Colgate University’s Lampert Institute for Civic and Global Affairs hosted Lampert Nonresident Fellow Michael O’Hanlon and General Bryan P. Fenton for a speaker event on Monday, April 13.
W. Bradford Wiley Chair in International Economics and Storing-Hou Director of the Lampert Institute Chad Sparber introduced O’Hanlon and Fenton with their long list of accolades.
O’Hanlon is the inaugural holder of the Philip H. Knight Chair of Defense and Strategy and serves as the director of research in the foreign policy program at the Brookings Institution, specializing in U.S. defense strategy and budgets, the use of military force and American national security policy.
“Michael O’Hanlon is a longtime Colgate partner. We are always grateful for his generosity in meeting with our students, whether through Lampert programming, field trips to Brookings or classroom visits,” Sparber said.
Fenton is a career Special Forces (Green Beret) Officer. He served as the 13th Commander of the U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) at MacDill Air Force Base, Fla. He oversaw all Special Operations for the U.S. Department of Defense with 70,000 Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Special Operations personnel and an annual budget of $14 billion. Before assuming command of USSOCOM, General Fenton served as the Commander of Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), headquartered at Fort Bragg, N.C. Before that, he was the senior military assistant for two U.S. Secretaries of Defense.
“This event came together after [O’Hanlon and Fenton] held a similar conversation for the Allen and Co. Sun Valley conference last July,” Sparber said. “We were eager to bring in a speaker who could discuss the latest developments in U.S. national security.”
Fenton, a graduate of the University of Notre Dame, did not come from a military family. He initially joined the Notre Dame Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) to help finance his education.
“I fell early to the propaganda of [Notre Dame], and there was a very heavy economic piece to [applying to ROTC],” Fenton said.
In his years at Notre Dame, Fenton worked under the late, legendary football coach, Lou Holtz, who would talk about his MBA – not the degree but rather “Made by Army.”
“I love sports, I love athletics and I found a sense of team. I was also inspired by the late Lou Holtz,” Fenton said. “[Holtz said he] learned more about the human, the human endeavor and leadership [while in the military] than any other place [he] had been coaching.”
When asked about his own military career, Fenton told of his first assignment in Berlin, Germany, before and after the wall came down.
“I had a feeling that our nation, our national security apparatus, had something to do with it. And I felt pretty good about that,” Fenton said.
O’Hanlon asked Fenton how to define his work within USSOCOM and JSOC within the broader military framework today.
“All kinds of TV shows, movies and Netflix series revolve around Special Operations and Special Operations Command, and what I’m going to tell you is going to sound nothing like that,” Fenton said. “National security successes are in the most challenging environments, in lands farthest from the U.S., places in the dead of night, places that are contested, congested, megacities, places where there are folks that don’t like us — and win whatever that mission might be.”
Fenton detailed the different regions that Special Operations covers, describing 8,000 people on any given day in 90 countries around the world actively gathering information, strengthening alliances and preparing to spring into necessary action. He discussed the history of JSOC and USSOCOM, tracing them back to Operations Eagle Claw and Desert One and framed the three categories of missions he oversaw.
“The first is hostage rescue by a non-state actor — think ISIS, al-Qaeda. That mission is coming through Special Operations Command. Second is counter-terrorism, where we are in our 25th year as we think back to the tragic events of 9/11. It moves along, it is not over — the war on terror, it’s not done,” Fenton said. “All special operations that might be otherwise directed, some very classified, some not — it gives us a catch-all.”
While discussing USSOCOM post-9/11 and the war on terror, Fenton reflected on his pride in the military’s work in this era.
“[The people I worked with] were some of the best people I have ever met. They’re hand-selected, an equivalent of the NFL combine for all of our teammates,” Fenton said. “Our mission was to ensure that nothing like that ever came out of Afghanistan or the Philippines and hit our homeland ever again — and we were successful. And I add to that that we have a ton of incredible men and women who never came home, and their loved ones — their families — they lost a loved one.”
In the wake of military operations involving Ukraine, Venezuela and, most recently, Iran, O’Hanlon questioned Fenton on the nature of relations between military officials and the Trump Administration.
“While recognizing the sensitivities since you are fresh out of uniform, there are questions about international law, morality, legality, especially with [President Donald Trump] and [United States Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth], who challenge a lot of traditional norms. I am asking, do you think the military voice is still being heard adequately in internal conversations before decisions are made, or do you feel like voices aren’t being heard adequately?” O’Hanlon asked.
Fenton, who worked closely with the last three administrations before retiring in October 2025, expressed complete confidence that his voice would be heard.
“We are absolutely heard adequately — either in-person or on video conference — your voice is absolutely heard. With military input, we check the 1s and the 0s. All of that input is absolutely heard and received,” Fenton said.
O’Hanlon asked Fenton to elaborate further about the current state of military leadership, especially in the face of dismissals of those in Trump’s cabinet.
“We work for the president, we work for the current secretary, we work for the constitution. We make sure we are giving candid military input, and if we get dismissed because of that, we can leave with the confidence knowing that we have generations and generations of talent behind us to step right in,” Fenton said.
Sparber encourages students to keep an eye out for further opportunities to engage with O’Hanlon as he is set to return to campus for another guest lecture in the Fall semester.
“I am glad we were able to give students an opportunity to ask real experts about military conflicts occurring around the globe,” Sparber said.
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Lampert Institute Brings Defense Experts to Campus for National Security Discussion – The Colgate Maroon-News
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