February 29, 2020: The IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) has purchased the Fire Weaver fire control network software for use by its warplanes, artillery and armored vehicles. In 2020 at least one of the four armored brigades will adopt the system. After the armor brigades have it, the six infantry brigades will. Some of the 22 reserve brigades (nine of them armored) may get the system as well.

Put simply, Fire Weaver takes data from existing sensors on tanks and other armored vehicles as well as artillery and warplanes and rapidly (within five seconds) lets vehicles, warplanes and artillery know which available target each combat system should fire at. This eliminates a common battlefield situation where too many weapons fire on some targets while other targets are not initially fired on at all. Currently, tank crews and artillery spotters (troops who call back to tell artillery which targets to hit) have manual procedures for picking which targets they should fire at. That often works quite well, especially during a situation where a tank unit encountering the enemy has an opportunity to fire first. Fire Weaver automates these decisions and makes more effective choices more quickly. The troops and pilots can override the Fire Weaver selected target but tests have shown that Fire Weaver is usually quite effective in selecting the best targets for each tank, artillery unit or aircraft.

Fire Weaver is easy to implement in the IDF because the Israelis have already been providing their troops with better sensors and battlefield networks. For example, in mid-2019 three Israeli firms, responding to an IDF proposal, showed off their versions of the proposed Carmel Concept for future armored vehicles. Three different armored vehicles; the Merkava 4 tank, Namer IFV (Infantry Fighting Vehicle) and the Eitan 8x8 APC (Armored Personnel Carrier) had proposed versions of Carmel installed. Carmel involves several existing technologies plus proposed new ones that would turn an armored vehicle into a “combat system” that would operate with, a crew of two or a robotic vehicle operated remotely (like a UAV) or autonomously to benefit from more information about where friendly and suspected enemy forces were. This information would often be delivered in real-time. This sort of thing provides a tremendous advantage in combat.

The best example of similar (to Carmel) existing tech is used in the F-35 where numerous sensor and communications systems are controlled by software that uses data fusion (merging data from many sources and presenting it to the pilot in a comprehensible fashion) to provide the F-35 pilot with unprecedented “situational awareness”. That means an accurate picture of where the pilot and everything else in the vicinity is. It had long been known that superior situational awareness was the key to victory in combat be it in the air, at sea or on land. Carmel proposes that manufacturers find ways to effectively combine existing tech with improved software. This would include more AI (Artificial Intelligence) to analyze sensor and situational data at high speed and either act autonomously (as ADS, or Active Defense Systems, do) or present options to the vehicle operators.

Russia has already attempted a version of Carmel with its Armata vehicle system. Russia built the T-14 tank and T-15 IFV (Infantry Fighting Vehicle) to demonstrate how their system works. Russia does not have the F-35 degree of data fusion software or even the existing sensor capabilities Israel has. Russia cannot afford to buy many Armata vehicles so their Armata remains more a demonstrator than a vehicle in service. The IDF wants as much of the Carmel System implemented as soon as possible in existing and new armored vehicles.

Carmel is a further development of existing technologies. For example in mid-2017 an Israeli firm announced it was marketing a ground vehicle version of the VR (virtual reality) capabilities already incorporated into some Israeli developed helmet displays used by combat pilots. The ground vehicle VR system is called Iron Vision and it is considered essential for next-generation tanks (like the Merkava 4) which will largely dispense with the traditional dependence on the tank commander spending a lot of time with his head sticking out of the turret to get a better view of the situation, and have smaller crews of crews only two or three. The VR helmet display would not just show video of what is outside but also an overlay of other information or even a map. Israel pioneered the development and use of these helmets and the F-35 was designed to use such a helmet.

One drawback of adopting VR helmet displays on a wide scale, like for armored vehicle crews, is the need to deal with the motion sickness problems some users encounter when first (or always) using the system. This is an old problem that was first encountered decades ago when modern flight simulators entered widespread use for combat pilots. Back then it was called “simulator sickness.” It is related to seasickness, which has been the bane of seafarers for thousands of years and was later found applicable to about a quarter of aircraft passengers. This motion sickness affected fewer pilots using modern (since the 1970s) flight simulators because one thing prospective military pilots must demonstrate is resistance to motion sickness. Simulator sickness was different and many pilots resistant to motion sickness suffered from simulator sickness. It was found that, like the ancient seasickness, over time most people got used to it. This is what the ancients called “getting your sea legs.” But even screened and trained military aircrew sometimes (fewer than five percent) could not adjust to simulator sickness. Because simulator sickness tended to show up after you left the simulator (and your body failed to immediately adapt) the military found that this was a manageable problem.

Commercial VR (virtual reality) developers have a more serious problem as more of their potential users (women in general and kids before puberty) are susceptible and, unlike adults on the job, you can’t compel consumers to do certain things that take time and effort to deal with the problem. Some will try the cure but the reality is that VR products currently have a bad reputation. That motivates commercial firms to find a solution and when they do, the military will have fewer problems with this and it may help air or ship passengers.

