Weight remains a major obstacle for the U.S. Army as it tries to equip soldiers with all of the gear needed to remain safe and connected to other soldiers on the battlefield.
"I tell people in my office, 'Stop hanging stuff on the kids like they're Christmas trees,' " Brig. Gen. Peter Fuller said Oct. 12 at the 10th Annual C4ISR Journal Conference in Washington, D.C. Fuller is head of Program Executive Office Soldier.It is time to integrate soldier gear, Fuller said, showing photos of soldiers and Marines worn out from the enormous amount of weight they are carrying.
He said the service hopes to address the problem by integrating soldier systems so that they perform multiple functions. He cited the use of separate eyepieces, one for night vision and another to provide intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.
Part of the problem, he said, is that various Army offices provide soldiers gear without enough coordination. Fuller's office provides basic kit, but then soldiers get additional specialized gear depending on their military occupation.
A recent study showed that medics and mortar operators in Afghanistan are carrying the most weight: roughly 133 pounds for a three-day mission.
"The soldier is thinking, 'I have a lot of kit; what do I really want to carry?' " Fuller said.
The biggest problem is batteries, which account for 3 percent of a soldier's total weight. Although technological advances are allowing batteries to carry more power per pound, demand for power is also increasing, he said.
A prime reason is the Army's top-priority drive to link dismounted soldiers to battlefield networks, so they can get more information about their surroundings. But more sophisticated communications gear requires more power.
The simplicity and ease with which Americans use smart phones has led to the misperception that getting individual dismounted soldiers good intelligence information is easy, said Fuller. He said he has to remind people that the individual phone is not doing all of the work, but that the nearby cell tower is essential.
"It is rocket science to get C4ISR at the dismounted level," he said.
However, the Army is trying to get that "last, most disadvantaged soldier into the network," he said.
The latest integrated set of soldier gear, originally called Ground Soldier System and recently renamed Nett Warrior, will suck 14 percent less power than the older Land Warrior system. That means carrying two 2.2-pound batteries per day, not three, said Fuller.
Besides being heavy, batteries are high-density energy sources, which, when people are shooting at you, can be like having an IED right on your body, he said. The Army is evaluating whether it's safer to place batteries behind or in front of soldiers' protective Kevlar plates, he said.
There is a change of focus going on within the Army from thinking about the soldier as the centerpiece of every formation to focusing on the tactical small unit, said Fuller.
Now, rather than each solider, Army leaders are starting to ask: How much power does a squad need? This could change power requirements and therefore the weight each soldier is carrying, Fuller said.
Last month, Robert Scales, a former major general and commandant of the Army War College, gave an impassioned talk to reporters at the Brookings Institute, saying ground forces, specifically small units, are not getting the resources they need to be dominant in Afghanistan.
Scales said that without access to intelligence, small units are often fighting blind in Afghanistan, unable to see over the next mountain ridge.
He made a plea that the Pentagon devote more science and technology money to focusing on the small ground unit, giving it as much attention as it does major weapons platforms.
The biggest problem is batteries, which account for 3 percent of a soldier's total weight. Although technological advances are allowing batteries to carry more power per pound, demand for power is also increasing, he said.
A prime reason is the Army's top-priority drive to link dismounted soldiers to battlefield networks, so they can get more information about their surroundings. But more sophisticated communications gear requires more power.
So even though increasing the amount of technogadgets the soldiers carries increases the weight, which they're trying to decrease, they're still going to press on with GSS/NW/LW, even though that system requires 2kg of batteries. Right, so where are they going to cut weight then? I don't see them reducing the amount of armour, by not requiring side plates to be worn (for example).However, the Army is trying to get that "last, most disadvantaged soldier into the network," he said.
The latest integrated set of soldier gear, originally called Ground Soldier System and recently renamed Nett Warrior, will suck 14 percent less power than the older Land Warrior system. That means carrying two 2.2-pound batteries per day, not three, said Fuller.
