Discover why U.S. drone dominance depends on three interconnected pillars—policy, production, and protection. In this SC Media perspective, Brett Freedman explains how strengthening regulatory frameworks, scaling industrial capacity, and advancing counter-drone defenses are essential to maintaining national security and protecting critical infrastructure in the age of drone warfare.

As drone warfare reshapes global conflict, the U.S. industrial base is falling behind—exposing tactical gaps, supply risks, and strategic vulnerabilities that demand urgent investment and policy response.

Explore how the U.S. can maintain competitive advantage in advanced technology against China by strengthening the “electric tech stack” that underpins defense, infrastructure, and innovation. This insight from SC Media highlights why semiconductor supply chains, critical materials, industrial policy, and cross-sector collaboration are essential to national security and economic resilience.

ICIT organizes its focus area on critical infrastructure into three interdependent pillars that incorporate four of the sixteen critical infrastructure sectors: Energy & Grid, Water & Wastewater, and Transportation & Telecommunications. In 2026, we will be examining these pillars through the lens of topics like Defense Critical Infrastructure, Cyber Force, Drones, Federal Civilian Executive Branch, and Data Centers & Artificial Intelligence.

In this SC Media perspectives piece, Dr. David Mussington, CISSP DDN.QTE makes a strong case for a standards-first, layered “drone wall” that fuses multi-sensor AI, SAPIENT interoperability, and non-kinetic + attritable effects to defend at scale — a practical way to bend the cost curve against mass UAS attacks. The Alliance, he writes, can field this now by networking existing sensors, enforcing interfaces, and training together.

The first test of a leader is presence. People may not remember the exact words you use, but they remember how your presence made them feel—steady, seen, or supported. That signal sets the tone in every setting, from the workplace to the family table. I’ve felt it in courtrooms, combat zones, and countless rooms where steadiness mattered most. In those moments, leadership was presence—grounded in preparation, steadied under pressure, and sharpened by focus, all sustained thro