4

DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
Christopher Miller

T

he Constitution requires the federal government to “provide for thecommon defence.”1 It assigns to Congress the authority to “raise andsupport Armies” and to “provide and maintain a Navy”2 and specifies that the President is “commander in Chief” of America’s armed forces.3
Ever since our Founding, Americans have understood that the surest way to
avoid war is to be prepared for it in peace—but when deterrence fails, we mustfight and win.
The Department of Defense (DOD) is the largest part of our federal government.
It has almost 3 million people serving in uniform or a civilian capacity throughout
the world and consumes approximately $850 billion annually—more than 50 percent of our government’s discretionary spending.
The DOD is also a deeply troubled institution. Historically, the military has
been one of America’s most trusted institutions, but years of sustained misuse, a
two-tiered culture of accountability that shields senior officers and officials while
exposing junior officers and soldiers in the field, wasteful spending, wildly shifting
security policies, exceedingly poor discipline in program execution, and (mostrecently) the Biden Administration’s profoundly unserious equity agenda andvaccine mandates have taken a serious toll.
Our disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, our impossibly muddled China
strategy, the growing involvement of senior military officers in the political arena,and deep confusion about the purpose of our military are clear signals of a disturbing decay and markers of a dangerous decline in our nation’s capabilities and will.
Additionally, more than 100,000 Americans die annually in large measure because— 91 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promiseof illicit narcotics flows—more than four times as many people in one year as welost in our 20-year war against al-Qaeda.
We also are witnessing a transformation in the character of war. The democratization of technology and the collapse of time and space require dramatic,
thoughtful changes in how we defend, deter, and fight. As with any huge bureaucracy—and the DOD is one of the world’s largest—breaking the status quo requires
leadership and endurance. Technology is critical to maintaining our warfighting
primacy, but we must be leery of the siren song that technology alone can protect
us. More important is how new technologies are developed, tested, procured, andused, and that relies on the true competitive advantages of our people: ingenuity,common sense, and thoughtfulness grounded in a free society. Because war willcontinue to be the most stressful and consequential human endeavor, the mostpowerful weapon systems will remain the six inches between the ears of our citizens and the strength of their hearts and content of their souls.
Military service is the most difficult task we ask of our citizens, and our nation isenormously blessed that so many young, patriotic Americans eagerly volunteer tocarry such a heavy burden. We owe them everything, and we must do better. To do
better, however, means recognizing and implementing four overriding priorities:
l

l

l

l

Priority No. 1: Reestablish a culture of command accountability,
nonpoliticization, and warfighting focus.
Priority No. 2: Transform our armed forces for maximum effectiveness inan era of great-power competition.
Priority No. 3: Provide necessary support to Department of Homeland
Security (DHS) border protection operations. Border protection is anational security issue that requires sustained attention and effort by all
elements of the executive branch.
Priority No. 4: Demand financial transparency and accountability.

This chapter offers recommendations for improving our armed forces and thecivilian organizations that support and oversee them.
DOD POLICY

By far the most significant danger to Americans’ security, freedoms, and prosperity is China. China is by any measure the most powerful state in the world otherthan the United States itself. It apparently aspires to dominate Asia and then, fromthat position, become globally preeminent. If Beijing could achieve this goal, it
could dramatically undermine America’s core interests, including by restricting— 92 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project

U.S. access to the world’s most important market. Preventing this from happening
must be the top priority for American foreign and defense policy.
Beijing presents a challenge to American interests across the domains ofnational power, but the military threat that it poses is especially acute and significant. China is undertaking a historic military buildup that includes increasing
capability for power projection not only in its own region, but also far beyond as
well as a dramatic expansion of its nuclear forces that could result in a nuclear
force that matches or exceeds America’s own nuclear arsenal.
The most severe immediate threat that Beijing’s military poses, however, is to
Taiwan and other U.S. allies along the first island chain in the Western Pacific. If
China could subordinate Taiwan or allies like the Philippines, South Korea, andJapan, it could break apart any balancing coalition that is designed to prevent Beijing’s hegemony over Asia. Accordingly, the United States must ensure that China
does not succeed. This requires a denial defense: the ability to make the subordination of Taiwan or other U.S. allies in Asia prohibitively difficult. Critically, theUnited States must be able to do this at a level of cost and risk that Americans arewilling to bear given the relative importance of Taiwan to China and to the U.S.
The United States and its allies also face real threats from Russia, as evidenced
by Vladimir Putin’s brutal war in Ukraine, as well as from Iran, North Korea, andtransnational terrorism at a time when decades of ill-advised military operationsin the Greater Middle East, the atrophy of our defense industrial base, the impactof sequestration, and effective disarmament by many U.S. allies have exacted ahigh toll on America’s military.
This is a grim landscape. The United States needs to deal with these threats
forthrightly and with strength, but it also needs to be realistic. It cannot wish awaythese problems. Rather, it must confront them with a clear-eyed recognition of theneed for choice, discipline, and adequate resources for defense.
In this light, U.S. defense strategy must identify China unequivocally as the
top priority for U.S. defense planning while modernizing and expanding the
U.S. nuclear arsenal and sustaining an efficient and effective counterterrorism
enterprise. U.S. allies must also step up, with some joining the United States intaking on China in Asia while others take more of a lead in dealing with threats
from Russia in Europe, Iran, the Middle East, and North Korea. The reality isthat achieving these goals will require more spending on defense, both by theUnited States and by its allies, as well as active support for reindustrializationand more support for allies’ productive capacity so that we can scale our freeworld efforts together.
Needed ReformslPrioritize a denial defense against China. U.S. defense planning should
focus on China and, in particular, the effective denial defense of Taiwan.

— 93 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative PromiseThis focus and priority for U.S. defense activities will deny China the firstisland chain.
1.

Require that all U.S. defense efforts, from force planning to employment
and posture, focus on ensuring the ability of American forces to prevailin the pacing scenario and deny China a fait accompli against Taiwan.

2. Prioritize the U.S. conventional force planning construct to defeat
a Chinese invasion of Taiwan before allocating resources to othermissions, such as simultaneously fighting another conflict.
l

Increase allied conventional defense burden-sharing. U.S. allies musttake far greater responsibility for their conventional defense. U.S. allies
must play their part not only in dealing with China, but also in dealing withthreats from Russia, Iran, and North Korea.
1.

Make burden-sharing a central part of U.S. defense strategy with theUnited States not just helping allies to step up, but strongly encouraging
them to do so.

2. Support greater spending and collaboration by Taiwan and allies
in the Asia–Pacific like Japan and Australia to create a collective
defense model.
3. Transform NATO so that U.S. allies are capable of fielding the great
majority of the conventional forces required to deter Russia while
relying on the United States primarily for our nuclear deterrent, andselect other capabilities while reducing the U.S. force posture in Europe.
4.

Sustain support for Israel even as America empowers Gulf partners totake responsibility for their own coastal, air, and missile defenses bothindividually and working collectively.

5. Enable South Korea to take the lead in its conventional defense against
North Korea.
lImplement nuclear modernization and expansion. The United States
manifestly needs to modernize, adapt, and expand its nuclear arsenal.
Russia maintains and is actively brandishing a very large nuclear arsenal,
but China is also undertaking a historic nuclear breakout.

— 94 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project1.

Expand and modernize the U.S. nuclear force so that it has the size,
sophistication, and tailoring to deter Russia and China simultaneously.

2. Develop a nuclear arsenal with the size, sophistication, and tailoring—
including new capabilities at the theater level—to ensure that
there is no circumstance in which America is exposed to serious
nuclear coercion.
lIncrease allied counterterrorist burden-sharing. Transnational
terrorism remains a threat to Americans even as we pivot toward Asia.
1.

Sustain the military forces needed to deter, prevent, and combat
terrorism, but at a sustainable cost in concert with other elements ofnational power and partner efforts.

2. Prioritize enhancing the capability of allies and partners to take the leadin combating terrorism in their regions.
DOD ACQUISITION AND SUSTAINMENT (A&S)

The DOD’s ability to acquire and field new and existing technologies is essential
to the ability of America’s military personnel to fight and win our nation’s wars.
To succeed in this endeavor, we must optimize the systems and personnel thatthe department uses, but the inflexible bureaucratic structure and risk-adverse
culture that have developed over the decades make it difficult to provide the toolsthat warfighters need at the speed of relevance.
The number one problem is the DOD budgeting process (instituted in 1961)
that requires acquisition spending to be locked years in advance. Because technologies change so rapidly and requirements can change overnight, this creates
situations in which military personnel not only go to war with outdated technology, but also may be fighting with equipment that is less capable than that of theircompetitors. America owes its military many things, and the most important is
the resources they need to survive on the battlefield and carry out the tasks we
ask of them.
Needed ReformslReform the planning, programming, budgeting, and execution(PPBE) process.

1.

Enhance funding and authority for DOD mission-focused innovation
organizations and away from program-specific stovepipes that,planned for and designed two or three years earlier, may no longer be— 95 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

relevant. This allows the acquisition community to focus on portfolio
management and move money around more easily instead of being
locked into inflexible, multiyear procurement cycles.
2. The President should examine the recommendations of thecongressionally mandated Commission on Planning, Programming,
Budgeting, and Execution Reform4 and develop a strategy for
implementing those that the Administration considers to be in the bestinterests of the American people. The commission’s final report is due
on September 1, 2023.
3. Develop legislation or other means of providing funding outside thetraditional PPBE process for the prototyping and experimentation of
emerging technologies that are deemed essential to modernization andfuture conflict. Consider creating a “fast track” for projects that satisfy
the most pressing national security needs.
4. Require the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition andSustainment, the Under Secretary for Research and Engineering,
and all service secretaries to conduct “Night Court” and use existing
authorities to terminate outdated or underperforming programs
so that money can be used for what works and will work. Require
the Under Secretaries and service secretaries to brief the Secretaryannually on the results.
5. Require the Office of the Secretary of Defense to research and reporton the acquisition processes used by America’s adversaries to improve
our understanding of how they are often able to innovate and field newtechnologies on a faster timeline.
lStrengthen America’s defense industrial base.
1.

