HELLO AND WELCOME TO WEAPONS AND WARFARE. FOR STRAIGHT ARROW NEWS I’M RYAN ROBERTSON, AND THIS WEEK WE’RE TALKING NATO, INNOVATION ON THE BATTLEFIELD, AND A COMMS CHECK WITH SOME EXPERTS IN COMMS.
AT THE RECENTLY CONCLUDED AFA WARFARE SYMPOSIUM WE HEARD FROM SOME OF THE SMARTEST VOICES IN NATO. WHILE THEY STAYED AWAY FROM THE POLITICS, THEY PAINTED A VERY REAL PICTURE ABOUT WHAT AN UN-CHECKED RUSSIA WOULD MEAN FOR EUROPE AND THE WORLD AT LARGE.
AND, AFRL, THE AIR FOR RESEARCH LABORATORY, IS AT IT AGAIN. DELIVERING INNOVATION TO THE TROOPS WHO NEED IT WITH AN IDEA THAT MAY JUST HELP SAVE SOME LIVES.
BUT FIRST, HERE’S SOME HEADLINES YOU MAY HAVE MISSED.
IF YOU WATCHED OUR EPISODE A COUPLE OF WEEKS BACK YOU MAY HAVE SEEN OUR DEBRIEF ON THE IDEA OF USING U.S. MILITARY TROOPS TO TAKE ON MEXICAN DRUG CARTELS. ASKED ABOUT THE POTENTIAL FOR GROUND FORCES DURING A VISIT TO THE U.S.-MEXICO BORDER, VICE PRESIDENT JD VANCE SAYS U.S. FORCES WON’T INVADE MEXICO DESPITE THE PRESIDENT DESIGNATING DRUG CARTELS AS FOREIGN TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS, OPENING THE DOOR FOR POTENTIAL MILITARY ACTION.
“I’m not going to make any announcements. About any invasions of Mexico here today. The president has a megaphone. And of course, he’ll speak to these issues as he feels necessary. But what designating cartel organizations allows us to do is deploy the full resources of the United States military to engage in serious border enforcement.”
VANCE WENT TO EAGLE PASS, TEXAS, ALONG WITH DEFENSE SECRETARY PETE HEGSETH AND DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE TULSI GABBARD TO TOUT A DROP IN ILLEGAL BORDER CROSSINGS.
REMEMBER THAT PROMOTIONAL ANIME VIDEO INTRODUCING ANDURIL’S BARRACUDA-500 AUTONOMOUS AIR VEHICLE? WELL, THEY’VE GONE FROM 2-D TO 3-D.
JUST SEVEN MONTHS AFTER BEING CHOSEN FOR THE ENTERPRISE TEST VEHICLE PROJECT, ANDURIL AND THE BARRACUDA, PULLED OFF A SUCCESSFUL FLIGHT TEST. WE KNOW BECAUSE THEY PUT IT ON INSTAGRAM. UP NEXT ANDURIL PLANS TO SHOWCASE THE BARRACUDA-500’S ABILITY TO WORK AUTONOMOUSLY WITH OTHER SYSTEMS.
BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE. ANDURIL ALSO RECENTLY CLINCHED A $642 MILLION CONTRACT FOR THE MARINE CORPS INSTALLATION-COUNTER SMALL UNMANNED AIRCRAFT SYSTEMS PROGRAM, WHICH IS BASICALLY A NETWORK OF DEFENSES AGAINST DRONES FOR MILITARY BASES AND FACILITIES. THIS NEWS FOLLOWS A $200 MILLION DEAL ANDURIL SECURED IN NOVEMBER TO PROVIDE COUNTER-DRONE TECHNOLOGY FOR THE MARINE AIR DEFENSE INTEGRATED SYSTEM. THIS MOBILE AIR DEFENSE SYSTEM CAN BE INSTALLED ON VEHICLES SUCH AS HUMVEES.
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
FOR DECADES AMERICA’S ROLE IN NATO WAS UNQUESTIONED.
AS CERTAIN AS DEATH AND TAXES.
THERE WAS NO DOUBT, AGGRESSION IN EUROPE WOULD BE MET BY THE U.S. AND ITS EUROPEAN ALLIES.
