The Army’s Advanced Field Artillery Tactical Data System 7.0, a joint and coalition command control system for fires support, faces a “need for immediate modernization” and currently relies on an architecture that is falling short as the Defense Department adopts its Joint All-Domain Command and Control and digital Sensor-to-Shooter frameworks, according to a recent contracting document.
A Defense Information Systems Agency document posted on beta.SAM.gov Feb. 11 explaining why an award for an AFATDS 7.0 contract action was not made through a full and open competition—and instead awarded to incumbent Leidos—indicates the current contract structure does not allow for backward compatibility with the legacy AFATDS system. Without an adjustment to the AFATDS 7.0 strategy to ensure the legacy program can interface with the new program, the end result would be an “untenable product.”
“Specifically, the regional fielding approach would create two, incompatible baselines for large portions of the force, as well as disrupting communications continuity, which would inherently decrease lethality on the battlefield,” the document reads. “In order to deliver these critical capabilities to the force, a shift from the current contract strategy (a total rewrite of code, or block development strategy) to a code conversion effort, reliant upon the legacy baseline, is necessary.”
The legacy AFATDS iteration already has a digital S2S framework, according to the document, but the new system would not be able to operate within the communications parameters of this existing capability without the change to AFATDS 7.0. Disrupted communications would undermine DOD’s JADC2 vision.< ..
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