Durandal
07-11-2004, 11:37 PM
DARPA KICKS OFF THRUST TO IMPROVE WARFIGHTING IN URBAN ENVIRONMENTS
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has kicked off a major new investment thrust by issuing a solicitation calling for the development of technologies to provide revolutionary improvements to warfighting in the urban environment.
The DARPA thrust, called Force Multipliers for Urban Area Operations, is focused on developing technologies that will make the planning and execution of urban operations as responsive, flexible and successful as other aspects of U.S. warfighting. DARPA is particularly interested in technical solutions that address the very different challenges presented by warfighting in the urban environment, and that enhance warfighter capabilities in order to reduce casualties and collateral damage and provide higher mission effectiveness with smaller numbers of U.S. forces.
DARPA is interested in 11 specific technical areas:
Novel, integrated concepts of operations tailored for the urban environment to reduce casualties while increasing the speed of operations;
Persistent reconnaissance, surveillance and target acquisition to gather information on targets across a foreign city;
New weapons that provide ultra-precise, beyond-line-of-sight lethal and nonlethal capabilities;
Technologies to enhance mobility in foreign urban areas;
Measures to counter combatants employing guerrilla tactics, suicide fighters and remotely activated improvised explosive devices;
Technologies to develop options for post-conflict stabilization efforts;
Tools to rapidly protect or restore the urban infrastructure or detect weapons stores;
Command, control and intelligence tools for urban warfighting;
Technologies to significantly reduce the logistics and support infrastructure necessary for urban combat;
New modeling and simulation systems that train warfighters using current knowledge of the urban terrain and prepare them to manage stability operations and interact with local non-combatants; and
Component technologies that will enable new system concepts.
DARPA plans an initial six- to 12-month technical feasibility demonstration of individual technology efforts, potentially followed by the development of specific technologies. Funding for individual efforts is expected to range from $50,000 to $400,000 per effort for the first phase of research; the number of efforts that will be funded is dependent on the number and quality of proposals received. DARPA will support research efforts for up to four years, at which time the technologies will be available to the military Services for additional development into specific military systems as desired.
White papers for the initial round of funding are due by July 28, 2004; full proposals for that round are due by October 6, 2004. The solicitation will remain open for a full year. Researchers interested in proposing should review the solicitation, available on the web at http://www1.eps.gov/spg/ODA/DARPA/CMO/BAA04%2D31/listing.html.
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Media with questions, please contact Jan Walker, (703) 696-2404, or jwalker@darpa.mil .
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has kicked off a major new investment thrust by issuing a solicitation calling for the development of technologies to provide revolutionary improvements to warfighting in the urban environment.
The DARPA thrust, called Force Multipliers for Urban Area Operations, is focused on developing technologies that will make the planning and execution of urban operations as responsive, flexible and successful as other aspects of U.S. warfighting. DARPA is particularly interested in technical solutions that address the very different challenges presented by warfighting in the urban environment, and that enhance warfighter capabilities in order to reduce casualties and collateral damage and provide higher mission effectiveness with smaller numbers of U.S. forces.
DARPA is interested in 11 specific technical areas:
Novel, integrated concepts of operations tailored for the urban environment to reduce casualties while increasing the speed of operations;
Persistent reconnaissance, surveillance and target acquisition to gather information on targets across a foreign city;
New weapons that provide ultra-precise, beyond-line-of-sight lethal and nonlethal capabilities;
Technologies to enhance mobility in foreign urban areas;
Measures to counter combatants employing guerrilla tactics, suicide fighters and remotely activated improvised explosive devices;
Technologies to develop options for post-conflict stabilization efforts;
Tools to rapidly protect or restore the urban infrastructure or detect weapons stores;
Command, control and intelligence tools for urban warfighting;
Technologies to significantly reduce the logistics and support infrastructure necessary for urban combat;
New modeling and simulation systems that train warfighters using current knowledge of the urban terrain and prepare them to manage stability operations and interact with local non-combatants; and
Component technologies that will enable new system concepts.
DARPA plans an initial six- to 12-month technical feasibility demonstration of individual technology efforts, potentially followed by the development of specific technologies. Funding for individual efforts is expected to range from $50,000 to $400,000 per effort for the first phase of research; the number of efforts that will be funded is dependent on the number and quality of proposals received. DARPA will support research efforts for up to four years, at which time the technologies will be available to the military Services for additional development into specific military systems as desired.
White papers for the initial round of funding are due by July 28, 2004; full proposals for that round are due by October 6, 2004. The solicitation will remain open for a full year. Researchers interested in proposing should review the solicitation, available on the web at http://www1.eps.gov/spg/ODA/DARPA/CMO/BAA04%2D31/listing.html.
-END-
Media with questions, please contact Jan Walker, (703) 696-2404, or jwalker@darpa.mil .