Future soldier
Major air forces are investing heavily in crewed-uncrewed teaming.
actionable insight today: “The data is gone, you have lost 30 years of insight,” said Campion. This is ironic considering the MoD has, since 2020–21, identified data as a “strategic asset”. Since then, though, the Integrated Review Refresh, published in May 2023, also touched on the possibility supporting data-sharing infrastructure and removing barriers to global data access and use. Should the new Labour government favour this policy in the Strategic Defence Review in the spring of 2025, it could help the UK interoperate with allies through initiatives such as the NFTE, or perhaps AUKUS pillar two.
Replicating sixth-generation air combat Looking forward, it will be difficult to simulate contemporary advancements in aerial warfare with the rise of sixth-generation air combat. Right now, it is still uncertain as to what this will look like; it is still largely undefined. In general, however, major air forces are investing heavily – perhaps too heavily in some cases, such as the UK’s Global Combat Air Programme – in crewed-uncrewed teaming. At the heart of the future network, a sixth- generation crewed fighter jet will operate alongside autonomous, uncrewed aerial vehicles (UAVs) that offer attritable mass at the tactical level. When asked how users will replicate the concept on the simulator, Dr Al Allsop, Combat Air and Synthetics SME at British defence training supplier Inzpire, stated “we do not know yet”. The crewed-uncrewed challenge may be addressed “with the [crewed] pilots [and] UAV teams conducting their training initially in the simulator. Then, once they move to live flight, the
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UAVs remain in the simulator with their positions, decisions and output of effects relayed to the live pilots by means of the [live, virtual and constructive] network,” Allsop said. This intricate process demonstrates the type of emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI), that the military have yet to truly grasp and implement fully. The complexity of crewed-uncrewed teaming will put more pressure on simulators, and replicating various autonomous systems will require a lot of computing power. “If we assume the UAVs will have advanced AI in them rather than just being used as a relay for sensors sent into dangerous environments, then the answer is yes,” said Allsop, regarding the potential increase in power requirements for simulators. “Simplistic decision algorithms (think logic gates) could be housed within the same programme, more probabilistic based or ‘trained’ AI would likely require separate instances for each UAV represented. Each of those requiring its own representation of the input of its sensors,” Allsop detailed. While this force multiplier model will be difficult to replicate, it is not beyond possibility. MBDA UK, one of Europe’s complex weapons specialists, opened its fully operable Digital Battlespace Facility last year.
The site, in Stevenage, leverages digital twin technology to allow users to design, troubleshoot and enhance a mix of different weapon systems together in the company’s portfolio with different platforms in a virtual, risk-free environment. The future weapon systems sector will require a digital backbone to showcase the interoperability and interactions of different systems. ●
Defence & Security Systems International /
www.defence-and-security.com
Kubeer/
Shutterstock.com
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