Assessing India’s Perceptions of China’s Nuclear Expansion

Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan

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China’s ongoing expansion of its nuclear arsenal may be aimed at eventually achieving nuclear parity with the United States. But regardless of the rationale, China’s nuclear expansion, along with possible changes to its nuclear doctrine, are of great concern to India, its neighbor in South Asia. This report—based on interviews with nearly two dozen Indian security experts, including former military and government officials—assesses India’s strategic thinking on China’s nuclear expansion, and what consequences it may have for India’s own nuclear development and US interests in Asia.

SummaryIndia is monitoring China’s ongoing expansion of its nuclear arsenal carefully, looking to identify China’s goals, gauge the impact on regional security, and determine its response.

A significant increase in the size of China’s nuclear arsenal, together with the adoption of a generally coercive posture toward India or a change in China’s no-first-use (NFU) nuclear policy, could compel India to respond.

Interviews with former senior Indian civilian and military officials suggest that India’s response will not seek to match China’s nuclear expansion but will address the imbalance qualitatively, focusing on developing longer-range and submarine-launched missiles and other technological enhancements.

The strong expectation is that China will not abandon its NFU stance, though it may modify certain policies within its NFU stance.

There was consensus among the interviewees on most subjects, but they were divided about whether China’s nuclear force structure will continue to emphasize land-based missiles or shift to emphasize submarines, which India has limited ability to track.

India and the United States could both benefit from closer interactions on addressing the rationale and consequences of China’s nuclear expansion.

Indian Defense Production: Relying on Self-reliance

Ajai Shukla

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On February 10, India’s Defense Minister Rajnath Singh inaugurated a five-day defense systems exhibition in the country’s information technology capital, Bengaluru. Aero India 2025, as this ongoing biennial exhibition is called, is the 15th edition of what New Delhi touts as Asia’s biggest aerospace and defense exhibition. Participating this year are 900 exhibitors from 90 countries, including 100 original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). Defense ministers from over 30 countries are attending, either virtually or in person.

India, the world’s biggest spender in the international arms bazaar, is easily able to draw in the world’s biggest arms sellers. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI)’s most recent report, India was the world’s top arms importer over the five-year period 2019-23, with imports rising by 4.7 percent compared to the 2014-18 period.

While the United States remains India’s premier arms supplier, France has slipped smoothly into second place. The manufacture in India of six Scorpene submarines, the purchase of 36 Rafale fighters, and the upgrade of 50 Mirage 2000 fighters have resulted in France supplanting Russia as India’s second-biggest weapons supplier. Even so, Moscow retains its stranglehold over large sections of India’s weapons imports, including T-90S tanks and armored personnel carriers, S-400 integrated air defense systems, Krivak III-class frigates, and Akula-class nuclear-powered submarines.

Now every major aerospace OEM is positioning itself to win the biggest prize in the international combat aircraft market: the Indian Air Force (IAF)’s ongoing acquisition of 114 medium fighters.

It's Not Just DeepSeek China is After

Steve Carmel

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It’s not just DeepSeek, China wants to dominate the deep seas. Can Trump prevent that?

Every day, we are reminded of the challenges the U.S. faces in maintaining global leadership in critical industries and technologies. The recent DeepSeek revelation, which shocked the tech world, exposed how aggressively China is advancing in the artificial intelligence sector.

With DeepSeek reportedly matching U.S. AI capabilities in effectiveness but costing less, it’s clear that China isn’t holding back in its bid for global dominance.

DeepSeek’s ramifications are unsettling, but it doesn’t necessarily pose the greatest risk to U.S. national security. A far more pressing threat to our strategic interests lies in China’s rapid and unchecked progress in securing primacy over the world’s oceans.

In a report issued last month, the outgoing U.S. Trade Representative warned that China is aggressively targeting the maritime, logistics, and shipbuilding industries: “we build less than 5 ships each year, while the PRC is building more than 1,700[.]” If America is to regain its edge in these critical sectors, swift and bold action will be necessary.”

