Exercise Omni Fusion, which took place last month, was an opportunity for both the UK and US military to improve on the information systems which are currently used by coalition partners in Afghanistan and on other operations across the world.
Omni Fusion is an annual event of a five-year experimental campaign plan, principally with the US Army, but also with two other coalition partners, Australia and Canada.
Through electronic simulation it aims to identify capability gaps and provides potential solutions relating to battle command. This year the experiment focused on identifying insights related to the human dimension of battle command within the context of division and joint operations.
The main event was the simulation experiment (SIMEX) to examine battle command concepts for the 2017 timeframe in which a fictional allied nation has requested US and coalition assistance in restoring the international border.
Although the controlling headquarters of the exercise was at Fort Leavenworth, a total of 450 military and civilian personnel from 12 different organisations based in ten different locations spread across America took part.
For the past two years there has been involvement from the UK but this is the first year that a UK Brigade Headquarters has deployed using British equipment and systems.
In the operation, staff from the British Army's 12 Mechanized Brigade Headquarters worked alongside the Battle Command Battle Laboratory at Fort Leavenworth. The brigade staff acted as 'rats in a laboratory' with technical staff from the Land Warfare Centre acting as the scientists setting more and more challenging scenarios for them to test. These included massive failure to a computerised command and control system caused by solar flares, viruses and worms.
The work done on Exercise Omni Fusion will immediately benefit British and coalition forces, particularly in Helmand province, Afghanistan, where the US Marine Corps are operating directly alongside UK forces.
Commenting on the operation, Commander of 12 Mechanized Brigade, Brigadier David Cullen, said:
"Coalition warfare is the future, it's not a question of can we make this work - we must make this work.
"We need to push information as best as we possibly can across the systems, to share situational awareness and understanding, to develop joint planning processes and really build capacity. The lessons developed and learnt on Omni Fusion will allow us to do things more dynamically in real time and space."
Colonel Mark Forman, US Army, Deputy Director Battle Command Battle Laboratory, commented on the work done by 12 Mechanized Brigade:
"The realism that is brought by 12 Brigade is superb. They are able to bring relevant operational insights from current deployments into the experimentation so that when they are sending reports, when they are doing their military activities, it's very much like what you would find in theatre today.
"I think the work done on Omni Fusion now as well as on Talon Strike in the future will make huge strides towards greater communication, greater procedural knowledge of each others actions and the ability to understand one another much better as far as our doctrine, training and preparation for future operations are concerned."
Next May Exercise Talon Strike with the 101st US Division will see the systems really being tested as 12 Mechanized Brigade will be based at Warminster with the rest of the exercise players in America:
"This will be an important step for the system and for distributed training," said Brigadier Cullen.
"Because if we can get it right it means that formations going into coalitions on future operations can train with those formations by staying in the UK, reducing expense and getting far greater integration and interoperability."
Experiments like Omni Fusion and the digital warfighting experiment are important to the Army's long range success because they allow the Army to test concepts in a laboratory before it has committed resources to changes and improvements which will ultimately be tested on the future battlefield.