Irregular Warfare Podcast - The Cyber-SOF-Space Triad and the Future of Army Special Operations

Episode Date: May 2, 2023

Be sure to visit the Irregular Warfare Initiative website to see all of the new articles, podcast episodes, and other content the IWI team is producing! For nearly two decades of constant operations during America’s post-9/11 wars, Army special operations forces played a central role at the tip of the spear. But how will they best contribute to future irregular warfare campaigns that take shape on a very different strategic landscape? In this episode, hosts Ben Jebb and Kyle Atwell are joined by Lieutenant Jonathan P. Braga, commanding general of US Army Special Operations Command, and P. W. Singer, a New York Times best-selling author and renowned national security futurist. Together, they explore the range of future threats that Army special operations forces will encounter, discuss how to harness the power of innovation to enable them to meet these threats, and recommend ways to optimize these uniquely trained and equipped soldiers and units for the future of irregular warfare. Intro music: "Unsilenced" by Ketsa Outro music: "Launch" by Ketsa CC BY-NC-ND 4.0

This is another type of warfare, new in its intensity, ancient in its origin, war by guerrillas, subversives, insurgents, assassins, war by ambush instead of by combat. By infiltration instead of aggression. Seeking victory by eroding and exhausting the enemy instead of engaging him. It is a form of warfare uniquely adapted to what has been strangely called wars of liberation. Welcome to Episode 78 of the Irregular Warfare Podcast. Wars of liberation. Our guests begin by framing future threats to the United States and its partners and allies, and what role ARSOF plays in strategic competition. They then explore a series of important topics relevant to the role of ARSOF in future conflict, to include balancing near-peer threats with transnational threats, the role of technology within the human domain, and a discussion on key historical SOF cases that may inform the future of warfare. on key historical SOF cases that may inform the future of warfare. They conclude with recommendations to the RSOF community on how to adapt to a new era of strategic competition.

P.W. Singer is a New York Times bestselling author and one of America's premier futurists in the national security space. He has authored and co-authored multiple highly acclaimed books to include Burn In, Like War, and Ghost Fleet. P.W. Singer received his Ph.D. in Government from Harvard University and a B.A. from the School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton. Lieutenant General Jonathan Braga currently serves as the Commanding General of United States Army Special Operations Command. Over the course of his three-decade-long career in

the military, he has led American and coalition forces in multiple combat theaters around the globe. Earlier this year, Lieutenant General Braga released the ARSOF strategy document, which serves as the anchor for today's conversation. You are listening to the Irregular Warfare Podcast, a joint production of the Princeton Empirical Studies of Conflict Project and the Modern War Institute at West Point, dedicated to bridging the gap between scholars and practitioners to support the community of irregular warfare professionals. Here's our conversation with Lieutenant General Jonathan Braga and P.W. Singer.

Peter Singer, General Braga, thanks for joining us on episode 77 of the Irregular Warfare podcast. It's great to have you today. I really appreciate you having us on. Yeah, thanks a lot, guys. This is a special opportunity for me to share this dialogue with someone I voraciously read and respect. So I look forward to the conversation, Peter. So the ARSOF, or Army Special Operations Forces Strategy Document, serves as the anchor for

today's conversation. And like any good vision, it starts off with an assessment of today's security environment. So, John, could you describe how you see today's strategic milieu and threat landscape and describe how that informed your vision for RSOF going forward? Yeah, sure. Great question. It really just stems from the national defense strategy. And it's been very clear of what our acute and pacing threat and challenges are out there. And honestly, it's been clear for a couple NDSs right now that the shift has been towards the People's Republic of China and Russia at the top two challenges that are facing there.

But in a broader context, there's challenges that the world is facing that I think are obvious to everyone from transformational technologies you see coming into the fold and increases as well as challenges such as pandemics, climate change, refugee crisis that are challenging the kind of the fabric and I would say priorities of different countries around the world that we're all facing differently. And then there's just the resurgence of the autocratic regimes, again, starting off there with the clear NDS priorities of the PRC in Russia. And I think that really required us to be clearly focused of what internal to Army special operations needed to shift and focus on. I had to make that a clear statement when we're talking about, first of all, being threat-informed, but strategically driven on those types of challenges. And that's been where I want to

start our journey and start our strategy. Peter, when you look at the current threat environment that we're trying to frame the RSAS strategy into, what are the most important components of it for the special operations community from your perspective? You know, it's interesting. The answer to that question is a challenge that I faced a couple months ago. I was asked to develop and teach a graduate level course on the future of warfare. And, you know, how do you approach that, which is really what we're after here

in the strategic question. And how do you break it down into different weeks, different parts, what are the readings and topics? And how I went after it, we started out with a look at, okay, what's continuous? What has happened in the past? How does that shape the future? But then the way that we broke it down was first looking at the new potential causes of conflict,

and General Braga hit them. You know, we've got some that are enduring great power competition leading to conflict, either through deliberate wars or miscalculations, like in a World War I, you've got that. But you also have all of these underlying forces that are somewhat new, whether it's climate change. We had a reading on that. We had resource shortages. They've always been out there, but maybe we've got new ones like water as a driver of conflict. We had a look at urbanization. You know, we can't project everything perfectly, but we can project that more people are living in cities and war is a human endeavor. So we're going to follow that. It's not just a driver, but we're more likely to fight in those spaces.

