After divesting of much of its EW tool set following the Cold War, the Army has sought to rebuild its arsenal and tactics within the spectrum. That includes the gamut of electromagnetic spectrum operations such as electronic attack, or jamming, electronic support, or sensing the environment for enemy signals, and electronic protect, or guarding friendly systems and units from enemy jamming.

Observations from Ukraine have solidified the importance of robust and redundant capabilities, particularly within the spectrum.

In addition to having jammers for offensive actions, U.S. forces must possess a raft of other tools to be able to protect themselves from enemy jammers, hide within the spectrum and deceive the enemy.

As evidenced in Ukraine, units can be located and targeted with munitions solely based on their emissions within the electromagnetic spectrum.

“Commanders must be able to see themselves to control their emissions and defeat the enemy’s ability to sense, identify, locate, and target them. This is critically important when observations from current conflicts around the world show there are eight minutes from identification in the EMS to artillery impacting on the detected location of said emission,” the Army’s Multidomain Operations Range Guide states.

As such, the Army’s budget request would place more investments in these key areas of understanding its signatures and protecting forces with a combination of new-start programs, repurposed portfolios and existing efforts.

The Modular Electro-Magnetic Spectrum System (MEMSS) is a new start this budget cycle, stemming out of a prior science-and-technology effort called Modular Electromagnetic Spectrum Deception Suite (MEDS). Officials have previewed the effort in years past, noting some prototyping had gone toward developing it.

The Army is requesting $9.1 million in 2026 for the effort in its research-and-development budget. Specifically, it would provide force protection and freedom of maneuver through “radio frequency technical effects,” a term the Army uses to describe classified capabilities.

MEMSS will look to prioritize iterative development with commercial-off-the-shelf capabilities, a top priority for the Army and its electronic warfare portfolio overall.

The budget documents note that the system will be given to units as part of the Army’s transforming-in-contact (TiC) initiative, which aims to speed up how the service buys technologies and designs its forces and concepts by injecting emerging capabilities into units and letting them experiment with them during exercises and deployments.

The documents note that these units will receive prototyped capability and, as part of the program, fiscal ’26 funding will support testing to ensure it performs as expected against realistic threats to include both lab testing and evaluation from soldiers from TiC 2.0 units, which now involves armored formations as well as Multi-Domain Task Force and Army special operations units.

Another new start within the Army’s budget request is a program called Counter Surveillance Reconnaissance (CSR). It’s envisioned as a family of systems to provide force protection at echelon — specifically ground-based capabilities for division, corps and theater commanders — through enhanced situational awareness, operational planning tools for effects coordination and electronic support capabilities.

This program, along with many others, is included in the Army’s new Electronic Warfare Agile Systems Development program.

For this budget request, the Army sought to secure agile funding for a limited pot of systems: electronic warfare, unmanned aerial systems and counter-UAS. This agile funding allows the Army to consolidate capabilities into a single portfolio to better move money around and be more responsive to real-world events, as opposed to having to ask Congress for reprogramming requests. The budget documents note this pilot effort provides enhanced capabilities through fostering innovation and the accelerated development of promising technology.

The Army is requesting $34.4 million in R&D funding for CSR in fiscal 2026. The program aims to use technologies that will hide units’ locations within the electromagnetic spectrum. So-called low-probability-of-detection/low-probability-of-attribution non-kinetic effects will establish “unobserved” positions and preserve combat power, the documents note.

The CSR program will provide three distinct lines of effort for counter-space surveillance that will be controlled by an overarching mission planner and common execution software to plan and employ non-kinetic effects to protect friendly forces.

The prototype development for all three lines of effort are scheduled to begin in second quarter of 2026. The first unit issued for the first line of effort is scheduled for third quarter 2029, with the second and third slated for fourth quarter 2030.

The Army’s budget request is also asking for $1.5 million in R&D funding for a program to develop an integrated multi-mission electronic warfare force protection system.

That program, Integrated Electronic Warfare Systems, shifted in funding and terminology compared with last year’s budget release. It has now been moved to the agile funding pilot.

Additionally, in the previous budget proposal, the Army sought mainly to fund Counter-Radio Controlled Improvised Explosive Device (RCIED) Electronic Warfare (CREW), a term that is a relic of the Global War on Terror when insurgents used radio devices to trigger roadside bombs.

The CREW technology, however, is still relevant today as it can be used for counter-UAS and counter-communications.  

Now, the program is aiming to prototype an integrated multi-mission electronic warfare force protection system that can respond to changing signals of interest employed by adversaries.

When a signal is discovered that isn’t in a unit’s library of known signals, a countermeasure must be devised, which historically could have taken months. That pace is unacceptable for the fast-paced warfare of the future. The Army and other services are looking at rapid reprogramming on the battlefield, in part, by leveraging artificial intelligence.

“Electromagnetic warfare (EW) capability gaps exist across several areas, including the need for development of more sophisticated countermeasures, and the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced analytics into EW operations. Specifically, the development of advanced countermeasures that can effectively disrupt or neutralize enemy EW capabilities is crucial, especially in the face of evolving technologies and tactics. Integrating AI and advanced analytics into EW operations will significantly enhance the ability to quickly identify and respond to threats,” the budget documents state. “VMEWS is intended to provide a suite of electromagnetic warfare capabilities to protect wheeled and tracked vehicles against a wide range of radio frequency-controlled threats.”

