Mil-Tech

Army wants soldiers to have improved carbine

Soldiers, get ready for a better carbine. The Army has launched a dual strategy designed to give you a more accurate, durable and lethal weapon that will be the mainstay for the next 40 years.

The first part of that strategy is to radically overhaul the M4 starting now and give grunts an improved version of the special operations M4A1. Simultaneously, the second part challenges industry to come up with a new carbine that can outperform the M4. The competition opened in early August.

“This is an historic event. We have not done a carbine competition in our lifetimes,” Col. Douglas Tamilio, project manager for soldier weapons, told Army Times. His office is spearheading the M4 Carbine Improvement Program. “We don’t switch rifles and carbines too quickly, and it is not an easy thing.”

The M4 has faced some criticism from soldiers and others who have cited problems with its lethality and reliability, including a 2007 “dust” test in which the M4 performed the worst among four weapons tested, with the greatest number of stoppages.

Tamilio, a career infantry officer, said the weapon has “served the Army extremely well” and touted the 62 improvements made to the M4 in the past 19 years. But, he said, “We can’t sit on our laurels and say M4 is good enough.”

Deadlier weapon

The improvements have begun on thousands of M4s being built now, and thousands more will get conversion kits.

The upgrades will be done in phases. The improvement plan’s first phase essentially distributes an improved M4A1, which is notable for its heavier barrel and automatic fire. The heavier barrel reduces warping and erosion, resulting in better performance and longer life. It also allows for a higher sustained rate of fire.

The Army also is adding ambidextrous controls.

The Army has 12,000 M4s on the production line, and has told manufacturer Colt to turn them into A1s, said Brig. Gen. Peter Fuller, Program Executive Office Soldier.

In addition, 25,000 M4A1s would be purchased beyond existing contracts, as well as roughly 65,000 conversion kits, Tamilio said.

“The Army would like to convert about 150,000 in the near term for infantry brigade combat teams,” he said. The optimal plan would be to convert all the M4s, he added, but funding will be a large factor in that decision.

More changes external to the weapon are also improving its reliability and lethality, Fuller said.

Soldiers will experience fewer jams, thanks to a new magazine that doesn’t allow rounds to move, he said.

And the new M855 A1 ammo provides more stopping power at shorter distances. The older round had to get into a yaw dependency for maximum effect. If it hit the enemy straight, it would punch right through them. The new ammo is not yaw dependent. If it hits the enemy, he is going down.

Many combat vets surveyed in 2006 described how enemy soldiers were shot multiple times but were still able to continue fighting. The survey included 2,600 soldiers who served in Iraq and Afghanistan.

One in five U.S. soldiers polled recommended a more lethal round. The new round is designed to address that.

“It’s not enhanced performance, it’s consistent performance,” Fuller said. “It really performs the way you want a round to perform, and it’s optimized to the M4.”

Better accuracy

The second phase of the M4 improvement program begins this fall and will focus on increasing the M4’s effectiveness and accuracy, with emphasis on the bolt, bolt carrier assembly and the forward rail assembly.

Over time, reliability will degrade with the bolt, as that component provides the weapon’s action. Officials will host an open competition for a new bolt assembly to determine whether different materials and coatings can enhance the bolt. The Army also is interested in “unique design changes” that have arisen within the industry, Tamilio said.

The service also looks to strengthen the forward rail assembly on top of the receiver. This lends stability to the weapon and serves as the mount for weapon attachments, but restricts the barrel movement that is required for accuracy when re-engaging the target. The Army wants to determine whether a free-floating rail is the answer.

Officials also will look to provide a more consistent trigger pull for better control, according to a June Congressional Research Service report.

New operating system

The third phase, focusing on the operating system, will begin in about 18 months, Tamilio said. The goal is to improve the gas system by allowing less gas and dirt in, or replacing it with a conversion kit similar to the HNK16 that would put a piston in the M4.

Both have their benefits and detractors, the colonel said. The piston reduces the number of moving parts and provides better stability, but there is “a little more metal on metal,” which can diminish durability and accelerate fatigue.

A gas-impingement system is far smoother in operation, and supporters say its reduced heat and carbon deposits will decrease malfunctions. But the gas system requires a lot more elbow grease to get it clean.

The 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta, or “Delta Force,” replaced its M4s with the HK416 in 2004, according to the congressional report. That weapon combines the operating characteristics of the M4 with the piston system.

“There’s a lot of dynamics involved,” Fuller said. “When you go to a piston charger, you’re actually driving that bolt down at an angle versus back, so you have to make sure you understand it might not be the same weapon.”

The next carbine

The competition for the Army’s next-generation carbine opened in early August, and the service is looking for the “future Army weapon for any environment,” Fuller said.

The Army’s open, industrywide Individual Carbine Competition was approved Aug. 4 by the Joint Requirements Oversight Council.

No caliber restriction has been placed on a new design. The requirements, instead, are for the most reliable, accurate, durable, easy-to-use and easy-to-maintain weapon out there, Tamilio said.

It will be at least a 500-meter weapon and have a higher incapacitation percentage, meaning if a shot doesn’t kill the enemy, it will put a serious dent in his medical record.

This weapon will be modular and able to carry all the existing attachments soldiers use.

It can have a gas or piston system.

Interchangeable barrel sizes, such as those seen in the SCAR, are not a “must have,” but “certainly won’t be a negative thing,” Tamilio said.

But above all, Fuller wants a weapon that has the soldiers’ approval.

“We really need to figure out lethality from a ‘soldier in the loop’ perspective,” he said. “If you can’t shoot the weapon accurately, it doesn’t matter how lethal it is.”

To meet that goal, Tamilio will release a draft request for proposal late this year. It is a warning order of sorts that will give industry a preliminary idea of what is expected. An industry day will follow in which officials will answer questions and provide clarity.

The official RfP will go out early next year, in the second quarter of fiscal 2011, which begins in January. Manufacturers will have a set time, typically a few months, to respond with their proposed weapons.

Next comes the “extreme, extensive testing” and selection of the weapons, Tamilio said.

During testing, hundreds of thousand of rounds will be fired over 12 to 18 months as weapons are tested to their destruction point. The primary goal is to determine if they meet Army specifications. But evaluators also will know whether a weapon can live up to its manufacturer’s claims.

“If they say it has a barrel life up to 20,000 rounds, we’ll test to that,” Tamilio said.

Weapons will also be tested to see if they maintain accuracy throughout their life cycle — something the military has not tested before, Tamilio said. A weapon typically loses accuracy as it ages.

“This is a huge importance for us,” he said.

