Army Going Over to EoIP

May 23, 2006

Here's a very interesting article based on a speech given recently by Lieutenant General Steven Boutelle, who is CIO/G6 of the U.S. Army. The article describes the Army's IT strategy, and the general had some very interesting things to say about how they are implementing IP communications in all of their operations.

Here is a partial quote from the piece I found particularly fascinating:

"Everything over IP [EoIP] is important. As we convert from circuit-based to IP-based systems, some good things happen. Some of the first people to do that in our community were the Joint Communications Support Element at McDill AFB and the Joint Special Operations Command. They did this on their own initiative. They said they were tired of circuit-based switches, and were going to convert to converged IP—data, voice and video teleconferencing. It’s all IP-based. What do you gain by that? First of all, after they went to EoIP, it’s now only a three-man or –woman team, which is scalable, flexible, costs less, has a smaller footprint, and you get more capability. These packages are deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan today. You also reduced your lift requirement from four C-130s to one ….

"When you move to an EoIP world, which everyone is doing across the DoD at different speeds, you start to get all this capability. So what we did in the Army was to look at what they had done very closely. Then we sent teams into Iraq to ask what the warfighter really wanted. What do you really need here—not what you need for a fight on the North German plain but what do you need in a fast-moving force that is heavily dependent on video, BFT and UAV? The Joint Network Node [JNN] is what they came up with and we built and provided it in 18 months, with the budget supplementals, to eight divisions in the Army—80 percent of the Army; and many of the National Guard and Reserve units have been converted or are converting. Today you can go into Iraq and Afghanistan, and find the 10th Mountain Division, 4th Infantry Division and 101st Airborne, with an all IP-based C2 system. One year ago, they were all Mobile Subscriber Equipment—circuit-based.

"The Army deployed JNNs to the 3rd ID when they went to Iraq for the second time and gave them IP systems. The additional divisions I just mentioned were “funded and provided” with the JNN systems prior to going into Iraq, and other units are being funded and provided as we speak, along with the associated National Guard and Reserve units. The last two divisions to be fielded will complete 10 active component divisions, and then we will have 100 percent of Army active divisions and the associated National Guard and Reserve divisions with EoIP. That means they’re all running Voice over IP, Red Switch, VTC, SVTC, SIPR and NIPR networks, and classified and unclassified video, and we put in a Vantage Switch so that they can talk to anyone who’s still on a legacy system. It’s efficient, commercial-off-the-shelf equipment. It’s easy to do and it’s cheaper.

"When you can go from four C-130s to one C-130 and improve capability, you’re in business. That is a great success."

AB -- 5/23/06