A top Marine general in the Indo-Pacific region has a direct message for defense industry partners: Bring more prototypes to exercises and be willing to leave them behind for continued evaluation and improvement.
General Glynn: „Come With Five, Leave Three”
“When you come with it [a prototype], don’t come with one with the intention to take it home with you and all the data that was collected while we conducted an exercise together,” said Lt. Gen. James Glynn, commander of Marine Corps Forces Pacific, at AFCEA’s TechNet Indo-Pacific in Hawaii.
Glynn emphasized the need for forces to have the opportunity to continue working with systems even after a formal delivery or exercise, allowing them to thoroughly evaluate and push the technology to its limits.
“Come with five. Take one or two home and leave three with us and we’ll continue to work on it,” he added. We’ll give you access to all the data that’s coming off of it and we’ll do everything we can to break it with the goal of making it better.”
Speed is Paramount: Embrace Failure in the Pursuit of Innovation
Glynn stressed that in the dynamic operating environment of the future, speed is critical. Forces cannot afford to wait for perfect solutions or for the acquisition community to spend years developing new technologies.
“Partner with us to fail. Got no problem when it doesn’t work,” he said. “If we have the prototypes, prototypes can move very quickly to what we actually operate on.”
Joint Fires Network: A Model for Rapid Prototyping
Glynn highlighted the Joint Fires Network — a prototyping initiative aimed at addressing the immediate battle management needs of combatant commands and displaying real-time, fused, actionable threat information to joint and partner forces — as an exemplary case.
He explained that it originated as an amalgamation of promising prototypes brought together to create a capability, regardless of its status as a formal program of record.
“I don’t care. It’s what we’re using, it’s what we’re going to have to use, we have to move at speed,” he said.
Urgency in the Indo-Pacific: Weeks and Months, Not Years
“What’s my biggest concern,” he added, “your ability to provide those prototypes, your trust to leave those prototypes, and our ability to continue to turn prototypes into programs of record and program a record to deliver on the timelines that we believe we need. You know the timeline. We’re working in in weeks and months, not years out here in the Indo-Pacific.”
