How the US Army III Corps uses VMware to support IT operations

VMware provides agility in much needed combat operations

The US Army III Corps is headquartered in Ft Hood, TX. III Corps has a rich history of support to the nation, including forming the leadership element and HQ of Multi-National Corps – Iraq in 2004. They are a battle tested major element of the US Army. Their mission: train, mobilize and deploy forces for counteroffensive combat operations.

The III Corps supports this mission globally. When they do, leadership from III Corps IT provides enterprise IT services (whether deployed or at home). One way they do this is through an innovative container.

The III Corps Large Scale Shelter (LSS) is a server room that deploys with eight racks within a container. A description of this capability and some of III Corps’ views are online here.

The limited room means that agility and improvisation are treasured by III Corps. LTC Jeffrey R Bourne, III Corps’ information assurance chief, put it this way: “Anything that can be virtualized, must be virtualized—and that’s what the VMware platform allows us to do.” III Corps uses VMware Infrastructure to easily build and deploy servers. These servers are connected to multiple networks, encompassing Coalition, classified and non-classified networks. Virtualizing services provides additional agility to the III Corps by allowing them traffic shaping and deployment options. This is some really amazing stuff. VMware is providing the III Corps with the flexibility they need to fight asymmetric battles. The flexibility necessary to re-provision services, to move them, or to shape traffic if necessary all enable better support to the warfighter – their ultimate goal.

Here are some of the results the III Corps has seen:

Speedy deployment of new systems. “We have security requirements for how our servers are built and setup,” says Bourne. “With VMware Infrastructure 3, we can just clone a template that has the proper security configuration. The process is extremely simple and saves a lot of time.”

The III Corps is using VMware to expand their deployed IT toolkit.
Provide more services with restricted space. “In the past, there were physical space limitations on how many servers we could add–and that, necessarily, limited the services we could provide and support,” says Bourne. “VMware Infrastructure 3 removes a lot of those limitations, allowing us to provide more service.”
Increase reliability of applications. “The redundancy, live migration, and failover capabilities that VMware Infrastructure 3 provides are huge benefits that make the decision to ‘go virtual’ advantageous,” says Bourne.