Space

Space Cowboys and Cyber Pirates, Part II

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By Christopher Rice

Space-based technology empowers American leadership—economic, cultural, and military.  Further, as Part I of this essay noted, the nation’s rivals have made significant investments towards targeting the vulnerabilities of her space sectors, both in orbit and online.  Part II will outline current space cybersecurity policy at the national level and identify some of its risks.  Finally, this essay will suggest another way for American policymakers to secure the nation’s space infrastructure:  a renewed system of letters of marque and reprisal empowering American space and cyber firms to better protect themselves.

Fortress America?

The emphasis competitors have placed on contesting American space dominance has not gone unnoticed in American policy-making circles.  Recent policy documents have reflected the importance of space systems and their related cyber and information infrastructure to American economic and military success.  While such policy measures are certainly a step in the right direction, the current policy structure encodes structural weaknesses and ambiguities that threaten the security of the commercial space sector, and national security more broadly.

The United States has long recognized the importance of space systems in maintaining its national security; however, attention to cyber threats is comparatively new.  Broad support for space development within the U.S. government stretches back to the Eisenhower administration.1  In contrast, the Department of Defense did not produce a comprehensive cybersecurity plan until 2011.2  In the decade since, American policymakers have struggled to keep pace with accelerating technology development and proliferating, network-borne threats.

American space operations have a reasonably strong base in government policy and have received high-profile attention in recent years.  The Trump Administration’s series of Space Policy Directives (SPD) offer a helpful foundation for understanding the importance of American space infrastructure and the threats it faces.  The seven directives cover a variety of topics from space traffic management to the establishment of the Space Force.  The directives most relevant to the security of American space systems are SPD-5 and SPD-7. 

SPD-5 establishes a basic policy framework for space cybersecurity.  It notes that space systems are vulnerable to cyber and information attacks throughout their lifecycles, from supply chain through design, construction, and launch, as well as in operation.3  Every stage of a satellite’s lifecycle is controlled through complex information networks, offering hostile actors a profusion of potential vectors through which to attack.  In response to such thoroughgoing vulnerability, the directive goes on to call for space system owners and operators “to collaborate to promote the development of best practices, to the extent permitted by applicable law,” while also “shar[ing] threat, warning, and incident information within the space industry.”4  This emphasis on cooperation is a necessary precondition of securing U.S. space infrastructure.

SPD-7’s focus is sharper, centering on importance of the U.S. Global Positioning System (GPS) constellation.  SPD-7 identifies the “widespread and growing dependence on GPS by military, civil, and commercial applications, systems, and infrastructure” and the critical role of GPS in maintaining situational awareness in space itself.5  It further emphasizes the interconnectedness of space systems, information, and security, by identifying the threat of navigation warfare (NAVWAR).  Mirroring aspects of  Chinese thinking on informationized warfare, NAVWAR “refers to the deliberate defensive and offensive action to assure and prevent positioning, navigation, and timing information through coordinated employment of space, cyberspace, and electronic warfare.”6  SPD-7 also calls for increased attention to cyber and electromagnetic security measures to ensure the continued operation of the GPS constellation in the face of opponents’ NAVWAR efforts.7  While the SPD series is not the first set of government policies concerning space and information security, it does provide valuable insights into current U.S. policy thinking.

Other policy documents help further define the current U.S. approach to ensuring the security of its space infrastructure in the face of information threats.  The 2017 National Security Strategy identifies both space and cyberspace as key security sectors, calling for the greater attention to maintaining American leadership in space and development of enhanced cyber “attribution, accountability, and response” abilities.8  The DOD’s 2018 Cyber Strategy acknowledges the importance of “defend[ing] forward to disrupt or halt malicious cyber activity at its source,  including activity that falls below the level of armed conflict.”9  Given the tremendous interpenetration of networks and space systems into all aspects of American life and the proliferation of both human and artificially intelligent threats, there is simply no possibility of fortifying the nation completely against cyber-attack.  Instead, malign actors must be identified and actively deterred or defeated.  The 2020 National Space Policy builds on the aforementioned documents, reinforcing the importance of total-lifecycle cyber security, public-private and interagency collaboration, and resilience.10  These documents clearly illustrate the importance of space cyber security, but some critical vulnerabilities remain.

While seemingly resolute in its promotion of space cyber security, current U.S. policy remains dangerously vague in key areas.  First, U.S. policy is ambiguous about what actions might be authorized in response to hostile cyber action against American space systems or infrastructure.  Although current policy reflects the possibility of NAVWAR and identifies the systemic vulnerability of the space sector to cyber exploitation, it fails to set forth a range of possible responses.  It is even unclear whether the United States views cyber-attacks against critical infrastructure as more or less escalatory than a more traditional, kinetic attack on the same systems.  Compounding the ambiguity, U.S. policy fails to clarify the position of U.S. commercial space sector assets within American retaliatory decision making.  With U.S. firms providing everything from digital communication and imaging to the launch of GPS satellites, the commercial space sector is a source of irreplaceable capacity—and a high-payoff target to America’s enemies.11 

Ambiguity, like that built into U.S. space cybersecurity policy, may inadvertently invite miscalculation.  An opponent’s perception of American commitment matters: “if we[, the United States,] leave ourselves loopholes through which to exit—our opponent will expect us to be under strong temptation to make a graceful exit.”12  Given the critical importance of space in U.S. economic stability and national security, a graceful response to provocation may not be possible.  Although they may appear less threatening than other forms of conflict, cyber operations may be, as Thomas Schelling described limited war generally, “like fighting in a canoe. [Any] blow hard enough to hurt is in some danger of overturning the canoe.”13  The risk of aggression is magnified further because, unlike traditional means of limited warfare, cyber-attacks—especially those directed at space sector targets—need not involve the clarifying shock of bloodshed.  An opponent, like China whose views of deterrence are heavily shaded with coercion and fundamentally distinct from those of the United States, might see cyber action against American commercial space firms as both useful and minimally escalatory, only to be met by an unanticipated, forceful response.14  In such a situation, the ambiguity of American space cybersecurity policy inadvertently catalyzes dangerous escalation.  The risks of ambiguity are too high.  To preserve American leadership in space and establish more effective deterrence, policy makers must communicate more clearly.

The United States must ensure the security of critical space systems and infrastructure, whether government- or commercial-sector.  To close the nation’s space security gaps and reduce the risk of miscalculation by potential adversaries, America must begin to marshal the resources and design regulations to protect all of its space infrastructure, including the commercial space sector.  U.S. policy makers must identify the American commercial space sector’s networks and infrastructure as defended assets. 

Not All Smooth Sailing

While there are obvious advantages to a clearer and more expansive national space policy, there are also notable risks.  Critics might suggest that such a broad expansion of the number of defended entities will be prohibitively expensive or potentially hazardous in itself.  The United States government assuredly cannot actively secure every single computer terminal in every firm that participates in the commercial space industry and its suppliers.  While rigorous cybersecurity standards, like zero trust frameworks, are necessary across government and commercial sectors alike, they are unlikely to change an opponent’s risk calculus on their own.15

Across such an expansive and potentially porous ecosystem, a successful defense must rely on deterring threats before they attack.  Credibility is necessary for effective deterrence.  The capacity to deter an opponent is based on the “[t]he willingness to hurt, the credibility of a threat, and the ability to exploit the power to hurt.”16  Unfortunately, as incidents like the recent Colonial Pipeline hack suggest, the United States may not have the capacity to defend its critical non-space infrastructure now, much less to make credible a significant expansion of its defensive cyber perimeter to encompass the commercial sector.17  Worse, it remains unclear whether the government can gather the talent necessary to ensure security.  Although the defense establishment is beginning to take meaningful steps to attract personnel with high-value abilities, including cyber security and other high-tech skills, doubt remains.18  The average personnel cost of the active-duty force increased by 64% between 2000 and 2012—a period where counterinsurgency operations emphasized large numbers of comparatively affordable dismounted infantry.19  An exponential growth in demand for exquisitely-trained technical specialists may impose insurmountable financial demands on the all-volunteer force, given the intense competition to attract specialized talent playing out across the economy.  Worse, the establishment of an implausible threat could undermine the perceived sincerity of the United States’ other deterrence arrangements, leaving it in even greater danger than before. 

