Leadership: March 12, 2003

Archives

A new command and control system is getting it's first battlefield test if there is a war in Iraq. The FBCB2 (Force XXI Battle Command, Brigade and Below) is a battlefield Internet project that has been in development for a decade. This technology is to work with two decade old project to equip each armored vehicle and small infantry unit with a small electronic device that would locate each friendly unit to all other friendly units. Many experiments have been conducted, with shortcomings fixed each time around. The system isn't quite ready for combat use, but many elements (the radios, networking hardware and lots of the software) are. Maybe. In fact, to reduce the possibility of fratricide (friendly units shooting each other), the U.S. is giving some of its radios to allied units to improve communication. Because the U.S. Army has adopted the "train as you fight, fight as you train" approach, the 4th Infantry Division, which has been used for most of the battlefield Internet experiments, is familiar with the equipment and is in Kuwait, will probably try and use as much as the new stuff as possible. 

 

X

ad

Help Keep Us From Drying Up

We need your help! Our subscription base has slowly been dwindling.

Each month we count on your contributions. You can support us in the following ways:

  1. Make sure you spread the word about us. Two ways to do that are to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.
  2. Subscribe to our daily newsletter. We’ll send the news to your email box, and you don’t have to come to the site unless you want to read columns or see photos.
  3. You can contribute to the health of StrategyPage.
Subscribe   Contribute   Close