The Pentagon Is Preparing Its Special-Ops Forces For A New Era Of Warfare

A West Coast member of Naval Special Warfare Command during a water-climb training event in 2014. Naval Special Warfare Group One  

Business Insider: With job cuts and drug tests, the Pentagon hopes to prepare its special-ops forces for a new era of warfare 

 * The US military is reorienting to great-power competition after 20 years of counterterrorism. 

 * This shift means a change in how US special-operations forces are used. 

* To make that change, Pentagon leaders say, those forces need to shape up and slim down.

After more than two decades of combat against terrorist and insurgent groups in the Middle East, the US military is reorienting for a different kind of fight. 

As the US military has waged those campaigns in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria, strategic challenges have only become bigger and more complicated. 

While the Russian military is suffering heavy losses in Ukraine, US officials continue to see it as a credible and unpredictable near-peer threat that poses an "acute" challenge. China's military is also growing more capable and more confident as Beijing pursues supremacy in the Asia-Pacific region.  

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WNU Editor: Another sign that the big wars are coming back.