WASHINGTON: For decades, critics have rightly nailed the Pentagon for the fact it doesn’t know how much money it’s spending or where that money really goes. Pressure has grown and grown for the Pentagon to prove it is worthy of the money taxpayers grant it by producing books an accountant can comb through and produce a… Keep reading →

PENTAGON; The outlines of the campaign against ISIL are beginning to come into focus. The bombings and missile attacks against ISIL in Iraq are largely tactical, designed to provide the Iraqi military with some breathing room until they and the Kurdish peshmerga can mount effective counterattacks to drive ISIL out of their territory. But the bombings and missile strikes in… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: We got a much better feel today for the overall costs of the operations against ISIL in Iraq: a daily average of $7.5 million since we got reengaged in Iraq on June 16. Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. John Kirby unveiled the figure during a pre-Labor Day news conference. Kirby stressed that the figure varied… Keep reading →

[UPDATED with details on latest strikes] Yesterday, President Obama ordered humanitarian airdrops to Iraqi refugees and authorized — but did not actually launch — airstrikes on Islamic State forces threatening either the refugees or Erbil, the capital of quasi-independent Kurdistan. This morning, at 6:45 am Washington time, the other shoe dropped, in the form of 500-pound smart bombs… Keep reading →

[UPDATED 2:10 pm with comment from President Obama & Pentagon spokesman Kirby] Western media are hardly going easy on Russia. But in all the often-excellent coverage I’ve read so far of the Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 disaster – which claimed 295 lives – no one* is pointing out two basic facts that point towards Russia and… Keep reading →

PENTAGON: In the wake of drug abuse and cheating on proficiency tests at nuclear missile silos, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel ordered a two-pronged review of the nuclear weapons program today. Hagel issued his memo after speaking with Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James, who had toured the service’s ICBM sites in the wake of the… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: “We still even today hold out hope that there will be a solution, that Congress can solve this.” That’s the word, as startling as it is, from the Navy’s senior spokesman, Rear Adm. John Kirby, on the day before the automatic cuts called sequestration are scheduled to kick in. But as Kirby, the Chief… Keep reading →