What is the US military doing with blockchain technology?

When we talk about blockchain, we often mention public chains such as BTC and Ethereum. These chains mostly carry DApps in fields such as DeFi, NFT, and DID, in order to capture and create more value, and to create new narratives through the wealth effect.

Actually, in addition to playing financial roles in the capital market, the decentralization and tamper-proof features of blockchain have already given birth to many real use cases that are not yet known to the public.

The US military think tank discovered the potential of blockchain as early as 6 years ago. In 2017, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), a subsidiary of the US Department of Defense, officially launched the research and development of military blockchain projects. The goal is to develop a secure and unbreakable messaging and transaction platform for the US military. To achieve this goal, DARPA funded the establishment of SIMBA Chain with the help of the University of Notre Dame and Indiana Technology Manufacturing Company (ITAMCO).

Unmatched Endorsement Project - US Army, US Navy, US Space Force, Boeing Company

After 6 years, in 2023, what is the progress of the US military's blockchain plan?

US Space Force and Space Debris

The United States Space Force (USSF) was established in 2019 and is responsible for organizing, training, and equipping active personnel for space operations. It hopes to use blockchain to solve the problem of space debris.

Space debris is one of the main threats that humans face when using space orbit. Every rocket launched into space produces space debris, which may collide with satellites and space stations and cause damage. Space debris will exist in Earth's orbit for a long time.

The amount of space debris is constantly increasing, causing the Earth's orbit to become increasingly congested and putting many services that modern humans rely on, such as communication, weather, and satellite GPS services, in danger.

SIMBA Chain has proposed a solution to the problem of space debris, which is to establish a new way of accurately recording and supporting the space debris cleaning process. By tokenizing space debris in the form of NFTs, various economic models can be used to promote the cleaning of space debris, and a stable space environment can be maintained by private enterprises.

On-chain Active Fragment Clearing Fund is a "recycling fund" proposed by SIMBA that binds space fragments with NFTs. Payment will only be completed after the space fragments are confirmed to be recycled. SIMBA also considers the feasibility of creating a "bounty fund" to attract entities to donate to the bounty fund and provide incentives for private companies.

可出租 NFT is another way SIMBA is considering, allowing a space fragment to be assigned to multiple different companies for processing or subcontracting from the time it is discovered until it is recycled and cleared, making the cleaning of fragments more flexible.

Fragment Clearing Verification - SIMBA first determines the expected completion result of a fragment, then determines the basis for verifying the completion of the clearing, and finally verifies whether the fragment has been removed from the orbit or meets the expected completion result.

SIMBA uses blockchain technology to tokenize space debris into NFTs, providing a new way to promote the removal of space debris and offering people a way to participate in the highly potential space economy and benefit from it.

US Air Force and 3D Printing

The United States Air Force is the largest air force in the world, with 330,000 active personnel and 5,200 aircraft, and a budget of $150 billion. It hopes to improve data tampering resistance and transmit confidential 3D printing plans through blockchain technology, eliminate security vulnerabilities, and launch pilots for additive manufacturing (3D printing) to coordinate distributed manufacturing on the battlefield.

The United States Air Force (USAF), with its massive scale, relies on an extremely complex supply chain to ensure that its frontline deployed forces are fully equipped and maintained. However, this complex supply chain also brings many security threats, as potential hostile forces may obtain or tamper with critical data. To address the security issues of the supply chain, the USAF has requested SIMBA to provide an additive manufacturing solution, mainly targeting three major issues.

Microelectronics Supply Chain Proof: In the entire microelectronics supply chain, the requirement for operational security is crucial. These components may not meet specific requirements, putting lives in danger.

Counterfeit Identification: There may be counterfeit parts and malicious code in the supply chain, which can cause a decrease in the performance of the US Air Force's missions and weapon systems.

Key Supplier Identification: Dependence on key suppliers brings more risks to the supply chain. Internal turmoil, corruption, and extreme weather can slow down the delivery of essential components.

SIMBA refers to the service platform it provides to the US Air Force as BASECAMP. BASECAMP is built on the foundation of SIMBA Blocks and registers and tracks them throughout the entire lifecycle of additive manufacturing components. By comprehensively registering additive manufacturing components through both software and hardware, parts can be tracked in all directions:

On the hardware side, during the manufacturing process, barcode functionality is embedded into the 3D printer to register the printed components.

On the software side, hardware identifiers, design files, and other metadata are recorded and registered on the blockchain;

In addition, BASECAMP also uses smart contracts to manage authorization and licensing files on the chain, and automatically sends notifications to key departments when file data is changed.

After the launch of BASECAMP, SIMBA Chain helped the US Air Force reduce the time spent on tracking non-compliant additive manufacturing parts from 2000 hours to 20 hours, a 99% reduction.

美国海军与波音公司

translates to

US Navy and Boeing Company

in English.

When it comes to Boeing, we often talk about familiar passenger planes such as the Boeing 737, Boeing 747, and Boeing 787. This is because Boeing is one of the world's largest manufacturers of commercial aircraft. However, many people do not know that Boeing is also a top manufacturer of military aircraft.

