Chuck Brooks, vice president for government relations and marketing at Sutherland Global Services, believes the U.S. should exercise vigilance, adopt intelligence and surveillance technologies and deploy trained security personnel to prevent attacks on soft targets.

He wrote in a guest piece published Monday on Federal Times the recent terror attacks in Brussels have brought a new focus to the U.S. government’s national security efforts.

“While no plots have been recently uncovered directed at our soft targets, it does not mean that such plots do not exist,” he noted.

“Increased vigilance, shared intelligence, continued specialized training, and more investments in security technologies, canine detection capabilities, and dedicated security personnel to patrol common spaces will all serve to make us safer.”

The Department of Homeland Security is eyeing a potential integration of physiological and behavioral sensor systems into checkpoints, according to Brooks.

He recommended that DHS checkpoints adopt facial recognition software designed to feed real-time data into a database of suspected terrorists as well as three-dimensional imaging tools that can work to detect bombs.

Threat interdiction programs should also employ geo-fencing, predictive modeling, situational awareness, interoperable communications and chem-bio sensor technologies, he added.

Peter Levine, deputy chief management officer at the Defense Department, has been tapped to replace Brad Carson as the DoD acting undersecretary for personnel and readiness, Military Times reported Wednesday.

Karen Jowers writes Levine will take over after Carson leaves the Pentagon on April 8.

Levine also serves as Defense Sec. Ashton Carter’s senior adviser on business transformation alongside his role as DoD deputy chief management officer, a position he was nominated for in March 2015.

Prior to joining DoD, Levine provided legal counsel to the Senate Armed Services Committee as a member of the committee staff for almost 19 years, Military Times noted.

Carson submitted his resignation in March after nearly one year in his post.

Outgoing U.S. Special Operations Command Commander Gen. Joseph Votel has handed over the reins to successor Gen. Raymond Thomas during a change-of-command ceremony at MacDill Air Force Base, DoD News reported Wednesday.

Lisa Ferdinando writes Thomas will oversee SOCOM’s operations and approximately 70,000 military and civilian personnel as Votel assumes leadership of U.S. Central Command.

“As we transfer leadership of this command between these two professionals, these two consummate warriors and two soldier statesmen, we also celebrate a certain continuity,” Defense Secretary Ash Carter said.

SOCOM’s operations span across reconnaissance, foreign internal defense, civil affairs, security force assistance and international humanitarian assistance, Ferdinando writes.

Votel noted that SOCOM will continue to face challenges such as terrorism as well as humanitarian and social incidents around the world.

Janine Davidson has began work as the U.S. Navy chief management officer and an undersecretary of the service branch after being sworn in to her new duties on March 22.

The Navy said Monday Davidson’s new role will add to her almost three-decade experience in academic research, national security policy and military operations.

Davidson served as the Defense Department‘s deputy assistant secretary for plans from 2009 to 2012 and headed the creation of military war plans and policies for the U.S. forces’ global force posture.

She was also the founding director of the Center for Complex Operations within the Office of Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict, where she was director for stability operations.

She was a member of the National Commission on the Structure of the Air Force and Reserve Forces Policy Board.

During her work in the academe, Davidson has authored articles on defense issues and taught political science and national security policy at Georgetown University, George Mason University and Davidson College.

Davidson joined the U.S. Air Force as a commissioned second lieutenant in 1988 and became the first woman to pilot a C-130 aircraft.