Summary

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the status of the technical and integration challenges that the Army will confront when it integrates five battlefield command and control systems and three communications systems into the Army Tactical Command and Control System (ATCCS).

GAO found that: (1) the Army took steps to manage ATCCS as a system of systems in various phases of development and deployment; (2) the Army needed to resolve over 40 technical problems that were important in developing and integrating the component systems into ATCCS; (3) the Army did not fully define how the component systems would integrate into the overall ATCCS configuration; (4) the Army did not analyze the communications work load to determine whether the communications systems for ATCCS would be adequately sized; (5) the Army was developing an automated communications planning and management system to obtain the substantial operational benefits that could be derived by managing the separate communications systems as one composite system; and (6) independent oversight will help ensure that the Army views ATCCS as a system of systems.