Subtle, significant differences in what the two men said about foreign allies reveal one of the potential fault lines between Trump and Milley.

In a media-wary administration, the big news from Defense Secretary Mark Esper’s formal press briefing was that he actually held one, and pledged to keep doing so.

“Arlington is full of our comrades, and we understand absolutely full well the hazards of our chosen profession … and we are not going to be intimidated into making stupid decisions. We will give our best military advice, regardless of the consequences to ourselves.”

“The Army has aligned itself with Secretary Mattis’s National Defense Strategy, which we will not walk away from,” Gen. Milley told an Association of the US Army breakfast. “It’s a solid strategy, it’s written in history, it’s written in the blood of generations past, and we subscribe to it.” And allies are key to the strategy.

WASHINGTON: After two years of reassuring US allies that Donald Trump’s America would not abandon them, Jim Mattis finally had enough. Even before Trump was sworn in as president, the announcement that he would pick Mattis as his Secretary of Defense was met with delighted relief “from the right, from the left, and from overseas.”… Keep reading →

Trump certainly fell in and out of love fast with the last outspoken warrior-intellectual he hired, short-lived National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster.

HALIFAX: The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs expressed frustration Saturday over the refusal of some tech giants to work with the US military. “I have a hard time with companies that are working very hard to engage in the market inside China,” said Gen. Joe Dunford at the Halifax Security Forum, “then don’t want to work… Keep reading →

ARLINGTON: To cut $33 billion from the 2020 budget – as President Trump has ordered – and still compete against Russia and China, the Pentagon’s political and joint leadership must take a firmer hand with the four armed services, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs said this afternoon. [Read how a Tea Party congressman turned… Keep reading →

There’s no timeline, no cost estimate, and no certainty Trump’s proposed Space Force will even happen. Even the interim step of creating a Space Command is being dialed down, a significant policy shift.

WASHINGTON: The days when America spoke of eliminating nuclear weapons are over, faced with Russian, Chinese and North Korean moves to build, boost or rebuild their nuclear forces. That’s the most essential message of the leaked Nuclear Posture Review. (Kudos to my colleague Ashley Feinberg at Huffington Post for getting this one.) The Pentagon immediately issued… Keep reading →