- Well, welcome back.

The US military is feeling the effects

of the coronavirus pandemic.

Troops and their familiesinfected with the disease

is only scratching the surface,only part of the story.

CBN News National SecurityCorrespondent Eric Philips

joins us with that; Eric.

- Well Jenna, you said it best.

We saw how quickly

this illness can spreadin tight confounds,

for example, aboard theUSS Theodore Roosevelt

during the saga there.

But one military experttells me that it's important

to take a look at really the big picture,

what happens beyond this current crisis,

and he says it's importantto do everything we can

to prevent the spread of what he calls

the slow erosion of ourmilitary superiority.

- We're gonna have a pivotalmoment when the United States

is gonna reclaim or relinquish

our military superiority inthe next two to five years.

- [Eric] Bradley Bowman studies

US defense strategy and policy.

He fears the Americanmilitary is in danger

of being replaced asthe world's superpower.

- There are areas where the Chinese

or Russian military have capabilities

that are more advanced than ours,

and it pains me to say that.

- [Eric] Bowman says foryears updating equipment

took a backseat to the War on Terror.

He says only in the past few years

has a focus been put towardresearch and development.

The results of that work

will be ready to implementin the next few years,

unless the COVID-19-strained economy

puts it on the back burner.

- And so what that means is

we'll have done all thisresearch and development efforts,

and got all these systems ready to field

to our troops who desperately need them,

and then we're not gonna beable to afford to ride them,

and I fear what that could mean.

I fear this gravely,

a historic kind of end, if you will,

to US military superiority.

- [Eric] Meanwhile, Bowmanwarns, our adversaries

are consistently looking for weakness.

He points to Russia, that evenin the middle of a pandemic,

is still sending nuclear-equipped bombers

to test our defenses in Alaska.

- Their assessment of our strength

is that we are getting, relativeto them, weaker and weaker,

and that's gonna invite the very thing

that we are designed to avoid.

- And while Bowman says thisis, indeed, an urgent situation

he wants to stress that right now

the US maintains sufficient combat power

to protect the American peopleand our interests abroad,

but he says we want to keep it that way,

and COVID-19 certainly presentsmore challenges to that.