Vladimir Rogov, a Moscow-installed official in southeast Ukraine’s partly-occupied Zaporizhzhia province, said fighting resumed there early Monday after Russian defenses beat back a Ukrainian advance the previous day.

Rogov claimed that “the enemy threw an even bigger force into the attack than yesterday.” The new attempt to break through the front line was “more large-scale and organized,” he said, adding: “A battle is underway.”

Rogov’s comments came after Moscow also claimed to have thwarted large Ukrainian attacks in the eastern Donetsk region, another of the four regions that President Vladimir Putin claimed as Russian territory last fall and partially controls.

Russia’s Defense Ministry claimed it had pushed back a “large-scale” assault Sunday at five points in Donetsk province.

The claims could not be independently verified, and Ukrainian officials did not confirm any assaults, but the reports fueled speculation that a major Ukrainian ground operation could be underway as part of an anticipated counteroffensive.

A video published by the Ukrainian Defense Ministry showed soldiers putting a finger to their lips in a sign to keep quiet. “Plans love silence,” it said on the screen. “There will be no announcement of the start.”

The Center for Strategic Communications of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said on Telegram that Russian forces were “stepping up their information and psychological operations.”

“In order to demoralize Ukrainians and mislead the community (including their own population), Russian propagandists will spread false information about the counteroffensive, its directions and the losses of the Ukrainian army. Even if there is no counteroffensive,” a statement on Telegram read.

Ukrainian officials have kept Russia guessing about when and where it might launch a counteroffensive, or even whether it had already started. A possible counteroffensive, using advanced weapons supplied by Western allies, could provide a major morale boost for Ukrainians 15 months after Russia’s full-scale invasion.

Recent military activity, including drone attacks on Moscow, cross-border raids into Russia and sabotage and drone attacks on infrastructure behind Russian lines, has unnerved Russians. Analysts say those actions may represent the start of the counteroffensive.

Driving out the Kremlin’s forces is a daunting challenge. Russia has built extensive defensive lines, including trenches, minefields and anti-tank defenses. The front line stretches for 1,100 kilometers (684 miles).

Ukraine could launch simultaneous pushes in different areas, analysts say.

Michael Clark, the former head of the Royal United Services Institute think tank, said the “increased tempo” of activity in recent weeks likely marked the start of the counteroffensive and that June is likely to see the start of Ukraine’s ground operation.

“There’s something going on,” he told the BBC.

Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov claimed that 250 Ukrainian personnel were killed in the fighting in Donetsk province, and 16 Ukrainian tanks, three infantry fighting vehicles and 21 armored combat vehicles were destroyed.

“The enemy’s goal was to break through our defenses in the most vulnerable, in its opinion, sector of the front,” Konashenkov said. “The enemy did not achieve its tasks. It had no success.”

The Russian Defense Ministry said the alleged Donetsk attack started Sunday morning. It was unclear why it waited until early Monday to announce it.

Ukraine often waits until the completion of its military operations to confirm its actions, imposing news blackouts in the interim.

For months, Ukrainian officials have spoken of plans to launch a counteroffensive to reclaim territory Russia has occupied since invading the country on Feb. 24, 2022, as well as the Crimean Peninsula, which it seized in 2014.

At least two factors have been at play in the timing: better ground conditions for the movement of troops and equipment after the winter, and the deployment of more advanced Western weapons and training of Ukrainian troops to use them.

The Russian Defense Ministry spokesman said Ukraine used six mechanized and two tank battalions in the Donetsk attacks. The ministry released a video claiming to show destruction of some of the equipment in a field.

In a rare specific mention of the presence of Russia’s top military leaders in battlefield operations, Konashenkov said the chief of the general staff of the Russian armed forces, Gen. Valery Gerasimov, “was at one of the forward command posts.”

Announcing Gerasimov’s direct involvement could be a response to criticism by some Russian military bloggers and by Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of Russian mercenary group Wagner, that Russia’s military brass hasn’t been visible enough at the front or taken sufficient control or responsibility for their country’s military operations in Ukraine.

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Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine: https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

Cattler now wrangles some 80 intelligence organizations from 31 NATO members, organizing their efforts somewhat like the director of national intelligence provides guidance to U.S. intelligence agencies. His main focus right now? Russia’s all-out war on Ukraine and its hybrid war against Ukraine and NATO, as well as the rest of Europe. This conversation has been edited for brevity and clarity.

Q: What does the hybrid fight look like right now?

