Hi-Tech Networking Comes to US Army Armored Ground Vehicles

The US Army will implement its VICTORY initiative, a network architecture and specification protocol aimed at improving how ground vehicles and their command-and-control, computing and surveillance equipment communicate.

VICTORY (The Vehicle Integration for C4ISR/EW Interoperability) began as a way to correct army vehicle problems created by "bolt-on" field equipment. The older approach is inefficient, as it results in duplicate hardware and software, which increases cost and maintenance.

VICTORY is intended to save resources by lessening the need for multiple attachments inside wheeled vehicles and ground combat systems, and will also allow vehicle platforms to share information, providing an integrated picture to the crew.

"Soldiers will find more common sets of devices, displays, and information in a wider range of vehicles ultimately making Soldiers and formations more connected, aware, and capable," according to an Army statement.

The Pentagon states that the overall technical approach to VICTORY includes what they call a "data bus-centric" design, using sharable hardware components, open-standard physical and logical interfaces, a set of shared data bus services, and shared hardware and software components.

The new architecture was demonstrated on a Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle (MRAP) in the Network Integration Evaluation (NIE) 15.2 in May 2015

"The demonstration illustrated how implementing the VICTORY standard could increase situational awareness within vehicles and across unit formations," the official statement reads.

By 2017, the Army plans to have the new networking architecture implemented on a wide range of vehicles, including Joint Light Tactical Vehicles, Strykers, Abrams tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles.