SSG Stephen Achee (left) and SSG Elizabeth Engstedt, CSS Automated Management Office, Headquarters Support Co., 449th Aviation Support Battalion, Texas Army National Guard, maintain the VSAT satellite at Logistical Support Area Anaconda, Baghdad Province, Iraq. (U.S. Army photo by SGT Huey Kehl.)

The program to “connect Army logisticians” with their own dedicated communications system reached a significant milestone when the 1,000th Combat Service Support Very Small Aperture Terminal (CSS VSAT) rolled off the assembly line at the L-3 Global Communications Solutions (GCS) Inc. plant in Victor, NY, on Jan. 9, 2008.

The program, managed by Product Manager Defense Wide Transmission Systems (PM DWTS), part of the Army’s Program Executive Office Enterprise Information Systems’ (PEO EIS’) Project Manager Defense Communications and Army Transmission Systems, started in May 2004 as the solution to the Army Deputy Chief of Staff (DCS) for Logistics/G-4’s number one priority after Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF) to connect logisticians with their own communications system to pass requisitions and, at the same time, eliminate the need for Soldiers to go in harm’s way in convoys to hand-carry requisitions.

Some 90 Army leaders and their industry partners met at a PM DWTS facility on Jan. 31, 2008, to mark the milestone. Among the Army leaders were Thomas Edwards, Assistant DCS, Army G-4; Gary Winkler, PEO EIS; and LTC Clyde Richards, PM DWTS.

Borrowing an analogy he heard from former Army Chief of Staff GEN Peter Schoomaker, Edwards compared the early process of trying to connect Army logisticians to “slogging through a swamp,” and said that for the G-4, the CSS VSAT solution was like “jumping out of a swamp and onto a rocket ship.”

MAJ Jeff Etienne (left), APM DWTS-Belvoir, prepares to cut the ribbon on the 1,000th CSS VSAT on Jan. 10, 2008, a day after it rolled off the assembly line at the L-3 GCS plant in Victor, NY. Holding the ribbon is Frank York, GCS President. (U.S. Army photo courtesy of MAJ Jeff Etienne.)

“The number one logistics issue out of the war [OIF] was to connect the logistician,” said Edwards. “You can’t run a distribution system if you don’t know what the user wants. If you [the CSS VSAT government and industry team] hadn’t been able to step up and make that happen, we’d still be on the sidelines. You have my personal and enduring thanks for that.”

Winkler, who became the PEO EIS in October 2007 after serving as Governance, Acquisition and Chief Knowledge Office Principal Director for the Army Chief Information Officer (CIO)/G-6, said that he watched the CSS VSAT program start to connect Army logisticians under former PEO EIS Kevin Carroll. “I saw the CSS VSAT program from CIO/G-6,” said Winkler. “It’s a great program meeting a critical need for warfighters. I congratulate you on its success and look forward to its future success.”

MAJ Jeff Etienne, the Assistant PM (APM) DWTS-Belvoir, discussed the CSS VSAT program’s history, from the first generation of 18 prototype units in March 2004 that used a .96 meter dish, to the current fourth generation 1.2 meter Hawkeye II-Enhanced units that were fielded starting with the 901st unit in November 2007. He said Soldiers’ demand for CSS VSAT continues to increase because it allows users to share documents, pass requisitions, collaborate and conduct meetings online and make voice-over-Internet-protocol telephone calls — all without moving from their location. This eliminates “sneaker net,” the often dangerous need to get in a convoy to hand-carry resupply or spare parts orders on floppy disks.

“Wherever Soldiers are located around the world, they can connect to a satellite through one of our four teleports [in MD, CA, the Netherlands and Australia],” said Etienne, adding, “I feel great every day I put on this uniform. Every day I feel like we’re making a direct, positive impact on the warfighter.”

“The number one logistics issue out of the war [OIF] was to connect the logistician,” said Thomas Edwards (left), Assistant DCS, Army G-4, to Army leaders and their industry partners in Springfield, VA, on Jan. 31, 2008, to mark the milestone of the 1,000th CSS VSAT produced. Looking on are MAJ Jeff Etienne (standing), APM DWTS-Belvoir, and Gary Winkler (seated), PEO EIS. (U.S. Army photo by Stephen Larsen.)

Connecting to Medical, Biometrics and Homeland Security Users
Richards said that the factory-to-foxhole Internet capability enabled by CSS VSAT provides information dominance for CSS warfighting units and noted that, in addition to connecting logisticians, CSS VSAT now also saves Soldiers’ lives by digitally transporting medical supply and casualty care transactions and supports force protection by digitally transporting biometrics and homeland security transactions. “We’ve also provided VSAT to support disaster relief efforts, such as we did after Hurricane Katrina,” said Richards.

Emphasizing that his objective as a PM was to provide a faster, better and cheaper system, Richards said that he was proud that the PM DWTS and the industry team had worked together to reduce the cost of individual CSS VSATs by 35 percent and made process improvements such as doing quality inspections at the vendor’s plant and shipping them directly from there to users. “I also want to tell you that, operationally, we have not lost one single VSAT out of 1,000,” said Richards.

Richards said that the original requirement from the G-4 was for 775 CSS VSATs, that there were 1,000 more “in the pipeline” and that the figure could ultimately grow to 3,000 CSS VSATs before they were done. Edwards said it could be even more. “I saw a chart the other day with the figure of 3,145 VSATs,” said Edwards. “And that figure could grow. Keep making it better and cheaper and the whole Army will come.”