The American special operators are becoming increasingly worried as the day gradually transitions into darkness. They are stationed in a heavily populated urban area within a politically unstable zone. The activity level in the area has increased recently, with the marketplaces and highways brimming with activity beyond the typical hustle and bustle of daily life. Although there is a high level of threat in the city, the details are unclear and the team wants to keep their profile low in case a firefight brings known hostile elements down on them.
The Americans choose to be more circumspect in evaluating possible dangers. An operator ventures out into the main road of the area, preferring to blend in with possible crowds rather than wear visible tactical gear, just to see what he may see.
A single button press grants the operator complete visibility. His head-up display is equipped with a sophisticated set of sensors that begin collecting data from his surroundings. An integrated artificial intelligence engine quickly gathers and routes body language, pulse rates, facial expressions, and even ambient snippets of conversation in regional dialects through his backpack supercomputers for analysis. Instantaneously, the data is simplified, examined, and then fed back into the head-up display. The tactical AI assistant of the operators returns a clear assessment: Several seasonal events are approaching the town, and the majority of onlookers are jubilant and enthusiastic, so the team faces little danger. For now, the crisis is over.
When considering the future of US special operations forces—those elite soldiers tasked with acting as the “tip of the spear” of the US military—defense department officials have frequently brought up this scenario, among many others, in recent years. While science fiction writers and defense officials may have imagined a world where brain implants, performance-enhancing drugs, and powered armor akin to Starship Troopers would shape warfare in the future, US Special Operations Command believes that the next generation of armed conflict will be fought (and hopefully won) using a relatively simple concept: the “hyper enabled operator.”
More brains and less brawn
The hyper-enabled operator (HEO) concept was first made public in 2019 through an essay written by officials from SOCOM’s Joint Acquisition Task Force (JATF) for Small Wars Journal. The Tactical Assault Light Operator Suit (TALOS) effort, which was started in 2013, aimed to provide US special operations forces with a suit known as the “Iron Man.” TALOS, the most recent development in the Pentagon’s decades-long effort to create a powered exoskeleton for infantry troops, was designed to increase operators’ survivability in combat by making them virtually resistant to small-arms fire through additional layers of sophisticated armor. The program was inspired by the 2012 death of a Navy SEAL during a hostage rescue operation in Afghanistan. Despite the fact that the TALOS project was deemed ineffective in 2019 because of difficulties combining its various systems into a single, coherent entity, the HEO was an obvious successor to the program because of the lessons it taught.
Giving warfighters “cognitive overmatch”—that is, “the ability to dominate the situation by making informed decisions faster than the opponent”—on the battlefield is the clear primary goal of the HEO concept, according to SOCOM officials. The future operator will enter combat with technologies intended to increase their situational awareness and pertinent decision-making to superior levels compared to the enemy, rather than giving US special operations forces a tactical advantage through next-generation body armor and exotic weaponry. The “OODA loop” (observe, orient, decide, act) was proposed by former fighter pilot and Air Force colonel John Boyd as the fundamental military decision-making model of the twenty-first century. The HEO concept aims to use technology to “tighten” that loop to the point where operators are making faster and more intelligent decisions than the enemy.
In 2019, SOCOM officials stated that HEO aims to ensure that the appropriate information reaches the right person at the right time.
By replacing the powered armor at the center of the TALOS effort with sophisticated communications equipment and a robust sensor suite built on advanced computing architecture, the HEO concept aims to accomplish this goal. This will enable the operator to gather pertinent data and turn it into actionable information using a straightforward interface similar to a head-up display—and to do so “at the edge,” in locations where traditional communications networks might not be available. As I previously noted, if TALOS was intended to be akin to an “Iron Man” suit, then HEO is effectively Jarvis, Tony Stark’s internal AI assistant who continuously provides him with information via the head-up display on his helmet.
