Can the Army leverage cyber tech to widen advantages over rivals?

All right, welcome back everyone. I'm Jen Judson, Land Warfare Reporter for Defense News, and I'm joined by Brandon Pugh, Principal Cyber Advisor to the Secretary of the Army and Lieutenant General Jeth Wray, Deputy Chief of Staff G6, U.S. Army

Gentlemen, thank you so much for joining me today to talk about the Army's tech advantage

You know, not a lot of people actually know what it is you do, Mr. Pugh

It's a pretty new job within the Army. So I'd love if you could kind of kick off, you know, what your job is

maybe a little bit on your background, like how you came into this position

And for you, General Ray, if you could talk a little bit about what the G6 is and how you kind of tie together and work together

Awesome. Yeah, no, happy to. Jen, really glad to be here at AUSA. I have to admit, my first AUSA

I guess I'm embarrassed to say that, but so I've been the principal cyber advisor of the PCA for

about four months. And if you're not familiar with the PCA, it is a fairly new role. We've only been

around since 2020. And at its core, we're there to be the principal advisor to the secretary of the

army, as well as the chief of staff on all things cyber. So the statute is very prescriptive. We have

seven responsibilities, everything from how we man, train, equip, how are we doing acquisitions

How are we defending Army networks from a policy and governance perspective

And then also we have the Budget Certification Authority, which is a unique authority our office has

essentially reviewing all the money we spend on cyberspace operations. But I'm the first political appointee, so I was really fortunate to be appointed by President Trump with the support of Secretary Driscoll

We have a phenomenal Army team that's come together, awesome military partners like General Ray

So really, really glad to be in the Army. General Ray? Yeah, thank you

Thank you so much, Jen. and I appreciate it. And so this is my first AUSA as the G6 of the Army

So I'm proud to be your Army G6. And so my role, advisor to the Chief of Staff of the Army

but also I implement all the policies between the PCA, anything that he would like to see in cyber security environment

and for the Chief Information Officer, Mr. Garciaga as well. So I also do implementation of all those policies as well

Okay. I want to ask sort of a broad question here, but the Army often talks about speed of relevance

So from your vantage points, cyber network modernization, what are some of the biggest bottlenecks that still slow down

how quickly the Army fields new technology? Is it technical, cultural, bureaucratic

a nice lovely mix of all those things? Let's just talk at sort of the high level on that, if you can

I think it's all the above. I think we're in a time right now where it's a cultural shift that we're kind of walking into

There's some policies that probably need to be identified in order to be changed

in order for us to use things like AI, machine learning, large language models, those things in our space

Because those are all new, coming on board. So some policies we'll have to adjust on the way we use it, especially at the edge

And now we can talk a little deeper about how we want to use AI at the edge a little bit later

But yeah, I think across the board, it's a cultural shift. And we're getting there one day at a time

Yeah, I think General Ray's right. This is a unique time for the Army. I don't know how many people had the opportunity to listen to Secretary Driscoll this morning

But, you know, the Army is really preparing for that future fight, making sure we stay ahead of these threats through what we call continuous transformation

And that's not just a buzzword or a simple reorganization. It is a holistic view by the secretary and the chief to make sure the army is prepared for that future fight

And obviously, technology, cyber, AI, drones are all central to that. And it's really making sure we stay ahead of adversaries

Absolutely. Can you give me an example where a program sort of broke through the friction

And what lessons you learned from that in recent experience? Yeah. Do you want me to start off

I can talk about next generation command and control. I know everybody talks about that

So, you know, we had tons and tons of disparate, you know, C2 systems that were out there, 13 systems to be exact

You know, AFAT has a couple of different ones. So what we decided to do is look at an ecosystem that could potentially replace that

And next generation command and control is something that we looked at. Now, that was built off of the predication of everything we did within C2 fix

organizations were working from 82nd, 101st, and 25th Infantry Division did the C2 fixed portion

which really leveraged all that we learned there into what we're doing with NextGen C2 with the

fourth ID, which is our first prototype organization. So again, NextGen C2, a full stack

What we're doing on the acceleration portion of it is we're looking at the infrastructure and the

transport portion of it on how we can accelerate that across all 19 divisions in a 30-month sprint

And I believe if we can put that transport and infrastructure in place, which is the

highway that we need in order for everything from the data and application layer to lay

on top of that, we're going to be in a really, really good place. Yeah, I think General Ray is right

