FEATURE ARTICLE

November 2006

Progress at Warfighting Lab Measured in Ounces

By Stew Magnuson

QUANTICO MARINE BASE, Va. — Brig. Gen. Randolf Alles wants everyone to know that developing meals-ready-to-eat for dogs is serious business at the Marine Corps warfighting laboratory.

“Handlers have to carry dry dog food. It’s heavy, and they have to carry water beyond that.”

The commanding general of the lab said reducing the weight Marines must bear in the field is one of their primary goals. While “doggie MREs” may elicit some grins, researchers are looking for any advantage in their effort to shave ounces off a leatherneck’s weight load.

“It’s a small effort,” he told National Defense. “But in this particular challenge, you’re not going to find any one item that’s going to instantly make him 30 pounds lighter.”

The warfighting lab’s budget is about $30 million per year. It is a “little fish” in the defense science and technology world compared to giants such as the Office of Naval Research and Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, he said. Many projects designed to benefit the Corps are carried out at ONR, so Alles wears a second hat as vice chief of naval research. Marine Corps research and development is also spread out at offices such as the joint improvised explosive device defeat organization and the joint program executive office for chemical and biological defense.

Most of the lab’s unique programs concentrate on improving the lives of Marines on foot.

“I would hope that 10 years from now I am able to lighten their load by 50 percent. I want them to be networked better, with more robust communications,” Alles said of the lab’s long-term vision. He would also like to see Marines able to call in close air support or artillery at the squad level, which would require secure networks.

The service’s challenge during the next decade, and beyond, will be equipping and training its forces to fight the so-called “hybrid wars,” Alles said. Such wars will be similar to the recent Israel-Lebanon conflict where irregular forces used both conventional and unconventional weapons and tactics to gain an advantage over a more powerful adversary.

In a hybrid war, opponents may use IEDs or makeshift weapons of mass destruction. “Maybe they don’t have a full-blown high order nuclear weapon, but they have dirty weapons or chemical or biological contaminants,” Alles said.

For example, Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon used tactics similar to insurgents in Iraq, while also successfully launching a sophisticated anti-ship cruise missile at an Israeli corvette.

Marines may be called upon to switch roles from counter-insurgency, where they may be “goodwill ambassadors,” to fighting a high-end war. “The problem we have to struggle with is how we train for this kind of full spectrum of warfare …. Simulation will get at part of that.” The training and education command at Quantico will be responsible for developing new programs to take on this challenge, he said. “That’s an area we need to put more effort into,” he added.

Equipping soldiers for hybrid wars will be a challenge. They will need better sensors, training and protective gear to ward off improvised WMD threats, such as common industrial chemicals that can be employed as rudimentary weapons.

Alles said he is mostly satisfied with the weight of the present-day chem-bio suits, but there are still issues with overheating.

At the recent Modern Day Marine exposition here, Marine and Navy researchers displayed several efforts to make life for troops in the field easier and safer. Protection against roadside bombs and mines was among the technologies featured.

Donald Sapp, an engineering advisor at Arlington, Va.-based Alion Science and Technology, displayed body armor designed to cover limbs while soldiers ride in vehicles.

“The problem they’re having now is that everyone is losing arms and legs,” he said.

The Navy Research Laboratory is working the problem with scientists from Oklahoma State University. The project is still in the early stages, but some sets of the body armor, which covers the legs and arms, has been sent to Iraq for field comments. At this point, the additional armor “is still a little heavy for walking around in,” Sapp said.

The Marines are also considering a modular Army prototype helmet that is built in two sections. It is lighter than one-piece helmets and reduces the heat trapped inside by 30 percent, Sapp said. Researchers are looking at ways to suspend the helmet on the head that will disperse the energy from impacts, he added.

Jeffrey Bradel, manager for USMC maneuver science and technology at the Office of Naval Research, is working on a seat for the internally transportable vehicle (ITV) that is intended to reduce injuries. The ITV, which fits inside a V-22 Osprey, has no armoring, so the lab is searching for other ways to protect those inside.

“What can we do to mitigate the shock and vibration of blast effects?” Bradel asked. “In a blast event, you want to keep the head and spine in line, because we have a lot of spinal injuries and snapped necks.”

High-tech protective seats used by aircraft pilots are an imperfect fit for trucks because they are expensive and take up too much space, he said. While the prototype seats under development have Kevlar to protect drivers and passengers from shrapnel, their primary benefit is keeping the body in place to prevent spinal injuries. They do this by collapsing and absorbing energy. The lab has constructed about 60 seats, and they are undergoing operational testing.

The advanced mine detector, being developed for ONR by GE Security, of San Diego, Calif., is also nearing the end of its development phase. It searches for radio waves to detect chemicals present in hard to find plastic mines, said D. Loganathan, a GE research scientist.

Almost all explosives contain nitrogen, which is marked by different electronic structures surrounding the molecules. The electronic structure emits unique radio frequencies that give off a signature. The advanced mine detector picks up the frequencies while software mounted in a backpack identifies the type of explosive. After five years of development, researchers have reduced the system’s weight to 23 pounds, he said. The goal will be to incorporate the technology into present day mine sensors, which use metal detection and ground penetrating radar.

“This reduces the false alarms to almost nothing,” Loganathan said.

Other than to say that there remains an acute need for technology that can detect makeshift bombs, Alles said the laboratory can’t comment on the Pentagon’s counter-IED program. Increasingly, the lab’s traditional mine detection programs are being lumped together with counter-IED efforts, he added.

Many roadside bombs are simply mines with a remote trigger attached to a blasting cap, he noted.

Detecting them from a safe distance is “an important issue for us and one that we have not cracked yet. If I can find them, obviously then that would be half the battle …. Right now, the best form of finding them is a Marine’s eyeballs,” he added.

Alles said other programs on the Marines’ horizon include the ongoing joint effort with the Army to replace the humvee. Protection will be key for the service since the current models were never designed to take on the extra weight of the armor, Alles said.

Meanwhile, deployment to Iraq of the lab’s hybrid electric reconnaissance, surveillance, targeting vehicle (RST-V) has been delayed due to reliability issues. The Marines are still interested in the vehicles powered by such systems, Alles said, but he had doubts that the technology would be incorporated into the humvee replacement program.

In aviation, the service is looking for solutions for the problem of landing aircraft in “brownouts.” High winds can kick up dust and sand in Iraq, creating hazardous conditions. The Marines are looking at lasers to help pilots fix their positions and give them readings on altitude and drifting.

“We lose about one aircraft per year to brownouts,” he said.

Please email your comments to SMagnuson@ndia.org

Back To Top