Soldiers will be involved in virtually all aspects of this testing, Tamilio said. From the individual to unit, he said the tests will focus on what soldiers really care about: “When he pulls the trigger, it fires in a reliable fashion, and what he aims at, he hits.”

Mixed reviews

Investing in an improved M4 has met some opposition.

Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., in April 2007 asked Army leadership why the service planned to spend $375 million on the carbine through fiscal 2009 “without considering newer and possibly better weapons available on the commercial market.” The senator’s letter questioned the M4’s reliability and lethality and called for a “free and open competition” to evaluate alternatives.

Nevertheless, improvements have been recommended from within the service. The Army Infantry Center in a Small Arms Capabilities-Based Assessment in 2008 identified 42 separate ideas for material solutions to address capability gaps. Thirteen solutions called for new or improved munitions, and 10 involved aiming devices, optics or laser designators. Only seven suggested modifying or developing new small arms.

After-action reports from soldiers both praise and criticize the M4’s reliability and lethality. The mixed reviews are reflected in the congressional report:

• A February 2001 U.S. Special Operations Command study said the M4A1 was “fundamentally flawed” and suffered “alarming failures … in operations under the harsh conditions and heavy firing schedules common in [special operations forces] training and operations.”

• An Army report from July 2003 on small arms performance during Operation Iraqi Freedom found the M4 was “by far the preferred individual weapon across the theater of operations.”

• A December 2006 survey requested by Army’s Project Manager for Soldier Weapons and conducted by the Center for Naval Analyses polled 2,600 soldiers who had engaged in combat action in Iraq or Afghanistan. More than half said they never experienced a stoppage in the M4 or M16.

The study found that the frequency of disassembled cleaning did not affect the number of stoppages. The type and amount of lubrication used had little effect on stoppages, though dry lubricant decreased reports for M4 stoppages. Nearly nine in 10 soldiers said they were satisfied with the M4.
• A December 2007 test — resulting from Coburn’s letter — evaluated the M4 against the HK416, the HK XM8 and the FNH SCAR. Each system had 10 weapons on the line, and each fired 6,000 rounds under sandstorm conditions. The XM8 had 127 stoppages, the SCAR had 226 stoppages, the HK416 had 233 stoppages and the M4 had 882 stoppages. The Army later modified that number to 296 stoppages, attributing the difference to discrepancies in the test and scoring.
When you’ll get it

A new weapon could be selected by the end of 2011. How long it would take to field a new weapon would depend on funding. Fielding could start fairly quickly, but will take up to 10 years, Tamilio said.

No cost estimate of producing a new weapon is available from the Army, as the dozens of potential manufacturers have yet to receive specifications and generate the subsequent design.

By Aug. 19, the Army had 41 respondents to its market survey, Tamilio said.

“Industry is waiting for this,” he said. “They are excited about this … and that’s exactly what we want.”

How the dual-path strategy unfolds remains to be seen, but it means every soldier should be getting a better carbine.

That’s because there are 1.1 million soldiers, but only 500,000 M4s in the system. If the Army selects a new carbine, it may purchase 1.1 million. But a more likely scenario would see 500,000 purchased for infantry brigade combat teams, and the existing and improved M4s given to support troops to replace their M16s.

If the M4 turns out to be the weapon of choice, then the ICBTs will likely be fitted with the improved M4s, and the existing M4s would again be given to support troops to replace their M16s.

For soldiers “consistently using that M4 and satisfied with that M4, to know the Army is going out there to get you something better … that’s pretty damn exciting,” Tamilio said. “And that’s only going to make you more effective on the battlefield.”

www.armytimes.com

Oz Electrifies Its Infantry

Australia is spending $300 million to have an Israeli firm create a BGC3 (Battle Group and Below Command, Control and Communications) system for the Australian Army. The system will be based on a similar one used by Israeli land forces. All of this goes back to the American 1990s era Force XXI Battle Command Brigade-and-Below (FBCB2) project.

Parts of FBCB2 (especially the Blue Force Tracking, or BFT, system) were quickly issued to the troops for the 2003 invasion of Iraq Blue Force Tracker (GPS/satellite telephone devices) were hastily placed in thousands of combat vehicles. Anyone with a laptop, satellite data receiver, the right software and access codes could then see where everyone was (via a map showing blips for each BFT user). The spectacular success of Blue Force Tracker (BFT) got the attention of generals everywhere.

Over the next five years the U.S. Army built new versions of the BFT tracking (for vehicles on the battlefield) device. Because this hasty (all the stuff was still in development) experiment was a huge success, the United States proceeded to add more of this capability by producing and distributing 50,000 additional tracker devices.

There were some problems, however. The biggest hassle was the delay (often up to five minutes) between getting updated data from the satellite. Another big problem was that stationary icons, placed on BFT user screens to indicate enemy troops or dangers (like minefields or roadside bombs), don’t get updated accurately, or in a timely fashion. Once the troops begin to encounter a lot of roadside bombs that don’t exist (although Blue Force Tracker showed them), they began to lose faith in the system. Fixing this wasn’t easy, and several different solutions were tried before a stable solution was found.

The army supposes it has fixes for the major complaints. For example, the new BFT2 will have a ten second (or less) delay between satellite updates. New software will help clear away inaccurate icons indicating where the enemy is, or may be. The BTF2 network will also allow users to send more information to each other, including attachments. This will enable BFT2 to be used in automated command and control systems, that work more effectively because they can pass more information, more quickly, between the headquarters and the troops. While the existing BFT laptop (which includes the satellite communications hardware) costs about $1,500. BFT2 will cost $2,500 each (but will be a much more powerful piece of equipment).

Currently the army and marines have 60,000 BFT tracking devices (and far fewer laptops equipped to display BFT data for commanders), and plans to get at least as many of the BFT2 units, and perhaps as many as 120,000. BFT2 is expected to start shipping to the troops in another year or two. There are already hundreds of BFT2 prototypes undergoing testing. The field tests have shown BFT2 to be 45 times faster than BFT, and transmits data 30 times faster. This allows BFT2 users to send each other pictures and Word documents. But while BFT2 has taken a long time to perfect, the army upgraded other aspects of FBCB2.

After 2003, as combat operations continued in Iraq, so did the flow of money for new communications gear, software and communications capability. As a result, there were soon several improvised battlefield Internet systems that enabled commanders to quickly establish electronic Command Posts in combat zones. The tools were available, there was a need, and things just happened. Many components of this new form of command post (the fast satellite data links, PCs, large flat screen displays and laptops everywhere, plus easy networking) remain fairly stable. Most of the change is coming in the software. But even this aspect is kept under control because most screw-ups occur in front of senior commanders. This delivers an additional incentive to get these things working right.

