Friend or foe? FBCB2 enhances battle planning, reduces 'friendly fire'

GPS World, Feb, 2005 by Marty Whitford

There's nothing friendly about it. So-called "friendly fire" has caused the wounding or death of roughly 250,000 American soldiers in 20th-century conflicts alone. Lt. Gen. Lesley McNair, the commander of U.S. Army ground forces in World War II, was inadvertently killed by his own troops at Normandy. In that same war, U.S. soldiers in Italy accidentally shot down 23 American transport aircraft, killing more than 400 GIs. Fratricide has equally bedeviled troops in wars in Korea, Vietnam, and the Persian Gulf.

More recently, Pat Tillman, a long-haired, fierce-hitting defensive back with the Arizona Cardinals turned down a $3.6 million contract after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on American soil, so he could volunteer to help fight the war on terrorism. After joining the elite U.S. Army Rangers, Cpl. Tillman died at the hands of his own comrades in a widely publicized friendly fire incident in Afghanistan in April 2004.

Wireless tracking technologies have joined the suite of current weaponry. Newly developed and deployed satellite-based situational awareness systems now help minimize fratricide and optimize operational readiness and battlefield decision-making. In use by the U.S. Army, Marines and select coalition forces in Iraq, as well as in Afghanistan and elsewhere (with a limited version undergoing NATO tests), the GPS-enabled Force XXI Battle Command, Brigade-and-Below (FBCB2) tracking system today helps protect tens of thousands of lives and hundreds of millions of dollars worth of military assets.

On April 1, 2004, U.S. Army Capt. James Stuart led a tank company into enemy territory on a nighttime assault east of Karbala, near Iraq's Euphrates River. Unbeknownst to Stuart, a U.S. scout platoon lay on the opposite bank, directly in his company's line of fire.

If not for the new FBCB2 satellite-based tracking system in Stuart's Abrams tank detailing on an electronic map where "the good guys" and "the bad guys" were, the "Hold" command he later gave most likely would have been a "Red Fire" (or "Fire at will")--and U.S. forces most likely would have been taking shots at each other as the enemy stood back and watched. The FBCB2 system helped avert another nasty "friendly fire" mishap and provided U.S. troops with real-time location information for battle planning and decision-making.

How It Works

There are two main variants of the Force XXI Battle Command, Brigade-and-Below (FBCB2) satellite-based tracking system, although other offshoots exist or are under development/testing. Both FBCB2 variants rely heavily on satellites and GPS technology, but they leverage different data distribution methods.

Radio Units. More than 8,000 FBCB2s (referred to by some soldiers as "fuzzy bunny chocolate bunny two" systems) utilize GPS receivers to capture satellite time and position data (used also to estimate speed). They communicate information to troops via voice (SINCGARS) and data (EPLRS) radios for FBCB2. EPLRS radios are the primary means for situational awareness transmission.

Blue Force Tracking. Another 2,000 units, called FBCB2--BFT (Blue Force Tracking) systems utilize the same types of GPS receivers to gather time and position information from satellites for identifying and tracking stationary and mobile troops and targets, but they distribute the information via a hub-and-spoke satellite-based communications network. Approximately 600 of the Blue Force Tracking systems operate on the commercial KU band and are encrypted for use in Kosovo. The others are in use by U.S. and U.K. forces in Iraq, and by Task Force 180 in Afghanistan.

"The satcom network allows us to centrally manage in Carson, California, the amount of information that goes onto the FBCB2--BFT network based on what data is being obtained and the available bandwidth," said Gerrit Le Grand, business development manager and chief engineer of communication systems for Northrop Grumman, the system's primary contractor.

"Relaying GPS information over military radios requires significant time and legwork up front to create an encrypted radio network, and there is less central control of the data--a network design which itself has inherent pros and cons," Le Grand said.

"The Blue Force Tracking variant of FBCB2, is more limited in availability, costs more and is less time efficient due to the central hub," he said. "However FBCB2--BFT's satellite communications network is ready to go as is--it's an out-of-the box, or in this case, out-of-the-sky solution. In addition, satcom transmissions are 'communications agnostic'--they can work over any platform that supports Internet protocol--and are far less susceptible to line-of-sight issues than radio-transmitted data. Each FBCB2 system type has its purpose and its place."

Update rates for each user logged onto the FBCB2--BFT are based on the network's high-tech time/motion filter, while those on the radio variant are set by each user as deemed necessary, said George Focht, FBCB2 program manager for Raytheon Co., a subcontractor on the project since the initial design stage in 1995.