PENTAGON ACQUISITION REFORM - CounterStrikeMedia

NATIONAL SECURITY, COOPERATION & THE CURSE OF LIGHT INFANTRY

2/28/2018

The Integrated Joint Force:
A Lethal Solution for Ensuring Military Preeminence
By Admiral Harry B. Harris, Jr., General Robert B. Brown, Admiral Scott H. Swift, and Dr. Richard D. Berry, Strategy Bridge: “The integrated joint force represents a pragmatic and economically viable approach to providing a lethal deterrent to any adversary (state or non-state) seeking to change the global operating system.”

It's Time for a National Security Cooperation Strategy // Remy Nathan
The current way the U.S. government approves what weapons get exported and where is fragmented and slow. That undermines American leadership and interests.

Special Operators Must 'Reinvent' Themselves
By Connie Lee, National Defense Magazine: “Mark Mitchell, principal deputy assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity conflict, said Feb. 28 special operators will not always have technological advantages over their enemies and must be prepared for a “great power competition.”

The Army’s Other Major Aviation Modernization Program
By Daniel Gouré, RealClearDefense: “The U.S. Army believes that future high-end conflicts will require aviation assets, particularly helicopters, that are long range, fast-moving and highly lethal. Future military helicopters will need to lift more weight, generate greater power and use less fuel.”

The Commanders Respond
From Proceedings Magazine: “This year, Proceedings asked the commanders of the world’s navies, “Maintaining freedom of the seas and access to the global maritime commons requires naval partnerships, cooperation, and interoperability. What do you consider your navy ‘s greatest capability or best practice and how could other navies learn from yours?””

THE BLACK BOX OF CHINESE INTELLIGENCE SERVICES

2/28/2018

The Black Box of China’s Chinese Intelligence Services
By Alasdair Gordon, The Cipher Brief: “China’s intelligence and security services play a pivotal role in shaping how China’s leadership views the outside world – but we in that outside world don’t know much about how they provide guidance and direction to diplomats and security officials, or how they help form government policy.”

China’s CASC readies improved CH-4 UAV
(IHS Jane’s 360) China Academy of Aerospace Aerodynamics (CAAA), the flight technology development arm of defence prime China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC), is developing a new and more capable variant of its strike-capable Cai Hong 4 (Rainbow 4, or CH-4) medium-altitude, long-endurance unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) under the designation of CH-4C, Jane’s has learned.

CAN THE U.S. NAVY RE-INVENT ITSELF & COLD WAR II

2/28/2018

The Navy Needs to Reinvent Itself
By Frank Goertner, CIMSEC: “Return to great power competition; revisionist powers; renewed capabilities; rebuild our military: such phrases feature prominently in recent U.S. national security guidance. They convey an imperative to look to the past as the nation prepares for a potentially volatile future.”

Cold War II
By Richard N. Haass, The Strategist (ASPI): "The Cold War lasted four decades, in many ways both beginning and ending in Berlin. The good news is that it stayed cold—largely because nuclear weapons introduced a discipline missing from previous great-power rivalries—and that the United States, together with its European and Asian allies, emerged victorious, owing to sustained political, economic, and military effort that a top-heavy Soviet Union ultimately could not match."

Prepare the Marine Corps for high-intensity conflict
Mackenzie Eaglen | American Enterprise Institut

U.S. LOST OPENING BATTLE AGAINST RUSSIA & UNDERWATER AIR CRAFT CARRIERS

2/26/2018

We’ve Lost the Opening Info Battle against Russia; Let’s Not Lose the War
By Dan Mahaffee, Defense One: “Our defenders must understand not just media technology but the critical historical and societal contexts that give it power.”

Russia’s New (Old) Heavy Army
By Pavel Felgenhauer, Eurasia Daily Monitor: “After decades of reforms and transformations, and all the hype about hybrid warfare, it seems the Russian military is increasingly falling back on the good old tank-heavy model of the Soviet military created during the Cold War.”

Underwater Aircraft Carriers?
By Robert Farley, The National Interest: “Both the United States and competitor nations have eagerly pursued the potential of UUVs. UUVs can contribute to both the hunting and the killing parts of ASW, although as of yet the only firm plans involve using them in the former.”

