Robert Neller  00:00

The cyber threat is really what's made everybody very nervous about the ability of certain systems that operate our power, our fuel, our shipping, our transportation, that those could be penetrated, brought down, or hacked, or even worse, the most insidious is that they appear that they're up, but they're just off.

Nico Johnson  00:22

National security has increasingly become a core theme and a core tenet. Energy infrastructure can be a strategic vulnerability. Few people have thought about risk and resilience at that scale more than General Robert Neller, the 37th commandant of the United States Marine Corps. General Miller, welcome.

Robert Neller  00:41

Great to be with you. Thanks.

Nico Johnson  00:43

You've spent a career thinking about the national security threats, both foreign and domestic. Today, we're talking about something that people don't always associate with security, and that is our energy infrastructure. Of course, you have seen how dependent our modern military operations can be on energy, fuel, electricity, logistics. When did it become clear to you that energy infrastructure itself could be a national security issue?

Robert Neller  01:12

Well, I think even in the military, and you start off, you kind of take certain things for granted, but as you get more senior, you begin to realize that particularly our bases and stations, both in the United States and overseas, are the places where we deploy our forces. It's where our families live, where we live, and so we must ensure that they've got security, that they've got power, that they've got supplies, that they have fuel that they have all the things that they need to do to operate both in your personal life and in their military life, and as we become more and more digitized, and how we manage all that, it's become more efficient, but it's also created risk, and so as I got more senior, I thought more and more about the risks of our bases and stations from potential cyber penetration, and then there's always a risk of natural disaster. When I was, my, in 2017 there was a big hurricane on the East Coast, just down the road here, Camp Lejeune, and huge amount of damage, and we're used to that. I mean, we're prepared for that. There's hurricanes on the East Coast, there's earthquakes on the West Coast, there's typhoons in Japan and Okinawa, and so we prepare for that. But you're also relying on the community to be able to bring the grid back up, because you're not running necessarily your own grid, you're tied to the local grid, so stuff you think about, but I think it's become the cyber threat is really what's made everybody

Nico Johnson  02:45

very

Robert Neller  02:45

nervous about the ability of certain systems that operate our power, our fuel, our shipping, our transportation, that those could be penetrated, brought down or hacked, or even worse, the most insidious is that they appear that they're up, but they're just off. In other words, they look like they're working, but they're not.

Nico Johnson  03:17

How critical a role is the work that is done at the sort of at the military base level to our national understanding of the way power infrastructure works and the way we secure that power at home and abroad.

Robert Neller  03:32

I think I think the military, Mike, I only speak for the Marine Corps, but I think it's true,

Nico Johnson  03:36

sure,

Robert Neller  03:36

for all the other services has always been involved in environmental things.

Nico Johnson  03:42

Yeah,

Robert Neller  03:43

always taken advantage of opportunities to do, to do solar power, to do wind power.

Nico Johnson  03:51

Yeah,

Robert Neller  03:52

to take advantage of a lot of bases have landfills, they create methane gas, turn that gas into fuel or electricity, and if you check the record, a lot of military bases have won environmental awards for their stewardship of the land.

Nico Johnson  04:08

Yeah, that's right,

Robert Neller  04:08

that the land that they manage, but also the way that they take care of the people there, because we have to pay for it, just like everybody else. It's not free, the service, the department, Department of Navy, the Department of Army, the Air Force has to pay for these things with the budget, and so obviously we're concerned about getting the best value for the dollar and not wasting taxpayer money, so it's a big deal, and it's a big deal, and a lot of the bases also have environmental issues, because the rules were different many, many years ago, and they may have not stored things right. I'm sure you've heard about the PFAS issue on bases, because PFAS was a substance involved in firefighting equipment, and all that. And so it's something you learn real early, and as you get more and more senior, it becomes something that's more and more on your mind.

Nico Johnson  05:00

I've personally experienced. I was mentioning before we started, I was doing a lot of project development earlier. Earlier in my career, we were building rooftop and ground mount systems on bases, mostly in California and down in Yuma, Arizona, places where we needed to provide mostly onsite micro grid type security, I think it's fascinating. I feel like most people don't realize, in as much as the military complex has been responsible for technological innovation all the way to like laptop computers and GPS and the internet, renewable energy has been built with the military complex and aerospace as the primary customers, right? Not to mention, obviously, telecom and off-grid.

Robert Neller  05:48

I think the advantage of military has is we have a bunch of part of the complex, part of the infrastructure of these laboratories.

