Introduction
This think piece is one-step among many in my career to contribute to the art and science of war—future war in the Information Age. My essay presents to readers both innovative and creative ways to help our military prepare for fighting and winning wars, conflicts, or deterring our adversaries from starting wars from now on, moving forward and changing through 2050, with an intellectual framework looking out even to 2100. The essay presents my thinking about dealing with or preventing war through thought, strength, capability, determination, and credibility in the Information Age. This think piece expands upon my thinking in the essay I wrote in the spring of 2025. The title of this essay was “The Trifecta Spirit, Causes, and Effects, Future War.”
One can and should muse on many current strengths and applaud America’s military prowess. However, one cannot dwell on past and current capabilities without considering a murky, fast-changing future. In fact, one must learn to look at the past, present, and future as a trifecta, a continuum. Thus, one must ponder the future, which often receives short shrift owing to the lure of the past and present problems, as a challenge of quintessence and thus devote one’s thinking to perform a thorough analysis and synthesis, leading one’s mind into thinking of high-quality concepts to prepare for fighting and winning wars in the Information Age. Bolstering the pressing need to take a hard look at the future, one realizes times have changed; technological advancement has quickened, exponentially, making the usual, gradual way of thinking about and changing our views of war now, and in the future, obsolete. This persistent motion of change and the need to expel mental energy on the future takes one’s mind into dispersed and decomposed weapon systems in nonlinear, complex contexts while vying with smart, adaptive foes motivated to destroy us by hate and envy, buttressing these emotions with innovative and creative technology, e.g., artificial intelligence (AI), drones, sensors, bots, et cetera.
My thinking in this paper challenges how one thinks compared to America’s past, current views, and delving into future views (rarely or cursorily addressed) of war in the Information Age. A similar challenging problem plagued my mind and shaped my thinking while I sometimes thought about mobile surface-to-surface missile (SSM) challenges over the past fifty years. The SSM problem first appeared in my mind years ago whilst I tried to outthink a hypothetical enemy who has and would use mobile surface-to-surface missiles armed with conventional, chemical, and nuclear weapons. Disintegrating the whole of SSMs into connected, yet discrete and hidden parts and pieces proved vexing as I thought about discovering their locations, e.g., radar, maintenance, fuel, computer scientists, medical, various mechanics, missiles, warheads, security, vehicles, transporter erector launchers (TELs), command-and-control, et cetera, and on order, to mass, maneuver, fire, disassemble, return to hide-sites, and prepare for the next mission. These imaginary, unpredictable enemies, complexity-shaped operational contexts, and diffused weapon systems, aggregating on order, firing, and then disassembling, has influenced my thinking and pushed my mind into creating the notion of the Matrix War, which comes forth in the last one third of this essay.
Mike,
Murmurings .. ah, starlings do it better than any other and this is an apt metaphor for future war as you describe. I am now going from exposure to absorption regarding your essay: “Information Age Warfare….”. Thanks for including me.
Truly a compelling tour de force of your maturing thought and represents a very coherent synthesis of your work over the years while offering a path for leaders here and now. Your skillful weaving of the environment we face and how we need to proceed is superb. I must say, of all your treatises I previously read, this one was the most enjoyable and meaningful. Perhaps, because I have been on the sideline witnessing your maturing thoughts and recognize the different themes.
I appreciate that you laid out a roadmap for progressing from stasis to action; a roadmap for a blind person but unfortunately not an entrenched moribund bureaucrat whether civilian or military. As you note, bureaucracy is the enemy of your vision as to our path forward. Your blending of Will; what, why and how to think; technologies application; the environment of war (seven silos and four domains); and the Matrix War quilt represents a how to proceed dynamic. As you recognize, there is a lot to chew on and absorb. Implementation requires individuals and organizations to look/think/assess/integrate, relook/rethink/reassess/reintegrate, and look/think/assess/integrate again. Regrettably, this kind of self-analysis and change rarely occurs pre-catastrophic event but is usually a part of the hindsight review that in and of itself leads to false corrective actions. We are always fighting the last war instead of, as you postulate, the future war. I find myself wondering if this is not a bridge too far for our civilian and military establishments?
Again, well done. I can only imagine how exciting but challenging this effort must have been. As I said before, this is really a _tour de force_of your work and you are to be congratulated. Its entry into our civilian military leadership environment will take considerable effort and an attack from multiple directions. I know you already know this and are working on the how to. As I read your essay, I recalled our days preSAMS with its exposure to the OODA loop, the great thinkers prerequisite course, and then seminars, Verdun and wargaming. Your work represents quite an assimilation of all these travels. At this juncture, I am want to wonder where you will archive all your work. No doubt you have given it some thought. There is much to learn, explore and expand upon in your work and it needs a future permanent home. I hope you have designated one. Enough of my ramblings!
Bill Godwin
Review of “War in the Information Age” by BG (Ret.) Wayne Michael Hall
By Ken Robinson, LTC, MI, U.S. Army (Retired), Military Intelligence Hall of Fame, Class of 2004
Brigadier General (Ret.) Wayne Michael Hall’s “War in the Information Age” is a cerebral and visionary treatise on the evolving nature of warfare, underscoring the intellectual, doctrinal, and structural transformations necessary to confront emerging threats. General Hall delivers a meticulously reasoned, multi-domain framework rooted in complexity theory, systems thinking, and cognitive warfare—positioning this work as essential reading for all national security professionals navigating the 21st century battlespace.
His thesis is unambiguous: the United States must break from legacy paradigms and institutional inertia if it is to adapt and prevail in the accelerating, non-linear conflicts of the Information Age. The document is divided into two parts—first exploring the demands on adaptability, organizational design, and thought processes; and second introducing the revolutionary concept of “Matrix War.” In both sections, General Hall blends strategic foresight with a practitioner’s precision, outlining twelve “thrust points” that serve as intellectual waypoints for modernizing warfare at all levels.
One of the report’s greatest contributions is its insistence on “how to think” over merely “what to think.” Hall rightly identifies the U.S. defense establishment’s overreliance on training and rote procedure while underdeveloping creativity, synthesis, and foresight. His call for institutionalizing imagination—through Virtual Knowledge Environments (VKEs), deep think cells, and radically restructured organizational models—should be read as a strategic imperative.
The report’s second half, which defines “Matrix War,” is particularly timely. Hall frames future warfare as an ecosystem of dispersed nodes, autonomous agents (human, AI, and cybernetic), and constant adaptation across physical, cognitive, and digital domains. The proposed emphasis on micro and macro Centers of Gravity (COGs), emergence, and dynamic co-evolution is intellectually rigorous and operationally actionable. It suggests a new grammar of warfare where narrative, tempo, and knowledge dominance eclipse physical firepower.
Importantly, Hall does not retreat into theory. His historical analogies—ranging from Scipio at Ilipa to the ingenuity of Ukrainian drone warfare—ground the reader in real-world precedent, reinforcing the urgency to innovate. His critique of bureaucratic inertia and the failure of DOTMLPF systems to evolve at the pace of threat is precise and deserved.
This report belongs not just in professional military education curricula, but in every SCIF, joint operations center, and policy strategy boardroom. For intelligence analysts, doctrine writers, futurists, and national security leaders, Hall offers more than a diagnosis—he provides a coherent blueprint for adaptation, integration, and victory.
RECOMMENDATION: Military Intelligence Magazine should not only publish this review but consider excerpting key sections of Hall’s work for focused discussion across the Joint Force. The U.S. military can no longer afford to admire the problem of future war from a safe distance. “War in the Information Age” is a strategic warning and a path forward—one we ignore at our peril.