The Joint Warfighting Center, Ft. Monroe, Virginia

Introduction

Instances of one branch of the military supporting the other can be found going back thousands of years. For the U.S., history has shown that a well-coordinated plan for the support of one branch by another can lead to tremendous success.

Recent history showed the Joint Chiefs that our progressively better coordinated actions (such as Grenada leading to Panama leading to the Gulf War) led to better results.

Hence, after the Gulf War Colin Powell directed the creation of a task force designed to lead the "group thinking" for the Joint Chiefs with respect to this collaborative warfighting effort. The new command was to be called the Joint Warfighting Center. From here, all branches could contribute to the growing strategies and tactics of joint warfighting.

The command engaged General Projection, through their contract with Servair (E-Systems/Raytheon) to design and build the presentation, briefing, command/control and video conferencing capabilities of this facility at Ft. Monroe.

Design

The facilities primary use is as a large simulation center with a command and control as well as briefing element. Additionally, with its proximity to Washington DC, the facility would be used by the Joint Chiefs for large scale briefings and command conferences; further, the Secretary of Defense and various under secretaries offices would utilize this advanced facility for simulations and to bring together all of the nation’s forces for joint operations.

General Projection was tasked with several major elements: design a flexible system that would serve the primary and secondary briefing facilities (known as the Distributed Simulation Capabilities Center- "DSCC" and Command Conference Room-"CCR") as well as the rest of the headquarters with briefing, connectivity to various simulation computers located throughout the campus and video conferencing throughout the military command and control network in North America and around the world.

Ultimately, the DSCC portion of the system consists of two (2) six foot by eight foot Stewart screens with Hughes 320 light valve projectors, Kodak slide projectors and various large screen monitor ports for display. Sound is handled by a combination of IED’s advanced microphone mixing system, Crown amplifiers and a theater style Apogee speaker system carefully “hidden” behind acoustically transparent panels in the projection walls.

A very large “United Nations”-style table seats the important viewers for presentations from two (2) Wolf vizualizer outfitted VanSan lecterns. Color Crestron touch panels control the entire presentation as well as curtain systems and lighting. Hitachi robotic camera systems are used in the front and back of the room for video conferencing feeds.

Joint Chiefs being briefed by the
2-star commander of Joint Warfighting Center

Special "briefing indicators", programmed by General Projection let conference members know the security level of a particular event. These are automatically updated by the remote control network.

The CCR is complemented with a smaller version of the Disc’s capability, including a Sony VPH-1292Q projection system and another smart lectern.

General Projection was tasked by Servair/E-Systems to provide a completely new ceiling and design to enhance the aesthetics of the system as well as the acoustics of the rooms. Additionally, the firm installed more than 100 new directional lights to provide appropriate lighting for meetings and video conferences.

All of these capabilities and the rest of the facility are served by a control room that houses Sony VTR’s, Panasonic multi-format VCR’s, Mitsubishi monitors and a host of presentation and video conferencing capabilities. Routing is accomplished via the Pesa Cougar routing system for RGBs, video and audio. Control is provided by the Crestron Cresnet system. PictureTel video conferencing products are used throughout. All of the equipment is housed in Stantron racks.

A separate room houses row upon row of computer racks containing PC’s and Sun workstations for source feeds and use by the audience at the large briefing table. Wall and floor plates located throughout the facility provide flexible connectivity in and out of the system for virtually any use.

Automation was emphasize by General Projection for this project. The amount of flexibility inherent in the design meant that presenters would require simple button pushes to accomplish complex tasks. General Projection designed a human-interface using the Crestron color touch panels that allow briefers to concentrate on their materials and not on how to “work the system.”

Success

After all adjustments were made, the system has been praised for its crispness of sound, brilliance of images and general ease-of-use. The facility will serve the country’s military well into the next century as helicopters constantly shuffle key leaders from the Pentagon to Ft. Monroe and back again.

This facility won many accolades. It was also featured in Government Video Technology Magazine. Click here to read the article.

For The Joint Warfighting Center maintains an excellent website full of information should wish to know more about that organization. Click here to go there now.

For more information on the design and integration of facilities that can support briefings, command/control and video conferencing, contact us by filling out our Information Request form or emailing Solutions@genproj.com