The ongoing war in Ukraine has led to some technological innovations in the field of combat control systems (SBU) on the part of the country's defense industry. In particular, the competence of Ukrainian programmers allowed us to create a technological product for tablets and smartphones called "Nettle".
"Nettle" was developed by the Kiev design bureau "Logika" (Logika). According to foreign sources, work on the product began in 2014. The creation process was not easy. It is reported that along with technical issues, "the most boring and difficult was probably overcoming bureaucratic problems."
The diagram illustrates how the Nettle combat control system exchanges information between maneuverable forces at the tactical level
Technical obstacles included the creation of a low-bandwidth mobile peer-to-peer communication network. Similarly, providing the means to facilitate ballistic calculations for a variety of artillery systems proved to be an equally difficult task.
According to the developers, Nettle provides standard combat control system services: cartographic information, tracking forces in blue (its own) and red (enemy) colors, data exchange and mission planning.
The company claims that "Nettle" is mainly used by the ground forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The software can be easily downloaded to civil standard devices, including smartphones or tablets using the Android operating system.
Despite the fact that the Nettle system is mainly applicable for conducting combat operations on land, Ukrainian sources report that it can be adapted for conducting air and sea combat. To this end, its digital mapping functions are already being used by the APU outside of land conditions.
From the point of view of users, "Nettle" is used at the tactical level, usually battalion, and below. At the same time, the system is also used at the brigade level. One of the useful features of the Nettle system is that it can be upgraded according to the standards of tactical communication networks.
It is claimed that the Nettle system communicates with many other combat control systems developed in Ukraine. In particular, we are talking about the Correction D-30 software used on Android platforms to facilitate artillery fire control, Delta software that performs complex tactical mapping and provides functionality for situational awareness, as well as MilChat systems that provide secure message transmission, and ComBat Vision, which provides military intelligence services.
The Nettle combat control system is easily integrated into devices running the Android operating system
According to Western analysts, in recent years, the Russian Armed Forces have also begun a large-scale digital rearmament of their forces. These modernizations were the result of the fact that in 2010 the Russian government launched defense reforms based on the military results of the Russian-Georgian war of 2008.
In the West, it is believed that the digital modernization of the Russian Armed Forces has led to the emergence of systems similar to the Andromeda-D SBU, which are believed to be mainly used by airborne troops. In addition, it is emphasized that the introduction of digital combat control systems in the Russian ground forces took place unevenly.
Questions remain as to the extent to which disparate Russian computerized SBUS are able to interact. In fairness, this last point is also relevant in relation to the Ukrainian forces.
At the same time, foreign experts insist that compatible digital SBU can give the APU an important qualitative advantage on the battlefield. The war has spurred innovation in the country's digital defense, a trend that shows little sign of abating.
According to the materials of the resource shephardmedia.com