The IDF considered all their current options here and for the moment have an alternative, which is simply showing the VR information on flat-screen displays already common inside tanks. Tank crews, however, being mostly young men familiar with video games are more eager to go with the “glass armor” VR. And that is what Carmel uses, in addition to flat screens.

The simulator sickness problem for tank crews is quite recent. The Israeli firm (Elbit) that pioneered the use of helmet-mounted display systems for jet fighter pilots had by 2016 had developed versions for helicopter pilots and crews of armored vehicles. The helicopter version (BrightNite) uses a multidirectional FLIR (Forward Looking Infrared Radar) to see clearly at night and display that data on special helmet visors used by pilots. In effect, while flying at night or in bad weather the BrightNite provides a form of “virtual reality” (VR) that enables the pilot to look in any direction and see what is out there in great detail and in real-time. The visor display still provides pilot selectable aircraft data (speed, direction, overlays of mission data and so on). BrightNite also allows the pilot to look down and, in effect, see through the cockpit floor at the terrain below. This was the inspiration for the “glass armor” VR in armored vehicles.

The IronVision helmets simply display videos so armored vehicle crews see what the day/night vidcams and other sensors mounted on all sides of the vehicle see. In effect, the crew can see through the armor at what is going on outside the vehicle. The IronVision HMS (Helmet Mounted System) is a major breakthrough because vehicle crews in combat are often forced to operate “buttoned-up” (no one with their head outside the vehicle to see what was going on) because of intense enemy fire.

Armored vehicles have been moving towards something like IronVision since the 1990s as more and more vidcams were mounted on the outside of the vehicle and more of them were designed to resist or adapt to combat damage. But the video had to be viewed on flat-screen displays and crew had to click from one camera to another to see in different directions. By now most modern tanks (and many other armored vehicles) have enough cameras to see 360 degrees (all around) the vehicle as well as up. But IronVision eliminates the need to look at a flat-screen and fiddle with camera controls. The crew simply turn on the HMS and see whatever they want by turning their heads. This is particularly critical in urban combat, where enemy troops, especially those armed with anti-vehicle rockets, can be anywhere, including the upper floors of buildings.

The tech for IronVision was developed from a concept that goes back to the 1950s when work on “smart helmets” developed for fighter pilots first began. At first, this was all about creating a HUD (Heads-Up Display), which at first was a system that projected data on a small transparent screen in front of the pilot. These first appeared in the late 1950s and were common in jet fighters by the late 1960s. The first helmet-mounted displays appeared in South Africa in the 1970s. In the 1980s Israeli companies took the lead in developing this technology, and made many technical breakthroughs that led to DASH (Display and Sight Helmet) system in the 1980s. Elbit teamed up with American firms to develop and market JHMCS (Joint Helmet Mounted Cueing Systems), which is largely an improved DASH system and entered service in 2002. Since then the technology has been developed rapidly to produce a combined VR and HUD.

The first visor displays soon evolved into the equivalent of a see-through computer monitor or HUD on the helmet visor. By 2000 this evolved to versions that enabled the pilot to can turn his head towards a target, get an enemy aircraft into the crosshairs displayed on the visor, and fire a missile that will promptly go after a target the pilot was looking at. There is an additional advantage in letting the pilot look around more often without having to look down at cockpit displays, or straight ahead at a HUD mounted in front of the pilot just inside the canopy. The helmet-mounted HUD gave an experienced pilot an extra edge in finding enemy aircraft or targets, and maneuvering to get into a better position for attacks. These pilot helmets were also useful for air-to-ground attacks, which the latest VR versions like BrightNite and IronVision are also designed to do.

While Fire Weaver and Carmel might sound like a daring leaps into future tech, they are not. These are the next steps in organizing existing tech into something more useful and effective on the battlefield. At its core, Carmel seeks the best design of an armored vehicle cockpit where two operators sitting side by side have much improved situational awareness and, depending on the type of vehicle, a different array of automated weapons at their command. For a tank, this would be the main gun, an RWS (Remote Weapons Station) atop the turret with a machine-gun in addition to ADS. An IFV would have an autocannon, RWS, ATGMs (Anti-tank guided missiles) and ADS while the APC would lack the small turret with the autocannon. The IFV and APC would also carry infantry in the back, who would dismount with a better idea of the situation outside. There is also a smaller version of Iron Vision for infantry that consists of an eyepiece displaying situational awareness data. The eyepiece has been tested and it would flip up and turned off as needed. Infantry, more than anyone on the battlefield, depend on situational awareness to survive and win.

In 2019 the IDF started using several versions of the Carmel implementation in some older armored vehicles, new vehicles, for testing. This may later involve testing of crewless (remotely controlled/autonomous) vehicles as well. The Carmel concept already envisions a third crew member sitting behind the two-vehicle operators to control nearby crewless vehicles. With the addition of Fire Weaver armor crews and their air support can find targets more quickly and eliminate the threat.