Simulation: Army: aiming to institutionalise simulation | ADM June 2012

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Already a leader in the use of simulation for training, including mission rehearsal and mission-specific training, the ever-adaptive Army is on the road to institutionalising simulation, garnering its many other benefits in such diverse areas as operational planning, decision making, concept evaluation, and modelling for options assessment.

In an interview with ADM late last year Major-General John Caligari, now Head Capability Systems, was succinct: “Simulation is a significant multiplier to everything we do because you can keep doing it and it costs nothing. You can keep driving it until it breaks and you find the edges of the problem. You can do that for modernisation, you can do it for training, you can do it with a soldier sitting in a vehicle who, when he turns the corner too fast and the vehicle rolls, thinks he’s dead.

“You can use it for command post exercises or force modelling and to test organisational force structures. You can change any of the parameters and do it over and over, more quickly and more safely than doing for real or live.

“There are things you can do with simulation that you just couldn’t do for real, even because it is too expensive to do live. Everything that can be simulated should be considered at the time every capability is considered for acquisition, and it must conform to a single synthetic environment.”

MAJGEN Caligari says his main effort in simulation has been to avoid the situation of every simulator coming with a proprietary system.

“Army has a Simulation Campaign Plan that defines a generation zero simulation capability, which is what we’ve got now through to a Generation 3 simulation environment we aspire to with a single synthetic environment so that all of the simulations across all of those capabilities are optimised.”

As an example, he says his vision is not to have a single simulator for a tank, which does nothing other than drive the tank or fire the main armament. Instead he envisages a simulator that drives, shoots and sees the tank next to it and, for collective training, it also sees offensive artillery or aircraft support, all connected.

But the road to a single synthetic environment is no easy matter and the Army alone has necessarily acquired a significant inventory of simulation assets, ranging from virtual simulation (tank crew trainers, weapons trainers) and live simulation (laser engagement systems) to some distributed systems of a very high order that embrace cooperative simulated engagements with other nations.

Army simulation assets

The 2011 Defence Simulation Strategy and Roadmap says the number and scope of simulation assets (technology, facilities and infrastructure) available to and used by Defence continues to grow. Over the last five years, simulation precincts - areas where simulation assets have been concentrated - continue to multiply and expand and many assets have been upgraded or modernised.

The focus of these assets remains on supporting the development of professional mastery within the Services and Defence Research & Development. Part task, procedural and mission simulators are making significant contributions to individual and force preparedness. Notably, there is now an increased capacity to deliver exercise support focussed on achieving joint effects and to provide decision support to capability development. Examples of recent Army specific capabilities that have been introduced include:


Joint and Combined Training Centre


The Joint and Combined Training Centre (JCTC) began operations in 2007 as an integral component of Talisman Sabre 2007 and operates under an Australian and US bilateral agreement. The core capability of the JCTC is the management of the Defence Training and Experimentation Network (DTEN), which has been developed to link ADF simulators and training areas, as well as providing a persistent linkage to the United States’ Joint Training and Experimentation Network (JTEN) since 2007.

The JCTC has been used during Mission Readiness Exercises (MREs) for land forces deploying to the Middle East Area of Operations.


Combat Training Centre- Live Instrumented System

The CTC-LIS was accepted into service in 2008 and played a critical role in Talisman Sabre 09 including interoperating with constructive simulation entities via Link 16, a virtual AC130 Gunship and the Hornet Air Combat Training System (HACTS). The eyesafe laser and radio engagement system incorporates realistic audio and visual effects and has directly supported pre-deployment training for troops.

There are a number of Battle Simulation Centres including those in current operation at Darwin, Townsville, Brisbane, Puckapunyal and one planned at Canungra.


ASLAV Crew Procedural Trainers (CPT)


Nine CPTs provide realistic training for ASLAV commanders and gunners in a fully immersive environment with a complete suite of simulated sights, periscope and outof-turret visuals. The capability has expended 1.2 million simulated rounds – representing a massive cost saving compared to the price of real ammunition, whilst providing more accurate feedback, avoiding safety risks, avoiding damage and wear and tear on weapons, and minimising environmental impact and clean-up activities.


Armed Reconnaissance Helicopter (ARH)


The ARH will be supported by a sophisticated training system component including:

  • a Full Flight and Mission Simulator (FFMS) providing aircrew training;
  • two CPT each with two separate domes operating coupled at all times; and
  • Ground Crew Training Devices including mechanical and avionics systems trainers.


Aircrewman Part Task Trainer (APTT)


Seven APTTs are used to train Army helicopter aircrewman in a virtual reality environment across their full range of tasks including approaches, external loads, hoisting, gunnery and crew interaction.

They have improved course pass rates, training standards and safety, while reducing flying hour requirements. APTTs can be reconfigured as Chinooks, Black Hawks, MRH-90s and Bell 412s. They can be networked together and have the potential to network into the broader Army simulation network.


Weapons Training Simulation Systems (WSST)


Provided exclusively by Meggitt Training Systems (MTS), WTSS is a complete small arms training environment that includes individual training in marksmanship and weapons handling. It is configured for the future adoption of mortar simulators for crew and collective training missions with an integrated capability supporting call for fire and indirect fire tasks.

Late last year MTS was contracted to deliver WTSS at four purpose-built Australian Army facilities, bringing the total number of WTSS facilities. Coordinated from Meggitt’s facility in Albury, NSW, MTS will provide operations and maintenance for 18 sites located at major troop locations in every state and territory throughout Australia. The contract will be supported by around 70 Meggitt personnel.

