This year promises to be a year of big changes in how the Defense Department does Cyber — and leaders are warning staffers that it’s not going to be business as usual.

Three major lines of effort will converge circa 2024, when a new breed of troops will man new kinds of combat units equipped with new technologies: talent & training, concepts & units, and money & modernization.

A new Army unit will hack and jam enemy networks and provide targeting data for both long-range missiles and missile defense.

Building physical things is not SAIC’s, well, thing. But physically building stuff has become less important and less profitable than integrating all the complex high-tech components and making sure they work together.

WASHINGTON: China is not ready to wage war far beyond the shores of Taiwan, but it is pressing hard to develop some advanced weapons and increasingly wants to project power beyond its shores with an increasingly capable military. Those are the fundamental conclusions of the Defense Intelligence Agency in a unique report with its roots… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: At least a dozen major Army weapons programs face big decisions in 2019. The service will launch a competition for new armored vehicles; award development contracts for scout aircraft and helicopter engines; conduct key tests of long-range missiles, anti-aircraft defenses, rifles, targeting goggles, and multiple battlefield networks; and field new electronics for command posts.

There are real signs of a renaissance in electronic warfare. Now comes the hard part: translating new strategies and concepts into doctrine, requirements, and systems in the field.

PENTAGON: In his first day on the job, acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan gathered civilian leaders of the military services to deliver a simple message: “China, China, China.”

“AFWIC was told to inform and try to shape the ’20 POM,” Fantini told reporters, but that 2020-2024 budget plan is due out in February and was already largely locked down. “But the ’21 POM,” he said, it’s “game on.”

“It’s not going to be just about , ’how do we get a lot of data?’” deputy undersecretary Lisa Porter told the House subcommittee. “It’s going to be about, how do we develop algorithms that don’t need as much data? How do we develop algorithms that we trust?”