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WASHINGTON D.C. -- Rep. Pat Fallon (TX-04) joined CSIS for a discussion on the future of a dedicated U.S. Cyber Force. The program included a fireside conversation with Commission member Maj. Gen. Ryan Heritage, USMC (Ret.).

See Rep. Fallon's written remarks below:

Good morning everyone, and thank you for allowing me to talk to you all about the United States Cyber Force, an institution that I and others are working so hard to establish as the seventh branch of the armed forces. 

I want to be clear from the start –

The U.S. military has fallen behind our adversaries in our cyber capabilities, and the remedy is clear…we, as a country, cannot adequately defend our national interests without a Cyber Force. Not only is it a necessity, but a dedicated service for the cyber domain is inevitable.

I’ll say it again, Cyber Force is inevitable. Whether we are successful this year, next year, or the following, there will be a Cyber Force.

Back in 2017, nearly a decade ago, my good friend and the Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Mike Rogers stood on this exact stage and explained clearly to the audience that a dedicated Space Corps (as he coined it) is coming. He laid out the factors that shaped his thinking:

• The services, and particularly the Air Force, were not prioritizing space;
• There was a lack of qualified Space professionals serving as leaders, with true experts routinely passed over for promotion in favor of pilots with no experience in the Space domain;
• There was no senior official accountable for Space, ensuring confusion over responsibilities and redundancy of effort;
• And, the Department’s Space budget had been so fragmented that there wasn’t the necessary attention or oversight for it.

Fast forward to today…not only was he successful in establishing the Space Force, but more so, his judgement that a Space Force was necessary for the good of the nation has been overwhelmingly endorsed in Congress, the White House, and the Pentagon. Just a few weeks ago at the State of the Union, you heard President Trump commend the Space Force and the foresight required to know how valuable it has become. The President and Mike Rogers were right, and their detractors who made exaggerated and false claims about how a military service for Space were categorically proven wrong.

As a former Air Force officer myself, all of the arguments for a Space Force resonated with me. Why? Because each and every reason parallels the reasons why we have an Air Force today. Through the 1920s and 30s, the Army consistently failed in its management of military aviation. The Army downplayed, diminished, and discounted the revolutionary potential of air warfare.

If these factors led to an Air Force, you’d think that the Air Force’s leaders would be wiser than to recycle those mistakes in their management of the Space Domain. However, I learned a long time ago: never underestimate the military’s capacity to repeat its errors.

For more than 20 years, the War Department has formally recognized five warfighting domains: Land, Air, Sea, Space, and Cyberspace. Today, we have military services aligned to four out of these five. For the life of me, I can’t understand why anyone would say that having the Army to focus on land warfare and the Air Force to focus on air combat is sensible, but having a Cyber Force is a bridge too far.

Not only is a Cyber Force sensible, but it makes even more sense when you consider the dramatic failure of the Department's fragmented approach for the last 15 years in distributing responsibility for generating forces and capability across the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps.

By the Department’s own acknowledgement, the military cyber ecosystem is not meeting the mark on training forces, developing mastery in the domain, or in growing the force to match the threat. What is so striking is that these are the exact same issues we were facing in 2022, as we were in 2017, as we were in 2012.

While we have failed to address these systemic issues after more than a decade and a half, our adversaries are seizing the moment–not only expanding their capabilities, but dramatically growing their forces.

Before my life in politics, I built and grew businesses. Let’s say I had a friend come to me seeking an investment in his company. He tells me, “we’ve been around for 15 years. While our product doesn’t scale and we haven’t turned a profit, things are going great.” Fair to assume that I’m not pulling out my checkbook for him.

I noted earlier how cyberspace has been officially recognized by the War Department as a warfighting domain since 2004. You’d naturally believe that over the last 20+ years, we’d have developed an entire generation of uniformed cyber leaders who could serve as 2-, 3-, and 4-star officers. If I’m raising the issue today, you’re right in assuming that isn’t the case.

Of the 13x general and flag officers assigned Cyber Command, there is only a single 1-star general with a cyber background. When the CYBERCOM Commander looks at the 4x Service Cyber Components, none are led by general or flag officers with cyber experience.

If we were talking about Strategic Command, there’d rightfully be an uproar if the 4-star commander lacked any relevant experience with nuclear weapons. Similarly, if the Commander at Indo-Pacific Command or the Command’s Director of Operations had never been to Asia, Americans  should be absolutely terrified. And yet, that’s precisely what we treat as normal for the cyber domain.

This may sound abstract, but let me phrase it another way. I could have the best accountant in the world, but if I need surgery, I’m not asking him to get into the operating room just because he’s good at doing my taxes.

As I look at the military’s cyber ecosystem, I see all the factors that Mike Rogers saw in 2017 when he looked at the space landscape:

• None of the services are truly invested in success in cyberspace;
• The leadership cadre is full of general and flag officers with deep backgrounds in aviation, special operations, and maritime warfare, but nearly none with actual cyber experience;
• There is no single leader in charge of the domain, with responsibility fragmented across the Assistant Secretary of War, the Chief Information Officer, and several others;
• The cyber budget is poorly managed and has nearly no overarching oversight.

There is one glaring difference between today’s cyber problems and the historical issues with the space domain and the air domain before that. Whereas the issues in space and aviation stemmed from mismanagement by one military service, the issues in the cyber domain are found across Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps. In this way, today’s cyber problems are compounded and even more evident. 

Six months ago, CSIS launched its Commission on Cyber Force Generation to bring together true experts in military cyber operations and think through what a future Cyber Force looks like. I know that they are deep into that, and am excited about what comes from that; however, as impressive as that group may be, it’s not what I think to be the most convincing evidence that change is necessary and on the horizon.

I had the chance to review a collection of uniformed and civilian cyber operators’ anonymized testimonials, and “jarring” doesn’t begin to describe my reaction. These were accounts from more than 90 professionals from every service, every rank from E-7 to 1-star and senior executives. What was clear and incredibly depressing was how little confidence the people that do this work everyday have in our ability to fight at scale. I read about critical deficiencies in training, planning, leadership, operations, management, and technical capabilities. Every single account reached the exact same conclusion that a Cyber Force was necessary, but for widely varying reasons. 

Our service members are pleading for help, and now it’s time for Congress to step up. Of course, that’s easier said than done. I’m in my third term in Congress, and I’ve seen a fairly predictable pattern in how Congress tries tackling problems:

• A mammoth issue is identified;
• Members get vocal about that issue but struggle to agree on the best solution;
• We argue incessantly, and end up compromising on a study of the issue that won’t be completed for at least 3-5 years.

I won’t stomach uniformed and civilian leaders inventing excuses and wasting years delaying the inevitable. We should count ourselves as fortunate– rarely is the solution so obvious and achievable.

After 78 years, no one looks back at the decision to establish the Air Force and says, “We’ve made a terrible mistake.” With now 6 years of history, I don’t believe anyone looks at the Space Force and thinks that either. In fact, it’s the opposite…I think the overwhelming majority look at both the Air Force and Space Force, and think, “Why didn’t we do this sooner?”

If we’ve established that the current structure is not working, and that the solutions applied in the past have a proven history of success, it is quite obvious where that leaves us. There will be a Cyber Force. It's a question of when. Like President Trump, I’m not a big fan of slow walking when it comes to national security.

We’re going to get this done, and when we look back, everyone is going to be glad we did.

Thank you for having me here, and appreciate the time.