While the brigade combat team has been the primary maneuver force for the Army in the past 20 years during the counterinsurgency fight, nation-state actors such as Russia and China will force the Army to operate over greater distances, necessitating capabilities at higher echelons. These units will be the primary users of the TLS-Echelons Above Brigade (TLS-EAB). The Army plans to build electronic warfare companies that will exist at the division and corps level.
The CEMA sections are cyber and electronic warfare personnel that exist on the staff section at whatever echelon they’re assigned to and act as planners and managers of their disciplines for the commander.ĭespite 1st Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division getting the system in 2022, Holland clarified that most units will continue to receive TLS-BCT through fiscal 2027, so units will have their electronic warfare personnel before receiving the system itself. Additionally, he said, most units will have their respective cyber and electromagnetic activities (CEMA) sections by the end of fiscal 2022, which is around the same time TLS-BCT is expected to hit its first unit: 1st Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division. The electronic warfare platoons the Army is building should be in place before TLS-BCT is delivered, Holland said, though he added the caveat that delivery dates can change.
The 3rd Brigade Combat Team/1st Armored Division consolidated all its 17 series - or cyber and electronic warfare personnel - into a signals intelligence and electronic warfare platoon to ensure complementary capabilities are integrated properly.Ī few units in Europe have done similar alignments with their forces as well. The effort is helping to inform concepts for future multidomain operations, he added. That platoon is a task-organized signals intelligence and electronic warfare formation within the military intelligence company intended to integrate systems such as TEWS and Prophet, a signals intelligence system, into a single platoon for training and operations, Holland said. In the interim, some formations have created specialized units to use these prototype systems, one being 3rd Brigade Combat Team/1st Armored Division, which received TEWS and created what it calls the Spectre platoon. These include the Tactical Electronic Warfare System (TEWS) - an electronic support and electronic attack platform - and the Flyer72 mounted Tactical Electronic Warfare Light (TEWL) - an electronic support-only platform. To date, the Army developed a pair of prototypes with the dual purpose of getting needed capability to forces in Europe and the Pacific and buying down risk for the TLS.