Defense Secretary Bob Gates and Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, are before the Senate Armed Services Committee to defend their defense budget in the face of GOP criticism over its program cuts. (Comptroller Robert Hale is in there too.) Their opening statements are careful More…
We’ll know for sure imminently, but McClatchy reports Secretary Bob Gates’ full defense budget may cut purchases of the Marines’s V-22 Osprey aircraft — a kind of super-helicopter that can operate at long ranges – which the service absolutely adores. Here’s the Marine Commandant, Gen. James Conway, speaking More…
The final round of details on the fiscal 2010 defense budget will be released today, but as Colin Clark of DOD Buzz reports, members of Congress are sick of Defense Secretary Bob Gates’ omerta strategy to block the armed services and their Hill patrons from reversing his More…
We should be getting the final round of specifics from the Pentagon about what programs and platforms and systems and operations are funded at what level for fiscal 2010 in the next day or so. Already Defense Secretary Bob Gates has announced what he’s putting on the chopping More…
The Republican Party is hurting for foreign policy and national security standard-bearers. Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), chairman of the GOP’s flagging Senate recruitment effort, is hurting for a measure of relevance. Cornyn’s scheduled speech to the American Enterprise Institute next Thursday, entitled “No Time To Cash In A More…
Defense Secretary Bob Gates walked into the Air Force’s War College at Maxwell Air Force Base in Alabama today and explained why he cut the F-22 fighter jet:
I keep rubbing my eyes and jabbing at my forearm with the point of a safety pin, and yet I keep seeing the secretary and the chief of staff of the Air Force saying a mournful public goodbye to the F-22:
Make no mistake: Air dominance remains an essential
First, Capt. Richard Phillips, the captured commander of the Maersk Alabama, is the bravest man in the world right now, having tried — sadly unsuccessfully — to swim from his Somali pirate captors while the USS Bainbridge floats nearby. Why doesn’t the Bainbridge just pursue the pirate sanctuaries? More…
In February, I was told that Michael Vickers, the assistant secretary of defense for (deep breath) special operations, low-intensity conflict and interdependent capabilities, was a key player on Defense Secretary Bob Gates’ defense-budget review. Over at DOD Buzz, Greg Grant has an interesting look at Vickers’ whole deal: More…
Brian Beutler continues to bird-dog the “Obama is cutting spending” meme that’s both untrue and useful for rolling back Defense Secretary Bob Gates’ reforms. Here’s what Gen. James Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told me yesterday (again):
“These are not
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