Future Tactical Truck to expedite transportation: Army garnering support for what could be a $3 billion vehicle program by 2006.

• Author: Erwin, Sandra I.

The Army wants to consolidate its various lines of tactical trucks into a single family of vehicles. The next-generation trucks would be modular--so they can be reconfigured for an assortment of combat missions--and would incorporate the latest commercial technology.

With at least seven different types of trucks in the fleet today, the Army increasingly is burdened by the cost of operating, maintaining and modernizing those vehicles, officials said. Further, the fleet is aging, and the Army does not expect it will have the funds to replace every truck under the existing fleet makeup.

Under a program called the Future Tactical Truck System, the Army will develop a multimode modular cargo vehicle, which will have two variants: a larger "maneuver sustainment" truck that will replace the current heavy and medium fleets, and a "utility" version that is the equivalent of a light truck.

The FTTS final requirements still are being written, but a draft document already was circulating among contractors who attended an industry conference in Michigan last month. "We are asking industry for input, so we can fine-tune the ORD [operational requirements document]," said an Army source.

If the Army can muster enough high-level support for the program, FTTS will enter a four-year advanced concept technology demonstration, known as ACTD, in fiscal year 2004.

The four-year research and development program would cost about $68 million. If the project is successful, the Army would begin production of FTTS in fiscal year 2008. Between 2008 and 2016, more than 5,600 trucks could be built, at a cost of more than $3 billion.

The timing is important in this program, officials said, because the Army wants the FTTS to be fielded alongside the Future combat System, a new high-tech combat vehicle slated to enter service in 2008 or 2010. Unlike existing trucks, the FTTS will have to keep up with the frontline combat vehicles.

As a first step toward the consolidation of its truck fleet, the Army Tank-Automotive and Armaments Command is merging three program offices--for light, medium and heavy trucks--into a single program manager for tactical wheeled vehicles.

The current tactical wheeled vehicles "consume too many resources, which increase the logistics tail," according to FTTS briefing charts prepared by the Army's Training and Doctrine Command. Another drawback in existing vehicles is that they lack "efficiency and agility" to meet the Army's goals of "timely, rapid...