Capabilities
Imagine you’re driving to a destination on a foggy road. Instead of looking ahead, you focus on all the hazards around you and navigate with your rearview mirror. That’s not how anyone drives—but that’s how most organizations manage risk.
On October 14-15, 2025, I was privileged to attend the inaugural conference on “Wargaming as an Analytical and Training Tool in Military and Civilian Environment,” held at the General Tadeusz Kościuszko Military University of Land Forces (AWL) in Wrocław, Poland. In some ways, the genesis of the conference itself, along with my attendance, was the result of one of the fun quirks of the professional wargaming community: if you meet one member of the community, you’re only one or two degrees removed from knowing all of them.
Henry Heren, a senior instructor on the Mission Operations Directorate Enterprise Training (MODET) team at Systems Planning & Analysis, recently authored “Space Isn’t a Sanctuary—It’s a Battlefield. Time to Act Like It.” His article appears in Spacepower Magazine, a publication by the Space Force Association, an independent nonprofit dedicated to advocating for and supporting the U.S. Space Force.
The U.S. Space Force was founded to secure national interests in, from, and to space. These three prepositions are more than mission statements—they define how we compete in today’s high-stakes, “Space Race.” Yet the effectiveness of this mission depends not only on capability, but on integration.
Testing space systems on orbit is costly, constrained, and risky. Yet readiness in space cannot be theoretical. In a contested domain where launch cycles are long and failure is costly, the United States must validate its capabilities before they leave Earth.
In the final installment of our four-part series, Christian Cabaniss, SPA Military Operations Analyst and USMC Col Ret, outlines why America’s semiconductor future hinges on breaking down silos. With billions invested and national security at stake, disjointed efforts across agencies and industry create dangerous vulnerabilities. This piece explores what holistic planning really means—from procurement strategies to international alignment—and what it will take to build lasting resilience.
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