Unfortunately, the U.S. shipbuilding industry has atrophied under years of neglect. As a result, China vastly outpaces the U.S. in the production of commercial vessels. This threat to our nation doesn’t stop at ship production. The logistics infrastructure that supports both civilian and military transport is just as critical—and it is here where the new Administration must act.

How Trump’s Gaza Plan Could Hand the Middle East to Russia and China

James Durso

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U.S. President Donald Trump recently called the Gaza Strip a “demolition site,” and said the Palestinians would be evacuated to Jordan and Egypt, where they would be “thrilled” to live. The U.S. would then take possession of Gaza (“We'll own it’), and would develop it, creating “thousands of jobs,” making it the “the Riviera of the Middle East.” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu noted the project, “it’s something that could change history,” and it will, but probably not the way he and Trump think.

Netanyahu called Trump’s idea to deport the Gazans “remarkable” and the “first good idea I've heard,” but just about everyone, everywhere reacted negatively to the plan. The White House quickly clarified the U.S. won’t pay for the reconstruction of Gaza, and it hasn’t made any commitment to send U.S. troops there, but an American private security company will be manning a key Gaza checkpoint and armed American military veterans wearing military-style garb will be as big a target as serving troops and will be valuable hostages.

In the U.S., many Arab American voters wondered if they made a mistake supporting Trump in 2024, and one Arab-American group rebranded, removing “Trump” from its name. According to Pew Research, Muslims will become the second-largest religious group in the U.S. by 2050 and is a demographic the Republicans needs to capture.

Jews continued voting for Democrats in 2024 (79% voted for Democrat candidate Kamala Harris; 21% voted for Trump, “the lowest proportion of Jewish votes for a Republican presidential candidate in 24 years.”)

Thus, the GOP may secure no net gain in votes and may suffer in the 2026 mid-term elections, so why bother doing this?

The Indo-Pacific: What You Need to Know Now

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As the United States navigates a pivotal leadership transition, the Indo-Pacific region stands at the forefront of global strategic interests. The region is home to an uncertain mix of political disquiet, military peril, and economic potential, with issues like North Korea's nuclear ambitions, China's assertive territorial claims, and the delicate balance of power involving Taiwan shaping the narrative. All this makes the Indo-Pacific a crucial arena for U.S. foreign policy and the alliances and partnerships that will influence global trade and security frameworks moving forward.

We asked a team of RAND researchers with deep expertise on the various countries that make up the Indo-Pacific to assess the issues, objectives, and outlook for the region at this critical moment.Jeffrey Hornung highlights Japan's focus on maintaining U.S. commitments amid regional security concerns.

Miyeon Oh discusses the Korean Peninsula's security challenges, balancing U.S. alliances with economic ties to China.

Samuel Charap addresses Russia's shifting priorities post–Ukraine conflict, emphasizing its ties with China.

Raymond Kuo outlines Taiwan's goals to enhance U.S. relations and defense capabilities.

Jude Blanchette examines China's strategic maneuvers and its hopes for an enduring “honeymoon” in U.S.-China relations.

Through objective research and expert analyses, RAND contributes to better understanding of the Indo-Pacific's geopolitical landscape, offering invaluable guidance during this critical period of U.S. leadership transition.

Chinese Water Projects in Tibet: A “Continental Challenge”

Antonina Luszczy kiewicz-Mendis

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The management of transboundary water resources originating in Tibet has become a critical geopolitical and geo-economic issue in Asia. This issue brief examines China’s hydrological projects on the Tibetan Plateau and their implications for downstream countries. By exploring two key pillars of China’s water strategy—the construction of mega-dams and the South-North Water Diversion Project—the issue brief discusses both the domestic and international consequences of Beijing’s initiatives, such as environmental degradation, displacement of local populations, and the potential for Beijing to weaponize water as a geopolitical tool. In particular, it focuses on tensions between China and India, the involvement of Tibetan expatriate leadership, and the role of the U.S.-China rivalry.

Donald Trump’s Machiavellian Instincts

James Holmes

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The new president seems to implicitly grasp two core lessons from Machiavelli’s writing: the difficulty of fundamental change, and the need to strike quickly against his enemies.