Israel paid close attention to the American experience, and quickly adapted the most successful U.S, ideas for Israeli use. This is what they are delivering to Australia, which has become a major customer for Israeli military technology. The Israeli LAND 75 and 125 systems will equip over a thousand Australian vehicles, and 1,500 troops, as well as making it possible to quickly (within minutes) establish a command post anywhere, and know where your troops are, and be in touch with them.

This was not the first time radical technology sneaked up on the military. Portable radio, first widely used during World War II, radically changed how commanders operated, especially at the tactical level. But the current revolution is different in that the signals can easily be encrypted, and carry visual, as well as speech, data. Thus commanders at all levels can eliminate face-to-face meetings, and just videoconference, or talk freely about plans. But even Instant Messaging have become a powerful tool, because many times, a few short text messages are all that is needed to solve problems.

Finally, the Internet delivered, for the military, many new ideas on how to efficiently handle information. The Internet has been militarized much faster than anyone expected. That has led to the military adopting new database and visualization tools as well. In a single decade, the way commanders run their units, and battles has changed more than it has in the past half century.

Taliban Military Equipment

The bullet made a zipping, or fizzing sound. American soldiers, relaxing beside their vehicles and backpacks without body armor or helmets, looked around, bewildered. A moment passed. Then another zip, fizz.

“They’re shooting at us,” a soldier claimed. Laughing, giddy almost, they moved behind an armored vehicle that shielded them from the fields to the west. Somewhere out there, a sniper was trying to kill them. He was far enough away for the gunshot to be inaudible, or he may have been using a silencer.

The fight in southern Afghanistan between insurgents and NATO troops, along with Afghan forces still learning on the job, is not a conventional war. A lot of it is harassment, the deadly kind. The Taliban shoot, drop their weapons and walk off. They plant roadside bombs and disappear. They know that they will lose a head-on clash with Western firepower.

“We have all this great technology and everything,” stated U.S. Army Capt. Michael Kovalsky of Fords, New Jersey. “We overlook the little things like a piece of garbage in a tree,” which is sometimes used by insurgents to mark the location of a bomb.

As U.S. Marines press the Taliban in a five-day-old offensive against their stronghold of Marjah, insurgents are resorting to tactics that worked for them against the Soviet Army in the 1980s. Or much further back. Alexander the Great, the British Empire – Afghanistan has known many invaders throughout history.

The insurgents of today have radios and cell phones, but little more in the way of a sophisticated communications network.

When Kovalsky’s Alpha Company of the 1st Battalion, 17th Infantry Regiment of the 5th Stryker Brigade moved into the Badula Qulp area, northeast of Marjah, last week, they occupied an abandoned Taliban compound. On some walls, they found cell phone numbers, possibly of insurgents, and drawings of American Chinook helicopters and other military hardware, said 1st Sgt. Gene Hicks of Tacoma, Washington.

The pictures appeared to provide a crude “running log” of American military strength in the area that could be consulted by other fighters as they moved from compound to compound, Hicks said.

The Taliban are patient and crafty when they plant roadside bombs, one of the biggest threats to American forces. They often do it in stages to avoid detection, according to American forces.

One man will drop off the explosives; the next day, a man will put in the charge; a day later someone will link up the materiel for detonation, and finally an insurgent will leave a marker – sticks across a path, a bundle of hay or rocks on the track.

Sometimes, they plant bombs – IEDs, or Improvised Explosive Devices – under puddles in the road. Or they create their own puddle, pouring water on the road to soften the earth for digging.

An insurgent’s bomb marker “could be anything. That’s the difficulty of it,” Kovalsky said. A rag on a branch could be a locator.

“Then again, who knows?” Kovalsky said. “On a windy day, it could have been somebody’s garbage blowing around.”

Alpha Company suffered casualties when it arrived in Afghanistan last year; the losses of new units are often higher when they first deploy because of inexperience. Alpha became battle-hardened in Maywan province and the Arghandab river valley of Kandahar province, other nesting grounds for the insurgency. They have yet to suffer a casualty in their current mission in support of the Marine offensive in Marjah.

Alpha Company’s commanders say they have noticed that Taliban cells operate locally, without much coordination with other groups of fighters, and that their leaders are, for the most part, not in the area.

Meanwhile, American technology – much of it high in the sky – scores successes, and falters at times. An Associated Press reporter and photographer accompanying a recent patrol heard a large explosion, one of many in the area. Soldiers said a Reaper, a pilotless reconnaissance aircraft with a weapons system, had killed a man who was apparently planting a bomb in the road.

The Stryker infantry carriers, designed for urban and open areas, can clock 110 kph (70 mph) on a highway. But they have had some trouble operating along a narrow canal road in Badula Qulp. The earth has caved in under at least three vehicles, pitching them at sharp angles in the mud and requiring hours to winch them out.

Instincts and experience, wedded to technology, help the Americans. One night, a gunner studying the thermal imaging screen of a Stryker’s weapons system spotted a man crouching and acting suspiciously in a field beside a compound. He was sure the man was planting a bomb.

Hicks took a look at the screen. Then the man stood up and wiped his hand on a wall. The sergeant had seen the same when he was deployed in Iraq. The man was no bomber; he was just going to the toilet.

Cyber-warfare is dangerous

International Institute for Strategic Studies says cyber attacks could become weapon of choice in future conflicts.

Cyber-warfare attacks, such as the targeting of activists’ emails in China recently, are a growing threat, according to security experts.

Cyber-warfare attacks on military infrastructure, government and communications systems, and financial markets pose a rapidly growing but little understood threat to international security and could become a decisive weapon of choice in future conflicts between states, the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies warned yesterday.

IISS director-general John Chipman informed: “Despite evidence of cyber attacks in recent political conflicts, there is little appreciation internationally of how to assess cyber-conflict. We are now, in relation to the problem of cyber-warfare, at the same stage of intellectual development as we were in the 1950s in relation to possible nuclear war.”

The warning accompanied yesterday’s publication of the Military Balance 2010, the IISS’s annual assessment of global military capabilities and defence economics. The study also highlighted a series of other security threats, including the war in Afghanistan, China’s military diversification, the progress of Iran’s suspect nuclear programme, and the impact of terrorist groups in Iraq and elsewhere.

Future state-on-state conflict, as well as conflicts involving non-state actors such as al-Qaida, would increasingly be characterised by reliance on asymmetric warfare techniques, chiefly cyber-warfare, Chipman informed. Hostile governments could hide behind rapidly advancing technology to launch attacks undetected. And unlike conventional and nuclear arms, there were no agreed international controls on the use of cyber weapons.

