Battle for Veterans Benefits – Taking on the VA is always on the lookout for interesting stories about our military concerning veterans and active duty members. The information in this article has us intrigued.
Our military services are always developing ways to employ and expand upon emerging technologies. In a world of smart phones and portable communication devices, like the IPhone, it only makes sense that the U.S. military would incorporate a way to use this technology in the field.
The Army has developed a program called Connecting Soldiers to Digital Application. This program’s mission is to get soldiers information when they need it no matter where they happen to be. The Army’s fielding plan calls for fitting commercial phones into special antenna sleeves. These antennas would then link the soldier into a network of ground stations and airborne nodules allowing them access to information on a garrison and operational situation.
Mike McCarthy is the director of the mission command complex of Future Force Integration Directorate at Fort Bliss, Texas. The directorate is one of the agencies leading the CSDA project.
“What we’re doing is fundamentally changing how soldiers access knowledge, information, training content and operational data,” McCarthy said.
Now that the Army has designed a way to communicate in a safe and secure manner, they are looking at how to pay for these tools. The Army itself could buy in bulk but allowing a soldier to choose his or her own smart phone might be an option too. The Army would then allow a monthly stipend to pay for a certain amount of service coverage.
The advantage of a smart phone would be special applications designed specifically for each individual, their environment and their jobs. It can also be used to view training videos and upload GPS coordinates of specific locations on post, which is currently not an option on places like Google maps.
According to an article in the Army Times, taking the phone to a war zone will be possible too.
“Rather than having to trudge over to the One System Remote Video Terminal to check out the blue force tracker or watch feeds from the Shadow buzzing overhead, soldiers could fish their smart phones out of their pockets.”
Today soldiers are going to be trained smart. Tomorrow they are going to be trained with smart phones. Hoorah to our military for thinking outside the box.