Replenish and maintain U.S. stockpiles of ammunition and otherequipment that have been depleted as a result of U.S. support to Ukraine.
This will strengthen the defense industry supply chain and ensure that
adequate inventory exists if it is needed for a future conflict.

2. Collaborate with industry to develop a prioritized list of reforms thatthe DOD and Congress can enact and implement to incentivize industry
to help America’s military innovate and field needed capabilities.

— 96 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project

3. Strengthen the ability of acquisition authorities to engage in multiyear
procurements and block buys. This will improve private-sector rates ofreturn, thereby incentivizing defense contractors to partner with thegovernment. It will also reduce government overhead by reducing thenumber of procurement competitions.
4. Prioritize the U.S. and allies under the “domestic end product”
and “domestic components” requirements of the Build America,
Buy America Act.5 Currently, defense companies are required to
manufacture defense items for the U.S. government that are 100
percent domestically produced and at least 50 percent composed ofdomestically produced components. However, there are loopholes thatallow companies to manufacture these items overseas. This can create
supply chain and other issues, especially in wartime. Manufacturingcomponents and end products domestically and with allies spurs
factory development, increases American jobs, and builds resilience inAmerica’s defense industrial base.
5. Review the sectors currently prioritized for onshoring or“friendshoring” of manufacturing (kinetic capabilities, castings andforgings, critical materials, microelectronics, space, and electric vehicle
batteries); evaluate them according to the strategic landscape; andexpand or reprioritize the list as appropriate.
6. Help small businesses to become medium-size and large vendors, which
encourages a more resilient industrial base and fosters competition.
Encourage and plan for durable supply chains for small businesses
so they also have commercial/private-sector customers and are notsolely dependent on defense orders, which can be highly specialized,
expensive, and irregular.
7.

lIncrease external engagement among small businesses to inform themof DOD’s needs and how they could work with DOD to meet national
security priorities.

Optimize the DOD acquisition community.
1.

Create incentives to emphasize speed and agility in decision-making
for prototyping and program-of-record starts and terminations.
Most bureaucrats would rather follow a checklist and fail than gooutside the procedures and win because failure means negative— 97 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

career repercussions. Senior acquisition leaders should design asystem that allows decision-makers to stay within the law but bypass
unnecessary departmental regulations that are not in the best interestof the government and hamper the acquisition of capabilities thatwarfighters require.
2. The Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment,
Under Secretary for Research and Engineering, and all service
secretaries should assess their acquisition workforces; determine what
additional personnel, resources, and training they need; and develop
implementation plans. The goal is to develop, prototype, acquire, andfield required capabilities at the speed of relevance to meet America’s
pacing threats and maintain a warfighting advantage.
3. Decentralize Defense Acquisition University (DAU) offerings andexpand the DAU mission to include accreditation of non-DOD
institutions. The critical shortage of trained and certified acquisition
personnel must be addressed with urgency in order to support DOD
mission objectives and goals. With the rapid evolution of training andeducational technologies, including remote and virtual practices, there
is no reason for DAU to maintain a monopoly on the knowledge andcertification that are required to perform as acquisition professionals.
Further, the cost to private contractors and non-DOD civilians who
aspire to such a role limits the supply of trained and certified candidates.
DAU has become an unnecessary barrier to entry in a career field that isvital to the DOD mission.
DOD RESEARCH, DEVELOPMENT, TEST, AND EVALUATION (RDT&E)

The FY 2017 National Defense Authorization Act established the position ofUnder Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering and assigned broad
responsibility for “all defense research and engineering, technology development, technology transition, prototyping, experimentation, and developmental
testing activities and programs, including the allocation of resources for defense
research and engineering, and unifying defense research and engineering efforts
across the Department,” to the new Under Secretary, who also was tasked with
“serving as the principal advisor to the Secretary on all research, engineering,and technology development activities and programs in the Department.” 6 This
led to the single largest DOD structural change since the Goldwater–Nichols
act of 19867 and was organized effectively during President Donald Trump’s
Administration.

— 98 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project

Needed ReformslChampion, engage, and focus the American innovation ecosystem.
To maintain leadership in the era of great-power competition andsucceed against our adversaries, a key DOD effort must be the creationof mechanisms and processes to embrace America’s most significant
competitive advantage: innovation.
1.

Engage and leverage all of America’s scientific, engineering, and hightech production communities to research, develop, prototype, andrapidly deploy advanced technology capabilities on a continuing basis topreserve our warfighting advantage.

2. Increase integration and collaboration among the DOD, government labs,
and private companies to solve the department’s most difficult problems.
3. Reduce the number of critical technology areas from 14 to a moremanageable number to concentrate effort and resources on those thatbear directly on great-power competition.
4. Rebuild RDT&E infrastructure that resides in Cold War–era facilities
and is not well-suited to the current era of rapid development andtesting of advanced technology and concepts to the maturity level
necessary for acquisition and operational fielding.
5. Move toward a much more comprehensive independent risk-reduction
approach to increase understanding of the technical risks by drawing
on the expertise in DOD laboratories and agencies to help acquisition
programs succeed.
lImprove the rapid deployment of technology to the battlefield.
America’s military advantage has derived from the professionalism of ourservicemembers and our ability to manifest our technological advantage
in battlefield capability. The current era of great-power competition willcontinue for the foreseeable future, and technology will be the currency ofcompetition. Our ability to prevail will rest on our ability to develop newtechnologies and move them onto the battlefield more rapidly than our
adversaries can.
1.

Accelerate the prototyping cycle to meet immediate battlefield needs.

2. Require tighter integration with user communities to provide value.

— 99 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

3. Establish a pipeline of near-term, mid-term, and long-term technologythat is aimed at great-power competition (China) and can be matured,
prototyped, and evaluated to support major acquisitions (the ability to
produce at scale) to break the cycle of schedule delays and cost overruns
from underdeveloped and poorly understood technologies.
l

Develop a framework to protect the RDT&E enterprise from foreign
exploitation. Strategic competition and adaptive adversaries require newthinking about how to protect technology. China has been relentless instealing U.S. technology, using the full range of measures from influence
operations to outright theft. This has been a major factor in its ability toclose the gap and in some cases to exceed U.S. capabilities.
1.

Implement a comprehensive approach to preserving U.S. technologicalleadership that is based on outpacing our adversaries; clear about what weneed to protect; tailored to various specific sectors (for example, academia,
the defense industrial base, and laboratories); and underpinned with a fullrange of consequences for attempted or actual theft.

DOD FOREIGN MILITARY SALESThe United States must regain its role as the “Arsenal of Democracy.” In fiscal
year (FY) 2021, U.S. government foreign military sales (FMS) nosedived to a low of$34.8 billion from a record high of $55.7 billion in FY 2018.8 This decrease hindersinteroperability with partners and allies, decreases defense industrial base capacity, and increases the taxpayer burden on the U.S. military’s own procurements.
Under previous Administrations, the United States built its reputation as a reliable
partner with a strong defense industrial base that could supply military articles
and goods in a timely manner. Today’s FMS process is encumbered by byzantine
bureaucracy, long contracting times, high costs, and mundane technology.
The United States can change this downward trajectory by improving internal processes that incentivize partners and allies to procure U.S. defense systems,
thereby expanding our “defense ecosystem.” We must reverse the recent dip in
FMS to ensure both that our partners remain interoperable with the United States
and that our defense industrial base regains much-needed capacity in preparation
for future challenges.
Needed ReformslEmphasize exportability with U.S. procurements. The record-low
FMS sales in 2021 were driven partly by the high costs of converting
weapon systems on the back end of production rather than emphasizing
exportability in initial capability planning.

— 100 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project1.

Ensure that senior U.S. military leadership emphasizes exportability inthe initial development of defense systems that are both available andinteroperable with our partners and allies.

2. Create a funding mechanism to incentivize exportability in initialplanning, which can be recouped after future FMS transactions.
l

End informal congressional notification. Informal congressional
notification or “tiered review” is a hinderance to ensuring timely sales toour global partners. The tiered review process is not codified in law; it ismerely a practice by which the Department of State provides a preview ofprospective arms transfers before Congress is formally notified.9
1.

End the tiered review process to eliminate at least 20 days from the
FMS process.

2. Use the tiered review process only when unanimous congressional
support is guaranteed in order to eliminate the “weaponization” byselect Members of Congress that has prevented billions of dollars ofarms sales from moving into formal congressional notification.
l

Minimize barriers to collaboration. The high cost of developing
advanced defense platforms requires the United States to collaborate withkey allies to minimize waste, complement strengths, and supplement our
defense industrial base to create a system that is greater than that of theUnited States alone.
1.

Enhance defense industrial base planning with partners to allow
them to focus on niche areas where there are cost advantages for theUnited States.

2. Decrease International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) to facilitate
trade with such allies as the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia.
3. Create opportunities to improve the health of the defense supply chain
with added opportunities for partners and allies to contribute.
l

Reform the FMS contracting process. The contracting timeline for the
FMS process is shockingly slow. On average, the DOD contracting timeline
takes approximately 18 months because of slow bureaucratic processes andchronic understaffing.10— 101 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

1.

Immediately fund more contracting capacity in all services to decrease
the contracting timeline and improve the delivery of defense articles toour global partners.

