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Empire Challenge 07 Tests Emerging Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Concepts
El Segundo CA (SPX) Aug 15, 2007 Northrop Grumman's recent participation in a joint military exercise will enhance its work with the U.S. Joint Forces Command to improve how military forces conduct intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR). Northrop Grumman contributed its modeling, simulation and analysis expertise to Empire Challenge 07, a demonstration of how coalition forces can work together to collect, analyze and share information. The exercise, sponsored by the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency and involving multiple U.S. government agencies and coalition nations, was conducted July 9-27 at Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, Calif. Lessons learned from the demonstration will be used in ongoing work under a cooperative research agreement between Northrop Grumman and the Joint Forces Command. The goal of the three-year agreement, signed in April 2007, is to identify ways to shorten the military commander's cycle of tasking sensors to collect intelligence, analyzing the information and disseminating it to warfighters. Shortening that cycle would enhance warfighters' situational awareness and increase their chance of success. Northrop Grumman's contributions to Empire Challenge 07 included simulation of moving target indicator sensor data collected by its RQ-4 Global Hawk unmanned system and E-8C Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System (Joint STARS). Northrop Grumman also provided advanced communications technology that greatly enhanced the quality of full-motion video information used in the exercise. Northrop Grumman offers this capability to its customers under a strategic alliance agreement with Digital Fountain Inc., whose patented DF Raptor forward error correction (FEC) technology protects the transfer of large files and streaming data from data loss. The USJFCOM/Northrop Grumman research team will use data from Empire Challenge 07 to support modeling, simulation, analysis and demonstration efforts. Much of that work is performed with Northrop Grumman's Cyber Warfare Integration Network (CWIN), which can generate operationally-based, virtual battlefield environments. "Participation in Empire Challenge is a milestone for this team," said Chris Frangos, director and Northrop Grumman's principal investigator for the ISR research project. "We learned more about the importance of integrating different kinds of sensors and systems to support dynamic tactical mission operations. This will enhance our ability to bring advanced technologies and architecture solutions to live exercises, enabling the warfighter to evaluate new concepts and capabilities in an operational environment." Community Email This Article Comment On This Article Related Links Northrop Grumman Read the latest in Military Space Communications Technology at SpaceWar.com
Thompson Files: Joint radio vision dims
Arlington, Va. (UPI) Aug 14, 2007 When U.S. President George W. Bush took office nearly seven years ago, his vision of how the military needed to change could be summed up in one word: transformation. Bush shared with many other observers a belief that the defense establishment inherited from Cold War years was too Balkanized and ingrown to cope with emerging threats. He directed Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to fashion a plan for transforming the joint force into a more integrated, collaborative enterprise that could respond quickly and precisely to conventional and unconventional challenges alike. New technologies, especially new communications technologies, were expected to play a pivotal role in this transformation. (Loren B. Thompson is chief executive officer of the Lexington Institute, an Arlington, Va.-based think tank that supports democracy and the free market.) |
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