“The Hunter configuration of the ATV has the capability of detecting and tracking targets such as small, unmanned aircraft.”
(Fort Sill, OK) In early April, soldiers tested the latest mobile fires system at the annual Maneuver Fires Integrated Experiment (MFIX). Two new platforms, nicknamed “Hunter” and “Killer,” were put through a series of evaluations to determine their effectiveness and possible future application. Both of the new “multi-domain platforms” are designed to provide mobile fires support solutions that empower soldiers to engage and defeat multiple threats simultaneously.
These vehicles resemble a dune buggy style All-Terrain Vehicle (ATV), as they are intended for use over a wide range of terrain. Unlike standard ATVs previously used in combat by Special Operations Forces (SOF), the Hunter and Killer are outfitted with technology that allows them to track aircraft and perform three-dimensional fires targeting.
Both variants are built on the same Polaris MRZR model, which enables the Hunter and Killer platforms to be transported via helicopters like the CH-47, or inserted via parachute onto the battlefield. This enables light infantry, airborne soldiers, and SOF soldiers to have counter-drone capabilities previously only available in mechanized or motorized units.
At the previous MFIX in 2016, a weapons platform called the High Energy Laser Mobile Test Truck (HELMTT) was tested. The U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command and the Army Forces Strategic Command demonstrated the vehicle’s ability to employ the Army’s directed energy technology to acquire, track, engage, and destroy targets in the air, as well as on the ground.
One of the unique features of MFIX is the ability to conduct these demonstrations in a simulated tactical environment, instead of in a laboratory. This allows actual soldiers to be involved in the integration and employment of new, conceptual technology. The application allows command level units to see how weapons, such as a laser based platform, could be operated in a combat environment. HELMTT laid the groundwork for this year’s MFIX by demonstrating it is possible to use concentrated light to destroy the emerging threat of enemy drones on the battlefield.
The Hunter configuration of the ATV has the capability of detecting and tracking targets such as small, unmanned aircraft. This can be combined with the Killer variant, which has the capability to attack the aircraft via unspecified cyber methods that can jam and/or disrupt their operation, ultimately leading the drone to crash. However, possible combat applications do not stop at the counter-drone capability.
Both configurations are also outfitted with surveillance and targeting equipment that could enable the vehicles to be employed at a reconnaissance and forward observer level. The same processing power available on the Hunter and Killer vehicles that enable operators to locate and target drones and their base stations could be employed to relay targeting information to an artillery unit or an aerial weapons team.
In theory, the information could be relayed to direct naval gunfire with pinpoint accuracy from miles away. At MFIX, the designers of the platforms experimented with the automation of software that would enable soldiers to multitask, allowing them greater flexibility in their operational workload.
The truly revolutionary combat application may very well be located in the cyber warfare capability that the Killer platform is rumored to have. Without revealing specific capabilities, the Army said that this platform could potentially empower soldiers in future conflicts to conduct a call for fire that employs a cyber attack instead of 155mm artillery rounds.
Given the ever-growing reliance of the modern military on computer technology, there is a very real possibility that the next arms race will involve cyber warfare capabilities. We may have already seen this application being applied to sabotage the test launch of a North Korean ballistic missile on the 15th of April this year.
As the threat environment continues to change, technology advances and our adversaries evolve. In order to ensure America maintains superiority on the potential battlefields of the future, exercises such as MFIX enable science fiction to become reality.
