Photo By Master Sgt. Ryan Matson | The 7th Army Training Command Mission Partner Environment team poses for a staff photo...... read more read more
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GRAFENWOEHR, Germany - For the past six years, Soldiers have been driving past the fenced-off construction lot where the former movie theater sits on Camp Aachen part of the Grafenwoehr Training Area in Germany.
It is the theater where many older or retired Soldiers who served at Grafenwoehr (Elvis Presley allegedly included) viewed movies or attended graduations years ago. As it was being renovated, many passersby may have wondered, “What is going on there?”
The theater is now the site of Mission Partner Environment, the 7th Army Training Command’s newest communication training platform.
What is the Mission Partner Environment?
Basically, MPE is a communications platform used by the U.S. Army and its allies and partners, with the capability to communicate on a single network to maintain a digital common operating picture and common core services across the globe.
“The shift from an episodic training network toward a persistent MPE training network will have a profound impact on Army senior leadership’s view on information sharing,” Brandon Waugh, 7th ATC MPE Division Chief, explained. “Standardizing the way the Army shares information with mission partners will reduce the costs associated with building tailor-made networks for each mission, along with the time required to deliver the capability.”
The old theater was transformed into a state-of-the-art, multi-million-dollar facility designed to provide long-term training capabilities to the U.S. Army and its allies and partners, Waugh said. The theater now serves as the MPE hub for the 7th ATC.
David Martin, a network engineer with MPE, explained that the MPE team at Grafenwoehr is the network and services provider for training at the 7th ATC, while the main proponent for the platform is the U.S. Army Europe and Africa Command Mission Command Support Division and MPE Division.
“They have a lot of the servers and manpower that brings these common operating pictures together at that level,” Martin said.
Although the MPE network is vital to multinational interoperability, it would not be effective without the Joint Multinational Readiness Center’s and Joint Multinational Simulation Center’s superb ability to provide stimulation, simulation, and mission command services to the U.S. and its unified action partners, said Waugh.
“Together our commands provide live, virtual, and constructive training that improve lethality and readiness to our [training] audiences,” Waugh said.
Why a persistant MPE is important
Waugh explained that historically, training is episodic, meaning network connections, configurations and equipment need to be prepared prior to each exercise, resulting in preparations that are both costly, time-consuming, and reoccurring.
A persistent training environment provided by MPE reduces the amount of unnecessary network setups, by providing persistent connections, Waugh said.
“What really makes this mission top-notch is that any combat brigades that come to Hohenfels or Grafenwoehr for an exercise rotation can already begin configuring their MPE network en route which allows them to have their computer accounts and network configuration in place prior to arriving here,” Waugh said. “The same is true if they were traveling into theater for a conflict – they can easily do the same thing, not just us, but all our allies can be instantly connected.”
The ability to train as they fight is the true value of MPE to the warfighter, Waugh said.
“That’s what’s important about this to an exercise participant,” Waugh said. “Now they are training on the same systems they would potentially go to war with – it will look exactly the same. It all goes in line with our motto: readiness first, train to win!”
More importantly, Waugh said, MPE provides the ‘communicate’ in the old Army adage of what is important for an Army to fight and win on the battlefield – shoot, move, and communicate. Nothing is more important to commanders than the ability to have a reliable platform to receive accurate information on the enemy and to communicate the actions for Soldiers to take.
Beyond that, Martin emphasized that MPE really provides joint interoperability amongst allies and partners.
“We have to be able to talk to our [allies and partners] to be effective as a total fighting force,” Martin said. “Any time lost in communication could potentially cost lives.”
How it all started
Martin explained that MPE was born partly based on constructive after-action review comments made by deployed units after returning from Afghanistan in 2017.
“They commented on how they had to build separate e-mail accounts to go into Afghanistan, they had to re-configure all of their hard drives on their mission command systems- systems to send messages back and forth from partner nations in time of need,” Martin said.
Based on those comments, in 2018 during the Joint Warfighter Assessment and Saber Strike exercises, the concept of a multi-national, interoperable communications network started developing. Three Operational Needs Statements were then drafted and sent to the Department of the Army leadership, Martin said.
The ONS was approved, leading to the initial purchase of network equipment necessary to make MPE possible, but the system still lacked a physical home at 7th ATC.
Meanwhile, the Camp Aachen theater was being refurbished and remodeled with the intention to be used as a multi-purpose building capable of hosting ceremonies, meetings and other similar functions, Waugh said.
Waugh and the initial team of four MPE employees started in March of last year to take the strategic and persistent training environment mission to completion.
Then COVID happened, Waugh recalled, meaning the team had to complete the project under the restrictions and challenges brought forth by the pandemic.
“We had to resource computers, monitors, phones, networking equipment, personnel, facility, and build the network throughout the Grafenwoehr Training Area,” Waugh said.
Within a year’s time, the team was able to repurpose the design and layout of the empty theater to house MPE, capable of hosting 60 multi-national exercise participants.
Some of the state-of-the-art equipment in the MPE include a massive video screen which allows commanders to watch operations such as airborne drops in real time. The facility boasts more than 140 communication/computer work areas equipped with nonclassified and secret internet protocol router networks, and voice over internet protocol phone stations for exercise participants. Each work station sits atop heavy-duty table-tops supported by lift systems. Waugh said each piece of equipment inside the MPE facility was specifically designed to be easily accessible, durable, and contain a futuristic yet functional look.
“We tried to provide the most-modernized facility possible to give the warfighter the best technical platforms to be able to communicate the commander’s intent to his or her subordinates,” Waugh said.
The full MPE staff is continuing to be assembled. A total of 13 people will be charged with carrying out the MPE mission at Grafenwoehr, Waugh said. Thus far, there are eight employees, all of whom are prior service veterans. The team consists of, or will eventually include, help desk personnel, network personnel, server administrators and cybersecurity personnel and the management.
Currently, the MPE system is operational at Grafenwoehr, Waugh said. The next milestone date in the system’s development will take place on April 20, when the exercise control group goes live, testing MPE’s true functionality in an actual training environment for DEFENDER-Europe 21.
DEFENDER-Europe is an annual large-scale U.S. Army Europe and Africa-led, multinational, joint exercise designed to build strategic and operational readiness and interoperability between U.S., NATO allies and partners.
The future
Waugh said that as more countries become equipped with and are able to communicate on the MPE system, the operational possibilities will also increase.
“In the past, we’ve typically been able to perform exercises in the European region,” Waugh said. “Eventually, with MPE’s capabilities, we will be able to replicate real-world operations by conducting and managing battlefield operations on a standardized network using common core services and interoperable mission command systems to conduct global exercises”.
| Date Taken: | 04.10.2021 |
| Date Posted: | 04.10.2021 12:34 |
| Story ID: | 393539 |
| Location: | GRAFENWOEHR, DE |
| Web Views: | 1,311 |
| Downloads: | 1 |
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