A: Let’s start with the NATO definition of hybrid threats: Combining military and nonmilitary means to take covert and even overt action that involves everything from disinformation and cyber attacks, economic pressure, energy, coercion, irregular armed groups and even use of regular military forces.

These hybrid methods are used to blur the lines between war and peace, and to attempt to sow doubt in the minds of target populations, really with an aim to destabilize and undermine societies. And what we’ve observed is that the speed, scale and intensity of these hybrid activities has increased in recent years.

Ukraine has been victim to hybrid attacks … since even before 2014 when Crimea was illegally annexed. In some ways, the beginnings of the Russian deployment for the annexation was also a bit of a hybrid operation, in that there were “little green men” there. They didn’t wear identifying badges on their uniforms, clearly intended to create some confusion or to sow some doubt, to cause [Western] decision-making to be a bit delayed, hopefully, to deny consensus, and so on … that could prevent the outcome, this illegal annexation of Crimea.

And then in the years in between, you’ve seen everything from sustained cyber attacks of varying scales, denial of service data, exfiltration and so on, and then attempts to really undermine the Ukrainian people’s confidence in the government, undermine elections, try to steer the government in a direction against a Euro Atlantic alignment, whether for the EU or for NATO.

Q: And the Russian message now?

A: What they’re saying is that external support to Ukraine, if not illegal, prevented under international law, is actually against peace, which is really hard to comprehend when you’ve initiated an illegal war of aggression. Asking the country that you’ve illegally invaded to lay down their arms as a humanitarian gesture is a bit of a stretch, and then also to say to nations — that have the right under international law to come to Ukraine’s defense and assistance — that they may not provide that aid, because it extends the war and increases the human cost? Certainly, we don’t agree with it. But this is the voice in this so far from Moscow.

Q: What of their attempts to message that the Western alliance is experiencing war fatigue?

A: I think war fatigue is a real thing. … You have it in Russia. You see it now, with people refusing to be mobilized and called up. You see it in feedback from soldiers that have been mobilized against their will, or that had been promised one thing, like being in the rear providing rear security or logistics, and then wind up in Bakhmut with little to no training and very poor equipment.

I think there’s a potential that you could see war fatigue elsewhere. In Ukraine, they have been subjected to very, very substantial, not just hybrid attack, but also direct physical attack, with many, many allegations of Russian war crimes and crimes against humanity. And that all does weigh on the society.

Q: But the message that the West is getting tired of war?

A: Look … we need to make clear that we will stand by Ukraine for as long as it takes, that we understand that it’s not just about protecting ourselves with stronger resilience, but it’s very important in a hybrid sense. Meaning that we’ve got the capability to withstand disinformation and propaganda, but also an understanding that there are costs that we feel due to higher inflation, energy prices, and so on.

When will the war in Ukraine end? Experts offer their predictions.

But it’s the right thing to do, not just to help Ukraine, but also to help ourselves when we look at the longer term security implications of the war, because Russia has made clear … in January of 2022, at least, that what they actually wish to see is a revision of the international security order and, especially on their border, to roll back NATO to make changes in the security environment that are not, in fact, in line with international law and the sovereign rights of states.

Now, Ukraine feels it directly because they’ve now suffered this expanded invasion. But I think this is also a key reason why so many nations have stepped up and have made the political statement of resolve and also have acted on that statement by providing this assistance now for more than 444 days.

Q: U.S. soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines have been told to prepare for war with China. Why should they be paying attention to what Russian troops are doing in Ukraine?

A: I think we can and should be able to handle and think about more than one thing at a time. The resolution of the war in Ukraine, I mean, just from the legal aspect of it alone, has bearing on other potential disputes around the world, even potentially including China and Taiwan. You could think of Russia and Georgia, and also, Moldova and Transnistria (an unrecognised breakaway state that is internationally recognized as a part of Moldova). There are a few other frozen conflicts around the world where these sorts of resolutions really matter.

And I think there’s been a good argument made in a lot of really strong public analysis that if Ukraine prevails, and the international order is preserved, that also helps maintain an international legal system and peace and stability … so these are very important.

Please remember that we … have a set of very important values. The idea that people have an inherent right to be free, that nations have a right to be sovereign, independent and make their own decisions, and that human rights are preserved on an individual level are things that I know we hold very dear.

And so I think this war in Ukraine is important to us whether we are Ukrainian or not. The war matters because of the things that are happening that we wish to stop and what the war means in the longer term for Ukraine, for Euro Atlantic security and also for international security.

