Pfc. Gualberto Zarate, guided by Sgt. Antonio Rodriguez, fires an AT4 Rocket Launcher with a 9 mm tracer round at Novo Selo Training Area, Bulgaria on March 12, 2025. assigned to 4th Battalion, 6th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team, 1st Armored Division. The Army named the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team as one of the next units to take part in Transforming in Contact 2.0 initiative.
(U.S. Army photo by Spc. Kyle Kimble)
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WASHINGTON — The Army soon begins the next phase of Transforming in Contact, the service’s initiative to revamp how units rapidly equip, test and acquire technology in a changing battlefield.
An Army spokesperson confirmed that the service assigned the 1st Armored Brigade Combat Team from the 3rd Infantry Division, Fort Stewart, Georgia, and the 2nd Cavalry Regiment from Rose Barracks, Vilseck, Germany as units who will participate in Transforming in Contact 2.0. During 2.0, the service will widen the scale of TiC and will expand to two divisions, two Stryker brigade combat teams, members of the National Guard and two armored brigade combat teams.
During a training rotation in Hohenfels, Germany over the next six to nine months, Soldiers from the 1st ABCT will receive new, next generation equipment including the integration of unmanned aerial systems or UAS, counter-UAS capability, and electromagnetic decoys. The 1st ABCT will train in preparation for Combined Resolve 2026, a joint, multinational exercise.
In TiC, Soldiers can directly impact the development of next generation weapons by providing feedback which the Army channels into capability documents. TiC units test cost-effective equipment that requires less training time and has a faster learning curve.
The Army’s end goal: Transform at a faster rate to be more survivable and more lethality-based on implementing new technology from Soldier feedback.
“A lot [has] changed in the world over the last couple of years,” Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy A. George said during a recent podcast interview. “What we realized is we had to change. and we had to change at a speed that we’re typically not used to in the Army in how we’re going to adapt, in how we train and operate. How we organize might be different.”
During the rotation the Army changed how it built its network, the service’s top modernization priority. George said the service shifted from large satellites, radios and heavy servers to greater connectivity through tablets, smart phones and wearable devices.
The service also incorporated robots and autonomous fighting vehicles. Three combat brigades, the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division, Fort Campbell, Kentucky; the 3rd BCT, 10th Mountain Division, Fort Drum, New York; and 2nd BCT, 25th Infantry Division, Schofield Barracks, Hawaii; received equipment that allowed Soldiers to respond and react to adversaries while learning to use the new equipment at greater pace.
“That’s going to reduce their missions,” George said. “It’s going to make them more mobile on the battlefield. They can hide in plain sight.”
The last of the three TiC 1.0 brigades, the 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division, Fort Johnson, Louisiana, completed the final training rotation during a training cycle at Hohenfels Training Area.
The unit’s TiC training carried into Combined Resolve, a joint, multinational exercise where the Soldiers utilized new equipment including an Anduril Ghost X medium-range reconnaissance drone and robots while using more UAS systems than ever before.
“We’re taking all of those lessons learned and we’re going to use that to help shape some decisions for the Army,” said Sgt. Maj. of the Army Michael R. Weimer during an AUSA discussion in Arlington Thursday morning. “And that’s going to inform Transforming in Contact 2.0.”
According to the 3rd Infantry Division, the unit will divide its TiC participation into four phases. The 1st ABCT started by changing “how it fights” with a greater focus on lethality and survivability while taking and integrating greater input from modern conflict data.
Second, the Soldiers will integrate the existing technology including UAS and c-UAS. Next, the new equipment will dictate how the unit organizes its formations, known as “task organizing for purpose.”
Finally, the 1st ABCT will continually look for opportunities to integrate new technology when it becomes available. The unit will also try to preserve command and control for survivability and leverage data for advanced decision making.
George and Weimer said that TiC has spurred the Army into training and integrating with new equipment at a frenetic pace they have not witnessed during their military careers. In transformation in contact the Army has adopted a different approach to acquisition in addressing the Army’s more immediate needs. The service takes feedback from Soldiers experimenting with the equipment and immediately channeled into capability-development documents.
“It’s exciting because I personally have never seen the Army move out this quickly,” said Weimer, a 32-year Army veteran. “And that’s priority one, sense of urgency.”
TiC improves retention
Weimer said not only has the TiC initiative helped the Army modernize equipment integration at greater speed, it has also helped the Army keep some of its top talent.
After the Army chose the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division from Fort Campbell, Kentucky, to become the first Transforming in Contact unit, it raised its retention rates within its first year as a TiC unit, eventually having the highest retention rate in the 101st, Weimer said.
The higher operations tempo and training schedule fueled the Soldiers’ morale, Weimer said.
“Troops want purpose,” Weimer said. “They want to be busy, not busy hanging around in the company area. They want to be training and when you tell them that you’re empowering them to make decisions for the future of the Army, this generation feels like it has an extra purpose. And that’s what we’re seeing in all three of those [TiC] brigades.”
Leaders on the ground
For three days and two nights, Weimer embedded himself with the Soldiers from the 3rd Battalion, 10th Infantry Regiment, 10th Mountain Division during one training rotation. There, Weimer said he wanted to experience what TiC Soldiers underwent on the ground. Weimer watched the unit experiment with small UAS to shorten its “kill chain” or process of identifying and destroying hostile targets to surveillance and intelligence collecting.
George visited Soldiers in Hohenfels last month braving cold temperatures to watch them test the new equipment. George said the key to TiC will be how quickly training processes align to eventually make the changes across the Army.
“Typically, the Soldiers, they’re very innovative, they’re ready for change, they can handle a lot of change, they do things very quickly,” George said.
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This "Transforming in Contact alters Army in unexpected ways" was originally found on https://www.army.mil/rss/static/380.xml