Donald Trump is not Hitler, Stalin, or Mussolini. Instead, he is Niccolò Machiavelli! Or at any rate, were he among the living today, the Florentine philosopher-statesman would instantly grasp the newly-installed chief executive’s methods.

In popular lore, “Machiavelli” is an amoral, mustache-twirling purveyor of ends-justifies-the-means statecraft. That’s a caricature. The real Machiavelli was an on-again, off-again official in fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Florence. He penned such treatises as The Prince, The Art of War, and my favorite, his Discourses on Titus Livy’s History of Rome, to help princes and leaders of republics navigate the politics of Renaissance Italy. That was no easy feat. To describe Italy in the age of Machiavelli as a hardscrabble neighborhood understates the matter to a comical degree.

Surviving and thriving in Florence demanded a bare-knuckles approach to statecraft. That’s what Machiavelli prescribed. Along the way, he produced counsel commanding lasting if not eternal value for students and practitioners of statecraft. And his advice was surprisingly humane for the times and circumstances. He aimed to help political leaders consolidate their rule and, in so doing, make life secure and bearable for the populace they governed.

Per Machiavelli, rather than comport himself like a villain, a wise prince should “seek to make the people friendly to himself,” helping them live content. Same goes for the overseers of a republic. So much for the caricature.

Change And Its Enemies

America’s Deterrence Gap

Will Thibeau

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Conventional wisdom traditionally delineates between military systems designed for strategic deterrence and those intended for tactical application. A machine gun, such as the M240B, firing 650 rounds per minute, is invaluable for a Ranger unit in combat but holds no deterrent effect on the grand strategic scale. In contrast, an aircraft carrier, strategic bomber, or nuclear submarine is resourced and evaluated precisely for its role in America’s strategic deterrence, shaping global power dynamics. However, the evolution of 21st-century warfare demands a reevaluation of this paradigm.

In February 2023, Austin Dahmer—a prominent America First foreign policy expert and current Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Policy—authored the white paper Resourcing the Strategy of Denial. Dahmer laid out the difficult, yet necessary budgetary and force structure choices required to build a Joint Force capable of deterring conflict with China. His analysis advocated for reallocating resources from the Army and Marine Corps toward the Navy and Air Force, given their critical role in the Indo-Pacific theater. Yet, in hindsight, a glaring omission in the report was the strategic importance of unmanned systems in deterrence. Given the timing, this oversight is understandable, but any modern revision must account for the now-undeniable fact that mass-produced, low-cost, attritable unmanned systems are a crucial pillar of deterrence in the Asia-Pacific.

A Tech Power Playbook for Donald Trump 2.0

Todd Young

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In coming years, the pace of technological innovation and deployment will only quicken. The new administration will need a systematic and sustained approach.

On January 20, Donald J. Trump entered office as our nation’s forty-seventh chief executive. With his electoral mandate for bold change, the opportunities are boundless. Following recent decades of costly foreign entanglements—from our abusive relationship with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to our disastrous military engagement in Iraq—most Americans are understandably eager for change. They want President Trump to press forward with his campaign promises to avoid unpopular foreign commitments, insist that allied countries stop “free riding” off of the United States, supercharge America’s manufacturing might, and ensure that the world plays by America’s rules, not China’s.

Meanwhile, tech power—AI, biotech, quantum, drones, and more—is fundamentally transforming our economy, security, and the very nature of global power. The Trump administration can seize on the intersection of the president’s promises and the opportunities for peace, freedom, and prosperity that the dynamic technological revolution presents.

President Trump wisely selected a Vice President who understands tech power and how it is fundamentally transforming our economy and security. JD Vance is familiar with Silicon Valley and has strong relationships with prominent tech luminaries like Elon Musk and Peter Thiel. Just days after the election, Trump also appointed a White House AI and Crypto Czar to spearhead federal policy and nominated tech strategist Jacob Helberg to lead the economic portfolio at the State Department.

