U.S. East-Coast based Naval Special Warfare Operators (SEALs), 10th Special Forces Group (Airborne) Green Berets, Alaskan Coast Guardsmen and Norwegian Special Operations Commandos conduct joint operations to strengthen interoperability and refine skills in the Arctic region near Kodiak, Alaska Feb. 23, 2024, during Arctic Edge 2024. AE24 is an annual…
By Robbin Laird I had a chance to talk with LtCol Howard DeCastro, the first CO of MAWTS-1 and LtGen Barry Knutson, the eighth commander of MAWTS-1, the day before the change of command ceremony at MAWTS-1. We talked about the approach of MAWTS-1 from the beginning and the importance…
By Pierre Tran Paris - The armed forces minister, Sébastien Lecornu, is due to make an official visit to Vietnam to attend French and Vietnamese commemoration on May 6 and 7 of the bloody battle of Dien Bien Phu, which marked the defeat of French colonialism in the southeast Asian…
U.S. Air Force Airmen assigned to the 28th Bomb Wing, Ellsworth Air Force Base, South Dakota, prepare to depart Luleå-Kallax Air Base, Sweden, Feb. 29, 2024, during Bomber Task Force 24-2. The Air Force routinely operates across the globe and remains flexible and agile to respond to the changes in…
After returning to the United States from Australia on April 25, 2024, I buckled up again for a flight to Yuma, Arizona to have the privilege of witnessing the MAWTS-1 change of command ceremony. In the process of finishing up our forthcoming book on MAWTS-1, this seemed a good way…
By Robbin Laird An aspect of modern Western strategic thinking has been a focus on gray zone conflict. This is an area I have always found confusing. In a world which I would characterize as one of the rise of multi-polar authoritarian movements and states, their constant conflict efforts have…
By Robbin Laird Although the Australian Defence Strategic Review and the recent Surface Fleet Review indicated that the threat environment was deteriorating in the here and now, the major investments are being made for a force that will not arrive for a decade. How then to enhance the ADF in…
When I met with LtGen Heckl earlier this year, we discussed the way ahead for the USMC in operating a distributed force, and he underscored it all starts with logistics. “The pacing factor for everything we are doing in shaping the distributed force is logistics and to do so in…