So if you're thinking about, you know, the future of ARSOF, you know, it can't predict every country it's going to fight in, but it can probably predict it's going to be more likely to be in urban environments. So we broke it down in terms of causes. We also broke it down into new domains, space, cyber, information operations, and how those matter in both outright warfare, but also that contestation underneath it. And then finally, we had a bracket looking at new technologies. It's not just their advancement. It's one, they have relatively low barriers to entry. So if you look at something like a drone, you look at something like AI, it could be

in the hands of an adversary, potentially like the PLA or the Russian military, but also, by the way, a non-state actor network, a terrorist group, all the way down to an individual. Hey, Peter, if I could just riff off that, because you stoked a lot of different things that I think are extremely important when we're communicating across our force is that all those transformational technology you talked about and the price point that can basically get into the hands of an individual citizen, vice a nation state, but make a strategic difference, a strategic impact.

So when we're talking down and into our force, we talk about because of that connectivity of the world, there truly is no sanctuary anymore. So I'd equate like the old vision of force protection was, you know, a bulletproof vest and a helmet and a gun. And I think it's at more threat today because those transformational technologies of your digital thumbprint and digital dust. And it's no longer safe to say, when I deploy from fort to port to foxhole, then I'm in the contact layer. Because of that transformational technology, you're at risk at home. And it's always on. There's no off and on. And that's a different mindset than it has been the last 20 years of a focus on

counterterrorism. I think that's important to point out there. And I'm sure we'll talk later about some of the other aspects of your opening comments there, but I thought it was important to reinforce when we're talking down and in, we talk about that. And we also mentioned the domains that you mentioned, you know, and back when the special forces started, and if you just look at a special forces patch, it's got three lightning bolts on it that are representative of the three domains at the time or the original creation there of the air, sea, and land domains there. But now I obviously remind our folks that, well, there's two more domains now, at least in the joint doctrine, including the space and cyberspace. And our forefathers didn't make a choice to blow off one or two of the domains and say, hey, we'll only be good at the land domain. Those other two,

we'll just cede those to the adversary. So I think it's imperative that we change our mindset and challenge our cognitive blind spot. One question that's come up in the RSOF community is the balance between focusing on technology versus investing in what some argue is the value proposition of RSOF, which is the human domain. How do you balance training and focusing on technology versus ensuring that we maintain the skill sets as a human domain force? And kind of the slogan I've heard for that is, our soft doesn't man the equipment, it equips man. Is there a tension there that either of you see as we learn how to adapt the force to the new strategic competition? I'll start off. I mean, we like to say people are a platform. I mean, it's really one of our

soft truths that humans are more important than hardware. But in order to be strategically driven and have an impact there, you've got to be leveraging that technology. And the fact that our adversaries are already doing that should be a call to arms that nobody should be outpacing special operations in the integration of technology and the speed of innovation that's out there, I think special operations forces are tailor-made to be the pathfinder for the rest of the military of the inculcation integration of that technology. So I look at it more as an opportunity. I don't see it as a tension. I think the newest people come into the force are already, in some cases, better trained on the technology that's already out there. So how do you take the best and brightest of ideas, and those are perhaps

trained better than anything at this current time, that we might be able to provide and educate in professional military education, but keep up with the speed of innovation? of this technology, but it's happening on the battlefield. In the Ukraine, everywhere else, in Syria, you see it every day, kind of the cat and mouse back and forth between friend and foe as new technology is incubated. You know, it's interesting. I don't think that there is as much of a tension between the people side and the technology side as we often do it. I think it's, you know, one of these more kind of rhetorical divisions. But at the end of the day, technology, it's a tool. It's a tool that a human applies to a task, but the human is the user of it.

And just like whether it's a chef or we're thinking about a special operator, they're using that tool to make them better at that task. So I don't know if it's, you know, as much as attention where we say, oh my gosh, it's, you know, one or the other, it's training or technology. And so even when people go, well, you know, we've got limited budget, well, still at the end of the day, what is the training that you're going to be doing? It's going to be utilizing that technology. And I think overall, if we look in the past of warfare and particular

in the history of special operations, you know, it's not who has the best or the most technology that wins out. It's who's got the best human concept, you know, the best doctrine for bringing it all together. I mean, if you go back to World War II, you know, the Germans don't have the most tanks. They don't have the best tanks, but they've got the concept of the Blitzkrieg. And so, you know, I still think that applies if we're looking forward at something like drones or cyber warfare or whatnot. It's still going to matter on that overall human concept.

But one other thing that I would add, and I think this is what's in particular part of what special operations brings into the fight, is not just that human intelligence and human skill side, but it's also that human relationship side. And that's mattered in the past, but it's also going to matter in the future, particularly a great power competition. Yeah, I would just add that on Peter's first point there, I mean, it really starts and it comes out in the strategy that innovation is a mindset. It's not an office. It's not a process. It's inherent in your people and the culture of your organization. And I think special operations has a lot of it. It doesn't mean we corner the market on it, but we're trying to inculcate it at the lowest levels of how you just always have a creative approach, a creative mindset that

includes integration of technology, but it also is problem solving. There's always going to be limitations, constraints, and restrictions on whatever mission you're given, but how do you creatively solve that problem? And I think that goes back to the, you know, the irregular warfare, really back to our roots embracement that's happening that we're focusing on here at USASOC. I think it's always been part of an American way of war. Since before we were a country, we took irregular approaches from the French and Indian War to different techniques from just hiding behind a tree, vice fighting out in the plains. And it's always been there. The Germans in World War II were confounded because we didn't always follow our doctrine. And I know that there's plenty written about that because we're always extremely creative inside their DNA. When I talk about generational relationships, I honestly mean that. Now, some of our relationships around the world certainly are newer than others, but some are literally generational.