2. Rationalize and speed arms sales decision-making to preclude ourenemies from exploiting bureaucratic slothfulness and allow us to
manage the development of indigenous defense industrial bases.
DOD PERSONNEL

The men and women of America’s armed forces are the most critical componentof our national defense strategy, but in recent years, they have been overextended,
undervalued, and insufficiently resourced. Their families help them to carry theburden of service, but the assistance they receive is disproportionately less than
the sacrifices they make. Young civilians who would thrive in a military environment are disenfranchised when educators and influencers discourage them fromlearning about military service and preparing for the honor of wearing America’s uniform.
The United States military is an extraordinary institution, staffed by exceptional
people who have defended our nation and changed the course of history, but the
Biden Administration, through word and deed, has treated the armed forces as justanother place to work. We must restore our military to a place of honor and respect
and recruit and retain the individuals who will meet the rigorous standards of
excellence that are required for membership in the world’s greatest fighting force.
Needed ReformslRescue recruiting and retention. Recruiting was the worst in 2022 that it
has been in two generations and is expected to be even worse in 2023. Someof the problems are self-inflicted and ongoing. The recruiting problem is notservice-specific: It affects the entire Joint Force.

1.

Appoint a Special Assistant to the President who will maintain liaison
with Congress, DOD, and all other interested parties on the issue of
recruiting and retention.

2. Improve recruiting by suspending the use of the recently introduced
MHS Genesis system that uses private medical records of potential
recruits at Military Entrance Processing Stations (MEPS), creating
unnecessary delays and unwarranted rejections.11
3. Improve military recruiters’ access to secondary schools and requirecompletion of the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery— 102 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project(ASVAB)—the military entrance examination—by all students in schoolsthat receive federal funding.12
4. Encourage Members of Congress to provide time to military recruiters
during each townhall session in their congressional districts.
5. Increase the number of Junior ROTC programs in secondary schools.
ll

Restore standards of lethality and excellence. Entrance criteria for
military service and specific occupational career fields should be based on
the needs of those positions. Exceptions for individuals who are alreadypredisposed to require medical treatment (for example, HIV positiveor suffering from gender dysphoria) should be removed, and those withgender dysphoria should be expelled from military service. Physicalfitness requirements should be based on the occupational field without
consideration of gender, race, ethnicity, or orientation.
Eliminate politicization, reestablish trust and accountability, andrestore faith to the force. In 2021, the Reagan National Defense Survey
found that only 45 percent of Americans have “a great deal of trust andconfidence in the military”—down from 70 percent in 2018.13
1.

Strengthen protections for chaplains to carry out their ministry
according to the tenets of their faith.

2. Codify language to instruct senior military officers (three and fourstars) to make certain that they understand their primary duty
to be ensuring the readiness of the armed forces, not pursuing asocial engineering agenda. This direction should be reinforced
during the Senate confirmation process. Orders and direction
motivated by purely partisan motives should be identified as
threats to readiness.
3. Reinstate servicemembers to active duty who were discharged for
not receiving the COVID vaccine, restore their appropriate rank, andprovide back pay.
4. Eliminate Marxist indoctrination and divisive critical race theory
programs and abolish newly established diversity, equity, and inclusion
offices and staff.

— 103 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

5. Restrict the use of social media solely for purposes of recruitment anddiscipline any armed services personnel who use an official commandchannel to engage with civilian critics on social media.
6. Audit the course offerings at military academies to remove Marxist
indoctrination, eliminate tenure for academic professionals, andapply the same rules to instructors that are applied to other DOD
contracting personnel.
7.

lReverse policies that allow transgender individuals to serve in the
military. Gender dysphoria is incompatible with the demands of military
service, and the use of public monies for transgender surgeries or tofacilitate abortion for servicemembers should be ended.

Value the military family. Military service requires extreme sacrifices
by families.
1.

Support legislation to increase wages and family allowances for activeduty enlisted personnel. No uniformed personnel should ever have torely on social benefits like as food stamps or public housing assistance.

2. Improve base housing and consider the military family holistically when
considering change-of-station moves.
3. Improve spouse employment opportunities and protections, including
licensing reform,14 and expand childcare.
4. Audit all curricula and health policies in DOD schools formilitary families, remove all inappropriate materials, and reverse
inappropriate policies.
5. Support legislation giving education savings account options tomilitary families.15
lReduce the number of generals. Rank creep is pervasive. The numberof 0-6 to 0-9 officers is at an all-time high across the armed services(above World War II levels), and the actual battlefield experience of thisofficer corps is at an all-time low. The next President should limit thecontinued advancement of many of the existing cadre, many of whom
have been advanced by prior Administrations for reasons other than their
warfighting prowess.

— 104 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project

DOD INTELLIGENCE

Our national defense establishment must evolve to meet the rapid, profound, and dynamic change in the global landscape, but absent significant effort
to evaluate and retool in critical areas—including our intelligence and security
portfolios—America’s competitive advantage against rivals and adversaries is atserious risk. However, for any structural changes to succeed, the crisis in our Intelligence Community (IC)/Defense Intelligence Enterprise (DIE) leadership must
be addressed.16
The DIE accounts for the bulk of the Intelligence Community’s personnel and asignificant portion of its budget. Of the IC’s 17 elements, eight are within DOD,17 two
are independent,18 and seven belong to various other departments and agencies.19
Overall, “[t]he DoD provides 86 percent of the personnel who conduct intelligence
activities, both military and civilian.”20
The Defense Intelligence Enterprise must deliver accurate, unbiased, andtimely insights consistently and with clarity, objectivity, and independence. If they
continue on their current path, however, both the DIE and the Intelligence Community writ large will continue to provide inaccurate and politicized intelligenceassessments that mislead policymakers.
Needed ReformslImprove the intelligence process. Defense intelligence assets have beencommitted to the prosecution of operational campaigns since September 11,
2001, at the expense of our strategic objectives, and this has led to increased
risk.21 Further, the DIE has evolved into a “customer-based” model with
the DIE/IC trying to be supportive of policy direction at the expenseof analytical integrity. The result has been a significant politicization of
intelligence.

1.

Establish unbiased intelligence reporting from DIE/IC senior leaders.
As the leader of the DIE, the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligenceand Security should provide a top-line, dissenting, or clarifying view of
DIE and IC assessments as needed.

2. Align collection and analysis with vital national interests (countering
China and Russia).
3. Establish an effective global federated intelligence frameworkwith allies and partners and our Combatant Commands. Avoid thetemptation to neglect areas that appear less pertinent but that support
a convergence of threats and the critical requirements to sustain
those threats.

— 105 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

4. Establish and sustain feedback loops to provide insight and direction
for continuous improvement and accountability.22 We must revisit
our assessments and understand where we got it right and where we
got it wrong.
5. Better exploit publicly available information (PAI) data and foster
innovation to improve collection and analysis. We must end the practiceof multiple DIE organizations paying to acquire the same PAI data andinvest more in machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) to
exploit open-source and classified intelligence data.
6. Remove policy obstacles that impede available technical solutions
and tailored approaches in order to preclude corruption at the pointof collection.
7.

lDevelop statistical discrimination techniques based on relative value
to deal with the volume and velocity of available data and information,
which are rapidly exceeding our ability to exploit and analyze available
data and information efficiently.

Expand the integration of intelligence activities. The prevalence ofasymmetric warfare requires Defense Intelligence to leverage the uniqueauthorities and capabilities of U.S. departments and agencies, as well as ourpartners and allies, to competitive advantage.
1.

Create an improved cyber defense and capability. We must reevaluate
the dual-hat structure between the National Security Agency (NSA) and
U.S. Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM).

2. Resurrect economic analysis capability to improve our ability to counter
Chinese whole-of-government strategies that combine security withpredatory economic objectives.
3. Resurrect critical thinking to provide true strategic intelligence that will
enable the U.S. to counter global adversaries and emerging technologies(such as adversary advances in hypersonics, Unmanned Aerial Systems(UAS), cyber domain, advanced fighter aircraft, and advanced undersea
capabilities) more effectively.
4. Rebuild human intelligence (HUMINT) and counterintelligence (CI) and
improve their integration with defensive and offensive cyber operations.

— 106 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project

5. Establish true alignment between DOD and DHS both to improve thedefense of critical U.S. infrastructure and national border integrity
and to develop vital information that enables defense against foreign
targeted disruptions.23lRestore accountability and public trust. In recent years, public trust in
Defense Intelligence has been eroded by, for example, flawed assumptions
leading up to our Afghanistan withdrawal, flawed Russia–Ukraine
assessments, divergences in relations with key Gulf allies, and voids being
filled by Russia and China around the world. For trust to be restored andsustained, officials must be held accountable.
1.

Restore DIE critical thinking. Establish mechanisms to restore analytic
integrity and return to true intelligence-driven operations. The next
Administration should eliminate the conflict of interest in the current
customer-based model (in which the customer is always right) by
enforcing time-tested procedures that guarantee independent analysis,
even if it means challenging policymakers’ assumptions. The Under
Secretary of Defense for Intelligence and Security’s leadership roleshould be expanded to include providing analytic top-line views andimprove DIE transparency by highlighting diverging views.

2. Elevate the DIE’s voice in national policy discussions, commensuratewith the DIE’s 75 percent share of the IC budget. Present defense
intelligence to senior policymakers, either independently to
avoid all-source bias or in consensus products like the National
Intelligence Estimates.
lEliminate peripheral intelligence obligations that do not advancemilitary readiness. In 2019, following the catastrophic 2015 data
breach at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the Defense
Counterintelligence and Security Agency (DCSA) accepted transfer of the
responsibility to conduct security clearance and suitability investigations
for 95 percent of the U.S. government’s civilian workforce. This decision,
which grew out of an intention to deconstruct OPM, was wrongheaded on
many levels and made the federal bureaucracy dependent on a new overlayof DOD bureaucracy, in a sense instilling DOD control of civilian managers.
This function should be returned to OPM except for military security
clearance investigations.

