Adapting Faster Than the Threat: Lieutenant General Cristian Dan on NATO’s Future Fight

NATO nations are confronting a battlespace defined by persistent surveillance, contested logistics, hybrid aggression, and accelerating technological disruption. The lessons emerging from Ukraine and other recent theatres are reshaping assumptions about command and control, manoeuvre, resilience, and deterrence itself.

Ahead of Defence IQ's Modern Warfare Conference 2026, Lieutenant General Cristian Dan, Commander of Multinational Corps South-East, shares his perspective on the strategic and operational shifts redefining modern land warfare.

Drawing on experience spanning Cold War-era training environments, operational deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan, and NATO leadership on the Alliance's eastern flank, LT Gen Dan explores the realities of warfare in an era where "the collapse of certainty" has transformed the battlefield. Across this interview, he discusses the growing importance of mission command, societal resilience against hybrid threats, the integration of unmanned systems, procurement reform, and the critical balance between technological advancement and human adaptability