What the FY2027 request buys
Verbatim from the R-2A exhibit for project AX3 of PE 0604115A. This is the budget justification's own description of work that has not happened yet — the one thing no other level of the budget carries.
Design and development of the prototype RF Smoke solution to disrupt the electromagnetic spectrum, effectively masking, concealing, and preserving combat lethality overmatch in contested environments. This will involve refining system architecture, integrating key components, and ensuring the solution meets operational requirements. Live-fire testing will be conducted to evaluate and demonstrate the RF Smoke's operational performance, including its effectiveness in real-world scenarios and its ability to achieve mission objectives. Upon successful testing and validation, the prototype will transition to the Program Executive Office (PEO) for further refinement, production planning, and eventual fielding to operational units.
The funding reduction aligns with the efforts plan, reflecting the completion of the prototype system's design and development phase in preparation for live testing and experimentation.
FY2025–FY2026: what came before
Prior-year accomplishments and current-year plans from the same exhibit. Context for the FY2027 plan, not a series — an activity partitions its project exactly in the request year, but can under-cover it in earlier years.
Complete RF Smoke prototype fabrication. Complete integration into EWPMT and AFATDS Command and Control Functions. Complete evaluation and assessment of prototype RF Smoke solution capabilities to disrupt the EM spectrum to mask, conceal, and preserve combat lethality overmatch.
Begin prototyping activities across multiple Program Executive Offices (PEOs) to support an end-state integrated SoS demonstration. Virtually prototype the SoS architecture.?Refine system and subsystem requirements and interfaces. Prototype RF Smoke technology candidates across EM spectrums of interest and initiate design-of-experiment analysis for optimal material payload mix against target sets. Virtually prototype dispense mechanism to aid in RF Smoke material candidate analysis for a Cargo Rocket/Missile application. Define application interfaces, virtually prototype RF Smoke effects model software for battle management of the smoke across Electronic Warfare and artillery fire control systems.
Three years, and no five-year plan
An R-2A activity publishes the prior year, the current year and the budget year. The FYDP outyears exist at project and program-element level and are deliberately absent here rather than inferred. Estimate types are colored and never summed into one figure.
| Fiscal Year | Estimate Type | Amount ($M) |
|---|---|---|
| FY2025 | Actual | 10.6 |
| FY2026 | Enacted | 18.6 |
| FY2027 | Request | 10.8 |
This activity is 3.4% of project AX3's FY2027 request and 3.4% of PE 0604115A's. In the request year the activities under a project sum to it exactly; in the current year they under-cover it in about 9% of cases, so an activity's delta can legitimately exceed its parent's and the two must not be compared row to row.
28 activities in project AX3
Every R-2A line of this project, largest FY2027 request first. Linked where the activity has enough of its own narrative to carry a page; the rest are shown in full on the program-element page.