SCHOFIELD BARRACKS, Hawaii - The commanding general of U.S. Army Network Enterprise Technology Command, Maj. Gen. Alan R. Lynn visited Hawaii as part of his recent Pacific engagement tour, which included a visit with Signal Soldiers of the U.S. Pacific Command and U.S. Army Pacific.
Lynn was the keynote speaker for the Signal Corps Regimental Association lunch at the Nehelani Conference and Banquet Center, 6 May.
Lynn spoke about the future of signal corps and upcoming projects at NETCOM, to include the virtual environment as a training aid, the future of Army cyber, and the Pacific.
"What the chief of staff of the Army wants for the future is a live, virtual, and constructive environment," said Lynn. "When funding goes down, at some point training stops. With a virtual environment, you can actually have some helicopters flying, with some folks behind a screen; you have some Humvees driving with some folks behind a screen. Everything is happening all at once."
"It has been determined that the cyber protection forces will fall underneath the signal corps, specifically NETCOM," Lynn said. "We have already stood up the 7th Cyber Mission Unit at Fort Gordon, and we are going to start recruiting here shortly for cyber warriors. By this summer there will be two cyber protection platoons."
Lynn also discussed the advantages of passive optical networks, which are point-to-multipoint, fiber to the premises network architecture in which unpowered optical splitter are used to enable a single optical fiber to serve multiple premises. There are many benefits to these networks over the current Ethernet systems being utilized by the Army including less equipment, better life cycle management, and further reach.
"Ethernet takes 35,000 switches and routers per post, you can do the same thing for about 2,000 switches with passive optical networks," Lynn said. "The life cycle for Ethernet is 5-7 years; it is 10-15 plus with the passive optical networks."
During his visit, Lynn also took time to recognize some Soldiers and Civilians for their support to the command and presented them with his commander's coin of excellence.
Spc. Vanessa Irvin, 311th Signal Commmand (Theater) G1 was awarded a coin for making the commandant's list during Warrior Leader Course.
"It was a great accomplishment," Irvin said. "To be recognized by the NETCOM Commander was an honor and a privilege."
NETCOM is based out of Fort Huachuca, Az. and consists of about 16,000 Military and Civilians spread across 20 different countries.
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