Pentagon plans 90-day base self-sufficiency as UK pushes household emergency stockpiles

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Highlights

The Pentagon's FORTRESS initiative will require all major continental U.S. military bases to independently sustain operations for 90 days, including via nuclear microreactors and microgrids, with up to $2.2 billion allocated so far.
No full cost or implementation timeline is set for FORTRESS, but officials estimate meeting the 90-day resilience target at roughly 500 U.S. bases could cost tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars over decades.
Preparedness initiatives in the U.S., UK, and EU reflect rising concerns over hybrid threats, state-backed cyberattacks, and potential supply disruptions well before any conventional military conflict.

Base resilience plan expands U.S. military requirements

As reported by Fortune, citing Fox News Digital, the Pentagon is developing a requirement for every major military installation in the continental U.S. to sustain essential operations on its own for at least 90 days if war cuts off outside power and supply lines.

The requirement sits under the FORTRESS initiative, short for Federal Operations for Resilience, Troop Resources, Energy, Supply, and Survivability. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth unveils FORTRESS in his Sept. 30 "State of the Force" address and says every major installation would generate its own power independently of the civilian grid, while a follow-up memo lays out plans for a dedicated program office.

The 90-day standard goes beyond electricity, extending self-sufficiency to water, fuel and communications. The plan envisions portable nuclear reactors, large-scale battery storage and microgrids that can disconnect bases from civilian power networks, and the Army in August announces up to $2.2 billion in awards to build nuclear microreactors at five bases, including Fort Bragg and Fort Hood.

FORTRESS also calls for strategic reserves of munitions, fuel, critical minerals, electronics, spare parts and medical supplies. Through the Civil Reserve Manufacturing Network, the Pentagon plans to identify commercial factories that could shift to defense production during a crisis, with technical specifications, cybersecurity protections, contracting arrangements and conversion procedures prepared in advance.

The Pentagon has not released a cost estimate or timeline. A senior defense official tells reporters on Oct. 20 that officials are still assessing the needs of roughly 500 bases in the continental U.S., and Air & Space Forces Magazine says fully meeting the goal could take decades and cost tens of billions of dollars, if not hundreds of billions.

Preparedness drive reflects wider hybrid threat concerns

Britain launches its Be Ready campaign on Oct. 22, urging households to keep three liters of drinking water per person per day, nonperishable food that needs no cooking or refrigeration, flashlights, power banks, first-aid supplies, a battery-powered or wind-up radio, pet food and cash in case card payments and ATMs fail.

UK defense leadership is framing the risk in starker terms. Writing in The Telegraph over the weekend, Defence Secretary Wes Streeting warns that adversaries could have the force strength and war economy to attack by 2030, leaving Britain and its NATO allies a little more than 1,000 days to prepare.

Neither the Pentagon effort nor the British household campaign is presented as evidence that a new war is imminent, and the two measures are not known to be coordinated. But both are shaped by growing concern that hostile states or state-backed actors could target critical systems long before any battlefield confrontation.

That concern is reinforced by earlier official warnings. In a February 2024 joint advisory, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, NSA and FBI say Chinese state-sponsored hackers known as Volt Typhoon compromise IT networks at U.S. organizations in communications, energy, transportation and water, potentially positioning themselves to disrupt essential services during a future conflict.

Britain's 2025 National Security Strategy names Russia as the country's most acute threat, flags Iranian hostile activity and describes China as a sophisticated, persistent challenge. A July government resilience report also points to new conflict in the Middle East, sub-threshold attacks from Russia and several major cyberattacks, while the National Cyber Security Centre handles more than 200 cyber incidents affecting critical infrastructure and its supporting ecosystem between June 2025 and May 2026.

The broader policy direction extends beyond the U.S. and UK. The European Commission in March 2025 unveils a preparedness strategy that calls for guidance to help EU residents keep at least 72 hours of emergency supplies, while U.S. officials continue public preparedness messaging through FEMA initiatives.

In our earlier article on the Bank of England’s push for “bare metal” recovery planning, we explained why UK regulators want major banks to be able to restore critical services even if primary IT systems are compromised. The piece highlighted growing concern that AI is increasing the scale and complexity of cyberattacks, making independent fallback and end-to-end recovery options a core part of financial stability planning.

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