I mean, maybe to kind of touch on something that's near and dear to my heart is AI, but

specific for our AI relates to cybersecurity. And I know this could be an entire panel in itself, but I think what we're seeing in AI at the business use case at enterprise level is extraordinary

Our CIO with the G6 are doing great work. I'm really passionate about how do we move AI to operational use cases, specifically cyber

So, for instance, how can AI be leveraged for cyber defense? And equally as important, how can we leverage it for cyber offense

And really seeing both sides of that. And in fairness, Army Cyber Command, I would say, is really the leader when it comes to AI and cyber

There's still significant room we can continue to improve upon their efforts and stay ahead

But I would say looking out at the services, it's extraordinary to see what our cybers have already done leveraging AI

Let's pull the thread a little on the NextGen C2 effort that you have going right now

Obviously, the fourth ID has been very busy working on this. They have kind of different sprints iterations every, I think, once a month that builds on developing this ecosystem and this tech stack, if you will

25th ID is going to be doing the same, I think a little bit, with two different prototypes, my understanding

We're working with a lot of different companies. Two separate prototypes between 25th and 4th ID. Yeah

I mean, this is a super ambitious effort when you talk about a 30-month sprint to get this out to 19 divisions

talk about what you're learning so far from the 4th ID, for instance

And are they giving you confidence that you're going to be able to, you know

hit those goals when it comes to being able to field this to the broader force

Yeah, I think they are. You know, again, this is a new, we're embarking on something new

And in the process of that, we're keeping cybersecurity on the forefront of everything

just like Mr. Puget said. When it comes to cybersecurity, we're going to bake it in early in the process is what

we did with what happening with 4th ID and their first application that they utilized We saw that there was some risks We mitigated those risks We moved forward from there and we were able to actually get ahead of it

and still use the application as it was designed. And from there, we believe now we can move on to

the next set of applications that we would like to bring in, you know, logistics. We're looking at

Intel apps that we're bringing on to the platform. And then we're going to assess those and we're

going to move forward from there, and I believe we can then move on to other organizations at the end

of the sprints that we're doing with Ivy. Ivy Sting. Ivy Sting

Yes, correct. Thank you. Yes, too. Yeah. All right. Well, in terms of the cybersecurity risk you were talking about, there was a memo that came

out recently. So I'm hoping that you can address that a little bit further in terms of how you address

cybersecurity deficiencies and risk. This is obviously a program that's going very quickly

and you're still at a pretty early phase here, if you will

but it's moving quick. So how will you continue to address those cybersecurity risks

and what are you currently concerned about as you move forward? You may have resolved some of the present risks

but how do you kind of continue to address and keep learning from that? Sure

I mean, what we did was we burnt down everything that we built in the beginning, and we built a new process and a new environment in order to create better security measures across the board

That's what we actually did, and that's what we'll continue to do. We have a team that stood up to overwatch all this now

Now, the Army Data Operations Center is going to be kind of a data team that's going to overlook that for the entire Army across the board

So we're putting measures in place to mitigate all those potential problems that may come about going forward

And General Ray actually said something in his first answer I just want to kind of flesh out too

It's really making sure as we're doing a new capability, making sure security is designed really by default and by design

So is security started at the very beginning, and how is it being infused throughout

And it should iterate. I actually think it's a good day if we detect the vulnerability and we remedy it

That's great. It's important to do it early on and now continue to fine-tune the product

which is what we've seen really throughout a lot of your efforts. Yeah, I mean, wouldn't you like to find it out earlier rather than us outfitting 19 divisions

100%. 100%. Exactly. So we're there. We're doing a good job at it

I'm proud of the team. That's a very, very good point. I'm going to open up the aperture again

Let's talk about AI because I know that you guys are very excited to do that. I know that AI at the tactical edge, that's going to be a big challenge

what is real right now when you talk about AI at the tactical edge

What's being tested or deployed that shows real promise when it comes to contested electromagnetic or denied environment

You look ready to answer that. I'm happy to. I mean, I come at everything from a fairly narrow lens

because cyber is what I know. And I think it's important to remind everybody

I know this audience here is very sophisticated, but AI is not new as a field

It's been around for a long time. And equally as important, we've seen AI being leveraged for cybersecurity purposes for well over a decade

What I think is really exciting is the rise of generative AI has continued to put emphasis on how can it help in security context

