Senior Leaders Discuss Recruiting STEM Candidates Into Special Ops

During a panel discussion at the Special Operations Forces Week 2026 convention in Tampa, Florida, today, a pair of senior SOF leaders discussed how to bring more recruits with science, technology, engineering and mathematics backgrounds into SOF formations.

Navy Adm. Frank M. Bradley, commander of U.S. Special Operations Command, and Marine Corps Gen. Francis L. Donovan, commander of U.S. Southern Command, discussed the topic during a panel discussion on SOF integration into the joint force.

When asked how to attract more SOF recruits with STEM backgrounds, Bradley said the best way to gain such talent is to challenge those individuals.

“You have to provide challenges for people who are STEM-oriented to solve, [and] the good thing is the world’s providing plenty of those [challenges] for us. … I don’t have to create new challenges to attract STEM-oriented professionals who want to fight and use their intellect to solve those problems, [because the problems] are abundant,” Bradley said.

He elaborated that the SOF community is currently going through a transformation that is focused on modernization aimed at establishing operational test and evaluation elements within SOF formations that are capable of working with engineers and acquisition professionals to solve difficult problems through both technical means and creative approaches.  

Bradley also spoke about the need to introduce children to STEM-related subjects early.

“We need to realize that tomorrow’s recruits coming into the military are sitting at your kitchen tables. And so, if you want more recruits in the future who are STEM-oriented in the military, we need to give our families an opportunity to be exposed and inculcated with an interest in [STEM],” Bradley explained. 

As one example of how to get children to take on such an interest, Bradley spoke about the military’s partnership with Congress and key policymakers to invest STEM outreach dollars into academic institutions with high-quality STEM cultivation programs. 

“[We can] focus [families] on our counterpart force concentration centers to help those families to have opportunity for robot camps, drone camps, coding camps — anything to do with introducing that interest at a very young age — so that, as we all aspire to, we can make the next generation smarter and better than ourselves,” Bradley said.

Donovan weighed in on the topic, noting the importance of future service members needing to maintain a balance between being heavily STEM-oriented and also warrior-centric.

“I think there’s a split point here we have to make sure that we’re very aware of. … We want a place for everyone,” Donovan explained in reference to finding such a balance. 

“Because I still think whether it’s SOF or conventional forces, we have to have young Americans that … when the chips are down, they leave that ramp in the back of a [military vehicle] and move into the hardest day of their lives; and they need teammates from the left and right that [also] have the grit to see the mission done,” he continued.

Donovan added that, while he views STEM and advanced technologies as value-added to the force, military technology should never fully replace humans.

“We can never … step away from the fact that, anytime we talk about autonomous systems, I’m never ever saying that there’s not going to be a human included. … Because someone still has to place their foot on a piece of ground to declare victory, and that will never go away,” he said.

The War Department has invested in STEM in one form or another since 2005. Presently, the department’s DOW STEM program mission is to “inspire, cultivate, and develop exceptional STEM talent through a continuum of opportunities to enrich our current and future Department of War workforce poised to tackle evolving defense technological challenges,” according to the program’s website.