Welcome back to Five Questions for a General, a production of the Modern War Institute at West Point. This series features specially selected cadet hosts who are given an incredible professional development opportunity—to sit down with senior military officers and ask carefully crafted questions about everything from leadership to their unique experiences while serving to their expectations about the future of war.
In this episode, Brigadier General Matthew Ross, commander of Joint Interagency Task Force (JIATF) 401, joins host Cadet Zack Pelosky in the West Point Class of 1974 Recording Studio to discuss the rapidly evolving threat posed by unmanned aircraft systems and the challenge of building effective counterdrone capabilities across the joint and interagency community. General Ross reflects on how the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks shaped his decision to become an infantry officer and influenced a career spent confronting adaptive threats, before explaining how JIATF 401 brings together the military services and federal agencies to address the growing drone threat. He emphasizes the need for layered defenses that go beyond simply defeating individual drones to targeting the networks, launch sites, and operators behind them; discusses the increasing role of directed-energy systems; and draws lessons from the military’s experience adapting to the threat of improvised explosive devices. Throughout the conversation, General Ross returns to themes of rapid experimentation, prudent risk, shared understanding, organizational culture, and the importance of teaching future leaders not simply what to think, but how to think in an era when technology is changing faster than military institutions can predict. Ultimately, he defines JIATF 401’s measure of success as rapidly delivering state-of-the-art counterdrone capabilities, along with the training, authorities, and infrastructure necessary for warfighters to employ them effectively at home and abroad.