— 107 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

U.S. ARMY

The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full
spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot
execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point thatis marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying
power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisisin the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weaponssystems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
All of these challenges are set against the backdrop of a complex and dynamic
global geopolitical environment that is exemplified and exacerbated by the triumphof our adversaries in Afghanistan after a 20-year struggle there as well as recent
Russian outrages in the Ukraine and China’s bellicosity both on its borders and insurrounding disputed regions. In spite of these ever-increasing operational pulls, ourArmy is consistently being asked to do more with fewer resources. The status quo
is further marked by a pervasive politically driven top-down focus on progressive
social policies that emphasize matters like so-called diversity, equity, and inclusionand climate change, often to the detriment of the Army’s core warfighting mission.
Needed ReformslRebuild the Army. The total Army budget has decreased by roughly 11
percent since 2018, perilously affecting the service’s readiness and ability to
train and to procure new personnel and equipment. Declining budgets anddecreased buying power have forced the Army to lower training standards
and opportunities to train, propose reductions in end strength, slash
military construction programs to historically low levels, and scale backessential modernization programs.

1.

Increase the Army budget to remain the world’s preeminent land power.

2. Accelerate the development and procurement of the six current
Army modernization priorities (long-range precision fires, the NextGeneration Combat Vehicle, Future Vertical Lift, the Army network,
air and missile defense, and soldier lethality) to replace worn out andoutdated combat systems and ensure ground combat dominance.
3. Increase funding to improve Army training and operational readiness.
4. Increase the Army force structure by 50,000 to handle two major
regional contingencies simultaneously.

— 108 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project

5. Reform recruiting efforts. The Army missed its 2022 recruitment goalby 25 percent, or 15,000 soldiers.
l

Focus on deployability and sustained operations. The U.S. Army’s
very lethal ground force capability is irrelevant if it cannot quickly deploy
to locations for employment in decisive operations to secure our global
security interests. Additionally, Army logisticians provide the groundtransportation (of both personnel and equipment); fuel, food, and water;
munitions (bombs and bullets); medical supplies and services; andveterinary services (food safety) that are critical to sustainment of theother services.
1.

Immediately increase the production and stockpiling of criticalmunitions and repair parts.

2. Prioritize expeditionary logistics in all force design and operational
planning to guarantee entry into a contested theater of war.
3. Increase the level of Joint Force training, synchronization, andcoordination focused on logistics.
4. Prepare to deploy forces from degraded U.S.-based transportation
infrastructure that is compromised by opposing forces.
lTransform Army culture and training. The Army can no longer serveas the nation’s social testing ground. A rebuilt Army that is focused again
on its core warfighting mission and empowered it with the tools, resources,
and authorities it needs to accomplish that mission must be the next
Administration’s highest defense priority.
1.

Stop using the Army as a test bed for social evolution. Misusing the
Army in this way detracts from its core purpose while doing little toreshape the American social structure. The Army no longer reflects
national demographics to the degree that it did before 1974 when thedraft was eliminated.

2. Demand accountability in senior leaders to reverse the decline in public
support for military service.
3. Reestablish the experiential base for the planning, execution, andleadership of Army formations in large-scale operations. Currently,— 109 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

there are no general or field-grade officers who served as planners orcommanders against a near-peer adversary in combat.
4. Examine the logic of emerging Army concepts about employing massed
long-range fires and effects without considering how to gain advantage
by closing with and dominating an adversary on land.
5. Recognize that high-intensity land combat operations cannot besustained through short-term individual or unit rotations in the style ofthe sustained low-intensity campaigns conducted over the past 20 years.
6. Transform how the National Guard is employed during extended
operations short of declared war to preclude back-to-back federal andstate deployments of National Guard soldiers in order to stabilize andpreserve military volunteerism in our communities.
7.

Revamp Army school curricula to concentrate on preparation for largescale land operations that focus on defeating a peer threat.

8. Address the underlying causal issues driving increasing Army suicide
rates, which have surpassed pre–World War II rates and are now
eclipsing the rate among civilians.
U.S. NAVY

As noted at the beginning of this chapter, the U.S. Constitution gives Congress
the power to “provide and maintain a Navy.” Inherent in this phrase is a recognition
that there is a vital national interest in the maritime environment and that thisnational interest requires sustained planning and investment. This is as true today
as it was almost 250 years ago and will remain true into the future.
The U.S. Navy (USN) exists for two primary reasons: to project prompt, sustained, and effective combat power globally, both at sea and ashore, and to deter
aggression by potential adversaries by maintaining a forward operating presence
in conjunction with allies and partners. Today, the People’s Republic of China People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) can challenge the USN’s ability to accomplish
its mission in the Pacific and Indian Oceans.
In the production, employment, and control of maritime forces, the USN must
consider the scope and rate of technological change and, where appropriate, adapt
its processes and workforce development. In balancing the necessary long-term
industrial model of naval platforms against emerging short-term opportunities,
the USN must take account of advances that may present vulnerabilities and risks
as well as what is assured and secure.

— 110 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project

Needed ReformslInvest in and expand force structure. The USN’s organizing principle
remains platform-centered: vessels manned by sailors. The manned surface
and subsurface forces act in concert with land-based, air-based, and spacebased forces to project power outside sovereign territory, principally by
operating in international waters. Investments must be closely coordinatedwith these other elements of military power.

1.

Build a fleet of more than 355 ships.26

2. Develop and field unmanned systems to augment the manned forces.
3. Require that range and lethality be the key factors in all procurement
and sustainment decisions for ships, aircraft, and munitions.
ll

Reestablish the General Board. In contrast with the Navy General
Board that served ship development so well during the interwar period,
the current joint process27 for defining the requirements for major
defense acquisitions is not well-suited to long-term planning of thesort that is needed for USN fleet architecture and shipbuilding. Theinterwar General Board should serve as a model, empowered withfinal decision authority over all requirements documents concerning
ships and the major defense systems fielded on ships. The individualboard members would ensure a broad base of knowledge as well as
independent thinking.28
Establish a Rapid Capabilities Office. The USN must transition
technology into warfighting capability more rapidly. It must foster a cultureof innovation that includes connecting theoretical and intangible ideas withreal production environments that produce tangible and practical outcomes
and adapting proven processes to advance material solutions.
1.

Harness innovation and willingness to tolerate risk so that “goodenough” systems can be fielded rapidly.

2. Use the Space Development Agency as a model.
3. Establish an oversight Board of Directors made up of the service chief,
service secretary, and Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition andSustainment.

— 111 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative PromiselAccelerate the purchase of key munitions. It takes years to build andmaintain navies but only hours to expend their ordnance in combat. The
USN must be prepared to expend large quantities of air-launched andsea-launched stealthy, precision, cruise missiles against targets both atsea and ashore. Additionally, modern air defense requires the use of highperformance surface-to-air missiles.
1.

Produce key munitions at the maximum rate with significant capacity.

2. Working with the Congress, employ the widest possible range oftechniques to enhance the munitions supply chains and workforce.
lEnhance warfighter development. The USN requires a variety of
documented qualifications for personnel to advance in their careers andassume leadership positions. It also requires individual professional
qualifications that are focused on warfighting.
1.

Mandate qualifications that demonstrate an understanding of corecompetence in collective, integrated warfighting, especially based on
current plans and technologies.

2. Elevate the Headquarters Staff focused on Warfighter Development(N7) within the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations (OPNAV) andempower it to develop such requirements.
3. Require that war games be utilized as experiential learning environments
for the participants as a prerequisite for achieving career milestones(department heads, commanding officers, and major commanders).
4. Highlight in training and leader development that USN forces can andmust maintain the ability to operate from and/or defend sovereign
territory to include our allies and partners.
5. Train to balance effects from kinetic to nonkinetic and from lethal tononlethal through effective command and control.
U.S. AIR FORCEThe U.S. Air Force today lacks a force structure with the lethality, survivability, and capacity to fight a major conflict with a great power like China, deter
nuclear threats, and meet its other operational requirements under the National
Defense Strategy.29 For 30 years, the Air Force has received less annual funding— 112 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project(if pass-through funding, defined as money in the Air Force budget that does not
go to the Air Force, is removed from the equation) than the Army and Navy havereceived. This underfunding has forced the Air Force to cut its forces and forgo
modernizing aging weapons systems that were never designed to operate in current
threat environments and are structurally and mechanically exhausted. The result
is an Air Force that is the oldest, smallest, and least ready in its history.
The decline in Air Force capacity and capability is occurring at the same time
the security environment demands the very options that the Air Force uniquely
provides. Combatant commanders routinely request more Air Force capabilities
than the service has the capacity to provide. The Air Force today simply cannot
accomplish all of the missions it is required to perform.
The Air Force has consistently stated on the official record that it is not sized tomeet the mission demands placed on it by the various U.S. Combatant Commands.
A 2018 study, “The Air Force We Need,”30 showed a 24 percent deficit in Air Forcecapacity to meet the needs of the National Defense Strategy. Those conclusions
remain valid and are more pronounced today because of subsequent aircraft retirements. The demand is also higher because of world events. To understand thesetrends, one needs only to consider that the Air Force’s future five-year budget plan
retires 1,463 aircraft while buying just 467. This makes for a reduction of 996 aircraft by 2027. The net result is a force that is smaller, older, and less ready at a time
when demand is burgeoning.
Needed ReformslIncrease spending and budget accuracy in line with a threat-based
strategy. Returning the U.S. military to a force that can achieve deterrenceor win in a fight if necessary requires returning to a threat-based defense
strategy. Real budget growth combined with a more equitable distributionof resources across the armed services is the only realistic way to create amodernized Air Force with the capacity to meet the needs of the National
Defense Strategy. Additionally, as noted above, pass-through funding causes
numbers cited in current DOD budget documents to be higher than thedollar amounts actually received by the Air Force.

