The U.S. Army's Network Enterprise Technology Command is the Army's central resource for wireless device and services.

They've just given their blessing to BlackBerry in a most significant way, writing a one-year contract with CDW Government Inc. for a whole bunch of wireless devices and peripherals including you know what.

The BlackBerry devices that are part of the order are loaded for bear. These Java-operated BB's (model numbers not yet available) meet Federal Information Processing Standard 140-2 for securing sensitive but unclassified data. They also cme with smart-card readers from a company called Appriva.

Total cost of the deal was not announced, but is believed to be less than $5 million.