It’s taken some time, but the defense industry seems to be over the shock of life beyond the Army’s Future Combat Systems program. For over a decade FCS was an inherent part of any discussion about next-gen Army vehicles and the transition to a lighter, faster and more functional combat force. In April of last year, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates made the bold move to not just restructure FCS but to cancel the program and start fresh. 

Since that time, the Army has been busy over the summer and through the fall conceptualizing the goals for a new Ground Combat Vehicle (GCV) and its overall Brigade Combat Team (BCT) modernization strategy. A Request for Proposal for the GCV has been out since February, with a deadline for submissions of late last month. Contracts for the GCV program aren’t expected to be awarded until the fall. Meanwhile the current plan is to deliver Increment 1 capability to seven Infantry Brigade Combat Teams starting in 2011. The rest of the BCTs will then receive upgraded capabilities on an incremental basis.

A Plan Emerges

This rebooting of the Army’s modernization strategy has been the cause of much uncertainty among makers of electronics and embedded computer products aimed at next-gen military vehicles and other systems. That uncertainty was eased somewhat when the Army rolled out its overall Army Modernization Strategy document, which details the various elements and implementation plans for the future. The four major elements of the plan are incremental improvements to the Army BC Network; Incorporating Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicles into the force; Accelerating the fielding of “capability packages” to BCTs by 2025; and developing a new Ground Combat Vehicle within seven years (Figure 1).

New Ground Combat Vehicle 

The GCV operates effectively with current Army and joint service systems as well as systems in development. GCV hosts the Army’s battle command network systems, and possesses growth potential in electrical and computing power to incorporate changes as network systems evolve. These vehicles also retain mission functionality with a degraded or interrupted network. GCV facilitates soldier integration into the network, employment of air and ground robotic systems, and enables access to joint capabilities at all levels.

The requirements for the Ground Combat Vehicle were developed from input of a variety of expert sources. Among these was an Army-sponsored Blue Ribbon Panel, which received input from Joint-Service partners, retired Generals, think tank analysts, representatives from the Office of the Secretary of Defense, Army Soldiers, and leaders with a wide range of operational experience to inform the Ground Combat Vehicle operational requirements development effort. That input was supplemented by contributions from commanders and soldiers with recent combat experience in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The GCV as conceived takes the best aspects of different existing vehicle platforms. This includes the underbelly protection offered by MRAP, the off-road mobility and side protection of the Bradley Fighting Vehicle, and the urban and operational mobility of the Stryker. An ability to integrate into the network to maintain situational awareness in urban and other operations is also a key requirement. This mandates sufficient space and electrical power to accept the network systems while also ensuring the ability to integrate upgrades and new technologies. The Ground Combat Vehicle’s development schedule calls for production of the first vehicle by fiscal year 2017.

Big Role for Embedded Computing

While it’s far too soon to know what shape the onboard computing systems for GCV will take, it’s likely that the significant body of work done for FCS computing systems will be leveraged for the GCV. OpenVPX—designed with just such harsh environment, high-performance applications in mind—is the most likely form factor (Figure 2). Early prototypes for FCS Integrated Computing Systems were based on 3U CompactPCI cards with Pentium M computing and 10-port Gbit Ethernet switching. And while such systems would have been part of the first spin-out of FCS future force technologies (for Bradley fighting vehicles, Abrams main battle tanks and Command-Variant Humvees) had FCS continued, the new FCS vehicles were looking toward VPX.