Q: Has this war also been important for learning how Russia fights?

A: Yes, I think it is pretty clear in the way the Russians fight that a lot of the military way of thinking seems to be very Soviet in its mindset, in terms of command and control … in the operational art, the way they organize, the way they choose to fight and the way that they employ weapons.

Look at the use of artillery, for example. It’s very high volume with less precision, but then at huge cost in terms of the ammunition expenditure and also the damage on the ground. These are things that are not usually associated with modern warfare. They’re more commonly associated with World War II and even, in some cases, World War I. So they continue to do more and more poorly on the battlefield.

Q: Does the U.S. risk seeing Russia as too weak, whereas before they saw Russian troops as sort of 10 feet tall? Have we gone in the other direction after seeing their performance in Ukraine?

A: I think most of us did not think the Russians were 10 feet tall. … But they had credible capabilities … both strategic and conventional. ….

Some make a mistake when they say that because Russia has been unable to translate the military activity into the strategic political effect, that means that they’re not doing anything. Completely false. They’ve done a tremendous amount of damage. And that damage is devastating on a practical human level. And that’s why I say I think it’s a mistake to lose sight of that.

And then further, they still retain great nuclear capability. They have the largest nuclear inventory in the world. And that does represent an existential threat, potentially, that needs to be really closely monitored and understood. That’s still retained. And this is a force that in some ways, is larger.

Just because an army is less capable doesn’t mean that it can’t cause significant damage, as this one has done and continues to do so.

Q: And you’ve been having to warn American and international companies about another threat from Russia: critical infrastructure threats.

A: To be clear, I’m not attributing the Nord Stream I or II attacks to Russia. But I’m just pointing out that you see that … the investigation has already preliminarily, to the extent it can, confirmed that it was sabotage and not a naturally caused outage in the two pipelines.

And we’re increasingly mindful that the way our societies have evolved, whether for information technology, communications, financial transfers, or for energy, now natural gas and oil transfers, but increasingly in the future, offshore windmills and solar panel arrays and so on, that we need to pay attention to the potential that Russia could choose to attack that infrastructure.

We already see them mapping undersea infrastructure. We know that they have capabilities that they’ve sought to preserve and expand over time to do the sorts of activities whether for intelligence, or for more hostile activities, more hostile actions against that infrastructure. And we have to look for it because, as I said in the definition, economic … leverage and energy leverage are two tools that we would consider to be in the hybrid toolkit.

Part of our public outreach has, in fact, been to the private sector — to the energy industry, to telecommunications industry, to IT service providers, network operators, and so on — to try to explain the potential of these threats because they have a large stake in the risk.

They do own some of it, and they also have some capabilities on their own to help us monitor, to provide that situational awareness and to see some anomalies, potentially to detect problems in the system. And I think, in some cases, they’re likely to be first, in fact, to see these things. …

I think it was the open ocean that they used to consider was the protection — that they had to provide armor for a telecommunications cable close to the beach so an anchor couldn’t drag across it and cut it. … Or maybe put a bigger fence or have some physical standoff around a landing station, so a terrorist attack would be less effective. Or there can’t be a break in, because I’ve got guards, and I’ve got cameras and things.

And what we’re saying to them now is: You have to potentially worry about a state capability that could reach out and touch your infrastructure.

Q: You’re essentially asking them to armor every foot of those undersea cables and put some sort of sensor on them to detect interference?

A: I wouldn’t quite go that far. … That’s reasonably unreasonable, because the cost would be phenomenal. … But that’s where you have to really then think through what do I do for surveillance? What do I do for monitoring? Maybe I use AI for anomaly detection or to look for patterns of surface ships, aircraft hovering around key nodes and that sort of thing. How do I use my network monitoring? If I’m on Google or … Deutsche Telekom, British Telecom, maybe there are things I could do other than just monitoring my network. I think there needs to be a good healthy discussion between the public and private sector about … ways to mitigate it that are feasible and affordable.

On April 11, the Biden Administration met with Balkan leaders to pledge support for their efforts to shut down Russian news sites disseminating disinformation. U.S. support could go a long way toward helping Balkan countries in their attempts to remain autonomous from Russia, which uses disinformation to try to undermine democratic governments in the post-Soviet space.

For the past three years, intelligence analysts and disinformation researchers at my company have been closely following the tactics and strategies of Russian disinformation operations. Here are some suggestions that the U.S. could take that would make even more of an impact in countering the anti-Ukraine disinformation being disseminated by Russia.

