The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has introduced a program that aims to create digital tools to support the U.S. military’s expeditionary operations in complex urban locations such as coastal cities.
DARPA said Thursday the Prototype Resilient Operations Testbed for Expeditionary Urban Scenarios program seeks a software platform for tablets and other personal devices to facilitate adaptive composition of multiple battlefield elements.
PROTEUS also seeks to demonstrate new tools and concepts across air, ground, sea and electromagnetic spectrum domains with an interactive virtual testbed.
The platform will be built to help military users compose dismounted forces, manned aircraft, unmanned aerial vehicles and other assets across various command levels as troops operate.
“We aim to amplify the initiative and decision-making capabilities of [non-commissioned officers] and junior officers at the platoon and squad level as well as field-grade officers commanding expeditionary landing teams,” said John Paschkewitz, a DARPA program manager.
“We want developers to come up with innovative, decision-focused, virtual worlds that correctly capture the complex and non-linear consequences of choices made at both the command and tactical levels by both friendly and opposing forces,” Paschkewitz added.
DARPA will host a proposers day for the PROTEUS program on June 30 in Arlington, Virginia, to gather input from potential developers of urban warfare concepts.
