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Navy
A dozen years ago, the U.S. Navy announced plans for three new classes of surface warships -- a land-attack destroyer, a missile-defense cruiser, and a fast coastal combatant that could replace frigates in shallow-water operations. The destroyer and cruiser ended up being terminated due to budget
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Date:
4/26/2013
Anyone in the Department of Defense in a position of responsibility for maintenance activities will tell you that rising costs have been “eating their lunch.” One reason for this is that we have a force structure half the size that it was at the end of the Cold War that is five times more active
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Date:
1/29/2013
In the four decades since Britain announced it would withdraw from its last military bases "East of Suez," America's joint force has become the main guarantor of security in the Persian Gulf. The growing U.S. role in the region was driven mainly be the need to assure access to the world's biggest
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Date:
12/3/2012
The Navy plans to release a draft solicitation for a new kind of sea-based aircraft in December. Called the Unmanned Carrier Launched Surveillance & Strike (UCLASS) aircraft, it will be able to carry a suite of sensors and weapons 2,000 nautical miles or more from the carrier that hosts it without
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Date:
10/31/2012
Unlike many of my colleagues, I found last Monday’s foreign policy debate informative. For example, I found out that the President’s views on weapons systems, force structure and sequestration are simplistic, at best and completely cockeyed, at worst. Responding to Governor Romney’s statement that
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Date:
10/24/2012
The Obama Administration has requested $156 billion in funding for the Navy in the fiscal year that began October 1. That's a $10 billion reduction from what the White House sought in the prior fiscal year, but still more than any other nation spends on its entire defense establishment (China's
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Date:
10/8/2012
The Obama Administration’s new national security strategy envisions a so-called pivot to the Asia-Pacific region which involves the deployment of the greatest share of U.S. military assets to that region as well as investments in new capabilities and operational concepts to deal with the emerging
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Date:
9/26/2012
There are only two winners in war: medicine and technology. The imperative to save lives and then provide wounded warriors with the best care and rehabilitation has been a powerful force producing dramatic advances in such areas as emergency medicine, trauma surgery, the treatment of burns, prosthetic
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Date:
8/7/2012
The shift of U.S. military strategy to an Asia-Pacific focus has big implications for the Marine Corps. Unlike in Europe and the Middle East, distances are vast and there are few U.S. bases. But the littoral nations of East Asia have become the industrial heartland of the new global economy, so
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Date:
6/5/2012
No doubt one of the pleasures of being Secretary of Defense is to be a commencement speaker at one of this nation’s military academies. Whether at West Point, Annapolis or Colorado Springs, it is a chance to speak to and perhaps make a lasting impression on a generation of military officers. Making
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Date:
5/30/2012
The U.S. Navy has just released its new 5 and 30 year shipbuilding plans which reflect the challenges facing the Navy. The resources available to support shipbuilding are declining even under the Navy’s overly optimistic scenario. Budget pressures are so intense that the Navy proposes reducing the
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Date:
4/3/2012
Defense strategy is always a balancing act between requirements and resources. Sometimes the scales are tipped in favor of requirements, as has been the case since September 11, and other times it tips in the direction of resource constraints as in the aftermath of the end of the Cold War and, it
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Date:
3/13/2012
Among the world's major-league military players, there isn't much doubt which team dominates. It's Team America. But that doesn't mean everyone fares equally well when the team's budget request is released each February. This year, the Obama Administration will crown the U.S. Navy as most valuable
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Date:
2/9/2012
One of the worst facets of the federal management culture is the way that politicians and policymakers devalue past investments. That's especially true with regard to Pentagon technology accounts, where every program termination is considered "savings" regardless of how much money was spent on
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Date:
12/19/2011
The shift in U.S. national security policy and defense strategy to the Asia-Pacific region is going to put additional pressure on the Navy. Over the past decade there has been a global proliferation of threats to U.S. air and naval forces led by China. The various arms of the People’s Liberation Army
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Date:
10/31/2011
You know the budget wars are heating up when a senior Republican senator starts attacking weapons programs important to other legislators in his own party. That's what happened yesterday, when Georgia Senator Saxby Chambliss assailed Pentagon purchases of Boeing's carrier-based F/A-18 Super Hornet,
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Date:
9/1/2011
As the Department of Defense prepares for the possibility of major spending reductions, budget analysts inside and outside the Pentagon have turned to their perennial pastime of predicting how many aircraft carriers the Navy will have to give up. I say the service won't give up any -- at least,
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Date:
8/16/2011
Proposals for deep cuts in military forces are swirling through Washington. Among the ideas being put forward just for the Sea Services are to reduce the number of nuclear-powered aircraft carriers from 11 to 9 and delay the start of the next Ford class aircraft carrier, cancel the next generation
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Date:
7/21/2011
If there is a war at sea in the near future, it will likely be in the Persian Gulf. It is the nexus of the geo-strategic, ideological and religious struggle between Iran on one side and the United States, the West and the non-Shia Muslim world on the other. It is also the one place where Iran can
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Date:
7/7/2010
For more than six decades, the U.S. Navy has kept America safe, guarded our overseas interests, reassured allies, patrolled the global commons and assisted the victims of manmade and natural disasters. Under the rubric of forward deployed credible combat power, the Navy designed a force structure
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Date:
7/2/2010
What can you say to a military service that is faced with a shrinking force structure, increased demand for its services, growing threats and declining budgets? How about get ready for a train wreck; or in the case of the U.S. Navy, a shipwreck.
In a speech on June 8 at the Naval War College,
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Date:
6/22/2010
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates set off a whirlwind of discussion and blogging with his May 3 speech to the Navy League. In his speech, the Secretary appeared to fire a broadside at the Navy and Marine Corps. He criticized the Marine Corps vision of amphibious warfare as well as its investments
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Date:
5/24/2010
This past Monday Secretary of Defense Robert Gates took on the U.S. Navy. In a speech to the Navy League he basically said that virtually the entire structure of today’s Navy was irrelevant to the threats of the future and too expensive to continue to build. Secretary Gates repeated his mantra that
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Date:
5/5/2010