1.

Adopt a two-war force defense strategy with scenarios for each service
that will allow the Air Force to attain the resources it requires bydeveloping a force-sizing construct that reflects what is required toaccomplish strategic objectives.

2. Eliminate pass-through funding, which has grown to more than
$40 billion per year and has caused the Air Force to be chronicallyunderfunded for decades.

— 113 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

3. Increase the Air Force budget by 5 percent annually (after adjusting for
inflation) to reverse the decline in size, age, and readiness and facilitate
the transition to a more modern, lethal, and survivable force.
l

Reduce near-term and mid-term risk. Increasing the Air Force’s
acquisition of next-generation capabilities that either are or soon will be inproduction will increase the ability of the United States to deter or defeat
near-term to mid-term threats.
1.

Increase F-35A procurement to 60–80 per year.

2. Build the capacity for a B-21 production rate of 15–18 aircraft per year alongwith applicable elements of the B-21 long-range strike family of systems.
3. Increase Air Force airlift and aerial refueling capacity to support agile
combat employment operations that generate combat sorties from ahighly dispersed posture in both Europe and the Pacific.
4. Develop and buy larger quantities of advanced mid-range weapons (50nm to 200 nm) that are sized to maximize targets per sortie for stealthaircraft flying in contested environments against target sets that could
exceed 100,000 aimpoints.
5. Accelerate the development and production of the Sentinel
intercontinental ballistic missile to reduce the risk inherent in an aging
Minuteman III force in light of China’s nuclear modernization breakout.
6. Increase the number of EC-37B electronic warfare aircraft from 10 to 20
in order to achieve a minimum capacity to engage growing threats from
China across the electromagnetic spectrum.
lInvest in future Air Force programs and efforts. Increasingly capable
adversaries require new capabilities to enable victory against those adversaries.
1.

Attain an operationally optimized advanced battle management system
as the Air Force element of the DOD Joint All Domain Command andControl enterprise.

2. Produce the next-generation air dominance system of systems (airmoving target indication, other sensors, communications, commandand control, weapons, and uninhabited aerial vehicles).

— 114 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project

3. Achieve moving target engagement capability and capacity against sea,
surface, and ground mobile targets at the scale necessary to meet theneeds of the National Defense Strategy.
4. Build resilient basing, sustainment, and communications forsurvivability in a contested environment.
5. Establish a vigorous and sufficiently funded electromagnetic spectrum
operations recovery plan to make up for more than 20 years of neglect of
this mission area.
U.S. MARINE CORPSThe U.S. Marine Corps (USMC) is the maritime land force of the Departmentof Defense and Department of the Navy. It serves a critical role as an expeditionary amphibious force that can project power from sea to shore and beyond while
performing other specialized missions like securing America’s diplomatic outposts abroad.
Between the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and the conclusion of U.S.
military operations in Afghanistan in August 2022, the Marine Corps engaged
in extended operations ashore as directed by the Secretary of Defense, leaving itwith little opportunity or ability to train for and execute the naval and amphibious
operations for which it is uniquely suited and directed by law. This lengthy divergence from its primary mission led to deep concern that the Corps had become a“second land army,” prompting senior Marine Corps leaders to push for the service
to return to the sea. In addition, the USMC spent nearly two decades fighting counterinsurgency wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and developed capabilities that were
specifically geared to those fights but have limited utility in scenarios involving
evenly matched and advanced enemies or amphibious operations that are necessary for the projection of naval power.
As a result, Marine Corps Commandant General David H. Berger developed
and began to implement Force Design 2030,31 a plan that, if completed, would be
the most radical transformation of the Marine Corps since World War II. The successful implementation of this force redesign, coupled with reforms in the Marine
Corps’ personnel system and the Navy’s amphibious shipbuilding plans, will be
critical to ensuring the Corps’ future combat effectiveness.
Needed ReformslDivest systems to implement the Force Design 2030 transformation.32
Divesting equipment that is less relevant to distributed, low-signature
operations in a contested maritime environment will make funds available
for modernization.

— 115 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

1.

Transform USMC force structure.
a. Eliminate all USMC law enforcement battalions.
b. Transform at least one Marine Infantry Regiment into a Marine
Littoral Regiment.
c. Reduce the size of remaining infantry battalions.

2. Divest systems or equipment that are better suited to heavier
U.S. Army units.
a. Maintain divestment of M1 Abrams tanks.
b. Eliminate the majority of tube artillery (M777) batteries.
c. Reduce the number of Advanced Amphibious Assault Vehicles andthe number of their replacements.
3. Use funds made available by divestment of systems to support new
systems that are geared to the likely needs of future conflicts.
a. Increase the number of rocket artillery batteries (HIMARS).
b. Increase the number of upgraded Light Armored Vehicle(LAV) companies.
c. Increase the number of Unmanned Aerial Systems and anti-air
systems (including counter-UAS systems).
d. Develop long-range strike missiles and anti-ship missiles for the Corps.
e. Modernize USMC infantry equipment.

lTransform the USMC personnel paradigm. More than other services,
the USMC relies heavily on junior noncommissioned officers (NCOs) to staff
key positions across the force but especially in combat arms. For example,
E-4s routinely hold squad leader billets when the Army normally has E-6s in
those billets. The nature of more distributed operations and the increasingly
complex responsibilities of a Marine Corps rifle squad and platoon underForce Design 2030 will only put more responsibility on the backs of squadleaders and platoon sergeants, increasing the need for more senior Marines
in those critical positions. Additionally, the Corps needs to improve its
retention of junior NCOs after their first enlistments (the Marines havemuch lower rates of reenlistment than other branches).33
1.

Align the USMC’s combat arms rank structure with the U.S. Army’s (squadleader billets are for E-6s, and platoon sergeant billets are for E-7s).

— 116 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project

2. Create better incentives to retain talented junior NCOs, especially ininfantry and other critical military occupational specialties.
3. Reduce unnecessary deployments to increase dwell time in order toenable more robust primary military education.
l

Align Navy amphibious shipbuilding with Force Design 2030. The U.S.
Navy has struggled for decades to maintain an amphibious fleet that could
support USMC war plans around large-scale amphibious operations. In
addition, amphibious shipbuilding has often had to compete against otherpriorities within a constrained budget and limited shipbuilding capacity.
1.

Develop and produce light amphibious warships (LAWs) to support
more distributed amphibious operations, especially in the Pacific.34

2. Maintain between 28 and 31 larger amphibious warships as opposed to
the 25 specified in current Navy shipbuilding plans and the 38 specified
before 2020.35
U.S. SPACE FORCE

U.S. space forces conduct global space operations to sustain and enhance air,land, and sea effectiveness, lethality, and superiority by providing secure broadband global communications (precision position, navigation, and timing accuracy);
attack warning and threat tracking and targeting capability (real-time intelligence,
surveillance, and reconnaissance information); and their assured continuity ofoperations both by defending U.S. assets and by conducting offensive operations
that are capable of imposing unacceptable losses on adversaries that might seek
to attack them.
The U.S. Space Force (USSF) was established to assure continuous global andtheater combat support from space, to deter attacks against U.S. space assets, andto prevail in space should deterrence fail. The USSF posture was conceived as abalance of offensive and defensive deterrent capabilities designed for maximum
effectiveness.
Needed Reformsl

Reverse the Biden Administration’s defensive posture. The Biden
Administration has eliminated almost all offensive deterrence capabilities
and instead will rely solely on defensive capabilities of disaggregation,
maneuver, and reconstitution—the most costly, the slowest, and ultimately
the most fragile architecture selection.

— 117 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

1.

Reestablish offensive capabilities to guarantee a favorable balance offorces, efficiently manage the full deterrence spectrum, and seriously
complicate enemy calculations of a successful first strike against U.S.
space assets.

2. Restore architectural balance in U.S. space forces, both offensive anddefensive, to restore deterrence dominance efficiently and quickly.
3. Rapidly expand space control capability, to include cis-lunar space (theregion beginning at geosynchronous altitude and encompassing themoon), to provide early warning of an enemy attack.
4.

lSeek arms control and “rules of the road” understandings only when
they are unambiguously in the interests of the U.S. and its allies, andprohibit their unilateral implementation.

Reduce overclassification. The USSF must move beyond the Cold War–era culture of secrecy and overclassification that surrounded military space
to facilitate greater coordination and synchronization of efforts across thegovernment and commercial sectors.
Declassify appropriate information about terrestrial and on-orbit spacecapabilities that threaten the U.S. space constellation, as well as thosebeing pursued by our competitors, to secure the principled right tocounter them offensively.

l

Implement policies suited to a mature USSF. No longer a “newborn,” the
USSF has entered its fourth year of existence, and the lessons learned can beincorporated across all facets of the force to increase its effectiveness.
1.

Restructure from the current “unity of effort” structure to “unityof command.”2. Lead the U.S. government’s development of a clear and unambiguous
declaratory policy that the United States will operate at will in spaceand enforce these operations with capabilities that ensure effective
deterrence and the ability to impose our will if necessary.
3. End the current study phase of concept development and issue
necessary guidance for the development and fielding of offensive
capabilities.