Navigating clear of these obstacles will not be easy, but it is nonetheless necessary.  Given the deep integration of commercial space infrastructure into all aspects of American life, there is simply no option.  A more limited approach will not meaningfully address the magnitude of the potential risks.  Efforts to secure a limited number of “trusted partners” in the commercial sphere will leave significant vulnerabilities within the space and space-cyber environment, leaving opponents free to threaten the entire ecosystem. 

Half-measures simply will not suffice, nor will business as usual.  As General Paul Nakasone, the former Commander of U.S. Cyber Command and Director of the National Security Agency, recently noted, America’s habitual approach to deterrence imagines a “‘binary world’ of ‘yes or no’ in regards to conflict.”20  While useful in managing the Cold War, this model is a poor fit for a world “where much of the nefarious activity — whether by nation-states, cybercriminal ransomware gangs, or other threat actors — plays out non-stop in an ambiguous strategic gray zone.”21  It is only a matter of time before threat actors turn their attention on America’s space industries with their growing economic value and central importance to national power.  The United States must identify a new approach that will enable it to simultaneously deter a multitude of threats each pursuing its own unique goals.

Luckily, there is a better way.  Policy makers can chart a new course, magnifying the impact of the limited resources available within the government itself, while still increasing the commercial sector’s security.  Just as maritime strategy—with its attention to the complex interrelations of sea, land, culture, technology, global politics, and economics22 across a hazardous domain that resists permanent control—offers a valuable model for visualizing interactions in space, American maritime history suggests a way to address the challenges of the nation’s future in space.23

Back to the Future

Although the threats to America’s space industries are many and capable, its commercial firms are hamstrung by federal law.  Under current U.S. law, American companies are limited to passive defense; they have no ability to take more proactive measures.  Companies are forbidden from conducting even the most basic back-tracing in response to hostile action.24  These restrictions create an environment full of soft targets and lay the burden for all but the most trivial cyber defense activities on the U.S. government.  Just as increasing the slope of an armor plate improves its protective capacity without requiring additional material and weight, resurrecting a time-obscured fragment of American law can provide a significant improvement in the nation’s security posture at minimal public cost.

A key to securing American space infrastructure can be found in the Constitution itself.  Article I, Section 8 authorizes the U.S. Congress to declare war and to establish regulations for the nation’s military forces, among other well-known powers.  It also gives legislators the ability to “grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water”—a little remembered power but one that has the potential to restore and even improve America’s position of leadership in space.25

A renewed system of letters of Marque and Reprisal offers a way to dramatically shift the cost structure of space and cyber warfare in America’s favor.  Letters of Marque and Reprisal are legal documents that “authorize private actors to seek international justice and use force in a public cause.”26  During the War of 1812, the United States issued letters of marque and reprisal to authorize American privateers, or privately-owned armed ships, to harass British vessels.27  While the British remained the dominant naval power, American privateers provided a valuable augmentation to America’s small navy.  Changes in the material demands of warfare made private entities acting on their own direction appear less beneficial in the intervening two centuries.28  However, a renewed system of letters of marque and reprisal can be used to magnify U.S. capability in space and cyberspace by empowering America’s vibrant high-tech industries to defend themselves.

The rebirth of letters of marque and reprisal would rapidly change the cost-benefit analysis of any hostile actor considering action against the United States.  Under such a system, private actors would have the legal authority to defend themselves, raising the cost of hostile action and, in some cases, likely deterring it completely.29  While maintaining international stability requires meaningful oversight and regulations governing the acceptable conduct of cyber or space privateers, even limited authorities would be a step in the right direction.  In the cyber domain, such authorities might consist of a tiered system of threat responses running from a mere trace-back identifying the source of an attack, through a blockade or sanction limiting traffic involving the hostile servers, to “employment of an electronic force as a countermeasure directed at the source of a cyberattack immediately terminating the attack or preventing it from attacking again.”30  These responses would be overseen by the modern equivalent of the prize courts that governed maritime privateers.  Instead of establishing legitimate ownership of seized property,31 these courts would ensure that American commercial cyber defense activities conform to proper evidentiary standards and relevant areas of the law of war.  With greater authority to defend themselves, American space- and cyber-technology companies would simultaneously impose greater risk of detection and threat of response on malign actors, reducing the attractiveness of cyber-attack. Although the construction of a fully established system of legitimate cyber privateering is beyond both the scope of this essay and the ability of its author, the utility of such a system—once wholly developed—appears clear.

The principles of letters of marque and reprisal apply to the space domain as well.  Given both the key role of space systems in maintaining networks and their vulnerability to network-based threats, cyber privateers would likely play a valuable role in a more integrated system of space infrastructure defense.  American commercial actors may be able to provide improved additional security for themselves and the nation in the physical domain as well.  Private companies could offer orbital security-as-a-service, utilizing constellations of small satellites to deny opponents the ability to endanger critical assets with direct ascent ASAT weapons or threatening RPO approaches.  Stronger physical measures, like the potential use of commercial space debris removal systems against threatening satellites, are likely limited by the 1967 Outer Space Treaty’s (OST) assignment of jurisdiction and control for orbiting objects to the state that launches and registers them.32  Yet, it is clear that many nations—and an increasing number of commercial players—have the capacity to weaponize their RPO capabilities, if not currently the intent.  Use of such systems before the outbreak of outright hostilities is certainly not in keeping with the spirit of reserving space for “peaceful purposes,” as the OST repeatedly insists.  The legitimacy of on-orbit counter-space operations in response to an overt hostile act in space is less clear.  In any case, a robust and responsive retaliatory capability remains a reliable means of raising the costs of aggression and upholding international law.  The dual-use orbital capabilities of America’s space and cyber technology sectors—if empowered by a well-regulated system of letters of marque and reprisal—can make an invaluable contribution to maintaining national security and global stability.

 Conclusion

Powering its vibrant economy and unsurpassed military capabilities, U.S. capacity in space is second to none, yet its vulnerability is equally peerless.  The borders of the U.S. space and cyber remain largely unpatrolled.  While efforts to develop and implement best practices are certainly valuable, they are not enough.  No wall can be built around America’s space industry to defend it from external threats, but no wall is truly necessary.  As Carl von Clausewitz noted, “the defensive form of war is not a simple shield, but a shield made up of well-directed blows.”33  The United States has the resources and talent to construct such a shield.  Letters of marque and reprisal are a time-proven approach to address today’s security challenges. 

As with their maritime forbearers in the Age of Sail, America’s unequaled high-technology industries have the talent and the capacity to contribute to securing their own perimeters.  The nation’s legal experts, civil servants, and diplomats are no less competent than those who fought for desegregation or implemented the Marshall Plan.  The nation can create a legal and diplomatic framework able to safeguard American security, while respecting the security of other nations and the principles of international law.

To do so, America must take stock not so much of its vulnerabilities, but of its incredible strengths.  It must unite the foresight and will to leverage those strengths with the courtesy and discipline to regard the safety of others.  In short, America must lead.  Should it choose to do so, American space and cyber industries will be, as its maritime economy once was, “the dagger which strikes at the heart of the enemy,” deterring aggression and upholding a stable, free world.34

Chris Rice is a US Army veteran. A graduate of the United States Military Academy and Georgetown University’s Security Studies Program, he has overseas experience in both South Korea and Afghanistan.

He works as a consultant in Northern Virginia, assisting in the delivery of critical technologies to the warfighter. When not at work,  Chris is typically cooking various dals for his wife and two children, carrying around a large bag full of sand, or (p)reenacting future battles with small, plastic robots.

References

1. Robert Pfaltzgraf, “Space and U.S. Security:  A Net Assessment,” X.

2. John T. Bennett, “Pentagon declares the Internet a war domain,” The Hill, July 14, 2011, https://thehill.com/policy/technology/171531-pentagon-declares-the-internet-a-domain-of-war.

3. Executive Office of the President, “Space Policy Directive-5—Cybersecurity Principles for Space Systems,”  https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/memorandum-space-policy-directive-5-cybersecurity-principles-space-systems/. 

4. Ibid.

5. Executive Office of the President, “Memorandum on Space Policy Directive-7,” https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/memorandum-space-policy-directive-7/.

6. Ibid.

7. Ibid.

8. Executive Office of the President, National Security Strategy, December 18, 2017, https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/NSS-Final-12-18-2017-0905.pdf, 31-32.