And the military has really jumped on that. We're not looking to kind of be behind where historically in other contexts perhaps we have

General Barrett's team and our cyber has really looked heavily on how can AI be leveraged for defense

I think just as an example, you know, we have millions and millions of points of data coming in really every single day

How do we now go through that to identify what is a potential threat, what's a potential risk, and then prioritize a response

I think that's key. And one of the capabilities we've seen nearly a 90% success rate at detecting an abnormality

That's something perhaps it would take a human significantly longer if they would catch it at all

And I'm a true believer that, you know, AI shouldn't replace that defender, at least not now

but it can be a huge adjunct. At our core, people are still, and our soldiers and our civilians are

still core. How can AI be leveraged to really fuel their work? And then how can it help with

the skill gap? You know, obviously, we're trying to work to a scenario where we have, you know

basic senior and master operators and their civilian counterparts. How can AI help bring

down those skill sets and maybe bridge that gap between somebody who's perhaps not a master yet

but is getting there? And, you know, a lot of times people shy away from offensive cyber

This administration has not. We've seen White House leaders really lean into how we can be leveraging cyber for offense

I think there's applications for AI to help there too. You know, how can we look for potential exploits or vulnerabilities in a network that's not one of our own

I mean, I agree with Mr. Pugh on everything there. It's about decision making, how quickly we can make decisions faster on the battlefield

So even at the right at the edge of the battlefield, I mean, we have unmanned systems that are flying

Can we identify them early in the process? Are they friendly foe? And what can we do in order to stop those from potentially causing harm to our soldiers that's on the battlefield

It's about improving operational resilience on the battlefield. That's another point. And then, obviously, we have to maintain the competitive advantage because we know what our adversaries are trying to do right now

Okay. What are the biggest technical challenges? Is it compute, data, bandwidth, trust

Talk about some of the challenges that you're facing when you look at this type of capability

One of the biggest ones for us always is going to be transport, right? And especially at the edge

You know, when we look at the battlefield, you know, my team and I, we look at it in like three specific areas

So what's happening on the X, where the action is taking place on the real, real far edge, and what type of bandwidth is required there

And that's probably where our most limited amount of bandwidth is actually at

And so how much processing power do we need there? Then we look at the Ys, where divisions sit, and what processing power do they need

What type of ytics do they need in order to process there? But more importantly, if you look further back on the Z, kind of where the core, the ASCCs are operating from, that's a lot of bandwidth we can utilize there

So that's how we're trying to frame it out on what type of bandwidth because that's where we can move data at echelon

And that's what we're trying to do in this data-centric environment. Yeah, I think General Ray lays out some of the technical challenges very well

Maybe one that's not technical. That's just something maybe all would struggle with is adoption

is getting people to say we have these extraordinary capabilities to not be fearful of them and lean

into them. And I would say under both of our leaders, the chief as well as the secretary

they are not shy to that. We've seen some of these capabilities being fielded in actual units

Gone are the days where these were just theories and perhaps in the year, years later, they'd go to

an actual practice. We're looking to put these in actual units. And then more importantly, see

are they actually working? And if they're not working, how can we continue to fine tune them? that way they can one day be fielded across the army. When you talk about transport and the

challenges there, what are some of the things you're looking at as possible solutions? What

have you kind of seen out there in the landscape that might help you solve those things Well I just going to talk from types of bandwidth instead of specific capabilities So you know we looking at obviously Wi 5G on the battlefield We looking at you know Leo And we are still going to look at another area to build out our resilient comms is

geo as well. We're not going to just negate that at all, just because we have Leo out there

which is a lot more resilient, but we still need that as a backup in the event that our adversaries

try to get after that constellation itself. So that's what we're looking at across the board

and kind of building out these Wi-Fi bubbles on the battlefield. And we're also going to end up looking at, you know

like the Vice Chief of Staff of the Army spoke this morning at the Cohen breakfast he talks about

Hey, is there a possibility for us to look on the edge at pucks on a truck kind of reducing the number of radios in our formation

It's something he wants us to look at, so we're looking at that as well. Okay. Another thing that kind of comes to mind is, you know

the cloud architecture, you know, cloud can be expensive. So are there alternatives that you're

looking at? I mean, cloud is actually, you know, a great opportunity as well in terms of transporting

but is there anything kind of novel or new that's on the horizon that could help get after like the

cost curve when it comes to the use of cloud architecture? Yeah. Yeah. Maybe at a high level