NOW, FOR THE FIRST TIME SINCE ITS INCEPTION IN 1949, THAT COMMITMENT IS COMING INTO QUESTION. AND WHILE NO ONE YET KNOWS EXACTLY WHAT THE FUTURE HOLDS, THE PEOPLE CHARGED WITH MAKING SURE NATO IS READY TO MEET ANY THREAT, REGARDLESS OF THE CURRENT POLITICAL RHETORIC, ARE KEEPING THEIR EYES FOCUSED AT THE TASK AT HAND.
AND THAT’S THE SUBJECT OF THIS WEEK’S DEBRIEF.
DURING THE FIRST FULL WEEK OF MARCH, A PANEL OF EXPERTS GATHERED IN AN OVERSIZED BALLROOM, IN AURORA, COLORADO, NEARLY SIX THOUSAND MILES AWAY FROM THE FIGHTING IN UKRAINE, TO TALK ABOUT RUSSIA’S ILLEGAL INVASION, AND WHERE THE NORTH ATLANTIC TREATY ORGANIZATION, STANDS TODAY.
[TOM GOFFUS, ASST. SEC. GENERAL FOR OPS, NATO]
“At NATO, the role of the ops division is three fold in six words, prevent war, support Ukraine and defend allies to prevent war that NATO has troops in Kosovo and in Iraq and NATO activities that are dynamically managed by SACEUR or on a daily basis in order to prevent Russia and all of Our adversaries from perceiving an advantage in either any geographic domain and any war fighting domain, or in readiness.”
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
THAT’S 32 COUNTRIES, INCLUDING THE UNITED STATES, THAT HAVE SWORN TO PROTECT EACH OTHER AND DEFEND AGAINST BAD ACTORS, LIKE RUSSIA AND VLADIMIR PUTIN. AND, AS TOM GOFFUS, THE ASSISTANT SECRETARY GENERAL FOR NATO OPERATIONS, DETAILED, EVEN THOUGH UKRAINE ISN’T A NATO NATION, THE RESPONSE TO RUSSIA’S INVASION DIDN’T GO UNCHECKED.
[TOM GOFFUS, ASST. SEC. GENERAL FOR OPS, NATO]
“The Ops division underpins the pillars of NATO’s work for Ukraine, including the NATO support and training assistance to Ukraine and Wiesbaden, Germany, the $40 billion pledge for military assistance to Ukraine that all allies made last year in DC, of which in 2024 we hit 51 billion. That’s 11 billion more than was pledged. By the way, almost 60% of that was from non US allies.”
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
BRIGADIER GENERAL ANDREW CLARK IS THE COMMANDING GENERAL FOR NATO INTELLIGENCE, SURVEILLANCE, AND RECONNAISSANCE. HE TOLD ATTENDEES, NO MATTER WHAT’S HAPPENING STATESIDE, FOR TROOPS STATIONED IN EUROPE, THE JOB REMAINS.
[BRIGGEN ANDREW CLARK, CG NATO ISR]
“So the advantage is we provide that unfiltered intelligence to all those nations. And so what I like to tell people is that in the US. We have the DGS system, the distributed common ground system, that that peds, the information that aircraft in the air, that in our Air Force collect, but we do it all in house. We’re one stop shop. We have about 150 analysts on the ground there, and that our products put, we put out about roughly 10,000 products a year is the rate we’re at right now.”
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
FOR OUR EUROPEAN COUNTERPARTS, LIKE ITALIAN AIR FORCE LIEUTENANT GENERAL LUIGI DEL BENE, DEPUTY COMMANDER AND CHIEF OF STAFF FOR OPERATIONAL FORCES OF THE 1ST AIR REGION COMMAND, THE SUCCESS OF THIS DECADES OLD PACT DEPENDS ON MAKING SURE 32 MOVE AS ONE.
[LT. GEN. LUIGI DEL BENE, ITALIAN AIR FORCE]
“So one of the biggest challenge is keeping the nations involved into this process and make sure that we’re synchronized to the all different changes that secure and shape are running every day together with the components. That’s from my perspective. The good part of that is that I’ve seen through the last couple of years definitely more focused leadership on readiness, which it’s it’s a good fact that people are taking this specific function more and more seriously.”
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
OF COURSE, INVARIABLY, THE CONVERSATION CONTINUED TO RETURN TO UKRAINE, RUSSIA’S ILLEGAL INVASION AND WHAT’S BEEN LEARNED IN THE YEARS SINCE.
