Iraq Airstrikes Are Strategic, Not Humanitarian
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[CORRECTED number of Mt. Sinjar airdrops] The Obama administration and the mainstream media can make the airstrikes in Iraq sound like a humanitarian war, a New Age operation driven not by realpolitik but by the high-minded and/or fuzzy-headed responsibility to protect. In fact, Obama is using deadly force for strategic goals, just like George Bush. The difference —… Keep reading →
Flynn’s Last Interview: Iconoclast Departs DIA With A Warning
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In this exclusive exit interview with Breaking Defense contributor James Kitfield, the outgoing chief of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, talks about metastasizing Islamic terrorism, his struggles to reform intelligence-gathering, and the risk of lurching from crisis to crisis in an Internet-accelerated world. – the editors. “Disruptive.” That’s how Michael Flynn’s enemies… Keep reading →
Quit Kvetching & Let Israel ‘Mow The Grass’: Rep. Doug Lamborn
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Colorado Republican Doug Lamborn is a fervent advocate for US aid to Israel’s missile defense programs, especially the celebrated Iron Dome. In this op-ed, the House Armed Services Committee member argues that such technologies are just one part of a larger strategy for the survival of Israel: living with perennial threats by regularly cutting them back — often… Keep reading →
Afghanistan Won’t Go Down Like Iraq, Gen. Dunford Tells Senate
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CAPITOL HILL: Afghanistan won’t go downhill like Iraq, the next Marine Corps Commandant told the Senate Armed Services Committee, because the US isn’t withdrawing in the same precipitous way. In fact, we’re not withdrawing, just transitioning. “I was one of the thousands of Marines who served in the Anbar province,” now fallen to the Islamic… Keep reading →
US Flying Blind To Looming Terror Plots
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There’s an old trope in intelligence circles that defenders have to be right all the time, while the terrorists only need to get lucky once to execute a successful attack. The knowledge that no one is right all the time makes most counterterrorism experts cautiously pessimistic about the likelihood of another successful terrorist attack on… Keep reading →
HASC Hammers DepSecDef Over OCO Counter-Terror Fund
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CAPITOL HILL: It was a bad day to be Bob Work. At his first public hearing before Congress as Deputy Secretary of Defense, Work received a bipartisan battering from a House Armed Services Committee deeply dissatisfied with the administration’s $58.6 billion request for Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) funding. At issue was not the $53.7 billion… Keep reading →
Train Afghans, Corrall Al Qaeda: America’s Enduring Mission in Afghanistan
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The commander of US Special Operations Command, Adm. William McRaven, will deliver the keynote speech this morning at the National Defense Industrial Association’s Special Operations/Low Intensity Conflict conference. One of the most respected analysts of special forces, Linda Robinson of the RAND Corp., wants to send a message to the admiral’s bosses and to Congress: special operations… Keep reading →
Somali Raid: The Long, Quiet Campaign Behind Friday’s SEAL Strike
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WASHINGTON: Friday’s Navy SEAL raid aimed at capturing the Somali terrorist known as Ikrimah is a glimpse at the future of American warfare, one where a small US combat presence is boosted by widescale support to local forces who bear the brunt of the fighting. The raid itself came like a blitzkrieg from the blue… Keep reading →
ASD Mike Sheehan: Yemen, Somalia Are Models For Mali; Afghans Should Watch
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WASHINGTON: French forces have made great strides driving al-Qaeda-linked insurgents out of Mali’s major cities, said the Pentagon’s top counterterrorism official, Michael Sheehan. But any long-term solution requires local forces in the lead — not Westerners. And those recent successes in Yemen and Somalia provide a model for Mali — and for Afghanistan after 2014.… Keep reading →
Army Commanders Warn On Afghan Withdrawal: Forces At ‘Bare Minimum’
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ARMY AND NAVY CLUB, WASHINGTON: “The biggest concern of my great Afghan security force partners is abandonment,” said Maj. Gen. James Huggins. “We have invested a great deal [in Afghanistan] for a long time,” he said, “[but] the Afghans have done it three times longer than us.” Speaking at an event this morning organized by… Keep reading →