DoD Unveils New Cyber Strategy; Cartwright Urges Shift From Defense
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Washington: One of the biggest attacks ever on American military networks occurred in March, when another country stole some 24,000 files from a U.S. defense company’s computers, Deputy Defense Bill Lynn said today. While no one mentioned either China or Russia they would be top of the list for any such attack. Lynn disclosed the… Keep reading →
DoD Caps Airlift at 300 C-5s, C-17s; Hill Cannot Refuse
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So how many aircraft does it take to move the world’s largest military force? Not as many as many as you would think, the Pentagon says. In what has at times seemed like a long-running bad joke, filled with terms like ‘floors’, ‘ceilings’ and ‘sweet spots’, the Pentagon has finally capped its strategic airlift requirement… Keep reading →
U.S. Doesn’t Need Next-Gen Bomber, May Scrap Aircraft Carrier
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Washington: America does not need a stealthy long-range bomber able to penetrate deep into remote, well-defended places, America’s No. 2 military officer said this morning. The country, Marine Gen. James “Hoss” Cartwright said, cannot afford to buy an upgraded nuclear triad of new bombers, new intercontinental ballistic missiles and new nuclear missile submarines. Cartwright, outgoing… Keep reading →
Navy May Be Force of Future, But Will Its Ships Sail
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Washington: The head of the Navy, Adm. Gary Roughead, has offered a pretty compelling story line in the last few months, arguing that the next decade will belong to his service as the U.S. withdraws from its land wars and is forced to rely on a steady global presence deliverable only by ship. The Navy… Keep reading →
Senate Presses DIA to Share Raw Data: ‘Connect the Dots’
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WASHINGTON: Lawmakers want the Pentagon’s intelligence shop to play nice with the rest of the intelligence community, and they have the program to do just that. Included in the Senate Armed Service Committee’s version of the fiscal year 2012 defense authorization bill, a Defense Intelligence Agency-led “pilot demonstration” program will allow the Pentagon to share… Keep reading →
Hill To DoD: What’s ‘Up Your Sleeve’ on SM-3 Missiles
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WASHINGTON: With the White House and Congress searching for defense cuts, a number of big-ticket Pentagon programs have been put under the microscope. With the recent release of two separate reports by the Defense Department and Congressional Budget Office, the Missile Defense Agency’s newest ballistic missile program could suffer. The SM-3 Block IIB missile will… Keep reading →
Wobbly Afghan Forces Unready to Replace U.S. Military
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U.S. troops will start pulling out of Afghanistan this summer. This raises the basic question — is the Afghan military ready to take over and would it survive the departure of much of the U.S. military. The plan is still to end the “combat mission,” whatever that means, in 2014, leaving behind trainers, advisers and… Keep reading →
New Cyber Strategy Falls Short
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The Pentagon is set to unveil its new strategy for dealing with cyber attacks. Because the cyber world now touches every aspect of our lives, the debate on what our cyber strategy should be has become one of the most important debates of its kind in our history. We must develop a cyber strategy that… Keep reading →
House Sidling Up to Major Defense Cuts; Lawmakers Look for a Leader
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Washington: They aren’t there yet, but if one peers deep into the voting tendencies of the House Republican Caucus, there are clear indications they are growing more comfortable with the idea of making significant cuts to the Defense Department budget. “The rising tide against defense spending is particularly noticeable among Republicans. A tally by Darcy… Keep reading →
US, Allies Military Spending Foretold to Sink Substantially
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Washington: The bad news: U.S. defense spending is likely — almost certain — to decline. The worse news — our allies spending is also likely to go down even more than it already has. The Council on Foreign Relations has just published what most western strategists and those of our Pacific allies can only regard… Keep reading →