As the range of battlefield threats proliferates to include systems such as mini-UAVs and loitering munitions, AFV situational awareness capabilities are rapidly expanding to match them.
While the ‘iron triangle’ of armoured fighting vehicle (AFV) design – firepower, protection and mobility – still holds true, it is increasingly an AFV’s situational awareness systems that are becoming crucial to both its offensive and defensive capabilities.
For the first armoured vehicles situational awareness was limited to peering through vision slits or periscopes, but during the Second World War infra-red devices began be used for night vision. The German Fahr- und Zielgerät FG 1250 (FG 1250 Driving and Aiming Device), for example, was paired with machine guns on Sd Kfz 251half-tracks and Pz Kpfw V Panther tanks in the later stages of the war.
Thales
With a rich history in the development of situational awareness technology, beginning with the use of analogue cameras, European systems house Thales was the first company to deploy a fully generic vehicle architecture (GVA)-compliant local situational awareness system (LSAS), which was fitted onto the British Army’s Foxhound protected patrol vehicle. More recently the company was responsible for designing and installing the fully integrated GVA-compliant LSAS for the British Army’s Ajax tracked reconnaissance vehicle and is providing the British Army’s future fleet of Challenger 3 main battle tanks (MBTs) with their primary commander and gunner sights, which feature an automatic target tracking wide-area search and detection (WASAD) capability in both day and thermal modes.
Speaking to ESD in early December 2024, Stewart MacPherson, head of digital strategy with Thales UK’s Optronics & Missile Electronics business, pointed out regarding GVAs that in future all vehicles would feature “one big ethernet IP-based system where you can add cameras or effectors onto that system”. By way of example he noted that the LSAS and sighting system on Ajax has 26 cameras.
“Obviously, if you’ve got 26 video feeds coming in, it can quite quickly overwhelm the user, so probably touching on future technology Thales are at the forefront of developing AI [artificial intelligence] and machine learning algorithms,” said MacPherson, adding that Thales refers to this as the ‘Digital Crew’.
MacPherson noted, “Digital Crew is a collection of algorithms that reduce the cognitive burden of the user to absorb the information presented by, in that case [Ajax], 26 different cameras, but as you can probably imagine there’s going to be more in the future; there’s going to be an increasing amount of sensors on that vehicle.”
MacPherson explained that machine learning-based algorithms, primarily based around convolutional neural networks (CNNs), offer a step change in situational awareness technology by being able to recognise imagery from sensors and contextualise it. This, said MacPherson, means that the software “now has eyes” and will thus lead to changes in how situational awareness systems are developed.
The machine-learning algorithms of Digital Crew are particularly effective with regard to object tracking – for example tracking the movement of small UAVs at distance in a way the human eye simply could not – and object classification, especially since Digital Crew is ever-present across all of the wavelengths of a vehicle’s sensor technology.
“You’ve got television: basically your visual system that the human eye can pick up. You’ve also got short wave infrared. You’ve got medium-wave and long-wave infrared,” MacPherson explained. “Obviously there’s advantages to each mode of sensor, but Digital Crew is running concurrently across every video stream. So if you’re an operator looking at a television feed of a tree line, for example, in the middle of the day, you might not be aware that camouflaged behind that tree line is an enemy vehicle, but the TI [thermal imager] is picking that up. You haven’t selected the TI yet, but the TI has been run through Digital Crew at the same time as the TV, so Digital Crew will alert you and say, ‘By the way, you want to move to your thermal channel because there looks like there’s something nasty behind that tree line.’”
Moving on to vehicle protection, MacPherson pointed out that one lesson from the current war in Ukraine is that even heavily armoured MBTs are still being penetrated by relatively low-cost weapons, such as loitering munitions. This, he said, means that a lot of effort is being focused on both soft-kill and hard-kill active protection systems (APSs).
In this area, Thales is taking the technology resident in its Elix-IR airborne multi-function passive threat warning system and looking to apply it to the land domain. While all APS capabilities require a very high-speed sensing capability to initiate hard- or soft-kill countermeasures, MacPherson noted that current APSs, which tend to rely on both optoelectronics and radar, risk giving away the position of the AFV even if the radar is used fleetingly. Thales is therefore looking at developing APS, vehicle-based artillery and rocket-launch detection systems and also counter-UAV capabilities that are completely passive in their sensing.
One other technology area to which MacPherson referred in relation to future AFV situational awareness capabilities was time-sensitive networking (TSN). “If you’re controlling weapon systems and effectors, you need to be able to provide safe, low-latency, real-time communications with those weapon systems,” he explained, “so it needs to be deterministic. It can be a message that sits on an ethernet network and waits to be picked up. It needs to be deterministic, sent to a weapon system, so we’re looking at time-sensitive networking. We have an office in Belfast that falls under the integrated airspace protection systems [domain], which is anti-aircraft missile systems, and they are looking at time-sensitive networks for controlling the weapon system, so sensor to effector and having a deterministic message set that allows you to know exactly when the weapon system picks up the message.”
One last point MacPherson mentioned was in relation to the need to provide very fast video with effectively zero latency. “Some of the issues that you get and can introduce latency is if you start to compress video and then decompress it at the other side,” he noted. “It can also increase if there’s various network artifacts that are hogging computer bandwidth on the network. Ultimately, what we do is we try and reduce the latency as much as possible. Not compressing it is one way to do it, or sending it point to point over a very fast video format. The latency in video is still an issue, but we can get around it such that there are drivers, cameras, that have to provide video at a very high safety integrity level (SEL) rating, which basically means there’s a requirement on the latency that they cannot be above.”
This is especially relevant to video used by a crewmember to drive an AFV, where even a small amount of latency can induce feelings of motion sickness, but it also affects other aspects of an AFV crew’s effectiveness.