Nico Johnson  05:55

Yeah,

Robert Neller  05:56

Naval Research Lab, the DARPA labs. In fact, the first time I ever saw a photo electric solar panel was a bunch of scientists from DARPA were out at an exercise we were doing in the desert in California around 2000 and they had this kind of very thin solar film that you can lay on the ground and it would allow you to run radios or certain low level things and so you know, I think about that from time to time, because these, these guys that worked in these labs were very forward thinking, yeah, looking for opportunities for the military, because normally when we go places and we're not going to go somewhere where there's a reliable local grid, it's an expeditionary environment, you're kind of out in the middle of nowhere. You got to bring everything with you, your food, you got to figure out where you're going to get your water, how to make your water clean, how to distribute the water, how you're going to get power, how you're going to fuel your vehicles, what the distribution is going to be. It's a big deal, and as the size of the force gets bigger and bigger and bigger, like it was in Iraq and Afghanistan. It becomes a huge enterprise. It

Nico Johnson  07:05

does. I remember around that time, mid 2000s there was a company called Konarka. I don't know if it ever came on your radar, but they created this sort of printed tent that was supposed to go to the military to basically forward operating bases would deploy these tents, and they would harvest sun through the fabric. I wonder, whatever happened to.. no,

Robert Neller  07:26

I never saw that. It's a great, it's a great idea. Yeah,

Nico Johnson  07:28

I mean, it was 20 years ago, and it was 20 years ahead of its time, frankly. But I, you know, it goes to show how the, the investment the leadership made at the sort of national and foreign security level really does help drive technological innovation across the board. The energy complex today is getting increasingly digital. You mentioned cybersecurity, it's more distributed, it's more interconnected than ever before. From a national security perspective, what vulnerabilities should the energy industry be thinking about that they might not fully appreciate?

Robert Neller  08:04

I think any business out there, particularly they're doing business with the Department of Defense, has to make sure that their network is has sufficient cybersecurity defenses.

Nico Johnson  08:15

Yeah,

Robert Neller  08:15

that their software is up to date, that their patches are all up to date, that they're doing individuals good cyber hygiene, because with AI now, for the tools, I mean, everybody's worried about AI, except the criminals. The criminals are going to be the first ones to adopt it and use it effectively, because they don't have to worry about the morality and the ethics that may be around that. So it's very, very important. I think I think the military does a really good job of working with the private enterprise, particularly on cybersecurity. I know the National Security Agency and Cyber Com are partners with all the commercial concerns that work in that digital space, but and there are certain rules or certain things they have to do in order to work with the Department of War Defense as they go forward, so it's a, it's a, it's a, there's an awareness now, still have to execute, and you still got to do the, do the plan to make sure you're safe and secure, and the people that would do harm to us are not inept,

Nico Johnson  09:22

I recognize that in a leadership position for the Marine Corps, you didn't necessarily work on behalf of or speak on behalf of the entire government or governmental agencies, but I'm thinking about how most energy infrastructure in the United States, at least, is private, it's owned by private corporations, utilities, and the like, independent power producers, and yet we still need to address the fact that the these power plants are national security threats, because so much of our community relies on the service provided by them. How, from your experience. Does effective collaboration work between government and private industry for things of that scale?

Robert Neller  10:07

You know, that's that's a little more challenging. A lot of, like, the most of the big energy companies have their own security,

Nico Johnson  10:13

yeah.

Robert Neller  10:14

And as a federal force, we really have no, no reason nor legal authority to go out and doing those, unless certain laws were changed, or certain certain things were put into effect, or it was a national emergency,

Nico Johnson  10:27

right? The

Robert Neller  10:27

National Guard could be called out to defend these plants. Yeah, I mean, the infrastructure is, it's pretty open. I mean, you drive around your neighborhood, you drive around where you live, there's transmission facilities are out there, anybody could, yeah, could damage those if they so choose to do so. So you know, the one of the advantages of living in a liberal democracy and having the freedoms we do is that we have certain attitudes when we don't want to make people be afraid of that, but we have to be aware of it, and I think, as if there were a real risk, then there would be certain plans put in there, plans that would have to be implemented to make sure that these things were safeguarded. If safeguard the water, safeguard the electricity, safeguard the food supply, safeguard the network for transportation. I mean, you know, it's you know, you get online, you're going to make an airplane reservation, and you have all your data in there, and you assume that the provider, the carrier, is going to protect that data and encrypt your credit card and all that, and that's why everybody's got to be aware that this is, you should never take this for granted.

Nico Johnson  11:39

Yeah, you know, it's.. it makes me think about the general security of these assets, and I presume at the level that you have operated in our government, you have more, have had more visibility into the real, not perceived threats to our infrastructure, and I guess I'm asking the question, where does, where does the line get drawn? Obviously, it's a big gray area, rather than a line between how private enterprise protects these assets and how our government security complex, I suppose, ensures that places of import, where we are generating large power capacity and large water sanitation capacity, are secure. I don't, I don't think most of our viewers would really have a clean understanding of how that works.

Robert Neller  12:36

Let's not forget that every city, state, county has local law enforcement and security forces against state troopers, you got local police, you got county sheriff, they all have a capacity, and they have the ability to do certain things.

