Singapore has launched a new military service to enhance its defenses against an evolving spectrum of security threats in the digital domain — something that experts say Japan could learn from, even if it is unlikely to follow such a model anytime soon.
First announced in March, the city-state’s Digital and Intelligence Service (DIS) — a fourth military branch alongside the army, air force and navy — was formally inaugurated Friday in a ceremony presided over by President Halimah Yacob.
The new military branch consolidates the Singapore Armed Forces’ cyber and command, control, communications, computers and intelligence units set up in recent years under a unified structure to enable the SAF to better train and fight as an integrated networked force while defending the country’s critical infrastructure.