The Army expects a competitive commercial solutions offering that leads to an other transaction agreement for a tech demonstration of a vehicle mounted multi-mission electronic warfare force protection system to accelerate technology maturation and prototyping.

A new procurement effort for the Army in the budget request is the Spectrum Situational Awareness System (S2AS), which will provide sensing and visualization of what units look like in the spectrum and allow commanders to be able to sense and report in real-time their command post signatures, sources of electromagnetic interference — either from coalition partners or the enemy — and threat emissions.

The Army awarded 3dB Labs earlier this year an other transaction agreement to develop and demonstrate a prototype. S2AS had already undergone a prototyping effort prior to the award.

The fiscal 2026 budget request includes $17.6 million in procurement funding for S2AS as a new start in procurement and under the “Electronic Warfare” program, which is also new this year as part of the agile pilot. Those funds would enable procurement, delivery, training and initial sparing of S2AS, according to budget documents, which state the Army plans to buy 20 systems.

The budget also asks for $8.9 million in research-and-development funding for S2AS.

The Army will be using transforming-in-contact units to help inform how the program matures.

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S2AS is envisioned to provide sensing and visualization of what units look like in the electromagnetic spectrum and allow commanders to be able to sense and report in real-time their command post signatures, sources of electromagnetic interference — either from coalition partners or the enemy — and threat emissions. Army officials see this as an important capability for operations in a complex future environment where forces will have to adeptly maneuver within the invisible electromagnetic spectrum.

“Modernizing spectrum awareness capabilities will enhance commanders’ ability to visualize and control the electromagnetic environment, enabling more effective decision making and improving protection to win the fight for spectrum dominance,” Maj. Cedric Harris, assistant product manager for Product Manager Electronic Warfare Integration at program executive office for intelligence, electronic warfare and sensors, said in a statement.

Under the agreement, 3dB Labs was awarded a little over $6 million for a 14-month period of performance.

“S2AS directly enhances the survivability and effectiveness of our soldiers on the battlefield,” Ken Strayer, project manager for electronic warfare and cyber at PEO IEW&S, said in a statement. “By integrating feedback from Transformation in Contact (TiC) units, including Electronic Warfare Soldiers and Spectrum Managers, we’re ensuring the system is specifically tailored to meet their operational needs.”

Transforming-in-contact refers to a key initiative of Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George to use deployments and troop rotations to test new equipment — mainly commercial off-the-shelf gear — that could allow units to be more responsive on a dynamic battlefield. The effort is initially focused on unmanned aerial systems, counter-UAS and electronic warfare. It will inform how the service purchases and employs emerging capabilities and also provide insights for force structure changes.

The program office has previously stated that the S2AS prototype will participate in a unit exercise in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025 as part of transforming-in-contact.

S2AS was always designed to be largely a commercial-off-the-shelf system. Over the past several years, commercial technology has improved such that the Army and other services have been able to purchase relatively mature electromagnetic spectrum solutions as opposed to building their own through onerous bidding, proposal and traditional acquisition processes with industry.

The Army said the system is designed for both local and self-protection applications and will be deployed in handheld and vehicle adaptable configurations to meet a variety of mission requirements.

Final procurement quantities and equipping distributions for S2AS will be informed by planned demonstration and testing events.

An operational demo is planned for the first quarter of fiscal 2026, which will support a potential rapid fielding decision in the second quarter of that fiscal year.

Efforts in fiscal 2025 for S2AS include initial delivery of prototype systems, vehicle and network integration, cybersecurity accreditation, testing and logistical support.

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Spectrum Situational Awareness System, or S2AS, is envisioned to be a commercial off-the-shelf solution that will provide sensing and visualization of what units look like in the spectrum and allow commanders to be able to sense and report in real-time their command post signatures, sources of electromagnetic interference — either from coalition partners or the enemy — and threat emissions. Army officials see this as an important capability for operations in a complex future environment where forces will have to adeptly maneuver within the invisible electromagnetic spectrum.

According to an Army spokesperson, the service has identified a mature commercial-off-the-shelf product to satisfy the requirements of the program.

Moreover, the Army intends for that system to participate in a unit exercise in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025 as part of the service’s transforming-in-contact initiative, one of its top priorities to inform how it purchases and employs new capabilities that will also provide insights for force structure changes.

The first iteration of the concept just concluded with the last of the three light infantry brigades wrapping up their capstone exercises. The initiative is expected to now focus on Stryker and armor brigades as well as division headquarters.

Throughout the first three rotations, brigades noted the importance of being able to manage their signatures and sense the environment.

S2AS is envisioned to support all Army command post operations with the ability to sense, detect and report friendly electromagnetic spectrum signatures as well as sources of electromagnetic interference, according to the spokesperson.

The transforming-in-contact units have been prioritized for planned demonstrations and initial equipment delivery. So far, the Army has publicly announced that the 25th Infantry Division and 101st Airborne Division will be the two divisions with 2nd Cavalry Regiment and 1st Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division as two heavy brigades for the next iteration.   

The final procurement quantities and equipping distributions for S2AS will be informed by the planned demonstration and testing events. 

An operational demonstration test event is planned for the first quarter of fiscal 2026, which will support a potential rapid fielding decision in the second quarter of that fiscal year.

Efforts in fiscal 2025 for S2AS include initial delivery of prototype systems, vehicle and network integration, cybersecurity accreditation, testing and logistical support.