— 118 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project

4. Alter the Space Development Agency’s current “fail-early” approachand transition to a methodology that maintains aggressive timelines butwith significantly greater engineering rigor, with special attention tosustainment, support, and fully integrated space operations.
5. Increase the number of general officer positions to ensure the Space
Force’s ability to compete for resources on a common basis with theother services.
6. Explore creation of a Space Force Academy to attract top aero–astro
students, engineers, and scientists and develop astronauts. The academy
could be attached initially to a large existing research university likethe California Institute of Technology or MIT, share faculty andfunding, and eventually be built separately to be on par with the otherservice academies.
U.S. CYBER COMMANDUSCYBERCOM was established in 2010 by the Department of Defense to unify
the direction of cyberspace operations, strengthen DOD cyberspace capabilities,
and integrate and enhance U.S. cyber expertise. Cyber capabilities and threats are
evolving rapidly. Accordingly, a conservative Administration should be especiallysensitive to and prepared to meet the challenges presented by bureaucratic silos,
inappropriately rigid tactical doctrine, and strategic thinking’s historic tendency
to lag behind technological capability.
The preliminary evidence from the war in Ukraine suggests that existing cyber
doctrine and certain capability and target assumptions may be incorrect or misplaced. The following recommendations therefore presuppose that there will bea rigorous “lessons learned” analysis and review of existing U.S. doctrine in lightof the battlefield evidence.
Needed ReformslEnsure that USCYBERCOM is properly focused. Mission creep
is leading to wasteful overlap with the Department of Homeland
Security, National Security Agency, Department of Defense, and Central
Intelligence Agency.
1.

Separate USCYBERCOM from the National Security Agency percongressional direction.

2. Conduct effective offensive cyber-effects operations at the tactical andstrategic levels.

— 119 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

3. Expand defensive cyber-effects operations authorized by President
Trump's classified National Security Presidential Memorandum 13,“United States Cyber Operations Policy.”36
4. End USCYBERCOM’s participation in federal efforts to “fortify”
U.S. elections to eliminate the perception that DOD is engaging inpartisan politics.
l

Increase USCYBERCOM’s effectiveness.
1.

Accelerate the integration of cyber and electronic warfare (EW)
doctrine and capabilities, abiding by the time-tested norms ofcombined-arms warfare.

2. Mandate that development teams will include both coders and soldiers,
aircrew, and sailors with kinetic experience at the platoon level.
3. Break the paradigm of cyber authorities held at the strategic level.
4. Increase cyber resilience by, for example, protecting the Nuclear
Command, Control, and Communications Network and the Air Force’s
Cyber Resiliency Office for Weapons Systems (CROWS).
5. Expand coordination of joint operations with allies.
6. Implement the Government Accountability Office’s recommendationthat the DOD Chief Information Officer, Commander of USCYBERCOM,
and Commander of Joint Force Headquarters–DOD Information
Network “align policy and system requirements to enable DOD to haveenterprise-wide visibility of cyber incident reporting to support tactical,
strategic, and military strategies for response.”37lRationalize strategy and doctrine.
1.

Update the October 2022 National Security Strategy to define DOD
roles and responsibilities beyond existing platitudes.

2. Apply traditional deterrence strategies and principles for using cyber/
EW in retaliation for foreign cyberattacks and/or EW actions against
U.S. infrastructure and citizens.

— 120 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project

SPECIAL OPERATIONS FORCES

Even though America’s conventional war in Afghanistan was a failure, Special
Operations Forces of the United States Special Operation Command (USSOCOM)
executed an extremely effective counterterrorism campaign: There has not been
another major attack on the homeland, global terrorist threats are reduced andmanaged, collaboration with international partners is effective, and units under
USSOCOM are the most capable and experienced warfighters in two generations.
There is a movement to reduce the scope and scale of USSOCOM’s mission infavor of other service priorities in great-power competition. This would be a mistake because USSOCOM can be employed effectively in great-power competition.
It makes sense to capitalize on USSOCOM’s experience and repurpose its mission to include irregular warfare within the context of great-power competition,
thereby providing a robust organization that is capable of achieving strategic
effects that are critical both to our national defense and to the defense of ourallies and partners around the globe. Irregular warfare should be used proactively
to prevent state and nonstate actors from negatively affecting U.S. policies andobjectives while simultaneously strengthening our regional partnerships. If wemaintain irregular warfare’s traditional focus on nonstate actors, we limit ourselvesto addressing only the symptoms (nonstate actors), not the problems themselves(China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran).
Needed ReformslMake irregular warfare a cornerstone of security strategy. The U.S.
can project strength through unified action with our Interagency,38 allies,
and partners by utilizing irregular warfare capabilities synchronizedwith elements of national power. Broadly redefining irregular warfare toaddress current state and nonstate actors is critical to countering irregularthreats that range from the Chinese use of economic warfare to Russian
disinformation and Islamist terrorism. A broad definition of irregularwarfare in the National Security Strategy would allow for a whole-ofgovernment approach, thereby providing resources and capabilities tocounter threats and ultimately serve as credible deterrence at the strategic
and tactical levels.

1.

Define irregular warfare as “a means by which the United States uses allelements of national power to project influence abroad to counter state
adversaries, defeat hostile nonstate actors, deter wider conflict, andmaintain peace in great-power competition.”

2. Characterize the state and nonstate irregular threats facing the U.S. byregion in the National Security Strategy.

— 121 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

3. Direct that irregular warfare resources, capabilities, and strategies be
incorporated directly into the overall National Defense Strategy insteadof being relegated to a supporting document.
4. Establish an Irregular Warfare Center of Excellence to help DOD train,equip, and organize to conduct irregular warfare as a core competency
across the spectrum of competition, crisis, and conflict.
lCounter China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) globally. DOD, in
conjunction with the Interagency, allies, and partner nations, must work
proactively to counter China’s BRI around the globe.
1.

Task USSOCOM and corresponding organizations in the Pentagon
with conceptualizing, resourcing, and executing regionally based
operations to counter the BRI with a focus on nations that are key
to our energy policy, international supply chains, and our defense
industrial base.

2. Use regional and global information operations to highlight Chinese
violations of Exclusive Economic Zones, violations of human rights, andcoercion along Chinese fault lines in Xinjiang Province, Hong Kong, andTaiwan in addition to China’s weaponization of sovereign debt.
3. Directly counter Chinese economic power with all elements of national
power in North America, Central America, and the Caribbean tomaintain maritime freedom of movement and protect the digital
infrastructure of nations in the region.
l

Establish credible deterrence through irregular warfare to protect
the homeland. A whole-of-government approach and willingness toemploy cyber, information, economic, and counterterrorist irregularwarfare capabilities should be utilized to protect the homeland.
1.

Include the designation of USSOCOM as lead for the execution ofirregular warfare against hostile state and nonstate actors in the
National Defense Strategy.

2. Demonstrate a willingness to employ offensive cyber capabilities against
adversaries who conduct cyberattacks against U.S. infrastructure,businesses, personnel, and governments.

— 122 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project

3. Employ a “name and shame” approach by making information regarding
the names of entities that target democratic processes and international
norms available in a transparent manner.
4. Work with the Interagency to employ economic warfare, lawfare, anddiplomatic pressure against hostile state and nonstate actors.
5. Maintain the authorities necessary for an aggressive counterterrorism
posture against threats to the homeland.
NUCLEAR DETERRENCE

Nuclear deterrence is one of the most critical elements of U.S. national security,
as it forms a backstop to U.S. military forces. Every operational plan relies on theassumption that nuclear deterrence holds. Ever since the U.S. first acquired nuclear
weapons, Administrations of both parties have pursued a strategy designed to deter
nuclear and non-nuclear attack; assure allies; and, in the event of nuclear employment, restore deterrence at the lowest possible cost to the U.S. Today, however,America’s ability to meet these goals is increasingly challenged by the growing
nuclear threats posed by our adversaries.
llChina is pursuing a strategic breakout of its nuclear forces, significantly
shifting the nuclear balance and forcing the U.S. to learn how to deter two
nuclear peer competitors (China and Russia) simultaneously for the firsttime in its history.
Russia is expanding its nuclear arsenal and using the threat of nuclear
employment as a coercive tactic in its war on Ukraine.

lNorth Korea is advancing its nuclear capabilities.

l

Iran is inching closer to nuclear capability.

Meanwhile, all U.S. nuclear capabilities and the infrastructure on which they
rely date from the Cold War and are in dire need of replacement. The next Administration will need to focus on continuing the effort to modernize the nuclear triad
while updating our strategy and capabilities to meet the challenges presented bya more threatening nuclear environment.
Needed ReformslPrioritize nuclear modernization. All components of the nuclear triad are
far beyond their intended lifetimes and will need to be replaced over the next

— 123 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

decade. This effort is required for the U.S. to maintain its nuclear triad—andwill be the bare minimum needed to maintain U.S. strategic nuclear deterrence.
1.

Accelerate the timelines of critical modernization programs including theSentinel missile, Long Range Standoff Weapon (LRSO), Columbia-classballistic missile submarine, B-21 bomber, and F-35 Dual Capable Aircraft.

2. Reject any congressional proposals that would further extend theservice lives of U.S. capabilities such as the Minuteman III ICBM.
3. Ensure sufficient funding for warhead life extension programs (LEP),
including the B61-12, W80-4, W87-1 Mod, and W88 Alt 370.
llDevelop the Sea-Launched Cruise Missile-Nuclear (SLCM-N). In 2018,
the Trump Administration proposed restoring the SLCM-N to help fill a
growing gap in U.S. nonstrategic capabilities and improve deterrence against
limited nuclear attack.39 The Biden Administration canceled this programin its 2022 Nuclear Posture Review (NPR).40 The next President should
support and accelerate funding for development of the SLCM-N with thegoal of deployment by the end of the decade.
Account for China’s nuclear expansion. To ensure its ability to deter
both Russia and the growing Chinese nuclear threat, the U.S. will need morethan the bare minimum of nuclear modernization. President Biden’s 2022
NPR described the problem but proposed no recommendations to restore or
maintain nuclear deterrence.
1.

Consider procuring more modernized nuclear systems (such as theSentinel missile or LRSO) than currently planned.

2. Improve the ability of the U.S. to utilize the triad’s upload capacity incase of a crisis.
3. Review what capabilities in addition to the SLCM-N (for example,
nonstrategic weapons or new warhead designs) are needed to deter theunique Chinese threat.
l

Restore the nuclear infrastructure. The United States must restore
its necessary nuclear infrastructure so that it is capable of producing andmaintaining nuclear weapons.