According to SOCOM spokesperson James O. Gregory, who is quoting the program’s general description from the command’s website, “[JATF] is targeting technologies to deliver cognitive overmatch to SOF operators working at the edge in austere and contested environments in coordination with and working through partners and allies” to WIRED. With the use of these technologies, SOF operators’ tactical teams will be able to quickly develop situation awareness by using data from next-generation sensors, networks, computers, and communication systems in an easy manner. It will also assist in making prompt, well-informed decisions and acting before an enemy has a chance to respond.
Step into the gray area
Five years after the HEO was first included in the tactical lexicon of the US military, what does it look like today? Due to the effort’s confidential (and partly theoretical) nature, few details are known, and SOCOM authorities have not said anything about its advancement. Gregory of SOCOM, however, claims that the situation and idea the HEO is attempting to solve have “evolved” from what program officials initially told reporters. SOCOM officials envision something more akin to a casually dressed operator collecting information on a busy urban avenue through an eyepiece resembling Google Glass and assessing the situation—more James Bond than Tony Stark—rather than augmenting warfighters deployed to active combat zones.
According to Gregory, “the JATF’s current operations are taking place in permissive or semi-permissive environments during the competitive phase of warfare.” (The US Army defines a permissive environment as one in which US forces can operate with the cooperation of the security apparatus of the host nation; in contrast, a “semi-permissive” environment is potentially hostile and frequently lacks dependable local support.) The HEO will assist elite forces functioning in the “gray zone” between peace and conflict; it will no longer be merely another tool for a kinetic assault.
The JATF is pushing for cutting-edge technologies that improve situational awareness, as detailed in a SOCOM broad agency release (a general call for research and development proposals from the defense sector) that was published in 2020 and updated as recently as November 2023. These technologies include low-visibility communications systems; sophisticated sensors capable of “iris, facial, anatomical measures, gestures, gait, heartbeat, electromagnetic signals, deoxyribonucleic acid [DNA], and microbiome recognition”; intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities “without substantial manning or networking resources” (the previously mentioned “at the edge”); and “data visualizations” that “permit [operators] to receive and intuitively understand networked information from communication, computing, and sensor systems,” among others.
To put it briefly, the HEO envisions systems that allow for the continuous, real-time capture of data and its subsequent distillation into actionable intelligence that may, in an unpredictable circumstance, make the difference between life and death.
The Edge Case
It is one thing to envision a set of aspirational skills; it is quite another to really build them. Gregory states that throughout the past few years, the HEO effort has stayed concentrated on three primary experimental technology areas when it comes to creating new products: sensing and edge computing, architecture and analysis, and language translation.
“Sensing and edge computing” encompasses both the gathering and analysis of data from diverse sources as well as the specialized processing power required by operators to operate both “at the edge” and the AI-enabled software that will serve as the HEO’s core.
According to Gregory, “traditional CPU-based devices are insufficient for emerging technologies and solutions in artificial intelligence/machine learning, which require specialized ‘compute’ hardware.” Our goal is to include a manpack device that can function as a tensor processing unit, neural processing engine, or graphical processing unit. This will give you the platform you need to make use of cutting-edge technologies, even when you’re not connected to the cloud, including language translation and other edge solutions.
The “architecture and analysis” component, which focuses on quickly evaluating and presenting data to field operators, is built on this processing capacity. Gregory explains to WIRED that the command has created “a flexible [system] architecture that fuses data from various sources and media types” to enable this feature and that this data is then presented in an understandable way that operators can evaluate and take action upon.
Regarding language translation, that should go without saying. According to Gregory, SOCOM thinks that “clear communication can greatly enhance the development of our long-term relationships before any hostilities ever occur.” Instead of depending on the frequently insufficient interpreters in the field, operators can communicate more successfully when they use voice-to-voice translation. Although many members of the SOF are bilingual, they are regularly sent to areas where there are distinct dialects or languages spoken.
According to C4ISRNet, SOCOM has reportedly focused on six main areas of product development in line with these experimental technology areas: the “operator-worn kit,” which consists of sensors and onboard computer processing power; application development resources; a distinct, mission-agnostic system architecture; the “human-machine interface,” which is typically thought of as a digital head-up display; a product dubbed “information realization,” which probably entails the clear presentation of data; and beyond-line-of-sight (BLoS) communications meant to maintain troops’ communication with their commanders (and each other) in environments denied satellite service.