I would say, is our partnerships with industry is key. I don't know how many people listened to

the Secretary's talk this morning, but really one of the many things that I think was really neat

that he said was we had an AI TTX, or a tabletop exercise at the Pentagon recently, where we brought

I believe he said, 15 CEOs and C-suites to the Pentagon to help us see how can we be leveraging

AI across the service. That's extraordinary. To see top-tier talent come to the Pentagon and help

us solve problems, I think is what we need to be doing and leading into. And I say that because

Cloud is just one example. A lot of these challenges, industry has largely figured out

or they have an innovation. Now the question is, how can we lean on them? How can we bring

their capabilities in? And then equally as important, this isn't just our largest companies

Yes, do they have a home too? Of course. But we also need these small venture-backed companies

that may be three or four people that have a novel innovation to get at some of these cost

challenges, bandwidth challenges, or just technical challenges. Okay. That's a great segue

to talk a little bit about the Army's new FUSE program, where you are adopting more of a venture capital approach to things

you know, fast bets, fast failures, scaling the winners. So how do you see that playing out in reality

I mean, this is just very recently launched. You know, who has the authority, the budget

What are you going to focus on? If you could elaborate a little on that program. Yeah, FUSE is really exceptional

And I would say this is only, somebody can fact check me, but I'd say two weeks old at this point, maybe three

So I mentioned continuous transformation earlier. How is the Army preparing for that future battlefield

A key part of that is acquisition because everything we're talking about today is going to be challenged or slow

if we cannot figure out acquisition and get these capabilities in the hands of a warfighter quickly

We don't have the luxury of time. We can't spend four or five years researching

perhaps fielding it, and then getting it to a soldier. It has to be quick. And that's what FUSE is looking to do

is adopting a venture capital mindset and consolidating. Previously, we had four innovation pathways

putting them under a single umbrella. And this is not just a consolidation. We're looking to have a potential product

to a funding pipeline within 10 days and a prototype in the hands of a soldier

within 30 to 45 days. And for anybody that knows the Pentagon, 30 to 45 days of having a prototype

in the hands of a soldier is extraordinary. And that's what we're looking to do

And there's four initial priority areas. But it's not to say we're limited as four, and that's power generation, UAS, counter-UAS, electronic warfare

to really break through what has traditionally been a very bureaucratic process

Yeah, and also, you know, AI at the edge is going to be one of those initiatives that we're looking at with this team of folks

that's going to try to get something into the hands of the soldiers within that 30 to 45 days

So AI at the edge is coming. And I would say one quick follow-up is anybody that's listening, I think the takeaway is like the Army is looking for partners

And if you're sitting in the audience, you're like, I'm not sure where to begin. I have a unique capability, but I'm not a massive company

There's a home potentially for you here. And I think Fuse is likely that home

Well, talk about what you're doing at AUSA. You are actually hearing from venture capital

So like Shark Tank, right? So we're going to hear from them exactly what they can offer in order to meet our demands that we're asking for

So we're looking forward to that. Yeah, and I think as a quick follow-up to that, historically, for those that have been in the Army for a while or followed the Army

look, we've identified a problem, then we've went out and looked for solutions. That is not what we're looking to do

We're looking for industry to help find problems for us, offer solutions

We might not even know we have the problem to begin with, but that's exactly what we need. We need to shift that balance

Yeah, yeah. I wanted to talk a little bit about integrating data networks across the Army and the Joint Force

Both your offices deal with that. So how close are you truly to, like, a data-centric operations where soldiers and commanders can access and trust data from, you know, multiple sources in real time

Yeah. So data is a new ammunition. You know that, right? But from a data-centric perspective, there was really three imperatives that came with us getting to a data-centric environment

One was robust transport. I think we're there. I think we're doing very well at that particular piece of it

The other was to be cloud-enabled, to have sort of a catch-as-minute of where our data is and resides

And I think we've made some decisions by this particular AI team coming together and looking

and we have now an authoritative data source that our chief information officer has put out

on where all our data will be stored. Can we do that regionally? That'll be great

If we can do that and we can replicate on those, that'll be great. The last part is how do we get our identity credential and access management

attribute-based access control, tagging and labeling of data? When we get to that point, and we're very close

I think now we're going to reach that data-centric environment that we're looking for