Syria’s Biggest Problem

Jesse Marks and Hazem Rihawi

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The shocking defeat of Bashar al-Assad’s regime by rebel groups led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham prompted a groundswell of domestic and international optimism. But already, Syria’s post-Assad future is on a knife’s edge. The obstacles to reconstructing the country are immense. Chief among them is the question of refugees forced from the country during Syria’s decadelong civil war. The return of these refugees could become the largest repatriation operation in decades, with over six million Syrian refugees abroad and seven million displaced within Syria. Hundreds of thousands of Syrians have already returned to their homeland, driven

Conflict Amplified: Disinformation and Hate in the Israel-Hamas War

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As the Israel-Hamas conflict has widened into a broader crisis Middle East crisis during 2024, the information environment surrounding these events has become even more complex. This report investigates the spread and impact of mis- and disinformation, hate speech, and extremist narratives related to the Israel-Hamas conflict in the UK, France and Germany. Employing innovative methodologies developed alongside CASM Technology, ISD analysed extensive multilingual datasets from mainstream and fringe platforms. These datasets comprise of social media posts from actors based in (or focused on) the UK, France or Germany, who are known to routinely spread extremist and hateful content, disinformation and/or conspiracy theories. As such, this study identifies the key themes and moments of online escalation around the Israel-Hamas conflict.

The findings of these investigations reveal the centrality of hateful narratives targeting Jewish and Muslim communities in online conversation about the conflict, as well as opportunistic use of its developments by extremist groups, and the amplification of disinformation by hostile state-affiliated actors. This research emphasises the hybridised and evolving nature of online misinformation, hateful and extremist narratives, and the importance of adaptive countermeasures to address these threats. To mitigate these online threats and their impact on communities effectively, platforms must ensure the comprehensive enforcement of existing policies, as well as the development of specific crisis-response mechanisms that account for the sensitivities of escalating conflict.

Report of the Webinar: Climate Crisis in Tibet – Part I: CCP’s Tibet Takeover: Wither Global Climate Action?

Ute Wallenböck, Jonathan Ping, Mark S. Cogan, Tsering Topgyal, Jagannath Panda, Lena Fargier and Alexander Droop

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This report is an outcome of the webinar titled “Climate Crisis in Tibet”, organized by the Stockholm Center for South Asian and Indo-Pacific Affairs (SCSA-IPA) at the Institute for Security and Development Policy (ISDP), which was held on December 18, 2024. This significant online platform brought together a distinguished panel of experts to explore the environmental and geopolitical impacts of China’s policies in Tibet. This webinar addressed a few critical questions:What is the nature and scope of the environmental degradation in the Tibetan Plateau?

What is the extent and ambit of the CCP’s policies for governing Tibet that particularly impact Tibet’s environment?

What are the projected objectives of the CCP vis-à-vis Tibet (e.g., development aims to end poverty)?

And what is the true nature of its policy frameworks, including disinformation campaigns (e.g., via influencer management firms) and China’s persecution of Tibetan environmental activists?

What has been the actual short-term and long-term impact on the Tibetan region and its people due to the CCP’s policies?

How is China’s control of Tibetan territories, including religion and culture, impacting Tibet’s climatic conditions?

Are the CCP’s actions, including militarization and laws, in Tibet that have repercussions on Tibet’s climate change irreversible?

How can international multilateral forums, such as the IPCC, United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), and ICIMOD, include Tibetan voices and concerns proactively without fear of Chinese retaliation?

IJ Infinity Group Military Strategy Magazine

Winter 2025, v. 10, no. 1 

Theory to Reality: Defensive Operations Confirm Clausewitz’s Theory

Military Strategy and the Political Dynamics of War

Beyond the Rifleman: A Case for Change Regarding the Management of Military Personnel

The Problem with Strategy as Problem-Solving

Virtù and the War on Hamas: A Machiavellian Reading of the Strategies Around the 2023 Israel-Hamas War

How can Strategic Theory Provide Insights into the M23 and the Broader Instability in Eastern DRC?