And that is not something you can just speed up in time of need and you can't create trust in time of need. But I also think it's a genuine concern and development of a real relationship. It's not necessarily a transactional relationship that I think some other adversaries may have a different approach than we do. We look to cultivate real, true, empathetic bonding relationships. They're real. We're the American mutts out there. We want to help our partner forces with their strategic priorities and their national objectives. And every state's going to act in their own

accordance. That's just the way the world works. But there's an overlap there where they align. And that's where we want to help each other out. So you're spot on on your question. And that's where we have to evolve as a mindset. Are you doing what you're doing because you'd like to do it, want to do it, or have to do it? So some people might be training on saying, no, no, I really want to train you on X. Train you how to shoot on the flat range of the pistol. Maybe that's not that important right now.

This is the other task at hand going back to, or what you're doing, is it contributing something that is strategically driven? Not just because, hey, I'm good at this. Let me teach you this. I want to be taught on that. I want to be taught on something else that's more important to my national decision makers and policy makers. Guys, can I ask a follow-up of the general?

I'm a history buff, but also work in the future. You said it was so key to, I think the quote was, get back to our roots. And then, you know, you used the example from, say, French and Indian War, you know, stand behind the trees, and then you sort of made a quick passing one to World War II. But when you say back to your roots, what are the missions, what are the operations in soft history that you find most inspirational, most instructive for the future? Great question. Well, first of all, I mean, if you just start in the Indo-Pacific theater, there's so much to unpack there. I mean, just the U.S. Army honestly had done more

amphibious assaults than our Marine Corps brethren, and it is a joint force. And SOF had an incredible footprint across the Indochina theater at that time, from the OSS detachments from Sri Lanka all the way over to Burma, and amazing heroic activities. You actually have the birthing of so many of the joint soft components in World War II, from the SEALs in White Beach and Guam to the Marine Corps Raiders early on in some of their fights. So there was a lot of activity. Usually when you think of World War II, people immediately jump to the Jedbergs in France and behind enemy lines there, which was absolutely heroic in itself. But there was quite a large commitment level in the Indo-Pacific theater

from across SOF, where really some of the formations, again, the UDTs from the SEALs, the Marine Corps Raiders, OSS deaths. And then in particular for Army Special Operations Command, you had the first special service forces, which were made for going behind enemy lines. They did an initial campaign up in the Aleutians, which many people didn't know the Japanese actually invaded the Aleutian Islands at the beginning of the war. And then later on, the Italian campaign of fighting behind enemy lines with the first special service forces, which I thought was pretty inspiring itself and pretty bold and bodacious. There was a joint U.S.-Canadian unit to start from. So right from the start, it started off with a joint generational relationship with our partners, our great partners, the Canadians, the North. That in itself was irregular. And then if you take the beginning stages of the OSS, and that's one of

the quotes that uses right in our strategy there, when General Wild Bill Donovan was visiting some of the training up there in Scotland before some of the initial Jedburgh teams went in, and he went back to talk to President Roosevelt and explain to him, obviously, we need to buy time for the joint and we need to kill the umpire and we need to run out the clock. And that's exactly where I see ourselves right now on that same precipice in competition is that we need to kill the umpire and run out the clock. We need to buy time for the joint force. And I would argue a whole of nation to be more on a footing that can keep us in competition to avoid crisis and conflict. So that was great context, looking at our geopolitical context, the democratization of technology threats, looking at what we can learn from the past. But to get into the weeds of the strategy document, John, you claim that ARSOF needs to conduct irregular warfare campaigns to provide capabilities and options to the wider

joint force for our audience? You know, think big army, Navy, Air Force, etc. So my first question is, what does an irregular warfare campaign actually look like? And how is it juxtaposed against a conventional campaign? That's a big one. That's a great question. So first of all, since I mean, the joint pub definition on regular warfare talks about influencing relevant populations right there, it jumps to the human and informational dimension or domain. So I think that's kind of a step one of a focus of an irregular warfare campaign is really focused on that, where I would argue that a traditional

campaign is military kind of blue versus red icon of attrition or destruction of military combat power. And you only need to look at our main adversaries' own written documents, whether it's three forms of warfare or Grasimov Doctrine and Little Green Men. Those are leveraging different types of national power, not just what we would consider governmental power, but national power. And I would argue that in a regular warfare campaign would need to leverage both governmental but whole of nation approaches in order to influence those relevant populations. So I think we need to be better organized. You need to have a campaigning type activity that could synchronize efforts, whole of nation efforts across time and space for a much larger holistic

effect that wouldn't be perhaps as linear as just looking at combat power through intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance on a screen or a map there. So it starts off completely different of a primary focus on, I would argue, the human domain. And usually I would also, it includes asymmetric approaches, not that that can't happen in traditional warfare. I would suggest that irregular warfare is complementary and it's actually conducted throughout the full spectrum of conflict. So competition, crisis, and conflict that we would be applying irregular warfare approaches and a campaign that would support the larger joint force. If I could follow up on that, another scholar who has written extensively about SOF and irregular warfare,

