WASHINGTON — The Army tested the first prototype for its data layer as part of its number one modernization initiative, Next Generation Command and Control — focused on speeding decisions using artificial intelligence —in the Pacific with 25th Infantry Division this week.
“Next Gen C2 is the vehicle, I think, that’s going to bring artificial intelligence and its capabilities to our commanders in the future. We think through the data, the data needs to be accessible, because if data is not accessible and it’s not secure, then it can’t be used by software, it can’t be used by algorithms and to train algorithms,” Brig. Gen. Michael Kaloostian, director of the Command and Control Future Capability Directorate at Army Transformation and Training Command, told reporters during a media roundtable Tuesday.
Kaloostian noted that the key to having decision dominance over adversaries in the future is speed. Artificial intelligence will be critical for providing that speed of decision, but that is predicated on having the data and ecosystem to support the algorithms.
The test is part of Lightning Surge (formerly Lightning Strike) — serialized events that incrementally add capability to prototype the data layer portion of NGC2 ahead of the Army’s headlining multi-domain experiment, Project Convergence.
The event closely resembles a parallel effort in 4th ID called Ivy Sting, where Anduril was awarded a contract to develop another NGC2 prototype to scale to that entire division.
The Army awarded Lockheed Martin a $26 million Other Transaction Authority last September to provide an integrated data layer for 25th ID as part of the service’s NGC2 effort, which aims to provide commanders and units a new approach to manage information, data, and command and control with agile and software-based architectures. Lightning Strike has tested out that prototype.
The Army has maintained it views the two NGC2 prototyping efforts not as competing but complementary. The Army wants to inject a diverse set of capabilities and vendors to prototype and inform what the eventual NGC2 ecosystem will look like.
Seeing The Light(ning Surge)
For Lightning Surge 1, which took place Tuesday through Thursday at Schofield Barracks, the Army’s priority was to establish and validate an NGC2 prototype common data layer with edge-to-common operating picture feeds for enhanced command and control. That common data layer, which operates on 25th ID’s existing transport and compute environment enables data to be updated everywhere in real time once updated into the architecture. Or, as Brinkman put it, “Hey, can we just visualize the battlefield?”
“Do we understand where people are? Do we understand our graphics control measures? Basically, how people ought to move and where they can’t move,” Brinkman said, adding they are focused on speeding up anything they can.
The service assessed how the NGC2 data layer improves the division’s ability to securely and rapidly provide commanders with shared data between networks and platforms, enable division maneuver by integrating and visualizing adversary and friendly electromagnetic emissions and accelerate commander updates using an AI pipeline to automate radio reporting process, the Army said.
Lightning Surge 1 involved dispersed command post operations to evaluate transport resiliency and effectiveness supporting the data layer with mission threads focusing at the division level to prioritize validating data exchange and integration for sUAS data, electromagnetic spectrum data, battlefield graphics, and soldier locations.
For its part, Lockheed and its team of vendors built and delivered a common data layer augmented by AI tools, one that enables voice and chat natural language processing for spot reporting, the company said in a release.
“This initial test is going to be really to demonstrate the data layer and the construct that we’ve put together … This is really software centric. Developing the data layer, the architecture, and then feeding data through to prove out that the architecture that we have is going to work for the Army’s objectives,” Chandra Marshall, vice president and general manager of multi-domain combat solutions at Lockheed, said in an interview. “From a prototype perspective, the entire system that we’ve had and our vision for it is centered around AI capability.”
For example, Brinkman noted that AI and talk-to-text technology can improve how radio report information is disseminated and populated on maps. Currently, that is a very manual process involving listening to radio calls and writing locations on maps.
With the power of data and AI, that information can automatically populate on a common operational picture for all relevant and cleared units to see across the battlefield.
“Think about what that dynamically changes. No more do you have somebody come on your radio and somebody’s like, can you please say that number over again? It shows up on the map and it really helps reduce the speed and the accuracy of what you’re able to do timelines. Also it helps us adjudicate, understand how and where we deploy our lethal and non-lethal effects,” Brinkman said.
Future Surges
Brinkman said Lightning Surge 2 will look at how to digitize and bring about kinetic and non-kinetic effects. Lockheed noted that event, on the calendar for February 2026, will focus on a fire mission thread.
“Going forward, we have Lightning Surge events that are planned on about one month increments, where we work with the Army and figure out what capability that we want to demonstrate and we’ll conduct those events. The whole idea here is to be flexible and do iterative development, and then on, like I said, about one month increments, to demonstrate the capability out at the 25th ID,” Marshall said.
Surge 3 will begin to deal in the airspace and 4 will look at logistics.
“All of these pillars are data focused, data specific pillars,” Brinkman said. “Not only are we now understanding where we are, understanding where our assets are, understanding how we can affect lethality on the battlefield, but then also what are the logistics tail, logistics requirements that are informed from the bottom up, not from strategic inventories or assets, they’re edge sensors … Once you have those data pillars built, you can combine all those together and start making really, really solid AI-informed decisions across those four pillars.”
Marshall said team Lockheed recently added Rune Technologies for a logistics capability, adding to the existing partners of Raft and Accelint.
“Part of the process with the Army is going through and getting their feedback on different capabilities and suppliers that they’re interested in and working through that and figuring out how we integrate that into the architecture,” she said. “But the process and the team that we have in place allows us to bring in the best in the industry. And also, if things aren’t working and we need to adapt, it allows us to off board people from team LM as well.”