Gen. Paul Nakasone, commander of U.S. Cyber Command and director of the National Security Agency, designated the Cyber National Mission Force as a new subordinate unified command of the Department of Defense during a ceremony held Monday at Fort Meade in Maryland.
CNMF serves as the joint cyber force of the U.S. military responsible for safeguarding the U.S. from cyberthreats through defensive, offensive and information strategies and activities, USCYBERCOM said Monday.
The new sub-unified command is composed of 39 joint cyber teams with over 2,000 service and civilian personnel who help ensure election security, counter cyber espionage, ransomware and other threats and support contingency operations.
Nakasone, a six-time Wash100 awardee, said CNMF “has always taken that first step forward” as part of USCYBERCOM.
“This has been a command that has understood from Day One, that our strength comes from a series of partnerships,” he added.
Maj. Gen. William Hartman, commander of CNMF, said the designation seeks to recognize the evolution of CNMF into a “forward-looking organization.”
“It’s about building a sustained readiness model that enables us to stay in a fight. It’s about our people: how we develop a dynamic model to recruit, assess, train and retain the world’s most talented cyber force,” Hartman noted.
