everything is 100 percent, or perfect, Tyree said. Instead it is whether we know enough and whether the risks are low enough that we could commit the resources to buy a brigade set of this equipment to take us into another series of tests in 2010, culminating in 2011 with the initial operational test and evaluation that gets us the production decision to go out and field this to the brigade combat teams. November 2009 ARMY 69