“Cyber-warfare [may be used] to disable a country’s infrastructure, meddle with the integrity of another country’s internal military data, try to confuse its financial transactions or to accomplish any number of other possibly crippling aims,” he informed. Yet governments and national defence establishments at present have only limited ability to tell when they were under attack, by whom, and how they might respond.

Cyber-warfare typically involves the use of illegal exploitation methods on the internet, corruption or disruption of computer networks and software, hacking, computer forensics, and espionage. Reports of cyber-warfare attacks, government-sponsored or otherwise, are rising. Last month Google launched an investigation into cyber attacks allegedly originating in China that it said had targeted the email accounts of human rights activists.

In December the South Korean government reported an attack in which it said North Korean hackers may have stolen secret defence plans outlining the South Korean and US strategy in the event of war on the Korean peninsula. Last July, espionage protection agents in Germany said the country faced “extremely sophisticated” Chinese and Russian internet spying operations targeting industrial secrets and critical infrastructure such as Germany’s power grid.

One of the most notorious cyber-warfare offensives to date took place in Estonia in 2007 when more than 1 million computers were used to jam government, business and media websites. The attacks, widely believed to have originated in Russia, coincided with a period of heightened bilateral political tension. They inflicted damage estimated in the tens of millions of euros of damage.

China last week accused the Obama administration of waging “online warfare” against Iran by recruiting a “hacker brigade” and manipulating social media such as Twitter and YouTube to stir up anti-government agitation.

The US Defence Department’s Quadrennial Defence Review, published this week, also highlighted the rising threat posed by cyber-warfare on space-based surveillance and communications systems.”On any given day, there are as many as 7 million DoD (Department of Defence) computers and telecommunications tools in use in 88 countries using thousands of war-fighting and support applications. The number of potential vulnerabilities, therefore, is staggering.” the review informed.

“Moreover, the speed of cyber attacks and the anonymity of cyberspace greatly favour the offence. This advantage is growing as hacker tools become cheaper and easier to employ by adversaries whose skills are growing in sophistication.”

Defensive measures have already begun. Last June the Pentagon created US Cyber Command and Britain announced it was opening a cyber-security operations centre attached to GCHQ at Cheltenham, in coordination with MI5 and MI6.

William Lynn, US deputy defence secretary, described the cyber challenge as unprecedented. “Once the province of nations, the ability to destroy via cyber now also rests in the hands of small groups and individuals: from terrorist groups to organised crime, hackers to industrial spies to foreign intelligence services … This is not some future threat. The cyber threat is here today, it is here now,” Lynn informed.

• The IISS 2010 Military Balance, published yesterday, said the insurgency in Afghanistan is complex and Pakistan’s full cooperation remains elusive.

• Al-Qaida retains the capability to launch regular attacks in Baghdad.

• The report said technical difficulties frustrate Iran’s nuclear ambitions but all the same Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium continues to grow.

• The IISS looked forward to increased defence co-operation between France and Britain,saying both countries needed to “spend smarter” because they cannot afford to “spend more”.

Solar-powered soldiers in the pipeline

Darpa, the US defence research agency, is devoting $100m to alternative energy. But will it be commercially viable?
Nine years ago, Robert Nowak, an electro-chemicals expert for the US Defence Department, learned that senior generals weren’t happy with their troops’ electronic gear. While the night vision, laser, and GPS devices worked well, the batteries that powered them weighed some 25lb per soldier, heavy enough to hurt some of the troops.

 
So Nowak, who worked at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa), the Defence Department’s research branch, solicited bids for a new device that would power a soldier’s gear at a 10th of the weight and a fraction of the $100 (£60) cost of the batteries. Today, the original 18 companies that took up Nowak’s challenge have been whittled down to two: Livermore, California-based UltraCell and Adaptive Materials of Ann Arbor, Michigan. Their solution: small, sturdy fuel cells that can power a soldier’s clutch of mobile devices for a week on a gallon or so of methanol or propane. Battle-ready versions of the fuel cells will be available this year.

Darpa regards the result as a game-changer for the military – akin to the potential shift in the automobile market from petrol-driven to hybrid or electric cars. Before the fuel cells: “If you were in Afghanistan and had a battery, you basically had to go to another country to get it recharged,” says Nowak, who is now retired.

Consumers and businesses might someday gain as well. Both companies are testing models for the US commercial market. First targets: city police forces and makers of recreational vehicles.

The big drive to create a viable alternative-energy future – by Detroit, multinationals such as IBM and BP, and Silicon Valley startups – is well known. But there’s another serious player in this sphere: the US military, and especially Darpa.

Created at the height of the Cold War to bolster US military technology after the Soviet Union’s Sputnik satellite launch, the agency has a long history of innovation. Most famously, Darpa’s researchers first linked together computers at four locations in the early 1960s to form the Arpanet, a computer network for researchers that was the core of what eventually grew into the internet. Other breakthroughs have lead to the commercial development of semiconductors, GPS, and Unix, the widely used computer operating system. There have been some serious gaffes as well, including mechanical elephants to carry troops through Vietnam’s jungles and an ill-conceived search for people gifted with psychic powers. But on the whole, Darpa has a strong record of bringing ideas from the lab to the real world.

Can Darpa now score another double success by changing how both the military and civilian worlds consume and produce energy? The Arlington, Virginia-based agency’s first goal is always to magnify the might of the US armed forces. That’s why it is devoting an estimated $100m of its $3bn annual budget to alternative energy. The US forces deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq are voracious consumers of energy. As a result, they have become perilously dependent on long, costly, and vulnerable convoys of diesel-fuel tankers. More vehicles are used to transport and guard the fuel – mostly for running generators for air conditioning, laptops, and other gear at US bases and posts – than are deployed in actual combat, according to a May report by the Military Advisory Board. With the expense of convoys and guards thrown in, the cost of a gallon of fuel used at the front can range from $15 to several hundred dollars, says the same report. So the army has set an overall goal of significantly reducing its fuel requirements. Under its plan, fuel and supply shipments to 5,000-troop brigades would be reduced from the current once every few days to just one a month.

Darpa describes itself as an incubator of long-shot technologies too risky for almost anyone else to take on. The agency operates by issuing challenges to companies that are so tough they are called ” Darpa-hard”. Typically, Darpa requires contractors to come up with solutions that are orders of magnitude superior to current technology. It pays companies – from startups to IBM – as well as top universities to meet a goal. Then, other than imposing strict reporting requirements, the agency gets out of the way of the researchers’ work.