Robert Neller  12:51

So, if there were a risk that were identified, you know, certainly the local leadership could, could exercise their authority to put those things, those forces in place to do that before they would go to the federal government. I mean, after 911 remember, you know, huge national emergency, you had federal air, you had US military aircraft patrol in the skies, or you had National Guard and other forces that were that were federalized, and at airports and different things before we, because we didn't have TSA back, we didn't have security force, we didn't, so there are a lot. There is a huge amount of capacity in this country to do stuff like that. Now those individuals that they were told to do that would be taken away from their normal duties in local law enforcement and different things, so you know I'm not trying to paint, I don't think anybody should be terrified and go run around. Oh my god, my god, they're coming, but at the same time you should know that there is a pretty substantial amount of capacity out there to secure this stuff, and the apparatus that we have to try to assess the threats is pretty good,

Nico Johnson  14:02

yeah. And I guess that's what, as a, as an average citizen, we don't have visibility into the apparatus. And I'm curious, around, you know, I think it was, I want to say it was Virginia, where there was the cyber attack that took down, was it the, the fuel delivery system?

Robert Neller  14:20

Yeah, there was a fuel system that got hacked, and they, and, and, so you know, US Cyber Com and the National Security Agency, up and outside of DC,

Nico Johnson  14:30

yeah,

Robert Neller  14:30

they collaborate extremely well with Department of Homeland Security and other agencies within the government, and work with to help people like that,

Nico Johnson  14:39

yeah,

Robert Neller  14:40

and then they're also coordinate our partners with, you know, the major brothers like Microsoft, Meta, different AI companies, and so there we've got a pretty substantial capability. It doesn't mean that we should let our guard down.

Nico Johnson  14:58

Yeah,

Robert Neller  14:58

it doesn't mean that we're not in vulnerable. Bowl, but it's not like we're, we're helpless.

Nico Johnson  15:02

Yeah,

Robert Neller  15:03

and so there's people, I just, you know, there's people out there every night, every day, 24/7 that are up there at Fort Meade that are watching to see that those that might do us harm don't do us harm. I have great confidence in that.

Nico Johnson  15:20

One of the things that I have had the privilege of in the last decade interviewing almost 1000 entrepreneurs is the clear visibility into the archetype, the prototype of successful entrepreneur. Why do you suppose armed services veterans are so consistently successful as entrepreneurs.

Robert Neller  15:44

No, I appreciate you saying that, because I think they are, you know, we were at war for 20 years, and I'm not going to discount on my.. I want to tell all the vets out there, thanks for what you did. You did a great job. Maybe we didn't get the outcome we wanted, but it doesn't deny the fact that you serve with honor and courage and virtue. I think when you're in the military at a very young age, you're put in a position of responsibility, you're put in a position where you're expected to perform, you understand what a mission

Nico Johnson  16:17

is, and

Robert Neller  16:17

you're expected to get it done.

Nico Johnson  16:18

Yeah,

Robert Neller  16:19

and you know that there's, there's really not a lot of gray area there. Either you get it done or you don't, and you get feedback. You get good leadership. The people above you have a responsibility to develop you and train you and mentor you. You're educated, either you know, you read, you study, you go to school, you're around people that are like-minded, so you kind of develop this sense of mission focus,

Nico Johnson  16:48

right?

Robert Neller  16:50

And when you get out, I think most, most people bring that with them,

Nico Johnson  16:54

it's muscle memory,

Robert Neller  16:55

and they just, so they're, they understand that, hey, you told me to do something, I'm going to do it, I'm going to get it done, because that's kind of the way what I've done the last four to 40 years of my life, and it's a really great way to operate, because if you and I are together and you asked me to do something, you have a very, very high level of certainty, then I'm going to do it, yeah, and if I can't do it, I'm going to come back and say, hey, I need some more information, or I need some more resources, right? Or, and you're like, okay, let me go see what I can do. So, we're all focused on getting it done, and I think we have a great military, you know, made up of great people. I learned I should have known this, but I think when my last job is Commandant, I realized that the kind of the foundation, this whole thing is our military to be successful has to do two things. We got to go find really good people,

Nico Johnson  17:48

yeah,

Robert Neller  17:49

and we got to make them into soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, coast guardsmen, guardians. If we do that, I mean, the gears are good, the equipment's important, the technology is important, but without the people it's not going to work, and so far we've been able to do that,

Nico Johnson  18:08

and those same lessons translate so well to the business world.

Robert Neller  18:13

I think they do.

Nico Johnson  18:14

General Miller, thank you. Thanks for swinging. Bye. Enjoy the time.

Robert Neller  18:17

Enjoy the pleasure.

Robert Neller  18:18

Thanks.

Nico Johnson  18:20

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