Sunday 9 September 2007

Bold Quest 07 begins to test Coalition Combat ID

News From USJFCOM
This is the latest in a series of fratricide prevention exercises conducted by various western nations. opswarfare's view is that the equipment should be deployed in actual operations as soon as possible.

opswarfare first wrote on the issue of fratricide prevention in 2005, and has been following the issue as it passed another milestone in 2006.

So what's next?

Well, for a start, the scenarios where most fratricide incidents have occurred should be first to try out the equipment in actual combat. The first scenario that comes to mind naturally are air-strikes, especially close air support missions that are "on call".

For this phase, equipment can be mounted on vehicles (tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, trucks, etc.) which are currently in theatre (e.g. Iraq or Afghanistan). The typical scenario could involve a unit, pinned down by enemy fire, calling for a quick air-strike from a loitering aircraft in the vicinity. The aircraft will take one additional step before releasing ordance on the target, namely "painting" the target with the emitter (most likely using encrypted millimetre-wave radio waves) to confirm that the target is not "friendly".

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