gates

House and Senate members today approved language for a homeland security appropriations bill that would give the Pentagon the right to continue withholding photos of the abuse of detainees in its custody, the ACLU reported on Wednesday.
The ACLU has been trying to get its hands on those photos, as well as other records, since 2003 [...]

To follow up on Spencer’s post about today’s New York Times story citing a secret Pentagon report that finds that “1 in 7 Rejoin Jihadists After Release,” it’s worth noting that not only has the Pentagon not provided any way of knowing who 45 of the 74 alleged recidivists are, but apparently only five of [...]

On Monday Defense Secretary Gates took a major step toward rebalancing U.S. military spending.

Robert Gates has gone to extraordinary lengths to circumvent early lobbying of Capitol Hill by the powerful defense industry.

Let’s say there’s this really expensive fighter aircraft that you don’t use in the two wars you’re fighting. You’ve got 183 of them coming, but that’s just not enough. Over the years you’ve typically said that you want 381 of them. But then the secretary of defense points out that you don’t use the planes [...]

Well, this took some nerve:  the military commission judge overseeing the prosecution of Abd al Rahim al-Nashiri, a Saudi citizen accused of plotting the 2000 attack on the USS Cole, just refused President Obama’s request to delay proceedings for 120 days, The Washington Post reports.
Although the other judges all readily complied, as was widely expected, [...]

Lara Jakes buries the lead in her story about all the money ex-Raytheon lobbyist Bill Lynn will make if he sells his company stock to take the No. 2 spot at the Pentagon:
Testifying before the Senate panel Tuesday, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said stringent ethics rules are a major reason it is difficult to fill [...]

Bill Gertz has kind of a breathless piece in today’s Washington Times about how Defense Secretary Bob Gates is asking many of the Pentagon’s political appointees to remain in their posts. Until such time, that is, as Barack Obama’s Pentagon transition team and defense aides replace them. See why that story is important? Me neither.

The good thing about staying on as defense secretary is that you can fly into Kandahar whenever you feel like it. And, like a baller, you can announce new troop deployments. Yochi Dreazen hangs out with Bob Gates and reports:

In my piece on Friday about Bob Gates’ agenda in the Obama administration, Larry Korb raised the question of what outmoded programs he’s going to ax. After all, anyone can posture about defense reform. Budgetary priorities are where the adults distinguish themselves from the children.
So it’s fortuitous that Julian Barnes — no, not the novelist, [...]