The Future Combat System’s specifications may be just too technologically ambitious for the timeframe imposed upon the program.

The U.S. Army’s transformation efforts today are being aimed in the short term toward fielding its Interim Brigade Combat Teams, advanced motorized brigades equipped with wheeled Light Armored Vehicles amply supported by reconnaissance systems.  The Army’s future Objective Force – the blueprint for the force after 2008 – however, is dominated by the Future Combat System, a multi-platform replacement for today’s heavy tanks.

The Army’s heavy tanks are designed to balance the requirements of armor, firepower, and mobility.  Tanks today are 46-68 ton vehicles with a smoothbore or rifled main gun of between 105mm and 125mm caliber.  This configuration has been the result of more than 50 years of evolution since the Second World War.  Advanced composite armor and explosive reactive armor is common.  Engines are diesel or sometimes, in the U.S. M-1 Abrams case, gas turbines.

The difficulty with these vehicles is that they are not light enough to be quickly transported to likely trouble spots.  The United States has some tanks and infantry vehicles pre-positioned in the Middle East and South Korean areas, but only enough for one and a third of the Army’s six heavy armored and mechanized divisions.  If Saddam Hussein had decided to continue southwards after occupying Kuwait in early August 1990, the light infantry of the 82nd Airborne Division deployed in his path would have had no chance of halting the assault of his tanks.  The soldiers even referred to themselves as “speed bumps,” as they would be virtually helpless in the path of the oncoming Iraqi forces.

Faced with this continuing dilemma, the Army first specified a reduced weight, “to be approaching 40 ton” vehicle, still recognizably a tank, with an upgraded XM291 120mm cannon.  Following the embarrassing delays in the deployment of Task Force Hawk to Bosnia however, the decision was made to develop a much lighter family of 20-ton systems.[1]  The difficulty with this concept is that with current technology, the only way a land combat system can be survivable is incorporate heavy ceramic composite armor, and to break through the armor of opposing tanks, a large, high-caliber gun adds to the weight.  The high-powered engines to make the vehicle maneuverable also add weight.  Thus, the Future Combat System as currently conceived will have to incorporate several technical breakthroughs in order to move, fight, and survive on the currently specified weight.

The Future Combat System (FCS) as the U.S. Army envisages it now is a number of manned and potentially unmanned vehicles, which would be ‘collaboration-centric’ – interdependent – rather than reliant on a single platform.[2] Following the growing success of unmanned aerial vehicles, the FCS concept has up to three of its four vehicles unmanned – the indirect fire, direct fire, and sensor vehicles.  Only the infantry carrier vehicle is currently definitely retaining human soldiers.  Other reconnaissance and surveillance sensors, including satellites and unmanned aerial vehicles would be tied into the system, providing a picture of the battlefield to all units.  The system as a whole is due to be in service by the end of the decade.

The program however has many potential difficulties with its varied concepts that could mean its ambitious goals are not realized in the time specified, or not at all.  The difficulties include its required short development time, and its advanced weaponry, protection, and communications/information systems.  Put simply, the required technological breakthroughs may not be made soon enough, or developed to the point where vehicle service entry is possible, within the six- to eight-year deadline that has been set.

The main weapons systems that the FCS is currently likely to employ are two-fold; an electro-thermal chemical (ETC) cannon, and two missile systems, Netfires and the Compact Kinetic Energy Missile (CKEM).[3]  The ETC cannon would replace the solid propellant of a conventional tank cannon with a chemically energetic (reactive) working liquid.  Opinions vary about whether an ETC cannon could be ready for a 2008 deadline.  A 1997 assessment noted that further fundamental research was required, and did not see an ETC weapon as a guaranteed viable proposition.[4]  Army literature in 2001 laid out a five-year development plan, but did not give much more than a list of objectives.[5]  Without a clear picture of the current status of ETC technology, it is impossible to say whether it will be ready for the FCS’s 2008 fielding date.

Netfires, pioneered by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), would see boxes of both precision attack munitions and loitering attack munitions scattered around the battlefield or dropped by air and ground platforms.  Many would be fired remotely.  DARPA hopes to demonstrate Netfires by 2004.  The final anticipated weapons system is the Compact Kinetic Energy Missile (CKEM).  The CKEM concept is designed to condense the technology of the Army’s existing Line of Sight Anti-Tank missile, which is still under development, into a smaller and lighter form, shrinking its length from 9 ft. to 4 ft. and weight from 175 lbs to 50 lbs.[6]  An Army Science Board report in 2000 assessing the FCS components according to their technical risks gave the Netfires program a low to moderate risk, while the CKEM was graded as a high technical risk.[7]  In particular, it may be impossible to shrink the CKEM system to the desired size and weight.  The Army’s chief scientist believes that it can only be reduced to 4.5 ft and 65 lbs, which will allow it to still be man-portable.[8]

Advanced protection concepts have also been planned for the FCS, including signature management to cut visibility to enemy sensors, as well as the ability to degrade, deflect, or destroy incoming projectiles as part of a “full spectrum” active protection system.  Advanced reactive and passive armor is also planned.  The Army Science Board report assesses most of the new technologies as moderate risk, with the exception of active protection systems that could defeat kinetic energy gun rounds, which are seen as high risk.

Communication and information systems are depicted as the center of the FCS.  FCS units will require acute awareness of threats at battalion level and below to allow them to survive and win against more heavily armored opponents.  However, it will be challenging to provide the smaller FCS units with enough communications capability, says Maj. Gen. Steven Boutelle, the program executive officer for command, control, and communications systems.[9]  The difficulties in passing enough information, which might negatively impact the ability to control unmanned vehicles, may have been a factor in contractor Boeing Co.’s recent announcement that of 13 vehicle types planned for the FCS, only five are to be unmanned.[10]  Generally, the information, communications, and battle awareness capabilities for the FCS are considered some of the riskiest technological leaps in the program.  The emphasis paid to information and its dominance of the Army’s new war-fighting concepts may be a danger itself.  Retired Army Col. Rich Sinnreich, who played an enemy commander in an exercise in 1999, said that “we’re counting more on information than we have any right to,” and that during that exercise, he was able to flood the friendly force’s sensors with false information.[11]

Given these new, undeveloped technologies, the timeframe for the deployment of the FCS, with first units to be fielded in 2008, seems too short.  Both the Army and outsiders, such as the General Accounting Office, say the 2008 deadline may well be unreachable.  The General Accounting Office noted that historically the Defense Department has on average taken 10 to 15 years to develop and produce system, and that systems requiring development of advanced technology, such as FCS, is likely to be longer.[12]  The Army Science Board says the technologies may be ready by 2010, but there is high technical risk.

Furthermore, given that the Army is designing FCS for its ideal battle in open terrain, rather than urban combat and infantry use in restricted environments – such as in the current operations in Afghanistan – the centerpiece of the Army’s transformation efforts may not be being designed in a way that adequately addresses some of the battles the Army will fight in the 21st century.

FCS, when deployed, should enable the Army to retain the advantage over potential opponents on the mechanized battlefield that it has enjoyed for some time.  However, it seems quite possible that its development might be slower than the Army wants, given the radical new technologies the system plans to include.  It seems likely the system could slip at least to 2010.  Plans should be made to accommodate delays or even fundamental redesign if some of the ambitious technologies do not eventuate, so that the Army’s current forces can fill any gap that might appear.  Furthermore, some thought should be given as to whether the current approach is right for the many battles that lie ahead where infantry operations will predominate.

Colin Robinson  CDI Research Analyst crobinson@cdi.org

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