OCTOBER 9, 2024 – To stay ahead of emerging threats and match the pace of unprecedented technological change, the Army is changing its ways of doing business. For the future fight we must have a layered approach to formation capability that supports multiple echelons from squad to Corps. We must have scalable and tailorable effects to see, stimulate, disrupt, and strike threat systems at ever increasing operational ranges to expedite and strengthen the kill web while mitigating risk through first contact with the enemy through machines. Shortening the kill chain gives commanders the capabilities to achieve the decision advantage and options to shape the battlefield environment with close and deep sensing and delivery of lethal and non-lethal precision effects.
Specifically, for the Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) ecosystem the Army is leveraging rapid technology growth and innovation across its formations for emerging capability development of the Future Tactical Unmanned Aircraft System (FTUAS) and Launched Effects (LE). Given the ever-changing strategic environment with the rapidly evolving, sensor-rich, contested battlefield, the Army must develop, acquire, and integrate continuously updated capability to warfighting formations to deliver lethal and survivable land power capabilities to the joint force.
The Army continues to transform to validate new capabilities and accelerate development and force design efforts to achieve a more lethal, strategically mobile, and combat ready force, now and into the future. This continuous transformation means iteratively adapting and evolving how we fight, how we organize, how we train and how we equip so we stay ahead of our adversaries. Ongoing conflicts in eastern Europe and the Middle East, experimentation, and training and exercises with Allies and partners, demonstrate the criticality of this change to meet the demands of the strategic environment, and the Army is adapting the ways it does business.
“Transforming in contact” captures near-term efforts (18-24 months) and is one of three-time horizons, including deliberate (2-7 years) and concept-driven transformation (7-15 years), working in tandem and perpetually. It focuses on near-term solutions to threats faced on the evolving battlefield and enables Army units to rapidly test organizational changes while integrating emerging technology.
For the Army to transform in contact leaders must drive innovation from the bottom-up and rapidly incorporate lessons learned into agile acquisition approaches, rapid requirements generation, more flexible funding. To accomplish this with our future UAS we must execute a flexible and agile acquisition plan that drives innovation and competition with focus areas in Requirements in Contact, Adaptive Acquisition Framework, and Modernized Force Design.
Requirements in Contact
Our FUAS requirements are remaining flexible, adaptable, and agile, for systems that our configurable, attritable, and layered at echelon. The Army is continuously assessing the strategic environment and the state of technology to maintain the advantage on the battlefield staying ahead of threat evolution. The Army must also harvest science & technology and industry innovation, and learn lessons from our own experimentation to provide capability to the warfighter sooner than later. An example of this new approach is the recent Tranche 1 fielding of Company level small UAS through a directed requirement to immediately enhance the Army’s ability to conduct reconnaissance, surveillance, and target acquisition missions at that echelon. The selection of commercial off-the-shelf systems is designed to meet immediate operational needs while informing future requirements. Additional examples include a requirement for a common controller for both air and ground, as well as ability to 3D print parts for sustainment. Our formations and commanders in the field cannot wait for the perfect solution, but the one that give us a minimum viable capability so that units can begin the training and integration required to establish tactics, techniques and procedures that will ultimately transform warfighting capability.
At the center of the FUAS requirement strategy is a “buy, give, inform” model to get systems and upgrades into the hands of Soldiers for use in training or operationally. Organizations such as the U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command (ATEC) will test systems and collect data by embedding evaluators within units, marking a departure from traditional test and evaluation processes. ATEC will seize every available opportunity to gather data and obtain Soldier feedback, aiming to efficiently provide insights to support system development and evaluations while reducing the scope of traditional test events. This approach includes leveraging warfighter feedback as part of an ongoing campaign of learning and integrating events such as Project Convergence, EDGE, PNTAX, and others involving both industry and government partners. Warfighter feedback will inform upgrades and assessed capability that is of high technical readiness level (TRL) will become readily available to the end user.
Adaptive Acquisition Framework
To maintain an asymmetric advantage over our adversaries and deliver timely, lethal, and survivable capabilities to the Joint Force, it is imperative that the Army continues to speed up and optimize its approach to acquisition.
Advances in UAS, sensor, and software technologies is occurring faster than traditional, linear procurement processes can react. The Army’s Program Executive Office for Aviation is embracing innovative, parallel approaches to employ the new ways of doing business as well, specifically adaptive acquisition authorities available to the Army to deliver capabilities faster while maintaining rigorous approaches to open systems design and intellectual property. The Army’s Future Tactical UAS program offers a recent example of adopting flexible tactics to deliver advanced capabilities at the speed of innovation.
