Australia — Better communications system to help keep soldiers safe

Defence today signed a $69 mil­lion con­tract to deliv­er faster and more reli­able com­mu­ni­ca­tions on the battlefield.

Min­is­ter for Defence Materiel Jason Clare said the con­tract with Raytheon would pro­vide:

• more than 1000 radios, which will be mount­ed on Army vehi­cles, pri­mar­i­ly Bush­mas­ters and M113 armoured vehi­cles, and hand­held portable radios to be car­ried by sol­diers in the field; 
• equip­ment need­ed to mount and oper­ate the radios; and 
• main­te­nance and sup­port ser­vices for three years. 

“These new radios will give front­line sol­diers and the Com­man­ders direct­ing them instant infor­ma­tion on where they are, where they need to be and what is hap­pen­ing around them,” Mr Clare said.
“Right now, the Army is using an old­er, ana­logue sys­tem which is fast becom­ing obso­lete.
“It’s served our troops well, but it’s time to move the Army for­ward into the dig­i­tal age.
“This new sys­tem will be faster and more reli­able, allow­ing troops to com­mu­ni­cate instant­ly with the cen­tral com­mand post.
“It will help Com­man­ders plan bet­ter by giv­ing them more accu­rate and time­ly infor­ma­tion about what is hap­pen­ing on the ground.
“This will help keep our sol­diers safe.
“It’s the next step in our plan to deliv­er a ful­ly dig­i­tal com­mu­ni­ca­tions sys­tem to the Army.” 

Press release
Min­is­te­r­i­al Sup­port and Pub­lic Affairs,
Depart­ment of Defence,
Can­ber­ra, Australia 

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