US Homeland Would Be at Risk in Great Power War: Top Military Adviser

U.S. Marines line up on the beach after the amphibious landing exercise during the joint Cobra Gold exercise in the coastal Thai province of Chonburi on March 3, 2023. Lillian Suwanrumpha/AFP via Getty Images

A future conflict between great powers would likely put the U.S. homeland at risk, either through kinetic or nonkinetic means, including psychological and cyber warfare, according to the nation’s most senior enlisted officer.

This means that the stakes of the next war will be much higher than those the United States faced during the Global War on Terror, said Ramón Colón-López, the senior enlisted adviser to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (SEAC).

“The nature of the enemy that we can potentially face in the near future is different than what we’ve become accustomed to fighting over 20 years,” SEAC Colón-López said during an Aug. 1 talk with the Air and Space Forces Association.

“Counterinsurgency is much different than dealing with a foe that has nuclear powers. The stakes are higher.”

SEAC Colón-López said that in the event of war between great powers—such as between the United States and China or Russia—all Americans would be considered “outside the wire” or in danger of being targeted by other means.

To that end, he said, securing U.S. citizens—particularly the family of service members who might be targeted—ought to be of top priority when making strategic decisions that could escalate to conflict.

“Everyone, including our families, are outside the wire,” SEAC Colón-López said. “We need to take that into the calculations when it comes to escalation, when it comes to the use of power.

“We’re not only fighting an enemy. We have to deal with the repercussions of what happens with their counter actions and how that is going to affect our families and our people back in the homeland. That is the main concern I have when it comes to strategic power competition.”

Future Conflict to Place Homefront at Risk

SEAC Colón-López also said that the U.S. military would have to do more to encourage the resiliency of its human component in an era defined by increasing technological advances.

While the military is increasingly pursuing advanced technologies, he said, it would need to double down on efforts to prepare its service members for the day when those advanced systems fail.

“We need to strike a balance somewhere in there, between intellect and courage, to be able to make sure that we have the best people on the battlefield,” SEAC Colón-López said.

“We know that technology is a double-edged sword. It can basically help us a lot when it comes to our advantages on the battlefield, but what happens when that gets shut off and we have to rely on the flesh and bone to be able to go ahead and take that decisive action to be able to continue to take the fight to the enemy?”

Similarly, SEAC Colón-López said that the military ought to work more with the government to craft a broad approach to combating misinformation and disinformation, which he believes could be used to undermine the confidence of service members’ families in the military and its mission.

He said that disinformation “is a hypersonic weapon of mass destruction,” capable of eroding confidence in the United States and its military, which requires a “whole of nation supporting mechanism” to counter.

“If [families are] not fully willing to assent to our responsibilities, or service members, or if they think that the institution [of the military] is rotten for whatever reason, then we’ll lose that support.”

Cyber warfare specialists serving with the Maryland Air National Guard’s 175th Cyberspace Operations Group at training at Warfield Air National Guard Base in Middle River, Md., on June 3, 2017. Air Force photo by J.M. Eddins Jr.

AI to Lessen Role of Humans in Combat

SEAC Colón-López’s comments come as the U.S. and Chinese militaries both seek to increase their reliance on cutting-edge technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics, throwing into question what role human beings will play in future wars.

China’s communist regime is investing heavily in a broad array of new technologies. While AI is foremost among them, the regime is also investing in developing capabilities related to autonomous robotics and hypersonics.

At the heart of the effort is the regime’s goal of “intelligentization,” a transformation of warfare through the mass integration of AI, automation, and big data.

Such programs essentially point toward one end: restructuring the Chinese military into an increasingly centralized cadre of officers who direct swarms of AI-enabled autonomous systems to do the actual fighting.

Likewise, the United States is pursuing the fielding of robotic systems en masse.

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley said earlier in the year that he hopes to bring together emergent capabilities such as robotics, AI, cyber and space platforms, and precision munitions into a cohesive new doctrine of war.

To that end, the Pentagon is experimenting with new unmanned aerial, ground, and undersea vehicles and seeking to exploit the pervasiveness of nonmilitary smart technologies, from watches to fitness trackers.

Gen. Milley said he believes that the world’s most powerful armies will be predominantly robotic within the next decade, and he means for the United States to be the first to reach that goal.

“Over the next 10 to 15 years, you’ll see large portions of advanced countries’ militaries become robotic,” he said during a March 31 talk with Defense One.

“I would submit that the country, the nation-state, that takes those technologies and adapts them most effectively and optimizes them for military operations, that country is probably going to have a decisive advantage at the beginning of the next conflict.”