The Army wants a single seamless data system from home base to the front line. That’s even harder than it sounds.

Gone are the days of a stately, deliberate, laborious acquisition process in which the Army would plan out the future in detail before going to industry. “We’d almost always guess wrong,” said Maj. Gen. David Bassett. “Eventually we’d deliver yesterday’s technology tomorrow.”

Army foot soldiers are going into battle with more and more electronics, wirelessly networked both to each other and to distant command posts. So can GI Joe be hacked?

Sun Tzu said all warfare is based on deception. Today, that means electronic deception.

The Army is already struggling to man its new cyber units — and now it wants to expand their ranks and responsibilities for a new mission.

The Army wants to move much faster in cyberspace against espionage, subversion, and disinformation — but that means accepting higher risks.