The State Department’s suggestions to block websites are a start, but will likely only impact the low-hanging fruit and activities of unsophisticated actors. Countries should not only be targeting the IP addresses and domain names of sites spreading falsehoods, but also the companies that host and support those web addresses. Other State Department-recommended efforts – such as labeling foreign government accounts, and enacting regulations that require transparency around foreign ownership of media properties – will take time to implement. There are some other steps that the U.S. could take in order to help counter the effects of Russian disinformation in the Balkans.

We know that Russia routinely uses bots – computers that pose as humans for disinformation campaigns – to exaggerate the “impact” of its messaging. A lot of Russian disinformation is actually remarkably crude and unconvincing for increasingly skeptical internet audiences, so they want to create the illusion of impact. In today’s hyper-networked media environment, having a “successful” comms strategy is an important component of great power status.

Therefore, it would be worthwhile to increase our capacity to detect bots and trolls by investing in the development of resources, personnel and software that can find the bots. Fact-checkers can use AI-based tools and large language models to recognize disinformation, however the lack of automation and the increasing sophistication of Generative AI-created disinformation makes it challenging to keep up.

Current U.S. resources are insufficient to be competitive in the fight against disinformation. Meanwhile, Russia has invested heavily in state-aligned international broadcasters, RT (Russia Today), RT Balkan and Sputnik News, purveyors of disinformation, as well as social media manipulation and hacking. Although the U.S. created the Global Engagement Center dedicated to fighting disinformation in 2016, countering disinformation has not been a budgetary priority.

Paid ‘influencers’

For the past few years, the Kremlin has paid “influencers” and popular bloggers to spread propaganda and disinformation. Although major social media platforms restricted many official Russian government accounts, these so-called “influencers” are still operational. Social media accounts owned by the Russian government, lawmakers, affiliated media, and influencers should be deleted to block this propaganda channel.

Another important policy the U.S. should consider pursuing, is to sanction fake news outlets and pro-Russian disinformation actors who are spreading propaganda under the guise of journalism. The EU has sanctioned RT and Sputnik News, but U.S. sanctions would hold even more sway. Sanctions are one of the most powerful tools the U.S. has in fighting disinformation.

The U.S. and European governments should urge all Western allies and partners, especially eastern European countries like Georgia and Moldova, to take similar steps as those listed above.

It’s important to understand that many of the disinformation narratives pertaining to Ukraine that are circulating in the U.S. don’t originate from Russia, but come from far-right actors living in the U.S. who are anti-Biden and anti-Ukraine. Thus, U.S. officials need to recognize that pro-Russian disinformation is not purely a foreign policy issue, but also a domestic one for them.

With its global influence and resources, the U.S. has the capability to make a significant difference in the battle against Russian disinformation and establish a model for other world leaders to follow. These recommendations would go a long way toward leveling the disinformation playing field.

Noam Schwartz is CEO and co-founder of ActiveFence, a global trust and safety company.

Have an opinion?

This article is an Op-Ed and the opinions expressed are those of the author. If you would like to respond, or have an editorial of your own you would like to submit, please email C4ISRNET and Federal Times Senior Managing Editor Cary O’Reilly.

Acknowledging that the other nations have closely followed the issue, Austin hit the subject head on in his opening remarks to start the meeting. The move underscored the gravity of the situation, since many of the documents distributed online revealed details on the status of the war in Ukraine and the ongoing delivery of weapons and other equipment to Ukrainian forces in battle — intelligence matters the other defense officials are keenly involved in.

“I take this issue very seriously,” Austin said at the start of the daylong session at Ramstein Air Base in Germany. “And we will continue to work closely and respectfully with our deeply valued allies and partners. "

Austin said he’d spoken to allies and partners about the matter, and “I’ve been struck by your solidarity and your commitment to reject efforts to divide us. And we will not let anything fracture our unity.”

The meeting marks the one-year anniversary of the creation by Austin of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group. This is the 11th time the defense leaders have met to coordinate aid to the invaded country. They have vowed to support Ukraine in its fight against Russian forces for as long as it takes. But the document leaks pose a multi-pronged concern.

Some allies in the room may be more wary about sharing intelligence and other information with the U.S,. fearing it might spill out to the public. Others may worry that the U.S. will clamp down on its own dissemination of intelligence involving the war, leaving them less informed.

