CSIS Event w/ Gen Guetlein, Hon Flournoy, Hon LaPlante, Hon Shyu & Hon Lynn III
Below you will find quotes and highlights from yesterday’s panels from CSIS Global Security Forum 2024, 24 April, 2024, with speakers including General Michael Guetlein, Hon Michèle Flournoy, Hon Dr. William LaPlante, Hon Heidi Shyu & Hon William Lynn III
Global Security Forum 2024: Gathering Strength in a Gathering Storm | CSIS Events
24 April, 2024
The Future of Warfare: Preparing U.S. Military Forces for Competition and Contestation | GSF 2024
Speaker:
General Michael A. Guetlein – Vice Chief of Space Operations, U.S. Space Force
Gen Guetlein
- Gen Guetlein’s shares perspective on the critical role of space in national and international security frameworks, the necessity for advanced space capabilities, and the importance of integrating these capabilities into broader military operations to ensure comprehensive defense and operational readiness.
Importance of Space in Modern Warfare:
- “The proliferation of technology as it’s come on, the fact that you can’t hide anywhere air land sea space, I mean everything is depicted as in terms of where things are going.”
Integration of Space in Joint Operations:
- “If we look at what just happened in the Middle East with what we were able to achieve. All those systems were integrated in that work together. We were picking out all of the launches with a misaligned system from the overhead architecture and immediately passing that down to Aegis immediately passing it back down to the cockpits of our airplanes immediately.”
Challenges of Space Security:
- “We’re not trying to build the best services on the planet. We’re trying to build the best joint force on the planet because we don’t fight as services. We fight as a joint force.”
- “I think one of the things that is the collection of us have kind of really become deeply immersed in how interdependent we are the thing that begins much of this as we’ve talked about is our ability to operate in and through space as well as our ability to protect our assets while at the same time degrading adversary space assets.”
Challenges Posed by China in Space:
- “The threat is so varied, and it’s not just one country; we’re seeing it across multiple countries, and other countries that are not currently in the business of trying to get into this game.”
Strategic Vision for Space Operations:
- “We have to test and we have to train in a virtual environment so that we don’t reveal a lot of our capabilities until we’re ready. Then go test them and demonstrate them in a live environment because that’s what’s gonna deter the adversary.”
Impact of Space on National Security:
- “The other thing that we’re seeing is not the single threat vector. We’re seeing a threat vector across multiple areas like you said core direct ascent jammers. blinders we’re seeing the entire spectrum of capabilities when it comes to counterspace which makes it challenging to protect and defend.”
Importance of Joint Operations with Allies:
- “We are seeing that more than we’ve ever seen before. And I think it’s something that our near peer adversaries counted out against us. They didn’t think we will be able to fight join. They also didn’t think we’d be able to fight with our allies.”
Leveraging Alliances for Enhanced Security:
- “They also didn’t think we’re going to be able to fight with our commercial partners. So what we are learning from not only what’s going on in the Middle East but especially in Ukraine is that we’re bringing all of this to bear simultaneously on the adversary.”
[End]
Ends-Ways-Means: Aligning U.S. Strategy with Geopolitical Realities | GSF 2024
The Honorable Michèle Flournoy, Co-Founder and Managing Partner, WestExec Advisors and former Under Secretary of Defense for Policy
Hon Michèle Flournoy,
These quotes reflect various strategic insights and concerns discussed in the transcript, highlighting the complexities of modern warfare, the role of technology and information, and the strategic challenges posed by global power shifts.
On Allies:
- “We need to be working more closely with our allies. And that’s something we can be doing today. That’s something we don’t have to wait 5-10 years to do.”
On Space National Security:
- “To create a resilient command and control ISR system that is all domain from space to cyber to traditional domains of warfighting.”
On Ukraine:
- “I think Trump has made it clear that he doesn’t intend to continue to support Ukraine and that you know he’ll negotiate the best deal ever and you know I think that will be a win for Russia.”
On China:
- “The truth is NATO has thanks to Putin refound its purpose. It is enlarged to include two countries we’ve always wanted to bring in and they weren’t sure and now they’re very sure. And I think it’s also awakened is Europe to the fact that they have to take the Russian threat seriously and they’ve got to start spending more on their own defense.”
On Military Innovations and Future Preparedness:
- “We’re talking about systems and defensive that you may be argued for at your time at the Pentagon that we are now seeing make a difference on the battlefield.”
On the Importance of Strategic Diplomacy:
- “It’s less about you knowing the size of our military trucks and more like how do we play our cards strategically.”
On Handling Information Warfare:
- “Information warfare is happening now. I just visited Taiwan where it was a major battlefield and during the election they call it “cognitive warfare.”
On Global Power Dynamics and Military Strategy:
- “I think what’s really changed now is that we see the rise of revisionist Russia even though by many objective measures Russia has long been in decline but we have under Vladimir Putin this ambition to kind of recreate the Soviet sphere of influence.”