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Specifically, that effort is for the forthcoming Spectrum Situational Awareness System, or S2AS, envisioned to be a commercial off-the-shelf solution that will provide sensing and visualization of what units look like in the spectrum and allow commanders to be able to sense and report in real-time their command post signature, sources of electromagnetic interference — either from coalition partners or the enemy — and what threat emissions look like. Army officials have said this is an important capability for operations in a complex future environment where forces will have to adeptly maneuver within the invisible electromagnetic spectrum.

That program is a new start in fiscal 2025, with the Army requesting $9.3 million in research-and-development funds for integration, testing, and technical and program management support.

However, with the continuing resolution and budget impasse on Capitol Hill, development is more challenging.

Thus, the Army is using ongoing efforts associated with its Terrestrial Layer System-Echelons Above Brigade (TLS-EAB) — initially designed as an integrated EW and signals intelligence platform primarily for divisions, corps and Multi-Domain Task Forces to sense across greater distances — to run risk reduction for S2AS.

“There’s been other efforts within EAB that allowed us to understand what software capabilities are out there to get after that type of spectrum situational awareness. We’ve made those investments and I think what you’ll see is upon the [middle tier of acquisition] initiation, once the CR is lifted and the program is running, that will move really quick,” Brig. Gen. Wayne “Ed” Barker, program executive officer for intelligence, electronic warfare and sensors, said in an interview at the Army’s Technical Exchange Meeting.

“I’m thinking inside of 12 to 18 months, we could probably be at a rapid fielding for that software from an S2AS standpoint,” he added. “We’ve taken the opportunity that if we’ve had implied and specified requirements within other programs, specifically EAB, that meet the need of S2AS, we’ve used that to burn down that risk so that once S2AS was initiated, we didn’t have to spend another year, year and a half, doing the analysis to get us to that point where we can make a rapid fielding decision.”

Last year, the Army decided to spilt up the signals intelligence and electronic warfare portions of its TLS family of systems, which also include the EAB’s smaller cousin, the Brigade Combat Team system. Barker said that ultimately was the right decision for the Army to make.

The service is on track to deliver signals intelligence prototypes for both TLS systems by next spring, while platform electronic warfare from a jamming perspective is still pre-decisional and the Army is still examining what that might look like, Barker said.

The Army is taking a hard look at its entire electronic enterprise and capabilities as it seeks to potentially take on sophisticated nation-state adversaries in large-scale combat operations.

“The nature of the fundamental of everything is going on within our portfolio from an EW standpoint, is rapidly changing. The challenge within the EW portfolio is the fact that the decades of [counterinsurgency] operations, we just did not necessarily have to be in that fight to the degree to which we think we’re going to be in it today,” Barker said at the Association of Old Crows annual symposium Thursday. “We kind of had to start clean because we didn’t really have the capabilities that were needed from an EW standpoint. We’re building that up on a daily basis and trying understand what that means across the not just the materiel side of the house, but how do you train EW?”

Elsewhere within the electronic protection and management space, the Army is still figuring out what its Modular Electromagnetic Spectrum System (MEMSS) program will look like. MEMMS stemmed out of a prior science-and-technology effort called Modular Electromagnetic Spectrum Deception Suite (MEDS) and will be a new start in fiscal 2026.

“How do we confuse the enemy? It’s really about creating those types of dilemmas that impact their decision space. How are we providing our commander freedom of maneuver to do the things that they need to do, to provide them the time to either move or make decisions?” Barker said, adding his office is working across the Army to help figure that out on the requirements and materiel side.

“We got to be very conscious within this space to make sure that what we’re doing is going to impact the adversary’s targeting cycle. But we also have to be conscious of what the range of options are that we want to present to the Army,” Barker said. “It can be anything from attritable sensors that emulate all the way up to the potentially the emulate a command post. But there’s costs associated with that, and so we’re trying to be very, very conscious of that.”

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A series of events will help officials determine what the concept of employment for EW will be at the division level and what programs of record will look like.

Those events included a tabletop exercise at Fort Eisenhower, Georgia, focused on how electronic warfare will be done at division and higher; an October Fires Symposium at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, examining how network, intelligence, cyber and EW will integrate into fires; a capabilities-based assessment for electromagnetic warfare conducted by the Cyber Capability Integration Directorate at the Cyber Center of Excellence in Augusta, Georgia, that will be completed over the next year; and a sensor-to-shooter event focused on challenges in the Indo-Pacific region and long-range precision fires at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

“We’re doing a deep dive on that now,” Col. Leslie Gorman, Army capability manager for electronic warfare, said in a recent interview regarding how the service is thinking about fighting electronic warfare at echelon and with what platforms. “I had a sit-down with some folks at the Pentagon yesterday. One of the things that came back was truly, what does that concept of employment look like at the division?”

She explained that the Cyber CDID event helped determine what exactly the forthcoming Terrestrial Layer System-Echelons Above Brigade (TLS-EAB) system will be.

TLS-EAB was initially designed as an integrated EW and signals intelligence system primarily for divisions, corps and Multi-Domain Task Forces to sense across greater ranges. Like its smaller, brigade counterpart, TLS-Brigade Combat Team, following experimentation and lessons from Europe, the Army has decided to split up the SIGINT and electronic warfare functions.