While MTS supplies the majority of the Army’s small arms training needs Virtual Simulation Systems (VBS2 developer) provides the Mk1 Virtual Sniper System employed by Australian Special Forces to train teams in sniper techniques as well as other skill sets which include battlefield commentary, over watch and pattern of life observation. The Virtual Sniper’s main advantage over other weapon training systems is that it attaches to the soldiers own service weapon, allowing an unprecedented level of virtual training.


Development of Mission Specific Training


With the 2005 decision to deploy additional Australian troops to Iraq with the Al Muthanna Task Group (AMTG), the Combat Training Centre was tasked with assisting in the conduct of mission rehearsal exercise for the AMTG prior to its deployment.

The commercial simulation Steel Beasts 2 (SB2) was used to familiarise Australian troops on deployment with the area of operations, and to provide tactical training and assist with operational planning. An additional simulation, Virtual Battle Space One (VBS1) developed by Bohemia Interactive, was also used to add combined arms elements to SB2 which is vehicle-centric.

The Battle Simulation Centre supported this pre-deployment training, allowing soldiers, particularly tactical level commanders to be exposed to the simulation systems. The inclusion of a ‘virtual’ games-based simulation training package as part of the mission rehearsal exercise for those on deployment was seen as an important step in the exploitation of simulation by the Army.

These initial steps in mission rehearsal led to the development of the Mission Specific Training (MST) program when in 2008 the Army Simulation Wing (now Group) undertook a six-month pilot proof of concept in support of field training at the Wide Bay Training Area. Among its other platoon-level tactical training tasks the pilot program supported force preparation for deployments to Afghanistan, the Middle East and the Solomon Islands.

Following the successful conduct of the pilot a rolling MST program was made available to units over a three year period and MST programs to support selected operational deployments, including to the MEAO, East Timor and elsewhere, occurred throughout 2009. The scenarios were flexible and adjusted to meet unit commanders training requirements. MST provided unit-led training for a defined conflict.

The MST program involves the conduct of up to two live lane training activities at platoon/troop level or below over a five day period. This training can be conducted in conjunction with virtual lane training. Collective and staff training is undertaken primarily through the conduct of command post exercises designed primarily to train headquarters staff, ideally closely replicating the operational environment.

The Combat Training Centre and the Battle Simulation Centres located at Darwin, Townsville, Brisbane, Puckapunyal and Canungra (planned) have been updated and modernised, a feature being the use of simulation at these centres for MRE and MST.

As we have seen these live, virtual and constructive environments are being used to deliver training that imparts particular knowledge, skills and attitudes to prepare soldiers for mission specific situations. Each element has injected the use of Virtual Training Lanes using VBS2 in support of their training outcomes. VBS-2, is a fully interactive, three-dimensional, PC-based synthetic environment underpins significant parts of ADF training - including a variety of implementations from ab-initio training, through to mission rehearsal.


Constructive simulation


Australian use of constructive simulations has a long history but with limited widespread use due to resource constraints and small development teams. Nevertheless there has been considerable experience with CombatSIM, Janus, JSAF and others.

These have been overtaken by a new simulation software development tool OneSAF (One Semi-Automated Forces). OneSAF is a next-generation, entity-level simulation that supports constructive and virtual training, computer-generated forces, and mission rehearsal designed for brigade- and-below, combat, and non-combat operations. Early versions were initially evaluated for their applicability to Australian requirements including its potential in training, land combat analysis, and integration with C2 systems and other software tools. It was also assessed for its ability to develop terrain databases to cover training areas and deployment areas of operations.

Defence says OneSAF is being developed in collaboration with Army, DSTO, Defence, academia and industry to provide baseline capabilities that Defence requires to sustain OneSAF into the future. A range of Australian developed enhancements will be incorporated into the baseline system through an agreement between the Australian and US armies.

The Army Simulation Campaign Plan identifies OneSAF as the Army’s primary constructive simulation for a range of activities including capability development; training for command teams; support to operational decision making, and as a Semi-Automated Force subsystem for future virtual simulators.

OneSAF is currently being introduced into service by Army’s day-to-day capability manager for simulation, the Army Simulation Group, through an Army Headquarters minor project. This project provides funding for a Foreign Military Sales case with the US Army for the provision of OneSAF, technical support and training, and funding for the development of Australian specific enhancements to OneSAF through a number of Australian and international contractors.

The initial focus for the introduction into service of OneSAF is the capability development domain, in particular Army’s experimentation program. This program is testing Army’s employment concepts for future systems, including Land 400, Army’s Combined Arms Fighting System.

OneSAF gives Army the ability to integrate with C2 systems through controlled interfaces utilising standard communications protocols. The integration of OneSAF with a number of coalition and national C2 systems has been successfully tested to date.

These integration tests have identified that the level of functionality exceeds the level required to meet current training and capability development needs. This is an ongoing activity that will be applied to new C2 systems as they are introduced into service.

OneSAF is shared with American, British, Canadian, and Australian (ABCA) members in support of interoperability in joint and distributed simulations. The Army Simulation Group has had successful interactions on OneSAF with ABCA members. Last year, as part of the Introduction into Service Program, Army utilised a coalition activity, ALLIED AURORAS, to successfully trial OneSAF version 3 in a coalition environment using a range of disparate coalition C2 systems.

Participants each used their own instance of OneSAF and were based in geographically dispersed locations including Australia, US, NZ and Canada. Subsequently, Army has taken delivery of One- SAF version 5 which has been the subject of extensive development work in Australia, in particular amphibious capabilities and user interface enhancement. The Army has had assistance from Calytrix Technologies (Australia), selected to deliver ongoing One- SAF Technical Development Support for the Australian Army, and the Swinburne R&D group which has undertaken entity behaviours and OneSAF testing regimes.

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