[quote][b][url=/v3/forum/europe-14/topic/arm%C3%A9e-de-lair-fran%C3%A7aise-266/?post=25108#post-25108]rafighter[/url] a dit le 19/09/2008 à 10:20 :[/b]

[quote]French Army Upgrades Fire Support in Joint Effort. By pierre Tran .

The French Army is field-testing in Afghanistan the U.S.-built Rover air-ground data link and Scarabée, a homegrown product from the French Air Force, as part of a drive to upgrade its fire support system. The equipment is expected to help broaden and deepen the Army's ability to call in precision strikes from land, sea and air, by deploying a dedicated expertise to a lower tactical level.

With France taking on a more aggressive combat role in Afghanistan, the need to hone air-ground integration has become evident following the Aug. 18 ambush that left 10 French soldiers dead and stoked controversy on the home front.

Such counterinsurgency operations highlight the role of close air support, increasingly seen as a vital component, while raising the risk to civilians and friendly forces.

A new doctrine of effects-based fire support is to be introduced next summer with the creation of an equivalent joint fire observer mission specialist in the artillery brigades, said Army Col. Jean-Michel Naal, who worked on drafting the doctrine for fire support at the Centre for Doctrine for the Employment of the Forces. The center distills lessons learned from the field and helps formulate the official Army manual.

Under the new approach, an artillery observer will be trained to call in strikes from the air and other sources; nevertheless, the forward air controller can still be deployed with contact troops if needed.

The creation of the new specialization reflects the shift to a joint forces approach, namely the need to call in different sources of fire support rather than just close air support.

The Army and French Air Force currently send their personnel to a training center that turns out forward air controllers qualified to NATO standards.

A Real Break

"This is a real strategic decision, a rupture," Naal said. "The new specialization will create a large number of better equipped, better trained multitasking personnel."

The battalion chief and company captain will each have specialist fire control advisers from artillery brigades attached for training and deployment, qualified to call in support from ground artillery, air and naval assets.

The Army also hopes in the future to have dedicated VAB armored vehicles equipped with transmission equipment and laser designators for calling in strikes.

As part of its transformation, the Army will nearly double the number of fire control specialists to 900 from 500. These specialists will be assigned to the Army's 24 artillery detachments for liaison and observation (DLO in the French nomenclature). Next summer, "coordination" will be added to the official title, creating a new term, DLOC, and a further six artillery detachments will be created.

The Army has already started moving in this direction, which in the near future will allow training and equipping of personnel to call in strikes from sources such as the Tiger attack helicopter or a single-launch rocket system (LRU in the French nomenclature), which the force hopes to acquire soon.

The Délégation Générale pour l'Armement (DGA) procurement office released a tender on July 10, 2007, for a contract to produce a prototype and full-scale production of 27 single-launch rocket systems. The rocket artillery system would have a range of 70 kilometers, all-weather capability and an accuracy of within 5 meters of the target.

To move beyond voice communications between ground controllers and aircrews, the Air Force is testing new digital equipment, including the Rover product, to improve air-ground integration, said Cmdr. Frédéric Solano, an Air Force spokesman.

This reporter recently saw an Air Force team performing a training operation on the outskirts of Kabul, Afghanistan's capital, in which a forward air controller used a backup UHF radio to guide a pilot in a Rafale F2 fighter jet in a practice strike. The dialogue was in standard NATO English, even though the personnel were French, and the secondary radio, which was not encrypted, was used because the main secure radio was not working.

The use of voice messages is slow and suffers from difficulties of comprehension in an allied coalition, where aircrews may be American, British, Dutch or French.

The Right Equipment

"It really is a question of getting the equipment, using the equipment, developing the concept of operations for their forces to work in an integrated manner," said Robbin Laird, a consultant with ICSA, based here and in Washington.

The U.S. and British military forces use the Rover, manufactured by L-3 Communications, which allows the forward air controller to send images to aircrews and to share the same operational picture. Sagém Defense Sécurité, part of France's Safran group, signed a partnering agreement to adapt the Rover to French standards, to allow transmission of video.

The French Air Force, meanwhile, has developed Scarabée, which is not interoperable with allied forces. The Scarabée system was built around the Mirage 2000D strike aircraft and is being tested with the Rafale.

Under Scarabée, the pilot and forward air controller must have the same digital picture, onto which the ground controller sends data that puts the crosshairs on the designated target and shows the positions of friendly "blue" forces.

Naal said that approach requires less data transfer, less bandwidth and is a "lighter, faster solution," as all that is being transmitted are the marker points. But the fact that both pilot and controller must have the same picture poses a constraint, and the system lacks the responsiveness of the Rover.

A DGA spokesman said the agency plans to start tests on an airborne transmitter for an air-ground data link. The DGA plans to borrow the equipment for test and evaluation, but no decision has been made on the suppliers.

http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?i=3723673&c=EUR&s=TOP[/quote][/quote]