THE CHINESE HAVE A RAIL GUN & HOW TO DEFINE 21ST CENTURY MARITIME POWER

2/24/2018

Why Air Force Is Rushing for a Sixth-generation Fighter Jet
By Gillian Rich, Investor's Business Daily: “Lockheed Martin's F-35, a so-called fifth-generation fighter, hasn't hit full rate production yet, but the Air Force is already accelerating the development of a sixth-generation fighter as China ramps up its military.”

Amphibious Operations: Lessons of Past Campaigns for Today’s PLA
By Kevin McCauley, China Brief: “Amphibious operations are important components of current PLA doctrinal writings and exercises. With no recent experience in amphibious warfare, PLA military science examines foreign and historical operations for guiding principles.”

THE STATE OF US ARMED FORCES

2/23/2018

White House, Boeing In Final Stages of New Air Force One Deal // Marcus Weisgerber
President Trump and Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg met in White House this week to break gridlock on price of new presidential planes.

New Report Notes Erosion of Pentagon's Technological Advantage // Caroline Houck
The evidence ranges from a new long-range Chinese missile to ramped-up European defense spending, an annual assessment of the world's militaries finds.

The State of Defense 2018: Overview // Kevin Baron
The one consensus seems to be the view that, under Trump, America is no longer the world’s clear leader. And that is a titanic change.

The State of the Army // Ben Watson
From Africa to Afghanistan, the U.S. Army is expanding its nation-building and its operations against terrorists, even as thousands of stateside soldiers prepare for possible conflict in North Korea.

The State of the Navy // Bradley Peniston
Operationally speaking, 2018 ought to be a back-to-basics year for a naval service shaken by a string of deadly mishaps.

The State of the Air Force // Marcus Weisgerber
The U.S. Air Force finds itself amid several transitions. After years of shrinking, it’s adding people and planes. After years of counterinsurgency, it’s readying for fast-paced, complex war against Russia and China. After years of constrained training, training is now a top priority.

The State of the Marine Corps // Caroline Houck If there’s one service that embodies the tension the U.S. military faces — unable to turn away from an ongoing counterterrorism fight, but knowing it needs to refocus on great-power conflict — it’s the Marine Corps.

Military Force Structure: Trade-Offs, Trade-Offs, Trade-Offs By Mark Cancian

US NEEDS NEW INDUSTRIAL BASE FOR THE LONG WAR

2/21/2018

The New National Security Innovation Base:
Charting the Course for Technology in War
By Daniel Morgan, Modern War Institute: “Technological innovations in war, however, do not by themselves achieve victory. Combined actions across the whole of government are needed to deter adversaries and build partnerships in this new globally complex security environment.”

POLITICS, POLICY & MILITARY OPERATIONAL ART

2/21/2018

Blue Whales and Tiger Sharks :
Politics, Policy, and the Military Operational Artist
By G. Stephen Lauer, Strategy Bridge: “Iraq and Afghanistan. Korea and Vietnam. The uniquely unhappy political nature of wars of limited policy aims after the Second World War and into the 21st century finds the United States military unable to disengage after intervention without the perception of defeat.”

CAN US PREPARE TO FIGHT RUSSIA & CHINA WHILE FIGHTING THE LONG WAR

2/21/2018

Can the Army Prepare for China and Russia, and Fight Terror?
By Dave Majumdar, The National Interest: “The United States Army will receive increased funding in the President’s fiscal year 2019 budget proposal as the service struggles to modernize while simultaneously fighting wars in current conflicts. The problem the Army must solve is how to deter Russia and China while dealing with today’s challenges.”

China’s ballistic missile development program is the “most active and diverse” in the world, with the Asian power close to having “the ability to deploy a nuclear triad for the first time,” the head of U.S. Strategic Command warned last week. - Defense News

RUSSIA'S NEW SUPPOSITORY: A NUCLEAR TORPEDO

2/21/2018

RUSSIA: Status-6: Russia's 100-Megaton Nuclear Torpedo
By Lyle J. Goldstein, The National Interest: “This “megaton-class nuclear weapon” [ядерное оружие мегатонного класса], as described by one Russian source, is delivered by an unmanned undersea vehicle (UUV) and has the potential to exterminate a significant portion of the U.S. population in a single doomsday blow if deployed against the East Coast of the United States.”

