World leaders and US allies are convening in Washington, DC as President Biden hosts this year's NATO summit, an occasion marking the 75th anniversary of the alliance. Many experts, including former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Jim Townsend, have been communicating the importance of this coalition as the Russia-Ukraine War drags on nearly two and a half years later.
Christopher Kirchhoff, the co-creator of the Pentagon's Defense Innovation Unit, joins Josh Lipton for a conversation about the military firepower being supplied to Ukraine, the role of the Pentagon's original Silicon Valley office, and how advancements in military technology are upending traditional warfare tactics.
"Just last month, the Ukrainians had to evacuate all 31 [M1A1 Abrams] tanks from the front lines because a quarter of them had been killed by Russian kamikaze drones. So you have drones taking out tanks, which, you know if you step back and look at that, that could mean the end of a century of mechanized warfare that began in the First World War."
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The co-author of Unit X: How the Pentagon and Silicon Valley are Transforming the Future of War compares the noticeable divide between military development and the global assembly line for consumer products and tech, using the F-35 Warfighter stealth fighter jet and the iPhone as two key examples.
"There's a whole nother system of technological production in our world for consumer devices. And you know what? It's faster, it's more efficient. And for many things it's less expensive. So the whole reason behind the Pentagon Silicon Valley office was to begin to merge those two systems of production so we could deliver better technology faster to the warfighter. And at lower cost."
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This post was written by Luke Carberry Mogan.