[End]
A Call to Arms: Mobilizing Industry and Unlocking Innovation
–The Honorable Dr. William A. LaPlante, Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment (A&S)
–The Honorable Heidi Shyu, Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering (OUSD(R&E))
-The Honorable William J. Lynn III, CEO, Leonardo DRS and former U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense
Hon Dr. William A. LaPlante
These excerpts from Hon LaPlante’s discussion highlight his perspective on the dynamic nature of national defense and the strategic approaches needed to maintain security and advancement in intelligence, space, and international military cooperation.
Necessity of Rapid Innovation and Production
- “Russia is at a wartime footing I would say in Europe and to now with the supplemental United States. We’re moving past and past the post cold war era it actually starting to get our industrial capacity starting to get it up again and get it to where it needs to be.”
Funding and Political Will:
- “The industrial base is not going to do anything without funding. And so what really was the game changer if you want to call it that for Ukraine was the initial supplemental. Once that supplemental hit then people were like there’s real money coming.”
The Importance of Production Capacity as a Form of Deterrence
- “I see production as deterrence and somebody from kind of the new technology or talking to them and they said well we don’t use that technology that terminology we use something else. I said Well if you produce a lot of iPhones what are you doing? Manufacturing? So Oh okay. Manufacturing returns.”
International Cooperation and Defense Capability Development
- “Everybody I think around the world is recognizing this and so you’re going to be seeing more and more announcements about code development not unlike what Heidi’s been working on with the Japanese on glide phase intersect CO production like the gamblers in Australia or the GMTs in Germany and CO sustainment like the regional framework sustainment framework and the mros.”
Intelligence and National Security:
- “We have to come up with the integrated concept which we’re talking about and then begin the program to do it and do multiple vendors and look at what you look at that look at let me look at a positive. I did it in the space and space development agency.”
Space Force and Space Capabilities:
- “People thought you would not go to proliferated constellations; they’re there now space development agencies buying them at a fixed price $10 million a pop and putting them up in space. That’s happened. We can do it here so totally good.”
Challenges in Production and Implementation:
- “So where are those programs where there’s no fight to services that are investing in different kinds of weapons. You know, changing their magazine from very exquisite things that they can’t produce in large quantities to complement those and there’s bright spots.”
- “If we can have companies out there which are doing produce things that will that will at low cost for all around will be reliable and two kill chains and work within a kill chain at large numbers to government should be buying that today.”
Hon Heidi Shyu
Hon Heidi Shyu during emphasizes her focus on rapid innovation, adequate funding, international collaboration, and the scaling of production capabilities to meet modern defense challenges.
Urgency of Defense Innovation and Production:
- “So we need to deliver capabilities as quickly as possible to our warfighters. So the things that we’re going to focus on hopefully I’ll get a chance to literally if you talk about some innovative system that we’re pushing through not just prototyping but experimenting and exercises.”
Funding and Support for Innovation:
- “One of the things we have a pot of funding for is access rights to accelerate procurement fielding of innovative technology that is primarily geared towards small companies. So literally to fulfill the valley of death, namely demonstrated capability you need to get into low rate initial production and we have a two year budget cycle. So once you demonstrate your capability you gotta wait two to two years in the capital gap.”
Global Defense Industrial Base and Production:
- “We are working very collaboratively with a lot of countries… They’re designing a system that could fulfill their needs as well as our needs”.
Technological Advancements and Integration:
- “One of the things we have a pot of funding for is access rights to accelerate procurement fielding of innovative technology that is primarily geared towards small companies.”
Hon William J. Lynn III
Hon William J. Lynn III articulates the need for international cooperation, the implications of industrial consolidation, the integration of commercial technologies into defense, and the challenges posed by political and budgetary constraints in advancing defense capabilities.
International Defense Partnerships and Collaboration:
- “The internationalization of the defense enterprise. The US has always had great technology but increasingly we don’t have all of it. And if we’re not ever going to get the best technology to the warfighter we’re going to have to look broader than just at home.”
Challenges of Defense Industry Consolidation:
- “The second is has been going on since the end of the Cold War is the consolidation of defense industry and how we deal with that we’re seeing that now with you know capacity limitations but there’s also limitations on competition and we’re seeing it now with the submarine industrial base is how are we going to expand enough to be able to meet the two per year goal on attack submarines rather than the one plus where we are? Think that’s a diversity of suppliers. It’s not a new nuclear yard but there’s got to be creative approaches to that.”
Future Military Needs and Technological Adaptation:
- “And then the third trend is commercialization of defense technology. By what I mean by that is more and more the origin of defense technologies on the commercial side of the ledger. I mean defense used to be its own but developing almost a little bit of a cocoon and was a net exporter of technology think GPS even the internet itself. Now it’s clearly a net importer whether it’s AI or autonomy. And so how we adapt the industry to pull those technologies in and provide them to the front lines I think is going to be a defining variable.”
Navigating Political and Budgetary Constraints in Defense Initiatives:
- “The support in Congress is there for it. But it’s so dysfunctional it’s not they can’t operationalize that they you know you have strong bipartisan majorities for it but you don’t allow them to vote or at least it’s that in many ways that political dysfunction is the biggest national security.”
[End]