Jamestown Foundation China Brief

January 31, 2025, v. 25, no. 2 

Beijing Woos Washington While Advancing New International Order

Star Hostage: TSMC, China’s Drive to Conquer Taiwan, and the Race to Win AI Superiority

Roiling in the Deep: PRC Pushes New Deep-Sea Order

Harnessing Hydropower, Sparking Tensions: PRC Mega-Dam and India's Water Security Fears

New Year’s Gala Celebrates Tech and International Outlook

How America’s Allies Boost U.S. Intelligence And Why Trump Threatens That Cooperation

David V. Gioe

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Intelligence diplomacy—“liaison” is the term of art—is a key, if often hidden, element of national power. Washington has more liaison partners than is publicly known, because countries and even nonstate groups that do not wish to be seen engaging with American officials still speak with the United States government via clandestine channels. Traditionally, liaison relationships are unaffected by international politics and shifts in foreign policy; administrations come and go, and the intelligence flows uninterrupted. But occasionally, political developments are so dramatic that they intrude on intelligence liaison.

How the fragile Israel-Hamas ceasefire deal could unravel

Lauren Kent

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It’s only three weeks into a fragile ceasefire, and Israel and Hamas are each ratcheting up allegations that the other party has violated the deal.

So far, 16 out of 33 hostages scheduled for release in the current phase of the agreement have been freed by Hamas, and 656 Palestinian prisoners from a list of nearly 2,000 have been released by Israel. But the weekly exchanges may now be disrupted after Hamas accused Israel of violating the agreement and said it would postpone Saturday’s hostage release “until further notice.”

Israel has hit back, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu saying late Tuesday that the Gaza ceasefire will end if Hamas does not release hostages as planned on Saturday.

“If Hamas does not return our hostages by Saturday noon - the ceasefire will end, and the IDF will return to intense fighting until Hamas is completely defeated,” he said in a video statement.

US President Donald Trump, whose envoy helped mediate the agreement along with officials from Egypt and Qatar, has suggested dismissing the multi-staged approach of the deal altogether and giving Hamas an ultimatum to release all the hostages at once.

While some Israeli politicians have endorsed Trump’s ultimatum, Netanyahu has not explicitly agreed to it – instead issuing an ambiguous statement.

In his statement on Tuesday, he “welcomed President Trump’s demand,” but didn’t specify how many hostages should be released.

“If Hamas does not return our hostages by Saturday noon, the ceasefire will end, and the IDF (Israel Defense Forces) will return to intense fighting until Hamas is completely defeated,” Netanyahu said in a video statement.

Here’s what each side is saying, and where the deal could go from here:

The Race to Explain Why More Young Adults Are Getting Cancer

Jamie Ducharme

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From Left: Imtiaz Hussain, 31, was diagnosed with colon cancer at 26. Carrie Regan, 41, was diagnosed with ovarian cancer at 40. Kelly Spill, 33, was diagnosed with colorectal cancer at 28. Giancarlo Oviedo-Mori, 32, was diagnosed with lung cancer at 18.Frankie Alduino for TIME

Dr. Frank Frizelle has operated on countless patients in his career as a colorectal surgeon. But there’s one case that stayed with him.

In 2014, he was treating a woman in her late 20s suffering from bowel cancer—already a rare situation, given her age. But it became even more unusual when her best friend visited her in the hospital and told Frizelle that she had many of the same symptoms as his patient. Subsequent testing revealed that his patient’s friend had a lesion that, had it not been caught early, likely would have become cancerous. “That really brought it home to me—how it’s much more common than you think,” says Frizelle, a professor of surgery at the University of Otago in New Zealand.

Still, like any good scientist, Frizelle was skeptical. Was it simply a fluke that he kept treating strikingly young patients? Or was his practice one tiny data point in a larger trend?

He found his answer after sifting through national health data: colorectal cancer, he discovered, was indeed being diagnosed more often than in previous years among New Zealanders under 50. Further research by Frizelle analyzing populations in Sweden and Scotland showed the same thing. A bigger picture was emerging. Here were three different countries, with different populations and health challenges—but united by a spike in colorectal cancers among young adults.

