In the coming clash between President Trump’s $750 billion defense budget and House Democrats’ desire to cut Pentagon spending, especially on nuclear weapons, there will be tremendous fiscal pressure to shortchange the almost $30 billion annual cost to modernize America’s strategic deterrent. The ideological cover for such penny-wise, pound-foolish cuts is the so-called Global Zero… Keep reading →

We have been here before. In 1982 Caspar Weinberger and David Stockman had a similar showdown referred by President Reagan. DOD won that time. What does that have to tell us about the impending Mulvaney–Mattis showdown? And if OMB wins this time, would Mattis stay on?

Russian President Vladimir Putin warned the United States a new arms race would provoke a “quick and effective” Russian response and threatened NATO’s members. Democrat leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives predict an increased risk of “an unconstrained nuclear arms race.” Is it true? Has President Trump fired the first shot in a Cold… Keep reading →

No one knows precisely what happened inside the White House that resulted in President Trump’s sudden about-face on Syria. One day he was planning to extricate American ground troops from Syria; then he wasn’t. Regardless, whoever is urging the president to leave a small contingent of 2,000 lightly armed soldiers and Marines in a remote corner of Syria is doing the president and the nation a grave disservice. 

“Look, the Obama administration indicated that Russia was in violation of the INF Treaty four years ago,” said a staffer from the House Armed Services Committee. “If the treaty’s being violated, we have to take steps to ensure that stability some other way.”

Some 35 years after Ronald Reagan’s famous Star Wars speech, the Pentagon’s R&D chief said that space-based missile defenses are technically feasible and reasonably affordable.

WASHINGTON: Defense Secretary Jim Mattis has laid out a measured and cautious spending plan that puts near-term readiness needs first in his first budget guidance memo. The memo, out this morning, largely defers major equipment modernization until 2019 and limits increases in the size of the force to “the maximum responsible rate” (emphasis ours). So,… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: “Trump is going to explode the debt,” GOP pundit Mackenzie Eaglen said. “What you’re going to see is a debt bomb.” While the new president wants to grow the military, rebuild infrastructure, and cut taxes, Eaglen said, his plan to fund all that that through steep domestic spending cuts “is complete fantasy” that will… Keep reading →

SIMI VALLEY, CALIF.: “I don’t how we buy it back without a real bloodbath,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham. “It” is the $500 billion, 10-year cut to defense spending imposed by the Budget Control Act of 2011, popularly (mis)called sequestration. Graham, one of Donald Trump’s harshest critics in the GOP, is not alone in thinking the… Keep reading →

Some members of Congress are rightfully calling for reform to the U.S. national missile defense program, but the change they suggest – removing the word “limited” from current U.S. policy – will carelessly expand the program and waste billions of dollars. If we’re serious about improving national missile defense, Congress must reform the objectives of the… Keep reading →