A Pentagon plan called FORTRESS would have every major U.S. military base able to keep running for at least 90 days without outside help, according to documents Fox News reviewed. What the plan is, why the Pentagon says power comes first, and what the same chain looks like in a house.
On September 30, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced a program called FORTRESS, short for federal operations for resilience, troop resources, energy, supply and survivability, in his State of the Force address at Marine Corps Base Quantico in Virginia. "Every major military installation in America is going to generate its own power, independent of the civilian grid," he said, according to DefenseScoop. He called the department "the insurance policy for the entire nation," the Pentagon's own news service reported.
On October 6, Under Secretary of Defense Michael Duffey signed a memo setting up a FORTRESS America program office, DefenseScoop reported. It names five areas of work: space and spectrum resilience, hardening installations and their computer systems, energy independence, supply chains and the defense industry, and a strategic defense reserve.
The 90-day figure came later. On October 25, Fox News reported that, according to Pentagon documents it reviewed, every major military installation in the continental United States "would be expected to sustain essential operations independently for at least 90 days, including access to electricity, water, fuel and communications." The documents also describe portable nuclear reactors, large battery systems and microgrids that can cut a base off from the civilian grid, along with reserves of munitions, fuel, critical minerals, electronics, spare parts and medical supplies.
The Pentagon has not published the 90-day standard itself, and no total cost or completion date has been announced, IBTimes UK noted. A senior defense official said on October 20 that the Pentagon was assessing energy needs and costs across about 500 installations in the continental United States.
Sean Parnell, the Pentagon's chief spokesperson, who led the initiative, explained the thinking to Fox News. "We don't want to rely on standard civilian municipal infrastructure to run our national defense," he said, calling that reliance "an intolerable risk." His summary: "Power is combat now." And the reason: "Without electricity, you lose communications, water, logistics, assembly lines and just basic military command structures."
Parnell told Fox that "the next conflict will likely be fought on multiple fronts" and that when it comes, "global supply chains will break." The plan is about readiness rather than a warning of a particular attack: IBTimes UK noted that the public announcement describes a broader resilience strategy and does not name a global war as its only trigger. It covers military installations; it is not guidance for the public.
Parnell's chain, power first and then communications and water, runs the same way through a town. The EPA warns that when water utilities lose grid power, the effects "may include pressure losses and boil water advisories, a reduction or cessation of water treatment," and that firefighters may not be able to get water from hydrants. Utilities fall back on generators, and generators run on fuel. In the EPA's example from Hurricane Florence in 2018, a North Carolina utility kept every plant running on generators, but its preparations were almost not enough when its own fuel supplier lost grid power and could not deliver.
In a house, Ready.gov says the refrigerator keeps food cold for about four hours and a full freezer holds its temperature for about 48 hours. It says to take an inventory of everything you need that runs on electricity, plan batteries or a power bank for those needs, have a flashlight for every person in the house, and find out whether your home phone works in an outage and how long its battery backup lasts.
Medicine takes planning. Ready.gov says to talk to your medical provider about a plan for medical devices that run on electricity and to find out how long your medications can be stored at higher temperatures. If the power is out for more than a day, it says to throw away medication that should be refrigerated and to ask your doctor or pharmacist for a new supply right away.
If you run a generator, Ready.gov says to use it only outdoors, at least 20 feet from windows, doors and attached garages, with carbon monoxide detectors on every level of the house.
A long power outage at home is the Grid Down scenario. MyPlann counts how many days your household could last on what is actually in the house, from water to fuel, and tells you what runs out first.
The public guidance asks for days, not months. Ready.gov says you may need to survive on your own for several days. Britain is asking households to be ready for three days, and Japan will ask for at least three days and a week if possible, as Issue 48 covered.
What the Pentagon's plan adds is the order in which things fail. In Parnell's words, without electricity you lose communications and water. A household that has water stored, a way to charge a phone, light, food that needs no refrigerator and a plan for its medicine has covered the same chain on a smaller scale.
This issue reflects what was known on Wednesday, October 28, 2026. Hegseth's announcement, the program's full name and his "insurance policy" remark are from the Pentagon's news service; his remark about the civilian grid, the October 6 memo and its five areas from DefenseScoop. The 90-day figure, the contents of the plan and Sean Parnell's remarks are from Fox News, which reviewed the documents; the October 20 count of installations, the absence of an announced cost or completion date, and the note on the plan's scope from IBTimes UK. What a power outage does to water utilities, and the Hurricane Florence example, are from the EPA's power outage checklist for water utilities. The household advice is from Ready.gov's power outage page and its kit page.
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