How the Trump administration could end a century of American scientific dominance

Adam Sobel 

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Rough seas ahead: The Trump administration is reportedly looking to cut funding for NOAA and the National Science Foundation by 30 to 50 percent, or more. Photo: NOAA's Fleet Then and Now - Sailing for Science Collection

When the Trump administration issued its federal funding freeze in its first days, it was immediately felt as an enormous shock to scientists across the country. And it still is; while the freeze was officially blocked by court order, functionally, it still appears to be in place to some extent, in that the processes by which federal funds are disbursed to universities, government, and industry laboratories are not operating normally. Communication with most federal science agencies is currently difficult if not impossible.

At the same time, Elon Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency” has been trying to convince employees of the science agencies to quit, through a buyout offer of questionable legality combined with threats that they may be fired in any case.

Project 2025, the playbook behind the administration’s actions, calls for drastic and unprecedented reductions in agency budgets. The National Science Foundation and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have both been reportedly threatened with cuts of 30 to 50 percent or more. A new directive on Friday orders overhead on grants from the National Institute of Health to be cut to 15 percent. At this level, universities will lose money for research, such that many will have to do less of it or none at all.

The damage won’t be limited to the universities themselves: According to United for Medical Research, a coalition of university and private industry research institutions, the $37.81 billion awarded in NIH research grants in 2023 generated $92.89 billion in economic activity. Even that statistic doesn’t account for more diffuse benefits, or the way those benefits compound in subsequent years. One recent economic study from the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, for example, found that non-defense R&D spending overall paid returns of 150 to 300 percent, and was responsible for a quarter of the United States’ productivity growth since World War II.

HOW TO TRANSFORM THE ARMY FOR DRONE WARFAR

Neil Hollenbeck 

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That the U.S. Army needs to adapt to drone warfare is obvious. The best institutional mechanism to do that is not.

Since 2022, Ukraine has led the world in the integration of aerial drones into large-scale ground combat operations. Unfortunately, Russia has been a fast follower. Both armies are using drones within traditional infantry, tank, and artillery formations, while also creating new drone warfare organizations. That the U.S. Army needs to adapt to drone warfare is obvious. The best institutional mechanism to do that is not. But there are some in Congress who are ready to make the decision for the Army now.

U.S. House Resolution 8070, passed in June 2024, included a provision establishing a Drone Corps as a basic branch of the U.S. Army. Chief of Staff of the Army General Randy George expressed opposition, arguing drones should be integrated into existing formations, not consolidated in a separate branch. The provision was not included in the final version of the bill.

How to organize the Army for adaptation to drone warfare could be the most important decision Army senior leaders make in the next few years. There are two ways to get it wrong. One would be to treat drones as an entirely new arm, to be developed and employed independently. The other would be to treat drones as tools to help other arms do what they already do better. With the airplane and the tank—the most disruptive weapons that were maturing during this same decade in the last century—the Army got it wrong in both ways.

The U.S. Army purchased the world’s first military aircraft in 1909. By the 1920s, the Army had established aviation as a separate arm, which, with strong congressional support, grew increasingly independent. As a result, air capabilities developed quickly, according to entirely new warfighting concepts. But airpower became unmoored from land power, if not from reality. Army aviators came to view airplanes as war-winners in their own right. That vision was never realized, and poor air-ground integration plagued the Army throughout World War II.

National Cybersecurity Incident Response Plan

RADM (Ret.) Mark Montgomery, Annie Fixler, Jiwon Ma

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Public Comment on the National Cybersecurity Incident Response Plan

The Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) Center on Cyber and Technology Innovation appreciates the opportunity to comment on the draft National Cybersecurity Incident Response Plan (NCIRP).

The leadership of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) in coordinating stakeholder and interagency engagement in drafting the NCIRP has been exceptional. As the designated National Coordinator for the security and resilience of the nation’s critical infrastructure, the agency has demonstrated the ability to manage and coordinate responses to cyber threats across both the public and private sectors. The NCIRP, as drafted, provides a strong foundation and serves as a testament to CISA’s dedication and its demonstrated capabilities over the years.