David Ucko, who's also one of our current IWI fellows, he's made the argument that because SOF works in this whole of nation or whole of government space, it needs to be very clear about where its missions and tasks start and where the interagencies or other assets begin. And when you're looking at placing SOF forces around the world to either prepare the environment or support joint operations, how do we facilitate collaboration with other agencies in a way that complements them without stepping on toes essentially or without a fratricide across the government essentially? Well, I'd start off with if you just showed up in the counterterrorism fight in 2015 or 2012, and you kind of magically parachuted, dropped into this first-person Call of Duty shooter game with everything, with all the authorities, the placement,

the access, the resources, great partnerships, intel sharing, cross boundaries internationally. That was not how it was in 2001. I can guarantee you that. And every single one of those was developed over time, access, presence, influence, capability, authority, resources, intel sharing agreements. It was step-by-step and it was a unity of effort. I don't think we ever technically had unity of command where there was an overarching document said the whole of interagency and the international community of the intel community, the interagency communities, and the military forces of the world, you will work together on the supreme allied commander of counterterrorism. That's just not how it worked. It was a coalition of the willing, and it was a

unity of effort that balanced national caveats, inherent capabilities, inherent compositions, and capabilities of different nations that we applied the strengths and weaknesses of everybody to have a much larger holistic effect. It was very beneficial to be co-located. That was a very beneficial factor that I think broke down a lot of barriers and sped up that speed of trust that Peter talked about. I think it's very hard to create relationships two-dimensionally. I think they need to be created three-dimensionally and working side by side by people, and then perhaps they can be maintained two-dimensionally afterwards. I was taking notes here, and I just thought it was fascinating to visualize. I mean, I think you could break it down, obviously, between below the threshold of outright open

warfare with a major state adversary. And so that below the threshold, we've got all the things that special operations bring to the table we've've talked about it's that partnership, training, capacity building, which is really about helping them solve their problems, but along the way, creating relationships that will aid us in the future. But the other thing that I think we don't maybe talk enough about in some of the grand strategy is that yes, in a strategic competition, it seems like it's going to be below the threshold of war. But actually, if you look back at whether it's the French and Indian War and what took place before that to the Cold War, you have a massive amount

of proxy warfare. And in that proxy warfare, it may be us helping to support an ally in a counterinsurgency against an insurgent group that, as opposed to the last decade plus, may be getting aid from that foreign partner. Alternatively, it may be us running an insurgency against an adversary and or their client states. Counter-extremism, again, going to tie into some of those larger strategic competition. And then you've got, okay, but what if it does turn hot? What if it turns into outright warfare? And yeah, I mean, part of why I wanted to ask the general about those historic parallels is that we can see all of them playing out in a outright conflict against a major state. You'd have raiding, like the start of Marine Special Operations, you know, at Macon Island.

You know, it wasn't about seizing Macon Island. It was about spreading the enemy out. You could see the same thing playing out in the future where the raids are not about seizing territory. It's about appearing in multiple different places. You have operate behind enemy lines. And that operate behind enemy lines might be about gathering intelligence, or it might be, you know, setting things afire for the enemy

behind their lines, which again, spreads their forces out. And then you've got that part of, you bring special skills enablers for the larger conventional forces. And one of the things that I think may be a little bit different than in the past is that there are certain things that special operations can do that entire other services might need. So you think about the example of Space Force and space conflict, actually a large amount of it depends on ground control stations, other things here on planet Earth. So essentially, if you want to succeed at, say, something like space warfare, we could think the same thing in air warfare, the like, you may need those

army special operations to enable things that are happening in entire other domains. One of our questions that we were looking at beforehand is, if the last era of strategic competition was characterized by proxy warfare. Just as Peter said, counter insurgency or supporting insurgents against governments, those are kind of key tasks that look a lot like counter insurgency or counterterrorism activities that have been done over the post 9-11 era. But if you add on large scale combat operations and all the soft missions there, it seems like maybe our force actually has more to do, more to train for in a post-9-11 era than it did during that era because you have to have the same competencies plus be ready to support the

conventional force for large-scale combat operations. Is that how you assess the situation? Yeah, there is a tension there of how do you do it all? How do you prepare for high-end conflict or large-scale combat operations while simultaneously contributing towards integrated deterrence during competition. I mean, if you take the height of the battle against ISIS and Raqqa, it was less about counterterrorism. It was more about support to maneuver warfare. Triple concertiner, belt obstacles, trench lines, counterattacks, VBIDs, artillery strikes, air attacks, you name it. It wasn't a pinpoint surgical raid, counter-terrorist killing of an HVI. We didn't probably predict that seven, eight, nine years

ago. I didn't predict that we would be helping our Ukrainian partners with trench warfare eerily similar to World War I on some of the similar terrain and geography of World War II, but here we are. But we have some of the building blocks that are applicable, and some of World War II, but here we are. We have some of the building blocks that are applicable. Some of the lessons learned in the last 20 years are applicable and some are not, but it's continuing to morph and change. There is a tension there of how do you do it all? To go back to one thing Peter said, everything in space or in cyber all has some sort of terrestrial conduit that in a sense is a network and is in a sense is a vulnerability point for both friend and foe and is an opportunity. And so soft can absolutely be mutually supporting to our cyber and our space partners out there. But I think combines,

