When America mobilized for World War II, it turned factories into foundries and assembly lines into arsenals. Our adaptive spirit and national commitment ensured success for the “Arsenal of Democracy.” The security of the country depended on it.
Our national security today is just as dependent on a strong economy and capable workforce as it was in 1941. An economy that can build and innovate deters would-be adversaries from believing they can test us, and it enables us to sustain ourselves if they dare try.
Yet the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war have revealed fragility in our industrial base at the very time that China has substantially expanded its own industrial capacity, and, along with others, has used that capacity to advance its military goals. That is why this moment is so pivotal. Across administrations and political lines, efforts to modernize America’s industrial policy and ensure our national security have converged.
Building on this bipartisan momentum, the Atlantic Council has launched the ReForge Commission.
With a unique breadth of experience from commissioners across industry, government, private capital and academia, our goal is clear: Just as the “Arsenal of Democracy” transformed U.S. industry to help win World War II, ReForge seeks to deliver a blueprint for defense and commercial sector support to our national security at speed and scale, including mobilizing effectively during conflict if needed.
In the emerging “Arsenal of Freedom” era, the industrial backbone of national security extends far beyond defense primes. It includes critical minerals, advanced manufacturing, energy systems, logistics networks, software and the broader innovation ecosystem that powers the modern economy. Over the next 18 months, the commission will assess this broad industrial landscape and develop a practical roadmap to rebuild the capacity, resilience and deterrence America’s security demands.
This is not a simple question with simple answers. The commission will confront our nation’s serious sustainment inadequacies and take advantage of our extraordinary economic opportunities. We will be grounded in the needs of protracted warfare, multitheater operations and homeland resilience.
Our work will anchor on three core pillars.
First, the commission will make a realistic assessment of America’s most stressing security needs. We will take account of the significant evolution in the character of warfare, changing workforce needs and the critical infrastructure at home and abroad that must be operable for our security. Without a shared picture of demand, identifying bottlenecks and setting milestones is impossible.
Second, we will transform that demand signal into a modern industrial strategy that can start now and endure across generations. This strategy cannot rely only on temporary surges or episodic subsidies. It must build a software-driven, rapidly adaptable supply chain; expand advanced manufacturing; and continuously embed resilience into the economy.
Third, the commission will recommend incentives to pull innovation, production and talent into the national defense ecosystem before crises force our hand. No industrial strategy will work without the right incentive structures. Industry cannot build mobilization capacity without clear, consistent investment from government, and government cannot take advantage of America’s innovation potential if the commercial sector will not work with it. Likewise, capital will not flow into transformational manufacturing unless risk and reward are aligned, and workforces will not expand absent durable cause to do so.
Using these three pillars, the commission will advance its central objective: to build a defense and manufacturing base so undeniably capable of scaling, sustaining and rapidly upgrading production that would-be adversaries conclude they cannot exhaust us through protraction. Geopolitics are shifting daily, but the United States can strengthen its industrial and technological foundations today to adapt with speed and purpose.
Encouragingly, Congress and the Pentagon are taking action on sweeping reforms to acquisition laws and processes — important steps toward a more competitive, agile defense ecosystem. The commission will build on these efforts, developing a bipartisan plan that reaches beyond acquisition into industrial strategy, cross-sector alignment and the broader economic foundations of national resilience.
We will not measure our success in the production of a report, no matter how compelling. We have both written, and read, many reports. Rather, we will judge the commission’s effectiveness in the delivery of actionable recommendations — solutions capable of breaking the status quo and reshaping the defense-industrial ecosystem to meet the needs of the warfighter and secure the nation for the era ahead. We will listen to industry and government, map real bottlenecks and propose concrete ways to close them.
This work will not be easy, nor should it be. The stakes are too high to do anything less.
Kathleen Hicks is the 35th U.S. deputy secretary of defense and co-chair of the Atlantic Council’s ReForge Commission. Mac Thornberry is a former chairman of the House Armed Services Committee and a 26-year member of Congress representing Texas’s 13th District, and co-chair of the Atlantic Council’s ReForge Commission. The ReForge Commission is led by the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security and its Forward Defense program.
