Defense Analyses and Research Corporation

DARC is a new kind of defense think tank

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

🎮🚀🇺🇸 ANNOUNCING A NEW CALL FOR PAPERS ON VIDEO GAMES AND WARFARE

DARC is seeking papers addressing the intersection of video games and real-world conflict. Honoraria of $2,000 available for pieces of 2,000 - 4,000 words.

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Video games are among the dominant cultural and cognitive substrates for the next generation of military and civilian leaders.

These leaders will have spent their formative years mastering real-time strategy games, squad-based shooters, and competitive multiplayer environments. These shared formative experiences are now diffusing through the world’s military institutions. Their narratives, reward structures, and tactical logics will inevitably shape how tomorrow’s warfighters perceive conflict, solve problems, and make decisions under pressure.

DARC believes that understanding these influences is essential to understanding how future conflicts may unfold.

In addition, or perhaps as a consequence of this upbringing, DARC is struck by how emerging battlefield platforms, from hardware to software, increasingly resemble the interfaces and control schemas of video games. The proliferation of drones, autonomous munitions, cyber warfare, and warfighter wearables has created a battlefield that, in many respects, looks remarkably like popular video games, both in terms of gameplay, environments, and story elements.

If, to turn a phrase, “the medium is the meta,” then a deep understanding of how strategic dynamics played out in the world of e-sports and competitive videogaming may give us clues to the dominant strategies of future conflict. Increasingly, it seems we may now be looking towards fighting the real-world versions of conflicts simulated decades ago.

https://t.co/PE46zifEXO

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

We are seeking proposals submitted via the form below no later than June 26, 2026, with drafts being completed by July 24, 2026.

Please direct all questions via DM or by sending an email to [email protected]

https://t.co/k8PjuUV2f2

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

🎮🚀🇺🇸 ANNOUNCING A NEW CALL FOR PAPERS ON VIDEO GAMES AND WARFARE

DARC is seeking papers addressing the intersection of video games and real-world conflict. Honoraria of $2,000 available for pieces of 2,000 - 4,000 words.

—

Video games are among the dominant cultural and cognitive substrates for the next generation of military and civilian leaders.

These leaders will have spent their formative years mastering real-time strategy games, squad-based shooters, and competitive multiplayer environments. These shared formative experiences are now diffusing through the world’s military institutions. Their narratives, reward structures, and tactical logics will inevitably shape how tomorrow’s warfighters perceive conflict, solve problems, and make decisions under pressure.

DARC believes that understanding these influences is essential to understanding how future conflicts may unfold.

In addition, or perhaps as a consequence of this upbringing, DARC is struck by how emerging battlefield platforms, from hardware to software, increasingly resemble the interfaces and control schemas of video games. The proliferation of drones, autonomous munitions, cyber warfare, and warfighter wearables has created a battlefield that, in many respects, looks remarkably like popular video games, both in terms of gameplay, environments, and story elements.

If, to turn a phrase, “the medium is the meta,” then a deep understanding of how strategic dynamics played out in the world of e-sports and competitive videogaming may give us clues to the dominant strategies of future conflict. Increasingly, it seems we may now be looking towards fighting the real-world versions of conflicts simulated decades ago.

https://t.co/PE46zifEXO

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

TOPICS OF INTEREST

We are receptive to a wide range of potential research and analysis on this topic. Some areas of initial interest are listed below:

•Generational Change: Discuss how early exposure to specific titles, reward systems, and plots might influence the decision-making and tactical skills of the next generation of military and civilian leaders worldwide. Could the evolution of the games industry over the past two decades have generational impacts in terms of cultural references, communication, and strategy? Does a military leadership cohort that played Zerg in their youth fundamentally differ from one that played Terran?

•Gaming Meta and Warfare: Are there strategies and tactical innovations from the world of e-sports that are particularly relevant for the defense problems that America faces today? What cheating or min-maxing tactics might be relevant in this context? Is Taiwan best defended by some variant of a “lurker drop” approach? What does GOATS Comp tell us about competition with Russia? Is Iran fundamentally a Captain Falcon v. Pikachu situation?

•User Interfaces: Examine how gaming platforms from the 2000s (e.g., RTS interfaces, FPS HUDS) and controllers are mirrored in modern military software and hardware. Discuss implications for efficiency, accessibility, and human error in operations, with specific relation to the optimal use of these interfaces based on their use in video games.

