Industry’s prototype Robotic Combat Vehicles are proving more capable than the Army expected, Brig. Gen. Richard Ross Coffman told me: “It is really exciting.”

With the surprise disqualification of the Raytheon-Rheinmetall Lynx, the Army has effectively left itself with one competitor for the Optionally Manned Fighting Vehicle, General Dynamics — unless the Pentagon or Congress intervene.

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.

Good news: That’s more money than the Army thought it could get for its top priorities. Bad news: We won’t see most of it this year.

Will high-tech hardware developed to protect aircraft translate to the mud and dust of ground combat?

In Iraq, M113 variants were deemed too vulnerable to roadside bombs and confined to base. But in a fast-moving mechanized war in Eastern Europe, the armored brigades would need support vehicles that stand a chance against Russian firepower.

If RAVEN succeeds in the next, more challenging round of tests, the BAE jammer will ultimately go on the 1980s-vintage M2 Bradley. That’s a big part of the Army’s urgent push to protect American armored vehicles against Russian-made anti-tank missiles in widespread use around the world.

SAIC not a traditional heavy-metal manufacturer and it shouldn’t be judged like one, CEO Tony Moraco and COO Nazzic Keene told me.

Last month, the Army committed to buying an initial brigade’s-worth of the Iron Fist Active Protection System for the M2 Bradley. Meanwhile, with Tuesday morning’s announcement, the US is spending over $200 million to install the rival Trophy APS on not only Army but Marine Corps M1 Abrams tanks.

Yes, MPF is much lighter and less heavily armored than the M1 Abrams or even Russian tanks like the T-90. But MPF is going to light infantry units that currently have no armored vehicles at all, just a handful of Humvees, towed M777 howitzers, and whatever weapons the men can carry on their backs.