What is the primary focus of SOFEX?

SOFEX primarily focuses on special operations and national security, showcasing advancements in defense technology and fostering dialogue among military and government officials.

2026 Special Operations Forces Exhibition and Conference (SOFEX)

Name: 2026 Special Operations Forces Exhibition and Conference (SOFEX)
Start: 2026-10-27T00:00:00Z
End: 2026-10-29T00:00:00Z
Location: Amman

Oct 27–29, 2026Amman, JordanIn-person

Registration open

The 2026 Special Operations Forces Exhibition and Conference (SOFEX) is an international event focused on special operations and national security. Hosted in Amman, JOR, from October 27-29, this conference serves as a platform for showcasing advancements in defense technology and fostering dialogue among military and government officials, as well as industry leaders.

Committees & topics

Topics
Manufacturing Technology and Engineering in Defense Production · Advanced Technology in Modern Warfare · Strategic and Defense Materials · Advanced Composites in Defense Platforms · Defense Research and Development · Defense Technology and the Changing Character of War · Special Operations Forces in Contemporary Security · Homeland Security and Critical Infrastructure Protection

Why it matters

SOFEX holds significant importance as a nexus for global defense and security discussions. It provides a unique environment for nations to explore cutting-edge technologies and strategies pertinent to special operations, counter-terrorism, and national defense. The event's location in JOR, a country with a pivotal role in regional stability, further amplifies its relevance, offering insights into the specific security challenges and collaborative opportunities within the Middle East.

For policymakers and military strategists, SOFEX offers a critical opportunity to engage with international counterparts, share best practices, and address complex security threats that transcend national borders. The exchange of ideas and the demonstration of advanced capabilities contribute to a more informed and coordinated international response to evolving security landscapes. The conference facilitates direct interaction between those who develop defense solutions and those who implement them, fostering innovation and operational effectiveness.

Beyond the immediate tactical and technological aspects, SOFEX influences broader geopolitical dynamics. The partnerships forged and the agreements reached at such events can shape defense policies, procurement decisions, and regional alliances for years to come. Understanding the discussions and trends emerging from SOFEX is essential for anyone analyzing international security, defense economics, or the future of warfare.

How to prepare

To effectively engage with the discussions at SOFEX, participants should undertake a comprehensive preparatory process. This includes a thorough understanding of the current geopolitical landscape, with particular attention to regional security challenges in the Middle East. Familiarity with the defense doctrines and strategic priorities of key participating nations, such as USA, GBR, FRA, and DEU, will be invaluable.

Delegates should also conduct a detailed stakeholder mapping exercise (see: "what-is-stakeholder-mapping" and "stakeholder-workshop") to identify key decision-makers, industry leaders, and potential collaborators. Understanding the motivations and interests of these diverse groups will facilitate more productive interactions and strategic networking. Consideration should be given to "hidden-stakeholders" who may exert influence behind the scenes.

Furthermore, an analysis of emerging defense technologies and their implications for special operations is crucial. This includes advancements in areas such as cyber warfare, autonomous systems, and intelligence gathering. Preparing specific questions and discussion points related to these technological trends will enable more substantive engagement. Finally, understanding the "engagement-strategies" employed by various nations and defense contractors will allow for more effective participation in the exhibition and conference sessions.

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 5 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Jordan

Host nation, emphasizing regional security and defense cooperation.

Role in topic

As the host nation, JOR plays a central role in facilitating dialogue and showcasing its commitment to regional stability. The event provides an opportunity for JOR to strengthen its defense ties with international partners and to highlight its own special operations capabilities and needs.

United States

Major defense technology provider and strategic partner in special operations.

Role in topic

The USA is a significant participant, often presenting advanced defense technologies and engaging in strategic discussions on counter-terrorism and special operations. Its presence underscores its commitment to international security partnerships and its role as a leading innovator in defense.

United Kingdom

Key ally in special operations, focused on interoperability and intelligence sharing.

Role in topic

The GBR typically participates to reinforce its alliances and demonstrate its expertise in special operations. Discussions often revolve around interoperability with partner forces and the importance of intelligence sharing in complex security environments.

France

Contributor of specialized defense equipment and counter-terrorism strategies.

Role in topic

FRA is a notable contributor of specialized defense equipment and often shares its experiences and strategies in counter-terrorism operations. Its participation highlights its role in European and global security initiatives.

Germany

Focus on advanced defense systems and training for special forces.

Role in topic

DEU's involvement often centers on showcasing its advanced defense systems and its contributions to the training and equipping of special forces. It seeks to foster international cooperation in defense technology and security training.