9. U.S. Department of Defense, Summary:  Department of Defense Cyber Strategy 2018, September 18, 2018, https://media.defense.gov/2018/Sep/18/2002041658/-1/-1/1/CYBER_STRATEGY_SUMMARY_FINAL.PDF, 1.

10. Executive Office of the President, National Space Policy, 18-19.

11. Sandra Erwin, “Falcon 9 launches GPS satellite in first national security mission with reused booster,” Space News, June 17, 2021, https://spacenews.com/falcon-9-launches-gps-satellite-in-first-national-security-mission-with-reused-booster/.

12. Thomas C. Schelling, Arms and Influence (Kindle Edition), (New Haven, CT:  Yale University Press, 2008), 46.

13. Schelling, Arms and Influence, 123.

14. Cheng, Cyber Dragon, 16.

15. Scott Rose, Oliver Borchert, Stu Mitchell, and Sean Connelly, “NIST Special Publication 800-207:  Zero Trust Architecture,” National Institute of Standards and Technology, August 2020, https://doi.org/10.6028/NIST.SP.800-207, ii.

16. Schelling, Arms and Influence, 3.

17. David E. Sanger and Nicole Perlroth, “Pipeline Attack Yields Urgent Lessons About U.S. Cybersecurity,” New York Times, Updated June 8, 2021, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/14/us/politics/pipeline-hack.html.

18. Headquarters Marine Corps, “Talent Management 2030,” November 2021, https://www.hqmc.marines.mil/Portals/142/Users/183/35/4535/Talent%20Management%202030_November%202021.pdf?ver=E88HXGUdUQoiB-edNPKOaA%3D%3D, 9.

19. Seamus P. Daniels, “Accounting For The Costs Of Military Personnel,” War On The Rocks,  September 22, 2021, https://warontherocks.com/2021/09/accounting-for-the-costs-of-military-personnel/.

20. Brad D. Williams, “Nakasone: Cold War-style deterrence ‘does not comport to cyberspace,’” Breaking Defense, November 4, 2021, https://breakingdefense.com/2021/11/nakasone-cold-war-style-deterrence-does-not-comport-to-cyberspace/.

21. Williams, “Nakasone: Cold War-style deterrence ‘does not comport to cyberspace.’”

22. John J. Klein, “Corbett in Orbit,” Naval War College Review, Volume 57, Number 1 (Winter), 2004, https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2073&context=nwc-review, 4.

23. Julian S. Corbett, Some Principles of Maritime Strategy, Project Gutenberg, https://www.gutenberg.org/files/15076/15076-h/15076-h.htm, 16, 91.

24. Michael T. Hopkins, “The Exceptionalist’s Approach to Private Sector Cybersecurity: A Marque and Reprisal Model,” George Washington University Law School, August 15, 2011, https://scholarspace.library.gwu.edu/concern/gw_etds/rf55z794d, 16

25. U.S. Const. art. I, § 8.

26. Theodore M Cooperstein, “Letters of Marque and Reprisal: The Constitutional Law and Practice of Privateering,” April 2009, http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.1008.6588&rep=rep1&type=pdf, 45.

27. Jonathan L. Still, “Resurrecting Letters of Marque and Reprisal to Address Modern Threats,” United States Army War College, March 2012, https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/ADA590294.pdf, 7.

28. Hopkins, “The Exceptionalist’s Approach to Private Sector Cybersecurity: A Marque and Reprisal Model,” 43.

29. Ibid., 88.

30. Ibid., 50, 52-54.

31. Ibid., 37.

32. “Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies,” opened for signature January 27, 1967, https://www.unoosa.org/oosa/en/ourwork/spacelaw/treaties/outerspacetreaty.html.

33. Carl Von Clausewitz, On War (Kindle Edition), (Princeton:  Princeton University Press, 1976), 357.

34. “Thomas Jefferson to James Monroe, 1 January 1815,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/03-08-02-0150.

Featured image: Tracy Caldwell Dyson in the Cupola module of the International Space Station observing the Earth below during Expedition 24. (Wikimedia Commons)

Space

Space Cowboys and Cyber Pirates, Part I

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By Christopher Rice

As the 2025 National Security Strategy notes, commercial and military space capabilities are one of the United States’ greatest geopolitical advantages.1  The nation’s civil, commercial, and military sectors have profited immensely from unrivaled incorporation of space-based capabilities.   However, competitors have identified weaknesses and shaped their strategic approaches to exploit them.  Worse still, although the U.S. civil, commercial, and military space communities are interrelated, the distinctions between them present malign actors with seams through which to hazard American security.  To compete successfully in space and retain its advantages in other domains the United States must establish a new, more integrated approach to securing its total space infrastructure—civil, commercial, and military alike—against attack in space or cyberspace. 

This essay makes the case for more coherent efforts to actively secure the nation’s space infrastructure, including the commercial space sector, against hostile action.  First, it will offer a discussion of the invaluable contributions of the U.S. commercial space sector.  Next, it will summarize the threats competing nations, specifically China, may choose to bring to bear against it.  In Part II, it will outline the current U.S. approach to space infrastructure security and identify risks built into that approach.  Finally, it will propose and defend one potential approach for maximizing the aggregate security of America’s space sectors while minimizing cost:  establishing a renewed system of letters of marque and reprisal to empower the civil sector to defend itself.

Space Cowboys—The U.S. Commercial Space Sector

The U.S. commercial space sector is an irreplaceable strategic asset to both the economy and national security broadly.   The Space Force’s Commercial Space Strategy recognizes that America’s strategic space environment is “driven, in part, by national security and civil needs.”2 However, “hybrid architectures” integrating commercial space capabilities offer improved capabilities and defray the costs of government investments. 3 American policy defines the commercial space sector as goods, services, or activities provided by private sector enterprises that bear “a reasonable proportion of the investment risk,” that are available for purchase, and governed by free market incentives.4 This definition covers a wide spectrum of systems and effects.  American commercial space firms offer world-leading capabilities across numerous sectors of space operations, including satellite manufacturing, satellite services, launch capacity, and ground equipment.5  The satellite services sector comprises the majority of the economic value of the space industry,6 providing products direct-to-home television, satellite communications, satellite radio, consumer broadband, and Earth observation.7  These services, along with satellite-based positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) services, enable the network-connected experience of modern, American life.

The strength of U.S. companies in these fields has made the industry an invaluable part of American economic capacity, and its importance is likely only to grow further.  The U.S. commercial space industry generated $158 billion in 2016.8  In addition, the commercial space sector contributed to over 2 million American jobs.9  The commercial launch industry alone has undergone blinding growth, from a single commercial launch in 201110 to 48 launches in 2021.11  The global space economy is expected to nearly triple in value by 2040 from $400 billion to $1.1 trillion with American companies leading the way.12  The promise of rapid growth has drawn significant investment from American entrepreneurs.

The nature of satellite services makes separating commercial and military capabilities nearly impossible, and U.S. policies have further blurred the lines separating the communities. Common commercial services like “[s]atellite communication, remote sensing, and global positioning services are extensively used during the conduct of normal military operations.”13  Further, the Space Force’s consideration of a proposed Commercial Augmentation Space Reserve—while a reasonable acknowledgement of the critical role of commercial space in national security—will, if adopted, further obscure the divisions between military and commercial space sectors and elevate the value of American commercial space firms as military targets.14  Indeed, Russian posturing against Starlink for providing internet services to support Ukrainian command and control offers evidence of the geopolitical impacts of U.S. commercial space firms and a foretaste of the threats they might come to face.15  For powers contemplating hostile action against U.S. interests, denying the United States access to space-based capabilities will require targeting both government and commercial systems. 

Complicating matters yet more, the U.S. government is the largest global customer for commercial space services, consuming 23% of the global market.16 The Department of War purchases 80% of its satellite communication bandwidth from commercial providers.17  The U.S. government is also heavily reliant on the commercial sector for launch capacity. Government investment in heavy launch capacity began to flag after the explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger in 1986.18  While commercial launch expanded briefly in the late 1990s, the United States failed to generate “significant investment in heavy lift launch until SpaceX, aided by NASA investments in 2008, brought the Falcon 9 to market.”19  This period of decay in U.S. space investment has made the government space communities—both civil and security—heavily dependent on commercial capabilities.  Such dependence on agents outside of the U.S. government’s direct control invites additional operational risk. The size and pace of growth within America’s commercial space industry magnifies the scope of potential vulnerabilities.  America’s competitors have prepared to exploit any potential weaknesses to the greatest extent possible.  

