US Army
- Future wars may “be won and lost in the synthetic environment,” a Royal Air Force officer said.
- Militaries are investing in synthetic training using AI and virtual reality.
- Air Vice-Marshal James Beck said the victor of future wars may only be “validated on the battlefield.”
Future wars may be fought and won in virtual and augmented reality before they are ever fought on the battlefield, a Royal Air Force officer said recently.
Militaries increasingly see advantages in who can model, simulate, and learn faster — not just who can build more tanks or fighter aircraft. Air Vice-Marshal James Beck, the RAF’s director of capabilities and programs, said that it’s “possible that the future will be won and lost in the synthetic environment and it’s simply validated on the battlefield.”
The UK, like most of Europe, is worried about Russia and anxiously watching its war against Ukraine. Beck called Russia the UK’s “pacing threat” and said it “must be our primary focus for many years to come.”
Speaking at the UK’s Royal United Services Institute event last week, he said that in the future, the UK will “need to live every minute thinking how we’ll behave, operating at wartime levels of risk.” As a result, he continued, “much will need to be undertaken in the synthetic environment, and this is why the RAF will remain at those developing synthetic systems.”
“We must assume that our military is being watched all the time. They can see what we can do,” he said.
The synthetic environment is a simulated, digitally-created space used for training, planning, and experimenting. The UK has invested heavily in this technology, and the Royal Air Force has a system called Gladiator in a purpose-built facility.
Gladiator completed its first major international exercise in 2023 and is integrated with systems like the Eurofighter Typhoon and F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter.
Air Chief Marshal Sir Mike Wigston, who was the RAF’s chief of the air staff at that time, said in February 2023 that it would “enable our forces to trial, test, and practice their tactics in a secure environment, linked across all operational domains.”
“It is an invaluable training tool for the next generation of warfighters across air, space, land, cyber, and sea, he added, explaining that it wouldn’t replace live exercises but would complement them.
U.S. Army Futures Command
The US military, likewise, has been investing in this kind of capability. A key project for Army Futures Command, now merged with Army Training and Doctrine Command, was the Synthetic Training Environment. Prototypes have been put to the test by soldiers.
Brig. Gen. George C. Hackler, then the commander of Army Operational Test Command, said after a 2024 test of training systems for armored vehicle crews that the advantage of the Synthetic Training Environment system is that “we can put people in simulated aircraft, ground vehicles, dismounts, and units can train and hone their warfighting skills.”
Marwane Bahbaz, the chief technology officer for the US Army’s Program Executive Office Simulation, Training and Instrumentation, said previously that the STE project aims “to revolutionize Army training” by merging live, virtual, constructive, and gaming platforms “into an interoperable training experience that provides real-life immersion for combat training.”
The Army said that this kind of training reduces wear and tear on equipment and also lets soldiers practice high-risk moves, like flying a plane, “with more confidence and less risk than in real life.”
NATO has also recognized its importance for training.
Gen. Philippe Lavigne, then NATO’s supreme allied commander for transformation, said last year that the way the alliance’s Joint Warfare Center housed simulations and “360-degree synthetic scenario generation” showed how it was mixing “training, conceptual advances, new ways of thinking, experimentation, doctrine, and wargaming — all contributing to the Alliance’s strength and safety.”
These, he said, work “to make NATO better!”
NATO has also launched its Distributed Synthetic Training project to link synthetic training systems among allies so they can train on them together, something that is easier and more cost-effective than the real, physical events.
Beck said that the UK and its allies “will need to evolve. We will need to deliver more” as the capabilities of adversaries have advanced dramatically, from drones to missiles. “To meet these challenges, we must remain agile and adapt at pace,” he said.
While militaries have invested heavily in developing synthetic training solutions, realism and integration remain stubborn hurdles. Systems can be hard to link, can be unrealistic in combat effects, and are sometimes constrained by security demands. Such challenges haven’t deterred efforts to modernize training, though.
Beck said the Royal Air Force’s new chief of the air staff “wants a searing spotlight on fine-tuning what we already have, to maximize our lethality today.” At the same time, he shared, “he’s equally focused on accelerating modernization, such that we can credibly deter.”
“It needs to be done at pace and within this decade,” Beck said, adding that “time is our most pressing threat.”
Read the original article on Business Insider
The post Future wars may be fought and won in virtual worlds and only proven on the battlefield, Royal Air Force officer says appeared first on Business Insider.
