Home » Intelligence » Army Vice Touts TIGR; Success “In Spite of” System

Army Vice Touts TIGR; Success “In Spite of” System

By Colin Clark Tuesday, December 2nd, 2008 11:36 am
Posted in Intelligence, Land, Policy

A technology that has “forever changed our Army” almost never made it to the troops. Called the Tactical Ground Reporting System (TIGR), it has made it to 15 brigade combat teams in less than four years “in spite of everything the Army could do to stop it,” Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Peter Chiarelli told the Army Science Conference this morning.

TIGR was first developed by DARPA, the military researchers who brought us the Internet. It is what the big brains here at the conference call a collaboration tool. The rest of us call it a shared computer database made up of maps and other tools that allow soldiers at the brigade level and below to share data and improve what they know about the enemy and each other. For those who’d like to read more, here is the link to the official DARPA website.

To get an idea just how much Chiarelli thinks this system has changed how the Army fights, read these claims he made: “It empowers our front line solders like never before.” “The strategic corporal is a reality.” “Before every soldier was a scout. Now every soldier is an intelligence asset.” “It has literally trumped the way we do business.”

Chiarelli made a number of other bold claims about TIGR, but none of them had anything to do with the technology and everything to do with the cumbersome and often flawed process that identifies and funds programs. In fact, TIGR almost never happened. It began life as Command Post of the Future and DARPA was ready to kill the program because it couldn’t find anyone to fund it, Chiarelli said. Regular soldiers saw some examples of the system — sergeants and specialists — and TIGR “spread like a virus.” But Chiarelli said the service’s “institutional antibodies” tried to kill TIGR at almost every step and it was only saved through funding stuffed into supplemental spending bills.

“The Army could not see its value because we were fighting for what was already in place,” he said. I asked Chiarelli what must be done to fix the budgeting and planning system the Army uses, since it so obviously is not getting the right tools to the right people when it counts. First, the Army needs to move as much funding for things like TIGR from the supplemental bills into the base budget, he said. Then, obviously aware he was stepping into a political minefield, Chiarelli said there was “an education requirement” to make sure Congress and the Army know what is needed and what needs funding. He started to offer a fuller answer but he clearly heard a little voice telling him to stop so he did.

A congressional aide in the audience voiced surprise that a senior Army leader had gone as far as Chiarelli did in criticizing the budget and planning process. Maybe the general needs to go further if the system is really as ineffective and cumbersome as he claimed today. It’s an issue the Obama administration might try tackling — fixing the planning and budgeting system. Then again, TIGR did make it to the troops in spite of the lumbering giant that the Army can be. Maybe the system does work sometimes in spite of itself.

This website uses IntenseDebate comments, but they are not currently loaded because either your browser doesn't support JavaScript, or they didn't load fast enough.

Join the Conversation

	DensityDuck December 2nd, 2008 at 1:24 pm One of my co-workers is ex-Army, and he had an amusing rant about development and procurement. He declared that the reason procurement is invariably screwed up is that in the military, procurement is the dumping-ground for idiots and screwups. You don’t want idiots and screwups managing your logistics, you don’t want them doing your mission planning, and you DEFINITELY don’t want them out in the field. But if you kick them out, then you hear a lot of crap about “retention rates” and “force size”, because the grand strategic plan still assumes that we’re all going to die fighting an Atomic War with Russia. So you put the idiots and screwups in procurement (or in joe-jobs like rear-area security, which is where you get Abu Ghraib.)
	soonergrunt December 2nd, 2008 at 1:59 pm Following on the DensityDuck, the other problem in R&D and procurement in the Army is that the people who do get programs have their careers wedded to the program’s success. If the program is cancelled, it is a failure, and thus their career is as well. The result is that the guy responsible for small arms is wedded to the success of the M4 carbine and will do everything in his power to kill any competitors to that system so that he still has a shot at one of the few O-7 billets in contracting or logistics. His career stays intact, and we keep a flawed weapon system. Insert your device/system/widget of choice in place of M4 carbine, and the same thing happens across the board whether you’re talking about camoflage patterns that don’t camoflage effectively, or rifles with known design flaws, or whatever. The guys who run these programs are never Combat Arms officers.
	Afghandoc December 3rd, 2008 at 12:49 pm This is the problem! The disconnect between the part of the military that is developing next gen technology and the people doing the fighting is well known! These two communities might as well be seperated by the Grand Canyon. When are we going to kill this cumbersome Aquisition process and bring in the experts and just develop this stuff like we did during WWII and the Cold War! V/R SF VET
	George Lewis December 3rd, 2008 at 1:37 pm Procurement needs to start in the field and the troops need to do the assessment. From shoes to weapons the war fighter needs to be the requester and the assessor of how the item works. As long as it starts from the top down it will not work. Send the developers of weapons into the field to look for what the troops want and need. The troops often don’t know what is being developed, and what for, before it is handed them. Often it was never needed. But if it looked good and it cost more than what we had, the developers were right there to make it look like it was the best thing on the market
	DensityDuck December 3rd, 2008 at 2:03 pm Afghandoc: We’ll do that when we get past the idea that competition improves products. There’s no need for competition when you have clearly-defined requirements. Either you meet those requirements or you don’t. Indeed, this whole tanker debacle is a refutation of the idea that competition is useful. NG’s offering had a lot of superior features that weren’t part of the contract requirement–but, according to Boeing supporters, those features shouldn’t have been deal-makers BECAUSE they weren’t in the contract!
	Rhyno2-327 December 5th, 2008 at 12:08 pm The people that procure the weapons WE use seem not to listen to our complaints. The M-4 is a prime example. The round has to be placed in the right spot to stop a hopped up on adrenaline insurgent, guys put 2,3 rnds center mass, only a shot in the pelvis stopped him. I said stopped, not killed. I still believe a good compromise would be a 6.8mm round. Do away with the gas impingememt system. Adams Arms is said to have a kit to change the system, by all means, get to doing it. The M-14 has been brought back, and are coveted by thier users. Kudos to the armorers for making the M-14 EBR. Damn fine weapon, and weight is not a problem.
	searp December 6th, 2008 at 9:09 am TIGR put developers in the field from the beginning. That tight connection between the developers and the troops in contact made all the difference. I sure got the lesson of a lifetime. TIGR created a requirement. I heard lots of folks from the requirements organizations (NOT the same as the troops in the field) talk about the absence of a requirement. They only got on board when the BCTs started telling them to get on board. Lots of lessons-learned, but my takeaway is that we have build enormous barriers between materiel providers and the troops, barriers that are so high that the normal Army process ensures that the developers never talk to the users. Customer feedback/customer relations is everything. For DOD the customer for materiel providers is the acquisition command, not the end user. Big, big problem.
	MKelley December 30th, 2008 at 10:49 am searp has it right — we need to push TIGR as the warfighters collection and archiving tool — on the ground with the troops — hosted on FBCB2 — available 24–7 — sync on return to the FOB — with significant events and data-information-knowledge selected and nominated by the leadership for porting to CPOF and CIDNE and injested into DCGS-A. To simple — therefore too hard. MOK
	Chris December 31st, 2008 at 6:30 pm Without impugning anyone’s intelligence, parentage or motivation, there is another factor at work, i.e., that the procurement process is so opaque and apparently random (i.e., risky) that only the very lowest grade people from the requirements office are assigned to have contact with it. The communication difficulties and confused roles (upper-echelon project people talking out of turn, etc.) that proliferate from this result in malfunctioning contracts and skewed programs. Nothing life-or death in my experience, but the principles would apply.