[BRIGGEN ANDREW CLARK, CG NATO ISR]
“Lesson number one, collective action rests on the foundation of shared awareness, and it takes real work to achieve that shared awareness. And unlike in 2014 where ambassadors were arguing, they’re looking at pictures, saying, See, the Russians are in Crimea, and the next ambassador would say, No, that looks like a hunter to me. And as a result, we didn’t do anything, because we didn’t have shared awareness of what was going on. Our 2022 response couldn’t have more been more different than the 2014 response in primary part, due to shared intelligence among allies, especially from the US. And So lesson number two is, it’s not what we do that provokes Putin. It’s what we don’t do. We should have learned that in 2014 and that’s lesson number three, which is Putin is not a strategist. He’s an opportunist. He pushes on some doors, and when nobody pushes back, he walks in what 2014 taught him was, there is no there was no significant consequence for using force.”
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
AS FOR PRESIDENT TRUMP’S DEMAND NATO NATIONS NEED TO BE SPENDING MORE ON NATIONAL DEFENSE, PART OF THE PROBLEM IS AN INABILITY FOR AMERICAN DEFENSE CONTRACTORS TO MEET THE NEEDS OF THEIR CUSTOMERS.
[TOM GOFFUS, ASST. SEC. GENERAL FOR OPS, NATO]
“I talked to a Lithuanian and with their extra percentage of GDP and defense spending, they want to buy amrams for their NASAMS. Five year wait. I talked to the Bulgarian Chad. They want to buy javelins for their strikers. Seven year wait. I talked to some of the big allies who want to buy patriots 10 year wait again. That needs to get fixed. And I know the industry will tell you what we need is long term demand. Well, 10 years sounds like long term demand to me. There is something that we need to get there, in there and fix.”
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
GIVEN THE CURRENT POLITICAL CLIMATE, THE PANELISTS ALL ACKNOWLEDGE THERE ARE NO QUICK FIXES TO ANY OF THE ISSUES FACING NATO PARTNER NATIONS. THE ONE THING THAT SHOULD BE CLEAR, THEY SAY, IS AN UN-CHECKED RUSSIA WILL MAKE WAVES THAT REACH FAR BEYOND EUROPE, BECAUSE LETTING PUTIN OFF THE HOOK WILL EMBOLDEN CHINA, AND CREATE A NEW SET OF PROBLEMS IN THE PACIFIC.
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
TIME NOW FOR WEAPON OF THE WEEK, AND WE HERE AT WEAPONS AND WARFARE GIVE THIS SEGMENT A LOT OF LATITUDE. FROM HELMETS, TO TACTICAL CAMERAS, AND UNDERWATER DRONES, WE SEE A WEAPON AS ANYTHING OR TACTICAL CONCEPT OUR TROOPS CAN TAKE TO THE FIGHT, AND WIN.
AND THAT BRINGS US TO ONE OF THE LATEST EFFORTS FROM THE GOOD FOLKS AT THE AIR FORCE RESEARCH LABS.
ONE OF THE MOST UGLIEST TRUTHS ABOUT ARMED CONFLICT IS PEOPLE GET HURT.
FORTUNATELY FOR AMERICAN TROOPS WHEN THAT HAPPENS, THEY CAN COUNT ON HIGHLY SKILLED AND HIGHLY CAPABLE MEDICAL PROFESSIONALS. AND NOW, THANKS TO THIS PIECE OF EQUIPMENT, THOSE PROFESSIONALS CAN PROVIDE AN EVEN BETTER LEVEL OF TREATMENT DURING THE GOLDEN HOUR–THE PERIOD OF TIME RIGHT AFTER SUSTAINING AN INJURY, WHEN CARE IS MOST CRITICAL.
[LT. COL. DEREK SORENSEN, 711TH HUMAN PERFORMANCE WING]
“What we have behind us is called the tactical anesthesia workstation. This is a iterative development to save the war fighter and bring heroes home. So it’s meant for our far forward surgical teams all the way at the front line, providing damage control surgery, helping save lives.”
