The British army’s £3.2bn delayed battlefield communications system threatens to become the Ministry of Defence’s “next procurement disaster”, critics have warned.The next-generation tactical communications system, known as Morpheus, is due to replace technology first introduced almost 20 years ago.Sometimes described as the “brain” of the army’s future armoured vehicles, it is pitched as a network that will connect sensors, commanders and weapons. The project involves both software and hardware, including battlefield radios.Morpheus was due to enter service in the middle of this decade, but some MPs and defence analysts have warned it was unlikely to be ready for use before 2030.James Cartlidge, the defence procurement minister, said in a written statement last month that the system was delayed and would not enter service in 2025 as planned, adding that a “revised [date] was yet to be defined pending ongoing contractual discussions” with US-based General Dynamics, which is the lead contractor on the first phase of the project.Responding to parliamentary questions tabled by Mark Francois, a Conservative MP and former armed forces minister, Cartlidge also disclosed that about £690mn has been spent on the system so far.The Ministry of Defence had previously warned of setbacks with the contract, declaring in December that an initial phase of the Morpheus project had “fallen considerably short of what was anticipated”.
