Summarized by the Alliance for Fort Gordon
Published August 28, 2026
In his closing keynote address at the AFCEA International TechNet Augusta 2026 conference on Aug. 20, US Army Lt. Gen. Paul T. Stanton, United States Department of War Cyber Defense Command commander and Defense Information Systems Agency director, delivered a blunt capstone message to military and industry partners: the joint force must stop treating its networks as static IT infrastructure and start commanding them as premier strategic weapons systems.
Speaking to an audience of military leaders, cyber operators and commercial technology developers at the home of the Army Cyber Center of Excellence, Stanton warned that legacy administrative frameworks and bespoke architectures are actively compounding operational risk.