Defense- & Dual-Use Technologies Edition

Techno-Military Optionality: Ensuring Success in Future Wars

Defense and dual-use technologies

Jan 31, 2025

Good morning!

Building our Future began more than two years ago, largely to help capture the reality of the speed of disruption that technology was bringing to national security.

Whether we were talking about the decadal shift from government-led innovation to private industry-led innovation or specific technologies like hypersonics, the reality remains that the battlefield has changed and our approaches to achieving dominance and overmatch must also change.

We’ve discussed some fantastic companies that are trying to help ensure a secure and prosperous future.

We’ve explored some of the major challenges facing American and global security, some systemic and some emerging.

As the new administration looks to further accelerate the modernization of the military and to leverage new technology, they will be faced with numerous vendors pitching an unending list of technologies. But how do we ensure that we are getting the right technologies into the force at the right time?

There’s two things that we have to do.

First, we have to maintain a certain amount of optionality.

Second, we must experiment.

Techno-military optionality

Military leaders love to talk about optionality.

Optionality is the quality of having available options that are not necessarily obligatory.

In this context, we need to preserve some optionality by not going ‘all-in’ on a specific capability or technology.

Instead, we should explore numerous technologies, ordering in limited quantities. By doing so, we can continue warming up the Defense Industrial Base, without becoming beholden to any specific solution or vendor.

This helps mitigate multiple risks, especially the risk of picking the wrong tech and the risk of obsolescence.

And, it allows a last minute pivot to double-down on success.

Experimentation

Live experimentation of the techno-military options under realistic conditions will provide unparalleled feedback on which of those options are most promising AND (perhaps more importantly) the ways that these technologies ought to be employed.

Big-brain Andrew Krepinevich spends much of his book, The Origins of Victory, exploring the experiments and wargames that informed the dominance of British battleships in World War I, the effective use of U.S. aircraft carriers and German air-ground integration of combined arms in World War II, and the employment of stealth tech to roll-back Iraqi integrated air defense (IADS) during the Gulf War.

The sort of feedback that informed these successes came directly from force-on-force experimentation:

British Admiral John Fisher enforced numerous Joint Exercises prior to the First World War that led to the development of the Dreadnought battleship, the use of distant blockades, and improved long range naval fires.
Nazi Generaloberst Heinz Guderian experimented with various tank configurations before realizing that speed, long range fires, and wireless communications would allow a combined air-ground tank task force to defeat the Polish and French militaries.
The U.S. Navy conducted numerous Fleet Problems during the interwar period to refine the design and employment of aircraft carriers—leading to prioritizing speed and range of aircraft over armor and armaments on the ship, ultimately resulting in success in the Pacific best captured during the Battle of Midway.
Finally, the Air Force use of its Exercise Red Flag at Nellis AFB resulted in the development of maneuvers that led to U.S. airpower’s overwhelming success in the 1991 Operation Desert Storm against Iraq.

It’s important to note that the results of these force-on-force exercises cannot be replicated through virtual / constructive exercises such as table-top exercises and wargaming. Only by actually stressing the systems can we truly determine what will be successful.

So, as the DoD faces the opportunity to shape its future, we need to ensure that we maintain a certain amount of optionality and that we actively experiment and test innovations to see which will likely yield the greatest results.

Alright, enough yapping, let’s dig in to the news!

News Headlines

In Trump's Pentagon, a growing skepticism of the Military as the 'easy button' (MT)
President's pick for Army Secretary to face confirmation hearing (M)
Third F-35 lost in under 18 months due to malfunctions (AP)
American Airlines passenger jet, Army helicopter collide near D.C.'s National Airport (AP)
Former U.S. Senator Bob Menendez sentenced to 11 years prison for accepting bribes, acting as agent of Egypt (AP)
Tulsi Gabbard's mysterious meeting with Bashar al-Assad eight years ago is at the center of spy chief's nomination fight (AP)
DeepSeek is having a profound impact on AI and national security (DO)
D.R. Congo president vows 'vigorous' fight to halt M23 rebel advance (BBC)

New SecDef pledges to 'rapidly' field emerging tech (DS)
President Trump's missile shield marks shift in homeland defense strategy (DN)
To limit Chinese influence on commercial tech partners, Pentagon plans big changes (DO)
First Replicator initiative capability on track for August: officials (NI)
Air Force ponders CCA drones that don't need runways for next increment (DS)
The Navy's robot refueler is coming--even as the fleet works out integration (DO)
Congressional Research Service has released its report on ocean surveillance shipbuilding program (NI)
Navy, Marines want more energy storage to supply power hungry warships and bases (NI)
Navy establishing task force along with new cyber career field (DS)

Threat Tech

Russia's ICBM program is faltering due to isolation of Ukrainian expertise (BI)
Pentagon scrambles to block DeepSeek after employees connect to Chinese servers (TC)
China builds huge, nuclear hardened, military command center in Beijing--time times larger than Pentagon (FT)
China's aerospace force reveals long-range radar in message to Xi Jinping (SCMP)
China's new Type 054B stealth frigate exposes U.S. naval inertia (NTc)
Russia is studying China's navy modernization program to find its own lessons (SCMP)

Foreign Defense Tech

E.U. unveils plan to 'reignite' innovation in response to pressure from China, Trump (F24)
Netherlands to buy Rheinmetall anti-drone cannons in $1.35B buy (DN)
Poland buys radar-homing missiles for its future F-35 fleet (DN)

Defense Industry

Pentagon hands out $7B for Next-Gen Adaptive Propulsion; RTX sees 'tailwind' (ASF)
U.S. Space Force Rapid Capabilities Office selects five, two-company teams for tech accelerator (SN)
Cummings Aerospace releases its Hellhound for Army competition (DN)
L3Harris wants to apply VAMPIRE anti-drone system to the maritime environment (DS)
MQ-25A Stingray 2026 debut will unlock unmanned aviation for carrier strike group (NI)

Autonomous Systems

U.S. Navy confirms drone 'hellscape' for use against PLA in Taiwan Strait attack is on track (SCMP)
Collaborative Combat Aircraft can do things 'we didn't think were possible' (ASF)
Navy to establish USVRON 7, adding another robotic ship squadron to the force (DS)

Finance & Deal Flow

Funds

Palantir cofounder Joe Lonsdale's 8VC is seeking $1B for its sixth fund (TC)

VC

Onebrief raised a $103M Series C led by General Catalyst and Insight Partners to deliver operational planning and military staff workflow software (BW)
Castelion, a defense manufacturer producing long range hypersonic strike weapons, raised a $100M Series A led by Lightspeed Venture Partners (BW)

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Exciting Opportunities

The Military Veteran Startup conference is coming up 5-6 February in San Francisco (PRN)
The Navy has released a BAA for aerospace science research with focuses on weapons and aerospace technologies which directly support naval science and technology requirements for joint strike warfare involving air superiority and precision attack, and air and surface battle space requirements of joint littoral aircraft involving aircraft, naval surface fire support and ship self-defense (SAM)

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