In addition to spurring the development of palm-size fuel cells, Darpa has contracted with companies to miniaturise solar cells that would supplant the need for generators. It now wants to develop inexpensive diesel and jet fuel from algae that could be produced in the battle zone. All three programmes include the aim of accelerating the manufacture of any new product by private companies, from whom the military could buy.

The agency certainly has no shortage of ambition. Take its solar panel programme. Current technology converts into electricity just about 20 per cent of the sunlight that hits silicon panels. DuPont and the University of Delaware are partners in a Darpa contract worth up to $100m to elevate efficiency to 40 per cent, at an affordable price. The idea is to capture the sunlight that would normally fall across a square-metre solar panel and concentrate it into a cell about the size of a fingernail. A number of those miniaturised cells would be arrayed across a panel that could be folded up and toted into battle, where it would power the needs of a half-dozen to a dozen soldiers. “It’s an aggressive goal,” says Brian Pierce, who is managing the Darpa programme. In contrast, solar cell maker SolFocus of Mountain View, California, is working on similar technology for civilian applications but is aiming for much more modest efficiency gains.

Darpa wants the cost of the new panel not to exceed $1,500 – compared with the more than $15,000 DuPont recently spent on a working model of the panel and its cells. Dan Laubacher, DuPont’s manager for the project, says the system is at least two years away from delivery to the military. But as production ramps up, he says, the ultimate cost “could be lower” than the $1,500 targeted by Darpa. Eventually, as costs come down, DuPont hopes to sell the panels to utilities.

Darpa-inspired fuel efforts would change the military. How much the agency could change the commercial alternative energy industry is a matter of debate. Some in Silicon Valley welcome Darpa’s commitment. Vinod Khosla, a co-founder of Sun Microsystems and one of the most active venture capitalists in alternative energy in the valley, notes that so far both the private and public sectors have failed to make a definitive breakthrough in alternative energy. “Nobody knows the right answer. So the more the merrier,” he says. “Darpa’s ability to take a long-term view of research is positive.”

However, some argue that alternative energy is unlike other Darpa efforts in the past, when the agency had a tremendous impact. In nurturing a proto-internet, for example, Darpa was alone in the field. Now hundreds of companies are exploring solar panel technology, doing advanced battery research, and experimenting with algae-based biofuels. This is also a global field, where Japan, Germany, and China already have the lead in critical areas.

Others say Darpa’s goals can be unrealistic. Darpa wants to reduce the current cost of algae-based fuel from $20-$30 per gallon down to $3. In January, Darpa awarded contracts worth up to $34.8m to two companies to produce aviation fuel at $3 a gallon from algae. The competitors are General Atomics, best known for its Predator drone, and Science Applications International. They have three years to do it. Some doubt these companies – or any company – can achieve that goal.

Chris Somerville, the director of the BP-funded Energy Biosciences Institute at the University of California Berkeley, has specifically avoided investment in algae-based fuel because his team does not see costs dropping below $10 a gallon. “We’re sceptical that that’s going to be possible,” Somerville says of the $3 price target. Darpa’s answer, as expressed by Nowak, is simple: “If you want to change the world,” he says, “set the bar high.”

By Steve LeVine

GD To Develop Next-Gen Combat Operations Center For US Marines

General Dynamics C4 Systems has been awarded $21 million to add Internet-like capabilities to the U.S. Marine Corps’ Combat Operations Centers (COCs), the focal point of decision-making for deployed Marine commanders and their staffs.
Through this effort, General Dynamics will upgrade the COCs’ electronic systems to increase Marines’ situational awareness and information sharing abilities, and improve network connectivity across the tactical battlespace. The contract being modified was awarded in 2002; the total value to date is $643 million.

Identified as the COC Model G, the new system will facilitate sharing of mission rehearsal and execution information among other Marine Corps Combat Operations Centers and joint forces partners.

The system will enable services such as electronic ‘chat,’ email and VoIP communications. General Dynamics will also migrate existing hardware-based command and control, tactical data systems and other applications to software-driven services using the Marine Corps’ service-oriented infrastructure.

Manny Mora, vice president and general manager for Battle Management Systems for General Dynamics C4 Systems, commented, “This effort begins the transition of the Marine Corps Combat Operations Center from a hardware-based system to a secure, software-enabled command and control system that will also facilitate rapid integration of new technologies as they become available.”

The COC Model G is also part of the Marine Corps’ initiative to become compliant with the U.S. Department of Defense’s Net-Enabled Command Capability (NECC). NECC enables Internet-like access to joint tactical networks and information that reaches across the battlespace and worldwide.

COCs are currently supporting operations at the battalion, squadron, regiment, group and Marine Expeditionary Brigade levels in Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries.

Iraq's New Buffalo Soldiers

It’s a typical day in Iraq for staff sergeant Neal Feldmann. The sun is shining and, as part of his job as combat engineer for the US Army’s 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division, he’s out clearing the route to ensure safe passage for the rest of his convoy. What he doesn’t realise is, he’s about to fall into a trap.

An IED (improvised explosive device – also known as a roadside bomb) has already detonated in front of him but having decided that there’s no further danger his vehicle continues on its way. This is what the enemy wants.

As staff sergeant Feldmann’s RG-31 draws level with the pothole created by the first IED, a watching enemy soldier pushes a button and a second bomb explodes, directly underneath.

“There was a loud bang and lots of dirt and dust inside the vehicle. There was so much smoke you couldn’t see the person in front of you,” Fieldmann says. “But you just employ the techniques and tactics you’ve been taught to ensure the personnel and vehicle are OK and then carry on [with] your mission.”

Not all military convoys are so lucky, however. In December 2006 alone, 70 of the 118 coalition casualties in the Iraq war were caused by IED attack. Hence, Feldmann enjoys the protection offered by driving Buffalo and RG-31 mine-protected vehicles.

Feldmann and his colleague, specialist James Keelan, can spend between four to 37 hours at any one time out on the road. As combat engineers operating out of Camp Striker, just south of Baghdad airport, it is their job to clear routes so the rest of their convoy can pass safely.

“You’re always on the lookout for anything out of the ordinary, like a wire or anything that looks suspicious,” Keelan says. “We know the things to look out for.” This constant scanning provides Feldman, and his following convoy, with the safety required to continue operating in such a demanding environment, according to Feldmann.

“You’re not on edge because you’re comfortable with the techniques and tactics you’ve been taught and with the vehicles you’ve been given. The rest of the convoy can be directly behind us or hours behind,” Feldmann says. “What we do is not 100% successful but it gives piece of mind for the soldiers in the vehicles travelling behind.”