We're getting real close. How is the Army aligning its data network modernization efforts with the joint all-domain command and control effort

Where are the seams? Sure. Okay, yeah. So Project Convergence is our real seam to get into anything that we do with the all-domain command control

that's where we really make our bread and butter is when we go to Project Convergence

because that's where we converge all of the different services together that's where we experiment and we exercise all those pathways to get there

so that's what we use in order to fuse what we're doing across the board

from fires to intel to logistics and sustainment so we use it all in that environment

What are you hoping to learn from the upcoming Project Convergence? I know that's still months and months away, but what's on your list for things that you

would really like to assess during the next round? I mean, obviously Project Convergence is a year-round effort

You doing smaller things as you lead up to the capstone but what are some of the focus areas in your perch that you leading up to This next round is going to be all about next generation command and control as we bring it on board from what 4th ID has learned over IV Sting and other operations

That's where we're going to lead right into that. So everything there and how that actually converges with things like Maven Smart Systems that you use at the COCOM level and then everything that JADC2 brings to the table as well

Another question on AI. As it proliferates, how is the Army balancing innovation with cybersecurity and responsible AI principles

and what governance mechanisms are in place to prevent what's called AI sprawl, if you will

No, Jen, I think you tee it up. I think the balance is key. The way I look at it is, look, I'm an AI optimist for anybody that knows me

I truly believe in the technology. That doesn't mean there's not risk with it. And look, we see adversaries already looking and experimenting in ways they can exploit AI in two ways

I think adversaries have an interest in going after the infrastructure of AI

but they also have an interest in seeing how they can leverage AI for cybersecurity attacks and incidents

We see that playing out. I think that's incumbent on the Army then to stay ahead of that

How are we, what are our efforts to prevent that? And how are we leveraging AI to defend and perhaps even go after adversaries

I think that balance is key. I will say a word of caution. some people rush into aggressive regulation and limitations of AI

Our adversaries are not going to respect whatever guardrails we put in place. That's not saying we don't have any

I do realize we live in a unique country. We should have guardrails. But China or any other adversary is not going to respect that

So we don't want to inadvertently limit our uses of AI for potential defense and offense at the same time

So really going back to that balance, I think, is key. I think to a large extent, the Department of War has done a good job of striking that balance

and really in line of what the White House has done in their recent AI impact strategy coming from the White House

It's really clear. We're going to lean on AI, really maximize its uses, but not ignore some of the risks that are present

And, Jen, what we're trying to do and make sure we do stay secure in that area is to air gap our systems from the larger Internet itself

so that we're not giving away our secrets either. So we're doing that air gap to make sure in between Mr. Pugh and Mr. Garciaga

They're making sure that we stay safe in that area as well. Okay. What are lessons from Ukraine about resilience and cyber defense that are informing how the Army designs networks and defends the tactical edge

It's all about signal, cyber, EW. So we're looking in those spaces to ensure that, one, we build a resilient network

Two, that we defended from a cybersecurity perspective and from an EW, we know that that's the area that our adversaries are going to come after

Now, I wrote a paper a couple months back to talk about the battlefield

Most believe the battlefield is over there, but it's over here 24-7. The reason why I really stressed EW in that particular paper that I wrote was because most people believe that the frequencies that we use forward is the only thing that you need to be thinking about

But I want people to think more about that our traffic lights, our grocery store scanners, our banks

all those things still work on frequencies and can be interrupted by our adversaries

So we have to protect those and bake in cybersecurity in those areas as well

Because if we're going to get from the fort to the port to the fight

all those environments have to be protected across the board. I just don't want to think that the fight is only over there

It's over here at 24 by 7. And I'm sure you can add a little bit to that

I think General Ray is right. And let me say, his paper is great. The first time I actually learned about his paper was at another conference

And I walked in, there was like a, I don't know, a 10-foot by 10-foot banner of his face

I'm like, well, I have to get a photo. And it was advertising his new article. No, but General Ray is right

Two things kind of stand out to me is too often times for too long

we've really just seen cyber as an isolated capability, something that just rests at Gordon or Fort Meade

And while a lot of operations happen there, this is a blurring domain. How can we leverage cyber at the edge

How are we blurring cyber capabilities with electronic warfare? These are not discrete domains

There's an increased emphasis on seeing how they can complement each other. Ukraine has showed that