REPAIR & REBUILD: US MILITARY

2/21/2018

Repair and rebuild: Balancing new military spending for a three-theater strategy
Mackenzie Eaglen | American Enterprise Institute
To reduce the chance of war and restore the credibility of America's nonmilitary tools of power, the US must quickly repair and rebuild its military. Yet lawmakers and Pentagon leaders must also ensure that the necessary haste of repairing and rebuilding the force does not lead to shortsighted choices.

The already forgotten Trump budget
James C. Capretta | Real Clear Policy
The Trump administration has produced a budget that is remarkable for its glaring disconnection from political and fiscal reality. It inherited a federal budget that was badly out of balance — and then promptly made the situation worse. The current trend toward growing deficits and debt will continue and likely get much worse.

The consequences that stem from a half-dozen years of funding cuts without a corresponding reduction in demand for the military came to a visible and tragic crescendo last summer with two Navy ship collisions and the unnecessary deaths of 17 sailors. The Trump administration’s recently announced FY2019 budget represents a 13 percent increase over FY2017 defense spending, which is significant. However, asMackenzie Eaglen explains in her latest AEIdeas blog, this new money is primarily intended to fill the hole dug by the Budget Control Act and other woes. In Trumpian terms, it is not enough to buy a “bigly” buildup. Find out why here.

In the meantime, there are key signals that Congress and the Pentagon can send to American adversaries that a defense buildup is real and that change is coming to the force. Eaglen outlines a few ways to do this in a War on the Rocks op-ed. Secretary of Defense James Mattis should support increasing the fleet size quickly with little risk by working to eliminate onerous requirements such as shock trials. Congress could also signal its enduring commitment to a genuine buildup by curtailing accounting gimmicks such as the National Sea-Based Deterrence Fund. Read what else can be done here.

SMALL UNIT DOMINANCE & ARMY MODERNIZATION EFFORTS

2/17/2018

Small Unit Dominance
From National Defense Magazine: “Whether they are Marine Corps grunts, soldiers on patrol or special operators carrying out missions behind enemy lines, dismounted warfighters are among the most vulnerable on the battlefield.”

Army Defends Shortchanging Future Modernization in 2019 Budget
By Matthew Cox, DoD Buzz: “For months, senior leaders have been stressing that the Army can no longer continue to make incremental improvements to its outdated fleet of aircraft, tanks, armored vehicles and fires platforms. Instead, they argue that the service must begin to build a future fleet of modern weapons systems capable of out-matching the modernized fleets of Russia and China.”

THE U.S. ARMY FUTURES COMMAND CENTER TAKES URBAN SHAPE & SHORAD SHOWS UP

2/11/2018

Details are scant on what the Army’s new Futures Command will look like or how it will be organized, but the service’s under secretary said it could reside in a city. “It will probably be in a city where we are going to put this Futures Command,” Under Secretary Ryan McCarthy said at a Brookings Institution event Feb. 8, “where there is access to academia and business.” - Defense News

The U.S. Army is going to assess the possibility of putting a 50-kilowatt laser onto its short-range air defense, or SHORAD, objective solution in less than five years, according to the service’s fiscal 2019 budget justification documents released Feb. 12. - Defense News

DEFENSE STRATEGY & 2019 BUDGET

2/7/2018

BREAKING DEFENSE

RUSSIA: The Return of the Commissars
By Aleksandr Golts, Eurasia Daily Monitor: “The Russian Army is planning to recreate the Main Political Directorate that existed in the Soviet Army (GlavPUR), according to the Deputy Chairman of the Public Council at the Russian Ministry of Defense, Alexander Kanshin. “The role of the moral and political unity of the army and society is increasing immensely at the time of global informational and psychological confrontation.”

Anchors Await
The Navy is failing at its most basic responsibilities.

How the defense budget falls short of strategic demands
Mackenzie Eaglen | Axios
Secretary Mattis’ national defense strategy targets readiness, lethality, and reforms to better counter great power competition from China and Russia. Yet President Trump’s budget calls for only a 2 percent annual increase in defense spending — enough to dig the Pentagon out of its current hole, but not enough to pursue the pivot Mattis envisions.

