Mid-Range Capabilities Project Office Assumes New Charter

By Nancy Jones-Bonbrest, Army Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies OfficeMay 20, 2021

Mid-Range Capabilities Project Office Accepts New Charter
1 / 2 Show Caption + Hide Caption – Mr. Gary Hallinan (right) became the first Project Manager of the Army Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office (RCCTO) Mid-Range Capability Project Office during an Assumption of Charter ceremony on May 14 at Redstone Arsenal. Lt. Gen. L. Neil Thurgood (left), director of Hypersonics, Directed Energy, Space and Rapid Acquisition, which includes leading the RCCTO, hosted the ceremony. (Photo Credit: U.S. Army Photo by Jori Canterbury, RCCTO) VIEW ORIGINAL
Mid-Range Capabilities Project Office Accepts New Charter
2 / 2 Show Caption + Hide Caption – Mr. Gary Hallinan (right) became the first Project Manager of the Army Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office (RCCTO) Mid-Range Capability Project Office during an Assumption of Charter ceremony on May 14 at Redstone Arsenal. (Photo Credit: U.S. Army Photo by Jori Canterbury, RCCTO) VIEW ORIGINAL

REDSTONE ARSENAL, Alabama (May 20, 2021) – With the vital mission of supplying a new Mid-Range Capability by Fiscal Year 2023, Mr. Gary Hallinan became the first Project Manager of the Army Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office (RCCTO) Mid-Range Capability Project Office during an Assumption of Charter ceremony on May 14 at Redstone Arsenal.

The Mid-Range Capability (MRC), part of the Army’s number one modernization priority of Long Range Precision Fires, will be designed to hit a variety of mid-range targets. The MRC prototype, consisting of launchers, missiles, and a battery operations center (BOC), will be fielded to an operational battery in Fiscal Year 2023.

“I have the right team working hard on a singular outcome that will provide our warfighters a better opportunity to come home,” said Hallinan. “We are responding to the needs of the Army with the MRC prototype.”

The MRC addresses a need identified by the FY20 Strategic Fires Study in coordination with key theaters and combatant commands and is a pivotal capability to achieving the Army’s modernization goals. In standing up the office, the team – headed from the start by Hallinan – wasted no time in moving forward with their mission to prototype the MRC. Officially stood up on July 1, 2020, they awarded their first contract, a prototype Other Transaction Authority, on November 6, 2020, and had funds obligated on the contract shortly after.

“We talk about being fast in the Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office and this office is a perfect example of just how rapidly we can move out once given a mission,” said Lt. Gen. L. Neil Thurgood, director of Hypersonics, Directed Energy, Space and Rapid Acquisition, which includes leading the RCCTO. “This team has been asked to do a very difficult task for the Army and I have no doubt that they have the right person leading the effort.”

The MRC will complement other critical systems in the Army’s long range fires portfolio, providing a combined operational and strategic capability that can attack specific threat vulnerabilities in order to penetrate, disintegrate and exploit targets in deep maneuver areas critical to the joint fight.

The capability also allows the Army and joint services to synchronize and leverage modernization efforts and investments across mid-range missile programs in support of multi-domain operations.

Mr. Hallinan came to the RCCTO after serving the Product Director (PdD) for Field Artillery Launchers (FAL) in PM Strategic and Operational Rockets and Missiles (STORM), part of PEO Missiles and Space.

The ceremony official charged Hallinan as the leader for the MRC Project Office.

“Thank you for such an honor to be the first Project Manager of this program office,” Hallinan said. “We have a lot of hard work to do and I have no doubt this team that surrounds me today is up to the task.”

The Army RCCTO, headquartered at Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is chartered to develop rapid prototypes and field residual combat capabilities.