BattlelandNational Security
Ever since the U.S. launched military action against Libya, those on Capitol Hill have been paying close attention. “I didn’t even know there was a U.S. Africa Command,” some are now saying of the outfit that ran the initial phase of the no-fly zone over that North African nation. “How come they’re headquartered in Germany instead of …
BattlelandNavy
The Navy — sometimes — moves at the speed of light. That’s how fast it went from announcing it had ignited a boat on fire with a baseball-sized laser beam to hints that this new class of weapon could be a key tool in the frustrating fight against Somali pirates in the Indian Ocean.
A tip of the sailor’s cap to the Office of Naval …
BattlelandNational Security
It was only three months ago that Defense Secretary Robert Gates rolled out $78 billion in Pentagon spending cuts he said the nation could safely make over the next five years. His boss, President Obama, just announced that Gates’ trims are only a down payment on the cuts the Defense Department needs to make.
Over the last two years,
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BattlelandNational Security
The New London Day, which does a good job covering nearby Electric Boat, one of the two sub-building shipyards in this country, has an wallet-opening story today about the company’s proposal to “stretch” its Virginia-class submarines:
EB has been working on a concept for a “stretch Virginia” to boost firepower. The task was to figure
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BattlelandNational Security
BattlelandNational Security
What does it mean when the First Lady of the United States has to unveil a program to help military families when the U.S. is engaged in two-and-a-half wars, a pair of them for nearly a decade? It’s the outcome of lengthy conflicts – with no clear goal – and a warrior class grown apart from the nation it is pledged to defend. It …
BattlelandNational Security
A pair of U.S. troops was killed in Afghanistan last week when Marines, under fire, called in a drone strike that hit friendly troops by mistake, NBC reports. “It’s believed that this is the first time that U.S. service members have been killed by a Predator in a friendly-fire incident,” correspondent Jim Miklaszewski says. A Hellfire …
BattlelandNational Security
As the father of two long-ago Cub Scouts who would enter the Pinewood Derby every year, we have certificates in our basement lauding them for best paint job or best aerodynamic design — in other words, praise to make up for the fact that their little wooden race cars didn’t win (don’t get me started on the mini-sailboats you had to blow …
BattlelandNational Security
As unrest sweeps across North Africa and the Middle East, China seems intent on making sure that whatever “bug” those folks have caught doesn’t infect its citizens — even if it has to kill them to keep it from happening. Beijing’s “negative trend” on human rights continues, contends the State Department’s just-released Country Reports …
BattlelandNational Security
My lone flight in an F-16 over the Gulf of Mexico left me unable to tell the difference between the sky above and the water below. So I can imagine the challenge NATO pilots are having trying to pick out Muammar Gaddafi’s tanks from those being manned by the rebels trying to topple him — especially when the tanks in question were …
BattlelandNational Security
This chart, from a Government Accountability Office report released Thursday, shows how much money we will be spending over the next quarter-century on the Pentagon’s biggest procurement program ever: the F-35 fighter. Check it out: an average of more than $10 billion a year, as far as the eye can see, when our existing F-15s, F-16s …
BattlelandTroops
Defense Secretary Robert Gates is a savvy guy. “A smart thing for government is always to pay the guys with the guns first,” he jokingly told U.S. soldiers Thursday in Baghdad. But it’s not really funny: he warned 175 U.S. troops — on behalf of more than 1 million of their comrades — that their mid-April paycheck might be only 50 …
BattlelandNational Security
Rep. Paul Ryan’s plan to cut the federal budget is garnering a lot of attention because it makes tough choices. Except when it comes to defense spending, that is. Unfortunately, the Wisconsin Republican and chairman of the House Budget Committee embraces the twin tom-toms used by those who think it’s perfectly fine for the U.S. to …
