INCREASED COMMS: Staff Sgt. Devin Sasser, network communications systems specialist for the Maneuver Combat Advisor Team 2310 with 2nd Security Force Assistance Brigade, configures a satellite terminal to increase tactical communication to support exercise African Lion 2024 in Dodji, Senegal in May 2024. (Photo by Sgt. 1st Class Nicholas J. De La Pena, U.S. Army Southern European Task Force, Africa, U.S. Army Reserve)
by John Anglin and Amy Walker
Headlines of recent global conflicts continue to underscore the critical need for secure resilient network communication options on the battlefield to enhance survivability and lethality. The Army fully expects any future adversary to use every means at their disposal to jam or corrupt the network. When units can’t pass the data that commanders need to make rapid informed decisions, both the mission and lives are at risk.
To enhance the network for future large-scale combat operations, the Army is in a state of continuous network transformation, with one eye on shifting battlefield tactics, and the other on emerging commercial and military technologies that could potentially help to combat them.
One way the Army is enhancing network resiliency is through agnostic transport diversity by increasing the number of network communication pathways available to units. The more signal pathway options that exist for data to travel through, the more resilient the network becomes, keeping Soldiers and their commanders connected, informed and lethal.
The Army’s network transformation includes the ability to simultaneously and automatically communicate across numerous frequency bands, satellite orbits and line-of-sight and beyond-line-of-sight systems. To be successful on complex future battlefields against sophisticated enemies, the Army will need to use more of the planet’s spacescape, expanding beyond the traditional geosynchronous Earth orbit (GEO). This signal pathway diversity includes multiple frequency bands and high throughput, low latency (HT/LL) multi-orbit network transport, leveraging low Earth orbit (LEO), medium Earth orbit (MEO) and advanced GEO satellite communications (SATCOM).
Being able to simultaneously use all network transport options will significantly enhance units’ primary, alternate, contingency and emergency communications plans, enabling Soldiers to use the best available transport option at any given time, and having plenty of backups to be prepared for every potential operational scenario, location or attack. Bandwidth can also be aggregated and optimized across multi-orbit capabilities to ensure network connections in denied, disrupted, intermittent and low bandwidth network environments.
At the end of the day, the Soldier will not have to worry about which signal path he or she is taking, it will be automatic. They can be more confident that essential data and communications are making it to the point of need and providing commanders the information they need to defensively react to threats and offensively become one.
MANY BECOME ONE
Currently, the Army is forced to use separate systems to leverage different frequencies and satellite constellations in different orbits. However, the Next Generation Tactical Terminal (NGTT) will combine all these capabilities into one system, significantly reducing logistical size, weight and power burden, as well as cognitive burden, so Soldiers can focus on the fight. NGTT will simultaneously leverage current and future HT/LL LEO, MEO and GEO constellations and services, as well as multiple frequency bands, and high-capacity terrestrial capabilities—with a single terminal, at-the-halt, at-the-quick-halt or on-the-move—to deliver the real-time data that commanders need to make rapid informed decisions. If one link or pathway goes down, Soldiers won’t have to switch frequency bands or change out any hardware; the switch to different transport options is automatic and seamless to the user.
Project Manager Tactical Network (PM TN), assigned to the Program Executive Office for Command, Control, Communications and Network (PEO C3N), manages and fields the Army’s tactical network transport systems. To date, the PM TN portfolio includes approximately 12,000 on-the-move and at-the-halt satellite terminals in the field globally, supporting units from home station to harsh dispersed operational environments at the edge of the battlefield. Once NGTT transitions from the science and technology community to PM TN, the system will become part of the PM TN’s SATCOM Family of Terminals, an innovative acquisition approach that reduces the variety of different terminals in the PM TN’s portfolio, providing fewer but more versatile terminal variants in standard sizes. The Family of Terminals approach combats the sheer volume and diversity of the PM TN’s vast portfolio, helping to overcome challenges from every angle—including cost, complexity, logistics, sustainment and the never-ending need for continual network modernization and integration to retain advantage over the enemy. (See “SATCOM Streamline” in the Spring 2023 issue of Army AL&T.)