Cyber Pirates and Other Threats to U.S. Space Security

The tremendous value of the U.S. commercial space sector is not without risk.  As the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis’s Space and US Security:  A Net Assessment notes, space-based capabilities like “early warning and strike capabilities . . . [as well as] critical communications and navigation support,” are invaluable for successful military operations.20  In the event of large-scale conflict, commercial space infrastructure will be a target.  These capabilities are also “intertwine[d] with the civilian sector[,]” meaning that “any effect on U.S. space-based capabilities carries national security implications and commercial consequences.”21  U.S. rivals have taken note of the importance of space capabilities in enabling its global military preeminence and have shaped their forces and doctrine to offset those capabilities.  While China is certainly not the only competitor to have shaped its capabilities to contest American dominance in space, its efforts offer a valuable example of broader trends.

As a rising power, China has benefited from years of observation of the American-maintained global order and formulated methods to target its vulnerabilities.  The first of these insights is that “[i]nformation technology, including computers and telecommunications systems, has permeated all aspects of society and economies and become an integral part of a nation’s infrastructure.”22  Managing the course of this expanding informationization was identified by the 16th Party Congress “as essential for growing ‘comprehensive national power.’”23  The value of information systems extends beyond economic leadership or cultural soft power.  Information dominance is seen as a prerequisite for military dominance.  Chinese analysts noted the critical role that information technology played in enabling lopsided coalition success in Operation Desert Storm and in later operations in Bosnia.24  According to Chinese policy, networks and information technology are not only critical to national development, they allow China to “[outflank] traditional military forces” like those of the United States.25  Finally, Chinese observers noted the central role of space systems in delivering U.S. information dominance.  As Dean Cheng notes in his book, Cyber Dragon:  Inside China’s Information Warfare and Cyber Operations, Chinese estimates suggest that satellites transmitted 70% of all coalition data during Desert Storm and between 70% and 100% of multiple sectors of critical battlefield information during operations in Bosnia.26  From these estimates, Chinese thinkers concluded that “without space dominance, one cannot obtain information dominance and aerial dominance, and therefore one cannot achieve land or maritime dominance.”27 In the future,  victory will likely go to whatever nation can establish and maintain superiority in the space domain.

To seize superiority in the space or information environments, however, China must be able to contest American operations in space.  Chinese analysts believe that control of the space domain is a prerequisite for effective information warfare, as so many information networks interact with space-based systems.  States without the ability to operate in space are functionally “’deaf and blind.’”28  Chinese experts have developed five operational concepts to confound opposing space operations and ensure that such sensory deprivation is reserved only for China’s opponents.  These operational categories are closely interconnected and mutually supporting, consisting of space deterrence, space blockades, space strike operations, space defense operations, provision of space information support.29  In Chinese doctrine, space deterrence consists of efforts to shape an opponent’s perceptions—and thereby its actions—to conform with Chinese intentions through the use of space-based technologies.30  Space blockades involve the use of forces in any domain, including direct action against launch sites, physical obstruction of orbits or launch windows, or cyber-attacks, to deny an opponent’s access to space.31  Space strike operations involve offensive use of space- or Earth-based, physical or cyber-attacks against “the range of enemy space-related targets, including those in orbit, on land, sea, and air,” to better enable space deterrence or blockade.32  Chinese space defense efforts center on protection of space infrastructure, as well as shielding key national targets from space-based or ballistic missile attack.33  Space information support involves many aspects of the satellite services sector, including imaging and surveillance, communications, and PNT, in addition to missile early warning.34  These space-centric but cross-domain efforts will be employed simultaneously to help China gain the advantage in space.  Further, because Chinese thinking on informationized warfare holds “peace and war, military and civilian [as] increasingly indistinguishable[,]” they will likely be employed before the apparent outbreak of conflict and against the broadest possible range of space targets, commercial, civil, and security alike.35

China has developed world class counter-space capabilities in support of their space and information warfare concepts.  One area of critical development is kinetic anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons and operations.  China has repeatedly tested direct ascent, ASAT weapons systems demonstrating its ability to hazard U.S. satellites in orbit.36  In addition, recent Chinese satellite operations have included up-close inspections of other satellites, a form of rendezvous and proximity operation (RPO).37  While not overtly threatening, such operations may indicate rehearsal for on-orbit ASAT capabilities.  The development of a new robotic arm by Tianjin University—ostensibly for orbital debris removal, but likely too short to safely grapple with tumbling objects—further suggests on-orbit ASAT development.38  China’s counter-space capabilities are not limited to kinetic action.  There are indications that the Chinese military has constructed five fixed and two mobile laser systems capable of counter-space operations.39  In addition, there are some unconfirmed reports of China deploying mobile satellite jamming systems near the contested portion of Kashmir.40  Finally, China maintains an active cyber warfare capability, which it has directed against a variety of space, defense, and financial sector targets, indicating the capacity to attack U.S. systems in the future.41  These non-kinetic counter-space methods offer varying degrees of reversibility in their effects, allowing China to temporarily degrade an opponent’s systems at a potentially lower escalatory cost.

Other nations also maintain credible counter-space capabilities.  Russia has long maintained robust kinetic ASAT programs, in addition to highly developed electronic warfare and cyber operations capabilities.42  Russia, like China, has demonstrated both the means and the intent to disrupt American military and commercial infrastructure, as well as the capacity to carry such efforts into space.43  India, too, has conducted successful direct-ascent ASAT testing and operates electronic jamming systems capable of targeting space systems; although, it enjoys notably better relations with the United States.44

While any of these varied counter-space systems may be at least potentially threatening to a space-faring nation, cyber weapons may prove most attractive to revisionist powers seeking to contest American space capabilities.  Unlike kinetic ASAT weapons, cyber weapons offer more scalable effects.  Cyber weapons may degrade an opponent’s space systems or infrastructure for a limited period of time before returning them to normal operations.   Such reversibility suggests cyber weapons may be less inherently escalatory than more overt means.  Investments in cyber-capabilities offer the potential for lopsided effects, without the level of expenditure that the development of major weapon systems usually requires.  Further, cyber weapons are generally less attributable than other counter space systems.45  States may be less likely to respond forcefully to attacks that are both limited in effect and difficult to trace to a definite point of origin.  In fact, in a well-executed attack, the target may not even recognize hostile action has even taken place.  Generally, successful cyber-attacks benefit from an advanced level of knowledge about the workings of the targeted system; however, they need not be especially resource intensive to conduct.46  The relative affordability of cyber action puts it within the reach of a growing number of state and non-state actors.  In fact, recent advances in artificial intelligence have produced autonomous cyber agents able to conduct a variety of attacks even without apparent human guidance intent. 47  Cyber weapons’ combination of scalability in effects, deniability, and affordability is a powerful incentive for their use, and American space infrastructure will remain an attractive target.

Given America’s uniquely broad space ecosystem, its potential vulnerabilities are equally unrivaled.  While cybersecurity is an increasingly active concern of policymakers, resources are limited.  The current national policy around space cybersecurity admits significant risk.  However, tools exist to harden the space sectors’ cyber perimeter at minimal cost.  Part II of this essay will show that a better approach could include removing the restrictions preventing American firms from actively defending their own cyber systems and replacing them with an oversight model drawn from America’s early days as a maritime power.  Empowered by modernized letters of marque and reprisal, U.S space cowboys and cyber operators can shift the balance of cyber risk in America’s favor.

Chris Rice is a U.S. Army veteran. A graduate of the United States Military Academy and Georgetown University’s Security Studies Program, he has overseas experience in both South Korea and Afghanistan. He works as a consultant in Northern Virginia, assisting in the delivery of critical technologies to the warfighter. When not at work,  Chris is typically cooking various meals for his wife and two children, carrying around a large bag full of sand, or (p)reenacting future battles with small, plastic robots.

References

1. Executive Office of the President, 2025 National Defense Strategy, November 2025, https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/2025-National-Security-Strategy.pdf, 21.

2. U.S Space Force, Commercial Space Strategy, April 2024, https://www.spaceforce.mil/Portals/2/Documents/Space%20Policy/USSF_Commercial_Space_Strategy.pdf.

