Under FORTRESS America, the Pentagon is preparing major U.S. military bases to sustain essential operations through wartime disruption. Fox News Digital reports a requirement of at least 90 days for major installations in the continental United States, covering electricity, water, fuel and communications.

The implications extend well beyond military readiness. The systems supplying installations also serve homes, hospitals, businesses and the communities where service members and civilian employees live. A conflict that interrupts those networks would create emergencies on both sides of the installation perimeter.

The initiative, known as FORTRESS America, brings that vulnerability into the center of Pentagon planning. Its purpose is to preserve the military’s ability to fight when the infrastructure supporting it becomes unreliable or unavailable.

That leaves a consequential public question: How would the civilian population withstand the same conditions the military is preparing to endure?

FORTRESS America prepares for disruption at home

Pete Hegseth established FORTRESS America through a Sept. 30 memorandum. The program connects military infrastructure, energy security, supplies and industrial capacity under a broader homeland-defense effort.

Its five pillars cover energy independence; supply-chain and defense-industrial resilience; strategic reserves; installation hardening and cybersecurity; and resilience in space and spectrum. Together, those priorities address the resources and communications required to sustain military operations through disruption.

The memorandum also directs the Pentagon’s acquisition and sustainment leadership to establish a program office within 30 days. That administrative deadline concerns organizing the effort, rather than completing improvements across military installations.

In his Sept. 30 address, Hegseth stated the energy objective directly: “Every major military installation in America is going to generate its own power.”

The specific three-month operating requirement comes from internal documents described by Fox. USA Herald has not independently reviewed those documents.

The distinction between announcing a requirement and demonstrating the capability matters. Developing independent power, protecting communications and securing supplies requires construction, equipment, trained personnel and testing. A policy directive begins that process; individual installations must establish that their systems can perform.

The threat reaches beyond the perimeter

The underlying concern has a documented history: an adversary could interfere with military operations by attacking civilian systems that support them.

In a 2024 joint cybersecurity advisory, U.S. agencies warned that Chinese state-sponsored actors known as Volt Typhoon had compromised critical infrastructure networks. The agencies assessed that the activity positioned the actors to disrupt services during heightened geopolitical tensions or military conflict.

The affected sectors included communications, energy, transportation, and water and wastewater systems. Those are services that communities need to function and military installations need to support their missions.

The strategic implication is significant. An adversary would not necessarily have to penetrate a heavily defended installation to interfere with its operations. Disrupting the utilities, transportation or communications serving it could create operational consequences.

That concern also connects civilian protection to national defense. A utility serving military customers may simultaneously supply neighborhoods, medical facilities and employers. Improving the installation’s ability to operate independently addresses one part of that shared exposure.

It does not, by itself, establish how the utility’s other customers would receive essential services during a prolonged disruption.

What happens outside the gates?

Civilian infrastructure failures can spread across systems.

Federal preparedness guidance on power outages identifies effects extending into communications, water and transportation. Outages can interrupt retail operations, fuel stations, banking services and access to electrically powered medical equipment.

Those interdependencies become especially consequential when disruptions persist. A facility may have backup electricity but still need fuel deliveries. A business may retain power while its suppliers or transportation providers cannot operate.

For military communities, the human consequences also affect readiness. Service members, civilian employees and contractors have families, medical needs and responsibilities beyond the workplace. If local services fail, sustaining the workforce becomes part of sustaining the mission.

The Army already recognizes household preparedness as a practical requirement. Its Ready Army emergency guide encourages families to establish communication plans, identify emergency meeting arrangements and prepare supplies. It emphasizes that family members may be separated when an emergency begins.

Those preparations can help households respond. They cannot establish the operating capacity of a regional water system, hospital network or fuel-distribution system.

The civilian preparedness question therefore requires information about institutions as well as individuals: which essential facilities have independent power, how they would obtain supplies, and how their plans connect with installation emergency operations.

Civilian planning exists. Its capacity still matters.

The federal government has established tools for civilian emergency coordination.

FEMA’s logistics and preparedness resources include assessments of state and local logistics capabilities, distribution planning and coordination with private infrastructure operators. Its community-lifelines approach helps emergency managers identify and prioritize services needed to stabilize an incident.

FEMA also emphasizes restoring existing supply chains. Reestablishing the businesses and transportation networks that normally deliver goods can be central to supplying an affected population.

That approach creates an important connection to the Pentagon’s wartime planning. If ordinary supply networks are disrupted across several regions, the ability to restore or replace them becomes a common problem for military and civilian authorities.

A planning framework establishes responsibilities and methods. The resources available to execute it determine what a community can actually sustain.

Assessing that capacity would require local information about backup generation, water access, medical services, transportation and staffing. The FORTRESS announcement alone cannot answer those questions for the communities surrounding hundreds of installations.

Nor does the program’s existence establish that civilian agencies have no plans. It makes coordination between those plans and military requirements a central public-interest issue.

Independent power requires more than a generator

Energy resilience is an early FORTRESS priority, but the technical solution will vary by installation.

Air & Space Forces Magazine reported Oct. 20 that officials were assessing approximately 500 bases in the continental United States. A senior defense official said the Pentagon was still determining costs and evaluating installations’ needs.

Options included microgrids, battery storage, geothermal and solar energy, and natural gas. The reporting also described existing Air Force resilience efforts, including exercises that disconnect installations from normal power to test their response.

