AFRL Directed Energy war gaming - ACE 10

  • Published
  • By Connie Rankin
  • 377th Air Base Wing Public Affairs
Kirtland Air Force Base, NM --  Air Force Research Laboratory's Directed Energy Directorate held its second Advanced Concepts Event during the week of May 17. ACE is the Air Force's only Distributed Mission Operations experimentation war game designed to demonstrate directed energy technology concepts for military applications. AFRL has sponsored six ACE events.

Participants included Army, Air Force and Navy in 12 locations positioned throughout the United States. Contractors participating in this event were Northup Grumman, Lockheed Martin, AEGIS, Schafer, Science Applications International Corporation, MEI Technologies, and Applied Research Associates.

The event allows Army, Navy and Air Force researchers to use innovative technologies in a virtual battlefield. Simulations using these technologies in war games get the added benefit of "feedback" from operational warfighters in the battlefield. Results from the experimental virtual battlefield determine whether the technology will be developed and integrated for a real-world battlefield system.

Additionally, a war game Common Operating Picture was linked into the Pentagon's Warfighter Capability Demonstration Center facility for observation.

Rudy Martinez, AFRL's Directed Energy Directorate's Wargaming team leader, explained that a secure distributed network links all ACE 10 facilities and participants together via the fiber optic Distributed Research Environment Network. He said ACE 10 demonstrated technology simulations in Space, Cyber, Strategic and Tactical domains.