Given the EAB effort was less mature than the BCT variant at the time the decision to split the functions was made, officials have stated EAB will be the main component for defining and demonstrating an initial EW architecture and publishing the requests for information concerning the architecture, that will eventually deliver it back to the BCT version for integration.

“There’s been some interesting information that came out of that [tabletop event]. We also have another CONEMP we’re taking a look at from [the] C5ISR [Center] to help shape some discussions with the maneuvers at an upcoming tabletop exercise with them because I think that’s going to be very important,” Gorman said, using an acronym to refer to command, control, communications, computers, cyber, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance. “As we’re flushing out the requirements at echelon that we’re not only talking to fires, we’re also talking maneuvers. Because it’s ensuring that we’re incorporating our capabilities in a light infantry fight. Since we are an enabler, what does it look like to implement an EW sensor on a” robotic combat vehicle?

Officials are also looking at other capabilities that have been prototyped and used primarily at the brigade level to see if there’s applicability at division, namely, the Tactical Electronic Warfare System-Infantry Brigade Combat Team, or TEWS-I, which was initially a quick-reaction capability built by General Dynamics, providing a smaller system designed for infantry vehicles. It was a prototype activity to serve as a risk reduction and requirements pathfinder for the Army’s program of record, the Terrestrial Layer System-Brigade Combat Team (TLS-BCT) and has been used by units within the XVIII Airborne Corps.

Gorman noted that the service is looking at experimentation efforts next year to not only gain improvements for TEWS-I, but how that capability could potentially be a division asset.

The Army is still essentially in the requirements phase when it comes to the electronic warfare portion of TLS-BCT again, trying to figure out what makes the most sense going forward.

Gorman noted it could evolve to include more robust communications systems, deception capabilities or situational awareness tools. Moreover, while the Army is currently fielding the TLS Manpack — the first official program in decades for a dismounted electronic attack capability that soldiers can use to conduct direction finding with limited jamming on-the-move as well — for mobility, the service is looking at possibly bringing that into a vehicle mount with an amplifier for extended range, something that was conceived of initially within the original TLS family.

Constant feedback from units is also helping to inform future generations of the Manpack capability, Gorman said.

As the Army is continuing to work on the platform and capability side of the issue, fleshing out how they’ll be employed, the other critical parallel effort is moving out on EW-enabling capabilities to be able to plan and manage within the spectrum.

“It’s also ensuring that we address it as a system-of-systems approach … It’s going to be important to be able to ensure that these capabilities that we’re fielding, we’re able to communicate and C2 those systems, be able to also incorporate where the systems are on the battlefield and incorporate that into not only our EW plan of action via [the Electronic Warfare Planning and Management Tool], but then also think leveraging [the Spectrum Situational Awareness System] for the spectrum management, the [electromagnetic emission control], the [electronic protection] capabilities, to be able to also bring that information into fires for a more comprehensive, holistic, synchronized, non-lethal effect support to fires planning capability,” Gorman said.

EWPMT serves as a command-and-control planning capability that allows service members to visualize potential effects within the invisible spectrum and chart courses of action to prevent their forces and systems from being jammed during operations. The Army is embarking on the EWPMT “Next” effort, which involves shifting to the Tactical Assault Kit framework, where applications for situational awareness data and geospatial visualizations can be created for better joint and coalition integration.

The Spectrum Situational Awareness System (S2AS) is a new start in fiscal 2025 and is envisioned to be a commercial off-the-shelf solution that will provide sensing and visualization of what units look like in the spectrum and allow commanders to be able to sense and report in real-time their command post signatures, sources of electromagnetic interference — either from coalition partners or the enemy — and threat emissions.

Officials have described EWPMT as the glue that holds the electronic warfare architecture together, because if forces can’t see, understand and plan within the spectrum, jamming and sensing capabilities won’t be effective.

“We’re talking about this too, is like we have a lot of Manpacks coming out. We’re going to have to be able to ensure that those systems can be effectively C2’d and that missions can be planned at the optimal level at echelon, so that way everyone understands what’s going on their battlespace. I think that helps reduce potential adjacent unit RF interference or jamming,” Gorman said. “It’s also ensuring that our signatures that we’re emitting, that is also a part of our planning efforts and you have to do that with each and every EW emitter or an effector.”

The Army will begin embedding its requirements personnel with experimental units to create a direct feedback loop to inform the software developers for EWPMT in the program office. This will help the program office prioritize as the service is planning likely tranches of 12 improvements per quarter going forward in line with a holistic software modernization strategy for EWPMT Next.

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Officials are finding from Ukraine’s conflict with Russia that the technology landscape can change in days, not months. As a result, the Army is pitching the need for fiscal nimbleness to be able to make changes to systems on the battlefield or procurement efforts to get soldiers the capabilities they require.

“Recognizing that we’ve made the shift from primarily what used to be a counter-IED focus to now one where we’re dealing with near-peer threats and a very, very contested battlespace. Flexible funding is one of the three areas we’ve talked about. Recognizing that even as we’ve seen in Ukraine, the EW changes in software that both sides are employing, often are done in a matter of days or hours,” Gabe Camarillo, undersecretary of the Army, told reporters on the sidelines of the annual AUSA conference. “We are looking at making sure that we can rapidly iterate our EW capabilities in a similar fashion. I think having the program and funding flexibility to do it will help us.”

