There's an App for That

(Image courtesy of DARPA)

Introducing KILSWITCH, the greatest military acronym of all time:

A new DARPA air support system will enable military members to call an air strike from a tablet. The tablet interface, called Kinetic Integrated Low-cost SoftWare Integrated Tactical Combat Handheld (KILSWTICH) [sic], uses Android and can zero in on an airstrike target within a few moments.

DARPA calls the program Persistent Close Air Support. The plan is for the tablets to use satellite positioning for more exact targeting and calling in UAVs to perform the strike. In addition to cutting the time required for an airstrike the new system also allows soldiers to carry less equipment compared to the radios and laptops they’ve been using.

Foxtrot Alpha says the military recently tested the program in an exercise in Yuma, AZ, that it called Talon Reach. There, the Joint Terminal Attack Controllers (JTACs)—the guys who call in a strike—used ordinary off-the-shelf tablets to successfully launch a simulated airstrike.

Maybe the next US Army drone should do little other than carry small-diameter bombs and at the disposal of Android-equipped soldiers. We — and they — might have to worry less about replacing or endlessly refurbishing the Air Force’s A-10 fleet.