The US military's various important fighter jets, such as the F-15 fighter, B-52 Stratofortress bomber, AH-64 Apache armed combat aircraft, and C-17 Globemaster III transport, are all produced by Boeing. The most important of the US military aircraft produced by Boeing is undoubtedly the F/A-18 fighter. This type of fighter is the main carrier-based aircraft on all 11 active aircraft carriers of the US Navy, and is an important guarantee for the US carrier battle group to "make waves and do evil" around the world. It is also Tom Cruise's aircraft in "Top Gun 2".

When producing military aircraft, Boeing requires a large amount of manpower to synchronize data from multiple sources. Specifically, Boeing needs to process and integrate up to 700 data tables from four data warehouses. Such a disconnected system poses potential security risks during the production process. Therefore, Boeing commissioned SIMBA to build a highly integrated supply chain solution that can track F/A-18 wing components from sub-suppliers.

To ensure the traceability of wing components, SIMBA adds digital markings to all wing parts. When the physical parts are transported from sub-suppliers to Boeing, the digital signals are propagated through blockchain, generating immutable records at each step. The distributed ledger composed of these records enables the supply chain to meet the four major standards proposed by the US Navy.

Secure and trustworthy: set different permissions for participants at all levels in the supply chain.

High integration: integrates with the previous generation system and tracks existing components.

High protection: Prevent malicious attacks from opponents; eliminate damaged data.Immutable: Achieving traceability and traceability capabilities through an immutable blockchain distributed transaction ledger.

For the past few decades, email has been the most relied upon communication tool in the supply chain industry. While email has proven to be effective, it requires a significant amount of operation and is almost impossible to prevent data tampering.

SIMBA uses blockchain technology to integrate Boeing's supply chain into a fully synchronized automated system, aggregating data scattered throughout the company and creating an immutable, transparent supply chain platform for F/A-18 wing components. The relevant workflows no longer need to be manually tracked, but are instead written into the blockchain in code form.

Pentagon and visibility during transportation

The mobilization of logistics materials is crucial to combat missions, especially during wartime. Logistics has always been a major problem for military forces around the world. In the Gulf War of 1991, the US military sent about 40,000 containers to the Middle East, but due to unclear labeling and chaotic management, more than 20,000 of them had to be reopened, registered, repackaged, and re-entered into the logistics transportation system. After the end of the Gulf War, the US military found that more than 8,000 of the opened containers had not played any practical role.

The Gulf War may have ended 30 years ago, but there has not been much progress in the US military's logistics system. Despite the importance of logistics, the US military has been hesitant to rely on automated systems. However, this has changed with the advent of tamper-proof blockchain technology and on-chain smart contracts that can automatically process messages.

In 2020, SIMBA Chain received a $1.2 million Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I grant from the US Department of Defense to launch the Authenticity Ledger for Auditable Military Encrypted Data Access (ALAMEDA) system. ALAMEDA was developed at the Southeast Regional Maintenance Center at Naval Air Station Jacksonville in Florida, USA.

Initially, the goal of the ALAMEDA system was to use blockchain to complete a new demand sensing solution, ensuring that the US military could timely obtain replacement parts for weapons. SIMBA collaborated with the US Marine Corps to build a blockchain platform to monitor inventory and cargo flow at the Albany warehouse in Georgia.

After successfully completing the first phase in 2021, the US Naval Research Institute provided SIMBA with a $1.5 million SBIR Phase II grant and adjusted the focus of ALAMEDA to provide a "single source of truth" for the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) under the US Navy and the US Department of Defense, using distributed ledger technology (blockchain).

Specifically, SIMBA needs to solve two challenging problems for the US Navy and the Defense Logistics Agency:

Accurately track goods in transit;

Let users know where their goods are located in their orders in a short amount of time.

The US Defense Logistics Agency currently has four transportation channels, namely the direct delivery channel between suppliers and users, the direct dispatch channel of the Defense Logistics Agency, the channel for requesting goods from warehouses, and the channel for inventory redistribution and transportation.

SIMBA provides a solution for the National Defense Logistics Bureau, which is also applicable to these four transportation channels. Simply input the data in standard format, including order status, delivery confirmation, exceptions, and estimated delivery date. After receiving the data, the ALAMEDA system will track the associated tracking number and transportation control number, and then automatically process various requests through blockchain smart contracts.

The ALAMEDA system can greatly reduce the response delay of the US military logistics system, solve the problems caused by lack of visibility, improve information sharing and security, as well as the security of goods and inventory, improve the efficiency of distribution and receiving, reduce the working hours of sorting goods, and alleviate the inventory pressure of warehouses.

Conclusion

SIMBA Chain, as a blockchain think tank for the US military, has received two research grants of $1.5 million each from the US Navy in 2020 and 2021 respectively. After seeing the performance and future potential of the project, on February 1, 2023, the US Air Force once again provided SIMBA with $30 million in funding, demonstrating the US military's determination to lead in the field of military blockchain.

The scientific and technological explosion triggered by the Second World War had a profound impact on the post-war world. Countless technologies such as electronic computers, GPS, digital cameras, canned food, blood banks and transfusions, sanitary napkins, freeze-drying technology, and head-up displays originated from the military technology transfer.

The real use cases of blockchain that can truly enter the public's life may be derived from a series of demands originating from the US military.

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