At the end of the Cold War, the Army divested much of its electronic warfare inventory. During counterinsurgency fights of the last 20 years, soldiers used blunt jamming tools to thwart improvised explosive devices, which, in turn, inadvertently jammed friendly systems. Now, the service is trying to develop more sophisticated systems to directly compete with advanced adversaries, their tactics and capabilities.

“A direct result of what we’re seeing in Ukraine is causing us to — our budget [request] that will come up next spring, you’ll see a significant increase in investment in unmanned aerial systems, counter-UAS and electronic warfare capabilities as well,” Army Secretary Christine Wormuth said at an event in September. “There’s a very tight cycle between the Ukrainians and the Russians in terms of developing a capability and then developing a counter to that capability. But one of the things the Russians have really been cycling quickly on is their EW capabilities, and that’s made it harder for the Ukrainians.”

As part of the flexible funding request — which also includes uncrewed systems and counter-unmanned systems technologies — the Army will be plussing up its electronic warfare budget, though top officials have been vague on exactly where those investments will be made.

According to the Army’s program office responsible for electronic warfare, the service embarked on a comprehensive review of its EW enterprise that spanned the scope of electronic attack, electronic protect and electronic support capabilities, also examining their relationship with signals intelligence as a means of ensuring it’s postured to address the current and emerging threats associated with large-scale combat operations.

“We considered major capability gaps, investments opportunities, trades, architecture considerations, and policy change requirements. Prioritization is on increasing EW capabilities at all echelons and formations from the company level all the way up to theater,” the program office said in a statement.

Some specific efforts mentioned by name include:

• The Electronic Planning and Management Tool, a command-and-control planning capability that allows service members to visualize potential effects within the invisible spectrum and chart courses of action to prevent their forces and systems from being jammed during operations. The Army is embarking on the EWPMT “Next” effort, which involves shifting to the Tactical Assault Kit framework, where applications for situational awareness data and geospatial visualizations can be created for better joint and coalition integration.
• The Spectrum Situational Awareness System, a new start in fiscal 2025 envisioned to be a commercial off-the-shelf solution that will provide sensing and visualization of what units look like in the spectrum and allow commanders to be able to sense and report in real-time their command post signature, sources of electromagnetic interference — either from coalition partners or the enemy — and what threat emissions look like.
•  The Modular Electromagnetic Spectrum System, which is related to command post survivability and could employ techniques to confuse and deceive adversaries born out of a prior science-and-technology effort called Modular Electromagnetic Spectrum Deception Suite (MEDS). That will be a new start in fiscal 2026.

Other capabilities in the Army’s current pipeline not mentioned include:

• The Multi-Function Electronic Warfare Air Large, a pod-mounted capability on a MQ-1C Gray Eagle drone serving as the Army’s only airborne electronic warfare (with limited cyber) capability organic to combat aviation brigades to support maneuver commanders on the ground.  
• The Terrestrial Layer System-Brigade Combat Team Manpack system, the first official program in decades for a dismounted electronic attack capability that soldiers can use to conduct direction and signal finding with limited jamming on-the-move as well.
• The TLS-Echelon Above Brigade system, designed primarily for divisions, corps and Multi-Domain Task Forces to sense across greater ranges than its brigade counterpart.
• The TLS-Brigade Combat Team system, which was designed as the first integrated signals intelligence, cyber and electronic warfare platform and as initially conceived, was to be mounted on Strykers and then Army Multi-Purpose Vehicle variant prototypes. The Army has now decided to split up the platform, separating the signals intelligence and electronic warfare capabilities, and it will be pursuing a new architecture for its EW suite.

Army officials have also noted they want to move away from major programs that take years to develop through lengthy requirements, in favor of more commercial-based systems that have demonstrated maturity.

The program office added that the Army is considering several ways to be more agile in the electronic warfare space to include the potential consolidation of funding lines to allow for increased flexibility while maintaining acquisition discipline and oversight, and establishing contracting mechanisms to acquire and integrate software solutions faster.

As it currently exists, programs are set up as specific line items with specific pots of money. The Army can’t take money from one electronic warfare program line item and move it to another to adjust to real-world needs, if, for example, a certain technology has matured that could be surged to forces on the battlefield.

Flexible funding could allow the service to move those pots of money to where forces need them, or if a new technology comes along that is ready for primetime.

“You talk to a lot of these companies out there, with tech companies … they will tell you that six months from now, things are going to be completely different. We want to buy a modular, open system architecture systems that we can put any different kind of sensor on. I think that’s going to help with the money problem as well, and that we can continue to adapt,” Gen. Randy George, chief of staff of the Army, told reporters at the AUSA conference.

“Agile funding enables us to buy technology in tranches that work together in open architectures, with interchangeable parts, and software-defined components that can be changed quickly to meet our needs. This is how we move from named systems to capabilities. We have to be willing to make smaller bets within budget cycles and we have to pick winners with more frequency. We cannot buy programs for 10 years at a time anymore. Technology changes too fast,” George said during remarks at the conference.

Officials noted that Congress has been receptive to this need but also wary.

