Pentagon Tech Leader Eyes Distant Powers as Admin Focuses on Western Hemisphere

Shift in Focus: Pentagon's Strategic Priorities

The Pentagon’s head of research and engineering, Emil Michael, has emphasized the need to focus on advanced threats that are not immediately adjacent to the United States. This approach contrasts with previous strategies that may have prioritized more immediate regional concerns.

Michael, who serves as the undersecretary of war for research and engineering and the department's chief technology officer, highlighted that China's military modernization over the past 15 years demands a new way of thinking. He noted that China is the primary global threat to the U.S., while former President Donald Trump and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth have focused on threats from the western hemisphere, particularly mass migration and cartel activity.

According to Michael, the U.S. military has the necessary equipment and technology to handle current operations in the Caribbean. However, he pointed out that there are significant threats further away from the U.S. homeland that the country does not yet have the capabilities to address.

"We have enough capability currently to do anything that's necessary in that arena. So I am focused much more on other parts of the world ... than this hemisphere, because the adversary capabilities are not nearly as close," he said.

Homeland Defense and Military Strategy

The Trump administration placed a strong emphasis on homeland defense in its military and foreign policy strategies during its first year. This included deploying U.S. troops to the southern border to combat illegal immigration and drug smuggling through the U.S.-Mexico border. The administration also aimed to build a massive multi-layered air defense system known as the Golden Dome.

Additionally, the U.S. Southern Command has initiated lethal strikes on vessels accused of carrying drugs, purportedly headed for the U.S. Since September, the military has targeted 22 vessels, resulting in the deaths of over 80 people. The Navy has significantly increased its presence in the region, marking one of the largest military buildups in the Western Hemisphere in decades.

The Trump administration's National Security Strategy (NSS) underscored its focus on defending the homeland, stating, "We want to ensure that the Western Hemisphere remains reasonably stable and well-governed enough to prevent and discourage mass migration to the United States; we want a Hemisphere whose governments cooperate with us against narco-terrorists, cartels, and other transnational criminal organizations."

While the NSS outlines broad threats in the Pacific region, it did not explicitly label China as the "pacing challenge," unlike the Biden administration's strategy. Despite this omission, Michael affirmed that the Chinese Communist Party remains the U.S. "pacing challenge."

Evolving Military Technologies

The Pentagon is actively shifting away from expensive and sophisticated systems that were primarily used in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Instead, the focus is now on low-tech, cheap, and mass-producible weapons, which have become increasingly common.

Russia's war in Ukraine has served as a real-life testing ground for offensive and defensive autonomous systems, commonly referred to as drones. Both sides have been able to mass-produce numerous drones with various functions, including attack, surveillance, and defensive roles.

"You're seeing the notion of mass attritable, low-cost weapons being used in conflicts in a way that we haven't seen before, as opposed to exquisite weapons we've seen before. So those changes ... combined with the rise of AI and how AI is going to be used for vision superiority or extending human capability beyond what a human analyst can do in any one capacity," Michael explained.

Differing Threat Environments

Michael noted that the U.S.'s threat environment differs significantly from that of Ukraine, where Kyiv's primary adversary is its larger neighbor. In contrast, the U.S. has not engaged in warfare with either of its neighbors in over a century.

"The notion of having as many drones as the Russians or Ukrainians so that we can push battle lines is not as important as it is in that conflict," he said.