The days when the U.S. Army could mass and mobilize troops in an uncontested environment and project power abroad without fear of disruption are gone. America’s competitors and adversaries have adapted their way of fighting, and the Army must adapt its way of thinking when it comes to defending the homeland.
Homeland defense is a key component of integrated deterrence for a joint force predominantly based in the continental United States. Successful large-scale mobilization and deployment to a forward theater through the competition-crisis-conflict continuum will require unity of effort across the interagency, meaning across U.S. government agencies and departments, including DoD. Specifically, the protection of critical infrastructure and key resources in the military, governmental and private sectors is essential to enable the joint force to project power.
Moreover, DoD’s contribution to defending the homeland will require Army components to simultaneously integrate with local, state and federal partners to conduct Defense Support of Civil Authorities (DSCA) while mobilizing and deploying to forward locations. As the worldwide COVID-19 epidemic and subsequent response taught us, operating in the homeland is inherently complex. To be effective, authorities must identify vulnerabilities while designing campaign activities that exercise theater-setting tasks, rehearse power projection timelines and support a whole-of-government approach to defending America.
Protecting Infrastructure
Homeland defense, the priority mission for DoD and the Army, is defined in Joint Publication 3-27: Homeland Defense as “the protection of US sovereignty, territory, domestic population, and critical infrastructure against external threats and aggression or other threats, as directed by the President of the US.”
Within this definition, the protection of critical infrastructure is one of the most elemental activities of homeland defense, because critical infrastructure empowers the joint force to project power forward and protect America’s sovereignty, territory and domestic population in-depth, as far away from the homeland as possible.
However, the precedent set over the past three decades of mobilizing and deploying to forward theaters with impunity is no longer a viable model. The Atlantic and Pacific oceans and America’s two friendly neighbors are no longer sufficient barriers to adversarial disruption. Should competition escalate to conflict, America’s competitors can, and will, seek to degrade the nation’s critical infrastructure to disrupt timely and effective combat power projection into their backyard.
Additionally, America’s competitors’ capability to impact critical infrastructure has implications beyond power projection of the joint force. U.S. adversaries continually increase their capability and capacity to disrupt American financial, supply chain, energy, telecommunications and information technology infrastructures. Disruptions to these sectors, left unimpeded, could cause significant impacts at the city, state and regional levels, threatening the security and prosperity of the American people.
It is the duty of the joint force to project combat power abroad, to defend in-depth and to support the American people’s requests for assistance. Should active defense of the homeland be required, the joint force must be prepared to conduct multidomain operations (including securing key critical infrastructure while augmenting state, local, tribal, territorial and even commercial efforts to secure critical infrastructure) to mobilize and project power forward as personnel respond to requests for assistance from joint and interagency partners.
Success in each of these activities will require immense coordination with federal, commercial, state, local, territorial and tribal entities. Moreover, because these activities will be conducted domestically, successful homeland defense activities may require DoD and the joint force to prepare to serve as a lead federal agency for a period of time.
Critical Activity
Defense Support of Civil Authorities is support provided by DoD in response to a request from a domestic civil authority. These requests often occur during national emergencies when other federal, state and local capacity is overwhelmed. Under the umbrella of DSCA, the Army recently conducted operations in support of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in response to natural disasters; the Department of Homeland Security in support of border security and resettlement of Afghan refugees; and the Department of Health and Human Services in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, the Total Army stands ready to conduct lifesaving activities in response to catastrophic incidents, including chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear attacks.
Throughout the preparation for, and conduct of, large-scale combat operations, it is highly likely that local civil authorities will be overwhelmed by either adversarial or natural activity (hurricanes, wildfires and pandemics don’t stop when the Army is conducting large-scale combat operations), or a combination thereof.
To counter these threats, the Total Army, as the primary land component of the joint force, must integrate across the interagency paradigm and conduct active defense of critical assets at key times and locations, in addition to being prepared to respond to requests for assistance from civil authorities.
Defensive efforts to secure critical infrastructure may be conducted under the authorities of DoD, a separate lead federal agency, or potentially both at the same time. However, regardless of the authority, DoD has a responsibility to the American people to be ready to both prevent adversarial disruptions and to respond to natural or human-made activity that could cause similar impacts.
The likely simultaneous conduct of both homeland defense and DSCA, paired with the restrictions of operating within the homeland, may require coordination at a level of complexity not previously seen by the Army. This complexity arises from the simultaneous execution of multiple operations, under multiple authorities, within the same geographic and temporal space.
However, these are not operations with which DoD, and the Army specifically, are unfamiliar. DoD has projected power (albeit in an uncontested environment) since its inception, and it has protected key infrastructure necessary to complete its mission during combat operations overseas.
Separately, DoD has and continues to support FEMA in response to natural disasters and, under multiple presidential administrations, DoD has conducted support of the Department of Homeland Security to provide security along the Southwest border. The complexity of homeland defense operations increases with the prospect of all these activities potentially occurring concurrently, and with Army forces operating in the same area but under different and distinct leadership and authorities.
Challenging Operations
Although complex and challenging, effective homeland defense operations are essential to the nation’s execution of integrated deterrence.
If the profession of arms is ever called upon to conduct large-scale combat operations against a peer or near-peer competitor, the successful conduct of homeland defense operations will be critical to the success of the forward fight. In steady state, active preparation for the complexities of homeland defense operations, including mobilization, interagency and intergovernmental coordination, support to civil authorities and the protection of key critical infrastructure, will enhance readiness and contribute to integrated deterrence.
The Army, as the primary land component of the joint force, should continue and expand its current homeland defense efforts to ensure timely and effective power projection and the preservation of the security and prosperity of American citizens. The American people expect and deserve nothing less.
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Lt. Gen. John Evans is the commander of U.S. Army North and senior Army commander, Joint Base San Antonio. Previously, he served as commanding general, U.S. Army Cadet Command, Fort Knox, Kentucky. He has served in a variety of command, staff and leadership positions. He holds two master’s degrees, in adult education and in national security and strategic studies.
Nikolas Fisher is a strategic planner at U.S. Army North.
Lt. Col. Steven Foster is the chief of plans at U.S. Army North.