WASHINGTON: Incoming National Security Advisor Michael Flynn issued a ringing endorsement today of American exceptionalism and declared, “we have always been the indispensable nation and we always will be.” Flynn also appeared to hint at plans, supported by most GOP defense lawmakers, to reduce the size of the National Security Council staff. Without providing any details, Flynn…
By Colin ClarkYesterday, Joan Johnson-Freese argued that complicit and compliant media have helped the Pentagon overhype the threat of war in space — to the point that exaggerated US efforts to prepare for conflict might help start one. In today’s article, she outlines how US policy got to this point and how to correct it. — the…
By Joan Johnson-FreeseWASHINGTON: Donald Trump wants “a plan for soundly and quickly defeating ISIS.” But Kimberly Kagan, a leading advocate of the troop surges in Iraq and Afghanistan, warns that, this time round, “we need to recognize there are limits on how fast we can accelerate.” Part of the reason is tactical, Kagan told the DefenseOne Summit…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.WASHINGTON: Worried by Sen. John McCain’s efforts to slash the general officer corps, abolish Frank Kendall’s job and restrict the size of the National Security Council, the White House today threatened to veto the Senate defense policy bill. Accusing the Senate Armed Services Committee of trying “to micromanage DOD” by taking those and other measures, the…
By Colin ClarkUPDATED from SASC briefing WASHINGTON: In their dueling drafts of the annual defense bill, Senate Armed Services Committee chairman John McCain has staked out bold positions where the House’s Mac Thornberry is cautious — and McCain is cautious where Thornberry is bold. Specifically, according to a summary his staff released last night, McCain’s bill is bold…
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.CAPITOL HILL: The Quadrennial Defense Review is dead. Long live a unified combatant command known as Cyber Command. Ok, it doesn’t quite ring like Long Live The Queen, but you get the idea. House Armed Service Committee staffers briefed reporters on some of the more important bits of the 2017 National Defense Authorization Act. Top…
By Colin Clark and Sydney J. Freedberg Jr.WASHINGTON: The Senate and House Armed Services committees’ push to review the foundational law underpinning today’s US military, known as Goldwater-Nichols, was given a boost today by a group of top former generals and mostly Democratic Pentagon officials. Their biggest takeaway: the National Security Council is too big and takes activist positions on military operations instead…
By Colin ClarkWASHINGTON: The enemy of my enemy is….who exactly? That is the question U.S. Central Command planners confronted recently when they targeted the Khorasan Group, a hardcore Al Qaeda cell in Syria suspected of planning terrorist attacks against the United States and Europe. Not surprisingly, the U.S. strikes also killed fighters from the Al-Nusra Front,…
By James Kitfield
UPDATED: Crowley Will Stay In NYC, Per Request She Withdraw; Jan. 16 This is a little out of of our usual lane, but the controversy about Monica Crowley’s apparent plagiarism, both in large sections of her Ph.D thesis and in a recent best-selling book of hers, raises troubling issues of truthfulness and personal integrity, values one hopes…
By Robbin Laird