3. Executive Office of the President, National Space Policy, December 9, 2020, https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/National-Space-Policy.pdf, 20.

4. Ibid. 8

5. John J. Klein, Understanding Space Strategy:  The Art of War In Space (Kindle Edition), (New York:  Taylor and Francis, 2019), 7.

6. Tina Highfill, Patrick Georgi, and Dominique Dubria, “Measuring the Value of the U.S. Space Economy,” Bureau of Economic Analysis, December 2019, https://apps.bea.gov/scb/2019/12-december/1219-commercial-space.html.

7.  Author redacted, “The Commercial Space Industry and Launch Market,” Congressional Research Service, April 20,  2012, https://www.everycrsreport.com/files/20120420_R42492_63f6f0770a711eb5094b9871844ae5fe28e34a4e.pdf, 1.

8. Tina Highfill, Patrick Georgi, and Dominique Dubria, “Measuring the Value of the U.S. Space Economy.”

9.  US Space Industry “Deep Dive,” https://www.bis.doc.gov/index.php/documents/technology-evaluation/769-final-dataset-overview/file, 29.

10. Federal Aviation Administration, “New Era of U.S. Commercial Space Transportation Begins,” March 22, 2021, https://www.faa.gov/newsroom/new-era-us-commercial-space-transportation-begins.

11. Federal Aviation Administration, “Commercial Space Data,” Accessed November 24, 2021, https://www.faa.gov/data_research/commercial_space_data/.

12. Federal Aviation Administration, “New Era of U.S. Commercial Space Transportation Begins.”

13. John J. Klein, Understanding Space Strategy:  The Art of War In Space (Kindle Edition), (New York:  Taylor and Francis, 2019), 203.

14. Courtney Albon, “Space Force may seek civil reserve fleet of spaceships for emergencies,” Federal Times, October 19, 2022, https://www.federaltimes.com/govcon/2022/10/19/space-force-may-seek-civil-reserve-fleet-of-spaceships-for-emergencies/.

15. Jeffery Kluger, “Ukraine Has Been Using Elon Musk’s Satellites And Russia Is Not Happy About It,” Time, October 28, 2022, https://time.com/6226133/russia-ukraine-spacex-satellites-elon-musk/.

16. Redacted, “The Commercial Space Industry and Launch Market,” 1.

17. Redacted, “The Commercial Space Industry and Launch Market,” 20.

18. Bonnie L. Triezenberg, “Protecting the U.S. Supply on Heavy Lift Launch Vehicles,” The RAND Blog, May 6, 2020, https://www.rand.org/blog/2020/05/protecting-the-us-supply-on-heavy-lift-launch-vehicles.html.

19. Triezenberg, “Protecting the U.S. Supply on Heavy Lift Launch Vehicles.”

20. Robert Pfaltzgraf, Space and U.S. Security:  A Net Assessment, Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, January, 2009, http://www.ifpa.org/pdf/Space_and_U_S_Security_Net_Assessment_Final_Dec15_08.pdf, 12.

21. Pfaltzgraf, Space and U.S. Security:  A Net Assessment, 13.

22. Dean Cheng, Cyber Dragon: Inside China’s Information Warfare and Cyber Operations (Kindle Edition), (Westport, CT:  Praeger Security International), 1.

23. Ibid., 1, 5.

24. Ibid.,, 155, 156.

25. Ibid., 1, 3.

26. Ibid., 155, 156.

27. Ibid., 164.

28. Ibid., 163, 164.

29. Ibid., 165.

30. Ibid., 165.

31. Ibid., 167.

32. Ibid., 168.

33. Ibid., 169.

34. Ibid., 171.

35. Ibid., 15.

36. Todd Harrison, Kaitlyn Johnson, and Makena Young, March 31, 2021, “Space Threat Assessment 2021,” Center For Strategic and International Studies, https://csis-website-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/publication/210331_Harrison_SpaceThreatAssessment2021.pdf, 13.

37. Harrison, Johnson, and Young, “Space Threat Assessment,” 13.

38. Ibid.

39. Brian G. Chow and Henry Sokolski, “U.S. satellites increasingly vulnerable to China’s ground-based lasers,” Space News, July 10, 2020, https://spacenews.com/op-ed-u-s-satellites-increasingly-vulnerable-to-chinas-ground-based-lasers/.

40. Harrison, Johnson, and Young, “Space Threat Assessment,” 14.

41. Ibid.

42. Ibid., 16-20.

43. U.S. Department of Defense, 2022 National Defense Strategy, 5.

44. Harrison, Johnson, and Young, “Space Threat Assessment,” 28.

45. Ibid., 5

46. Ibid., 5.

47. Sam Schechner and Robert McMillan, “A User’s Guide to the Universe of Rogue AI Bots,” Wall Street Journal, 6 August 2026, https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/a-users-guide-to-the-universe-of-rogue-ai-bots-ef9d9d43?mod=Searchresults&pos=5&page=1

Featured image: NASA astronaut Nicholas Patrick, STS-130 mission specialist, doing extravehicular activity (EVA) on the International Space Station. (Wikimedia Commons)

Concepts of Operation

Reimagining General Quarters for Surface Ships

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By LT Connor Keating, U.S. Navy

During World War II, General Quarters (GQ) was essential to U.S. Navy ship survivability. Setting GQ established the highest material condition—Zebra—throughout the ship and manned every combat and repair station with the crew’s most qualified personnel. That model reflected an era in which major naval engagements were expected to be intense but comparatively short. Today, however, surface ships face a different problem: they may need to sustain elevated readiness for hours, days, or longer under persistent missile and drone threat. Traditional GQ remains vital for brief periods of peak danger, but it is no longer a practical default for prolonged combat operations. The surface force should update how it employs GQ by preserving continuity at key watchstations and pre‑setting survivability measures in high‑threat environments before a ship is forced to react under severe time constraints.

Recent operations in the Red Sea and the Strait of Hormuz underscore this problem, but they also show that the fleet has long recognized the need to pre-set survivability measures and has already adapted in practice. The Navy’s watch-condition framework distinguishes between full General Quarters and more sustainable wartime steaming postures, and commanding officers routinely adjust manning, material condition, and station assignments to threat and mission. Wayne Hughes anticipated this dynamic decades ago, observing that in a twenty-four-hour battlefield, ships would fight important engagements at “condition” watches rather than only at fully surged battle stations.¹ The evolution and codification of Conditions II and III likewise reflected recognition that full General Quarters could not be sustained indefinitely. Recent combat experience has reinforced that point and spurred further innovation in how ships manage prolonged readiness under threat.

Under OPNAVINST 3120.32D (Standard Organization and Regulations of the U.S. Navy), there are four conditions that govern a ship’s watchstanding requirements based on tactical and material necessity. Condition IV provides peacetime cruising readiness which is rarely used today, Condition III is intended to combat single warfare‑area threats for extended periods and the default readiness condition of the fleet, Condition II increases manning for a specific warfare area or mission while the remainder of the ship remains at Condition III, and Condition I (General Quarters) mans all weapons, sensors, engineering, and damage control stations with material condition Zebra set throughout the ship. NWP 3‑56, Composite Warfare Doctrine, further refines how ships integrate into composite warfare organizations under these conditions. This article accepts that framework; it focuses on how ships sequence and manage transitions within that construct, rather than advocating for a new formal condition of readiness.

The issue, then, is not whether the force understands that prolonged full GQ is unsustainable—it clearly does, as evidenced by the development of Condition II and III watches and by how many commands already tailor S&A details and transit watchbills to flow into and out of GQ. Rather, the central question is whether those adaptations can be refined into a more explicit, repeatable, and doctrinally supported model for sustained missile combat, instead of remaining dependent on individual command initiative and local practice.

Red Sea Observations

Operations against Houthi attacks since late 2023 have highlighted both the strengths and limitations of the current model. Aegis‑equipped surface combatants–and modern ship classes more broadly–are designed to “fight from Condition III,” with augmentation from Condition II teams to handle more complex or sustained threats, rather than immediately surging to full General Quarters for every indication of an inbound threat. Ships in the Red Sea have demonstrated smart, local adaptations to Condition III manning, material conditions, and watchstanding that resemble elements of the approach outlined here, balancing readiness and endurance over extended periods in threat envelopes. These assumptions—that ships will routinely fight from Condition III with targeted Condition II augmentation—mean that the core problem today is not how to reach GQ once, but how to manage readiness, fatigue, and survivability during repeated, prolonged exposures to threats while remaining primarily in Condition III.