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
IF IT LOOKS LIKE SOMETHING YOU MIGHT SEE AT THE BEDSIDE OF ANY PATIENT, THAT’S KIND OF THE POINT. AT THIS YEAR’S AFA WARFARE SYMPOSIUM, LIEUTENANT COLONEL DEREK SORENSEN TOLD US THAT UNTIL THE INTRODUCTION OF THE TACTICAL ANESTHESIA WORKSTATION ALL OF THE GEAR YOU SEE WOULD MOST LIKELY BE SITTING ON A FLOOR, OR MAYBE EVEN THE GROUND ITSELF.
[LT. COL. DEREK SORENSEN, 711TH HUMAN PERFORMANCE WING]
“Now it’s organized. It’s structured. Helps save lives and improve care in that space. So now it’s transitioned through those iterative processes, and it’s actually out in the field, with our ground surgical teams providing care and saving lives.”
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
BUT THE PROBLEM WAS NOT FULLY ADDRESSED UNTIL THE AFRL AND THE 7-11TH HUMAN PERFORMANCE WING AT WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE PAIRED UP TO FIND A WORKABLE SOLUTION.
[LT. COL. DEREK SORENSEN, 711TH HUMAN PERFORMANCE WING]
“I think a lot of the challenges are, is our commercial partners, that all these devices come from, for medical devices, they don’t have a need to make a station that can go out in the dirt and play, and we’re not a big customer like the all the hospitals and medical system across the world. And so this is where that unique thing of taking your operational SMEs that live in our training pipelines, pairing them with all of our experts ins and outs, and engineers just across the street at AFRL, and we solve a really hard, complex problem, and we have ways to speed it faster than anything.”
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
PART OF THAT SOLUTION CAME WITH HOW THEY DECIDED TO INTRODUCE THE STAND TO MEDICAL PERSONNEL.
[LT. COL. DEREK SORENSEN, 711TH HUMAN PERFORMANCE WING]
“Like I said, we actually fielded first in the training pipeline. So all the folks come through before they go out in the field, and so we use that as a tight OODA Loop, because our engineers were right there, the instructors were there, we could see performance decrements where people were struggling make adjustments before we went into final production to kick it out into the field for field testing, which really helped us be super fast.”
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
COLONEL SORENSEN WENT ON TO SAY THE STAND CAN ALREADY BE FOUND AT NEARLY 40 BASES AND WILL BE DEPLOYED WITH MEDICAL TEAMS POSTING UP ANYWHERE NEAR THE ACTION.
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
BACK IN NOVEMBER, WE INTRODUCED YOU TO PERSISTENT SYSTEMS, A COLORADO-BASED COMPANY THAT SPECIALIZES IN MOBILE AD HOC NETWORKING TECHNOLOGY. AT THE TIME, THEY HAD INKED A DEAL WITH THE AIR FORCE MOBILITY COMMAND TO FORTIFY THEIR COMMUNICATIONS SYSTEMS. NOW, THEY’RE TAKING THINGS A STEP FURTHER WITH A NEW PIECE OF HARDWARE. AND THAT’S THE SUBJECT OF THIS WEEK’S COMMS CHECK.
IT’S CALLED THE PERSONAL TRANSPORT 5, OR THE PT-5, AND THE FOLKS AT PERSISTENT SYSTEMS SAY IT’S THE NEXT EVOLUTION IN CONNECTIVITY FOR TROOPS ON THE GROUND.
[ADRIEN ROBENHYMER]
“So what we’re doing is we’re adding some hardware to the side of the system so it’s backward compatible to all the 1000s of systems that are already out there. And what it’s doing is it’s allowing us to access not only Wi Fi, but also cellular networks for multiple locations, whether it’s in the United States or abroad, and that allows us to kind of extend the network that’s created by the existing system beyond line of sight and integrated to the cloud. So whether you’re connected to the cloud for a government cloud solution or a private cloud solution, now the mesh network is able to access all the data within that cloud.”
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
“Walk me through like a real world situation. If I’m a dismounted soldier and I have this radio, I can take over an aerial drone at that point, if it’s connected to the system, I can have access to it. Is that right?”
[ADRIEN ROBENHYMER]
“Absolutely. Whether it’s in the air, ground, swarming, weapons, all of the technology now is part of its same network, and you’re able to interact with the data coming off of it. You’re able to provide AI enhanced features to it, with data fusion and course corrections and different types of applications that can exist. And it all happens real time, very low latency and high throughput with a lot of scale, so lots, hundreds of 1000s of nodes all at the same time, now connected.”
