RKE2 was built from the beginning with the unique needs of the U.S. Government in mind. Its goal was straightforward: reduce the amount of work required to deploy a secure, compliant Kubernetes platform and help mission teams move from infrastructure to capability faster.

By incorporating many of the security controls required in government environments directly into the distribution, RKE2 significantly reduced the configuration burden placed on administrators. Instead of starting with a general-purpose Kubernetes distribution and hardening it from the ground up, teams could begin with a purpose-built foundation and focus on the smaller set of environment-specific decisions required for their deployment.

Modern military operations are no longer confined to well-connected, centralized environments. Today’s missions increasingly operate at the tactical edge in contested, disconnected, and resource-constrained settings where command and control (C2) systems must function without constant reach-back, specialized personnel, or fragile sustainment models.

In these environments, mission success depends on edge platforms that are secure by design, rapidly deployable, and sustainable under real-world conditions. Anything less introduces risk to timelines, to operators, and ultimately to mission outcomes.

At Rancher Government Solutions (RGS), we believe mission-ready C2 at the edge requires a fundamentally different approach, one built for operational reality, not ideal conditions.

Twelve to sixteen hours per month. That’s how long it used to take operators to manually validate DISA STIG compliance across Kubernetes clusters.

Now, it takes seconds. 

Compliance Operator, part of Rancher Government Carbide, automates DISA STIG validation for RKE2 clusters using a lightweight, integrated compliance operator. It fundamentally changes how federal teams validate cluster hardening against DISA-published STIGs. No third-party tools or extra configurations. Just faster, continuous compliance built directly into the platform. 

Greetings! Let's dive into Rancher's Harvester product and explore some of the synergies that emerge when we combine the infrastructure and orchestration layers using a unified API. That unified API is the Kubernetes API. So, instead of using the usual cloud-agnostic tools in our toolbox (Terraform, Ansible, etc), we are going to try to use ONLY Kubernetes to deploy a guest RKE2 cluster onto Harvester and then install Rancher Multi-cluster Manager on that cluster. Ideally we do this with minimal steps and avoid usage of complex bash scripts.

The United States Army’s outdated command and control (C2) infrastructure limits its operational efficiency, particularly in critical combat scenarios. The agency’s “C2 Fix” initiative aims to address these issues by simplifying network infrastructure across Army formations. With over 85% of the Army’s units still relying on less agile legacy systems, the current C2 framework lacks the flexibility to support rapid, secure, and scalable communications between intelligence, sustainment, and tactical operations.      

Open-source software (OSS) offers flexibility and innovation, but federal agencies face challenges when integrating these tools into mission-critical operations. Rancher Government Solutions (RGS) understands these challenges and an RGS Subscription ensures that agencies using OSS like Kubernetes receive the stability, security, and support required to meet and exceed government standards.

Containerization and microservices architecture have become foundational in modern software development and operations. Gartner predicts that by 2026, over 90% of global organizations will be running containerized applications in production, up from less than 40% in 2021. This shift brings both opportunities and complexity for enterprise IT. 

The balance between modernizing IT infrastructure and preserving existing investments presents a major concern for the U.S. Government. By allowing customers to leverage new technologies without the constraints of vendor lock-in or hardware limitations, RGS is transforming the approach to IT modernization, ensuring a future-proof IT environment with unparalleled flexibility and choice.

Overview and Introduction

In today's highly connected world, we sometimes forget that there are many instances, especially in the government, where environments need to be intentionally isolated from external connectivity, creating what is known as an air-gapped or disconnected environment. In some cases, these environments may have external connectivity, but that connectivity is extremely unreliable or is limited in it's communication, creating what is known as a denied, disrupted, intermittent, and limited impact environment.

In this deployment guide, we will be effortlessly installing the core Rancher Stack, including Rancher Kubernetes, Rancher Multi-Cluster Manger, Longhorn, and NeuVector. In about 15 minutes, we will have a three-node Kubernetes Cluster (RKE2), with lifecycle management (Rancher Manager), persistent storage (Longhorn), and cluster security (NeuVector).