— 124 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project1.

Accelerate the effort to restore plutonium pit production, which is essential
both for modern warhead programs and for recapitalizing the stockpile.

2. Continue to invest in rebuilding infrastructure, including facilities at
the National Laboratories that support nuclear weapons development.
3. Restore readiness to test nuclear weapons at the Nevada National
Security Site to ensure the ability of the U.S. to respond quickly toasymmetric technology surprises.
lCorrectly orient arms control. The U.S. should agree to arms control
agreements only if they help to advance the interests of the U.S. and its allies.
1.

Reject proposals for nuclear disarmament that are contrary to the goalof bolstering deterrence.

2. Pursue arms control as a way to secure the national security interests of
the U.S. and its allies rather than as an end in itself.
3. Prepare to compete in order to secure U.S. interests should arms control
efforts continue to fail.
MISSILE DEFENSE

Missile defense is a critical component of the U.S. national security architecture.
It can help to deter attack by instilling doubt that an attack will work as intended,take adversary “cheap shots” off the table, and limit the perceived value of missiles as tools of coercion. It also allows space for diplomacy during a crisis and canprotect U.S. and allied forces, critical assets, and populations if deterrence fails.41
Adversaries are relying increasingly on missiles to achieve their aims.
lll

China and Russia, in addition to their vast and growing ballistic missile
inventories, are deploying new hypersonic glide vehicles and investing in
new ground-launched, air-launched, and sea-launched cruise missiles thatuniquely challenge the United States in different domains.
North Korea has pursued an aggressive missile testing program and isbecoming increasingly belligerent toward South Korea and Japan.
Iran continues to maintain a missile arsenal that is capable of striking U.S.
and allied assets in the Middle East and Europe, and its rocket launches
demonstrate that it either has or is developing the ability to build ICBMs.

— 125 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise

Missile defense has been underprioritized and underfunded in recent years. In
light of these growing threats, the incoming Administration should treat missile
defense as a top priority.
Needed ReformslChampion the benefits of missile defense. Despite its deterrence anddamage-limitation benefits, opponents argue incorrectly that U.S. missile
defense is destabilizing because it threatens Russian and Chinese secondstrike capabilities.

1.

Reject claims made by the Left that missile defense is destabilizing
while acknowledging that Russia and China are developing their own
advanced missile defense systems.

2. Commit to keeping homeland missile defense off the table in any arms
control negotiations with Russia and China.42
lStrengthen homeland ballistic missile defense. The United Statescurrently deploys 44 Ground-Based Interceptors (GBIs) as part of its
Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system to defend the homelandagainst North Korea, but as North Korea improves its missile program, thissystem is at risk of falling behind the threat.43
1.

Buy at least 64 of the Next Generation Interceptor (NGI), which is moreadvanced than the GBI, for an eventual uniform fleet of interceptors.44
The Biden Administration currently plans to buy only 20.

2. Consider additional steps to strengthen the GMD system such as alayered missile defense or a third interceptor site on the East Coast.
llIncrease the development of regional missile defense. As the Ukraine
conflict amply demonstrates, U.S. regional missile defense capabilities arevery limited. The United States has been unable to supply our partners
reliably with any capabilities, and the number and types of regional missile
defense platforms are less than the U.S. needs for its own defense. The U.S.
should prioritize procurement of more regional defense systems such as
Theater High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD), Standard Missile-3, andPatriot missiles.
Change U.S. missile defense policy. Historically, the U.S. has chosen
to rely solely on deterrence to address the Russian and Chinese ballistic— 126 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project

missile threat to the homeland and to use homeland missile defense only
against rogue nations.
1.

Abandon the existing policy of not defending the homeland against
Russian and Chinese ballistic missiles and focus on how to improve
defense as the Russian and Chinese missile threats increase at an
unprecedented rate.45

2. Invest in future advanced missile defense technologies like directedenergy or space-based missile defense that could defend against more
numerous missile threats.
lInvest in new track-and-intercept capabilities. The advent ofhypersonic missiles and increased numbers of cruise missile arsenals bythreat actors poses new challenges to our missile defense capabilities.
1.

Invest in cruise missile defense of the homeland.46

2. Accelerate the program to deploy space-based sensors that can detectand track missiles flying on nonballistic trajectories.47
3. Accelerate the Glide Phase Interceptor, which is intended to counter
hypersonic weapons.

AUTHOR’S NOTE: The mission of the Department of Defense is to provide the military forces needed to deter

war and ensure our nation’s security. This chapter provides a blueprint to ensure that the Department can meet our
national security needs. Its preparation was a collective enterprise of individuals involved in the 2025 Presidential
Transition Project. All contributors to this chapter are listed at the front of this volume, but Sergio de la Pena andChuck DeVore deserve special mention. The author alone assumes responsibility for the content of this chapter, andno views expressed herein should be attributed to any other individual.

— 127 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise
ENDNOTES

1.
2.
3.
4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

11.

12.
13.
14.

15.

16.
17.

18.
19.

U.S. Constitution, Preamble, https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/preamble/ (accessed
February 16, 2023).
U.S. Constitution, Article I, § 8, https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/article-1/ (accessed
February 16, 2023).
U.S. Constitution, Article II, § 2, https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/article-2/ (accessed
February 16, 2023).
Established pursuant to S. 1605, National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2022, Public Law No. 117-81,
117th Congress, December 27, 2021, Division A, Title X, § 1004, https://www.congress.gov/117/plaws/publ81/
PLAW-117publ81.pdf (accessed February 16, 2023).
H.R. 3684, Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, Public Law No. 117-58, 117th Congress, November 15, 2021,
Division G, Title IX, §§ 70901–70953, https://www.congress.gov/117/plaws/publ58/PLAW-117publ58.pdf(accessed February 16, 2023).
S. 2943, National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017, Public Law 114-328, 114th Congress, December
23, 2016, Division A, Title IX, § 901, https://www.congress.gov/114/statute/STATUTE-130/STATUTE-130-Pg2000.
pdf (accessed February 16, 2023).
H.R. 3622, Goldwater–Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act of 1986, Public Law No. 99-433,
99th Congress, October 1, 1986, https://www.congress.gov/99/statute/STATUTE-100/STATUTE-100-Pg992.pdf(accessed February 16, 2023).
U.S. Department of Defense, Defense Security Cooperation Agency, Historical Sales Book, Fiscal Years
1950–2021, p. 7, https://www.dsca.mil/sites/default/files/dsca_historical_sales_book_FY21.pdf (accessed
February 15, 2023).
Paul K. Kerr, “Arms Sales: Congressional Review Process,” Congressional Research Service Report for Members
and Committees of Congress No. RL31675, updated June 10, 2022, p. 1, https://sgp.fas.org/crs/weapons/
RL31675.pdf (accessed February 15, 2023).
Keith Webster, “How to Reform America’s Military Sales Process,” The Hill Congress Blog, October 6, 2022,
https://thehill.com/opinion/congress-blog/3675933-how-to-reform-americas-military-sales-process/(accessed February 15, 2023).
See Thomas W. Spoehr, “The Administration and Congress Must Act Now to Counter the Worsening Military
Recruiting Crisis, Heritage Foundation Issue Brief No. 5283, July 28, 2022, https://www.heritage.org/sites/
default/files/2022-07/IB5283.pdf.
Ibid.
Ronald Reagan Institute, “Reagan National Defense Survey,” conducted November 2021, p. 4, https://www.
reaganfoundation.org/media/358085/rndf_survey_booklet.pdf (accessed February 16, 2023).
See Paul J. Larkin, “Protecting the Nation by Employing Military Spouses,” Heritage Foundation Commentary,
June 6, 2019, https://www.heritage.org/jobs-and-labor/commentary/protecting-the-nation-employingmilitary-spouses.
See Jude Schwalbach, “Military Families Deserve Flexible Education Options,” Heritage Foundation
Commentary, April 14, 2021, https://www.heritage.org/education/commentary/military-families-deserveflexible-education-options.
See Chapter 7, “The Intelligence Community,” infra.
The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA); the National Security Agency (NSA); the National GeospatialIntelligence Agency (NGA); the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO); and the intelligence andcounterintelligence elements of the military services: U.S. Air Force Intelligence, U.S. Navy Intelligence, U.S.
Army Intelligence, and U.S. Marine Corps Intelligence, which also receive guidance and oversight from theUnder Secretary of Defense for Intelligence (USDI).
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
The Department of Energy’s Office of Intelligence and Counterintelligence; the Department of Homeland
Security’s Office of Intelligence and Analysis and the intelligence and counterintelligence elements of the
U.S. Coast Guard; the Department of Justice’s Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Drug Enforcement
Administration’s Office of National Security Intelligence; the Department of State’s Bureau of Intelligence andResearch; and the Department of the Treasury’s Office of Intelligence and Analysis.

