US Army preps new Command Post Computer Environment increment

The US Army command post during Joint Warfare Assessment 2021 at Fort Carson, Colorado, which was the culmination of testing for CPCE Increment 1. (Amy Walker/US Army PEO C3T public affairs)

The US Army, making steady progress in rolling out its Command Post Computer Environment (CPCE), has started planning the next increment.

CPCE is the central computing environment developed to support command posts and combat operations. It aims to reduce stove-piped legacy systems and provide an integrated, interoperable, cyber-secure, and cost-effective computing infrastructure for multiple warfighting functions. It is to provide army programmes with a core infrastructure, including a common operating picture (COP) tool, common data strategy, common applications such as mapping and chat, common hardware configurations, and a common look and feel.

Speaking during the Association of the United States Army annual convention in early October, Colonel Matt Paul, project manager mission command in the programme executive office for command, control, communications-tactical (PEO C3T), told Janes that the CPCE software was being introduced on a two-year cycle across active, National Guard, and Reserve components. Increment 0 had been fielded to about 20% in 2019.

Development and testing of CPCE Increment 1 was complete, he said. Testing had culminated in the Joint Warfare Assessment 2021 (JWA 21) event at Fort Carson in June, which included Australian, Canadian, and the UK participation. Col Paul said the decision to field CPCE Inc 1 was scheduled to be taken “in the next month or so” (by late November). It would upgrade those elements that received Inc 0, plus about another 20% across the army.