UPDATED with comment from Army Commission & National Guard Association of the US WASHINGTON: The Army $7.5 billion wishlist for Congress, obtained by Breaking Defense, of needs that didn’t fit in its 2017 budget includes $1.64 billion for new weapons and $1.2 billion to implement the recommendations of the National Commission on the Future of the Army to retain four National… Keep reading →

Aviation, always the Army’s largest modernization account, goes into a nosedive in the fiscal 2017 budget, plunging from $5.9 billion to $3.6 billion. The $2.3 billion cut more than makes up for a $1.3 billion cut to total Army spending that helps fund readiness, operations and maintenance. But with aviation accounting for 25 percent of the… Keep reading →

UPDATED: ADDS J-8 Readiness Comments; Sen. Reed Urging GOP To Let OMB Director To Testify PENTAGON: On a grand strategic level, the Defense Department’s 2017 spending plan reorients the military to deter Russia and China. Down in the trenches, though, it’s a long, slow slog to rebuild the force for high-intensity conflict after 14 years… Keep reading →

As former Air Force Chief of Staff “Buzz” Moseley once declared, “there is not a place on the face of the earth that the USAF will not fight their way into.” But this aspiration has been complicated by 15 years of fighting low-end opponents like the Taliban even as peer adversaries like China and Russia… Keep reading →

The sea and the sky above it are becoming more dangerous for US forces. Even terrorist groups like Hezbollah and the Islamic State have access to anti-ship and anti-aircraft missiles, let alone great powers like Russia and China. But the US Navy and Marines recognize this “anti-access/area denial” challenge and are reshaping their forces to… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: After 15 years of ad hoc solutions, the Army may build specialized battalions and brigades to train and advise foreign forces, the service’s chief of staff says. Gen. Mark Milley made clear that advisor units are just a proposal under study, a study that only started “a couple of months ago.” But even studying the… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: Russia and China are investing heavily in cyber and electronic warfare, but they’re not shutting down US satellite downlinks yet. Instead, we have met the enemy and he is us — we think. “In 2015 thus far, we have had 261 cases where we have been jammed from getting information from our satellites down… Keep reading →

ARLINGTON: Pop culture pictures hackers in clean, air-conditioned rooms, working global network magic from a desk. For the Army, though, that’s not enough. If American troops are to prevail against inventive foes in high-tech, close-quarters fights, the hacker elite have to get their boots muddy with the regular grunts. So now the Army’s sending cyber soldiers to… Keep reading →

PENTAGON: Newly created, US-trained units are leading the Iraqi Army counteroffensive against the Islamic State, officers of the 82nd Airborne Division said this morning. Yes, the recapture of Ramadi is moving slowly, acknowledged Col. Curtis Buzzard and Maj. Michael Hamilton, but at least it is moving, and the Iraqi troops they mentored are not only… Keep reading →

PENTAGON CITY: The dirty secret of so-called “unmanned” systems is they require a whole lot of men — and women — to operate them. They’re just back at base, running things remotely, rather than hands-on in the aircraft. With the Air Force drone community overworked and undermanned, the service’s intelligence chief has suggested a Solomonic… Keep reading →