Will A ‘Digital Military’ Change The Way Wars Are Fought?

Jacob Parakilas, The Diplomat: Will a ‘Digital Military’ Change War? 

The U.S. Space Force claims that it is in the process of delivering a “digital military branch.” Is it a contradiction in terms? 

According to General Jay Raymond, the head of the U.S. Space Force, America’s newest military branch is also on its way to becoming the world’s first fully digital armed service. 

Rather than a Tron-esque idea of soldiers fighting virtually in a purely digital battlefield, what Raymond was referring to — previously laid out in a Space Force vision statement — is somewhat more prosaic, emphasizing the need for the new service to be interconnected and innovative. 

In other words, the actual ambition is more or less to have a military service that works within the frameworks created by the current state of digital technology rather than adopting them piecemeal. 

The particular mission of Space Force lends itself naturally to networking — after all, Space Force personnel are expected to remotely operate satellite and reconnaissance platforms, rather than piloting space fighters or boarding enemy spacecraft. (For the foreseeable future, at least.) 

That stands in stark contrast to the marines, for example, who are still expected to operate in a world of very real mud and blood.

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WNU Editor: Before the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, we saw how a few thousand US soldiers and contractors with drones, surveillance tools, electronic interceptions, etc., coupled with deadly air-power and Afghan troops on the ground, could work together and be effective at keeping the Taliban at bay for years. Once this U.S. digital military presence was removed, the Afghan Army lost its advantage and fell apart very quickly.

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