The Air Force is buying a new intercontinental ballistic missile at a time when the Trump Administration has expressed concern military contracting practices are undermining the defense industrial base. The Air Force’s missile is an opportunity to demonstrate that the military can get a good deal without hurting the industrial base. The specific issue is whether the U.S. will continue to have competing sources for large solid rocket motors, or end up with only one. If the service mandates competitive [ Read More…]

September 27, 2018 marked one of the most important milestones for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program. On that date, the U.S. Marine Corps conducted the first combat strikes by the U.S. military employing the revolutionary fifth-generation fighter. Perhaps equally impressive, this mission in Afghanistan was conducted by the short-takeoff/vertical landing (STOVL) variant of the JSF, the F-35B, from an amphibious warfare ship. The F-35B allows large deck amphibious warfare ships to undertake missions that until now would have [ Read More…]

If you thought that accusations of suspicious relations with Russia were limited to the sphere of national politics, you would be wrong. The rules for playing the new version of McCarthyism are really simple. Whenever you have exhausted substantive arguments against a particular individual organization, policy or position, just play the “Russia Card.” Accuse your target of having a connection to Russia. You can now employ this infernal device in disputes involving business, the arts or sports. No matter how [ Read More…]

SpaceX has transformed the commercial space market, accomplishing feats not previously thought possible for a privately-held company. However, the jury is still out concerning whether the company has a sustainable business strategy. There are at least five challenges that might threaten the enterprise’s existence over the long run: commercial market stagnation, military market access, civil space safety, weak enterprise profitability and oversized capital requirements. I have written a commentary on these issues for Forbes that you can read here.

At Saturday’s Army-Navy Game, President Donald Trump took the unusual step of announcing that he would be nominating the Chief of Staff of the Army, General Mark Milley to replace the current Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Marine Corps General Joseph Dunford, when his current term ends. Why General Milley? Perhaps it is because much like President Trump, Milley too is a visionary. Also like the President, the Chief of Staff is a blunt-spoken realist. The decision reflects [ Read More…]

These are worrisome times for America’s space warriors. Russia and China are developing diverse ways of degrading or destroying U.S. national-security spacecraft, and the Air Force must respond. It can’t do things the old way, because that will take too long. Speed is of the essence. The service is already taking advantage of so-called “section 804” authorities to rapidly field new space systems, but it needs to do more. Among other things, it needs to align government and industry incentives [ Read More…]

Nobody can accuse the Army’s acquisition system of thinking small. The Army has a nearly three-decades-long history of inventing massive, highly integrated and extremely complex modernization programs that go through years of research and development, cost billions of dollars and, in the end, often produce nothing. In contrast to these difficulties, the Army is really good at developing modifications and upgrades to existing platforms and systems that not only extend their life but improve their effectiveness. The Abrams, Bradley, Stryker, [ Read More…]

This afternoon the U.S. Treasury Department issued an important and much anticipated task force report on the United States Postal System. The Postal Service faces major financial and operational challenges. The 74-page document is in response to an executive order President Trump issued on April 12. Seven key takeaways follow. It clearly is a pro-taxpayer document. The report warns that the Postal Service has a negative net worth of $62 billion, that without major reform it will continue to suffer [ Read More…]

President Trump shocked the defense establishment Monday by describing the current level of U.S. defense spending as “crazy,” and calling for a halt to what he characterized as an “uncontrollable arms race.” Official Washington is accustomed to dismissing such tweets as little more that mindless rants, but there is mounting evidence that President Trump’s attitude towards defense spending is evolving. Aside from the opportunity costs of spending $700 billion annually on the military, budget director Mick Mulvaney is warning the [ Read More…]

The U.S. Navy faces a tough challenge in containing Chinese military forces in the Western Pacific, in part because it has under-funded anti-ship weapons since the Cold War ended.  But it is about to get a potent new weapon called the Long Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM) based on an Air Force munition made by Lockheed Martin. LRASM is a stealthy cruise missile that is very difficult for enemy defenders to intercept.  Thanks to a precision routing and tracking sensor built [ Read More…]