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
THE PT-5 IS THE LATEST EXAMPLE OF HOW PERSISTENT SYSTEMS IS WORKING TO MEET THE NEEDS OF EACH BRANCH OF THE U.S. MILITARY AS THEY CONTINUE TO MODERNIZE AND PREPARE FOR AMERICA’S NEXT CONFLICT.
[ADRIEN ROBENHYMER]
“Especially as a non-traditional contractor, our goal is to outpace requirements, outpace the needs, the EW environment, everything. So we’re constantly moving. We have teams out all over engineering resources that are collecting information from all the different services, depending on where they’re operating, whether it’s an unmanned system, manned system, anywhere in the world, the cloud interactions, the AI portions of that. So yeah, every few months, something’s coming out with new features.”
[RYAN ROBERTSON]
ALRIGHT FOLKS, THAT’S GOING TO DO IT FOR US ON THIS EPISODE OF WEAPONS AND WARFARE. AS ALWAYS, IF YOU LIKE WHAT YOU SAW–PLEASE LIKE AND SUBSCRIBE TO OUR SOCIAL MEDIA CHANNELS. WE WANT TO GROW OUR AUDIENCE, AND WE’D APPRECIATE YOUR HELP DOING JUST THAT.
FOR MY WRAP THIS WEEK–I WANT TO SPEND A LITTLE TIME ON SOMETHING THAT HAPPENED IN THE LAST FEW WEEKS THAT HIT ME HARDER THAN I WOULD HAVE EXPECTED.
THE DEATH OF GENE HACKMAN AND HIS WIFE BETSY ARAKAWA. HACKMAN WAS A MARINE BEFORE HE WAS AN ACTOR…SERVING IN CHINA, JAPAN, AND HAWAII. WHEN HE WENT TO HOLLYWOOD–HE PLAYED SOME OF THE MOST ICONIC ROLES IN SOME OF MY FAVORITE MOVIES….UNFORGIVEN, CRIMSON TIDE, THE REPLACEMENTS…THE MAN HAD A GREAT CAREER.
DETAILS ABOUT THEIR DEATHS ARE STILL COMING TO LIGHT–BUT WE KNOW HACKMAN AND HIS WIFE LIVED IN A VERY LARGE HOME IN SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO. WE KNOW BETSY ARAKAWA DIED OF HANTAVIRUS, AND HACKMAN–WHO SUFFERED FROM ALZHEIMERS–DIED ABOUT A WEEK LATER.
A DOG THAT WAS LOCKED IN A CLOSET DIED OF STARVATION, BECAUSE HACKMAN AND HIS WIFE WEREN’T FOUND FOR WEEKS.
GENE HACKMAN WAS EXTREMELY SUCCESSFUL. FROM THE OUTSIDE, IT WOULD SEEM HE HAD EVERYTHING HE COULD EVER WANT….BUT HE AND HIS WIFE WERE DEAD AND GONE FROM THIS WORLD FOR QUITE SOME TIME BEFORE ANYONE KNEW. TO ME, THAT’S TRAGIC.
I DON’T THINK ABOUT MY OWN DEATH ALL THAT MUCH. I DON’T THINK ANY OF US REALLY SHOULD. BUT WHEN IT’S MY TIME TO GO–MY HOPE IS I’VE MADE ENOUGH OF AN IMPACT ON THE PEOPLE AROUND ME THAT THEY NOTICE WHEN I’M GONE.
HACKMAN AND HIS WIFE OBVIOUSLY LIVED A VERY PRIVATE LIFE. AS IT TURNED OUT, MAYBE TOO PRIVATE. AND THE IRONY IS THEY COULD HAVE HAD PEOPLE TO LEAN ON. PEOPLE LIKE FAMILY, FRIENDS, EVEN HIRED HELP. BECAUSE EVENTUALLY, WE ALL NEED HELP. ASKING FOR IT ISN’T GIVING UP YOUR INDEPENDENCE. IT’S OK TO ADMIT YOU NEED HELP, ODDS ARE, SOMEONE IS WILLING TO LEND IT.
FOR SENIOR PRODUCER BRETT BAKER, VIDEO EDITOR BRIAN SPENCER AND GRAPHICS ARTIST DAKOTA PITEO–I’M RYAN ROBERTSON WITH STRAIGHT ARROW NEWS, SIGNING OFF.