Topics & background

The background behind each topic and the actors that shape it.

Manufacturing Technology and Engineering in Defense Production

Defense manufacturing has undergone a structural shift since the 2010s, as additive manufacturing, digital twins, and computer-numerical-control machining have moved from prototyping into the serial production of weapons platforms, munitions, and spare parts. The Russia-Ukraine war exposed brittle Western and Russian production lines, particularly for 155mm artillery shells, missiles, and drones, prompting the United States, EU members, and South Korea to expand munitions output and to reshore critical machine-tool capacity. Jordan, host of SOFEX, has positioned its King Abdullah II Design and Development Bureau (KADDB) as a regional integrator for armored vehicles and small arms manufacturing. The core engineering debate today concerns how to scale advanced manufacturing without sacrificing quality assurance, how to secure supply chains for precision components and rare-earth inputs dominated by China, and how to integrate civilian Industry 4.0 techniques into classified defense work. Export controls under the U.S. ITAR regime, the EU dual-use regulation, and the Wassenaar Arrangement increasingly shape what manufacturing knowledge can cross borders. Capacity remains the binding constraint: most NATO states still cannot match the production tempo demanded by attritional warfare.

Key players

Advanced Technology in Modern Warfare

Advanced technology has become the principal axis of military competition, encompassing artificial intelligence, quantum sensing and communications, hypersonic propulsion, directed energy, and autonomous systems. The 2022 U.S. National Security Strategy and corresponding Chinese 14th Five-Year Plan both identify these domains as decisive for the next two decades, while NATO's DIANA accelerator and the EU's European Defence Fund channel state investment into dual-use research. The battlefield in Ukraine has served as a live testbed, where commercial drones, satellite imagery from Starlink and Maxar, and AI-assisted targeting tools such as Palantir's MetaConstellation have compressed kill chains from hours to minutes. The central policy questions concern governance and proliferation. UN GGE and CCW discussions on lethal autonomy remain unresolved, export controls on advanced semiconductors have tightened sharply since the U.S. October 2022 chip rules, and Gulf states including the UAE and Saudi Arabia are negotiating access to U.S. AI chips against geopolitical alignment conditions. The diffusion of relatively cheap advanced technology to non-state actors — Houthi anti-ship missile attacks in the Red Sea being a notable case — further complicates traditional deterrence frameworks.

Key players

Strategic and Defense Materials

Modern defense platforms depend on a narrow set of critical materials — rare-earth elements, tungsten, titanium, cobalt, gallium, germanium, and high-purity graphite — whose supply chains are heavily concentrated. China processes roughly 90 percent of global rare earths and dominates gallium and germanium refining, both of which it placed under export licensing in 2023 in response to U.S. semiconductor restrictions. Titanium sponge production is concentrated in China, Japan, and (until sanctioned) Russia, creating acute vulnerabilities for Western aerospace primes such as Boeing and Airbus. In response, the United States has invoked the Defense Production Act to fund domestic mining and processing, the EU adopted the Critical Raw Materials Act in 2024 setting extraction and recycling targets, and Japan, Australia, and Canada have formed the Minerals Security Partnership. The core dispute today is whether materials security can be achieved through diversification and stockpiling, through friend-shoring with partners like Australia and the DRC, or through deeper recycling and substitution research. Jordan and other Middle Eastern states with phosphate and potash reserves are increasingly relevant suppliers of secondary defense inputs.

Key players

Advanced Composites in Defense Platforms

Composite materials — carbon-fiber-reinforced polymers, ceramic matrix composites, and aramid fibers — are now structural to fifth-generation aircraft (F-35, J-20), submarine sonar domes, missile bodies, helicopter rotor blades, and modern body armor. The shift to composites delivers weight savings of 20-40 percent over aluminum and steel and enables stealth signature reduction, but it concentrates supply in a small number of producers: Japan's Toray, Teijin, and Mitsubishi Chemical supply the majority of aerospace-grade carbon fiber, while U.S. firm Hexcel and Germany's SGL Carbon round out the Western base. The contemporary debate centers on three issues: export controls (carbon fiber and precursor PAN are listed under Wassenaar and routinely flagged in Iran and North Korea proliferation cases), industrial scale-up to meet hypersonic missile and uncrewed-platform demand, and recycling of thermoset composites, which remains technically immature. China has invested heavily through state champions such as Zhongfu Shenying to close the gap in T800- and T1100-class fibers, with implications for both military aerospace independence and global market structure.