The Army’s team at the UAS Project Management Office takes Modular Open Systems Approach (MOSA) seriously. This approach not only supports rapidly integrating hardware and software but also employs a business strategy that allows it to quickly maneuver, both contractually and programmatically, to on-ramp and off-ramp vendors and meet future UAS requirements. This strategy allows the Army to contract directly with multiple industry partners that can supply technologies, Government labs, and Other Government Agencies for design and integration upgrades.
The Army is also leading a unique contracting approach by leveraging multiple contracts, instead of a sole, vendor-locked agreement with an original equipment manufacturer, to quickly and economically incorporate the market’s best available technologies and expertise into FTUAS. The flexibility to contract with the aircraft manufacturer, combined with numerous options to contract directly with technology suppliers for software and payloads, provides the Government the agility to rapidly integrate best available technologies and enables continuous capability insertion.
Lastly, the Army is enabling agile integration of technology by establishing MOSA “use cases” as a primary evaluation factor in the source selection. A use case is how the Army intends to use the system once it’s fielded. The FTUAS contract contains several separate MOSA use cases, which include operational, training, maintenance, spare parts procurement, and both hardware and software upgrades and modifications. Industry must demonstrate through their technical proposal and data assertions that the Army will be able to meet MOSA and sustainment goals.
Modernized Force Design
In response to the rapid evolution of UAS, the Army has also embarked on a comprehensive overhaul of its training and operational structures. Throughout FY24, capability developers at Fort Huachuca and Fort Moore implemented significant updates with the guidance from the Aviation Center and the Maneuver Center, respectively, to align UAS training with the latest technological advancements.
At Fort Huachuca, the Army’s UAS Training Center expanded its curriculum to encompass a diverse array of UAS, ranging from small Group 1 First Person View (FPV) drones to advanced Group 3 Future Tactical UAS systems. This strategic move aims to cultivate highly skilled 15W UAS Operators and 15E UAS Maintainers capable of proficiently managing all UAS groups and payloads deployed across Army operations. Simultaneously, the Small UAS Master Trainer Course at Fort Moore broadened its Program of Instruction, incorporating additional small UAS systems and payloads. This initiative ensures that Master Trainers possess the expertise necessary to effectively train personnel on any UAS system within a Brigade Combat Team’s inventory.
In parallel, the Aviation Center has spearheaded the experimentation and testing of various Tactical UAS Platoon designs as part of the Transformation in Contact initiatives. This modernization initiative positions 150U UAS Warrant Officers, 15W UAS Operators, and 15E UAS Maintainers as pivotal career master operators and integrators within their respective units. These specialists are tasked with overseeing a wide spectrum of UAS and LE systems and payloads, assuming responsibility for training development, safety protocol enforcement, tactical deployment strategies, risk management, spectrum coordination, airspace integration, maintenance oversight, quality assurance, hardware upgrades, and software engineering.
The goal of the revamped Tactical UAS Platoon is to strategically design and equip ground brigades and Combat Aviation Brigades with unparalleled UAS and LE knowledge and capabilities, ensuring superior operational readiness and effectiveness beyond the Forward Line of Troops (FLOT) in the context of Large-Scale Combat Operations (LSCO). By integrating advanced training methodologies and refined operational structures, the Army aims to uphold its leadership in UAS operations, guaranteeing adaptability and readiness in the dynamic landscape of modern warfare.
Conclusion
Transform in contact is here to stay, and remains focused on creating units that are strategically deployable, tactically mobile, lethal, and survivable in a multi-domain environment. It will test unit structure changes, simplify the command-and-control systems at the brigade and division level through use of existing technology to include commercial, off-the-shelf, and provide Brigade and Division Commanders the formations and tools to compete in contested environments.
We must, and we will break from previous paradigm of rigid monolithic program of record for Future Unmanned Aircraft System technologies. Our UAS technological potential inherent in America’s industrial base and research community is a strategic national strength. Key to reclaiming Army UAS advantage at the tactical and operational levels lies ahead. We will rapidly develop and deliver capability with maximum flexibility for adjustment through demand signals from the warfighter. We cannot cede this space to our adversaries. Our Soldiers, our Army, and our National Security depends on it.
Authors
MG Michael C. McCurry – United States Army Futures Command Chief of Staff
BG Phillip C. Baker – Future Vertical Lift Cross Functional Team Director
BG David C. Phillips – Program Executive Officer- Aviation
Courtesy Story
Program Executive Office, Aviation