The US Defense Department will test a new phase of the MAJIIC intelligence gathering and sharing system during an advanced-concept technology demonstration in September, the Pentagon said in a statement on Thursday.

With the MAJIIC, which stands for Multisensor Aerospace-Ground Joint ISR (intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance) Interoperability Coalition Architecture, US forces operating in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere would be able to locate an enemy position on the battlefield and share intelligence information and imagery with coalition allies in near-real time, the statement said.

The project, which will be operated by the US Joint Forces Command, based in Norfolk, Virginia, was revealed at a C4ISR ( Command, Control, Communications, Computer, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance) Integration Conference on Wednesday.

"It's all about a single-point query to get at all of the ISR information that's available based on location, time, status of the ISR," said Navy Captain Allan Nadolski, director for intelligence at Joint Forces Command.

The system uses a Web-services approach, by gathering all the information together first, getting it on a network and then making it accessible at one time, he said.

The system went through its first validation in August 2004 and the Pentagon hopes the new capability will allow ISR information to be shared among coalition partners and alleviate massive data backlogs generated during operations, the statement said.

Source: Xinhua