FORT NOVOSEL, Ala. — Fort Novosel and the U.S. Army Aviation Center of Excellence conducted the annual Aviation Industry Days event to foster dialogue among Army aviation experts and aviation industry representatives August 7-8, 2024.
With a theme of “Army Aviation: Dominating from the Air-Ground Littoral,” the event included a two-day lineup of guest speaker sessions along with technology displays from aviation industry representatives.
Maj. Gen. Clair A. Gill, U.S. Army Aviation branch chief, kicked off the event by welcoming leaders, industry partners, Soldiers, and a group of flight school students who packed the Post Theater, and thanked them for their participation.
“We’re in the Army’s most transformative period in about forty years,” Gill said, as he reflected on the post-Vietnam era institution of Air-Land Battle doctrine and the development of the “Big Five” weapons systems.
“Army aviation is again on the leading edge of our generation’s transformation as we field Future Vertical Lift--the Future Long Range Assault Aircraft, Future Tactical UAS, launched effects, and we modernize our entire fleet with an open system architecture that will form the nexus of the ecosystem to meet the existential threats facing our army and our joint partners both now and in the future,” Gill said.
“Army aviation is lethal and survivable” and is not a second-tier force, Gill said.
He noted that Integrated Air Defense Systems are not invulnerable:
“Army aviation can will use unmanned systems to make first contact, stand off distances from engagement zones, and use terrain to mask and maneuver to defeat the IADS, and will do it for our Joint teammates,” Gill said.
Going forward, Army aviation must transform in contact, he explained.
“As we look beyond the present-time horizon, we know we have to transform successfully to fight in these multiple domains against our potential adversaries,” Gill said.
This includes conducting equipment modernization for units at echelon to maximize time, providing updated new systems to formations while they deploy so they can use them and give feedback before those are distributed to remaining formations, all to help ensure readiness now and into the future.
Gill explained that events like Industry Days help prepare Army aviation for the transformation and industry partners are crucial to success, and he asked for feedback and recommendations.
“There’s a wealth of talent and experience in this audience,” Gill said. “Frankly, this is the brain trust of Army aviation, whether you’re in uniform, whether you used to be in uniform, or whether you wear a suit and you just support those in uniform. Our collaboration with you, the industry, is essential to meet requirements of putting the right equipment and capabilities in our soldiers’ hands to enable them to win at the time and place of our choosing.”
Gill explained the Modular Open Systems Approach, which will to allow the Army to acquire warfighting capabilities including systems, subsystems, software components and services, with increased flexibility and competition.
“MOSA will provide sustainable, adaptable architecture standard or both FVL and mission system integration for our enduring fleet,” he said.
The MOSA will help meet the demands of pace as the Army looks for a much faster timeline for fielding and modifying warfighting capabilities going forward in light of emerging technology and threats.
Gill asked for industry’s help with Army aviation‘s top priorities of FVL, survivability equipment, lethality, and targeted modernization of the enduring fleet, to meet the demands of Large Scale Combat Operations as the branch upholds its sacred trust with the ground Soldier.
Lt. Gen. David J. Francis, U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command deputy commanding general and U.S. Army Center for Initial Military Training commander, who previously served as the Army aviation branch chief, pointed to flight school students in the room as the event’s bottom line and lauded them for their participation during the Q&A.
“These are the future company, battalion and brigade commanders that are going to lead this branch at a critical time in the history of this planet, when we really need them,” Francis said. “All the old people sitting in here are here for you. Everything that we’re doing here is about enabling our future force to fight and win.”
Francis commended the branch’s current leadership and talent for their operational, acquisition and Joint staff experience and for the consistent “drum beat” as initiatives previous branch leaders worked continue forward. He said he also looks forward to working with industry going forward.
He shared observations from his recent experience at U.S Africa Command.
“At the end of the day the ultimate customer for what we deliver as a branch, as an Army, is to the combatant commanders that are responsible for executing combat operations across the globe,” Francis said.
“The insatiable appetite that combatant commands have for resources is not going away,” Francis said. “No crisis that happened around the world that does not involve multiple geographic combatant commands and multiple functional commands as well. We are a global world; if something happens in one place it affects many other combatant commands, whether it’s an evacuation of the embassy in Sudan, the Israel crisis, what the Houthis are doing at the Red Sea, Ukraine, you name the place.”
Francis emphasized the ability to communicate across the globe, share data that enables the warfighting function to occur across all domains instantaneously.
Allies and partners will remain a critical piece of any future operation, he added. He also emphasized that for the combatant command, speed matters—they need capabilities today.
Francis said the world has changed in the two years since he left Fort Novosel, including a rapidly changing threat environment.
“I think that everything we do, everything we talk about here, all the capabilities that are under development, has to begin with a discussion about the threat. To that end, this is one of the primary missions of TRADOC,” he said, noting The Operational Environment 2024-2034: Large Scale Combat Operations – a complete update to the 2019 TRADOC Pamphlet 525-92, that was recently released and is available at https://www.tradoc.army.mil/.
The document describes what the operational environment will look like to a LSCO-focused Army, and outlines 12 conditions that cover a wide array of possibilities the Army may face in future conflicts--an operational environment where understanding the enemy is imperative and where highly trained Soldiers and leaders provide a clear advantage.
Maj. Gen. Michael C. McCurry, Army Futures Command’s incoming chief of staff and former Aviation branch chief, joined the event virtually.
He explained two things that will not change in the future: War is still a human endeavor and land is still decisive.
“It’s still a contest of wills,” McCurry said. “Although we have new tools we’re working on and modernization priorities and we’re integrating humans and machines, we still have to put our young Soldiers out there in the mud.”
“People don’t live anywhere but the land. Land is a pathway to creating interior lines, a pathway to establishing logistics and command and control, it’s the bedrock of expanded maneuver,” he said.
He also said although people may talk about the idea of short lethal wars that will not continue to escalate, efforts in the Middle East in the last 20 years have proven the opposite, “and we’ve still got people there. I’d ask that you keep them in your thoughts and prayers,” he said.
He said close combat is decisive:
“We need to not only focus on tools to help us sense deep and shoot deep, but how do we support that Soldier on the ground and maintain the lethality in close combat,” he said.
Regarding artificial intelligence and a path to autonomy, McCurry said, “We will abide by the laws of armed conflict,” but also added that “the appropriate levels of human judgment must be applied.”
Other sessions included updates from Maj. Gen. Robert L Barrie Jr., deputy for Acquisition and Systems Management, Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army (Acquisition, Logistics and Technology); and Maj. Gen. Lori L. Robinson, commander, U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Command.
Attendees also heard from Brig. Gen. Matthew W. Braman, director, Army Aviation, Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff G-3/5/7, Pentagon; Brig. Gen. Bernard J. Harrington, who commanded 1st Multi-Domain Task Force, Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington; and Brig. Gen. David C. Phillips, Program Executive Officer for Aviation; Christi Dolbeer, a member of the Senior Executive Service and director of the Technology Development Directorate, U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Aviation & Missile Center; as well as Col. Jason Cook, representing the Future Vertical Lift Cross-Functional Team.
The event also included a half-day of sessions on Thursday that provided updates from program managers and requirements developers across various aviation platforms.