that's why I talk about it, the combined soft space cyber triad is absolutely critical that we develop this and bring capability both for high-end conflict, but I would argue for steady-state competition as well. This is a modern-day triad. It doesn't replace the nuclear triad. It doesn't replace strategic deterrence, but it's absolutely complementary because it's used throughout the spectrum of conflict, and it provides policymakers flexible deterrent and response options that are below the level of armed conflict. deterrent and response options that are below the level of armed conflict. So something of note that I found especially interesting in the RSOF strategy was this term that you just used, right? The space cyber soft triad. I think most people's images of soft

conjures, you know, decked out operators kicking in doors, conducting raids, things like that. But the space cyber soft triad talks a lot more about the interplay between being mutually supportive in the space domain, offering cyber capabilities. And, you know, it seems like soft might be well situated to address that. So could you just kind of flesh that concept out a little bit and talk about how you define this concept and explain why soft is particularly well suitedsuited to leverage and, I guess, enhance cyber and space capabilities. And, you know, question for both of you, but I'll direct that one to John first. Sure, I'll start with the word concept. And I think it was important,

you know, when we coalesced around that term triad, and it did have connotations. You know, back in the day, if you're my age or older, and you took any international relations degree, you knew about George Kennan and Thomas Schelling and the word triad meant everything from capabilities, from subs, silos, and bombers, to deterrence theory and game theory, to international relations, to the Cuban Missile Crisis, to tactical nuclear weapons, to artillery-delivered nuclear weapons. I mean, it meant everything from TTPs up to strategy, up to policy. There wasn't an international relations degree producing university that didn't cover it. And I think that much thought needs to go into this modern day triad, this soft space cyber triad there, because it is the newest tools out there that can have strategic effect or can be much lower effect there, depending on what is decided and what is employed there. So it's important that there's a robust investment, in my opinion, from the academic community to the policy community to the military community of what is the best way to employ these capabilities

and techniques from, again, strategy, theory, policy, and actually down to things and widgets and the capabilities and equipment. And ultimately, our tasks are the same, whether it is employing the soft space cyber triad or other elements is to help our force, the joint force, see further, strike faster, and then hopefully inhibit the adversary to do the same and blind the adversary there a little bit and hopefully impose doubt, cost, and belief on different ways there. You know, I think it's interesting. There's two levels to think about this, the overall organizational, and then there's the individual. On the organizational, maybe I can say this, it'll be tougher for the general, is that triad, it's made up of one organization that's literally the oldest of all of them. And then when they realized the importance of these two new domains,

one was modeled somewhat, but not exactly after special operations. And then the other was out of the blue made into a service. And we could have a lot of discussion and debate back and forth, but it is interesting and it will have meaning and effect how this triad works in the future, how it's funded, how it's staffed, how the people within it visualize themselves when each part of the triangle, you've got, whether it's a service, a new command that's still determining who it is. And then you've got another command that, as the general said, has so much history that it can talk about, we need to get back to our roots. And then you've got another command that, as the general said, has so much history that it can talk about, we need to get back to our roots, right? And so all of those are really interesting

when you think about the future of it, the effect of that history, that structure, that culture that's either there or being created, what will be the effect of that? That's my big organizational response to it. At the individual level, one of the techniques that we do in these workshops that we run for organizations is to try and help the group envision a future and then work backwards from that. So I think a really interesting approach to this is somewhere in the community is a special operator that just joined. What will they say at their retirement ceremony? How will they look back upon their life history, right? Including, you know, and it might be the kind of experiences, the training they receive, or we can just use it on this question of the triad, you know, over the course of, you

know, we'll make them an NCO. Over the course of that NCO's career, how did these elements of the triad play out? What did they do with these other partners in the triad? What skills did they have to build along the way? How did they view them, et cetera? And so then we can go, okay, this is our vision of it. And then now we go, okay, well, that was fiction. That was fantasy. Okay. What is that person who's joining right now? What skills do they need? What capabilities does the organization have to provide them, et cetera, to try and help that retirement ceremony be a good one when they look back on their career and they say, you know, this is all that worked out for me.

Yeah, that's a great tool there, Peter. I haven't been using the, what would you say, retirement speech, but I do actually leverage one of your previous books there with Ghost War, the August Cold Era of like, hey, what is your role in Ghost Fleet 2.0 and opening chapter? And what does that look like? And what is all the preparation that needed to be done in order for you to have that role you're going to play in this first person movie that's unfolding before your eyes, and then work backwards from there. So we're using that type of mindset to drive everything from our change in our doctrine. Again, this campaign of learning experimentation we're doing with the space community and the cyber community. And we're

doing that even down to the individual level for courses as we're experimenting with the robotics and unmanned systems and AI courses inside our own professional schooling here and trying to figure out how do we leverage that. I think it's so important when you talk about some of these disciplines that we need to even explore, whether it's a new MOS, military occupational specialty, or a new job title. So that's what we're doing inside of USASOC. And we're experimenting with the creation of a digital, basically a technical warrant, one being an innovator and one being an integrator of how do you integrate all this new technology. John, you've mentioned innovation multiple times as an essential component.

