via DefenseNews.
The Army's Maneuver Center of Excellence (MCoE) at Fort Benning, Georgia, is seeking the approval of senior Army acquisition officials for a plan to choose from readily available vehicles and field some 300 of them to the service's global response force (GRF), under the 18th Airborne Corps. Once the program is established, a vendor could be selected and a vehicle fielded in 2016, they say.Read it all here.
"Industry is saying, 'I can build this right now for you, I just need someone to say go,' " said Carl Pignato, a light combat vehicle analyst at the MCoE's mounted requirements division.
Senior Army leaders have been calling for such a capability, including Vice Chief of Staff of the Army Gen. Daniel Allyn and Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster, director of the Army Capabilities and Integration Center. Allyn years earlier, as chief of the 18th Airborne Corps, signed off on an operational-needs request for the capability.
"We know that we need a middleweight, mobile, protected firepower platform to allow early entry forces to seize and exploit the initiative," Allyn told reporters in October. "Our tanks and our Bradleys are the finest fighting platforms in the world, but they're heavy. You've got to seize a major airfield to get them in [to the fight]. You'll see, in the future, some equipment that's not quite so heavy, but enables us to have tactical mobility."
Cross pollination with a competition for roles and missions.
Note the wording of General McMasters. A middleweight force. Mobile. Protected firepower. Designed for early entry forces.
That should chill the heart of every Marine.
The US Army, and in particular the 18th Airborne Corps is coming after us with a vengeance. Where we have basically emasculated the MEU into a small bastardized SPMAGTF-CR, the 18th Airborne Corps is about to scoop up all those legacy Marine Expeditionary Unit missions.
Instead of the 82nd flying in to augment the MEU and falling under our control, we have flipped the script ourselves and now the SPMAGTF-CR will fly in to augment the Global Response Force Ready Company, Brigade or Battalion and fall under their command & control.
Keep an eye on the US Army. Those sneaky little bastards are getting stuff done. They're not drinking our milkshake...yet. But they have their straw out.
Sol' you have any info about FED Alpha, what happen with that design?
ReplyDeletefrom what i gather it was only a technology demonstrator and a fuel efficiency demostrator at that. why DARPA would waste time on it is beyond me. DARPA hard it was not and civilian automotive industry is already light years ahead of what was a cool looking vehicle. that FED Alpha was anotther case of image over substance. it looked great but provided absolutely NOTHING new.
DeletePity, it was indeed good looking one. I was hopping that they will move forward with small series for testing in different branches. Maybe fuel is cheap now, but this tech for military should be develop further.
Deleteif i'm reading it right all they did was add a hybridized engine to a stylized vehicle. it looked great but did nothing to advance the science. DARPA was after headlines. no big loss, a tremendous waste of time and not in keeping with the historical mission of DARPA...pushing science forward.
DeleteEhhh... as we say "the triumph of form over substance", pity, really pity.
DeleteIf the Army manages to keep the changes to a minimum on the selected vehicle that will be a massive acquisition win for them. That is what dooms about 90% of these of "off the shelf" programs. They are off the shelf and production ready until we start listing final requirements.
ReplyDelete