Wet tees on sat links: Army’s desert trial reveals commercial tech challenges, opportunities

U.S. Air Force airment stand for a photo with the Starlink system, which is comprised of a constellation of low-Earth orbit satellites providing troops with high-speed internet capabilities in one of the most remote areas of northern Ghana for exercise African Lion 2024 (AL24) at Tamale Air Force Base, Ghana, May 15, 2024. (U.S. Army Reserve photo by Sgt. Caitlinn Belcher)

WASHINGTON — In the sweltering 100-plus degree Mojave Desert heat, some of the Army’s Starlink ground terminals were overheating, reducing the throughput soldiers needed to pass and receive data. With no contractor support in the field, soldiers were left to troubleshoot solutions themselves.

Their straightforward fix: soaking T-shirts with water and draping them on the terminals’ antennas to cool them down.

“We did have a couple cases where things were overheating … but we see when you have commercial-first [tech], it’s not necessarily purely ruggedized, we see that we have some shortcomings in some of the technology’s ability just to handle the heat,” Maj. Gen. Patrick Ellis, commander of 4th Infantry Division (4ID), told reporters in July. “But we also found there’s some pretty basic ways for us to accommodate for the heat. Some soldiers figured out that by soaking a T-shirt in ice water, you can put on top of some of the antennas and cool them off enough for them to function. We may not always need to buy [a] hardened, boutique capability.”

The overheating Starlink incidents happened back in July, during the Army’s high-profile tech experimentation event called Project Convergence Capstone 6 at Fort Irwin. At the time, the 4ID was testing the bounds of the service’s Next Generation Command and Control hardware and software in harsh, more real-world conditions.

It was a significant test for the Army’s latest acquisition strategy, which focuses on using commercially available equipment first, which can be fielded much faster than bespoke, exquisite systems built for the military. For NGC2 it means using Starlink, 5G- and WiFi-enabled systems, among others. (SpaceX, which developed and maintains Starlink, did not respond to a request for comment for this report.)

The primary prototyping period for NGC2 concluded with Project Convergence, informing how the Army’s baseline of capabilities for the architecture. The service will be weighing just how much to mix commercial options with ruggedized or bespoke ones for both hardware and software. Ruggedized and bespoke equipment is typically more expensive and takes longer to develop but generally can withstand harsher conditions or has specific, military-centric capabilities. Commercial, on the other hand, is usually less expensive but doesn’t always stand up to austere conditions.

Going into Project Convergence, Army officials “knew the known limitations from some of that” commercial tech, Brig. Gen. Shane Taylor, capability program executive for Command and Control Information Network, told Breaking Defense.

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But even then he said that a big lesson from PCC6, was that soldiers used tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) on the battlefield to mitigate unforeseen problems, like using the wet T-shirts to cool the terminals.

“Before we go spend quadruple the cost of that equipment, are there some things that we can do?” Taylor said, adding that in the past, if systems didn’t work exactly, the thinking was to reengineer or design the whole system, or, in his words, “Army-ize” the capability.

Joseph Welch, portfolio acquisition executive for command and control and counter-command and control, told Breaking Defense at the TechNet conference in Augusta, Ga., that he agreed. “Anytime a TTP can be utilized and taught and understood in a very straightforward manner, and it’s not detracting from mission effectiveness, I mean that’s something I think that’s obviously appealing compared to over-ruggedized or telling vendors to make more rugged equipment,” he said.

The feedback also has spurred discussion on what types of cooling technology, for example, the Army can add to vehicles to help mitigate issues.

“The good thing is the commercial market’s continuing to move forward as well. So there’ll be more solutions that the Army will be able to take advantage of when you look out several years,” Welch said regarding SATCOM and resiliency and cost.

“When we took a look back at what it was costing the Army to outfit divisions with legacy C2 capability compared to as our notion of a baseline is, we’re under review now coming out of PCC6, but we’re anywhere from 50 percent less expensive to another, I don’t know, 25 percent on top of that depending on the selections that we make,” he added. “We already know that the commercial first is going to significantly lower our costs and allow us to go faster.”

