The potential operational utility of individual soldiers equipped with performance-enhancing
exoskeletons is one of the key surprises of the 20XX series. Players in game after game
organized their ground combat operations around relatively small, highly trained, exoskeletonequipped light infantry units and special operations units.... In the first game in the 20XX series, however, players stripped exoskeleton-equipped forces
from larger units and employed them separately to take better advantage of their operational and
tactical mobility, inherent stealth, and lethality. In conjunction with supporting LRPS and ISR
assets, they were used as a distributed, mobile, ground-combat strike force tasked with finding
and attacking an adversary’s key anti-access systems (e.g., mobile EM-gun batteries, ASCM
launchers, and missile TEL vehicles) to clear the way for follow-on forces. This asymmetric
approach sought to exploit the ability of a relatively small number of stealthy ground forces to
engage an adversary’s anti-access forces under conditions in which they would be ill-equipped to
defended themselves: a close-in ground attack. (See Figure 2 for a schematic of exoskeleton equipped forces used in distributed strike operations.) This use of exoskeleton-equipped forces to
roll back an adversary’s anti-access capabilities was repeated in several subsequent games.
Facing an adversary with robust anti-access capabilities that constrain the number and type of
ground forces that could be successfully inserted into the theater of operations and sustained,
players have sought to increase the combat power of those relatively few friendly troops that can
be deployed by taking advantage of robotic capabilities of various kinds. As part of this overall
strategy, exoskeleton-equipped light infantry have generally been the force of first resort, for
both urban combat (and more generally, in most forms of close combat) and non-linear,
distributed strike operations. Air drop via stealthy, long-range, air mobility aircraft has been the
preferred method of strategic entry for 20XX ground forces, followed by covert undersea
delivery.23 Operational and tactical mobility was generally provided by the inherent capabilities
of exoskeleton-equipped forces (e.g., long-endurance mobility under a load, coupled with tactical
burst speed), by personal mobility aircraft, and stealthy intra-theater mobility aircraft.