At the Association of the U.S. Army 2024 (AUSA 2024) conference, Naval News had the opportunity to get an up close look at Oshkosh’s Rogue Fires JLTV in a conversation with Janet Keech, the Senior Director of Programs at Oshkosh. Keech manages U.S. Marine Corps programs, medium U.S. Army programs, and the science and technology portfolio for Oshkosh.
The Rogue Fires family of unmanned ground vehicles is based off the Oshkosh Defense Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV), combining autonomy with a rugged, high mobility armored vehicle. Throughout its development, several iterations have been pitched as concepts or prototypes, including a proposed 120mm and 155mm howitzer variant, U.S. Army HIMARS variant, U.S. Marine Corps Mark 41 VLS variant, U.S. Marine Corps Naval Strike Missile (NSM) variant, and an unarmed logistics vehicle variant.
The U.S. Marine Corps pursued the NSM variant and Mark 41 VLS variant as some of their anti-access area denial (A2AD) tools of choice, entering into a low-rate initial production (LRIP) deal with Oshkosh in 2023 which permitted the production of unmanned Rogue Fires JLTVs on the same production line as the ‘traditional’ family of vehicles.
In the future, the U.S. Marine Corps also intends to pursue the Rogue Fires launcher for future Long Range Precision Fires (LRPF) and HIMARS capability with the GMLRS and PRsM family of munitions. An unmanned ground vehicle featuring this weapons system was tested by the U.S. Army in 2024.
Adding the HIMARS family of munitions to the Rogue Fires JLTV could open up the possibility of launching several anti-ship weapons from a common launcher. This includes the AGM-158C LRASM or AGM-158C-2 LRASM-ER anti-ship missile, Precision Strike Missile (PrSM) Increment 2 (also known as the Land Based Anti Ship Missile, or LBASM anti-ship ballistic missile), or traditional GMLRS and GMLRS-ER.
For the U.S. Marine Corps, this would expand the A2/AD capability of the Force Design 2030 fighting force significantly, providing a wide range of high and low end weapons to deny access to maritime and littoral environments. Lockheed Martin has expressed interest in pursuing LRASM integration into HIMARS, as reported by Air and Space Forces. Lockheed Martin also pitched the capability to Australia as Naval News reported.
“The Marine Corps intends to use it for long range fires, as well as the HIMARS [family] of weapons. You can also take the sled off of it, put a cargo bed on it, and you could use it as an autonomous logistics vehicle as well… …We wanted to put [Rogue Fires] on display to show that the flexibility of this system could incorporate any Army needs that they would have for payloads or for contested logistics types of scenarios.”
Janet Keech, Senior Director of Programs at Oshkosh
According to Keech, the Rogue Fires is currently undergoing an update to improve autonomy with the existing ‘leader-follower’ control system. That system allows for the operation of many unmanned JLTVs with one marine in control. The update will bring waypoint navigation to the Rogue Fires family.
“One marine in a truck can lead multiple Rogue Fires behind it, in a convoy type of situation, or send them off to their different destinations. Or it can be used with a handheld controller. It’s also going to have something called waypoint navigation, which is where you can program in coordinates, as well as advanced obstacle avoidance.”
Janet Keech, Senior Director of Programs at Oshkosh
For the U.S. Army, there is specific interest in the logistics capability and the six thousand pound payload capability Rogue Fires can bring. The Army has also put interest into the lethal payloads Rogue Fires offers. In a contested environment, Rogue Fires could act at the final link to resupply forces in the forward edge of the battle area. It could also act as a quick reaction force with lethal payloads, providing direct or indirect fire through rocket artillery or other payloads.
“Think about the last mile of delivering supplies with a very mobile and transportable system.”
Janet Keech, Senior Director of Programs at Oshkosh
For operations in the U.S. Marine Corps, the Rogue Fires vehicle will ‘shoot and scoot’, firing its Naval Strike Missiles at targets and returning to a consolidated home base where the vehicles can reload and move to another remote location. Each vehicle will be capable of conducting this type of operation with the various guidance modes employed. According to Keech, there is no plan to provide an autonomous or unmanned reloading mechanism to the system.
