The outgoing leader of Northern Command and North American Aerospace Defense Command highlighted challenges the nation faces during a ceremony Monday, underscoring the threat of peer nations and violent extremists that are attacking our democracy online every day.    

“Our own discord is being perpetuated to create internal strife within our government and amongst our people,” Gen. Glen VanHerck said. 

He called on the audience at Peterson Space Force Base to come together to face that challenge. 

VanHerck handed off leadership to Gen. Gregory Guillot during the ceremony attended by high-level U.S. and Canadian officials, including the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and the deputy secretary of defense.

New commander of NORAD and Northern Command, Gen. Gregory Guillot speaks to the media after a change of command ceremony at Peterson Space Force Base on Monday, Feb. 5, 2024. (Photo by Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette)

The officials lauded VanHerck’s three decades in the military and his work to modernize the combined commands focused on defense of the U.S. and Canada. 

“We are better prepared today to deter, detect and defeat any threats to the homeland,” said Kathleen Hicks, deputy secretary of defense. 

Some of those threats come from North Korea, which was testing cruise missiles in January. Russia and China also pose a threat in the arctic region. In August, the two nations sailed ships close to Alaska in a joint flotilla that U.S. ships shadowed. 

The U.S. has been working on bolstering arctic defense infrastructure for years. For example it put in a long-range discrimination radar to track all classes of ballistic missiles at extensive range at Clear Space Force Station. 

Gen. Wayne Eyre, the Canadian chief of the defence staff, said we are likely at a turning point in history with the world’s authoritarian powers militarizing. In particular, China is acting on its aspiration of global preeminence, he said. 

“Our competitors have become bolder, more active,” he said. 

The outgoing North American Aerospace Defense Command and the Northern Command leader, Gen. Glen Vanherck, addresses the crowd during a change of command ceremony at Peterson Space Force Base on Monday, Feb. 5, 2024.

Jerilee Bennett, The Gazette

Last year, the Chinese sent a spy balloon over Canada and the U.S., sending Northern Command into the headlines. The balloon was shot down near the coast of South Carolina. Previously, VanHerck said the U.S. saw the “best possible outcome” from discovering the balloon because the military mitigated the collection of information while maximizing its own intel gathering.

In his address, VanHerck described a range of work during his 3½ years in leadership, including resettling thousands of Afghan refugees and addressing the COVID pandemic. Millions of vaccines were distributed across 42 cities in 25 states, VanHerck said.

He also described the commands’ ongoing needs around timely funding and updating the acquisitions process to bring it out of the Industrial Age.

Congress needs to come together to fund national security priorities rather than relying on continuing resolutions, he said, noting Washington has failed to pass a budget on time in 13 of the last 14 years.  

Investments are also needed to process information faster using artificial intelligence to give high-level leaders time to make decisions. 

The country must also remain the first to see global threats. 

“You can’t deter or defeat what you can’t detect,” VanHerck said. 

Incoming commander, Guillot was most recently the deputy commander of U.S. Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East. 

He said he expected to bring a “relentless and disciplined” approach to the combined command.