In the modern world, most nations attempt to minimize the risk of war caused by miscommunication or inadequate communication. As a result, military communication is intense and complicated, and often motivates the development of advanced technology for remote systems such as satellites and aircraft, both crewed and uncrewed, as well as computers. Computers and their varied applications have revolutionized military comms. Although military communication is designed for warfare, it also supports intelligence-gathering and communication between adversaries, and thus sometimes prevents war.

The six categories of military comms are:
• alert measurement systems
• cryptography
• military radio systems
• nuclear command and control
• signal corps
• network-centric warfare

The alert measurement systems are various states of alertness or readiness for the armed forces used around the world during a state of war, act of terrorism or a military attack against a state. They are known by different acronyms, such as DEFCON, or defense readiness condition, used by the U.S. Armed Forces.

Cryptography is the study of methods of converting messages to a form unreadable except to one who knows how to decrypt them. This ancient military comms art gained new importance with the rise of radio systems whose signals traveled far and were easily intercepted. Cryptographic software is also widely used in civilian commerce.