buglerbilly
16-04-10, 02:50 PM
By WILLIAM MATTHEWS
Published: 15 Apr 2010 20:19
When U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates canceled the Army's over-ambitious and over-budget Future Combat Systems last year, the service hoped at least to salvage some high-tech "spinouts" from the program wreckage.
So far, though, the Army is not having a lot of luck.
In tests of half a dozen Increment 1 systems developed as part of FCS, the Army found only two that work well enough to be sent to troops in combat zones today, said Lt. Gen. Robert Lennox, the Army's deputy chief of staff.
One is a hovering drone, a Class 1 UAV that looks like a miniature lunar lander. It's designed to provide "soldier-level" intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.
The other is a robot that crawls on treads to approach possible threats and transmit pictures back so troops can stay out of harm's way.
Those, "I would take to combat today," Lennox told the Senate Armed Services airland subcommittee April 15.
But that leaves some expensive but non-performing equipment behind.
The biggest - and most expensive - is the Non-Line-Of-Sight Launch System. In tests last fall, the $466,000-per-shot missile missed its targets as often as it hit them. Missiles using an infrared seeker hit five of 11 targets; those using a laser designator hit five out of seven.
Soldiers using the system were beset by navigation system fault codes, system aborts and other problems, according to David Duma, the Pentagon's principal deputy director of operational test and evaluation.
Another FCS spinout, the Network Integration Kit, "did not meet its reliability requirement, demonstrating a 33-hour mean time between system abort versus a requirement of 112 hours," Duma told the subcommittee. The system also took three times too long to boot up, he said.
The network integration kit is supposed to improve communication and situational awareness by enabling unattended sensors to feed information into military networks.
It might not have mattered much that the network integration kit didn't work very well. The unattended sensors didn't work very well either, Duma reported.
Both the "urban unattended ground sensor" and its "tactical" counterpart "demonstrated little contribution to unit situational awareness, providing limited actionable intelligence," he said.
The urban sensor was judged "not reliable." As for the tactical sensor, "half its photo images were blank or blurry," Duma said.
Lennox agreed that in tests, many of the spinout systems failed. But he argued that that's what the tests are for.
Lt. Gen. William Phillips, the Army's chief weapons buyer, said the service takes the test results seriously and vowed that it will not send faulty equipment to soldiers in the field.
But the Army has already begun buying the equipment, and that prompted criticism from the Government Accountability Office.
Michael Sullivan, GAO's director of acquisition and sourcing management, said the Army has moved some of the FCS spinouts into initial low-rate production, "despite having acknowledged that the systems and network were immature, unreliable and not performing as required."
Essentially, Sullivan said, the Army should not be buying stuff that it knows does not work. The Army is spending $682 million this year to buy FCS spinouts.
Phillips said the Army has the authority to buy one brigade set of spinout gear for testing purposes.
The best way to see whether new technology is worthwhile "is to put it in the hands of soldiers and let them see what works," Lennox said.
Sullivan said that should be done before the Army gives the go-ahead for low-rate production. By beginning low-rate production of gear that does not work, the Army is not following newly-adopted acquisition policies designed to prevent the services from buying faulty equipment, he said.
Phillips insisted that the Army is following acquisition rules, but wants to get innovative equipment as quickly as possible to troops who need it.
Published: 15 Apr 2010 20:19
When U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates canceled the Army's over-ambitious and over-budget Future Combat Systems last year, the service hoped at least to salvage some high-tech "spinouts" from the program wreckage.
So far, though, the Army is not having a lot of luck.
In tests of half a dozen Increment 1 systems developed as part of FCS, the Army found only two that work well enough to be sent to troops in combat zones today, said Lt. Gen. Robert Lennox, the Army's deputy chief of staff.
One is a hovering drone, a Class 1 UAV that looks like a miniature lunar lander. It's designed to provide "soldier-level" intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.
The other is a robot that crawls on treads to approach possible threats and transmit pictures back so troops can stay out of harm's way.
Those, "I would take to combat today," Lennox told the Senate Armed Services airland subcommittee April 15.
But that leaves some expensive but non-performing equipment behind.
The biggest - and most expensive - is the Non-Line-Of-Sight Launch System. In tests last fall, the $466,000-per-shot missile missed its targets as often as it hit them. Missiles using an infrared seeker hit five of 11 targets; those using a laser designator hit five out of seven.
Soldiers using the system were beset by navigation system fault codes, system aborts and other problems, according to David Duma, the Pentagon's principal deputy director of operational test and evaluation.
Another FCS spinout, the Network Integration Kit, "did not meet its reliability requirement, demonstrating a 33-hour mean time between system abort versus a requirement of 112 hours," Duma told the subcommittee. The system also took three times too long to boot up, he said.
The network integration kit is supposed to improve communication and situational awareness by enabling unattended sensors to feed information into military networks.
It might not have mattered much that the network integration kit didn't work very well. The unattended sensors didn't work very well either, Duma reported.
Both the "urban unattended ground sensor" and its "tactical" counterpart "demonstrated little contribution to unit situational awareness, providing limited actionable intelligence," he said.
The urban sensor was judged "not reliable." As for the tactical sensor, "half its photo images were blank or blurry," Duma said.
Lennox agreed that in tests, many of the spinout systems failed. But he argued that that's what the tests are for.
Lt. Gen. William Phillips, the Army's chief weapons buyer, said the service takes the test results seriously and vowed that it will not send faulty equipment to soldiers in the field.
But the Army has already begun buying the equipment, and that prompted criticism from the Government Accountability Office.
Michael Sullivan, GAO's director of acquisition and sourcing management, said the Army has moved some of the FCS spinouts into initial low-rate production, "despite having acknowledged that the systems and network were immature, unreliable and not performing as required."
Essentially, Sullivan said, the Army should not be buying stuff that it knows does not work. The Army is spending $682 million this year to buy FCS spinouts.
Phillips said the Army has the authority to buy one brigade set of spinout gear for testing purposes.
The best way to see whether new technology is worthwhile "is to put it in the hands of soldiers and let them see what works," Lennox said.
Sullivan said that should be done before the Army gives the go-ahead for low-rate production. By beginning low-rate production of gear that does not work, the Army is not following newly-adopted acquisition policies designed to prevent the services from buying faulty equipment, he said.
Phillips insisted that the Army is following acquisition rules, but wants to get innovative equipment as quickly as possible to troops who need it.