Preserving capacity, General Tom Lawson, Chief of the Defence Staff, Keys to Canadian SAR
Issue link: http://vanguardcanada.uberflip.com/i/337874
D DIGITAL ARMY 30 JUNE/JULY 2014 www.vanguardcanada.com get marker, a laser designator and a ther- mal, all in one box, that is within a similar weight to that one ranger finder." And where once only a few of those boxes could talk to one another, Vaughan envisions a true networked system of sys- tems. "I know that is a word that people throw around a lot, but it truly is here. In Afghanistan you had your laser range finder and your DAGR and that was a sys- tem of systems, that was your dismounted fire solution system. Today we can incor- porate all of those additional accessories – range finders, markers, designators – into an overall fire solution and you can just plug and play. It gives you more flexibil- ity in how you conduct fires. If you want a precise mission, you've got some tools that will add precision. If you want to mass your firepower for effects, you have a dif- ferent tool for that. It gives the ground commander more flexibility to complete his mission." Combine that with the Canadian Army's Digital Precision Strike Suite (DPSS), software that features applications known as the Precision Strike Software Special Operations Force (PSS-SOF) toolkit and the DPSS Collateral Damage Estimator (DiCDE), and an operator can generate an accurate grid to within centimetres from the target, while minimizing any potential fratricide. In most case, DPSS is able to overcome the inherent inaccuracies of GPS and the orientation of the digital magnetic com- pass in a laser range finder by allowing an operator through the use of a tablet-like display to drag the generated target loca- tion directly over the actual intended tar- get. Rather than calling for a centre mass strike on a building, for example, a con- troller can now bring down precision ord- nance directly on top of a specific room to remove a sniper. In addition, current Digital Close Air Support software suites allow a controller to see not only which aircraft are available but also exactly what weapons each car- ries – he can even tap the screen to select the appropriate weapon. "You are drag- ging and dropping," Vaughan explained. "It takes that guess factor out. We have a very accurate grid, if we have a plane that shows up with a whole bunch of differ- ent missiles and bombs – 2000 pounders, 1000 pounders, 500 pounders, 75 pound Hellfire, small diameter 250 pound bombs – we can now use the right munition with the minimum amount of force necessary to remove a threat." The DiCDE software provides the added assurance of a "frag envelop" showing the likely impact of the ordnance selected. Vaughan says that exchange of data with pilots will go a long way to minimizing the inevitable language barriers of coalition op- erations – even if the language is English. "The first pilot I spoke to in Afghanistan was a Scottish pilot. I had to get him to start enunciating his words," he said. "The NATO standard for Forward Air Control- lers is English, but you have Italian, Ger- man, French, Dutch pilots, and lessons learned have shown us that machine-to- machine interface gets that key information directly to the pilot and all we have to do is get him to read back those 10 numbers and a couple of key pieces of information to make sure he understands where the target is in relation to the friendlies." While that software will help refine a grid, it is not without its limitations. Even Lessons learned have shown us that machine- to-machine interface gets that key information directly to the pilot and all we have to do is get him to read back those 10 numbers and a couple of key pieces of information to make sure he understands where the target is in relation to the friendlies.