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 The goal of Land Warrior is to enhance a soldier's
mobility, situational awareness (command and control and
communications), lethality, sustainability and survivability.
According to its original schedule the US Army planned to field the
Land Warrior Initial Capability (IC) systems in 2004. According to the
revised schedule, only test items will be deployed in October
2004 with initial systems supplied only Special Operations
and Ranger battalions but even these are not being delivered and the
entire program is shifted to start in 2006.
Operational testing of improved, more mature Land Warrior suits will
be with mechanized Infantry Stryker brigades, redesigned as
Upgrade I, or Stryker Warrior systems. Such testing is currently
planned toward 2006. Despite the delays, the program
is maintained at a high priority, and is now managed in a faster
spiraling development path, pushing subsystems to the field as
soon as they mature. Among the near term applications
resulting from this process included issue of personal protection
body armor improvements, lighter-weight helmets and the
Commander's
Digital Assistant (CDA).
The integration and optimization of Land Warrior
components and suits focusing on Upgrade I phase, optimized for the infantry teams operating with the Stryker APC. Future
Stryker infantry teams will be able to utilize their
Stryker Warrior combat suits for mounted, as well as dismounted operations.
Through 2015, the U.S. Army is
expected to procure up to 34,000 Land Warrior suits at a total
program cost of around $8 billion. |
