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How the Futures Command is helping Army to envision NGC2

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5 months ago

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When it comes to developing the next generation command and control systems, the Army is taking a different approach to capture those requirements.

The team working on program development issued a characteristics of need late in 2024 that focuses on the end result and not the map for getting there.

Joe Welch, the deputy to the commanding general of the Army Futures Command, said the characteristics of need is a central starting point for the NGC2 program.

Joe Welch is the deputy to the Commanding General of the Army Futures Command.

“The characteristic of need is really a signal to industry that we have a problem, and we have a problem statement, and we have an idea about what the solution or solutions may be, and then we think they have some characteristics associated with them,” said Welch in an interview with Federal News Network at the recent Army TEM conference in Savannah, Ga. “But it’s really more of a signal that we’re dealing with a complex problem and that we really need to understand industry’s input into our problem statement, not into what we are saying the solution needs to be, but what our problem is. So that’s really what the characteristic of need statement is all about.”

The Army released the characteristics of need for NGC2 in mid-December. It is a precursor to a bigger multi-year effort to update and standardize command and control across the service.

The Army Futures Command is taking on the job to create the requirements documents to meet the end goals defined by Command and Control Cross Functional Team. The futures command then will provide those documents to the Program Executive Office for Command, Control, Communications and Networks (PEO-C3N) for the solutions.

This multi-organization effort is a recognition that building the next generation of command and control is a lot more difficult and complex than previous development efforts.

Welch said with the range of technology solutions available and the idea that needs and technologies will continually evolve, NGC2 must be agile enough to meet the needs of commanders and soldiers as they emerge.

Always incorporating lessons

The Army has been working on NGC2 for much of the past two years, releasing the first version of the characteristics of need in late spring 2024 and then using an exercise called NetModX to help further refine the document.

The current approach to command and control is disparate and lacks interoperability. A common complaint among commanders is they don’t train as they would fight, which means learning new systems and capabilities in theater.

Welch said the characteristics of need is a living document and will continue to evolve as the Army tests out new technologies and processes.

“The single biggest thing that I think that we learned through this experimentation that we did back in the fall called NetModX is if you think about different war fighting functions and the data and information needed to support those and how they come together for a commander, the need to provide more rapid situational understanding to be able to make more rapid decisions,” Welch said on Ask the CIO. “We had some experimentation with that earlier in the year at Project Convergence, Capstone Four, what we hadn’t done yet is put it over what I’ll call a representative network, the type of processing, compute network solutions, radio solutions, the way that we manage those bits and bytes on the battlefield. We really hadn’t kind of coupled those things together yet. We did that at NetModX, and it just drove home the challenges that we saw there.”

The Army Futures Command took those lessons and updated characteristics of need that incorporates the need for a more cohesive technology stack that stretches from the data to the applications to the transport.

Welch said the characteristics of need included a new section to signal the importance of not piecemealing the NGC2 solution together.

Army TEM 14 is coming

When it comes to the NGC2 technology stack, Welch said the application layer has to be focused on the user’s needs.

“One thing that modern applications have in common most of the time is that you don’t really need a whole lot of training in order to get started on it. When you download an app onto your phone, generally, you’re able to start using it even if you haven’t done it before because that’s a very highly specialized skill set in order to make something intuitive right to understand. That has been in the characteristic of need from the first one that we did back in May, the level of intuitiveness,” he said. “If we can get that piece right, then all the other layers below it that help support that.”

With a goal of implementing the initial capabilities of NGC2 by 2026, Welch said much of the next year will focus on piloting and prototyping technologies and processes with a host of vendors.

The Army is hosting Technical Exchange Meeting (TEM) 14 in Grapevine, Texas where it will meet with vendors about the acquisition strategy, the technology roadmap and technology discriminators. The Army released a request for information to help decide which vendors to meet with. Responses are due by March 19.

Welch said the pilots and prototypes are focused both on technology as well as how the Army works with teams of vendors in that space.

“What we’re about to move into with the acquisition team is what they’re what they’re talking about as a prototype. We’re going to be building that to a bit of a larger scale, working with contract processes that are that are that are built to handle that larger scale, keeping our options open to learn from that and iterate,” he said. “We’re trying to move very quickly, but we are also keeping our decision space open, especially in this very important area of how we’re going to continue to contract for this activity, so that we can incorporate the lessons that we have learned when we get to kind of the initial, larger scale capability in 2026 before we start really expanding that out to much more of the Army.”

The post How the Futures Command is helping Army to envision NGC2 first appeared on Federal News Network.

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Former AOC Campaign Organizer Arrested Over Terror Threats Against Jewish High School

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18 hours ago

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August 10, 2025

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Photo: Ståle Grut NRKbeta

A former campaign organizer for Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has been charged over alleged terror threats she made against a Jewish high school.

Iman Abdul, who previously worked as a youth organizer for AOC, was arrested on Friday for allegedly urging her 25,000 social media followers to “attack” the Leon M. Goldstein High School for the Sciences in Manhattan Beach.

“If anyone needs a public school in NYC to attack for whatever reason … Lexus driving Israhell (sic) loving Zionisits (sic) all attend here,” she wrote in a social media post, which has since been deleted.

