Nuclear microreactors soon will be part of the U.S. Army’s inventory under the Pentagon’s Janus Program, which on Wednesday announced five companies that have been chosen to operate the power plants on five military installations across the United States.

It’s the latest development in a military-wide push to ensure bases have reliable power supplies that function independently of local power grids, which could become targets in a future conflict. “We are building the energy resilience necessary to project combat power globally, without relying on potentially vulnerable external grids,” Army Secretary Dan Driscoll said. 

In a wide-ranging exclusive interview on the latest episode of the Threat Status weekly podcast, Space Force Col. Eamon R. Murray said his installation, Colorado’s Buckley Space Force Base, is also in line to receive a nuclear microreactor, built by California-based company Radiant Industries.

Adm. Daryl Caudle, chief of U.S. naval operations and member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, says that while the Pentagon is focused on a “whole of government” approach to maintaining U.S. interests in the Pacific, the growing naval requirements tied to conflicts in the Middle East are posing a dilemma for American naval forces.

“The fact that we’re short on carriers in [U.S.] Pacific Command, because we keep moving them into Central Command, yeah, of course, it does,” Adm. Caudle said when asked by Threat Status during an invitation-only lunch with reporters Wednesday about whether the current global conflict dynamics present a dilemma for him.

Adm. Caudle said that while the Navy has shifted its focus to the Pacific for decades, its ships currently have “got to be sourced from somewhere” to support the Iran war. The combat power remaining, roughly 200 ships and 1,500 aircraft, is focused on the Pacific. The admiral described the situation as a “60-40 split” with other regions around the world. 

“We know the pacing threat is the [People’s Republic of China],” Adm. Caudle said. “We want to be postured to actually make sure that we’re prepared for any kind of conflict in the Pacific.”

The Chinese military is studying the use of AI to boost the capabilities of its hypersonic missiles in defeating U.S. missile defenses, according to a recent report by the China Aerospace Studies Institute, a U.S. Air Force think tank.

China’s two main hypersonic glide vehicles, or HGVs, are carried by DF-17 and DF-27 missiles and maneuver during flight to amplify their strike capabilities. “Yet questions remain about how maneuvers are achieved and the extent to which they can adjust to avoid defensive interceptors,” the report said.

Advances in AI-enabled neural networks trained on “intercept avoid” could help China’s hypersonic missiles make it past air defense systems, according to the report, which cites work by scientists at China’s Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics that aims to bring the capability to reality.

A Ukrainian cargo aircraft at one of Germany’s busiest freight airports was almost destroyed this month by an explosive drone — an incident that national security insiders are citing as the latest warning that Russia’s shadow war against the West may be entering a more dangerous phase.

While German authorities have stopped short of formally blaming Moscow, local media reports have cited security sources as saying Russian intelligence is suspected of involvement in the incident. Threat Status Special Correspondent Guillaume Ptak in Kyiv examines the Germany development as well as other recent incidents in Estonia and the Slovak Republic that appear to have characteristics of Russian hybrid warfare.

On Aug. 14, there was an arson attack on a robotics building in Estonia, whose unmanned ground vehicles have been deployed to Ukraine. On Tuesday, Slovak police announced they had foiled an arson attack on a factory producing unmanned aerial systems in the country’s east. Three foreign nationals were detained, and police seized a large quantity of incendiary mixture, tools, phones, a camera and a handwritten plan.

Artificial intelligence is critical to manufacturing, national security and the staying power of American leadership, according to Peter Morici, an economist and emeritus business professor at the University of Maryland, who writes in an op-ed for The Washington Times that “AI-enabled robots will replace most factory workers.

“American industry cannot compete if AI use is taxed while China subsidizes the development of robots and AI. Just as important, the U.S. economy can hardly grow without AI,” Mr. Morici writes. “This year, fixed business investment is projected to increase to $4.7 trillion from $4.3 trillion in 2025.”

AI’s impact on the job market is too large to ignore and “the problem was that AI-related layoffs were happening in a stagnant job market for other reasons,” he writes, asserting that “new hires increasingly function like middle managers, overseeing the work of several agents and interacting with clients early in their tenure to determine needs and preferences for final work products.”

• Aug. 27 — 2026 Navy Summit, Potomac Officers Club

• Aug. 27 — AI and Autonomy on the Modern Battlefield, Atlantic Council

• Sept. 3 —The AI Open-Weight Debate: Balancing Innovation and Security, Center for a New American Security

• Sept. 9 — Bend but Do Not Break: Shaping the Future of the All-Volunteer Force, Center for Strategic & International Studies

• Sept. 9 — Global Affairs Expert Webinar: China’s Influence in the Americas, Council on Foreign Relations

• Sept. 12-13 — AFA National Convention, Air & Space Forces Association

• Sept. 22 — Nuclear Energy Policy Summit 2026, Atlantic Council