Gregory claims that in recent years, the command has progressively released a few new capabilities resulting from the HEO initiative. According to Janes’ assessment at the time, SOCOM declared in 2021 that two products, a BLoS communications system, and an unidentified “integrated situational awareness tool,” would be converted into formal programs of record. Gregory told WIRED that the command’s SOF deployable nodes, a family of cutting-edge satellite communications equipment, are equipped with “a steerable gimble antenna system that enhances the functionality” as part of the BLoS system. The SEEKER app, which “enables advisers to build advanced situational awareness, thereby allowing them to select actions with an eye toward the broader situation rather than just the immediately apparent problem,” was also confirmed by the spokesman. Uncertainty surrounds whether the latter is connected to the “automate the analyst ”initiative the command launched in 2020 to give operators a self-sufficient AI assistant.
The “visual environment translation” technology is another option; it is intended to translate inputs in other languages into understandable English in real time. The system, which goes by the general name Versatile Intelligent Translation Assistant (VITA), is “the most mature” of the JATF’s experimental technology areas, according to SOCOM. It has voice-to-voice and visual environment translation capabilities. According to Gregory, VITA is simply “a voice-to-voice translation engine that functions offline on GPU-enabled devices.” It is portable and can “engage in effective conversations where it was previously impossible” when used with a laptop, wearable technology, or smartphone. Not only has VITA effectively displayed its ability to translate between Russian, Chinese Mandarin, and Ukrainian during testing, but the technology has already been deployed to two unannounced theaters of action.
According to Gregory, “the visual translation component improves situational awareness by translating video images in real-time, such as street signs, graffiti, and other written texts.” “Users can instantly understand foreign languages by using their phone’s camera to scan their environment.”
“A high-quality translation capability that is not reliant on the cloud or local interpreters, thus significantly reducing risk and logistical costs while increasing operational range and effectiveness for USSOF and our partners,” according to Gregory, is what VITA offers US special operations soldiers. “At present, the JATF is collaborating with industry partners to decrease the hardware’s dimensions and convert it into a SOF Program Executive Office in preparation for its eventual fielding.” (And that language translation might not be limited to a mobile device for very long: SOCOM is still pushing forward with head-mounted sensors and an augmented reality HUD to display these functions directly in front of operators’ eyes, according to the command’s fiscal year 2025 budget request released in March.)
Field Operations
US military planners see promise in the HEO concept: As to an assessment conducted by the Army, the effective implementation of the system has the potential to enhance operator survivability to a much greater extent than the extra body armor offered by the TALOS program. However, like with other potentially game-changing technological endeavors, HEO may prove to be a science fiction fantasy that crumbles under the weight of its technological intricacy. Furthermore, there’s no assurance that operators will first accept the new technology easily: While VITA has demonstrated operational potential, it remains uncertain whether more HEO offerings can demonstrate sufficient intuitiveness to genuinely support field operators instead of overburdening them with an intricate new system. “If you load a mud foot down with many gadgets that he has to watch, somebody a lot more simply equipped—say with a stone ax—will sneak up and bash his head in while he is trying to read a vernier,” as Heinlein so eloquently stated in Starship Troopers.
Heinlein stated it well in Starship Troopers: “Someone much more simply equipped—say with a stone ax—will sneak up and bash his head in while he is trying to read a vernier. If you load a mud foot down with many gadgets that he has to watch.”
Like TALOS, military engineers may find it too ambitious to completely achieve the promise of a tactical AI helper akin to Jarvis, Tony Stark’s sidekick. However, the HEO initiative will still provide a significant capability boost for US special operators stationed overseas, even if it merely manages to produce, say, the VITA language-translation tool. The day is slowly giving way to night, but American commandos control the night and will continue to do so well into the following fight with the assistance of the HEO.