And a recurring theme is that we don't really have a choice but to innovate because our adversaries are innovating and we need to adapt. This ties into another key theme from the RSOC vision, which is modernizing and innovating. Could you discuss specifically how USOSOC is trying to innovate? Peter mentioned that we need to identify the skills, units, and capabilities for the future. So what are some of those innovations that you're focusing on at the organizational level in order to maintain use of SOC's comparative advantage? And after that, Peter, we'd be curious to hear your assessment based on your extensive understanding of the international security environment of what the most important roles for SOC might be capabilities-wise moving forward.

Sure. Well, I'll start at the organizational level. One of the biggest efforts we're undertaking here, and it really started with prior to the invasion of Ukraine, is the standing up of a trans-regional irregular warfare headquarters. And it goes back to some of your initial questions about, hey, what does a campaigning headquarters do? But the fact is that some of our adversaries are inherently trans-regional. Some of the capabilities, be it functional or not, are global in nature. And we had yet to find the team to join that we could contribute towards our regular warfare approaches in an organized manner and contribute towards a larger campaign of

measures of effectiveness and performance, and hopefully measure those operations, activities, and investments to know if you're contributing towards deterrence or you're contributing towards escalation, obviously counter to what we want to do in supporting our stated policy goals. But in all reality, because of that challenge of being threat-informed, strategically driven, operationally focused, and tactically prepared, we're changing about 80% of the formations inside USOC right now. Some are a campaign of learning, and we're experimenting in order to make informed decisions. And that's down to the unit of actions. We're experimenting with the size of an operational detachment. We're experimenting with convergence headquarters, how you converge these new capabilities in these new domains.

We're experimenting with the trans-regional irregular warfare headquarters. We're creating an information warfare center, which I'm sure warms Peter's heart there of how important we take information ops. And I used to say that it used to be everyone's responsibility to be an intelligence officer from the beginning, you know, opening salvos of the CT fight, where you just think like the intelligence person comes in and gives you a target package and say, hey, go hit this target. To where we are now, where everybody consumes intelligence, everybody questions everything, everybody is on that journey of learning. It's the same precipice we're on now with information ops and the power of it and how seriously you do it. So from my end on it first, really appreciate the general serving as my book agent on this. It's awesome. But let's get to the

innovation point. It's become such a buzzword. This was supposed to be a conversation about the future of warfare, but there's that wonderful quote from World War II that Admiral King had where he said, quote, I don't know what the hell this logistics is that Marshall is always talking about, but I want some of it. And I feel like we're in sort of the same space right now with innovation where every leader is like, this innovation stuff, it's awesome. Go out and get it for me. But what does it really mean in execution? And what is it that soft in particular can bring to the table in innovation? And for me, you've got three value adds, three advantages compared to the rest of the force.

value adds, three advantages compared to the rest of the force. One is you can contract, you can buy more rapidly than other parts of the force. And so that allows you to draw in technology, projects, ideas much more rapidly than the rest of it can. I know it's frustrating for people, but go speak to your conventional side. The second is you're more operational. You're more operational in terms of your own activities. As we've been talking about, it's most likely to accelerate as we see great power competition increase, proxy, but all the old stuff not going away, counterterrorism, counter extremism, you name it. So it's not only that you are utilizing capabilities and can test out new and learn new things, but as we talked about, it's also you're working with partners. So it's as much

you're learning from your operations as you might be learning from experiences that, you know, whether it's the Ukrainians, the Filipinos, et cetera, in a way that the conventional forces don't have the opportunity to. And then the third is who you are in everything from your history or culture to recruiting. You know, there is an emphasis on creativity, on coming up with new ideas, on yes, there's a doctrine, but let's break outside the box of even our own doctrine. And so each of those elements, I think, are value adds that special operations brings to the table. I'm going to roll a grenade onto that table, though, and say, maybe then the key is not innovation, but rather adaptation and communication. That is, how do we take either those ideas from the

private sector or from partners and draw them in, but even more so, how do we potentially share them across the network of our partners, be it within the special operations community, but also the conventional force? If the value add is, for example, that you can be more experimental or that you're gaining operational experience, then part of deriving more from that value add is, how do I then share that with others, not just within my own community? Yeah, I agree. That is something we desire to do. And to be honest with you, the innovation slash adaptation nuance there is true. It's probably one of the myths out there that we don't build ships, tanks, satellites, planes counterculture to the army. I'd say the military want to build a green box that can communicate.

I can freeze it. I can put it in water. I can bring it up to 30,000 feet. It can do everything. Next thing you know, you get a green box that's the size of a truck. But a philosophical change, soft went down that path at least 10 years ago to embrace software to keep up with the speed of just change. So that was a different philosophical approach that we're leveraging to this day to the fullest effect and using in certain areas around the world to, I would say, very good

results. And then it's actually in some of our charter of some of our units to share lessons learned and some of the capabilities and equipment that we do innovate rapidly on and pass that on to the larger army and then the larger joint force. So we're always seeking that because we benefit greatly from that when the service adopts one of our ideas and makes it a service common idea. It's good for the whole joint force. It's certainly easier to resource in the long term. So we like to look at ourselves as, again, that little startup company that keeps moving on to the next thing. And then hopefully the idea is good enough, it's big enough that it is adopted by the joint force, and that it's just a win for everybody. So we take that

