Axios Event: Lawmakers focus on shoring up U.S. defense capabilities for future battles

WASHINGTON – Controlling raw resources, boosting domestic supply chain potential and advancing cyber warfare plans have become key strategies for national security, policymakers said at an Axios event.

Why it matters: These capabilities will shape battlefield outcomes for years to come, and militaries are feeling the pressure to succeed.

Axios' Colin Demarest spoke with Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), Rep. Pat Fallon (R-Texas) and Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.) at the June 25 event, sponsored by Accenture.

What they're saying: Rounds warned of U.S. reliance on China's rare earth minerals, and China's long-term strategy to monopolize that market.

• "They started planning this 20 years ago, and what we've been doing is kind of being asleep at the switch, because our analysis has been what's the least expensive way to get this stuff, and it's on order on demand," he said.
• "We have done very little to actually build the internal supplies here in the United States that we need," adding that the U.S. should be able to source some of these critical minerals domestically and from Canada and Africa.
• Fallon expressed interest in strengthening U.S. missile defense strategies like the Golden Dome. "You could see what the Iron Dome has done for the Israelis," he said. "You're not going to eliminate every threat, but you could mitigate the threats. I don't want to be playing catch up, and right now, unfortunately, in a couple of these areas we are."

The big picture: In addition to shoring up U.S. supply chains, cyber and autonomous warfare are other areas of concern.

• Understanding what cybersecurity looks like for the companies in the U.S. defense industrial base is a must, Rounds said. "In most cases, they can't do it by themselves. We've got to be able to lay out the standards for them," he added.
• "What we have seen is the future wars will be fought in the homeland with cyber, we already are seeing that," Fallon said. "We're going to see it with AI, of course, and we're going to see it with how computers function in the future, but also with unmanned vehicles."
• "We are the technology wizards. We want to keep that, we want to maintain that, we want to increase that," Dean said. "As we see with Ukraine and other conflicts, more and more of what is going to happen is going to be done autonomously, without manned vehicles."

Content from the sponsored segment:

In a View From the Top conversation, Ken Merriam, Accenture managing director of supply chain and operations, data and AI, emphasized the rising focus on supply chain resilience as an important asset for companies.

• Autonomous supply chains powered by AI agents and quantitative solvers that forecast demand and optimize inventory are speeding up the process of identifying issues and executing solutions, he said.
• "This sounds like something out of the future, but it's actually here," Merriam said. "In fact, what we found from surveying about 1,200 companies is that 25% of commercial firms [have] already started their autonomous supply chain journey."