A clear and effective national response framework is critical for ensuring a well-coordinated response to cyber incidents threatening the security of U.S. critical infrastructure. The NCIRP could be refined further to provide greater clarity around the roles and responsibilities of key entities. Following the issuance of the final draft, we look forward to the implementation plans that will operationalize this framework.

Further Recognition of Space as a Critical Infrastructure

One notable aspect of the plan is its recognition of the space domain as a critical asset to our country. Space assets provide essential services for infrastructure systems we rely on every day, such as global positioning, satellite communications, and remote sensing, which support transportation, energy, emergency response, financial systems, and much more. Disruptions to these assets could have cascading effects across various sectors. However, the NCIRP’s acknowledgment of this fact falls short of the needed step of formally designating space systems as critical infrastructure. National Security Memorandum 22 similarly fails to include space as a critical infrastructure, but this does not diminish its importance in national security.

New Cybersecurity Battleground: Modern Threats, Modern Defenses

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Cyberattacks seem to dominate headlines these days. Whether it’s hackers leaking confidential data or holding hospital files hostage for ransom, cybercrime increasingly impacts everyday life. Yet many companies still rely on outdated tools and strategies to defend their networks, data, and systems.

The harsh reality is that legacy approaches focused on building walls to keep intruders out don’t really account for modern hacking techniques. Instead of smashing through the front gates, adversaries now sneak in using clever tricks or disguising themselves as trusted users.

Once inside, they often roam freely across digital infrastructure, looking to grab sensitive information, plant malicious software, or study system designs for future exploitation. Even more concerning, attacks often persist undetected for weeks or months before their true impact emerges.

By then, tremendous financial, operational, or reputational carnage may already be done as hackers exfiltrate troves of IP, personal records, or other crown jewel data assets over lengthy periods. Or criminals have embedded difficult-to-repair malware rigged as a digital time bomb to one day wreak havoc.

The escalating cyber threat now poses dangers rivaling traditional crime and warfare, even though many organizations lack effective deterrence and protection. However, modern defense strategies emphasizing detection, response, and resilience could help rewrite the narrative from helpless victims to empowered guardians.

Power Generation – Reducing Excess in the LSB

1LT JORDAN BLOOMFIELD 1LT SAMUEL PANNEK

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Light, mobile, and agile — these are all terms used to describe the new light support battalion (LSB) concept. As transformation in contact (TiC) progresses, we continually look for ways to live up to them; to do so, we must rightsize our organization and the equipment it carries. Legacy power generation continues to weigh us down as we prepare for the next war. While generators are required for maintaining command and control (C2) nodes as well as conducting general operations within an LSB, they are often underutilized, with our Soldiers possessing no true understanding about how much power a single generator produces. Reducing the size and number of generators within the LSB ultimately improves the battalion’s capabilities and balances the formation against our future mission. 

Waste of Energy Throughout Operation Lethal Eagle (OLE) 24.1, the 526th Light Support Battalion operated three 5-kilowatt (kW) generators, three 15-kW generators, and two 30-kW generators in a moderately dispersed base cluster. These generators, while capable of producing 185 kW of power, on average produced 31 kW of power daily. The average power usage per company was 28.56 percent of its total capability. The most notable energy waste was from the Headquarters and Headquarters Company (HHC) node: It was capable of producing 65 kW of power but only required 3 kW daily, a mere 5 percent of its capability. J Forward Support Company had the least utilized amount of energy based off its capabilities; it was able to produce 25 kW but only utilized .5 kW of power daily — just 2 percent of its maximum capability. The only company that frequently met the max capability was C Company (medics), which used 3-10 kW daily (the 10 kW being utilized during X-rays). This met the 10 kW capacity. The effects of wasting a generator’s power are more serious than simply transporting unnecessary equipment. During large-scale combat operations (LSCO), near-peer threats possess the capability to detect emitted energy in a given area and target the source with deadly unmanned aerial systems (UAS) and indirect fires. It is critical to reduce energy emissions as much as possible.

