Cheryl E. Quenneville and Cynthia E. Dunning
During an anti-vehicular landmine event, the lower legs are particularly vulnerable to injury. Energy-attenuating (EA) floor mats are appealing in their potential to protect against the high-rate loading associated with such events, while consuming minimal space within the vehicle. To examine the efficacy of these mats, five commercially-available EA products were subjected to loading in an impact testing machine against an Anthropomorphic Test Device (ATD) leg. Over a range of test velocities, the ability of the mats to reduce axial tibial force in the ATD leg was quantified. Several of the mats reduced the tibial force by approximately 75% at the highest impact speed tested; however, when the results were extrapolated to the level of previously reported floor velocities, the injury threshold would be exceeded for all materials. EA floor mats are able to dissipate much of the energy from a blast, but cannot mitigate all of the loading to the lower legs during a landmine blast event.
Corné J. Smith and Jacobus P. Venter *
In the scope of Tactical Data Links (TDL), the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) started the journey to establish a national TDL capability with the commencement of their national Strategic Defence Procurement Packages (SDPP) in 1999. These procurement packages saw the development of fighter, helicopter, frigate and submarine platforms with requirements for TDL capabilities. In this, the SANDF pursued the development of an indigenous TDL data model and data transfer protocol standard appropriately named Link-ZA. This paper expands on the implementation evolution and challenges of the standard over the last 10 years and provides a generic TDL Capability Model with a strategy for establishing interoperability between different implementations of the standard, thus establishing a SANDF tactical Network Enabled Capability.
Colin Wills
This paper examines the part Situational Awareness (SA) plays in counter-air operations, focusing on the utility of future Unmanned Combat Air Systems (UCAS) in gaining control of the air in 2040. Current UCAS development focuses on Intelligence, Surveillance, Targeting, Acquisition and Reconnaissance (ISTAR) and Suppression of Enemy Air Defence (SEAD) roles. If a UCAS cannot control the airspace in which it is operating in, and unless control can be gained by other means, then manned fighter aircraft will be required to achieve this task. This would seem somewhat perverse, largely negating the purpose of utilising UCAS in the first place. Could a UCAS gain control of the air in 2040? The author believes that such a system could; UCAS should not be viewed in isolation, but rather as part of a system of systems, that aid, it can be argued, the most critical component of warfare—SA. The importance that SA plays in warfare, particularly in control of the air, is not only vital, but will be the critical node in enabling this to be achieved.
Ben Whitham
An adversary land force that invades sovereign territory should be shaped and delayed using coordinated and synchronised deceptions, working in concert with other obstacles as part of a defence-in-depth strategy. There should be no difference in this approach to the conduct of defensive operations in cyberspace. While there is academic literature on the benefits of employing cyber deception, there is no clear policy or process for how this capability could be leveraged at the tactical level within the Australian or US military. This paper describes a set of responsibilities for each of the information operations, intelligence, and communications planners within a tactical headquarters in order to deliver a coordinated cyber deception capability.
Arthur Ollett, Nihal Fernando, Frederic Lafon, Bruce Keech, Mark Simmonds, and Anthony Richard
The Common Router Network (CRN) concept is a key enabler for a robust, scalable, and efficient wide area network infrastructure applicable for maritime or land tactical and strategic environments. Based on the open standards of Internet Protocol (IP) it provides a secure and flexible means of exchanging a wide variety of information well beyond the capability of restrictive stovepipe data links. It is fundamentally aligned with the Protected Core Network (PCN) concept initiated from a research program undertaken by the NATO C3 Agency. It defines a flexible transport infrastructure supporting military operations based on Network Centric Warfare (NCW) principles. The CRN creates a loose coupling between the information domain and transport infrastructure, focusing on providing high service availability in high-threat environments while managing the available bandwidth. This paper discusses the fundamentals of the CRN, its application in the tactical maritime, land, and strategic environments and provides examples of its use for WAN connectivity of local area networks, maritime combat system training, and at-sea collaboration supporting anti-submarine warfare.