The unease comes at a crucial time. Ukrainian leaders are gearing up for the launch of a spring counteroffensive to try and take back territory gained by the Russians, hoping to give Kyiv a stronger position if the warring sides try to negotiate peace.

So far, Austin and others have insisted that the intelligence leak hasn’t driven a wedge between the U.S. and its allies and partners. But the stunning breach exposing closely held intelligence has sparked international concern and raised fresh questions about America’s ability to safeguard its secrets.

Airman 1st Class Jack Teixeira, a member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard, has been charged under the Espionage Act with unauthorized retention and transmission of classified national defense information. He served as an information technology specialist and held a top secret security clearance, which gave him access to highly classified programs.

Teixeira, 21, is accused of sharing highly classified military documents about Russia’s war in Ukraine and other top national security issues in a chat room on Discord, a social media platform that started as a hangout for gamers.

U.S. Air Force leaders said earlier this week that they were investigating how a lone airman could access and distribute possibly hundreds of highly classified documents. The Air Force has also taken away the intelligence mission from the Air National Guard 102nd Intelligence Wing based in Cape Cod, where Teixeira served, pending further review.

Reading such titles makes it hard not to liken the naming pattern to the U.S. military’s own operation naming conventions, which are typically indistinct adjective-noun combinations that evoke anything from absurd patriotism to complete confusion.

As such, we’ve compiled a list of our favorite U.S. military operation monikers that could easily pass as Taylor Swift song titles.

1. Red Dawn

While Operation Red Dawn was the mission that led to the capture of Iraq’s ousted leader, Saddam Hussein, it carries a rather lyrical ring to it and evokes a poetic morning of sorts. Plus, it’s derived from the 1984 film of the same name, starring impossibly tight jean-wearer Patrick Swayze.

2. Acoustic Kitty

The CIA in the Cold War attempted (and failed) to turn cats into the ultimate spies by implanting listening devices into their ears. Swift, meanwhile, is a known cat mother of three named Meredith Grey, Olivia Benson and Benjamin Button. The idea that she might sing about them isn’t terribly far afield.

3. Casanova

In 2013, 12 men were arrested in Texas in connection “with a conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute marijuana.” However, given Swift’s history of writing about men in comically stereotypical roles and gender norms, it wouldn’t be surprising to see a Swiftian song about a seductive lead with many lovers.

4. Morning Light

Operation Morning Light involved a 1978 search for a Soviet nuclear-powered spy satellite — Cosmos 954 — that accidentally entered northern Canadian airspace before crashing. The American and Canadian militaries worked together to collect its debris. For Swift, it would perhaps be a song about the refreshing experience of waking up to a new day after a heartbreaking evening.

5. Evening Light

Another “Light” mission, this 1980 iteration was an epic failure of the American military to end the Iran hostage crisis and rescue the 52 Americans trapped at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. For Swift, it’s aligned with Morning Light, and everyone knows how much she loves a theme — hello, “Midnights.”

6. All-American Tiger

In 2003, troops in Iraq were sent to patrol around the Euphrates River near Al-Qaim, where they found 12 people of interest. This, however, also sounds like the name of a Swiftian anthem — her answer to Katy Perry’s “Roar,” in which she sings, “I’ve got the eye of the tiger, a fighter, dancing through the fire, ’cause I am a champion, and you’re gonna hear me roar.”

7. Gothic Serpent

Unfortunately, this was the 1993 mission that led to the Battle of Mogadishu in Somalia, the subject of the film “Black Hawk Down.” Alas, it could also lend its name to a particularly angsty song about the vipers in the press that so often spew venom about Swift’s personal life.

8. Steel Curtain

This 2005 mission meant to create a blockade to tamp down on the flood of insurgents into Iraq from Syria. However, it’s also a great name for the walls a celebrity like Swift might put up to keep the conspiracy theory-hunting fans and ravenous tabloids from invading her privacy.

9. Just Cause

This is the name given to the 1989 U.S. mission to invade Panama and remove military dictator Gen. Manuel Noriega from power. For Swift, it could be about the deliverance of justice, or, with the addition of an apostrophe, a song about things she does “just ‘cause.”

If Taylor Swift’s got a blank space, baby, maybe she’ll write down some of these titles.

Photographs and other documentation of run-ins between Chinese and Russian forces and those of other countries have proven critical to debunking propaganda, establishing factual timelines and holding Presidents Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin to account, Rear Adm. Mike Studeman said April 5 at the Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space conference in National Harbor, Maryland.

