When you\u2019re fighting an enemy like Iraq, \u201cit was probably okay to take tens of minutes between identifying a target and actually putting round on that target,\u201d Gen. Mike Murray<\/a> told a Center for a New America Security webcast. But in a future fight against \u201cour near-peer threats, both Russia and China\u2026 it\u2019s not going to be tens of minutes.\u201d<\/p>\n The Army\u2019s Project Convergence wargames <\/a>at Yuma Proving Ground will test a kill chain this fall combining Army and non-Army assets, Murray said:<\/p>\n From beginning to end, satellite to shots fired, Murray said, \u201cright now, we have some success doing that in less than 20 seconds.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2018Very Immature Technologies\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n As head of Army Futures Command, Murray oversees development of 34 high-priority systems programs<\/a> across six broad portfolios<\/a>: long-range precision artillery<\/a>, high-speed aircraft<\/a>, armored vehicles<\/a>, the tactical network<\/a>, air & missile defense<\/a>, and soldier gear<\/a>. Project Convergence stems from the Army\u2019s realization last year that, since all of these weapons need to work together on the future battlefield \u2013 and preferably as much more than the sum of their individual parts \u2013 Futures Command needed to start testing how<\/em> they\u2019d work together as early as possible in their development.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have\u2026 almost no programs of record at Yuma,\u201d Murray said. \u201cThese are very immature technologies that we\u2019re piecing together to understand potential, to understand what soldiers can do and really what commander can make out of these tools.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s a tremendous work in progress. \u201cPart of the magic out at Yuma is there are people recoding software every night to fix problems \u2014 and I see that on a future battlefield,\u201d Murray said. \u201cBrigade commanders and division commanders \u2013 if we [still] have brigades and divisions \u2014 are going to have kids in their command posts that are able to re-code software to solve problems they came up with that day.\u201d<\/p>\n As the director of the Joint AI Center told me in a recent interview, software can adapt to new threats and opportunities vastly faster<\/a> than you can upgrade your physical weapons. So in this software-driven way of war, constantly changing your code isn\u2019t a bug \u2013 it\u2019s a feature.<\/p>\n It\u2019s not just the Army that needs to connect this way, either. All the services are striving to link together in a single Joint All-Domain Command & Control<\/a> (JADC2) meta-network, an idea of increasing interest to US allies as well.<\/p>\n While the inaugural Project Convergence this fall will be largely Army, with the significant exception of the LEO satellites, observers from the Air Force<\/a> and Great Britain will be present. Project Convergence 2021 will be \u201cvery much focused on bringing the joint force in,\u201d Murray said, and 2022 will bring in foreign partners. \u201cThe UK is signed to participate in \u201922 and they will be there this year [observing],\u201d he said. \u201cThe Australians are talking about participating in \u201922.\u201d<\/p>\n But the new network will never be omniscient and omnipresent, Murray warned, not just because of real-life technical limitations but because enemy jamming<\/a> and hacking<\/a> will actively attack its communications links.<\/p>\n \u201cJADC2 [has] been described variously as all sensors, all shooters, all C2 nodes,\u201d the general said. \u201cI think it\u2019s a little more narrow than that, because we\u2019re going to be in a contested environment, restricted bandwidth. We just won\u2019t have wide open pipes to push data through.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.fie.undef.edu.ar\/ceptm\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/general.jpg\")