Northrop Grumman [NOC] has delivered the first battery engagement operations center for the Integrated Air and Missile Defense (IAMD) Battle Command System (IBCS) to the U.S. Army. The milestone was celebrated during a ceremony on Aug. 11 at the company’s Madison facility on Wall Triana Highway.
“This initial system will be used as a test bed to support the IBCS critical design review and the IBCS software development and coding,” said Army Maj. Gen. Genaro “Gino” J. Dellarocco, Program Executive Officer, Missiles and Space, Redstone Arsenal, Ala Dellarocco. “This prototype will allow the warfighter to interact early and influence the design to ensure we provide them this critical capability.”
When fully developed, the IBCS battery engagement operations center will enable an Army air defense battery to establish common battle command of air defense assets that are fully integrated with other Army and joint IAMD systems. The initial system consists of common hardware and software housed in a rigid wall shelter and mounted on a five-ton M1085 Medium Tactical Vehicle, a part of the Family of Medium Tactical Vehicles.
“We are nine months into this phase of the program and now have an IBCS engagement operations center, which is incredible,” said Dellarocco. “We have had several Army, Navy, Air Force, Missile Defense Agency and OSD (Office of the Secretary of Defense) leaders visit the Northrop Grumman IBCS development and integration laboratory. They will now be able to see and touch the actual IBCS system.”
“We leveraged the proven design from our Command Post Platform program to accelerate the first system delivery to the Army,” said Karen Williams, vice president of Air and Missile Defense Systems for Northrop Grumman’s Information Systems sector.
“Northrop Grumman reaffirms our commitment to provide our warfighters the absolute best solutions our company and many others have to achieve the warfighter’s desire in closing the significant capability gap in air defense battle command,” Williams added. “With our combined efforts, we are proud to be part of a government/industry team to provide our warfighters the tools to deliver the right information — at the right time and to the right place — in order to save lives during crucial, often very short, decision timelines.”
In December 2009, the Northrop Grumman team was awarded a $577 million, five-year contract for the development of a common battle command system for Army integrated air and missile defense. The IBCS program will provide the Army with its first truly open-architecture and mission-tailorable battle command system for air and missile defense units. The system will also utilize an integrated fire control network based on a track management solution that provides vastly improved decision-making aids. This will enable IBCS to supply warfighters with the data to make time-sensitive tactical decisions under the most demanding conditions and significantly enhance joint IAMD operations.
Systems that will be integrated via IBCS include Patriot, Surface-Launched Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile (SLAMRAAM), Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor (JLENS), Improved Sentinel radar, and — if the U.S. Department of Defense directs the inclusion — Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) and Medium Extended Air Defense System (MEADS).