2024年5月15日，在加纳塔马利空军基地举行的“非洲雄狮2024”（AL24）演习期间，美国空军士兵与星链系统合影。星链系统由低地球轨道卫星星座组成，为加纳北部最偏远地区的部队提供高速互联网接入。（美国陆军预备役中士凯特琳·贝尔彻摄）

华盛顿——在莫哈韦沙漠超过100华氏度（约38摄氏度）的酷热天气下，陆军的一些星链地面终端出现过热现象，导致士兵收发数据所需的吞吐量下降。由于现场没有承包商提供支持，士兵们只能自行排查故障。

他们采取的简单办法是：将 T 恤衫浸湿，然后披在终端天线上降温。

“我们确实遇到过几起设备过热的情况……但我们发现，当采用商用技术时，它未必是完全坚固耐用的，某些技术在散热方面存在一些缺陷，”第四步兵师（4ID）师长帕特里克·埃利斯少将在7月份告诉记者。“但我们也发现有一些非常基本的散热方法。一些士兵发现，将T恤浸入冰水中，然后盖在天线上，就能有效降低天线温度，使其正常工作。我们可能并不总是需要购买专门的加固型设备。”

星链过热事件发生在7月份，当时正值陆军在欧文堡举行名为“融合顶点计划6”的高规格技术试验活动。当时，第4步兵师正在严苛且更接近实战的环境下测试陆军下一代指挥控制硬件和软件的性能极限。

这对陆军最新的采购战略来说是一次重大考验。该战略的重点是优先使用商用设备，因为商用设备的部署速度远快于为军方量身定制的精密系统。对于NGC2卫星而言，这意味着要使用星链、5G和WiFi等系统。（开发和维护星链的SpaceX公司未对此报道置评。）

NGC2 的主要原型开发阶段以“融合项目”（Project Convergence）告终，该项目为陆军确定该架构的基本能力奠定了基础。陆军将权衡如何将商用产品与加固型或定制型硬件和软件相结合。加固型和定制型设备通常价格更高，开发周期更长，但通常能够承受更严苛的环境或具备特定的军事功能。另一方面，商用产品通常价格更低，但未必总能经受住严苛环境的考验。

陆军指挥与控制信息网络能力项目主管谢恩·泰勒准将告诉《防务新闻》，在启动“融合项目”之前，陆军官员“知道其中一些商业技术的已知局限性”。

生物防御就是部队防护：今日做好准备，明日应对。

一位功勋卓著的战斗机飞行员兼生物技术公司首席执行官倡导在下一次危机到来之前，为应对新型病毒威胁做好准备。

但即便如此，他表示，PCC6 的一个重要教训是，士兵们在战场上使用战术、技术和程序 (TTP) 来减轻无法预料的问题，例如用湿 T 恤来冷却终端。

“在我们花费四倍的价格购买这套设备之前，我们还能做些什么呢？”泰勒说道，并补充说，过去，如果系统运行不正常，人们的想法是重新设计或改造整个系统，或者用他的话说，就是“陆军化”这项能力。

负责指挥控制和反指挥控制的投资组合采购主管约瑟夫·韦尔奇在佐治亚州奥古斯塔举行的TechNet会议上告诉《防务新闻》，他对此表示赞同。“任何时候，如果一种战术、技术和程序（TTP）能够以非常简单明了的方式使用、教授和理解，并且不会降低任务效能，我认为这显然比过度加固或要求供应商制造更坚固的设备更有吸引力，”他说。

这些反馈也引发了关于陆军可以在车辆上添加哪些类型的冷却技术来帮助缓解问题的讨论。

“好消息是，商业市场也在不断发展。因此，展望未来几年，陆军将能够利用更多解决方案，”韦尔奇在谈到卫星通信、弹性和成本时说道。

他补充道：“我们回顾了陆军为师级单位配备传统指挥控制能力的成本，并将其与我们目前设定的基准成本进行了比较。根据我们最终的选择，我们目前的成本比传统方案降低了50%，甚至可能在此基础上再降低25%。” “我们已经知道，优先采用商用技术将显著降低成本，并使我们能够更快地推进项目。”