About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline

1 1 (September 27, 2021)

handle is hein.crs/govehix0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Congressional Research Servkc
Inforrming the legislative debate since 1914
The Army's Project Convergenc(
What Is the Army's Project
Convergence?
Project Convergence is what the Army calls a campaign of
learning, designed to further integrate the Army into the
Joint Force. It is how the Army intends to play a role in
Joint All Domain Command and Control (JADC2), the
Department of Defense's (DOD's) plan to connect sensors
and weapon systems from all the military services-Air
Force, Army, Marine Corps, Navy, and Space Force-as
well as Special Operations Forces (SOF), into a single
network which, theoretically, could prove faster and more
effective in responding to threats from peer competitors.
Designed around five core elements-soldiers, weapons
systems, command and control, information, and terrain-
Army Futures Command (AFC) plans to run Project
Convergence on an annual basis. The Army intends to
conduct experiments with technology, equipment, and
solicit soldier feedback throughout the year, culminating in
an annual exercise or demonstration. In basic terms, the
Army reportedly wants to take the service's big ideas for
future warfare and test them in the real world. The Army
wants to figure out what works and what needs fixing-and
figure that out as early as possible, when it's much cheaper
to make changes.
Project Convergence 2020 (PC20)
PC20 took place at Yuma Proving Ground, Arizona
between August 1 1th and September 1s 2020 and involved
about 500 personnel. PC20 was intended to provide
information to support decisions to
 Change how the Army fights by shaping how it
organizes for combat;
 Highlight opportunities to optimize operational
processes;
 Evolve how the Army visualizes, describes, decides, and
acts on enemy threats; and
 Build soldier and leader trust in emergent technologies.
PC20 concentrated on what the Army calls the close fight
by integrating new enabling technologies at the lowest
operational level so tactical networks could facilitate faster
decisions. At the unit level, PC20 focused on Brigade
Combat Teams (BCT), Combat Aviation Brigades (CAB),
and Expeditionary Signal Battalion-Enhanced (ESB-E). At
the system level, PC20 involved the Army's MQ 1C Grey
Eagle unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), the Air Launched
Effects (ALE)-a multi-purpose helicopter- launched
system-and the tactical network-command, control,
communications, intelligence, and computer systems used
by the Army in combat.

Updated September 27, 2021

Figure I. Representative Exercise Operational
Scenario

I

Phae I Pentn

Source: From Army Briefing provided to CRS dated September 10,
2020.
One of PC20's experiments reportedly included using low-
earth orbit satellites and Grey Eagle UAVs to perform
sensing for air targets and a ground system to detect a
target. Data from the two systems was passed back to an
organization at Joint Base Lewis McChord, Washington,
where the target was processed.
The data was then passed back to Yuma Proving Ground to
a system to engage the target-either a self-propelled
artillery system such as the Extended Range Cannon
Artillery (ERCA) system currently under development, a
Grey Eagle, or another ground platform. This entire
sequence was supposedly accomplished within 20 seconds.
The Army's Plans for Project
Convergence 2021 and 2022 (PC2 I and
At present, the Army has made planning information
publicly available only for 2021 and 2022.
Project Convergence 2021(PC21 )
While other supporting exercises and experiments have
been conducted throughout this year, PC21's main series of
live-fire events reportedly will take place October. 12th _
November 10th at a number of installations located in the
United States. PC 21 plans to involve approximately 7,000
personnel including 900 data collectors, and will include
experiments involving about 107 different technologies.
Some of the Army's objectives during PC21 reportedly
include identifying technologies to enable the Joint Force to
penetrate enemy's anti-access, aerial-denial (A2/AD)
capabilities as well as determining which emerging
technologies are needed to execute the Joint All-Domain
Operations concept. The Army is also reportedly looking
for ways to incorporate artificial intelligence (Al), machine
learning, autonomy, robotics, and common data standards
and architectures to more quickly make decisions across
multiple domains of operations.

ttps://crsr

I

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Contact us for annual subscription options:

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

profiles profiles most