I sat down for a short time last week with Under Secretary Of War For Research And Engineering Emil Michael.

BIO: Mr. Emil Michael serves as the Under Secretary of War for Research and Engineering (USW(R&E)) and Chief Technology Officer for the Department of War(DoW), spearheading the Department’s efforts to ensure U.S. military technological superiority and keep the DoW at the forefront of innovation. In this critical role, he provides strategic direction and oversight for the DoW’s entire research, development, and prototyping enterprise, including direct oversight of organizations such as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and the Missile Defense Agency (MDA).

My initial question was about AI. Under Secretary Michael responded AI is an enterprise corporate use case, deployed for intelligence to fuse it for war fighting, logistics, modeling and simulation. 

He stated DOW is very competitive on AI, and quantum computing. We are leveraging corporate capabilities -- if it exists, let’s use that.

When asked about DEI, Michael state he believed for the most part the bureaucracy for that ideology was already dismantled.

I inquired about small nuclear and he lit up to discuss small nuclear transportable energy to help power bases, data centers, and to move forward energy capabilities for the Army, Navy, and DIU (The Defense Innovation Unit (DIU), also called Unit X, is a United States Department of Defense (DoD) organization founded to help the U.S. military make faster use of emerging commercial technologies). 

Michael described how the technology has to be ruggedized.

I mentioned STEM support in the military and he described the long-standing vast network of labs inside DOW. However, he mentioned DOW also funds MIT Lincoln labs, and is always looking to find new areas of expertise.

The Under Secretary described how he reduced 'critical technologies' from 14 to 6. These include quantum computing, battlefield info dominance, biomanufacturing, biologics to create new materials, contested logistics.

I asked about space and energy sustainment with new technologies; he replied space is the energy of the future.

I look forward to a more in-depth discussion with the Under Secretary in the near future.