Moving forward, MacPherson noted that Thales is currently developing a new targeting and surveillance solution called the Panoramic Above Armour Gimbal (PAAG) system that will be installed on a telescopic mast on the Bundeswehr’s Boxer multi-role armoured vehicles. The system will allow target designation from inside the safety of an AFV instead of having to expose a dismounted soldier to do the job.
Summing up his points, MacPherson stated that the future “will be dominated by a proliferation of sensors on these vehicles; there will be a myriad of sensors on these vehicles. And in order not to overwhelm the crew, Thales and other businesses need to develop these AI algorithms, this Digital Crew, to reduce the cognitive burden on the physical crew and provide a benefit to reducing the observe, orient, decide, act (OODA) loop. How their customers will win future battles is reducing the OODA loop.”
Hensoldt
Germany’s Hensoldt, meanwhile, also has a significant track record in providing AFV situational awareness systems. Noting that situational awareness is evolving rapidly as battlefield complexity increases, a company spokesperson told ESD in early December 2024 that the company “is pushing the boundaries of situational awareness in AFVs through the integration of innovative sensor technologies and advanced AI-based systems”. Most recently, the company’s digital optics have been integrated into the German Army’s Leopard 2 MBT and Puma infantry fighting vehicle (IFV) fleets.
One of Hensoldt’s latest standout solutions is Ceretron: an AI-supported processing unit that analyses sensor data and provides users with significantly improved and rapid situational awareness. The company spokesperson explained that the Ceretron system “enhances decision-making capabilities by delivering a comprehensive, real-time understanding of the battlefield environment, which is critical in high-stakes situations. The Ceretron unit processes information from multiple sensors, such as infrared and visual optics, merging them into one actionable data stream that commanders can act on swiftly.”
The spokesperson added that “Hensoldt’s digital optics, particularly integrated into Leopard and Puma platforms, enhance image quality and visibility in complex environments. These digital systems allow crews to perceive and identify threats with remarkable clarity, even under low-visibility conditions, such as during night operations or in harsh weather. Together, these technologies reflect Hensoldt’s commitment to advancing situational awareness, enabling better protection and tactical effectiveness on the battlefield.”
In terms of enhancing battlefield capabilities, the spokesperson noted that the “integration of digital optics into platforms such as the Leopard and Puma offers enhanced target identification – crucial for engagements in complex environments. This capability not only improves battlefield survivability but also facilitates faster and more accurate engagement of targets, supporting the rapid execution of military strategies.
“These innovations, including Ceretron and digital optics,” the spokesperson added, “support a shift towards a more dynamic and responsive military doctrine. They enable forces to detect threats earlier, react faster and operate more efficiently in ever-changing battle conditions.”
BAE Systems
While BAE Systems did not have a spokesperson available for interview, company representatives pointed ESD to a range of developments in which the company is seeking to provide enhanced AFV situational awareness and vehicle protection technologies.
BAE Systems’ vehicle protection system offerings comprise sensors, countermeasure systems and AI-enabled autonomy functions designed to reduce the cognitive load on ground vehicle crews, allowing them to quickly respond to potential threats.
Among these is the 360 MVP Sensor system, which according to company literature “improves ground vehicles’ situational awareness, reduces crew cognitive load and integrates easily with other vehicle protection system features – all to enhance crew response time, survivability, and mission success”. Comprising high-definition, extended-view sensors built with BAE Systems’ 1920×1200 longwave infrared camera cores, the 360 MVP Sensor system delivers low-latency imagery day or night, in adverse weather and despite challenging natural and manmade battlefield conditions, according to BAE.
“The large field of view and our advanced algorithms improve situational awareness for ground vehicles and reduce the cognitive load on the crew,” the company states. “These algorithms allow the system to provide early warning of incoming threats such as anti-tank guided missiles, unmanned aerial vehicles and ground forces, allowing crews and systems to respond before the threat can engage. The 360 MVP Sensor system gives crews active vehicle protection with a ‘see first, act first’ advantage, while improving manoeuvrability and survivability in dense, urban terrain.”
Associated with these capabilities is the company’s overall Intrepid Shield concept: a full-spectrum, multi-domain electronic warfare (EW) solution designed to create a protective sphere around platforms in highly contested battlespaces. By leveraging the radio frequency (RF) and infrared IR parts of the EW spectrum, Intrepid Shield is designed to provide a comprehensive suite of protection capabilities while simultaneously implementing open architectures for rapid fielding and continuous system upgrades to outpace the threat.
Meanwhile, in October 2024 BAE Systems announced it had teamed with Kongsberg Defence and Aerospace to bring the latter’s Integrated Combat Solution (ICS) AFV situational awareness tool to the US market. ICS provides AFV crews with the capability to link and share video streams, metadata, target information, slew-to-cue commands and more, which according to BAE Systems reduces the typical threat response speed from minutes to seconds. The ICS capability has already been demonstrated on the US Amphibious Combat Vehicle (ACV) and Armored Multi-Purpose Vehicle (AMPV) platforms.
Closing thoughts
Future AFV situational awareness and associated technology promises to transform both the way land forces fight and perhaps also the design of the armoured vehicles they use. For example, increasingly effective APS capabilities might allow AFVs to be more lightly armoured, thus improving their mobility.
Meanwhile, developments such as the US Army’s Robotic Combat Vehicle (RCV) programme, being developed as part of the army’s Next Generation Combat Vehicle (NGCV) family of vehicles, could see the situational awareness of manned AFV formations enhanced by a forward screen of RCVs, all with their own sensors and effectors. What is already clear is that the old adage of the Second World War era, where it was deemed that if you couldn’t physically see a target then you couldn’t shoot it, is no longer an absolute truth.
Peter Felstead