These operations have also reinforced the value of Condition II watches, which provide improved readiness, usually for a specific warfare area, over sustained threat periods without the full manning demands of Condition I. While implementation varies across the fleet, Condition II serves as a proven intermediate posture that a “Condition II GQ” model can build upon by adding explicit watchstander continuity and pre‑set Zebra measures. Some forward‑deployed destroyers have already experimented with intermediate postures in which sailors’ Condition III watchstations are deliberately aligned with their repair‑locker assignments and other GQ duties. Similarly, well‑designed S&A details and transit watchbills in chokepoints often approximate a Condition II GQ model by keeping key operators where they would be at GQ while elevating damage‑control readiness. These efforts demonstrate that the concept is both practical and familiar; what is missing is consistent nomenclature, guidance, and training across the surface force.

In particular, Condition II DC (damage control) has emerged as a widely used, if not fully standardized, tool for improving damage‑control readiness over sustained periods of threat. By keeping repair lockers and key DC functions at an elevated state of manning while the rest of the ship remains at Condition III, Condition II DC already functions as a proof of concept for sustained, mission‑tailored readiness. The Condition II GQ concept extends that logic from damage control to the broader watch organization and material condition of the ship.

That challenge becomes even more acute in a contested chokepoint such as the Strait of Hormuz.² ³ Ships routinely set General Quarters for the transit itself and relax it on either side. Yet under persistent drone or missile threat the tactical problem is not simply how to respond to a single inbound salvo; it is how to sustain elevated readiness over hours without cycling the entire crew through full GQ repeatedly. A Condition II GQ posture—elevated manning at critical stations, Zebra pre-set on the main deck and below, and designated continuity watchstanders—would allow the ship to treat the transit as a high-threat Condition III baseline and transition to full GQ only when the next inbound threat is detected, rather than defaulting to the all-hands surge for the duration of the transit.

Figure 1: U.S. Navy Watch Conditions

Watch Condition Description
Condition IV (Peacetime Readiness) Condition of readiness for optimum peacetime cruising. No weapon batteries manned. Engineering plant ready for speeds as ordered. Material condition Yoke (modified for access during daylight). Adequate watchstanders for safe/efficient operation. <33% on watch.
Condition III (Wartime/Heightened/Tension Readiness) Sufficient personnel to man limited weapons systems for prolonged periods while retaining capability to conduct or repel urgent attack and surge to General Quarters. Non-weapon requirements of Condition IV apply. Modified-Zebra set. ~33% on watch. Ships are designed to fight from this condition with augmentation as needed.
Condition II Increased manning for a specific warfare area or mission (e.g., Condition II DC for damage control). Rest of ship at Condition III. Modified-Zebra set. ~50% on watch.
Condition I (General Quarters) Highest degree of readiness. All combat/repair stations, weapons, sensors, damage control, and engineering manned. Material condition Zebra set throughout the ship. Prepared to fight at maximum capability. ~100% of ship on watch.

A New Approach

The Navy should therefore formalize and codify sustainable practices already in widespread (if uneven) use during major combat operations and while operating within adversary weapons engagement zones (WEZs). This refined construct—here termed “Condition II GQ” for discussion—blends Condition II’s increased manning and sustainability with Condition I’s continuity and survivability focus. It does not replace traditional GQ or dismiss existing adaptations but makes them more explicit, repeatable, and easier to train to across the force.

Framed this way, “Condition II GQ” is not a proposal to create a new numbered condition of readiness alongside Conditions I–IV. Instead, it is a standardized way of employing existing Condition III and Condition II (including Condition II DC) to maintain a sustainable high‑threat baseline while enabling rapid, continuity‑preserving transitions into Condition I.

The core of the proposed approach is to treat sustained high‑threat operations as a Condition III baseline, augmented by mission‑tailored Condition II postures and pre‑set survivability measures, with a more deliberate and continuity‑preserving transition path into GQ.

Practically, “Condition II GQ” would mean three things. First, key combat watchstanders remain in their Condition III positions during the initial surge to GQ, with the off‑going section reinforcing them rather than relieving them. Second, Zebra is pre‑set on the main deck and below, with clear guidance on when to order full shipwide Zebra. Third, repair lockers and critical damage‑control functions are manned at Condition II levels even while the rest of the ship remains in Condition III. This creates a sustainable high‑threat posture that closely resembles how well‑run ships already fight, but in a form that can be trained to and evaluated consistently across the fleet.

First, ships should preserve continuity among key watchstanders when shifting from Condition III to GQ. The most proficient Condition III watchstanders at critical positions—such as the officer of the deck, tactical action officer, CIC warfare coordinators, and key weapons and sensor operators—should remain in place when the ship surges to GQ. Instead of rotating those personnel out at the outset of an engagement, the previous watch section should report immediately to assist, back up, or relieve as required, while remaining personnel report to repair lockers and other assigned stations. This principle is not absolute. Certain one-of-one or dual-hatted billets will still require relief; the model simply prioritizes continuity at the stations where tactical situational awareness is most costly to lose and allows the previous section to reinforce rather than fully relieve wherever possible.

Figure 2: Example OOD Rotation Under New GQ Model

Watch Station Section Assigned Section 1 GQ Section 2 GQ Section 3 GQ Section 4 GQ
OOD 1 ENS Constitution On Watch Assist Bridge Repair Locker 2 Repair Locker 2
OOD 2 ENS Congress Repair Locker 5 On Watch Assist Bridge Repair Locker 5
OOD 3 ENS Chesapeake Repair Locker 2 Repair Locker 2 On Watch Assist Bridge
OOD 4 ENS President Assist Bridge Repair Locker 3 Repair Locker 3 On Watch

Second, ships operating in high-threat areas should pre-set a higher material-condition baseline before contact is made. Specifically, commanding officers should consider setting Zebra on the main deck and below while retaining the ability to set full Zebra rapidly when circumstances require it. Modern anti-ship cruise missiles and ballistic missiles can compress warning and reaction time to a matter of minutes, and in some scenarios, less than a minute. A ship that must shift from a lower baseline to full survivability measures only after detecting an inbound threat may have insufficient time to do so effectively. Pre-setting lower-deck compartmentalization offers a more realistic survivability posture for prolonged operations, while avoiding some of the strain associated with maintaining full shipwide Zebra indefinitely.

Figure 3: Crew Reaction Time to Modern Missile Threats

Threat Speed (Mach) Speed (knots, sea level) Min. Detection (~44 NM) Reaction Time (Min) Reaction Time (Max ~200 NM)
1 661 44 NM ~3 min (239 sec) ~18 min (1,089 sec)
3 1,983 44 NM ~1 min (79 sec) ~6 min (363 sec)
5 3,305 44 NM <1 min (47 sec) ~3 min (217 sec)

Note: Detection ranges are based on the line-of-sight radar horizon equation. Times are approximate and based on open-source SPY radar height and worst-case (sea-level) missile speeds.4

Together, these changes create a practical middle ground between traditional Condition III and full GQ while incorporating the increased manning and sustainability of Condition II. The ship retains continuous watch rotations and a more sustainable battle rhythm, but it also gains greater survivability and a more seamless path to full combat posture. The proposal is less a claim of a wholly new watch condition than an effort to regularize and clarify a set of practices that many commands already approximate under pressure, making that intermediate posture more explicit, repeatable, and easier to train to for sustained combat operations under persistent threat.

Such a model would also clarify an increasingly important doctrinal point: in modern missile combat, readiness is not binary. The choice is not limited to either normal steaming conditions or a fully surged GQ posture that can only be maintained briefly. Surface ships need an intermediate posture that reflects the operational reality of long‑duration exposure to threat. In many cases, the decisive factor will not be whether a ship can reach full readiness eventually, but whether it can maintain the right level of readiness continuously without creating avoidable vulnerabilities through fatigue or disruption. What is missing today is not the ability to operate at Condition III with Condition II and Condition II DC overlays, but a codified, fleet‑wide model for preserving continuity at key watchstations and pre‑setting survivability measures so that ships can move between these postures and full GQ with minimal friction and tactical disruption.

