I have been leaving the slating of the Ministry of Defence systemic failures in Procurement to the redoubtable Richard North over at the Defence of the Realm, but this one it appears has slipped his notice. Fortunately The Register picked up on this in its story of the 8th September: Army's £114m battle-comms net not up to Afghan demands with the sub-heading of: Israeli off-the-shelf replacements rushed in and then BBC News published a very similar story on the 10th September: MoD withdraws £114m comms system in its Technology Section.
In non-technical terms, the Cormorant System was designed to replace the various legacy and ad-hoc off the shelf equipment used by the British Joint Task Force Headquarters with a purpose designed integrated system to provide the communications links to the in-theatre sub-commands, certainly a worthy objective.
The £114 Million contract was placed with EADS Wales, part of EADS UK and the system was scheduled to start in service deliveries during 2002. But the project suffered a series of delays and wasn't declared operational until December 2004. Now an MoD project that is only two years late, is actually unusual as often it is much longer.
But a two year delay to ensure that the Cormorant System met the needs of the Joint Services Commands, and that would, with regular updating meet its 20 Year planned service life, would surely be worth it, wouldn't it?
Almost immediately it was introduced, muted criticism (because the Armed Forces aren't allowed any other kind) began and in even in summary are pretty damning: "cursed with some of the worst procurement decisions, shoddy workmanship, non-existent quality control and so-called support arrangements which verge on criminal neglect ".
As an aside: Cormorant is deployed at the in-theatre command level, it needs to integrate with tactical systems such the Ptarmigan System which was already approaching obsolescence when introduced during the 1980's and by the time it was fully functional in the 1990's was obsolete, but will only start to be replaced by the BAE Systems Falcon in 2010.
In Afghanistan the Cormorant Systems role is to link the British Main Operational Bases, exactly what it was designed to do. BUT it isn't up to it!
So to supplement a system that was specifically designed to avoid the need for ad-hoc off the shelf equipment, back in June the MoD rush ordered off the shelf the Israeli RADWIN 2000 System and it is currently being implemented by Horsebridge Network Systems.What makes this even more ironic is a quote from Major Lee Hawkes:
"RADWIN’s systems meet our requirements, without additional modification or equipment."
From the above it would appear that the RADWIN System will provide added capability to Cormorant, but this does not actually reflect the true state of affairs as it now appears much of the Cormorant Infrastructure in Afghanistan is being withdrawn back to the UK and replaced by the much cheaper RADWIN System.
If the Cormorant saga was an isolated case it would be a disgrace, but from the leaks of the Gray Report (See: Times Online 23rd August and 24th August ), this is just another example of the Ministry of Defence systemic failures in Procurement, However in my opinion, these failings are deeply rooted and go back as far as the early 1960's. in part exacerbated by the ever changing Political view of Defence , which rarely has anything to do with the Nations Defence Requirement, but instead mainly with Party Political expediency and short term Political gain.
In non-technical terms, the Cormorant System was designed to replace the various legacy and ad-hoc off the shelf equipment used by the British Joint Task Force Headquarters with a purpose designed integrated system to provide the communications links to the in-theatre sub-commands, certainly a worthy objective.
The £114 Million contract was placed with EADS Wales, part of EADS UK and the system was scheduled to start in service deliveries during 2002. But the project suffered a series of delays and wasn't declared operational until December 2004. Now an MoD project that is only two years late, is actually unusual as often it is much longer.
But a two year delay to ensure that the Cormorant System met the needs of the Joint Services Commands, and that would, with regular updating meet its 20 Year planned service life, would surely be worth it, wouldn't it?
Almost immediately it was introduced, muted criticism (because the Armed Forces aren't allowed any other kind) began and in even in summary are pretty damning: "cursed with some of the worst procurement decisions, shoddy workmanship, non-existent quality control and so-called support arrangements which verge on criminal neglect ".
As an aside: Cormorant is deployed at the in-theatre command level, it needs to integrate with tactical systems such the Ptarmigan System which was already approaching obsolescence when introduced during the 1980's and by the time it was fully functional in the 1990's was obsolete, but will only start to be replaced by the BAE Systems Falcon in 2010.
In Afghanistan the Cormorant Systems role is to link the British Main Operational Bases, exactly what it was designed to do. BUT it isn't up to it!
So to supplement a system that was specifically designed to avoid the need for ad-hoc off the shelf equipment, back in June the MoD rush ordered off the shelf the Israeli RADWIN 2000 System and it is currently being implemented by Horsebridge Network Systems.What makes this even more ironic is a quote from Major Lee Hawkes:
"RADWIN’s systems meet our requirements, without additional modification or equipment."
From the above it would appear that the RADWIN System will provide added capability to Cormorant, but this does not actually reflect the true state of affairs as it now appears much of the Cormorant Infrastructure in Afghanistan is being withdrawn back to the UK and replaced by the much cheaper RADWIN System.
If the Cormorant saga was an isolated case it would be a disgrace, but from the leaks of the Gray Report (See: Times Online 23rd August and 24th August ), this is just another example of the Ministry of Defence systemic failures in Procurement, However in my opinion, these failings are deeply rooted and go back as far as the early 1960's. in part exacerbated by the ever changing Political view of Defence , which rarely has anything to do with the Nations Defence Requirement, but instead mainly with Party Political expediency and short term Political gain.
