Adversary intelligence officials target American soldiers on popular internet platforms such as LinkedIn, Indeed and Reddit, hoping to find individuals who will share military secrets that could be beneficial in a future conflict, Army intelligence officials said at the Association of the U.S. Army conference in Washington. (Adam Lowe/U.S. Army)
WASHINGTON — U.S. soldiers in 2025 are more likely to face the enemy online than on the battlefield, as American troops are targeted daily by foreign intelligence officers seeking details on weaponry and tactics, top Army officials warned this week.
Adversary intelligence officials target American soldiers on popular internet platforms such as LinkedIn, Indeed and Reddit, hoping to find individuals who will share military secrets that could be beneficial in a future conflict, Army intelligence officials said Wednesday at the Association of the U.S. Army conference in Washington.
The primary illicit actors represent America’s top foes, such as China, Russia, Iran and North Korea, who have increasingly been found working together to seek the latest American secrets, said Lt. Gen. Tony Hale, the Army’s intelligence director.
“The adversary is collecting on us every day, no matter where we are,” Hale said. “They’re trying to connect virtually with service members, with family members, with Department of War and Department of Army [civilian] employees and with contractors to gain that advantage that they believe will help them win the next fight.”
To counter the increasing enemy online activity, the Army has reorganized its counterintelligence community in recent years, standing up Army Counterintelligence Command in 2021 to oversee its 3,000 civilian and uniformed agents, the general said. Those agents have conducted more than 600 national security investigations — including more than 200 currently open cases — since 2021, leading to the arrests of 25 soldiers and former soldiers suspected of espionage.
And the workload is getting larger every year, Hale said.
That led Congress last year to grant the Army’s civilian counterintelligence agents new authorities meant to bolster their ability to disrupt foreign intelligence operations aimed at soldiers and Army civilians, Hale said. Those new authorities grant civilian agents the power to conduct searches, execute warrants and make arrests outside of Army posts, where most troops and service civilians live, the general said. He expects his civilian counterintelligence agents to begin using those new off-base authorities by the end of 2025.
Scott Grobatt, the Army counterintelligence special agent in charge for the northeastern region, said soldiers can become entangled with adversary intelligence officials both intentionally and unwittingly. Some are motivated by money provided in exchange for secrets, and others may be tricked into taking fake secondary jobs writing articles that could reveal useful information to foes, he said.
Leaders from the squad up through battalion-size units must be plugged in with their troops to identify when something seems amiss, including potential enemy spying activities, said Grobatt, who served as an infantryman before entering the Army intelligence community.
“There’s one thing I know after 36 years in the Army, that is problems are identified and solved through the leadership chain,” he said. “Squad leaders and team leaders, when you’re in the barracks and you hear someone talking about, ‘I just got a job to write a white paper about that new piece of technology sitting in the motor pool.’ … Intervene, have a conversation, call the [local] counterintelligence agent so we can talk to them.”
Army Counterintelligence Command has uncovered several recent cases of soldiers willingly engaging in espionage. A Fort Bliss, Texas-based soldier, Spc. Taylor Lee, was charged in August with the attempted transmission of national defense information to a foreign adversary and attempted export of controlled technical data without a license.
Lee, 22, had sought to provide Russia with sensitive information about the M1A2 Abrams main battle tank, according to the Justice Department.
Last year, Army Sgt. Korbein Schultz, an intelligence analyst from Fort Campbell, Ky., pleaded guilty to six counts of transmitting classified information to a foreign government. Officials charged Schultz provided a Chinese agent protected information about his unit, about several weapons systems and aircraft, and on U.S. military lessons learned about the Ukraine-Russia war with applications “to Taiwan’s defense,” in exchange for about $42,000. The 25-year-old received a seven-year prison sentence in April.
Army officials warned that adversary intelligence officers were likely present this week at the AUSA conference in Washington, where two massive trade room floors sported the latest weapons technology from top American and allied firms. (Eric Kayne/Stars and Stripes)
Hale and Grobatt warned that adversary intelligence officers were likely even present this week at the AUSA conference, where two massive trade room floors sported the latest weapons technology from top American and allied firms. Army Counterintelligence Command flooded the conference with “dozens of agents,” Grobatt said.
“They are here to copy, steal, mimic, reverse-engineer our next generation-lethality that will save our soldiers’ lives and win our wars,” the special agent said.
Hale said those efforts showed why Army Counterintelligence Command is among the busiest units in the service.
“These guys are the only ones that are engaged with the enemy every freaking day,” the general said. “It can be a scary story when you talk about counterintelligence and what the adversaries’ capabilities are, but … I would put this team up against any of our adversaries, and we’ll get after it.”
