BattlelandNational Security
If you read enough stories of war and mayhem, your eyes tend to roll along from start to finish (assuming you get that far). But every once in awhile you’re stopped cold by a sentence, like this one. What brings you up short is that it surfaces without warning in the middle of a pretty positive story, kind of a reader’s IED. This one …
BattlelandTroops
BattlelandNational Security
The New York Times is reporting this morning that the U.S. and its allies are quietly seeking a nation that might become a new home for Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in exile. There’s just one teeny-tiny complication (beyond the fact that he has shown no willingness to pull up his [tent] stakes and leave):
BattlelandNational Security
Hard to imagine a more striking pair of stories to define Battleland’s mission than a pair this morning – one on the front page of the Washington Post, and the second on Page 1 of the New York Times. They’re flip sides of the same coin, and get to the heart of the debate I hope we can have here.
The Post‘s grim headline says it all:
BattlelandNavy
Seabees Caleb Baker and Seaman Eric Hofmans, of Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 74, take a recent break as they finish building a school in Djibouti, in the Horn of Africa. Their sense of pride comes through loud and clear. It reminds me of my late father-in-law, who was a Seabee for 42 years. He too built stuff all over the …
BattlelandNational Security
BattlelandNavy
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06zbOZIdNFI&feature=player_embedded#at=48]
Always impressive to see young Americans responding to an emergency, like this engine fire Monday aboard an F-18 during a touch-and-go exercise on the USS Carl Vinson.
BattlelandNational Security
We’re launching a major offensive operation here on Monday with the start of our new Battleland blog. What with the ever-changing threats confronting the nation, the three (OK, 2.5) wars the nation is waging, and the budget crunch the U.S. military now faces, there’s not a better time to begin a blog dedicated to the challenges of …
BattlelandNational Security
General-Colonel Alexander Nikolayevich Zelin, Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Federation Air Force, sits in the cockpit of a B-52 during a recent visit to U.S. Air Force Global Strike Command at Louisiana’s Barksdale Air Force Base. Most of us of a certain age are amazed to see a Russian general sitting at the helm of a …
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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