Among recent examples, he said, was Russian harassment of a U.S. Air Force intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance drone, which splashed into the Black Sea after an in-air collision in March. Footage captured by the MQ-9 Reaper — and quickly made public — showed two Russian Su-27 jets flying erratically, dumping fuel and the crash that ultimately forced it down.

“The affected party or a monitoring party, essentially, now is able to take that and say, ‘This is what’s really going on. China, do you stand by it? Xi Jinping, do you stand by it? This is you, right?’” said Studeman, commander of the Office of Naval Intelligence. “There’s a statement: Sunlight is the best disinfectant. That applies right here.”

Cameras have recorded alleged war crimes by Russian troops in Ukraine and intercepts of aircraft across the world. China conducted more than 100 intercepts of U.S. aircraft in international airspace between 2021 and 2023, according to the admiral’s presentation at the conference.

Cameras, too, documented an attempted blinding by a Chinese ship of a Philippine coast guard crew in February. Luckily, Studeman said, the “Philippines and others are getting wise to this, and what they’re doing is they’re actually recording.”

“Their best weapon system is not a gun, it’s not a missile,” he said. “Their best weapon system is actually a camera or video camera to be able to show the world what’s really happening.”

Pentagon officials consider China and Russia premier national security threats. The U.S. military, as a result, spends countless hours monitoring their respective maneuvers, fortifications and investments.

If bad-faith behavior is not exposed, it will continue to “thrive in the shadows, like a mushroom,” said Studeman, who previously served as the director of intelligence at U.S. Indo-Pacific Command.

“Staying silent in this world that I just described, that China’s painting, is not an option,” he said, “and will not advance our security interests or those of any other nation out there.”

Vice Adm. Jeffrey Trussler on April 3 told C4ISRNET that Vice Adm. Karl Thomas, for now the commander of the 7th Fleet in Japan, is the “perfect replacement for me,” given his time in the Indo-Pacific and exposure to at-sea issues.

“He’s operating in that environment right now,” Trussler said after a speech at the Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space conference in National Harbor, Maryland. “Everything we’re trying to do here in D.C. — policy, requirements and resourcing, the ideas we have — he’s going to have come right from there.”

Information warfare is a fusion of offensive and defensive electronic capabilities and cyber operations. It combines data collection, analysis and manipulation to gain an upper hand. Trussler has been in the job since June 2020 and is retiring.

Pentagon cyber policy post may stay unfilled during review

The fleet Thomas commands is devoted to the Indo-Pacific, a massive region the Biden administration considers invaluable to international stability, financial health and military readiness. The fleet regularly works with friendly forces from Australia, South Korea, New Zealand and more; its area of operations spans more than 124 million square-kilometers.

The Senate received Thomas’ nomination March 6. It was referred to the Senate Armed Services Committee but has not yet advanced.

If and when Thomas is confirmed, Trussler said, the 7th Fleet commander should use his experience to compare and evaluate in his new post everything he’s “been seeing and doing for the last two years to everything we’re doing” in Washington.

“He’s going to provide extraordinary clarity to some of the capabilities that we need,” Trussler said.

Heritage, who is expected to gain a star as a lieutenant general, has served as the commander of Marine Corps Forces Cyberspace Command at Fort Meade, Maryland, since 2021. In January, he also took the helm of Marine Corps Information Command, an entity Commandant Gen. David Berger championed in an update to Force Design 2030.

Should the Senate confirm him, Heritage will succeed Marine Corps Lt. Gen. Matthew Glavy. Senators received the nomination March 30, one day before the Pentagon announced Heritage’s prospective move. The announcement did not say where Glavy is headed next.

Pentagon cyber policy post may stay unfilled during review

As the deputy commandant for information — a role created years go — Glavy oversaw the rollout of Marine Corps Doctrinal Publication 8, or MCDP 8, a catalog of the latest philosophies regarding information warfare, military data and media literacy. It’s one of several MCDPs that outline the tactics, techniques and procedures of the corps, the first of which was published more than two decades ago.

“We’ve been complacent in just assuming information is like the air we breathe,” and that there is no consequence to using it incorrectly, Glavy told reporters in June. “History is telling us, current events are telling us, that approach will not work, either mid-term or long-term.”

Information warfare is a fusion of offensive and defensive electronic capabilities and cyber operations. It combines data collection, awareness and manipulation to gain an advantage before, during and after battles.