If war is politics by other means, then politics is war by other means, Chinese and Russian leaders believe. And political warfare must be conducted with the same ruthless ingenuity as open war because the stakes are equally high: the survival or destruction of the regime.

The Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) John Richardson made a major organizational announcement with major strategic implications when he announced the Navy would re-establish the Second Fleet, which covers the Atlantic. But that would, so far, only mean adding 250 people to the command. Without making larger strategic changes, that is not enough. To respond appropriately to Russian naval… Keep reading →

While a Trump-Kim summit is a victory for South Korean diplomacy and the policy of maximum pressure, it is also a tremendous victory for Kim Jong Un, and this must be recognized.

A British defense official talks about an age of competition among great powers, putting the Ministry of Defense on the same page as its Pentagon colleagues

WASHINGTON: This city’s fixation on how much stuff the Pentagon should buy is distracting us from the “core ideological struggle” against corrupt dictatorships, said the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee. Numerical targets like a 355-ship Navy — now enshrined in law — or a 500,000 active soldier Army are not only unaffordable… Keep reading →

HERITAGE FOUNDATION: Just calm down and read the document. That, in essence, is the administration’s response to critics who call its new nuclear strategy irresponsible and dangerous. In fact, deputy undersecretary for policy David Trachtenberg said over and over here this morning, the Nuclear Posture Review is fundamentally conservative (with a small “c”). The 2018… Keep reading →

The National Defense Strategy does a service by getting the diagnosis right. But that is only the first step. To get the right prescription—the defense program—we will have to develop the operational concepts that link the ends sought with the means we can procure to achieve them.

“The United States has been fighting weak and isolated regional adversaries for the last 25 years, and a result we have a very inflated view of how good we are,” warned the study’s lead author, Mark Cancian of CSIS.

When Secretary of State Rex Tillerson arrives in Ankara on Thursday, he will find Turkey unrecognizable as the ostensibly Muslim democracy and close ally that U.S. officials once held up as a model for the Islamic world. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is poised to complete his long transformation of Turkey from a raucous — if imperfect democracy — to an autocracy, one ruled by caprice and fear.

SAN DIEGO: The Pentagon’s new National Defense Strategy has shaped the 2019 budget request due out this month, Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan said here. The strategy, he said, will lead swiftly to major reforms in everything from cybersecurity to how the military deploys forces around the world, “Tomorrow morning about nine o’clock eastern standard… Keep reading →