Implementation Considerations

Implementing this approach will require changes to shipboard practice and, potentially, to fleet guidance. At the ship level, watchbills would need to identify specific continuity billets that remain fixed in place during a GQ transition, as well as which personnel surge to support them from repair lockers and other battle stations. This model should align with and build upon existing NTTP guidance for Condition I manning; watchbills would simply designate those continuity billets explicitly and ensure that Condition III, Condition II, and S&A watchbills are constructed to flow into and out of one another with minimal disruption. Damage control training should include scenarios that test prolonged operations at Condition III with rapid transition to Condition II GQ, building on existing Condition II DC drills by incorporating continuity billets and pre-set material conditions into the same scenarios. Commanding officers, executive officers, and damage control assistants would need clear guidance on when to pre-set Zebra below the main deck and when to order full Zebra throughout the ship. Fleet experiments aboard a forward-deployed DDG or in a carrier strike group, coordinated through a type commander or the Surface and Mine Warfare Development Center (SMWDC), could refine the details, including how the model should vary across ship classes, missions, and threat environments.

At the doctrinal level, this would likely take the form of amplifying guidance in OPNAVINST 3120.32D and NWP 3‑56 to describe sustained high‑threat operations in which ships are expected to remain at Condition III, with designated continuity billets and pre‑set material conditions below the main deck, for extended periods inside an adversary’s weapons engagement zone.

The proposal also carries trade‑offs that deserve consideration. Preserving continuity among key watchstanders may increase fatigue among the crew’s most critical operators if not managed carefully. Pre‑setting a higher material‑condition baseline could impose added wear on equipment and create additional burdens for daily shipboard routines. Those concerns are real but manageable, and they are outweighed by the risks of relying on a readiness model that assumes ample warning time and short‑duration engagements. The point is not to eliminate strain; it is to distribute and manage it more intelligently.

Figure 4: Current GQ Model vs. Condition II GQ

Aspect Current GQ Model Condition II GQ
Key Watchstanders Mass turnover upon setting GQ No rotation; previous section assists on watch
Material Condition Full Zebra set throughout the ship Zebra pre-set main deck and below; full Zebra optional/rapid
Repair Lockers All manned All manned
Watch Rotations Stopped Continue as in Condition III

Conclusion

Missile threats, persistent surveillance, and the demands of the twenty-four-hour battlefield have reinforced the limits of traditional General Quarters as the sole framework for prolonged high-threat operations. The fleet already understands many of these limits and has adapted in practice, but those adaptations remain uneven and loosely defined. The Navy should retain GQ’s core purpose while refining its execution for current combat conditions. Preserving continuity at key watchstations and pre-setting survivability measures in high-threat areas would give surface ships a more sustainable and tactically sound approach to readiness. If the surface force expects to operate for extended periods inside contested missile envelopes, it must better capture, standardize, and train to those lessons in its readiness doctrine. Doing so would not replace the existing conditions of readiness in OPNAVINST 3120.32D or NWP 3-56; it would operationalize them for an era in which ships must fight from condition watches under persistent surveillance and missile threat.

Lieutenant Connor Keating commissioned from the Virginia Tech NROTC and served aboard USS Benfold, a forward-deployed destroyer in Yokosuka, Japan. On shore duty, he was a protocol action officer to the Chairman and Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He is an integrated air-and-missile defense warfare tactics instructor and participated in the Naval War College’s Halsey Alfa Advanced Research Project as a resident student. 

References

1. For recent operations against Houthi attacks, see U.S. Naval Institute, “Red Sea Operations Offer the Wrong Lessons for the Pacific,” Proceedings 152, no. 1 (January 2026).

2. Congressional Research Service, Iran Conflict and the Strait of Hormuz: Impacts on Oil, Gas, and the Global Economy, R45281 (Washington, DC: CRS, March 11, 2026), https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R45281.

3. Department of the Navy, Standard Organization and Regulations of the U.S. Navy, OPNAVINST 3120.32D (with Change 1) (Washington, DC: Department of the Navy, July 16, 2012), chap. 4. Figure 1 summarizes the doctrinal conditions of readiness as defined in OPNAVINST 3120.32D and illustrates the gap between those formal conditions and the sustained, high‑threat environments in which ships increasingly operate.

4. Author’s estimates based on unclassified SPY-series radar performance data and typical anti-ship missile profiles. See Lockheed Martin, “Aegis Combat System,” fact sheet, accessed May 2026, https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/products/aegis-combat-system.html.

Featured image: Sailors fight a simulated fire during a general quarters drill, June 25, 2026. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist Seaman Apprentice William Lawson)

Information Warfare

New Organization, New Rules: Information Warfare Can Thrive in the New OPNAV

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By Adam Reiffen

Working afloat and ashore, the U.S. Navy’s Information Warfare Officers engage adversaries, create plans, connect circuits, and drive operations around the world every day. In May 2026, the Information Warfare Community was directed by the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) to reorganize itself within the Pentagon, a large-scale change to the manning, funding, and authorities required for global operations. When taken with the December 2025 creation of the Information Warfare Line designation, the current moment marks a generational opportunity for broader community to make the changes necessary to take its hard-earned and permanent place among the Navy’s elite warfighting communities. The Navy’s Information Warfare community will need clear focus, strong leadership, and decisive action to make best use of the new paradigms wrought by administrative change, starting at the highest echelon of Navy command.

On May 21, 2026, the Chief of Naval Operations released Naval Administration Directive 123/26, “Realignment of OPNAV N2N6 Responsibilities,” a title which perhaps undersells the importance of its contents. The directive is the first major realignment of the Navy’s Information Warfare Officers and their roles on the Navy’s top Pentagon staff since 2009 and lays out a series of significant changes in the short and long term across every community designator. The message begins with a useful discussion of the community’s history that ties its past orientation to the present day. In 2014, Navy Information Forces was established as the Type Commander tasked with administering community training, manpower, tactics, readiness, and fleet integration within a constantly evolving number of fields. Left unsaid in the message is the community’s raison d’être: The ability to consolidate and streamline the man, train, and equip missions across subspecialities as varied as intelligence, cryptology, oceanography, communications systems, and cyber warfare.

Operationally, each discipline benefits from the skills of the others, and the community is stronger by virtue of its size, resourcing, and impact. The composite structure of the former Naval Operations (OPNAV) for Information Warfare (N2N6) reflected this reality, if imperfectly in spots, and the community’s early identity benefitted from OPNAV and the Navy Information Forces working together to promote and professionalize the newly formalized community. For example, OPNAV resourced the Warfare Tactics Instructor program, giving the Information Warfare community their own professional tacticians to develop tactics, techniques, and procedures for the Fleet. And when Navy Information Forces was given responsibility for overseeing Maritime Operations Center resourcing across all numbered fleets, OPNAV worked in tandem to expedite resourcing. The previously mentioned new administrative changes fundamentally upend that structure, and senior leaders must be attuned to historical approaches to resourcing requirements.

After establishing the background of Navy Information Warfare, the Chief of Naval Operations’ (CNO) message sets two principal directives for the OPNAV staff. Taken in order, the first change is the separation of intelligence functions, including support to plans, policy, and strategy, from Information Warfare requirements and capabilities. Under the previous construct, the three tenets of Navy Information Warfare–battlespace awareness, assured command-and-control, and integrated fires–were collectively housed under a single OPNAV staff code. A newly-created position, Assistant Deputy CNO for Information Warfare (IW) Requirements and Capabilities, “…will serve as the principal advisor to the CNO on IW policy and lead policy matters pertaining to information technology, space, and cyber and will serve as the Department of the Navy, Deputy Chief Information Officer Navy.”

More technically oriented functions like cryptology, oceanography, and information technology shared common cause within the Information Warfare community, bound by their shared emphasis on technology, natural sciences, and history within the Navy. Therefore, moving these technical fields into their own section within the Naval Operations (OPNAV) staff flows logically; it bins the complementary skills and interests of their practitioners in a dedicated lane to work on critical issues unique to their communities. For instance, senior leaders have directed the force to roll out artificial intelligence tools and speed the adoption of other digital technologies. The technical experts within Information Warfare are on the front lines of those critical changes; integrating and streamlining their work within the new directorate will hopefully provide the best circumstances to expedite progress.

