By Julian Nettlefold,
Project Overview
Availability of situational awareness information in a timely, accurate and consistent manner is a key enabler to the effective command and control of dismounted close combat forces and achievement of military objectives.
The UK’s current use of paper maps and radio voice communications is slow and onerous and can lead to misinterpretations between commanders. Advances in situational awareness technology, as demonstrated by the USA and other allies, offer the opportunity to further digitise the Battlefield.
Through the automation of battlefield data collation and exploitation, commanders at company-level1 and below, shall be more informed, able to make decisions quicker, increasing operational tempo and reducing the risk of own force casualties.
The DSA project team entered an Assessment Phase2 in March 2021 to develop a new, technology-driven, situational awareness capability enabled through the acquisition of suitably qualified and experienced industry partners.
Specifically, a Design and Integration Partner to develop a Ministry Of Defence (MoD) owned solution which shall enable future capability evolution into the 2030s and beyond, ensuring that the MoD has access to the latest technology and innovation from across industry whilst avoiding “Vendor Lock In3.”
A Radio Provider and component provider shall also be contracted by the Authority to provide/manufacture/ produce the physical DSA system at scale. It is expected the first capability delivery of DSA shall be Quarter 3 2024. DSA is a project within the Land Environment Tactical Communications and Information Systems (LE TacCIS) Programme.
The DSA project team sits within the Dismounted Command Control, Communications and Information (DC3I) team. As part of Battlefield and Tactical Communications and Information Systems (BATCIS) delivery team it reports to Defence Digital, Directorate Information and Ground Manoeuvre. Background The complexities of terrain, populations and enemy strategies within the Land Domain means that dismounted close combat remains a typical operational deployment.
The achievement of military objectives through dismounted close combat operations, typically in a dispersed group, is dependent upon effective command and control enabled through situational awareness.
Situational awareness is the: “knowledge and understanding of the current situation which promotes timely, relevant and accurate assessment of friendly, competitive and other operations within the Battlefield in order to facilitate decision making. An informational perspective and skill that fosters an ability to determine quickly the context and relevance of events that are unfolding.”
Today, the UK achieves situational awareness through the use of paper maps and radio communications, typically Personal Role Radios (PRR), with basic position location information provided by Bowman, Common Battlefield Applications Toolset (ComBAT), Infrastructure and Platform Battlefield Information Systems Applications (BCIP) 5.6. The need for more dependable battlefield situational awareness has been recognised for some time. Through capability concept demonstrators in 2015 and 2019, the potential of technology to provide more timely, accurate, complete and consistent information, increasing dismounted commanders’ decision-making capabilities and an overall significant step-change in military effectiveness has been demonstrated. For UK Defence to realise the operational benefits of this technology, the DSA project was established to provide dismounted close combat users with enhanced voice and data services that shall result in greater situational awareness capabilities.
Outcomes
The primary outcomes of the DSA project are to visualise battlefield information, reduce the burden of collating operational data and provide military commanders timely data to make better,
more accurate operational decisions.
Benefits include:
A Increased tempo, by enabling a wealth of position location information to be
gathered and presented automatically and more accurately in seconds, compared to the current more manual process often undertaken over congested voice communications networks.
B Better and quicker decisions, by reducing the information gathering process and decreasing the cognitive burden on commanders allowing them to focus on analysing the available information to make quicker, better informed decisions.
C Increased coordination, by providing a battlefield management view of operations and a means of planning and communicating across forces without having to rely on voice communications, reducing errors and confusion.
D Reduction in risk and own force casualties, by enabling users to locate and communicate more accurately both enemy and friendly force locations, reducing the risk of fratricide.
E Optimised communications performance by managing the electromagnetic integration of DSA to maintain safety, security and co-site interoperability.
Overeaching Requirement
DSA project shall provide an Official Sensitive5 capability incorporating:
A Voice communications, i.e. radios, to all dismounted close combat users.
B Situational awareness to all dismounted commanders to companylevel, including: 1 Position and location information of soldiers. 2 Friendly force locations. 3 Battlefield management software applications, including visual representations, operational constraints and intelligence.
C Planning and information sharing tools for commanders.
D Ability to work collaboratively between commanders within the company group.
E Ability to produce a coherent view of the battlefield and contribute to the strategic operational picture in a timely and accurate manner.
Combat Situational Awareness
In simplified terms, DSA shall address: Where am I? Where is my unit? Where is the enemy? What are my orders? Dismounted close combat users operate within a wide range of Radio Frequency (RF) environments, and as such, it is essential that the DSA capability continues to operate within the harshest of RF environments; which may include other co-sited transmitters and/or Force Protection (FP) Electronic Countermeasures (ECM). The DSA capability shall be designed around the dismounted close combat soldier and allow future integration with mounted close combat platforms. In order to ensure effectiveness and compatibility with other technology-driven soldier related capabilities, its development shall be aligned to other MoD systems architecture and open standards.
The DSA Design and Integration Partner
The Design and Integration Partner shall be responsible for the design and development of the DSA System, including evolving the draft DSA System Architecture (provided by the Authority at Contract Award) and developing and managing the DSA System Design.
The Design and Integration Partner shall produce detailed subsystem requirements documents and technical product specifications for the radio and components, which shall be used by the Authority to contract third party suppliers to provide/manufacture/ produce the DSA system at scale.
A The radio subsystem requirements’ documents and technical product specifications shall form the basis of the procurement for a Radio Provider, the competition for which shall be led by the Authority supported by the Design and Integration Partner. The competition shall include down-select trials to ensure that the chosen radio, together with associated waveforms and cryptographic security, can perform at the required operational level and environment.
B The component subsystem requirements’ documents and technical product specifications shall be used by the Authority to contract for the supply of components.
C The Design and Integration Partner shall work with the Authority (and its third-party suppliers) to scope solution designs which ensure optimised value
