WASHINGTON: When Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh meets with President Obama at the White House this Friday, the rise of China may not be on the official agenda, but it will be on everybody’s mind – and Beijing will be watching warily. Friday’s meeting will be just the latest in a series of summits that… Keep reading →

Dear Reader, with Congress close to irrelevant (and out of town anyway), the Defense Department bracing for the coming end of the world (slight exaggeration) and so many of DC’s denizens out of town and recharging for the September onslaught, this August probably will be particularly quiet. So we are experimenting with that terribly au… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: The American who leads the leading edge of our sword in the Pacific — the Air Force — worries that China‘s sometimes “aggressive approach” in using its fighters, bombers and ships to signal its territorial claims across the Pacific creates “the potential” for a serious incident in the region. But Air Force Gen. Herb… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: The recently retired senior admiral of the Navy, Adm. Gary Roughead, says the Obama administration must do much more across the government to ensure the Pacific pivot works and is well directed, joining his voice to four prominent House lawmakers. I asked Roughead after today’s hearing on the Pacific “rebalance” if he knew about… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: For six decades, Americans have been in charge of the joint US-Korean headquarters that would control both countries’ forces in the event of war. The South Koreans were supposed to take over the Combined Forces Command in 2015, but now Seoul is getting cold feet about ending the Cold War arrangement — and Korea’s new… Keep reading →

CAPITOL HILL: The House Armed Services Committee has scheduled its first hearing on what is arguably the Pentagon’s most important shift since the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the strategic shift of US forces and focus to the Pacific. So far the witness list for the Wednesday morning hearing doesn’t boast a list of… Keep reading →

AI FORCE ASSOCIATION HQ: For more than 60 years, most Americans have thought of nuclear weapons as an all-or-nothing game. The only way to win is not to play at all, we believed, because any use of nukes will lead to Armageddon. That may no longer be the game our opposition is playing. As nuclear… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON:  The much-debated “pivot to Asia” works even in the face of sequestration and is reassuring our Pacific allies that we will stand behind them, the Navy’s most senior officer said on his return from the region. “Our budget situation is tough, [but] it’s not going to stop the rebalance,” pledged Adm. Jonathan Greenert, chief… Keep reading →

By Robbin Laird and Ed Timperlake The Chinese, who have been shoving their neighbors around with considerable panache over the last year, upped the ante yesterday with a claim in the official People’s Daily — not yet disavowed by the government — that the PRC may have a claim to Okinawa and others of the… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: What does America need an army for, anyway? The question has bedeviled policymakers since the Founding Fathers, who wrote their distrust of large ground forces into the Constitution. The question returns as budgets come back down after every land war. This time around, the Army leadership has not given the country a clear answer,… Keep reading →