mission very seriously there of trying to be a disruptive thinker and thought leader, but it's got to have a larger so what. How does it support the joint force? Even if it's just going to be held inside SOF, well, what's the payback? What's the contribution effect to the joint force, but hopefully it's just adopted by the joint force and becomes part of their capabilities as well. So I know we touched on military cooperation and working with partners earlier, which I think a lot of our listeners understand to be the bread and butter of SOF, but I'd briefly like to return to discussing the role of America's allies and partners, which is something that seems to be central to the ARSOF strategy document. So how exactly do our allies and partners provide value in the context of irregular warfare? Is it simply through providing geographical proximity and

access? Is it a diffusion of ideas or filling capability gaps? Or maybe there's something else there that I'm missing, but I'll direct that question to John first. Anytime you have different viewpoints, I think you end up at a better solution, first of all, just in problem solving. So while we are very alike, I consider one of my most special, I don't know, honors, fortuitousness. I feel extremely thankful just to be in this very small club of international special operations forces of the world that we're all alike enough to be just a little bit weird to go do something and challenge yourself to be especially assessed and selected and end up in this kind of elite club that just wants to make a difference and contribute to something much bigger than themselves. But we're all coming from different countries, different parts of the world and different upbringings. So at the end, you have different viewpoints on things. I think you just arrive at a better solution at the end of the world and different upbringings. So at the end, you have different viewpoints on things. I

think you just arrive at a better solution at the end of the day. But man, it is so much easier to solve problems when you got teammates around the world and literally can pick up the phone. I mean, I can pick up the phone and call any of my special operations friends, leaders around the world. And because of that trust, I can cut right to the chase. It's not like a diplomatic message. And then in three weeks, let's have a meeting and then let's talk about this. And then let's get through the formalities. And then after three dinners, like, no, no, I can pick up the phone and call these because of real relationships and hopefully contribute towards discussions that actually affect and inform policymakers, sometimes strategy, in some cases, law, like the look at the law that was enacted right before the Ukrainian war,

and you look at some of the other decisions that have been made in different countries, we hopefully can contribute to the diplomatic efforts out there that are ongoing now and always will be. I look at it as critical. These partnerships are critical going forward. Ben, an interesting way to answer your question is to flip the perspective to the adversary. So the general talked about the idea of we want to keep conflict underneath the threshold of war and what winning looks like.

And so let's take the lens of a PLA planner, a PLA strategist who's thinking about your same question, or maybe even a PLA special operator, someone in the Thunder God Commando Airborne Force. who's thinking about your same question, or maybe even a PLA special operator, you know, someone in the Thunder God Commando Airborne Force, how do they look at you? How do they look at U.S. special operations? How do they compare themselves? While you may say, of course, we're tougher, of course, we're smarter, they probably don't think that. Just as or more likely, they think they're tougher, they think they're smarter. But what are't think that. Just as or more likely, they think they're tougher, they think they're smarter. But what are those advantages that that PLA plan or that PLA commando

looking at you would say, gosh, the Americans have this, and I wish I could have it, but it's going to be really hard for me to achieve that. One is your experience, that long history, and all that that's meant for lessons learned, for culture, you name it. But the other part that it means is what the journal laid out is that trust, those networks, those partnerships that you have all around the world, which of course links to a third part of something that they wish they could have, which is that global presence, that global presence of everything from formal basing agreements to just transit, personal ties, you name it.

So if I'm thinking about, if I'm trying to get in the lens of the adversary, there are certain things that they can seek to match and may match within the next whatever decade. There's others that are going to be incredibly difficult for them if we keep at it, right? So we could lose those networks. And so we wouldn't have that advantage, or we could not be applying experience in ways that keep allowing us to be dynamic. But again, I always like to look at a question, not just from our point of view, but from the adversary's point of view. And that's particularly important when you're looking at an issue like deterrence, which is so much about deterrence is really not

what am I doing, but what is the enemy thinking? I do agree that the global presence is something where we think is extremely important. I mean, we are region aligned in USASOC and we have a global footprint upwards of 80 something different countries perpetually, at least over 3000 people deployed at any one time. We think that's imperative to always be out there with our partner forces and maintain those relationships. It's critical that we are not made to be just to deploy for conflict and just wait for the buzzer to go off. We're meant to be deployed. We're meant to be developing those relationships and cultivating them, you know, human to human. And sometimes I'm talking to our most junior members out there.

I said, even if you don't understand, you know, three levels up and natural strategy, if anything, just develop a real relationship with whoever you're there training with and maintain that relationship. That's important. That's strategic competition right there. Have a true, genuine relationship that you can actually pick up the phone or text or reach out through social media 15, 20 years from now when he or she is the minister of defense or minister of interior or the president of the country. If that's a real relationship, it'll last.

And that's important. Gentlemen, the first Irregular Warfare podcast episode released almost exactly three years ago, just short of that. And this will be my last time asking the same question we've asked every two weeks since then as our closing question. And I'll start with Peter with this, which is based on today's conversation, what are your recommendations for practitioners, scholars, and policymakers on how to address irregular warfare and United States Army Special Operation Command rule in it? Oh my gosh. You looked back, you know, the history of this podcast, and we've had a conversation that's pulled at various points from history. So maybe that's my recommendation is that if people are trying to prepare for the future, it's incumbent on them to both stay apace with all of the dynamic changes that are going out there. And we've heard, it was not me, it was the general who was saying, chat GPT or AI or whatnot. I mean, you're not going to be a successful leader unless you are aware and understanding of these new elements or what are insights that we can draw out from what's happening right now in Ukraine. However, dot, dot, dot, given all that, I think a key takeaway for people