A Data-Centric Approach to Increasing Crew Lethality: Proposing ‘Moneyball for Gunnery’

Lt. Col. Jonathan D. Bate, 1st Lt. Ethan Barangan, 1st Lt. Nicholas Calhoon and Staff Sgt. Jacob Seitz

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When Billy Beane, general manager of the Oakland Athletics from 1997-2015, started using data analytics to build a winning baseball team on a budget, many in the baseball community were skeptical. However, the team’s performance demonstrated that leveraging in-game data to identify undervalued players could provide an edge. During the 2002 season, the team won 20 games in a row on a budget less than a third of the league’s most expensive teams. He accomplished this by applying a “sabermetrics” approach of collecting and analyzing in-game activity to build a cost-effective team, as described in the 2003 book Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game.1

Inspired by Beane’s approach, our data analytics team in the Ivy Raider Brigade (1st Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division) asked a similar question: Can data analytics help us improve crew performance during mounted machine gun (MMG) lethality? Similar to the Oakland A’s, combat units are constrained in terms of time and ammunition. Producing better Table VI results more efficiently builds lethality.

We found that similar to baseball, in-game statistics during gunnery can identify factors that correlate with better crew performance. Our results, which suggest that Table III is an undervalued player, stem from only a single brigade’s Stryker gunnery, but the project underscores the general approach’s potential. Of note, we do not argue that analytics should replace leader experience or “gut instinct;” rather, the insights data provides can elevate intuition while reducing cognitive bias.

Mobile Brigade Combat Team Targeting Process“OWN theKILL CHAIN

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LTC Christopher The Army introduced the Mobile Brigade Combat Team (MBCT) to support division as the new unit of action. The MBCT, outfitted with equipment like the Infantry Squad Vehicle (ISV) for mobility and unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) for sensing and striking, supported with new communications infrastructure through C2 fix allows commanders to greatly increase operational tempo. As a result, 2MBCT required a more agile, adaptive and responsive targeting process tied to critical events instead of the 72-hour Air Tasking Order (ATO) cycle.

The challenge the fire support enterprise faced with the existing targeting process was that it remained tied to both a timeline that cannot maintain the pace of operations and resources not always aligned to the MBCT commander. To address this need, 2MBCT developed a process based on the find, fix, finish, exploit, analyze (F3EA) targeting cycle anchoring it around two boards called “flash mobs,” a term acquired from 3rd Brigade, 25th Infantry Division. At the Joint

Readiness Training Center (JRTC), 2MBCT implemented this process resulting in an increased lethality for the MBCT despite some challenges. 

Connecting the Force: Building US Military Interoperability for the Modern Battlefield

James Micciche,  Jahara Matisek 

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Institutional strategy in a post-information age cannot solely focus on platform development and employment but rather must emphasize ensuring a force has the right connections to operate and rapidly adapt to a flat and transparent operating environment. The three dimensions of interoperability outlined in Allied and Joint doctrine, technical, procedural, and human, provide a framework for force and concept developers to follow ensuring a modern force is connected and adaptable enough to meet the unforeseen demands of tomorrow’s conflicts.

When pressed on force design shortfalls in the first year of the Iraq War, then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld infamously quipped, “You go to war with the army you have, not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time.” While a wide swath of the American media landscaped disparaged Rumsfeld for the tone and setting of his comment, his logic was not flawed. In fact, the “countless duels” Carl von Clausewitz defined as war, expand far beyond the battlefield and include research and development investments, doctrine and concept development, and choices in force structure all occurring long before hostilities begin. J.F.C. Fueller’s concept of Constant Tactical Factor expands on this idea describing how battlefield advantages derived from industrial and technological innovation are often short lived and cyclical due to adversarial counters and innovation. In the end, Rumsfeld was describing the underlying problem institutional strategy seeks to solve, building a military as close to the army you want, while allowing the flexibility to overcome adversarial counteractions and rapidly changing environments to field the army you need, before the enemy does.