Sunday, May 15, 2011

Linking Up in The Field

The Austrlaian Department of Defence selected Elbit Systems Land and C4I - Tadiran’s DOMINATOR Integrated Infantry Combat System. The relatively modest $300M contract provides the Austrlaian Army with a portable digital command and control system, under project LAND 75 Phase 3.4 (Battle Management System) and LAND 125 Soldier Combat System Phase 3.

Military forces around the world have tried, and mostly failed, to equip soldiers with digital radios and portable computers. The problem is that while you can retrofit a vehicle with new IT equipment, there are limits to what a soldier can carry.

Dominator provides an assortment of potable items of equipment, which can be plugged together and worn on a belt. This includes a "Personal Digital Unit (PDU) the
450 g processor for the system, n 8 inch touch screen and a rechargeable battery.

The network for the system is analogous to the Better Approach To Mobile Adhoc Networking (B.A.T.M.A.N.), mesh system (now being added to Linux), allowing an ad-hoc mesh network, with a central point of failure. Soldiers can get information from the newtok relivant to where they are and what they are doing, somewhat like social networking for warfare.

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