“In my experience, appropriators in particular, are leery of what they see as slush funds. But I think, given the dangerous environment we’re in and the recognition by everyone that technology is evolving as rapidly as it is, there’s more openness to this,” Wormuth told reporters. “We’ve been talking to both members, but also clerks and PSMSs on the Appropriations Committee about how we can perhaps consolidate budget line items into fewer pools and have the ability, as a result, to be able to move money around … We’re not trying to eat the whole elephant all at once. We’re trying to start with more of a pilot approach, see if that works, and if members and their staffs feel like they can have the oversight and transparency that they need to have to do their jobs, we may, in the future, be able to expand it.”

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Those units are part of Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George’s so-called transforming-in-contact concept, where the service plans to use deployments and troop rotations to test new equipment — mainly commercial off-the-shelf gear — that could allow units to be more responsive on a dynamic battlefield.

According to George, there are three areas where the Army needs to be faster and more adaptable when it comes to delivering equipment to forces, due to how challenging the threat environment is and the cat-and-mouse aspect of countering opponents’ moves: unmanned aerial systems, counter-UAS and electronic warfare.

Those transforming-in-contact units include: 2nd Brigade, 101st Airborne Division — the first mobile brigade combat team — 3rd Brigade, 10th Mountain Division and 2nd Brigade, 25th Infantry Division.

Given the rate of change in the electromagnetic spectrum, enabled by software-defined systems that can be altered as fast as a patch is able to be developed and delivered, the Army wants to prioritize tools that can be fielded rapidly.

“My number one talking point in terms of our equipping for the future is our focus on doing limited prototyping and rapid fielding of mature [commercial-off-the-shelf/government-off-the-shelf] products,” Kenneth Strayer, project manager for electronic warfare and cyber at program executive office for intelligence, electronic warfare and sensors, said in an interview previewing his remarks that he’s slated to deliver Wednesday alongside the Army capability manager for EW at the TechNet Augusta conference.

“The pendulum consistently swings and we’re going back towards the need and the desire to get equipment, limited prototypes, in the hands of units very quickly so that they can learn, they can iterate, and we can get early, good enough capability out to the field,” he added. “We’re looking at off the shelf. We don’t want to do all the development in house. I don’t think we need to because there’s now a competitive marketplace out there to be able to buy ready products or things that need minor modification and integration. Long, long list of vendors who are offering some very effective capability for remote sensors and [software-defined radios] and digitization.”

Part of that change is necessitated by observations from Ukraine in which the cat-and-mouse game of systems being countered and counters being countered, are occurring in hours or days as opposed to the Cold War paradigm of weeks, months or years.

The Army is now trying to get out of the business of major programs that take years to develop through lengthy requirements, tweaks and user tests, shifting the way it talks about strategies and prioritization, but Strayer declined to quantify the ratio or percentage of commercial versus major government-run programs in the future. In some cases, though, these exquisite systems are necessary to build for specific needs.

One such system is the Multi-Function Electronic Warfare Air Large (MFEW) that serves as the Army’s only airborne electronic warfare (with limited cyber) capability organic to combat aviation brigades to support maneuver commanders on the ground. The Lockheed Martin-made technology is a pod-mounted capability on a MQ-1C Gray Eagle drone. It has been under development for roughly seven years.

“It’s not like I can go out and just go buy a pod that does this. It required a lot of detailed engineering and testing and packaging. That’s part of the reason why MFEW is taking perhaps longer than some people hope it would because there are problems out there that requires that level of engineering and acquisition,” Strayer said. “We would prefer, whenever possible, to not go down that pathway.”

Strayer said he’d like to get MFEW in the hands of a transforming-in-contact unit following the system’s limited user test next year, but that might be a ways off. Currently the program is getting ready to perform airworthiness certification on the Gray Eagle. Once that’s completed, officials will perform a developmental test at the beginning of next year with a limited user test at the end of the year. Pending the results of that, Strayer said he’d like to get the initial pods in the hands of a unit in 2026.

MFEW has done some support at Fort Drum, New York, with the 10th Mountain Division to demonstrate the payoff of having that high-capability airborne, long-range platform. There were favorable comments from the unit during their recent exercises, Strayer said.

One of the best examples of the new approach is the Terrestrial Layer System-Brigade Combat Team Manpack system, the first official program in decades for a dismounted electronic attack capability that soldiers can use to conduct jamming on-the-move as well as direction and signal finding with limited signals intelligence capabilities.

The system, made by Mastodon Design, a CACI subsidiary, was previously used by U.S. Special Operations Command, allowing the Army to shrink down the timeline for much of the necessary vetting and testing of a new program. The Army awarded Mastodon a nearly $100 million procurement and fielding contract earlier this year.

“It was a huge win for us. I mean, we went from good idea to a fielded product in about 24 months, which is unheard of in acquisition cycles. A lot of that’s because it was a mature baseline. We had a lot of tests and performance data, not only with Socom, but other services and units who had been buying this product over the last couple of years,” Strayer said. “Another good example of how [in] industry there’s now a very robust industry community who’s developing what I call off-the-shelf products that we view more as a catalog buy than a developmental program.”

Strayer said 2nd Brigade, 101st Airborne Division received some of these systems — albeit on loan — during its rotation at the Joint Readiness Training Center this month, to test the system and provide feedback.

Overall, the Manpack system received enough funding in the fiscal 2024 appropriation to purchase enough for two brigades. Pending the fiscal 2025 appropriation, the service will have enough for another eight brigades, with the eventual goal of total Army fielding.

