Army Tests Roving Digital Command Posts - WSJ.com: "U.S. Army is experimenting with gadgetry that may play a key role in the battlefields of the not-too-distant future.
Beer-keg-shaped drones hover over a simulated battlefield, tracking targets of interest. Small, portable robots with an odd resemblance to the computer-animated hero of the movie "WALL-E" peer around corners, relaying sound and digital images. Sensors silently track enemy movements.
Some of these devices are already in service, but the Army wants to link them together on a secure mobile network that gives soldiers a detailed look at the battlefield in real time. The Army has outfitted a number of armored trucks with "network integration kits" that bundle together information from the different sensors, turning the vehicles into roving digital command posts.
Maj. Bill Venable, an Iraq War veteran and Army product manager, likened the new approach to "Web conferencing" on the battlefield. In the past, Maj. Venable said, he had to travel to a combat outpost to receive paper copies of operational orders, get the profile of an insurgent suspect or watch video feeds from a drone. With this new gear, soldiers could sift through military networks without heading back to base.
If all goes according to plan, some of this gadgetry may appear in Afghanistan as early as 2012. But first, the Army needs to see if the new equipment will actually be useful in combat.
That's the job of the Army Evaluation Task Force. Based at Fort Bliss, Texas, the unit is currently putting the equipment through its paces in a seven-week evaluation here. Col. Dan Pinnell, the task force commander, said his job was to provide the Army with a straight report card on the new gear. "My task is to evaluate capabilities—new doctrine, new hardware, new tactics and new organizations—in a realistic environment," he said.
The results of a similar exercise last year, Army officials acknowledge, were less than spectacular. The range of the new digital gear was extremely limited, with operations restricted to a five-kilometer radius, and much of the equipment wasn't tough enough to withstand battlefield conditions.
Observers say a larger issue remains—whether the service will continue funding the effort.
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