The Army’s science and technology community—specifically the Command, Control, Communication, Computers, Cyber, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (C5ISR) Center, an element of the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command, U.S. Army Futures Command—has been developing the on-the-move NGTT solution. On the current timeline, the Army expects the initial single-band NGTT solution to transition from science and technology to PM TN in 2025 and a multiband NGTT solution to transition in 2027. NGTT’s ability to operate on-the-move in contested and congested environments will significantly enhance tactical network satellite communications and network resiliency, increasing the survivability and lethality of U.S. forces.
PM TN and the C5ISR Center are also collaborating with the U.S. Navy to share information, incorporate lessons learned and ensure unity of effort across DOD. The Navy is using the same NGTT technology in its equivalent effort, known as the Satellite Terminal (transportable) Non-Geostationary, or STtNG, which provides a multiband, multi-orbit SATCOM capability to ships.
MULTIPLE MEANS TO RESILIENCY
NGTT is just one of several means the Army is using to reach its large-scale combat operations network goals. For instance, the Multi-Orbit Modem (MOM)—a multiband, multi-orbit, multi-constellation capable modem—will be able to “talk” to numerous multi-orbit military and commercial satellites constellations simultaneously. MOM supports a Modular Open Systems Approach design, enabling plug-and-play configurations to tailor capabilities to the needs of each echelon. On the current timeline, the Army expects to transition MOM from science and technology to PM TN in fiscal year 2027.
GLOBAL SIGNALS: Spc. Ahlijah Madison, assigned to the 44th Signal Expeditionary Battalion, conducts communications check over a tactical satellite during the joint exercise African Lion 2024 in Tunisia in April 2024. (Photo by Sgt. Lukas Sparks, U.S. Army Southern European Task Force, Africa)
To support large-scale combat operations from a business tactic, the Army is also exploring a lease-versus-buy model—known as SATCOM as a managed service, or SaaMS—for acquiring and delivering scalable commercial satellite communications. PM TN manages this effort for the Army and will wrap up a global SaaMS pilot at the end of fiscal year 2024 informing future implementation decisions. Instead of having to procure, field, sustain and modernize equipment on its own for every unit and every mission, SaaMS will enable the Army to lease these capabilities at the point of need. This business model would be scalable to expand or contract as missions change, helping to reduce on-hand inventory, satellite airtime and cost. SaaMS would ensure bandwidth is allocated at the right place and time to support data exchange in a wide variety of mission sets.
CONCLUSION
It can’t be overstated that underpinning all the Army’s efforts to increase network capability, capacity and resiliency is the need to increase simplicity, since more and more Soldiers going to the battlefield are not signal trained. Their primary mission is to shoot, move and communicate. Balancing the need for increased capabilities with the need to reduce complexity is a difficult job, but as commercial technologies continue to evolve and mature, the Army will continue to partner with industry to ensure capabilities become simpler to use.
For more information, contact the PEO C3N Public Affairs Office at 443-395-6489 or usarmy.APG.peo-c3t.mbx.pao-peoc3t@mail.mil. Go to https://go.usa.gov/xMSNz for the 2021 Army Unified Network Plan or follow PEO C3N at http://peoc3t.army.mil/c3t and https://www.facebook.com/peoc3t.
JOHN ANGLIN is the technical management division chief for PM TN, assigned to PEO C3N. He has over 20 years of experience, as both a civilian and a Soldier, in Army tactical network communications. He holds an M.S. in systems engineering from Johns Hopkins University and a B.S. in information technology with a concentration in security from Colorado Technical University. He is a DAWIA certified Practitioner in engineering.
AMY WALKER has been the public affairs lead at PM TN for over 15 years and was the public affairs lead at PEO C3N for the previous two. She has covered a majority of the Army’s major tactical network transport modernization efforts, including Army, Joint and Coalition fielding and training events worldwide. She holds a B.A. in psychology with emphasis in marketing and English from the College of New Jersey.