HUMAN ERROR AND IEDS

One threat to convoy life comes from within. Ex-serviceman have been known to grumble about troops in turrets being unprepared and not carrying their weapons, soldiers falling asleep when they are meant to be on the ball and vehicles stopping for no apparent reason.

“Soldiers are always on the lookout for anything out of the ordinary, like a wire or anything that looks suspicious.”"A convoy in a hostile environment needs to keep moving no matter what,” an ex-serviceman posted on the International Association of Counterterrorism and Security Professionals website.

“If stopping cannot be prevented every soldier in the convoy needs to be at the ready. Too often there are troops in turrets sitting on their butts with their hands off their weapon systems.”

But mistakes do occur and error can lead to accidents, according to Feldmann.

“We’re all human – we all make mistakes but we don’t call it human error. I’d never tell anyone they made a mistake. The Red Sox can win seven games in a row and then lose one – is that human error or is it fatigue? All we know is that we are far superior to the insurgents and we’ve proved that many times.”

As Keelan puts it: “Sure, it happens but there’s no way to eliminate it.”

By far the biggest threat faced by convoy troops in Iraq today is the IED. According to the record and testimony of the US defence department, since the war in Iraq began more than 3,398 US servicemen have lost their lives – 70% in an IED attack (figure stands for 16 May 2007).

“IEDs are the biggest threat we encounter,” Feldmann says. “I’ve been out here for nine months and in that time we’ve found 150 IEDs and been struck 60 times, so in that time that’s 210 IEDs.”

IED – IMPROVISED EXPLOSIVE DEVICE

An IED is an improvised bomb which incorporates destructive, lethal, noxious, pyrotechnic or incendiary chemicals – it is designed to blow up people and vehicles. IEDs typically contain an explosive charge, a detonator and an initiation system. They are triggered by remote control, infrared or magnetic triggers, pressure-sensitive bars or trip wires.

What makes IEDs so dangerous is the fact that they can be manufactured anywhere by anyone with materials that are readily available. It is not uncommon for IEDs to be produced using agricultural and medical supplies by people who’ve found instructions on the internet. This means that, with no standard production formula, IEDs are difficult to track and detect.

It is a threat that is constantly evolving, according to Wayne Phillips, the vice president of Force Protection, a company that manufactures the Buffalo mine-protected clearance vehicles.

“The enemy is very adaptable,” Phillips says. “We come up with something to counter what they are doing and they counter it right back. It’s an ongoing battle.”

“What makes IEDs so dangerous is the fact that they can be manufactured anywhere by anyone with materials that are readily available.”Force Protection is not the only company working to keep troops safe from IED attack. The RG-31 Nyala is another multi-purpose mine-protected vehicle made by Land Systems OMC in South Africa. Its success at resisting IEDs is, in part, due to its steel-welded monocoque hull – as of January 2007 the US army had over 400 RG-31s in service.

THE NEW COMBAT FRONTLINE

Since Force Protection started supplying its Buffalo vehicles in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2003, there have been no fatalities due to IED attack, according to a Fox News Channel report broadcast on 31 October 2006.

“Our senior scientist is in my opinion the most pre-eminent blast and mine protective authority in the US,” says Philips. “Everything on the outside of our vehicles is made to be blown off, it’s expendable. We concentrate on protecting the engine and the people inside. I can’t say too much about how we do it but we use armour, different combinations of materials and jamming equipment.”

Everyone knows that the law of the jungle applies in combat situations – the fittest survive, so it is fitting that the vehicles designed by Force Protection to give soldiers the edge in the age-old convoy war are named Buffalo, Cougar and Cheetah.

The Buffalo Mine-Protected Clearance Vehicle (MPCV) incorporates the most powerful blast and ballistic protection available with detection and removal capability, including a robotic arm measuring 30ft and an iron claw mounted with camera and sensory equipment. This allows personnel to examine potential threats from within the safety of the vehicle’s armoured hull. The Buffalo is the sole source for the US Defense Department’s category III Mine-Resistant Ambush-Protected (MRAP) vehicle.

There are two cougars – the 4×4 mine-resistant medium vehicle, which is designed for ordnance removal, command and control and lead convoy missions, and the 6×6 mine-protected field ambulance. Both are used as MRAP vehicles.

The Cheetah is Force Protection’s newest vehicle series. It combines state-of-the-art ballistic-protection technology with the mobility of a unique light-armoured vehicle and is designed specifically for light tactical, reconnaissance, communication and urban operations. With a nuclear, biological and chemical overpressure system option, it is a perfect fit for emergency response teams and forward mobile command posts.

THE EVOLVING IED THREAT

Convoy protection is not new. Since the US Indian wars with Native Americans in the 19th century, convoys have become a major target, largely due to the people and supplies they carry.

Threats have changed over the years from the arrows of the American Indians to the bullets of the world wars and the guerrilla tactics of today.

“Mine-protected vehicles offer a new level of confidence in dealing with IEDs.”This threat means organisations such as Force Protection have to be incredibly light on their feet. Force Protection designed its newest vehicle, the Cheetah, in just one year after the US army raised warning of a new kind of IED threat.

“It’s hard to put a time frame on the production of a new vehicle but it has to be done quickly because there’s a need in the field for it,” Phillips says.

SAFE FROM HARM

Feldmann says mine-protected vehicles offer a new level of confidence in dealing with IEDs. “We’re not allowed to talk about specifics but the vehicles are designed to force energy away from you. It’s basic science,” he says.

But Feldmann says more of these vehicles are required to carry out operations with the maximum amount of efficiency and the best result. “You ask anybody here; we just need more vehicles. If one of these vehicles goes down you either have to give up your mission or carry on in a less safe vehicle. That’s when you feel on edge.”

The US Government is currently increasing the number of IED vehicles it uses in military hotspots. Force Protection’s Phillips says his company alone has received a recent order for an extra 1,000 of these vehicles.

And according to Keelan and Feldmann, you cannot have enough of these life-saving vehicles in a place where a beautiful sunny day can easily become a nightmare with nothing more than the push of a pedal.

Leading the Army's technology charge

When describing the collection of technology projects under his command, Army Maj. Gen. Nickolas Justice likes to joke that “if it’s got electricity running in it, they probably blame me for it.”

The quip understates the complexity and importance of the systems Justice runs at the Program Executive Office for Command, Control and Communications Tactical (PEO-C3T) at Fort Monmouth, N.J. They include the Warfighter Information Network-Tactical, the Army Battle Command System, Force XXI Battle Command Brigade and Below, and a mobile electricity program that supplies ruggedized power generators for the Defense Department.

