UPDATED: Adds Changes To Air Force Space Command CAPITOL HILL: Principal DoD Space Advisor. Gone. Air Force’s new A-11 space staff. Kaput. Defense Space Council. Dead. And that’s really just the beginning of what the Senate and House Armed Services Committees hath wrought to national security space in the National Defense Authorization Act. The… Keep reading →

  WASHINGTON: A massive maintenance backlog has idled 15 nuclear-powered attack submarines for a total of 177 months, and the Navy’s plan to mitigate the problem is jeopardized by budget gridlock, two House Armed Services Committee staffers told Breaking Defense. That is almost 15 submarine-years, the equivalent of taking a boat from the 2018 budget… Keep reading →

ANNAPOLIS: The President, Congress and the Navy now all want the fleet to grow from the current 278 ships to 355, but that will probably take until the 2050s, the Navy’s No. 2 civilian said Wednesday. “To quote the Rolling Stones, you can’t always get what you want,” said Thomas Dee, who has served for… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: After almost a decade of reporting on the Army’s crucial networks, I’d thought they’d started to get things right. Boy, was I wrong. At a hearing this afternoon of the House Armed Services air and land subcommittee, the Army left lawmakers shaking their heads when they announced they plan to shut down the controversial… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: The Navy is making cyber investigations automatic after any mishap, starting with the at-sea collision that killed 10 sailors aboard the USS McCain. They don’t expect to find any evidence of a cyber attack this time, admirals emphasize, but they’re using the McCain as a test case. If there was a cyber attack, however, it’s… Keep reading →

UPDATED with more from Rep. Smith WASHINGTON: The congressional budget process is headed for “a complete meltdown” in December, and the most likely outcome is a year-long Continuing Resolution, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee believes. The government is already on a three-month CR until December, which is bad enough, said a visibly frustrated… Keep reading →

CAPITOL HILL: Congress’s repeated budget malpractice and the Navy’s flawed policies combined to cause the accidents that killed 17 sailors, the Navy and the GAO say. Legislative dysfunction means budget cuts, caps, and delays have chronically shortchanged training and maintenance across the fleet, forcing sailors to work 100-plus hours a week to try to catch… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: It probably won’t do much to fend off vigorous efforts by House lawmakers to create a Space Corps, but the Air Force has picked most of the people to staff its new A11 space office in the Air Staff. The pick for assistant deputy chief of staff, Shawn Barnes, for space operations is pretty deft,… Keep reading →

Over the past two years, America’s near-peer competitors have reorganized and integrated their air, deterrent, missile defense, cyber and space forces to make them more effective. But U.S. competitors aren’t just reorganizing; they are building and fielding capabilities that create new vulnerabilities for the U.S. in space. As Gen. Jay Raymond, head of Air Force… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: Space Corps. It sounds cool. You get visions of space marines and pilots saving the universe. In their latest blast against the Air Force, though, Reps. Mike Rogers and Jim Cooper are more, well, down to earth. They argue that the failings of big-ticket programs such as OCX and FAB-T offer ammunition that a Space… Keep reading →