“They’ve all gone on ‘Birthright,’” she added added, referencing a program that provides free 10-day trips to Israel for young Jews.

The post in question showed the location of the school on Google Maps so that her followers could locate it.

According to The New York Post, officers from the New York Police Department (NYPD) took Abdul into custody at her Brooklyn residence on Friday.

She was later charged with making her making terror threats, aggravated harassment, threatening mass harm, and endangering the welfare of children

In the summer of 2018, she was involved in the Democratic primary campaigns of progressive figures Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and state Senator Julia Salazar, even serving as a paid canvasser for Salazar.

Abdul’s post was first flagged by the online campaign group StopAntisemitsm, who said she should be “prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”

She later messaged the group directly, where she denied having made physical threats of violence.

“I never called for an attack on the school in the sense of mass organization or not even individual people attacking individuals, that’s literally stupid,” she wrote.

“I called for an attack on the school, the Zionist institution funded by our public dollars … we have every right to verbally attack the school.”

She has since deleted all her social media accounts and is expected in court at a later date.

The post Former AOC Campaign Organizer Arrested Over Terror Threats Against Jewish High School appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

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Jimmy Kimmel Blames ‘Repulsive’ Liberal Activists For Trump’s Return to Power (VIDEO)

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18 hours ago

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August 10, 2025

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Late-night comedian Jimmy Kimmel has blamed “repulsive” liberal activists for enabling President Donald Trump’s return to power.

During an appearance on the Sarah Silverman Podcast on Thursday, Kimmel said without a shred of irony that “loud voices” had scared people away from the Democratic Party.

“I’s not the party. It’s not the majority,” Kimmel insisted. “ It’s the loud voices that scare people from saying what they believe and make you think twice about a joke or whatever.”

“You know, a lot of their points are valid, but a lot of them are also just repulsive, in that they repel people,” he continued.

“They go like, ‘Oh, you’re no fun. I don’t want to be around you.’ And I think that if you had to boil it down to one thing, that’s kind of what it is.”

It is not the first time that Kimmel, who is himself a committed left-wing activist, has accused humorless liberals of costing the Democrats the 2024 election.

“I think a lot of the outrage is completely manufactured, and it’s like, a lot of these people who are angry aren’t really angry,” Kimmel said back in April.

”I think these liberals who’ve done such a good job of viciously attacking comedians are a big part of the reason why Trump is the president right now.”

So Close, Yet So Far: Jimmy Kimmel Actually Nails 1 Reason Trump’s Winning

Following Trump’s victory last November, Kimmel choked up on air as he moaned about the “hard-working immigrants” who might be deported under the administration.

Last month, Kimmel had a social media meltdown after his fellow late-night comedian Stephen Colbert was canned by CBS.

“Love you, Stephen. Fuck you and all your Sheldons CBS,” he wrote at the time.

President Trump, meanwhile, warned that Kimmel may well be next on the chopping block.

“I absolutely love that Colbert got fired,” Trump wrote after hearing the news of Colbert’s firing. “His talent was even less than his ratings.”

“I hear Jimmy Kimmel is next. Has even less talent than Colbert!” he continued.

The post Jimmy Kimmel Blames ‘Repulsive’ Liberal Activists For Trump’s Return to Power (VIDEO) appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

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National Security Advisers From Europe and Ukraine Hold Meeting Today in England, Hosted by UK Foreign Secretary Lammy and US Vice President Vance

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18 hours ago

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August 10, 2025

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UK’s Lammy and US Vice-President Vance will host the European and Ukrainian ‘allies’ for a meeting today.

As we have reported previously, Vice President JD Vance’s holiday in the UK is actually filled with relevant work pushing President Donald J. Trump’s foreign policy.

Today, a meeting of National Security Advisers from the US, UK, as well as European ‘allies’ and Ukrainians, is being held, hosted by Foreign Secretary David Lammy and Vance.

The meeting is taking place at Chevening, Secretary Lammy’s ‘official country residence’ in Kent where Vance is staying during his days in the UK.

Daily Mail reported:

“The aim of the meeting is to bring together advisors from the US, Europe and Ukraine – it is understood to have been requested by the US.

A Downing Street spokesperson said that Keir Starmer and Volodymyr Zelensky agreed the meeting would be a ‘vital forum to discuss progress towards securing a just and lasting peace’.

‘Both leaders welcomed President Trump’s desire to bring this barbaric war to an end and agreed that we must keep up the pressure on Putin to end his illegal war,’ the spokesperson added.”

This meeting follows the news that Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin will hold a peace summit in Alaska on August 15.

“’The highly anticipated meeting between myself, as President of the United States of America, and President Vladimir Putin, of Russia, will take place next Friday, August 15, 2025, in the Great State of Alaska,’ Trump wrote. ‘Further details to follow. Thank you for your attention to this matter!’”

This stay by Vance highlights that Foreign Secretary Lammy has somehow managed to become closer to the Trump administration, having previously called the president a ‘Neo-Nazi sympathizing sociopath’.

Read more:

VP Vance Warns UK Foreign Secretary Lammy: Do NOT Go Down ‘Very Dark Path’ of Censorship

The post National Security Advisers From Europe and Ukraine Hold Meeting Today in England, Hosted by UK Foreign Secretary Lammy and US Vice President Vance appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

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