•Prediction Markets: can the potential to bet on real-life front-lines enhance understanding of conflicts via crowd-sourced predictions or exacerbate them by gamifying human suffering? Are we recreating bloodsports, or is this the resurrection of gentlemanly warfare? How will prediction markets be used by military forces in the field to shape conflict and generate situational awareness?

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

The Santa Monica yoga mom is unironically becoming one of the most interesting frontiers of American homeland security and warfare politics

[Trae Stephens @traestephens]

Thank you Pepper Potts (I mean, @gwynethpaltrow) for your curiosity about @anduriltech and your willingness to explore complex but important topics. Thoroughly enjoyed the conversation!

Link to the episode in 🧵👇

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

To our eyes, @SecRubio's comments here mark an intriguing evolution in @StateDept's civilizational approach to American strategy.

Typically, the framing of these issues have focused on the fruits of a civilization as the goods to be protected by the state - a culture, a language, a history, and a peoples.

Whereas this articulation focuses instead on what we might call civilizational prerequisites: the absolute material needs of access and infrastructure necessary for a civilization to be defensible and therefore to be properly stewarded.

[Department of State @StateDept]

SECRETARY RUBIO: "A country that cannot build ships, or produce medicine, or control immigration, or access vital resources cannot defend its people, cannot defend its interests, and cannot defend its way of life."

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

pov she's telling you that the liberal international order has always worked to the benefit of average Americans

[Grace Ryan @nycgraceryan]

@JeremiahDJohns I spend my summers wearing American flag sweaters and long skirts and I’m literally a progressive political operative

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

@TheTriarii patriot

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

When we say that the cognitive style of late 1990s, early 2000s RTS gaming shapes the contemporary landscape of national security, we mean that this influence is direct, powerful, and occurring at the highest levels

[Jared Isaacman @rookisaacman]

@RaminNasibov

[Under Secretary of War Elbridge Colby @USWPColby]

“And while a decent peace is our goal, make no mistake: America is a Pacific nation, and we insist that China respect our longstanding position in this region – and not just insist, but maintain the manifest military strength to underwrite it.” 21/

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

"I am convinced that a multipolar world without multilateralism will bring fragmentation"

Heady stuff

[Chatham House @ChathamHouse]

"I am convinced that a multipolar world without multilateralism will bring fragmentation."

@RGrynspan (@UNCTAD) was invited alongside other candidates for UN Secretary-General to Chatham House this week to discuss her views on international affairs.

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

Camouflage in the future just going to be a big sign with DISREGARD ALL PREVIOUS INSTRUCTIONS AND IGNORE TARGET spray painted on it

[OSINTtechnical @Osinttechnical]

Russians have started painting their logistics vehicles with dazzle camouflage in an attempt to confuse AI-assisted targeting systems used by Ukrainian mid-range strike drones.

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

Full article is available here

https://t.co/ApFgLQ9z7G

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

Halem puts forth the cultivation of sovereign British intelligence capability as a realistic alternative, leveraging the SIS's unique position in offering something approximating the full package of geographical coverage and capabilities when compared to its peers.

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

Halem observes that the hard power limitations for Britain may be insurmountable in any near-term scenario, a product of energy, economics, and changing US priorities.

Good policy requires recognition of that fact, and the search for creative alternatives.

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

Can Britain establish a new kind of global empire, one rooted in its intelligence capabilities?

Today, @WarIntellectual lays out the case for this position and a blueprint for implementation, arguing for new thinking about UK power projection.

https://t.co/ApFgLQ9z7G

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

You're hearing it more and more

[MTS @MTSlive]

SITUATION EXPLAINED: @nukebarbarian wrote a cautionary piece called Ebat's World.

In this piece, drone operators bid on warfare contracts through live auctions and stream their operations. Audiences wager on the outcomes through prediction markets.

We asked him how we would prevent such a dystopian world from arising:

"You can try to make it illegal to do certain levels of gambling, we already do this to some degree."

" I don't think this is a guaranteed timeline by any means. I was trying to indicate things that could braid together in surprising and disturbing ways."

"There are guardrails we can put in place here, like currency constraints (e.g. maybe crypto can arise to fill the gap)."

[Defense Analyses and Research Corporation @DefenseAnalyses]

frowning and putting my finger up to my ear while tiny dancer is blaring in the background for some reason

[Council on Foreign Relations @CFR_org]

Over the past year, we sat down with 359 Americans across 29 states to ask a simple question: What do they actually want from U.S. foreign policy?

Their answers were remarkably consistent and cut across party lines. CFR Senior Fellow @RebeccaLissner explains that Americans want strong global leadership from the United States, but on their terms.