That history helps explain both the foundation for FORTRESS and the size of its ambitions. Military energy projects were underway before the new initiative. Extending independent operation across major installations requires a much broader undertaking.

The Energy Department’s microgrid guidance describes systems that can disconnect from the larger grid and operate independently. They combine local energy resources, distribution equipment and controls that balance electricity supply with demand.

Their effectiveness depends on design and operation. A microgrid must have sufficient generation and storage for the facilities it serves. Its operators must also maintain equipment and protect the control systems from cyber threats.

The department cautions that microgrids can involve substantial upfront costs and specialized maintenance requirements. Their communications and control equipment can introduce cybersecurity risks of their own.

For an installation, demonstrating resilience therefore means testing the complete system under demanding conditions. Keeping selected command facilities operating is a different engineering requirement from maintaining normal service across an entire base.

Nuclear power is moving into contracts

One of the most consequential energy efforts is the Army’s Janus Program, which predates FORTRESS and seeks to place nuclear microreactors at military installations.

An Aug. 26 Army announcement identified five vendors and initial locations. Antares Nuclear was paired with Fort Bragg; BWXT Advanced Technologies with Fort Campbell; and General Atomics Electromagnetic Systems with Fort Hood. Radiant Industries was paired with Fort Benning, and Westinghouse Government Services with Fort Drum.

The Army described potential government funding of approximately $2.2 billion across fiscal years 2027 through 2031, alongside private investment. Payments would follow specified technical milestones. The prototype reactors would be contractor-owned and operated.

The service said it expected the effort to support more than 20 reactors across military installations. That is a program objective, rather than a count of operating systems.

USA Herald previously covered the Janus contracts and their oversight implications. The program connects military energy requirements with efforts to develop a commercial market for advanced reactors.

Its funding should not be treated as the total cost of FORTRESS. Janus addresses a particular energy technology; the broader initiative encompasses other power sources, infrastructure protection, supplies and communications.

Fort Benning illustrates the work still ahead

Recent activity at Fort Benning shows how much preparation separates a reactor announcement from an operating installation.

According to an Oct. 19 Army account, installation leaders and Radiant representatives conducted an initial site visit Oct. 16. Fort Benning is scheduled to receive three microreactors to supply selected mission-critical facilities during commercial grid outages.

The visit involved infrastructure mapping, integration with the existing electrical system and discussions with utility providers. Participants also examined emergency response, physical security, safety protocols and environmental compliance.

The Army said final approval of the preferred location depended on environmental and cultural-resource surveys.

Those steps are part of making the proposed capability usable. A reactor must fit the installation’s electrical system and emergency arrangements. Local responders and utilities also have roles in the planning.

The description of selected mission-critical facilities is important. A reactor project serving those facilities does not automatically establish that every building, housing area or neighboring community would have independent electricity.

Nuclear deadlines bring oversight obligations

The policy driving Janus includes a specific deadline.

Executive Order 14299 directs the Army to begin operating an Army-regulated reactor at a domestic military installation by Sept. 30, 2028. It also calls for Energy Department technical advice and recommendations addressing reactors and spent nuclear fuel at military sites.

The deadline applies to that nuclear deployment objective. It does not establish when every installation will meet the broader FORTRESS goals.

For host communities, oversight includes the reactor’s operating responsibilities, emergency procedures, environmental review and eventual fuel management. The executive order itself recognizes the need to address operation, replacement and removal.

Contractor ownership also makes performance obligations consequential. Procurement documents and subsequent oversight will need to establish who maintains the systems, how reliability is measured and what happens if a vendor cannot deliver.

A milestone payment model ties public funding to progress. Long-term reliability must also be demonstrated once equipment is installed and operating.

Costs and readiness need measurable evidence

The Pentagon’s resilience efforts face challenges beyond selecting technology.

A February 2026 Government Accountability Office report found gaps in how the department tracked natural-disaster costs and planned resilience improvements. Across the installations it examined, GAO identified instances where insufficient funding or missing information prevented improvements.

The review concerned disaster recovery, rather than the new FORTRESS initiative. Its findings nevertheless identify existing management issues relevant to a large infrastructure program: incomplete cost information, uneven planning and difficulty translating identified needs into funded projects.

Natural disasters have already demonstrated that installations can lose infrastructure and sustain costly damage. Wartime planning adds the prospect that an adversary could deliberately target dependencies and interfere with recovery.

That makes the conditions used to evaluate readiness consequential. Tests that assume prompt fuel deliveries, available technicians and functioning communications would answer different questions from tests conducted without those supports.

Public accountability will also depend on distinguishing spending from results. A contract award, completed construction project or successful equipment demonstration each represents a different stage of progress. None alone establishes the performance of an installation’s entire support system.

Reporting which capabilities have been tested, what limitations remain and how projects are funded would allow Congress and communities to assess the program’s claims.

Military continuity and civilian survival are connected

FORTRESS America places prolonged infrastructure disruption inside the Pentagon’s planning for war. Its practical objective is to preserve military operations when the civilian systems normally supporting them cannot be relied upon.

For the public, the consequences reach into water service, medical care, transportation, employment and family safety. Those systems also sustain the people who operate, maintain and supply military installations.

The central issue is how military independence will connect with civilian continuity. Installation commanders, emergency managers, utilities and public officials have overlapping responsibilities when infrastructure fails.

The measure of preparedness will be whether those arrangements work together under the conditions the Pentagon is preparing to face—and whether the people outside the gates can continue receiving the services essential to survival.