In his six years as commander and several more as deputy of PEO-C3T, Justice has learned a few tricks that other government information technology executives would do well to follow, including how to get the most from the resources one has, knowing what risks are worth taking and shaping new technology to serve a mission’s needs, not the other way around. He has also become a vocal proponent of open-source software because of its flexibility and cost-effectiveness.

Justice spoke with Federal Computer Week contributor David Perera about putting those lessons into practice and the opportunities he’s pursuing for using open-source technology.

FCW: Can you explain how the various directorates you oversee as commander of PEO C3T fit together? They seem like a diverse group.

Justice: It’s a broad portfolio, but the function of everything is having the infrastructure to power an electronic force, or digital force.

FCW: Is it fair to say that many of the programs you oversee are charged with making systems interoperable that weren’t designed to be so?

Justice: A lot of the programs…have been around for many years in various forms. So, yes, they started out as very specific solutions to problems.

FCW: If many of the projects started out as stand-alone systems, how do you now make them interoperable?

Justice: One of the first things you want to do is separate data from the actual application. One of the things we’ve started to do is architect the Army Battle Command System into very specific services that you can call across applications. We’ve put in place the ability to share information with a publish-and-subscribe service that allows you to reduce the number of interfaces between programs. You write interfaces for a publish-and-subscribe service. That allows people to write their interface to [the service] so you have a common denominator to get information across systems.

FCW: Is service-oriented architecture the magic solution that can erase stovepipes?

Justice: It’s certainly treated that way in the press a lot of times. … It’s very fashionable to use that term. What it is, and what you need, is a defined architecture to build to and come up with common standards and solutions and allow people to develop solutions that have applicability beyond the specific intent they were defined for.

You put an architecture in place that allows you to share data with guys that you didn’t intend to share data with because you didn’t have a need, but when the need arises, you have the ability to get the data published out to places where other people can access it and use it.

I don’t think I would call SOA the ultimate solution. I think good planning and good engineering [are] how you solve problems. If you look at this world, one of the challenges you have is always new and emerging technologies. I don’t see a silver bullet out there. What I see is that as technology is fielded and becomes available, you have a number of challenges that you will always be faced with to overcome, to be able to bring a broader applicability to what the technology has to offer.

FCW: You are a noted proponent of open-source applications. What’s your assessment of the degree to which the Army has embraced them?

Justice: I have [seen] some positives and some shortfalls that I will share with you. We’ve actually embraced a lot of the open-source operating systems material and some very specific tools out there that give us collaboration tools — chat and things like that. We have a large base of open-source operating systems that we’re doing.

What we have not really embraced very well yet is open-source application development. Getting our feet wet in the open-source operating systems world is pretty easy because it matches up with some of the appliance kinds of devices that we have that go into the platforms and are embedded. But changing the culture where you’re developing applications in an open-source environment is a bit challenging for us right now.

In the applications world, you have to have a process in place that’s very collaborative and have the ability to place that software up there, have it peer reviewed, have people who are willing to invest their time and energy in making it better. That process infrastructure is just going into place right now within [the Office of the Secretary of Defense]. We’re just beginning to look at an ability to be able to share those codes around.

We’ve also got to learn to write contracts with our software developers and folks that allow us to take advantage of that. That whole world of intellectual property is a challenge throughout the whole open-source world, and it’s certainly a challenge for us in DOD, where we’re sort of new to that realm.

What I also find is the opportunity [to use] open source as we work with our coalition partners because I think a lot of the NATO nations are more embracing of open-source technology than we have been. You’ll find [that] a lot of cost solutions that we can work on with other nations are often open source.

FCW: The objections to open source include concerns about its security and stability, a possible lack of life cycle support, and a shallow industrial base. What objection concerns you most?

Justice: I hear a lot about security, but open source is not limited to concerns about security. Our security guys are concerned about software, period. I don’t see that as just limited to open source. I think a lot of the challenge, when you really push down those first responses that you hear, tends to go back to, ‘I don’t know how to contract for it. I don’t know what my deliverables are. I don’t know what my intellectual property rights are.’ How do you sustain it? That’s another question. But if you really look, there’s a large sustainment pool out there for open-source solutions.

FCW: What needs to happen, either at the Army or DOD level, to make adoption more widespread?

Justice: I think what we need to do is actively promote it more. The current process and system [are]: You go out and you look for your own sustainment, so it typically comes in a more proprietary format. We also need to take an active role and participate in that. I think a lot of our computer guys would be excellent at actually operating in that environment. And we look to do that.

Some of the criticisms are often outweighed by some of the advantages. And one of the advantages, particularly with our coalition partners, is the low cost of entrance into some very robust technologies. We find that open source allows for a very low entry fee to start playing in it. Oftentimes, that’s where we see it: new technologies that are very robust, and they give us an opportunity to leverage that kind of stuff. I found it most easy to embrace in the NATO world.

FCW: What were some of the changes PEO-C3T had to make as it began supporting battle operations in Iraq and Afghanistan?

Justice: It was really about three things that we had to adjust to. No. 1, we had to get a system-of-systems focus and really understand that, unlike in peacetime where we were just delivering a solution, people’s lives depended on what we were doing. It was imperative for us to get down into those formations and actually understand how we could assist in solving [their] challenges and sharing information and being able to make [them] more effective. And that meant taking a lot of my civilian engineer talent and sending them out to get side by side with young soldiers and spend nights in training sessions with them, learning what those soldiers actually expected out of those solutions.

Now, that sounds pretty basic, but sometimes when you look at the Army, large as it is, we often get compartmentalized in what we do. Just being out there, watching the units and being able to learn what they do and the urgency of it and the conditions in which that stuff had to operate was one of the biggest challenges.

Also, we literally had to start new forums where you take a lot of your genius people and have them get together and collaborate on common solutions, having them understand that everything in a combat formation has to be balanced against the very limited amount of resources — that you have to nurture and care for those solutions. If you can share things and reduce the footprint and the weight that unit has to carry, that in itself is of tremendous value.

We also had to partner with the science and technology community to learn how to get ahead of their cycles and engage with them far earlier so that we were able to help outline the best way to implement some of the science and technology solutions they were bringing to the table. I’ve got some of my folks who are working very closely with project managers in [the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency] and the research and development and engineering community — that whole science and technology world.

How you change some of those stovepiped solutions is to invent new technologies and do engineering changes to those solutions and integrate those into the current battle command systems.

Army Modernization Debate Begins

I attended the same interview at the Pentagon with Colin and Greg Grant where MGen. Terry met with a select group of reporters. It’s too bad he didn’t say much, but I’ll go ahead and give Colin some props for spinning out a story on it and getting the debate started.