Long-term Defense Planning Assumptions Need to Change!
By Jyri Raitasalo, RealClearDefense: “Even in the best of circumstances, it is going to take years, most probably more than a decade, to address these shortfalls of military capability.”

CHINA'S INNOVATION DELIMMA

2/5/2018

Xi looks to China's private sector as he pursues a slimmer, smarter PLA
(War On The Rocks) As highlighted by Admiral Harris, China’s military-modernization drive continues to accelerate. Concern about the pace and intent of China’s defense modernization is indeed growing in the United States.

Bigger, Faster, Stronger: China’s Ever-Evolving Military Tech
(DefenseOne) China’s progress hasn’t gone unnoticed.

The U.S. Faces an Innovator’s Dilemma in Its Relationship With China
By Norton A. Schwartz, RealClearDefense: “The outcome for the U.S. will vary greatly depending on the strength and endurance of trade, national security, and immigration policies. The current approach will not be a match for the comprehensive course that China has set.”

China Will 'Pull the Trigger' in the South China Sea
By Gordon C. Chang, The National Interest: “James Fanell, once the top intelligence officer of the U.S. Navy’s Pacific Fleet and now a noted commentator on defense matters, is concerned that the Chinese desire confrontation to achieve their “centennial goal of the great rejuvenation” of the Chinese state. This goal, he told The National Interest, “requires the consolidation of all its perceived territories, to include the maritime territories of the South and East China Sea.””

China’s ‘New Silk Roads’ reach Latin America
BY PEPE ESCOBAR
Beijing is turbo-charging its infrastructure connectivity across the region and the Caribbean

RAND CORP., LOOKS AT FORCE PLANNING & CAPABILITIES; UP NEXT IS RUSSIA AND A NEW US CRUISE MISSILE

2/4/2018

RAND

Building Armies, Building Nations: Toward a New Approach to Security Force Assistance
Michael Shurkin, John Gordon IV, Bryan Frederick, Christopher G. Pernin
Events in Iraq and Mali have raised questions about the value of Security Force Assistance and U.S. capacity to strengthen client states' militaries in the face of insurgencies or other threats. History shows that SFA programs could be improved if they focused more on ideology and how an army complements a host country's larger nation-building efforts. Read more »

Pentagon Confirms It's Developing Nuclear Cruise Missile to Counter a Similar Russian One // Marcus Weisgerber
The new Nuclear Posture Review nods to North Korea, China, and Iran but devotes most of its time to Russian threats and U.S. deterrence.

Mattis: There Is No Such Thing as a 'Tactical' Nuke
By Richard Sisk, Military.com: “Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said there is "no such thing" as a tactical nuclear weapon in the context of strategies that consider the use of so-called "low yield" weapons to avert all-out nuclear war.”

HOW CHINA & RUSSIA UNDERSTAND WAR

2/4/2018

How China Understands Warfare
China's army now characterizes warfare as a clash between opposing operational systems—not merely one between armies. That's according to a new RAND report. Thus, warfare no longer focuses on the annihilation of enemies on the battlefield. Rather, victory goes to the side that can disrupt, paralyze, or destroy the enemy's system. Read more »

China Has Big Plans to Win the Next War
By Jeffrey Engstrom, The National Interest: “As a result of extensive examination of these conflicts and others, the PLA now views modern conflict as a confrontation between opposing systems, or what are specifically referred to as opposing operational systems.”

The Russian Way of Warfare: A Primer
Scott Boston, Dara Massicot
The Russian armed forces are not like the Soviet Army in size, depth, or global ideological aspirations. But Russia has demonstrated its military competence and operational flexibility in Crimea, eastern Ukraine, and Syria. Read more »

CHINA: The 'Globalisation' of China's Military Power
By Jonathan Marcus, BBC News: “China's modernization of its armed forces is proceeding faster than many analysts expected.”

ARMY WAKING FROM SLUMBER

2/2/2018

An Army Trying to Shake Itself From Intellectual Slumber
By David Johnson, War on the Rocks: “For the past three decades, the U.S. military has lived off the concepts and eroding capabilities for conflicts against peer adversaries that it developed during the Cold War. For the Army, AirLand Battle is the last fully institutionalized intellectual and doctrinal warfighting construct intended for high-end adversaries, although there have been several replacement candidates in recent years.”

