Focus on Capacity Growth to Cope with Peer and Near-Peer Conflict
Army 4.0 – published last week by the Esercito Italiano (EI – Italian Army) – is the planning document through which the service is preparing to face future doctrinal, organisational and procurement challenges. MON’s Italian sister publication Rivista Italiana Difesa (RID) published an exclusive preview – with the in-depth analysis due to appear in the October issue.
Army 4.0 is a well-structured, agile, and comprehensive document, focused on the capacity growth needed to better cope with modern ‘peer’ conflict scenarios, according to the now consolidated multi-domain approach. Moreover, the document contains very interesting news and indications of the EI’s future procurement choices, starting with armoured vehicles.
In this respect, in the short term, the EI has launched a modernisation programme for its main battle tank – Ariete AMV – for which €1 billion has already been allocated, with more to come. This not only allows for significant improvements to the baseline platform in mobility, lethality and protection but will also enable the reactivation and consolidation of appropriate skills to support future European tank programmes.
In the medium to long term, the Army is assessing the Armored Infantry Combat System (AICS) programme, as well as the future European MBT. Army 4.0 sets out two key concepts. Both programmes must be European in scope and simultaneously assure consolidation of the appropriate national industrial capability in the land sector that “maintains an Italian design authority to guarantee the necessary resilience”. Italy will not be satisfied by license production only, then.
Second, new-generation platforms will have to be ‘cyber-native’, highly integrated and connected, featuring multiple protection systems (especially active) against threats such as drones, loitering munitions, artillery strikes, etc. These same platforms “will have to make use of complementary automatic robotic swarms/systems [to conduct] exploration, escort, sensor and alarm functions”.
Artillery will also be modernised. In this case, the EI seeks newly-designed large-calibre units “integrating all systems capable of developing in-depth effects, kinetic and non-kinetic”: long-range artillery and missile systems, loitering munitions, drones of various types, including EW. To this must be added the enhancement of existing MLRS, plus guided munitions for 155mm and other calibres, as well as large-scale development/acquisition of loitering munitions, armed drones and drones for battle damage assessment and terminal fire guidance tasks.
As far as helicopters are concerned, in the short term, the Army seeks completion of the New Helicopter Exploration and Escort (NEES) AW-249 and Light Utility Helicopter (LUH) AW-169M programmes. In the medium to long term, however, it is looking at the US Future Vertical Lift (FVL) programme and the two technologies competing in its field: compound and tilt-rotor. This leaves the door open to various solutions.
In anti-aircraft defence, in addition to the two programmes already underway – the short-range GRIFO and SAMP/T-NG in the medium-range sector – Army 4.0 explicitly identifies a need to define the requirements – in partnership with the national industry – a new family of very short-range systems in shoulder-launched and vehicle-mounted variants.
Finally, the EI also wants logistics to be distributed, more granular in nature and capable of “feeding the entire force down to the individual platform”. Within this framework, Army 4.0 proposes massive use of UGVs for supply and transport, optimum human resource management and containment of threat exposure.
In conclusion, the document marks a decisive turning point in the service’s recent history, which will now have to be supported by robust investment, including that already made and/or planned.
Original at https://www.rid.it/shownews/5159
