The United States Army has taken a decisive leap toward the future of warfare, testing the first prototype of its new „data layer” this week in the Pacific as part of its top modernization initiative: Next Generation Command and Control (NGC2). Focused on accelerating decisions using artificial intelligence, this strategic innovation was put to the test with the 25th Infantry Division.
Speed: The New Secret Weapon
Brig. Gen. Michael Kaloostian, director of the Command and Control Future Capability Directorate at Army Transformation and Training Command, underscored the critical importance of speed in gaining decision dominance over adversaries. „Next Gen C2 is the vehicle, I think, that’s going to bring artificial intelligence and its capabilities to our commanders in the future,” Kaloostian told reporters. He emphasized that data accessibility and security are paramount, as without them, software and algorithms cannot function effectively, and AI cannot be trained.
The test, dubbed „Lightning Surge” (formerly „Lightning Strike”), is part of a series of serialized events incrementally adding capability to prototype the data layer portion of NGC2, ahead of the Army’s headlining multi-domain experiment, „Project Convergence.”
A Technological Symphony: Lockheed Martin and Ivy Sting
This exercise in Hawaii has a parallel initiative, „Ivy Sting,” conducted with the 4th Infantry Division, where Anduril was awarded a contract to develop another NGC2 prototype. For „Lightning Surge,” the Army awarded Lockheed Martin a $26 million Other Transaction Authority last September to provide an integrated data layer for the 25th ID. NGC2 aims to offer commanders a modern approach to managing information, data, and command and control with agile and software-based architectures. The Army maintains that these two NGC2 prototyping efforts are not competing but complementary, aiming to inject a diverse set of capabilities and vendors to inform the eventual NGC2 ecosystem.
Unveiling the Battlefield in Real-Time
During „Lightning Surge 1,” conducted Tuesday through Thursday at Schofield Barracks, the Army’s priority was to establish and validate an NGC2 prototype common data layer with edge-to-common operating picture feeds for enhanced command and control. This common data layer operates on the 25th ID’s existing transport and compute environment, enabling data to be updated everywhere in real time once integrated into the architecture. The goal was simple: „Can we just visualize the battlefield?” an Army official explained. „Do we understand where people are? Do we understand our graphics control measures? Basically, how people ought to move and where they can’t move.”
The service assessed how the NGC2 data layer improves the division’s ability to securely and rapidly provide commanders with shared data between networks and platforms, enable division maneuver by integrating and visualizing adversary and friendly electromagnetic emissions, and accelerate commander updates using an AI pipeline to automate the radio reporting process.
Lockheed Martin and its team of vendors built and delivered a common data layer augmented by AI tools, one that enables voice and chat natural language processing for spot reporting. „This initial test is going to be really to demonstrate the data layer and the construct that we’ve put together… This is really software centric,” stated Chandra Marshall, vice president and general manager of multi-domain combat solutions at Lockheed. „From a prototype perspective, the entire system that we’ve had and our vision for it is centered around AI capability.”
From Radio Voices to Digital Maps
A concrete example of AI’s impact is the improvement of the radio reporting process. Currently, this process is manual and laborious, involving listening to radio calls and transcribing locations onto maps. With the power of data and AI, that information can automatically populate on a common operational picture, visible to all relevant and cleared units across the battlefield.
„Think about what that dynamically changes. No more do you have somebody come on your radio and somebody’s like, can you please say that number over again? It shows up on the map and it really helps reduce the speed and the accuracy of what you’re able to do timelines,” an official stated.
Future Waves of Innovation: Logistics and Airspace
„Lightning Surge 2,” planned for February 2026, will explore the digitization and incorporation of kinetic and non-kinetic effects into the system, focusing on fire missions. Subsequently, „Surge 3” will address airspace, and „Surge 4” will concentrate on logistics.
„All of these pillars are data focused, data specific pillars,” an Army official declared. „Not only are we now understanding where we are, understanding where our assets are, understanding how we can affect lethality on the battlefield, but then also what are the logistics tail, logistics requirements that are informed from the bottom up, not from strategic inventories or assets.”
Marshall mentioned that the Lockheed team recently added Rune Technologies for a logistics capability, complementing existing partners Raft and Accelint. The process involves gaining Army feedback and integrating the best suppliers, with the flexibility to adapt the team as needed. This iterative and flexible approach, with „Lightning Surge” events planned in approximately one-month increments, will allow the Army to demonstrate new capabilities and refine the future NGC2 in the field.