It really has. I'd say, secondly, it's also important to say this isn't just a Department of War issue

General A was spot on. Our adversaries are intent on leveraging cyber against us on a daily basis

Some we don't see, some we do see. And there's a large risk there to the American way of life

perhaps going after a critical infrastructure. But in a military context, how could it impact our ability to mobilize troops and equipment in a time of conflict

That's what I'm really concerned with, and that just can't happen. And for anybody that's interested in that, the Army Cyber Institute for many years has been doing studies on this

They picked two major cities each year to say, well, if there was a cybersecurity incident across all these two cities, what would be the impact

And the results were startling. It showed there could be actual implications to our ability to move tanks to a theater environment

Yeah, that's actually really terrifying. What is the Army doing to contribute to, you know, this hardening, if you will, you know, on the fort side

We often talk about the tactical edge, you know, that's where we're focused. But, you know, can you talk a little bit more about what the Army is doing to help contribute to protecting us here

Sure. I would just say, you know, we the good and bad about the Army is we're really geographically spread out

We have bases all over the country and we rely on private critical infrastructure operators to a large extent

So think for those that may not that might not resonate with you. You know, think our water, our gas, electricity in an overwhelming majority of cases

Those are private operators. So if there's a disruption to one of those private operators, how is that impacting one of our bases

And I think that that puts a lot of pressure on us. One of the things is that we need to have a close relationship with the interagency, realizing this is not just a Department of War issue

How are we working with CISA and the Department of Homeland Security? How are we working with energy, even with state on the diplomatic side

This is a holistic issue that requires a holistic response. I think that's one

It's also incumbent on us is what forces do we have at our disposal? So obviously, I didn't say this in my opening, but I'm still an Army reservist, so I'm very passionate about the Army Reserves and Guard

But I say that because those folks are awfully living in their community, are cyber experts

How can we leverage their expertise to help respond to potential incidents against our critical infrastructure

and get at some of the legal authorities that might be challenging to active duty Title X forces

I think there's extraordinary potential there, and we have some strong successes we can point to

but seeing how that becomes common practice, not just a handful of states

And, Jen, to add to that a little bit is that operational technology now falls under the G6

But Army Cyber, under General Barrett and her team, are the ones that do the execution of operational technology

So we are looking at critical infrastructure. We're also working at G357 as well because they do a portion of that

So we're looking across the board on all things critical infrastructure. Okay

What's working and not working when it comes to attracting and retaining top talent to get after some of these areas

both uniformed and civilian? I'm happy to, yeah. I promise we did not coordinate in advance

but if you had to get to my top four priorities, we'd probably have gotten to all of them

sincerely because people and structures are key. You know, the secretary was spot on today

Of course, he's my boss. But that aside, really at our core, we are a people business. And that

is our uniform members as well as our civilian members. And we take that to heart when it comes

to cyber. We realize we're going up against cyber companies and tech companies that can offer higher

paychecks. The mission that we offer is unparalleled. But we've also done, you know, some concrete steps

to also combat that. You know, for those that aren't familiar, we have something called the CES

or the cyber expected service program to offer special recruiting incentives, specific pathways to enter into government service

I think that's key. It's also how are we retaining the soldiers we have and the civilians we have

What is their upward progression? So they're not thinking, well, let me get out of my uniform or my civilian role

to go to a critical or a private sector operator. I think that's key for us

And it's also, I think, a third part of that is how are we increasing their expertise

when they're in the role? What does a pipeline look like to go between basic, senior, and master

That way an operator continues to progress in their career field. Yeah, I think what's changing daily is people are now getting a chance to do their actual job

and I think that's going to be the key to keeping them around longer

is that they actually have the hands on keyboard, and that's a great thing. And I would say that's a unique thing

We were kind of, Sergeant Major and I were talking about this earlier. That's a unique thing about the signal in CyberCore

Obviously, we need our, you know, no matter what your branch is in the Army, this is a, you know, everybody is in the same fight

But Signal and Cyber, you are on the fight and you're on a keyboard on a daily basis

You don't have to leave the United States to be doing super solid things for this country

And I think that's something we need in the Signal and Cyber Corps, people to know that, you know, day one, you're going to be going against a potential adversary or a potential threat actor

Just relatedly, we were talking about this a little offline ahead of this panel

but what are some of the tools you're starting to see, whether it's an AI that help train those professionals, be better at their jobs

say a cyber defender, if you will, or somebody working in cyber offense, for instance

