By Jen DiMascio

The Senate last week passed the defense authorization bill for 2008, which recommends nearly a billion dollar reduction in the Army’s plans to buy tactical radios.

The administration sought $2.9 billion for tactical radios–the bulk of which was included in the president’s supplemental war funding request. The bill provides only $1.4 billion and includes language questioning the Army’s near-term plans to spend $2.3 billion on single channel ground and airborne radios.

“While the conferees are supportive of the overall effort to improve Army communications and properly equip near-term deploying units, the conferees believe that the Army’s long-term tactical modernization plan lacks sufficient analysis of future Army communications needs, is not synchronized with other Army and Department of Defense programs, and does not account for future Army modernization funding projections,” the conference report said.

The report references an Army Science Board study that recommended the Army stop buying SINCGARS because of “limited production capacity.” It also called the service’s plan to purchase SINCGARS into question because of concerns about future encryption standards and a Marine Corps decision to stop buying SINGCARS.

Moreover, the conferees said, the Army’s plans do not align with the Defense Department’s larger plan to buy the Joint Tactical Radio System.

“The conferees are concerned that the acquisition of thousands more SINCGARS radios will seriously undermine the Army’s investment in the JTRS program,” the report said.

Lawmakers added that the Army should work with the assistant secretary of defense for networks and information integration to “reexamine” the Army’s plan for future tactical radios.

In the meantime, the report recommends the service buy only the minimum amount of SINCGARS and buy a limited amount of tactical radios that comply with Software Communications Architecture standards (SINGCARS radios do not).

“The conferees encourage the Army to avoid new or extended, long-term sole-source tactical radio procurement contracts that may limit the Army’s options in the future,” the report said.

ITT [ITT] has long had a lock on making the Army’s SINCGARS radios. The Army in May conducted a market survey to see whether other companies could fulfill its tactical radio requirements and afterward opted to continue sole-sourcing the radio to ITT.

But other companies, such as Harris [HRS] and Thales have products that could work on Army vehicles, Dennis Bauman, the program executive officer for the JTRS program, said last week. The Harris Falcon III and the Thales JEM radios could work, he said.

“They both come with a vehicle adapter that allows you to put two single channel handhelds into a vehicle adapter and have a two-channel SINCGARS capability. So we have that capability in JTRS today,” Bauman said.

Another official with the JTRS program said the Harris and Thales radios have an advantage in that they can plug into Army vehicles and be removed, rather than be bolted down.

Asked if the Army might shift its plans to buy SINCGARS radios, Bauman said, “We believe that the future of DoD communications is software defined radios on the JTRS model. We have SINCGARS out there today. We just saved the Army a $100 million buying SINCGARS capability. I don’t think the Army will continue very long buying legacy SINCGARS radios, unless they have a particular need for a particular configuration of SINC radios” (Defense Daily, Dec. 14).

Bauman’s deputy, Howard Pace, added a rhetorical question: “Do you want to buy a legacy radio that has no legs to the future?”

But the Army will have a continued need for existing SINCGARS radios, according to Larry Williams, technical director for business development at the company.

While “SINCGARS-like” radios have several waveforms, they do not have the complete package that would allow them to function across the full spectrum of operations, Williams said. They also lack the interfaces and protocols to link with other Army data and command and control systems. In addition, no other radio has the same ability to deter interference from nearby radios, he added.

The Army has steadfastly defended its decision to continue buying SINCGARS, saying that its May market survey, which showed that no other products, could “meet the full requirements of the SINCGARS ORD and specifications and therefore SINCGARS remains the radio of choice to meet these fielding requirements.”

The service is reviewing its future radio requirements (Defense Daily, Oct. 9).