— 128 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project
20. Staff Study, IC21: Intelligence Community in the 21st Century, Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence,
U.S. House of Representatives, 104th Congress, 1996, p. 71, https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/ADA315088.pdf(accessed February 15, 2023).
21. Ronald O’Rourke, “Great Power Competition: Implications for Defense—Issues for Congress,” Congressional
Research Service Report for Members and Committees of Congress No. R43838, updated November 8, 2022,
https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R43838/93 (accessed February 15, 2023).
22. U.S. Government Accountability Office, Defense Intelligence and Security: DOD Needs to Establish Oversight
Expectations and to Develop Tools That Enhance Accountability, GAO-21-295, May 2021, https://www.gao.gov/
assets/gao-21-295.pdf (accessed February 15, 2023).
23. The U.S. military has a long history of providing support to civil authorities, particularly in response todisasters but for other purposes as well. The Defense Department currently defines defense support of civil
authorities (DSCA) as “Support provided by U.S. Federal military forces, DoD civilians, DoD contract personnel,
DoD Component assets, and National Guard forces (when the Secretary of Defense, in coordination with theGovernors of the affected States, elects and requests to use those forces in Title 32, U.S.C., status) in responseto requests for assistance from civil authorities for domestic emergencies, law enforcement support, andother domestic activities, or from qualifying entities for special events. Also known as civil support.” U.S.
Department of Defense, Directive No. 3025.18, “Defense Support of Civil Authorities (DSCA),” December 29,
2010, p. 16, https://www.dco.uscg.mil/Portals/9/CG-5R/nsarc/DoDD%203025.18%20Defense%20Support%20
of%20Civil%20Authorities.pdf (accessed February 15, 2023).
24. U.S. Army, “Who We Are: The Army’s Vision and Strategy,” https://www.army.mil/about/ (accessed
February 17, 2023).
25. “[T]he Army’s internal assessment must be balanced against its own statements that unit training is focusedon company-level operations [reflective of counterintelligence requirements] rather than battalion or brigade
operations [much less division or corps to meet large-scale ground combat operations against a peercompetitor such as Russia or China]. Consequently, how these ‘ready’ brigade combat teams would perform
in combat operations is an open question.” “Executive Summary” in 2023 Index of U.S. Military Strength,ed. Dakota L. Wood (Washington: The Heritage Foundation, 2023), p. 16, http://thf_media.s3.amazonaws.
com/2022/Military_Index/2023_IndexOfUSMilitaryStrength.pdf (accessed February 15, 2023).
26. For background on the USN’s fleet size, see Brent D. Sadler, “Rebuilding America’s Military: The United States
Navy,” Heritage Foundation Special Report No. 242, February 18, 2021, https://www.heritage.org/sites/default/
files/2021-02/SR242.pdf, and Ronald O’Rourke, “Navy Force Structure and Shipbuilding Plans: Backgroundand Issues for Congress,” Congressional Research Service Report for Members and Committees of Congress
No. RL32665, December 21, 2022, https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/RL/RL32665 (accessed
February 15, 2023).
27. The Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System (JCIDS) is the process by which the services
develop and the Joint Staff approves the requirements for major defense acquisitions. See Defense
Acquisition University, “Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System (JCIDA),” https://www.dau.
edu/acquipedia/pages/articledetails.aspx#!371 (accessed February 15, 2023).
28. The board would seek to balance a mix of active military and civilians with expertise in and responsibility
for major acquisitions and former military and civilians with experience in strategy and acquisitions. The
proposed composition would include the Vice Chief of Naval Operations as Chairman, with three-star level
membership from the Joint Staff, the Navy and Defense Acquisition Executives, and the Naval Sea Systems
Command. In addition, there would be four-star retired naval officers/Navy civil servants as members, oneeach named by the Chairmen of the House and Senate Armed Services Committees, the Secretary of theNavy, and the Secretary of Defense. Finally, there would be a member appointed by the Secretary of the Navy
who had previous senior experience in the defense industry.
29. See James Mattis, Secretary of Defense, Summary of the 2018 National Defense Strategy of the United Statesof America: Sharpening the American Military’s Competitive Edge, U.S. Department of Defense, https://
dod.defense.gov/Portals/1/Documents/pubs/2018-National-Defense-Strategy-Summary.pdf (accessed
February 17, 2023), and U.S. Department of Defense, 2022 National Defense Strategy of the United States ofAmerica Including the 2022 Nuclear Posture Review and the 2022 Missile Defense Review, https://oldcc.gov/
resource/2022-national-defense-strategy (accessed February 17, 2023).

— 129 —

Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise
30. U.S. Air Force, “The Air Force We Need: 386 Operational Squadrons,” September 17, 2018, https://www.
af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/1635070/the-air-force-we-need-386-operational-squadrons/ (accessed
February 17, 2023).
31. General David H. Berger, Commandant of the Marine Corps, “Force Design 2030,” U.S. Department of theNavy, U.S. Marine Corps, March 2020, https://www.hqmc.marines.mil/Portals/142/Docs/CMC38%20Force%20
Design%202030%20Report%20Phase%20I%20and%20II.pdf?ver=2020-03-26-121328-460 (accessed
February 17, 2023).
32. Department of the Navy, United States Marine Corps, “Force Design 2030,” March 2020, https://www.hqmc.
marines.mil/Portals/142/Docs/CMC38%20Force%20Design%202030%20Report%20Phase%20I%20and%20II.
pdf?ver=2020-03-26-121328-460 (accessed February 15, 2023).
33. Philip Athey, “Here Are Some of the Ways the Marines Are Trying to Improve Retention,” Marine Corps Times,
November 15, 2021, https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/your-marine-corps/2021/11/15/treat-peoplelike-human-beings-here-are-some-of-the-ways-the-marines-are-trying-to-improve-retention/ (accessed
February 15, 2023).
34. Megan Eckstein, “Marines, Navy Near Agreement on Light Amphibious Warship Features,” Defense News,
October 5, 2022, https://www.defensenews.com/naval/2022/10/05/marines-navy-near-agreement-on-lightamphibious-warship-features/ (accessed February 16, 2023).
35. Megan Eckstein, “Marines Explain Vision for Fewer Traditional Amphibious Warships,” Defense News, June21, 2021, https://www.defensenews.com/naval/2021/06/21/marines-explain-vision-for-fewer-traditionalamphibious-warships-supplemented-by-new-light-amphib/ (accessed February 16, 2023).
36. See Sidney J. Freedberg Jr., “Trump Eases Cyber Ops, but Safeguards Remain: Joint Staff,” Breaking Defense,
September 17, 2018, https://breakingdefense.com/2018/09/trump-eases-cyber-ops-but-safeguards-remainjoint-staff/ (accessed March 7, 2023); Dustin Volz, “White House Confirms It Has Relaxed Rules on U.S. Useof Cyberweapons,” The Wall Street Journal, September 20, 2018, https://www.wsj.com/articles/white-houseconfirms-it-has-relaxed-rules-on-u-s-use-of-cyber-weapons-1537476729 (accessed March 7, 2023); andFederation of American Scientists, Intelligence Resource Program, “National Security Presidential Memoranda[NSPMs]: Donald J. Trump Administration,” updated March 7, 2022, https://irp.fas.org/offdocs/nspm/index.
html (accessed March 7, 2023).
37. U.S. Government Accountability Office, DOD Cybersecurity: Enhanced Attention Needed to Ensure Cyber
Incidents Are Appropriately Reported and Shared, GAO-23-105084, November 2022, p. 36, https://www.gao.
gov/assets/gao-23-105084.pdf (accessed February 17, 2023).
38. See Paul Evancoe, “Special Operations and the Interagency Team,” U.S.Military.com, https://usmilitary.
com/special-operations-and-the-interagency-team/#:~:text=Seldom%20considered%20are%20those%20
other%20government%20agency%20%28OGA%29,response%20and%20consequence%20management%20
to%20name%20a%20few (accessed February 17, 2023).
39. U.S. Department of Defense, Nuclear Posture Review, February 2018, pp. 54–55, https://media.defense.
gov/2018/Feb/02/2001872886/-1/-1/1/2018-NUCLEAR-POSTURE-REVIEW-FINAL-REPORT.PDF (accessed
February 17, 2023).
40. U.S. Department of Defense, 2022 National Defense Strategy of the United States of America Including the2022 Nuclear Posture Review and the 2022 Missile Defense Review, pp. 3 and 20.
41. Patty-Jane Geller, “Missile Defense,” in 2023 Index of U.S. Military Strength, ed. Dakota L. Wood (Washington:
The Heritage Foundation, 2023), pp. 507–508, http://thf_media.s3.amazonaws.com/2022/Military_
Index/2023_IndexOfUSMilitaryStrength.pdf.
42. Matthew R. Costlow, “The Folly of Limiting U.S. Missile Defenses for Nuclear Arms Control,” National
Institute for Public Policy Information Series, Issue No. 505, October 18, 2021, https://nipp.org/wp-content/
uploads/2021/10/IS-505.pdf (accessed February 16, 2023).
43. Forum for American Leadership, “Don’t Hand North Korea a Win in the Missile Defense Review,” January 4,2022, https://forumforamericanleadership.org/dprk-missile-threat (accessed February 16, 2023).
44. Patty-Jane Geller, “It’s Time to Get Homeland Missile Defense Right,” Defense News, January 4, 2021, https://www.defensenews.com/opinion/commentary/2021/01/04/its-time-to-get-homeland-missile-defenseright/#:~:text=Restoring%20our%20eroding%20edge%20when,advanced%20technology%20and%20
new%20capabilities.%E2%80%9D (accessed February 16, 2023).

— 130 —

2025 Presidential Transition Project
45. Forum for American Leadership, “How Biden's Missile Defense Review Can Succeed,” October 21, 2021, https://forumforamericanleadership.org/missile-defense-review (accessed February 16, 2023).
46. Tom Karako, Matt Strohmeyer, Ian Williams, Wes Rumbaugh, and Ken Harmon, North America Is a Region,Too: An Integrated, Phased, and Affordable Approach to Air and Missile Defense for the Homeland, Center
for Strategic and International Studies, Missile Defense Project, July 2022, https://csis-website-prod.
s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/publication/220714_Karako_North_America.pdf?VersionId=BhIKa8jHHF_
kV94NXRMx6D4m2o6LQqUf (accessed February 16, 2023).
47. Rebeccah Heinrichs, “Why America Needs the Ability to Track Enemy Missiles from Space,” The Hill, April 16,
2019, https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/438939-why-america-needs-the-ability-to-track-enemymissiles-from-space/ (accessed February 16, 2023).

— 131 —