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GAO-12-851R 1 (2012-08-02)

handle is hein.gao/gaobacgke0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Accountaybility Integrity - Reliability United States Government Accountability Office Washington, DC 20548 August 2, 2012 The Honorable Roscoe G. Bartlett Chairman The Honorable Silvestre Reyes Ranking Member Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces Committee on Armed Services House of Representatives Subject: Cancellation of the Army's Autonomous Navigation System The Army intended the Autonomous Navigation System (ANS) to enable ground robotic vehicles to partially drive and navigate themselves and to do so in remote areas with difficult terrain, by integrating sensors, processors, and software. Initially, the Army was developing the system as part of manned and unmanned ground vehicles (UGV) that were part of the Army's Future Combat System (FCS) program. But after the cancellation of various FCS vehicles beginning in 2009, the Army planned to couple ANS with the yet-to-be developed Multi-Mission Unmanned Ground Vehicle (MM-UGV), which among many uses was intended to counter roadside bombs - or improvised explosive devices (lED) - in Iraq and Afghanistan. General Dynamics Robotic Systems (GDRS) was the contractor for ANS. 1 The Army made considerable effort to develop and validate a requirement for the MM-UGV and ANS; however, both were cancelled in 2011. With the cancellation of these efforts, you expressed interest in the impact on Army future autonomous unmanned ground capabilities. In response, we examined: * To what extent did the Army demonstrate ANS capabilities prior to cancellation? * What methods did the Army use to compare ANS to commercially available and other alternatives, particularly in the area of field demonstrations? 1 Boeing was the prime contractor for the FCS program, with subcontractor GDRS responsible for the ANS portion of the program. GAO-12-851 R Autonomous Navigation System