“It was developed for a very specific threat and it does incredible things…we intend to operate it differently — in support of an Army on the move. It’s not just going to be static.”

“This is a radar they’re going to buy for, I don’t know, 30 years?  So you want to make sure you’ve got new technology that can meet the threats of the future.”

Instead of building a 100-kilowatt weapon, the Army now plans to leap straight to 250 or even 300 kW — which could shoot down much tougher targets.

After years of tests, setbacks, and painstaking fixes, the Army has its first fire-control center for a radically new kind of missile defense.

All told, the Army’s investing $57 billion in modernization over five years — but it wants to take time to test new technologies before it commits to them.

The new approach will focus on an urgent but largely unmet threat: Russian and Chinese cruise missiles.

AUSA: The Army is investing more and more money in lasers to defeat incoming rockets and enemy drones. Across the Air & Missile Defense (AMD) portfolio, “we put over 50 percent of our S&T (Science and Technology) money going towards directed energy projects,” up from about a third previously, said the AMD modernization director, Brig. Gen.… Keep reading →

“We were never above probably a total of eight people,” the aviation Cross Functional Team chief, Brig. Gen. Wally Rugen, told me. “We’re not this big colossal thing, we’re a lean, mean organization.”

Today, Brig. Gen. McIntire told me, Army field artillery and air & missile defense are like two boxers, one who can only punch and the other who can only block. “We’ve got to have one boxer that has the ability to strike and block simultaneously,” he said. “That’s the speed that we’re going to need in the future.”