Key players

Defense Research and Development

Global defense R&D spending exceeded USD 130 billion in 2024, with the United States accounting for more than half through the DoD's RDT&E budget and DARPA. China's official defense science and technology spending has grown at roughly 7-10 percent annually, channeled through institutes under the State Administration for Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence (SASTIND) and the seven 'national defence universities.' European R&D has consolidated under the European Defence Fund, launched in 2021 with a EUR 8 billion envelope for 2021-2027, while the UK reorganized its efforts under DSTL and the new Defence Innovation hub. The principal debates concern the speed of capability fielding, the integration of commercial 'dual-use' innovation from venture-backed startups, and protection of research from foreign intelligence collection. The U.S.-led AUKUS Pillar II framework, NATO's DIANA and Innovation Fund, and the I2U2 grouping (India, Israel, UAE, U.S.) all aim to accelerate collaborative R&D among trusted partners. Tensions persist over technology transfer rules, ITAR's friction on allied co-development, and the growing role of non-state research consortia.

Key players

Defense Technology and the Changing Character of War

Defense technology in the mid-2020s reflects a convergence of unmanned systems, networked sensing, precision strike, and AI-enabled decision support. The war in Ukraine demonstrated that low-cost FPV drones and loitering munitions can attrit billion-dollar armored formations, while Israel's multi-layered air defense (Iron Dome, David's Sling, Arrow) and U.S. THAAD/Patriot systems have absorbed unprecedented missile and drone salvos from Iran and the Houthis. The U.S. 'Replicator' initiative announced in 2023 commits to fielding thousands of attritable autonomous systems within two years, signaling a doctrinal shift toward mass over exquisite platforms. For Middle Eastern actors, defense technology procurement is now closely tied to geopolitical alignment. Gulf states diversify suppliers across the U.S., France, China, Turkey, and South Korea; Jordan, Egypt, and Iraq increasingly purchase Turkish Bayraktar drones and Chinese Wing Loong systems alongside legacy U.S. platforms. The unresolved questions concern interoperability across mixed fleets, the ethics and law-of-armed-conflict implications of increasing autonomy, and how export-control regimes will adapt to a world in which the commercial drone industry routinely outpaces military procurement cycles.

Key players

Special Operations Forces in Contemporary Security

Special Operations Forces (SOF) expanded dramatically after 2001, when U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) led counter-terrorism campaigns against Al-Qaeda and ISIS, with British UKSF, Australian SASR, French COS, and Jordanian Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC-J) operating in coalition. Post-2014, the strategic emphasis began shifting back toward great-power competition: SOF units now train Ukrainian forces, conduct deterrence rotations in the Baltics and Indo-Pacific, and form the nucleus of 'campaigning' below the threshold of armed conflict. Jordan's SOF, headquartered at the King Abdullah I Special Operations Training Center (KASOTC), have become a regional training hub for partner forces across the Middle East and Africa. Current debates concern SOF's appropriate balance between counter-terrorism (still active against ISIS-K, Al-Shabaab, JNIM in the Sahel, and Houthi/IRGC-linked actors), security force assistance, hostage rescue, and high-end roles such as deep reconnaissance and strategic targeting in peer conflict. Issues of oversight, civilian casualties, host-nation consent, and the proliferation of private military contractors — notably Russia's Wagner/Africa Corps — also shape policy discussions in NATO and at the UN.

Key players

Homeland Security and Critical Infrastructure Protection

Homeland security as an organizing concept emerged in its modern form after the 11 September 2001 attacks, with the creation of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in 2002 and parallel reforms across allied states. Two decades later, the threat picture has broadened from transnational terrorism to include ransomware against hospitals and pipelines (Colonial Pipeline 2021, Change Healthcare 2024), drone incursions over airports and energy facilities, sabotage of subsea cables and pipelines (Nord Stream 2022, Baltic Sea cables 2023-2024), and state-sponsored influence operations. The 2023 Hamas attacks on Israel and ongoing Houthi missile and drone strikes have refocused attention on layered border and aerial defense, particularly for Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. The central policy questions concern integration of civilian and military capabilities, public-private cybersecurity cooperation around critical infrastructure (energy, water, finance, health), border management amid record migration flows, and the appropriate balance between security and civil liberties. International coordination occurs through INTERPOL, the Global Counterterrorism Forum (co-chaired historically by the U.S. and others, with significant Jordanian involvement via the Aqaba Process), and EU agencies such as Frontex and ENISA.

Key players