How are you potentially seeing opportunities for AI to either help train or help them do their jobs better

or any other tools that you're eyeing? Yeah, go ahead. That's your arena. No, yeah, I think there's maybe three concrete examples

but for the sake of time, maybe I'll touch on maybe one of them. I think we've seen simulated training environments

that mimic a real-world environment, and we can have AI be iterative

So as a defender takes a prescribed action, we can see an AI agent take a different action

they might not be expecting in real time, going into an adversary that might hopefully

be even more sophisticated than a real-world adversary, and getting that hands-on keyboard experience

before it's an actual adversary they're going against. I think that's key. I think also how do we complement a human operator with AI agents

And I'd say that's really the future of where I'm personally passionate about is, you know, not saying an AI agent should be the only part of it

but they can be complementing, you know, a human. Take prescribed courses of action, either in a defense or an offensive environment

perhaps before we have a human on keyboard, realizing that, you know, we up against adversaries that have tons of individuals on keyboard How do we close that gap between our what I would say best trained soldiers with technology and really blending those two

Yeah, the other thing I would tell you is in requirements, you know, in requirements

we had hundreds and thousands of requirement documents, and we used AI to help us kind

of look across all those documents and see where some duplicate efforts were

and we were able to reduce the number of requirements documents that we had across the board

So that's a big one that I think has really helped us push forward

And I would say the takeaway for me is, look, AI, I always like to say, is not the silver

bullet for everything. I think there's this temptation is throw a little AI at it or just add AI to your marketing activity

You have to be relevant. You know, I'm a firm believer AI can help in a lot of cases

It may not be the 100% solution for everything. It is taking that balanced approach to say, where do we have deficiencies or how can it

further enable a human? I think that's where we need to take that calculus and inventory

Yeah, I mean, especially with all that data flowing in on the battlefield, like that's just, I mean, how else are you going to do it

There's no shortage of data. That's for sure. AI, aggregation of information

That's how I look at it. I like it. I'm stealing that. What is one technology area that's still underrated but could sort of redefine how the Army might operate and what in some ways in the next five years

What are you eyeing as very emerging? Wow. Yeah. Go. Yeah, I mean, the risk of not having a fully thought out answer, I can say something I'm very passionate about

If you're not tracking the 11th Cyber Battalion at Fort Gordon, you should be

I think it's one of the neatest units for many reasons. But one that stands out is their work at really combining cyber and EW, really getting at what we like to think is tactical cyber

How do we bring cyber to the front line versus just sitting back in Fort Gordon or me

And I'm not saying that to diminish those functions. We knew those functions, but it shouldn't be seen as cyber is a last resort

How can this be an option that's on the battlefield in an embedded team at perhaps a core or division level

That's really interesting. And we see many of our private sector partners that are thinking through how their products can enable such an action

So I know I'll be personally excited to see how that will play out in the next year, perhaps two years

Mine would be, you know, it's all about data management. We don't have a data problem

We have a data management problem, and I want help from industry and everyone else to help us figure out how to ensure we can manage our data going forward

Because it's only going to get larger and larger, more and more petabytes of data across the boards

It's all about data. All right. Well, with that, you've talked about dedicated data formations

Yes. So what are the pros and cons of creating those? What are some of your ideas for this type of concept

I mean, as next generation command and control comes on board, as we look across how we're going to move data through that type of new ecosystem that we're creating

we have to have someone that can and will be able to oversee and manage that data is the reason why we've been thinking very heavily on creating these, you know

Army data operation center or commands that we can go ahead and look at that across the board And we believe that that will be not only in one theater but it will be across all of our theaters so we can manage data in all those aspects because we be linking in not only with Army data

joint data, coalition data, and COCOM data because at the end of the day

we're fighting in the COCOM environment. We must link into them. So you have to go from your Army environment

to your joint environment, to your coalition, and then to your COCOM environment

So that's how we're going to be looking at data across the board. Well, if you stood up such formation, can you talk a little bit more about what kind of chain of command or authority would reside

If you have a centralized data core, for instance, is it distributed function embedded within existing units

How are you looking at that chain of command? Yeah, so all that is going to be flushed out here in the next couple of weeks

We're going to put the teams together to kind of flush that out. So I'm not going to really speculate on what the team will come out with after they take a look at it

