NATO troops carry out a rapid ambush during the Exercise Forest Guardian in rural Latvia on Oct. 4.
Photographer: Damian Lemanski/Bloomberg
UK Troops Explore the Future of Combat on NATO’s Eastern Flank
In the wilds of Latvia, the British military is trying out new battlefield technology — and how to best integrate ‘the technician and the tactician’ in weapons development.
In a makeshift command center at an abandoned Soviet airfield on NATO’s eastern flank, British soldiers used a specialized network to connect with drones, robots and artillery — technology they hope will transform the battlefield.
In the future, the soldiers of the Army’s 11th Brigade might use the system to target an enemy. During the exercises in Latvia this month, however, the goal was to eliminate something more benign: traditional paper maps and lengthy weapons development cycles.