The incoming commander of the famous 10th Mountain Division, Maj. Gen. James Terry, sat down with defense reporters today to talk about the future of Army modernization. Terry, a very personable commander with a refreshingly candid approach, wouldn’t offer specific answers about what the Army’s Brigade Combat Team Modernization would look like. After all, it’s one of the biggest acquisition decisions the service will make for years and it’s not unreasonable for him to go slow. But there is a larger issue that a major general dares not address in public — are the Pentagon and Army moving in the right direction when it comes to redesigning the force? The answer we got from a respected analyst is a resounding “No!”

Terry knows a great deal about the past and future of Army modernization from his job as director of TRADOC’s Future Force Integration Directorate, known fondly as FFID. But he is also an officer in the chain of command and the Army is in the midst of deciding just what the successor to FCS will be, so he couldn’t say much.

Terry did say that the Army is probably going to do more of taking Operational Needs Statements from commanders in the field and turning them into programs of record, those wonderful budgeting tools that allow the service to build a program into its regular annual funding plan. At the end of the session, I asked him if the Army was moving from a force bent on fundamental change — which the service declared was the case with the development of FCS — to a more incremental approach. Terry said he thought the service was probably headed to something much closer to a step by step approach.

Eager to get some perspective on whether the service is generally headed in the right direction since the demise of the Manned ground Vehicle program, I called one of the best outside analysts who follows the Army, Dan Goure of the Lexington Institute. Goure was adamant. The Army has, under enormous pressure from Defense Secretary Robert Gates, begun to turn into an institution planning for the last war — one of the greatest sins of which a military can be accused.

The Army’s current course “almost guarantees surprise, technical and operational surprise” in our next conflict because the service is rebuilding to cope with the wars it has most recently fought — Iraq and Afghanistan. Gates has declared repeatedly that he is acting to rebalance the US military in light of the lessons he has learned since coming to the Pentagon.

“Why would you think you are going to get yourself in the same situation in five years”” Goure asked. On top of that, Army officials have said repeatedly they are planning for uncertainty and for the long war. “The Army uses the term uncertainty — that’s not a plan for the future,” he said. Instead that leads the service, Goure opined, to operating without “a greater vision, a greater purpose than the immediate fight.” And that takes us back to his initial premise, that the current course of the Army will place the country in peril because it will be vulnerable to an enemy able to target our technology that has been developed with the current fight in mind. “You don’t have a core purpose for the Army,” whether it might be developing the capability to read and react to an enemy attack, mobilize quickly and stop the enemy in its tracks almost anywhere in the world, pacify the Indians or stop the Soviets at the Fulda Gap.

Israel's own rifle gives the bullet to US-made M-16

Fondly patting his dust-covered rifle at the end of day-long shooting practice, Israeli platoon commander Afik Soher says he wouldn’t replace it with any other.
Israel’s army is gradually phasing out the veteran US-made M-16 assault rifle in favour of the modern, home-produced Tavor, which has become a symbol of pride for the Givati infantry brigade where it first became standard issue.

“It’s a great gun and I wouldn’t trade it for anything,” Soher says.

Malfunctions cut short earlier attempts to introduce it to troops and the weapon was used on a wide scale for the first time during this year’s war in the Gaza Strip, when it performed with no reported problems.

The acrid smell of gunpowder fills the air of the sandy shooting range in the heart of the Negev desert in southern Israel where recruits, mainly in their late teens, are spending the week practising shooting techniques.

Wearing full combat vests and camouflage helmets, the company soldiers run in file into the shooting range, take positions and fire five rounds towards a cardboard target positioned 100 metres (yards) away.

They then run through the case-littered stretch of sand to check their shots before comparing their results.

“It is fun working with it because soldiers have special motivation to hold an Israeli-made rifle,” says company commander Second Lieutenant Yinon Guttel.

The TAR-21, or “Tavor Assault Rifle – 21st Century”, is made of strong, composite materials and features an integral electro-optical sight and a bullet-loading action mechanism located in the butt stock which makes it short and ergonomic.

However, the Tavor, the Hebrew name for mount Tabor in northern Israel, uses the same 5.56 millimetre cartridges and magazines as the M-16.

“Advanced countries with modern armies develop their own weapons. We have our tank, now our infantry has a rifle,” says Guttel.

Designed to meet urban fighting requirements that Israeli troops first encountered during the 1982 Lebanon invasion, the Tavor has been years in research and development.

Work on it was begun by the now-privatised Israel Weapons Industries, with the aim of replacing the ageing M-16 and the locally-manufactured but unpopular Galil rifle.

“The gun was developed on the basis of lessons drawn during the First Lebanon War,” said Zalman Sheves, head of development department of the Tavor at IWI, referring to the 1982 invasion.

“The IDF (Israel Defence Forces) fighters encountered urban warfare for the first time in a massive way, which was completely different from previous wars. The conclusions were that a very compact, light rifle that can be easily used in rooms and when getting off vehicles was needed.”

“We applied in the gun everything the IDF wanted a future rifle to be after the war,” he said.

The IWI factory has produced thousands of the Tavor rifles in recent years for the Israeli army as well as for an undisclosed number of foreign clients. Sheves refused to give the rifle’s price.

The Israeli army began issuing the gun to the Givati brigade, one of five infantry brigades in regular forces, in 2006, but suspended use just months later after numerous malfunctions were exposed.

In August 2008 the TAR-21 was reintroduced in Givati and today the entire brigade is equipped with it, while other brigades are gradually being supplied.

Unlike the M-16 that has been used by dozens of armies in numerous battlefields across the world from Vietnam in the 1960s to Iraq and now Afghanistan, the Tavor has yet to fully prove its effectiveness.

The 22-day war in Gaza in December-January was the first major offensive in which Israeli troops used the rifle and no malfunctions were notified.

The main difference between the Tavor and the M-16 is the use of the Bullpup configuration in the Tavor, where the action and magazine are located in the buttstock, considerably shortening the rifle’s length.

“For someone who has also had an M-16, I must say that I would recommend to assign new recruits with the Tavor,” says Guttel.

“It was built on the basis of an existing rifle but included modifications and improvements of the M-16′s flaws, such as fitting it for left-handed (people), a short weapon that better fits urban warfare but that can still fire long distances.”

Sheves says replacement of the M-16 with the Tavor reflects the change in warfare in the 20th and 21st centuries.

“The M-16 is a very veteran rifle that was developed in the early 1960s. It is a good rifle but the needs in the battle field have changed. The M-16 was a good fit for warfare in the 1960s and 1970s that involved open areas and fortified targets. The Tavor is better fitted than the M-16 to the modern battle field,” he told AFP.