You want to break any news? I don't want to break any news right now, but it's coming. All right, excellent

In terms of one policy, like if you could change one policy tomorrow that would accelerate innovation, what would it be

What is like the biggest thorn in your side? I'll give you the hard question this time

You get to go first in this one. I get to go on hard. So, you know, the one thing I would like to see, and if you think back, if we're going to achieve data centricity, it was all really about how do we move data across all of our enclaves, NIPR, SIPR, JWICs

How do we move data from one end to the other? If we can find a way within that environment to actually use identity, credential access management, attribute-based access control to really look at the security of the data, that's the policy that I would like to change is to secure at the data layer, reduce at the transport layer

Yeah, I would say maybe starting at a very high level is, you know, what is the relationship between Army Cyber and U.S. Cyber Command

and I think that's key, is really looking at how do the services support U.S. Cyber Command

from the man-trained-equipped function, making sure that Cyber Command has the right individuals

who have the right training and the right expertise. And it's easy to talk about it just in the context of the Army, but we need to remember

you know, we have the Navy feeding up, the Air Force feeding up, and there's a lot that go into it

Man-trained-equipped is only one aspect of it. You know, we have the budget considerations of how does funding work between Cyber Command and the services

We have the acquisition components, and I'd say there's continued interest in making sure that relationship and that dynamic is fully fleshed out

Similar to what we saw with the special operations model. It took a long time to get to that point and to mature

I would say cyber is where we are now. I think it's essential to get it right to make sure structures are not our barrier to staying ahead in cyber

I wanted to ask a little bit more about, you know, we've had some big changes when it comes to, you know

deactivating Army Futures Command and setting up, you know, T2COM, the new transformation and training command

There a lot of work that Army Futures Command was doing in the realm of next C2 as well as a lot of the things that we been talking about today

How do you see the new command structure sort of enabling what you want to accomplish

I think it will continue to enable. I think the organization, by putting those two organizations together

only enhances what we're going to do across the board. and by having the training and now the transformation portion together

we can start at the lowest echelon and actually move that training and transformation

all the way to all our formations, our 19 divisions that are out there

So I see nothing more than us creating a better environment in order to do all the things we were already doing

Yeah, I would say General Ray is closer to this than me, but I would say just being four months in the job

It's been really refreshing to see how close T2COM is and their leadership with, like, our acquisition community

And I think that's really essential to have. There should be, you know, one of the same and constant dialogue

And I think we see that, actually, in Fuling, especially as a new command has stood up. All right

I want to give you an opportunity to go into some final thoughts

anything that I haven't asked about that you want to make sure that you highlight

So, General Ray, I'm going to start with you. No, I just want to say thanks, Jen, for this

And thanks, everybody, for listening today. We are on a trajectory. We will continue to transform the Army across the board

General George and the Secretary has given us our marching orders on going there

We're going to need industry to really partner with us on this endeavor

And AI and machine learning, large language models, cloud, all those things are going to play a big role in everything that we do going forward

So thank you so much, and hope to see you all throughout the AUSA. Jen, I would echo what General Roy has said. We're at a unique window here in the Army

Continuous transformation is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to make sure we're prepared for that future fight

And that is really at the core of what we're doing. Everything from what General Roy talked about in terms of some of his reconfigurations, the data structures

that is all going back to continuous transformation, making sure we're as prepared as possible

Really as evidence of that is the secretary and the chief's leadership, they've identified $40 billion of savings over the course of five years

And that, you know, sometimes hard decisions to cease procurement in certain areas, but then reinvesting that into what we need for that future fight

That is really where we are. And I'd say it's a really exciting time to be in the Army, why I'm so excited to be on the Army team

But I would say for anybody listening, the soldiers, the civilians and the industry partners in the audience, we need them

It's easy for General Ray and I to be up here and just be leaders at the Pentagon. Ultimately, we're representing and working with everybody here

And this is really a team effort. Well, thank you so much for taking the time to join me here at AUSA

And I hope you enjoy the rest of your show and thank everyone for being here as well

I'd like to also thank Booz Allen Hamilton for supporting this important conversation

here at the AUSA annual meeting. And for continued coverage of Army modernization and emerging technology

visit defensenews.com for full reporting of AUSA. Thank you for joining us

Thanks, Jen. Thanks, Jen. Appreciate it. Yeah, it was great. Thank you