In addition to the Manpack, 2nd Brigade, 101st is also experimenting with the Tactical Electronic Warfare System-Infantry (TEWS-I) at JRTC, a quick-reaction capability built a few years ago by General Dynamics, serving as a smaller system designed for infantry vehicles. While there won’t be any future production on that system given it was a quick-reaction capability, Strayer said it has generated discussion on requirements for light and airborne forces for mobility.

“Because it’s more tightly integrated into a platform, you get some of the advantages of the tactical mobility and the power that comes with that. We’re really interested in getting the feedback and seeing where we go,” he said. “If there is a requirement for this lightweight mobile kit, then we have to look at the payoff as to whether you need some of the more higher-end capability that comes on TEWS-I or if it’s really a Manpack, which is maybe up-gunned and more fully integrated into a vehicle platform. I think those are two different approaches you could take to the problem.”

Strayer noted that other transforming-in-contact units have begun to experiment with other capabilities, although he declined to specifically identify those units. One includes pre-prototypes of a Spectrum Situational Awareness System (S2AS), a new start in fiscal 2025 envisioned to be a commercial off-the-shelf solution that will provide sensing and visualization of what units look like in the spectrum and allow commanders to be able to sense and report in real-time their command post signature, sources of electromagnetic interference — either from coalition partners or the enemy — and what threat emissions look like.

The program office also hopes to get emerging systems into the hands of the these units. Those include the Electronic Warfare Planning and Management Tool (EWPMT) Next, a command-and-control planning capability that allows service members to visualize potential effects within the invisible spectrum and chart courses of action to prevent their forces and systems from being jammed during operations. The “Next” effort involves shifting to the Tactical Assault Kit framework, where applications for situational awareness data and geospatial visualizations can be created for better joint and coalition integration.

The emerging systems also include representative products associated with a new electronic warfare architecture the Army is developing, once established.

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“We need decoy systems such that if … the enemy is looking at us through the electromagnetic spectrum, they can’t pinpoint us. They might be able to see us, but they can’t understand us … We need to be able to raise the noise floor of the signal to noise ratio, such that again, they might be able to see that we are in a generalized location, but the enemy won’t be able to pinpoint or target our capabilities,” Maj. Gen. Paul Stanton, commander of the Cyber Center of Excellence, said Friday during a virtual event hosted by Defense One. “In FY ’25, we believe that we’re seeing the very rapid maturation of these obfuscation and decoy capabilities. We will look at rapidly advancing that technology.”

One of the biggest lessons from Russia’s incursions into Ukraine — stemming from 2014 to its current invasion — is how units can be located and targeted with kinetic munitions solely based on their emissions within the electromagnetic spectrum.

In addition to efforts for units to reduce their overall signature, the Army is pursing technologies that will allow them to deceive the enemy and even hide in plain sight.

Top Army leadership has been harping on the notion that in the future, forces will be under constant observation with nowhere to hide — unlike past conflicts. This is due to the technologies possessed by sophisticated actors to track forces through airborne or satellite systems or digital means of detecting forces based on emissions.

In order for troops to be able to employ decoys, obfuscation techniques or even jamming, they must first understand what they look like within the spectrum.

One program the Army is making investments toward is called the Spectrum Situational Awareness System, or S2AS. It is envisioned to be a commercial off-the-shelf solution that will provide sensing and visualization of what units look like in the spectrum and allow commanders to be able to sense and report in real-time their command post signature, sources of electromagnetic interference — either from coalition partners or the enemy — and what threat emissions look like.

Officials noted it will be critical to allowing units to understand their own electronic footprint.  

A new start in fiscal 2025, the Army requested $9.3 million in research-and-development funds for integration, testing, and technical and program management support of the program. The documents project an anticipated contract award in the third quarter of 2025, with first unit integrated and fielding to the Army beginning in the second quarter of 2026.

Stanton noted there are promising technologies the Army is experimenting with at Project Convergence, which took place from early February to mid-March, in the way of decoys and obfuscation.

He did not mention any specific systems by name.

One system that was tested at Project Convergence was called MAGPIE, which can replicate Army assets — such as company to division level radio frequency signatures — to confuse and deceive enemy signal collection.

At Camp Pendelton, California, during the first phase of Project Convergence, the system was explained to DefenseScoop as being able to collect the signals and signature profile of a command post — or anything that emits — and copy it to rebroadcast as a decoy. A couple of the systems can be deployed to mimic a command post so the enemy doesn’t know exactly where the command post is or which one is the real command post.

The Army has also articulated its intention for a prototyping initiative dubbed the Modular Electromagnetic Spectrum System (MEMSS). This capability stemmed out of a prior science-and-technology effort called Modular Electromagnetic Spectrum Deception Suite (MEDS) and will be a new start in fiscal 2026, Army officials have said.

The effort is related to command post survivability and could employ techniques to confuse and deceive adversaries.

“It goes back to understanding how you look and are there ways to lower or raise noise levels to better hide in plain sight,” Brig. Gen. Wayne “Ed” Barker, program executive officer for intelligence, electronic warfare and sensors, told DefenseScoop in a December interview.

Officials explained that R&D for the effort is ongoing and there could be a range of options for what such a system could look like — from low-dollar disposable to an emulator to make it look like certain radio signals are emitting from a location to digitally replicate a command post. It could also be as small as a handheld device.

The program office is still making small investments to “hit the ground running in ’26,” Barker said. The funding lines are still a bit amorphous and officials believe these concepts could be achievable in the near term.

