BattlelandNational Security
We are entering the final days of command under Sec Gates. The certification of DADT’s repeal is practically sitting at his desk, and I know more than a few of my brothers in arms who are anxiously waiting for him to sign it. If it doesn’t come before he leaves office on 30 June, I know all of us would appreciate the incoming …
BattlelandNuclear Weapons
As the Pentagon’s “efficiencies review” unfolds, one Cold War mainstay of the US military posture is inevitably going to be retired – namely, the land-based portion of the strategic missile triad. The Pentagon is tasked with coming up with $400 billion in savings over the next decade, and so this long-discussed option (and old Mark …
BattlelandVeterans
Before I introduce myself, I want to thank all of the readers of this column for your kind words about my first post. David Self was a wonderful person and a dedicated NCO. Men and women like him are the backbone of our armed forces; they do the tough business in training and in combat. We lose them far too often and it’s always …
BattlelandNational Security
Yesterday I sat in on a promotion ceremony and something struck me. The officer being promoted restated the Oath of Office in which he swore to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States”. The United States military is unique in the way we swear to protect the document that, in a very real way, defines freedom as …
BattlelandPresident Obama
Picking up on Mark’s thread this morning, Galrahn, the eminent blogger at Information Dissemination, likewise sees a fight that’s getting nasty, arguing yesterday that the Army was “lucky” (in that, Will-no-one-rid-me-of-that-meddlesome-flag-officer! way) to see two of its great rivals for the position of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs …
BattlelandNational Security
Wait, the chaplains are in the news… again? Military chaplains never make the headlines. Weird!
According to a letter written on Monday by retired chaplains and religious agencies to the services chiefs of chaplains, gays getting married in base chapels “creates an environment that is increasingly hostile to many chaplains – …
BattlelandNational Security
…who has struggled to help a wayward child, this story from the independent Air Force Times newspaper — about an Air Force general who bent the rules for his son — is heartbreaking for the family, but largely heartwarming for the rest of us. Too often, such abuses of power go uncorrected in the military. It’s worth pointing out when …
BattlelandNational Security
It’s always heartbreaking when a young American in uniform dies in a combat zone. Violent accidental death is always tragic, and almost always preventable. But it’s criminal the way Jimmy Hansen died. The Pentagon issued a terse statement the day after it happened. “Senior Airman James A. Hansen, 25, of Athens, Mich., died Sept. 15 of …
BattlelandNational Security
No matter how tough your week has been, it couldn’t have been as bad as the so-called instructor pilot whose shortcomings have just been detailed in an Air Force report into the crash of a T-6A training aircraft last fall. Because it’s late Friday afternoon and I’m in a pretty good mood, I’m not going to include his name.
BattlelandNational Security
The never-ending saga of the Pentagon’s new aerial KC-X tanker came to a halt, at least temporarily, late Thursday as the Defense Department finally announced it would award the $35 billion prize to the Boeing Co. The Defense Department has been trying to buy a new flying gas station for so long, the top Air …
BattlelandNational Security
Buying military gear is complicated, expensive and dangerous — it’s dangerous because every dollar you spend on an unneeded weapon means you’ve lost a dollar that could have been spent on a needed weapon.
That’s what makes Thursday’s report from the Government Accountability Office so interesting. While the government auditors won’t …
BattlelandNational Security
Excuse me, but that is the Air Force’s top officer scolding the contractors who supply him with weapons. Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz didn’t mince words Wednesday after giving a speech in Washington, D.C.
When an audience member asked him what contractors could do to help the Pentagon during the coming lean times, …
BattlelandNational Security
How isolated are some U.S. posts deeps in the nooks and crannies of Afghanistan? So isolated that they’ve been supplied totally by air — for years. Over two recent days, three huge C-17 aircraft parachuted in 120 bundles of fuel to keep Forward Operating Base Waza K’wah in the Paktika province of Afghanistan up and running. It was the …
