CAMP GRAYLING – With the advent of drones and other high technology equipment on battlefields, U.S. Army units now have chief technology officers.
Col. Jefferey Roberts holds that position with the Army Reserve’s 75th Innovation Command, 428 Army Engineering Company out of Houston.
Roberts’ company was among the thousands of American military members training at Northern Strike exercises, which conclude today at the Camp Grayling National All-Domain Warfighting Center.
Earlier this week, the company was demonstrating an unmanned ground vehicle – or UGV – that can clear mines without exposing soldiers to enemy fire.
The UGV is sometimes called a ground drone. This tracked vehicle works with two robotic bulldozers.
The MICLIC (or Mine-Clearing Line Charge) has a rocket launcher on top that fires and then pulls a 100-meter-long string of explosives across obstacles, such as a minefield.
When it’s in place, the explosives are detonated and a path is cleared for the troops.
MICLICs are controlled by a soldier operator in a modified semi-trailer. At the Northern Strike exercises, this equipment was on loan from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Members of Great Britain’s Army and Navy were there to train with this equipment as well.
Col. Roberts said being able to train at Camp Grayling is vital.
“Michigan has a wonderful training range, and the Michigan National Guard has been very good at cultivating this area so we could do events like this,” said Roberts, who added that soldiers want to have the best technology.
“They try it out and drive it hard and find out what its weaknesses are and where we can improve on it,” he said.
As the soldiers learn to use it, they provide feedback to the engineers who develop the technology so it can be improved based on that field experience.
This is “very rewarding because ultimately this is going to save lives on the battlefield,” Roberts said.
This year, more than 1,000 military members from countries such as Latvia, Syria, Liberia, and Sierra Leone were participating in the exercises. But military members from some other countries did not acknowledge their participation.
In addition to those training to fight, equipment manufacturers were on site as well to talk with the military and have equipment tested.
“We invited them to test their things, their wares with live people,” said Michael Kroll, the deputy public information officer and community relations manager for the Michigan National Guard.
Soldiers “break stuff,” Kroll remarked.
“No matter what you give them, they’ll break it,” he said. “They have a comment about everything.”
Capt. David Kennedy, the public affairs officer for the Michigan National Guard, said it’s “equally — or more — important to get their hands on the technology here.”
“The worst time to learn how to use a new piece of equipment is when you’re in contact” with the enemy, Kennedy said.
According to Chief Warrant Officer II Aric Peterson, the Army is learning and adapting much quicker.
“We’re always using those lessons learned from the past,” Peterson said, “and still keeping those in our back pockets. But then still looking to the future as far as technology and how to utilize that.”
“I look at drones and I try to figure out how to use them to make a job easier or safer,” he said. “That’s what we do here.”
Northern Strike participants are from the Army, the National Guard and the Army Reserve; the Air Force, the Air National Guard and the Air Force Reserve; two components of the Marines; two components of the Navy and the Coast Guard.
More than 9,000 participants came to Camp Grayling for this month’s Northern Strike exercise.