“It goes back to getting that kind of seed corn and being able to incubate ahead of that ’26 time frame for MEMSS,” Barker said.

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One of the the service’s major takeaways from Russia’s 2014 invasion of Ukraine, was Russian forces’ ability to locate Ukrainian command posts and fire upon them, just based on their electronic signatures.

The Army’s Russia New Generation Warfare study in 2017 spurred several modernization efforts still ongoing today to improve signature management, reduce the size and complexity of command posts, and develop better electronic countermeasures and jamming capabilities.

The service has continued on this modernization effort, renewed by observations in Ukraine’s current conflict with Moscow as well as the sophisticated capabilities of other top competitors such as China.

The goal is to be able to hide in plain sight, leaders have said, which means relying on new technologies and tactics that make units harder to detect in the spectrum, but not hamper their ability to get their jobs done.

“We have got to build a network that is hard to find, that it’s hard to target,” Mark Kitz, program executive officer for command, control, communications-tactical, told DefenseScoop at the TechNet Augusta conference.

The Army wants to tailor certain technological options and concepts based on particular units and the environment they will be operating in. But in order to do that effectively, they must understand what they look like in the spectrum.

“We also have to see ourselves. We also have to understand when we turn on jammers, we have to understand our own network and our own environment,” Kitz said.

A “commander is going to have to make decisions about what parts of the network he’s going to want to enable and what parts of the network he’s going to want to obfuscate,” he added. “Every commander is going to have to make those decisions, because each fight, each snippet of spectrum is going to look so different.”

For example, disaster relief responses will likely be conducted in a more permissive environment allowing commanders to rely on digitally louder technologies such as 5G. However, a GPS-denied environment, Kitz noted, means spectrum will immediately be contested.

“I think the Army has to embrace that each operational environment, the future spectrum is going to potentially look very different,” Kitz said. “Each commander is going to have to make hard decisions about spectrum, signature reduction efforts, and having the thickened capacity that he needs to run his network.”

The signature management issue spans across Army program executive offices. And to allow the Army to see itself in the spectrum, a program will be coming online next year with PEO Intelligence, Electronic Warfare and Sensors called Spectrum Situational Awareness System (S2AS), he noted.

This effort is a commercial-off-the-shelf solution that will provide sensing and visualization of what units look like in the spectrum.

Army units are beginning to baseline their signatures. During a recent operational assessment in Germany, a unit collected what its signature looked like.

Additionally, when units go to the combat training centers for their validation exercises, they’re now starting to ensure some type of baseline as a means of understanding what a normal output might look like to inform their signature management.

“What I’ve seen out of the [combat training centers] is they are starting to collect what the signatures look like of the” command posts, Col. Shermoan Daiyaan, project manager for tactical radios at C3T, told DefenseScoop. “They don’t really have a baseline. I’ve seen some heat maps that showed a signature within CPs from the CTC rotations. We don’t know if it was high or low, or if that’s good or bad. They’re starting to build that type of capability to see themselves, and we got to get there.”

Daiyaan added that commanders are now starting to make decisions on who can talk on a radio because once anyone in a unit pushes that button, they radiate in the spectrum and can be found by the enemy.

“I had one commander would put it to me this way: He says, ‘Shermoan I’m asking myself, who should be authorized to squelch the hand mic on a radio?’ He’s saying, ‘I’m making it an O-6 decision on who should hit a mic on a radio … because I want to hide in plain sight,’” Daiyaan said.

Kitz explained that the program office wants to be able to tailor capabilities to those commanders’ specific needs.

“If a commander is so worried about just keying a mic, that’s a very different operational environment than we encountered in Afghanistan or encounter today,” he said. “I think tailoring that infrastructure is really important, allowing those commanders to understand these are the risks that I’m going to take when I break squelch.”

Ultimately, commanders need those options — and the program office needs to enable their mission, not limit them — because commanders can’t be blindly turning everything on and conversely, can’t turn everything off because the threat of being discovered is so great.

Technology needs

Signature management will be a key area in the Army’s upcoming technical exchange meeting in December, which will be the 11^th iteration. These biannual events gather members of industry, the Army acquisition community, Army Futures Command and the operational community to outline priorities and capabilities to modernize the service’s network.

“I think industry wants to know, hey, this is …a top three thing for [Maj.] Gen. [Jeth] Rey at the network CFT. ‘How do I get in, where can I make an investment to help build out some more of those options?’ I think that’s what we focus on at TEM 11,” Kitz said.

Initiatives come down to “blocking and tackling.”

“Making sure that as we execute radio buys, as we execute SATCOM, across the whole portfolio, that we’re really looking at [low probability of intercept/low probability of detection] and we’re really taking into account what the signature will be,” he said.

On the radio side, Daiyaan explained the Army is looking for capability modes where soldiers can go out and just send enough of a signature to collect packets and position location information.

Others described ongoing science-and-technology efforts involving antenna remoting and obfuscation that puts more signals into the battlespace to be able to hide within the noise.

Other efforts involve ongoing waveform development and modernization.

“We’ve already done piloting of other waveforms … like millimeter wave or free space optics. The signature is like much reduced on those and they’re directional, so unless you’re an enemy right in that line of sight, you’re not going to see the signal either,” Matt Maier, project manager for interoperability, integration and services at C3T, told DefenseScoop.

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