A Forecast On Military Matters

The nuclear situation seems to be what it has been since the Cold War. This will probably last until a generation of leaders who are too stupid to understand mutually assured destruction shows up.

Anti-aircraft lasers are likely to be the biggest game changer- removes air superiority.

Kessler Syndrome - collisional cascading shall eventually happen in orbit. There are natural consequences to putting satellites in orbit, which is why Kessler came up with his hypothesis in the first place. Additionally, small state or even non-state actors may have the resources to ensure the Kessler Syndrome actually happens to degrade or destroy American spying/observational power. Depending on how it was done, this may even destroy GPS, and it appears teaching people how to use maps and navigate terrain no longer seems important to many military leaders.

Overdependency on tech will, obviously, become a problem.

Spying, observance, data collection:


Surveillance will likely move from an unsustainable global level, to regional levels, especially as the anti-air tech becomes more widely distributed. First, there will be a strong desire to stop foreign surveillance, and likely an end to the insane fantasy of recording everything. Instead focus will tend to be much more local, meant to stop immediate crimes and unapproved surveillance. Expect surveillance to become a government monopoly- either the local leaders run it directly, or the locality is being ruled via misdirection.

Light infantry will be ever more necessary, and a professional military class will likely be required, as it is increasingly obvious modern military training and bureaucracy can't understand or handle the development of a modern soldier. They depend ever more on special forces, yet appear to have no idea how to create them and keep them healthy.

We will see a continued rise in the use of light infantry and- as often as possible- deniable activities. Basically, what I mean is this- as localities begin to try and re-assert their own sovereignty, they will begin to notice various state and non-state actors that threaten their ability to do so. As an example, Japan keeps finding North Korean missiles coming uncomfortably close.

Or, a more depressing example- as America begins to break up, some small part of it gets tired of some political action group full of lawyers using lawsuits to enforce their will on the locality. For the locality, the ideal would be a sudden disappearance of the legal threat, and perhaps the activist lawyers as well. This would be especially helpful in dissuading future lawsuits.