HUNTSVILLE, Ala. – An Army official last week laid out how the Army’s test plan for its recent command and control system is ready as much as be able to deploy systems to Guam later this decade.
The Army’s Integrated Air and Missile Defense Battle Command System (IBCS), built by
Northrop Grumman [NOC], was approved for full-rate production in April (Defense Every day, April 12).
Then, in May, the corporate announced IBCS achieved its initial operational capability (IOC), showing it meets objective capabilities required and was able to be fielded to the Army for further system development (Defense Every day, May 1).
IBCS will likely be the Army’s newest missile defense command platform and is designed to integrate various sensors and shooters. The Army’s 343rd Field Artillery Battalion will likely be the primary unit to receive, test and field the IBCS by the tip of FY ‘24.
“So 343 has the system currently. We’re going through an upgrade to an [Low-Rate Initial Production, LRIP] version of the system where we’re upgrading each hardware and software, and 343 will likely be the primary unit within the Army to receive that equipment in fourth quarter FY ‘24. The plan after that’s to get on a two battalion per 12 months cadence. So starting in ‘25, we will likely be filling two IBCS-enabled Patriot battalions yearly,” Col. Chris Hill, Project Manager, Integrated Fires Mission Command inside U.S. Army PEO Missiles and Space, told reporters during an Aug. 7 visit here at Northrop Grumman’s final assembly facility here ahead of the Space and Missile Defense Symposium.
Hill underscored the PEO is using an Integrated Fires Test Campaign (IFTC) to incrementally integrate recent sensors and shooters to IBCS, including the Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor (LTADMS), Indirect Fire Protection Capability (IFPC) Increment 2 launchers, Army Long Range Persistent Surveillance (ALPS), Sentinel A3 radar, Sentinel A4 radar and Distant Interceptor Guidance-350 (RIG-360).
“We don’t provide an IBCS to the warfighter. IBCS is a C2 system. So for the Integrated Fires Test event, we’re one operational test, where you have got IBCS, you have got LTAMDS, you have got IFPC. That every one will likely be tested through the same period of time. So why are we doing that? The explanation we’re doing that’s because in FY ‘27, we’ve defense of Guam that’s sitting on the market,” he said.
DoD has said it plans to have accomplished a command center with enhanced integrated air and missile defense (IAMD) capability with the IBCS by 2027, with tentative 2029 activation of an integrated battle management capability with IAMD.
Hill confirmed this implies by FY ‘27 the Army plans to integrate LTAMDS, IFPC, ALPS, Sentinel A3, Sentinel A4 an RIG-360 into IBCS to be used on Guam.
Last 12 months the Missile Defense Agency announced the Guam air and missile defense architecture Guam will likely be based around mobile versions of the Aegis Combat System, RTX [RTX] Standard Missile (SM)-3 and SM-6 missiles, IBCS, LTAMDS and Sentinel radars while also maintaining the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system battery already deployed on Guam (Defense Every day, March 29, 2022).
The primary set of Guam systems is scheduled to reach in 2024, including recent AN/TPY-6 radars using the identical technology because the Long Range Discrimination Radar at Clear Space Force Base, Alaska.
Until the Army receives the primary full IBCS unit in late 2024, the Northrop Grumman is making software and hardware changes to the LRIP IBCS version. IBCS and the unit will undergo developmental testing, recent equipment fielding, recent equipment testing, collective training and ending with an operational test event.
“So fourth quarter ‘24 is just not far-off,” Hill said.
While the operational test event will occur at the tip of the 2024 calendar 12 months, the 343rd Field Artillery Battalion is taken into account trained and fielded after ending the collective training, he said.
Hill also said yearly the Army may have a qualifying event that permits them to get IBCS and these systems on the range, and that only comes after they’ve conducted tests of developmental testing.
“So we’ve it IFTC ‘24, ‘25, ‘26 after which defense of Guam.”
He confirmed that this 12 months’s IFTC, for FY 2023, is testing IBCS and LTADMS before it moves on to IFPC launchers in 2024.
Ultimately, by fiscal 12 months 2027, “LTAMDS should come on board. And from an integrated fire standpoint, that’s after I would consider a battalion fully modernized. Once we’ve IBCS and LTAMDS integrated into that formation,” Hill said.