Intelligence professionals rely on the technical acumen of these Information Warfare communities for collection, processing, and dissemination of information, but do not themselves necessarily possess the same technical mastery over the disciplines in question. For its part, the Intelligence component of the community will now report to the Deputy CNO for Intelligence, Operations, Plans, Strategy, and Warfighting Development for “operational intelligence support, intelligence production prioritization, and policy clarification and changes.” As the old adage goes, “intelligence drives operations, and operations inform intelligence.” We see this in the Fleet and Joint Force increasingly, as space-based systems, cyber effects, and electronic warfare have played central roles in recent and ongoing campaigns. OPNAV’s new structure now affirms this at the highest levels of Navy decision-making. Furthermore, integration with the Plans, Policy, and Strategy directorate ensures Intelligence is integrated directly into strategic planning for future operations. The Plans, Policy, and Strategy Directorate’s output directly informs and begets requirements, which are needed to generate authorities and funding. If operational relevance is the goal, Naval Intelligence only stands to benefit from this reorganization.

Still, for the first time in nearly two decades, there will be an administrative division between Information Warfare officers on the OPNAV staff, and the community must avoid creating conflict by failing to clarify mission, functions, and tasks. A schism within senior Information Warfare leadership at the OPNAV level would run counter to the increasing degree of the community’s integration and prominence in the Fleet today. After the Navy released message 094/24 that broke Information Warfare officers out of their previous Restricted Line status, a designation for technical specialties who officers are precluded from command at sea, Navy Information Forces has worked to define what it now intends IW officers to be. Notably, these efforts include establishing opportunities for IW officers to command at sea. The Information Warfare Squadron concept is in pilot right now with the first community’s officers serving as independent warfare commanders afloat vice holding staff positions. If successful, this would mark the beginning of a future in which the Information Warfare realizes its decades-long goal of operational autonomy. Rearranging OPNAV staff Information Warfare functions seeks to align the highest echelons of Navy strategic decision-making with operational and tactical objectives, not the least of which being resourcing and sustaining Information Warfare squadrons across the Fleet. Senior leaders must promote that unity of effort as personnel transition to new roles, responsibilities, and workflows within the Pentagon to ensure that the community’s capabilities, personnel, and effects are synchronized and deployed to maximum efficacy across the Fleet–especially if the community’s individual specialties are well served by splitting up across the OPNAV staff. The organizational rearrangement brings danger that OPNAV and Navy Information Forces can run in opposite directions. Mitigations must be put in place to ensure operational requirements continue to be captured and reflected in program development, even if the requirement is from an Intelligence analyst and the program is “owned” by another directorate.

The second directive in the new administrative guidance has the greatest potential to change Navy Information Warfare’s capabilities and standing within the service. Unrestricted Line communities–traditional naval operators in surface ships, aviation, subsurface, expeditionary forces, and special warfare–have dedicated branches within the office of the Deputy Chief of Naval Operations for Warfare Systems, or OPNAV N9. OPNAV N9 is the resource sponsor and requirements manager for each of these warfare areas, essentially determining what the Navy needs, how much money will be required to meet those needs, and serving as a central node for coordinating and integrating all of the analysis and oversight needed to turn spreadsheets into ships and memos into missiles. Each warfare area is broken out into a subordinate element—Expeditionary Warfare is N95, Surface Warfare is N96, Undersea Warfare is N97, Air Warfare is N98—and collectively they are known as the “High Nines” on the OPNAV staff.

Previously, similar functions for Information Warfare communities were performed within the now-defunct OPNAV N2N6. Information Warfare is now split between OPNAV Intelligence (N2) and Information Warfare Requirements and Capabilities (N6N9). These entities are focused on resourcing and requirements for each of Information Warfare’s distinct specialties. Following this year’s administrative realignment, Information Warfare has its own dedicated resource sponsorship and requirements office: N99. This marks a promotion for Information Warfare, putting the community and its portfolio—Tactical and Enterprise Networks, and Nuclear Command, Control, and Communications (NC3); Oceanography and Navigation; IW Resources and Manpower; Intelligence Capabilities; Integrated IW Fires; and IW Future Capabilities—on as close to an equal footing as it has ever been to its Unrestricted Line peers. The new N99 office will not report directly to the OPNAV Warfighting Requirements and Capabilities (N9) office like its sister branches do, which does keep Information Warfare somewhat siloed from other communities. But when taken together with new opportunities for command at sea, Information Warfare Officers and their mission areas have never had so much visibility or influence within the Navy. A major issue for now, however, is that the number of billets available for Information Warfare requirements officers on the OPNAV staff remains largely unchanged. This means that in the near term, the newly-established N99 will likely perform the same job as its previous incarnation but in a different part of the org chart. This means a bigger pool of officers hunting for resources but with the same number of IWOs. Without significant manpower changes from Millington that realign the operational and staff rotations in officer careers, IW is liable to lack firepower in these resourcing fights.

Less heralded but no less important are the professional development and career progression opportunities now available for Information Warfare Officers. In the long term, this change may prove among the most profound of the whole realignment effort. There is a tongue-in-cheek aphorism that appropriation is governed by the Golden Rule: Whoever has the gold makes the rules. Unrestricted Line communities have built their officers’ career progressions with requirements officer and financial management tours. These key roles are delineated in official career path guidance promulgated by Navy Personnel Command, called out in promotion board precept language, and reserved for high performers who are often recruited and talent managed. The net effect is that trained personnel bring their critical expertise to the Navy’s seemingly endless stream of key requirements and resourcing discussions, ensuring their communities are best represented when budgeting. The Information Warfare community will stand to gain from prioritizing the billets and officers that fight for these resources. 

By carving out its own “High Nine” within the OPNAV staff, Information Warfare can push to achieve parity in both job execution and career trajectory with Unrestricted Line for officers assigned to N99 billets. Navy Information Forces and Personnel Command must first address inventory problems for Information Warfare officers at the O-4 to O-6 ranks, where numbers thin out dramatically. A retention bonus would surely help, but a more cost-effective solution would be to fix the billet structure for a career trajectory that better balances operational and staff roles. Information Forces and Personnel Command should then begin to call out requirements officer and financial management positions by name in board precepts to ensure upwardly mobile and successful officers are assigned to them. Subsequently, they should expect those officers to both excel in their work and be competitive for future promotion to positions of authority. This could begin to look more like the “golden path” that defines traditional officer careers. Common career markers like requirements, financial management, and OPNAV staff jobs bridge the cultural and operational differences between officers in otherwise separate communities and provide a common framework to build leaders in the Fleet. For their part, N99 officers should integrate into the rhythm and pace of their directorate counterparts, using that organizational parity to give Information Warfare programs their best shot in budget battles. Also, the new N99 can and should create its own culture internal to the organization to both breathe life into its daily tasks and project an image of unity and identity out to the rest of the Navy staff.

NAVADMIN 123/26 affords the Information Warfare Community a once-in-a-generation chance to overhaul its officer career paths and shift attention to resourcing and requirements, changes that would yield significant long-term benefits for both the community and its personnel. Information Warfare remains a growth industry within the Navy, and for good reason. As the Fleet generates, processes, analyzes, and demands more information to plan and execute operations worldwide, Information Warfare personnel are poised to meet those needs and innovate to fight and win our nation’s wars at sea. The challenge now is ensuring we continue to modernize resourcing, requirements, and mission sets without losing the advantages the community gained by forging a unified effort over the past two decades. The threat of intra-community drift is real and requires proactive leadership, clear guidance, and consistent cross-specialty engagement to ensure that administrative separation does not lead to operational and cultural divorce. The realignment of responsibilities outlined by the Navy’s recent administrative updates has extraordinary potential to both facilitate and make permanent those changes, but Information Warfare must strike while the iron is hot to build the kind of weapon system it can wield with great skill and confidence for years to come. If Information Warfare’s many communities can remain united through these changes, they–and the Navy–will be stronger than ever.

Lieutenant Commander Adam Reiffen is an Intelligence Officer currently serving in the Wargaming Department of the Naval War College. He previously served as a Federal Executive Fellow at Brown University’s Watson School of International and Public Affairs, as well as a Requirements Officer at OPNAV N2N6.

The opinions expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the views or policy of the U.S. Department of War, the Department of the Navy, or the U.S. government. No federal endorsement is implied or intended.

Featured image: A U.S. Sailor stands watch in the combat information center aboard Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Donald Cook (DDG 75), June 8, 2026. (U.S. Navy photo)

Fostering the Discussion on Securing the Seas.