Virtual webinar event with William (Bill) Dempsey (JSOU Academic Chair to USASOC/USAJFKSWCS) and Brian L. Steed (Assistant Professor Department of Military History US Army Command & General Staff College)

In a world increasingly defined by the Compound Security Dilemma and marked by conditions of volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity, no component of the military element of national power is better prepared to help secure vital U.S. interests than the nation's Special Operations Forces (SOF). U.S. SOF is ever-evolving in order to meet the challenges of an uncertain future, which now sees the dawning of a Fourth Age of SOF. An understanding of the ways in which SOF previously deterred conflict and combatted the nation's enemies is necessary, but not sufficient, to meet the challenges of the future. With an eye on the past and a focus on the future, this forum provides a platform in which to consider, debate, and explore what are sure to be many answers to the question, "What kinds of personnel, capabilities, authorities, mission sets, equipment and doctrine will best prepare America's Special Operations Forces to succeed  in the Fourth Age of Special Operations?"

As far back as its origins in World War II, support to National Resilience and Resistance Operations has long been a core competency of Special Operations Forces (SOF). As expansionist authoritarian powers threaten U.S. partners who resolve to push back against subversion and aggression, SOF must be prepared to support partner resilience initiatives. Furthermore, in the event of armed aggression, Joint SOF must be prepared to transition from support to resilience to support to resistance operations. Such operations will likely be carried out in denied or contested environments and require support from the services and collaboration with joint, interagency, intergovernmental, and multinational partners.

This Forum will provide a platform in which to consider, debate, and explore bold and innovative joint SOF-supported trans-regional approaches to resilience and resistance in the context of compound threats, most especially at key geostrategic locations that are consequential for the preservation of the liberal international order.

You are invited to a Zoom webinar.
When: September 15, 2021 1100 am Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Topic: ThinkJSOU Live Webinar: “The Invisible Woman”.

Moderator & Interviewee: Dr. Lillian “Doc” Alessa JSOU Faculty & Author Erika Robuck

Register in advance for this webinar:

https://jsou.zoomgov.com/webinar/register/WN_QN2I8tcsQGCDE0KyF0MqyQ

For the past two decades the United States has largely focused on wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, and counterterrorism operations in response to the 9/11 attacks. Although the U.S. has adjusted its focus away from these conflicts and towards strategic competition, the national security institutions executing the policy change have been shaped by the Global War on Terror (GWOT) and the operational environment it produced. With the rebalance towards strategic competition, SOF practitioners and their partners must appreciate how the recent past shapes the present and forecast what changes are required to be effective in the future compound security environment. Embracing this reality, JSOU's 4th quarter, FY21 "Future of SOF" Virtual Forum will reflect on two important factors that shaped the GWOT operational environment and will continue to shape the compound security environment:  the expansion of the SOF/IC relationship and the technologies that inform and enable operations.

You are invited to a Zoom webinar.
When: August 25, 2021 1100 am Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Topic: Think-JSOU Live Webinar: “SOF Working With the Intelligence Community”.

Moderator & Interviewee: Dr. David Oakley JSOU Faculty & Colonel (R)/Executive Director International Spy Museum Chris Costa

Register in advance for this webinar:

https://jsou.zoomgov.com/webinar/register/WN_GkSz612pTXSQvzSmFyST3w

The imperatives of diplomacy and alliances are again of central focus, and the status of the underlying strategic logic of the United States, China, Russia seeking relative advantage is once again, and still, quo. If anything, the recently released Interim National Security Strategic Guidance highlights that strategic competition is centered more specifically on an increasingly assertive China than a disruptive Russia and that U.S. foreign policy needs to focus on Europe, the Western Hemisphere, and the Indo-Pacific, and be viewed and approached through the lenses of intersectionality, convergence, and compound security. In this, JSOU's third forum on Great Power Competition, we turn our attention to the way strategic competition is playing out in the Indo-Pacific in particular, and neighboring and inter-linked areas more generally. This examination focuses specifically on the ways that risks are being anticipated, calculated, and managed in order to prevent competition from leading to conflict.

The Exploring SOF Identity Forum is for ALL levels of special operations professionals, academics and stakeholders in the special operations enterprise. We seek a diverse audience to engage in discourse on topics including:  1) SOF Utility, 2) Ethics, 3) Emergent and Disruptive Technology, and 4) Diversity and Inclusion. These are some of the most important topics for special operations currently, and our goal is to engage a broad audience - senior leaders, leaders, operators, and academics, any of whom may be engaged in strategic, operational and/or tactical level commands - with unique experiences and ideas in order to truly EXPLORE these emerging problem-sets. Discourse among divergent minds is the objective - getting after the right questions, correctly framing the problems, opening minds - not so much solving the problems at this point.

This event combines the strategic insight and experience of senior leaders from our strategic, operational, and tactical JSOF formations with the theoretical, analytic, and emerging research perspective of top scholars from the DoD. Key topics for the upcoming November 2020 GPC Forum include discussion panels exploring the geostrategic nature of the GPC environment as being distinct from, as well as possibly similar with, many assumptions from the Cold War. Furthermore, the upcoming GPC Forum will explore the role that Westphalian state actors and non-state and sub-state actors play as both adversaries and partners in the compound security environment. The forthcoming forum will explore the emerging challenges to the current global order to better understand the myriad strategic intents of partner forces and adversaries as part of a broad network of international actors. The forum will also analyze varying approaches for gaining "intellectual overmatch" in GPC and understanding how emerging complexity and subsequent paradigm shifts will challenge the global strategic future. Lastly, the upcoming GPC Forum will allow senior leaders, scholars, and stakeholders to apply the newly uncovered knowledge about the GPC environment into the integrated campaign of practice and drive options for future strategic designs, from a combination of thinking-to-know and thinking-to-do innovative design and applied research techniques.

THIS THREE-DAY EDUCATION SEMINAR will provide students with a comprehensive understanding of China’s and Russia's strategic interests and subsequent rise as a recent near-peer competitor that challenges United States international security interests. Over the course of 3 days, participants will cover the following topic areas:
• Historical overview of great power competition and the rise of China and Russia to great power status and possible regional or global competitors to US international security interests.
• Political and economic systems of China and Russia affecting their great power status. • More aggressive Chinese and Russian national security policies that challenge U.S. interests around the world.
• Legacy philosophical Chinese and Russian doctrines that impact strategic aspirations. • Chinese and Russian political and economic structures and ambitions affecting great power status.
• Chinese and Russian accelerated military modernization programs that compete with US and its allies security arrangements.
• Chinese and Russian habitual theft of intellectual property and heavy investment in artificial intelligence (AI). • Chinese and Russian "Gray Zone" operations. • Expansion in the Indo-Pacific region and Africa.