Army bridging training gaps in vehicle convoy operations.

• Author: Tiron, Roxana

The U.S. Army's training and simulation branch is trying to address deficiencies in convoy operations--"a very bad weakness," according to a service official.

"Every day, we are losing soldiers during convoy operations, because of our inability to do convoy operations," said Lt. Col. Joseph Giunta, program manager for ground combat tactical trainers at the program executive office for simulation, training, research and instrumentation (PEO STRI).

To counter the problem, Giunta's office is working on developing a common driver-training system, leveraging the concept of the Stryker Light Armored Vehicle already in development. His goal is to integrate all the Army's driver-training requirements into one solution with multiple versions, one of them being the Stryker, Giunta told National Defense in a phone interview.

Ultimately, the trainer would have to provide a similar functionality as the heavily used Engagement Skills Trainer--a marksmanship training device--to test the soldiers' reactions under attack in convoy operations.

PEO STRI is in the initial stage of building that common driver-training program, Giunta said. "We have found an opportunity to leverage this drivers' trainer for our Stryker customer," said Giunta. Tanks and air defense artillery will be incorporated. "Our goal is to integrate all the organic weapons platforms on our vehicle platforms."

The Army has five other requirements for driver trainers, and none of them are integrated, according to Giunta. "So we are going to build five different driver' trainers in five different locations with five different functional capabilities, and none will talk to each other," he said. The solution was to incorporate all the other devices into one common trainer.

"We have guys who have never fired out of a moving vehicle before, and less than 24 hours in the country, he is doing it live, with the bad guys," he said. "There aren't very many mechanics shooting their .50 caliber [machine guns]."

Nevertheless, the databases associated with the current driver trainers are "pretty static," meaning that they do not present any challenges or obstacles. In Baghdad, soldiers routinely are attacked with rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), mines and improvised explosive devices, but are not trained to recognize them, Giunta said.

"We do not put anything dirty in there, so how can a driver of a Humvee identify that at 40 miles an hour on the Baghdad streets," he said. "You have to see that over and...