- Russia's war in Ukraine has vividly demonstrated the consequences of communications failures.
- For US military leaders, the war underscores the need to manage their forces' electronic signatures.
- To do that, younger troops will have to unlearn some habits, the Marine Corps' top general says.
The use of technology on the battlefield, particularly during the Russia-Ukraine conflict, has prompted the US military to rethink its operations as it prepares for a future conflict with a technologically-advanced adversary, the US Marine Corps' top general said this month.
The risk posed by electronic emissions is salient for Marines, and one of the most important may be that your electronics are giving away more information about you than you think, according to US Gen. David Berger.
Under Berger, who took over as commandant in July 2019, the US Marine Corps has focused on developing capabilities to operate in a more dispersed manner, which could be undermined if Marines' electronics allow rivals to track them, listen to their communications, or attack them.
"We have to be distributed. You have to have enough mobility that you can relocate your unit pretty often. You have to learn all about — like some of us learned 30 years ago — camouflage, decoys, deception," Berger said at a Defense Writers Group event on December 8. "What we didn't worry so much about 30 years ago now is every time you press a button, you're emitting."
For young soldiers, sailors, and Marines, cell phones and other devices are part of everyday life, and managing those devices' emissions will require unlearning some habits, Berger said.
"They don't think anything about pressing a button. This is what they do all day long. Now we have to completely undo 18 years of communicating all day long and tell them that's bad. That will get you killed, so turn your cell phone off," Berger said at the event. "They're like, 'I won't touch it. It just stays on.' No, there's parts of the cell phone you don't understand."
Targeting cell phones has been a feature of the fighting between Russia and Ukraine since 2014. Russian hackers have used malware in phone apps to track Ukrainian artillery units and have sent propaganda to Ukrainian phones using simulators that imitate cell towers.
Phones have been a vulnerability for Russia since its military attacked Ukraine in February. Ukrainians and foreign governments have eavesdropped on Russian troops using unsecured phones to talk to each other and to their families in Russia. Ukrainians have also reportedly tracked Russian generals making unsecured calls and used the information to launch attacks.
In recent years, the phones of US and allied troops in Europe have also been affected by hacking attempts and sinister calls believed to have originated in Russia.
Russian electronic warfare, including jamming and other interference that has affected US operations in Syria and elsewhere, has become a greater concern for the US military, which in turn has focused on improving its electronic-warfare capabilities and on limiting its troops' exposure.
In 2018, the Pentagon banned the use of geolocation functions on phones by personnel in "operational areas" after it was reported that troops using fitness trackers were revealing their locations and even the layout of their bases.
Securing communications and reducing electronic signatures is especially important for the Marines Corps as it develops concepts for operating small, mobile units within range of Chinese forces — and of Chinese intelligence-gathering platforms — in the Western Pacific Ocean.
Marines have tested new technologies meant to provide more secure communications between their units and with other forces, but using phones and other devices could still allow adversaries to track their movements in peacetime and to strike in wartime.
During an exercise in California in 2019, a Marine compromised his unit by taking a selfie that revealed their location. "They were like, 'OK, you guys are dead,'" a Marine general said at the time.
The collection of electronic signals "is absolutely becoming more and more ubiquitous," Berger said this month.
Operating in such an environment means "electronic signature management is huge," Berger said, adding that the Corps is headed toward signals-intelligence operations being "pushed down to much lower levels" of the force "than some of us were accustomed to."
The US Air Force, which is developing its own concept for dispersed operations in the Pacific, faces a similar challenge in managing electronic emissions, according to Chief Master Sgt. David Wolfe, senior enlisted airman for US Pacific Air Forces.
"The Chinese especially have a very robust intelligence network themselves, so they're trying to figure out what we're doing. We're doing the same thing, so it's a game of known cat-and-mouse," Wolfe told Insider at a summit of senior enlisted leaders in Washington DC in August.
"We're trying to help our people understand that everything that you say and do is subject to monitoring by everybody," Wolfe said. "I mean, my phone's in my pocket right now. We could be recorded right now and not know it."