Army to close active information operations command as it moves those ops to smaller specialized units

Patty Nieberg

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The Army is closing its last standing active-duty information operations command as part of the military’s shift to joint operations and a broader realization that information warfare is and will be significant in future wars.

With that in mind, the Army wants soldiers conducting information operations closer to the future fight and integrated into the different geographic regions.

In July, U.S. Army Cyber Command’s 1st Information Operations Command held its last change of command ceremony at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. The command was the Army’s only active-duty command focused on civil affairs, cyber warfare and psychological operations, also known colloquially as a PSYOP which aim to influence the beliefs and actions of other countries’ populations. The command will be inactivated in fiscal year 2025, according to Maj. Lindsay Roman, a spokesperson for U.S. Army Cyber Command.

“There was a little bit of a mismatch between what the functions were in [1st Information Operations Command] which had kind of accreted a variety of jobs over the years that weren’t all really truly related,” said Aaron Pearce, U.S. Army Cyber Command’s director for information warfare. “They were a parking space for cyber red teaming before cyber red teaming really became a common thing within the military.”