is the value of pulling insights from history. You have in this community, an amazing history, almost treasure trove of narratives, lessons learned, experiences to pull from. So I think, you know, having a greater awareness of that, making a dedicated effort to learn those. And then again, one of the advantages of your community is that how you can utilize those for everything from inspiration to culture building within your units, not just what are we going to do in the future, but what have we done in the past that's applicable to this? So you're hearing from the futurist. Let's go out and read some history. So I guess I'll riff off that one from the futurist there. But to answer your question directly, recognizing different target audiences out there listening here from academia, policymakers,

practitioners, I think it requires three different things, a refocus on the larger kind of deterrence theory and the tools for deterrence and just thinking. I think it needs a renewed investment in regular warfare approaches and capabilities that actually leverages whole of nation, whole of government. I don't think we'll go far enough, but whole of nation approaches. I mean, it was in the Cold War from pop culture on, it was evident of who are the good guys and who are the adversaries there. I'd say there's only been a new awakening and coalescence around there here recently. And then lastly, I think more effort to organize, physically organize, to ensure unity of effort. We talked a lot about unity of effort in

the CT fight, but unity of effort going forward here, unity of command might be a bridge too far just with the way the world on the U.S. side is set up. But certainly, unity of effort across the spectrum of conflict, you know, before time of need, but, you certainly unity of effort across the spectrum of conflict before time of need, but heavy emphasis on the competition phase. I think we need to truly embrace acceptance of risk and competition in order to avoid strategic risk later on in conflict. Sometimes it may seem safe. Well, don't do anything and let's hope it gets better. I get concerned of not being prepared enough at the end, should it go to high-end conflict that we didn't do enough to actually deter. And again,

the goal here is to avoid World War III. To close, I guess, with on the history part, you know, on the special forces side, near and dear to our heart is President Kennedy, who helped with our establishment back in the day on the special forces side of Army special operations. And if I could read two quotes, I apologize if they're long, but I think they're pretty fitting to what Peter was just talking about. I like to tell the force, you know, rear view mirror is good, but to inform where you're going, but you can't just stare in it, but it can help inform going forward. So back to JFK, you know, he said, this is during his speech when he was at West Point in 1961, I believe it was,

there is another type of war, new in intensity, ancient in its origin. War by guerrillas, subversives, insurgents, assassins, war by ambush instead of combat, by infiltration instead of aggression, seeking victory by eroding and exhausting the enemy instead of engaging him. A whole new kind of strategy, a wholly different kind of force, and therefore a new and wholly different kind of military training. And he was talking about U.S. Special Forces at that time. And then he went on to finish saying, talking really now to the West Point cadets who were about to graduate at that time. And you can imagine the world then, how much had changed just since the end of World War II and how friends became adversaries and the like, but obviously some

high stakes deterrence initial chapters of the Cold War. But he says, above all, you'll have a responsibility to deter war as well as to fight it. For the basic problems facing the world today are not susceptible of a final military solution. Our forces therefore must fulfill a broader role as a compliment to our diplomacy, as an arm of our diplomacy, and as a deterrent to our adversaries, and as a symbol to our allies of our determination to support them. the trust that is invested before time of need, the fact that it's not going to be a final military solution and requires an irregular approach that focuses on the human domain and perhaps asymmetric approaches. And it talks about influencing relevant populations,

which really defines irregular warfare. I think a lot of that echoes of what we need to be thinking about moving forward when you're talking about irregular warfare and the challenges before us. But I can't thank you all enough for what you're doing for the profession and the profession of arms and the professional study. Again, I talked to the force quite a bit and talk about it's our individual responsibility as professionals to do self-study and self-reading. And I think your podcast does a great job as a great resource for those irregular warfare practitioners out there. So thanks for what both of you are doing. And Peter, I really appreciate the time you gave to us today.

Really enjoyed it. Thank you in turn. And I also want to add in my appreciation to our hosts. It's a lot of effort to put all of us together virtually. So really do appreciate it, particularly with Kyle, you know, looking back and looking forward in his own podcast career. Yeah, bookends. We got his last one. How about that? I feel privileged. while looking back and looking forward in his own podcast career. Yeah, bookends. We got his last one. How about that? I feel privileged. Well, gentlemen, thank you both for being here today. All the back work we put into it is more than worth it to get guests like both of you. So thank you for joining us for episode 77 of the Irregular Warfare podcast. Thank you again for joining us on the Irregular Warfare podcast. Van. Following that, Ben and Laura will discuss the enduring legacy of the Vietnam War and its

impact on irregular warfare. Be sure to subscribe to the Irregular Warfare podcast so you don't miss an episode. The podcast is a product of the Irregular Warfare Initiative. We are a team of all volunteer practitioners and researchers dedicated to bridging the gap between scholars and practitioners to support the community of irregular warfare professionals. You can follow and engage with us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, or LinkedIn. You can also subscribe to our monthly e-newsletter for access to our content and upcoming community events. The newsletter signup is found at irregularwarfare.org. If you enjoyed today's conversation, please leave a comment and positive rating on Apple

Podcasts or wherever you listen to the Irregular Warfare podcast. This really helps expose the show to new listeners. And one last note, what you heard in this episode are the views of the participants and do not represent those of Princeton, West Point, or any agency of the U.S. government. Thanks again, and we'll see you next time. Thank you.