CHANGING ARMY CULTURE

MATTIS MOVES TOWARD GREAT POWER COMPETITION: WALKING A TIGHTROPE

2/2/2018

Mattis walks strategic tightrope with new strategy
Mackenzie Eaglen | Axios

The theory and practice of war termination
Oriana Skylar Mastro | International Studies Review

Seth G. Jones writes: The Trump administration’s National Security Strategy and National Defense Strategy outline a U.S. shift from counterterrorism to inter-state competition with China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea. However, U.S. policymakers need to be prepared for much of this competition to occur at the unconventional level, since the costs of conventional and nuclear war would likely be catastrophic. - Center for Strategic & International Studies

Rep. Mac Thornberry writes: The United States’ nuclear deterrent has been the cornerstone of our national defense and of international stability since World War II. Today, operating, sustaining, and recapitalizing our nuclear deterrent accounts for only about 4 percent of our overall defense budget, yet its value to America’s security is incalculable. - Defense News

Week Ahead: Mattis Heads to the Hill
By Rebeccah Kheel & Ellen Mitchell, The Hill: “The appearance Tuesday alongside Joint Chiefs Vice Chairman Gen. Paul Selva will focus on the Pentagon's two big recently completed undertakings -- the National Defense Strategy and the Nuclear Posture Review.”

Continuity and Change in U.S. Nuclear Policy
By John R. Harvey, Franklin C. Miller, Keith B. Payne & Bradley H. Roberts, RealClearDefense: “This month, the Trump administration all but pledged itself to an open-ended nation-building operation in U.S.-occupied, northeast Syria. Given America’s uninspiring recent track record, this should concern us all.”

The U.S. Nuclear Posture Review: All Quiet on the Eastern Front
By Rod Lyon, The Strategist (ASPI): “The US commits itself to doing four things ‘to maintain credible extended deterrence and thus effective assurance in this complex environment.’”

America’s Two Doctrines
By Sam Roggeveen, the interpreter: “China’s rise presents a type of challenge America has never faced before in the Asia Pacific: in economic terms it is much more substantial than the Soviet Union (always more of a European power), and on present trends China’s military capabilities in the region will match those of the U.S. in a decade or two.”

SOTU: NOW WHAT

2/1/2018

The state of defense: Time for Trump to put the money where his mouth is
Mackenzie Eaglen | AEIdeas

Trump’s State of the Union hit the right foreign policy notes. Now comes the hard part.
John R. Bolton | The Hill

FIXING DEFENSE BUDGET
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TRANSPARENCY & COST CAPABILITY
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MACKENZIE EAGLEN
AEI

DEFENSE STRATEGY-PRIORITIES
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DEFENSE INNOVATION PROBLEMS
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REBUTAL TO EAGLEN
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DOD ACQUISITION REFORM

twelve problems_negatively_impacting_defense_innovation___american_enterprise_institute_-_aei.pdf
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the_1960s_had_their_day__changing_dod’s_acquisition_processes_and_structures___realcleardefense.pdf
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Dr. Kathleen Hicks

getting_to_less.pdf
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THUCYDIDES & THE LONG WAR PROBLEM

FORCE PLANNING IN AGE OF GREAT POWER COMPETITION

AGAINST ALL ODDS: CHANGING ACQUISITION CULTURE

THE CRISIS OF AMERICAN MILITARY PRIMACY

NATIONAL MILITARY STRATEGY: REVOLUTIONARY APPROACH

UNDERSTANDING MILITARY MODERNIZATION

5 STRATEGIES FOR SEC. OF DEFENSE

WHY THE 3RD OFFSET FAILS

INADEQUATE DOCTRINES FOR IRREGULAR WAR

ALTERNATIVE WAR STRATEGIES & FORCE POSTURE

REVERSING DECLINE: ELIZABETHIAN ENGLAND

U.S. GRAND STRATEGY FOR WINNING WORLD WAR IV

MULTI-DOMAIN BATTLE REPLACES R.M.A.

GLOBAL DEFENSE SPENDING.pdf
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REBUILDING AMERICAN MILITARY.pdf
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Tweets by WilliamHolland

Principles Guiding Pentagon Acquisition Reform
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