Soldiers of the U.S. Army’s 25th Infantry Division spent two weeks testing new command-and-control software in field conditions in Hawaii. The Nakoa Fleek exercise, which concluded on September 25, was the fifth round of the Lightning Surge experiments focused on deploying the Next Generation Command and Control (NGC2) system.
NGC2 is intended to provide commanders with a single digital picture of the battlefield that is continuously updated through data sharing between units. During Nakoa Fleek, soldiers tested new radios, sensors and command posts directly in field conditions.
The exercise ran from September 14 to 25 at Schofield Barracks. The first phase focused on connecting new systems, the second on defensive combat and maneuvering against an opposing force, and the third on analyzing the results. On September 23, soldiers from the 1st Battalion, 27th Infantry Regiment, and 1st Battalion, 35th Infantry Regiment, conducted an air assault to test coordination during a complex operation, according to DVIDS.
The soldiers also tested whether a shared battlefield picture could be transmitted from cloud servers to small units even in the event of a loss of connectivity. According to Maj. Rebecca Borrebach, the 25th Division’s lead data engineer, the goal is to get the right data to the right commander at the right time.
One of the main lessons from the exercise was the importance of system usability. According to Maj. Jay Trexler, the division’s innovation officer, if a soldier cannot quickly figure out how to use a system under pressure, it is not an effective combat tool.
The 25th Infantry Division is one of two U.S. Army divisions prototyping NGC2. The 4th Infantry Division at Fort Carson is conducting parallel tests as part of the Ivy Sting series.
The next step for the 25th Division will be Lightning Surge 6 during the Joint Pacific Multinational Readiness Center 27-01 training rotation. Units from the 3rd Mobile Brigade will join the exercise to test improved decision-support tools and more autonomous networks.
