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Defense Department leaders and Lockheed Martin executives explained to international partners changes that have been made in the Joint Strike Fighter program. Ashton B. Carter, the department's undersecretary for acquisition, technology and logistics, and Robert Stevens, chief operating officer for Lockheed Martin, the prime contractor for the program, explained what measures Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates has taken to right the program. A department study of the program completed in October found the development phase of the revolutionary aircraft had slipped by 30 months. Gates has made changes that will reduce the slippage to 13 months, Carter said during a...

Military: Two U.S. congressmen take the lead in proclaiming the obvious — that those who attack this country should be punished and not those who risk their lives to defend it. The Navy SEALs are a special breed of patriot and warrior. This highly trained and select group — the best of the best — is a daily participant in the long twilight struggle against the enemies of freedom that President Kennedy warned us about. Kennedy formally created the SEAL (sea, air, land) outfit as an elite force capable of combat operations in any environment. It was a team of...

Industry advocates are voicing concern with U.S. President Barack Obama’s decision to cancel NASA’s Moon-bound Constellation program and the threat it poses to America’s aerospace work force and U.S. strategic missile arsenals, but Defense Department officials said the two agencies are forging a plan to sustain the nation’s solid-rocket motor industrial base. Rep. Rob Bishop (R-Utah) is among those railing against Obama’s proposal to scrap NASA’s plan to replace its space shuttle fleet with new rockets and spacecraft in favor of relying on commercial crew taxis to get astronauts to the international space station and back. “This is not money-saving....

Defense: The administration decision to scrap a proven aircraft in favor of a supposedly cheaper, more flexible replacement is proving to be an expensive mistake. We may wind up defenseless and broke. The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter that was supposed to be America's frontline fighter for the foreseeable future is in big trouble. Defense Secretary Robert Gates fired the general in charge of the program this week amid concerns of spiraling costs and program delays. Gates also announced he is withholding $614 million in fees from the prime contractor, Lockheed Martin. Daniel J. Crowley, one of Lockheed Martin's project managers,...

When Israel and Hezbollah battled for more than a month in Lebanon in the summer of 2006, the result was widely seen as a disaster for the Israeli military. Soon after the fighting ended, some military officers began to warn that the short, bloody and relatively conventional battle foreshadowed how future enemies of the United States might fight. Since then, the Defense Department has dispatched as many as a dozen teams to interview Israeli officers who fought against Hezbollah. The Army and Marine Corps have sponsored a series of multimillion-dollar war games to test how U.S. forces might fare against...

The Department of Defense awarded nearly $30 million in stimulus contracts to six companies while they were under federal criminal investigation on suspicion of defrauding the government.According to Air Force documents, the companies claimed to be small, minority-owned businesses, which allowed them to gain special preference in bidding for government contracts. But investigators found that they were all part of a larger minority-owned enterprise in Southern California, making them ineligible for the contracts. Contractor Database [1]Search for companies near you that got stimulus transportation contracts. The Air Force and the Army awarded the companies 112 stimulus projects at U.S. military...

NY Congressmen, John McHugh recently nominated by President Obama to Army Secretary, was described by the press as a popular and bi-partisan pick (McHugh is a Republican). Perhaps the most happy about the selection are the defense vendors, contractors, and lobbyists that In Congress,that gave McHugh thousands of dollar of campaign dollars who he provided with millions in earmarks ABC News and Taxpayers for Common Sense are reporting that McHugh was excellent at "playing the game:" "He has certainly played the game here in Washington, gotten campaign contributions and delivered earmarks," said Steve Ellis of Taxpayers for Common Sense, a...

<p>Thursday, November 20, 2008 The Pentagon has suffered from a cyber attack so alarming that it has taken the unprecedented step of banning the use of external hardware devices, such as flash drives and DVD's, FOX News has learned.</p> <p>The attack came in the form of a global virus or worm that is spreading rapidly throughout a number of military networks.</p>

A shadow legal body was set up by the Defense Department to manipulate the prosecutions of U.S. Marines accused of massacring Iraqi civilians in Haditha in 2005. That’s the bombshell disclosure from the Thomas More Law Center, a national public interest law firm that is representing one of the accused Marines, Lt. Col. Jeffrey Chessani. And it could prove to be the most damning piece of evidence showing the political motivations behind the ongoing prosecutions of the Haditha Marines. “The hysteria and media firestorm over Abu Ghraib and the Pat Tillman investigations led to fear of a similar media reaction...

Late last week, the Defense Department released an analysis of 600,000 documents captured in Iraq prepared by the Institute for Defense Analyses, a federally funded think tank. Here's the attention-grabbing sentence from the report's executive summary: "This study found no 'smoking gun' (i.e. direct connection) between Saddam's Iraq and al Qaeda." Relying on a leak of the executive summary, ABC News reported that the study was "the first official acknowledgment from the U.S. military that there is no evidence Saddam had ties to Al Qaeda." There followed a brief item in the Washington Post that ran under the headline "Study...

Duncan Hunter is a good man, a true patriot and a very conservative Republican, although not a small-government, new federalist one. He's still a much better choice than Rudy McRombee, hands down. I'm a Fred Thompson supporter, but I nevertheless like and admire Hunter. Oh sure, I have a few nits to pick with the man. His less than sterling attendance record in the U.S. House is one. His voting record on fiscal issues is another. Finally, his opposition to free trade is a non-starter for me, although those with a more populist bent will see it as a big...

Some Democrats have decided to try to transform the military draft into what the Social Security issue was 25 years ago. Time and time again since the late 1970s, Democratic candidates and campaign committees sought to win the votes of seniors by raising questions about whether Republicans would dismantle Social Security if they ever won control of Congress. The Democrats’ scare tactics on Social Security were not without basis. Republicans opposed the creation of Social Security, and for more than a decade, many conservative GOP candidates and high-profile officeholders, including former Rep. Newt Gingrich (Ga.), bashed the system and berated...

Frequent tours for U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan have stressed the all-volunteer force and made it worth considering a return to a military draft, President Bush's new war adviser said Friday. "I think it makes sense to certainly consider it," Army Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute said in an interview with National Public Radio's "All Things Considered." "And I can tell you, this has always been an option on the table. But ultimately, this is a policy matter between meeting the demands for the nation's security by one means or another," Lute added in his first interview since he was...

AS the National Intelligence Estimate issued last week confirms, a terrorist haven has emerged in Pakistan’s tribal belt. And as recent revelations about an aborted 2005 operation in the region demonstrate, our Defense Department is chronically unable to conduct the sort of missions that would disrupt terrorist activity there and in similarly ungoverned places. These are perhaps the most important kind of counterterrorism missions. Because the Pentagon has shown that it cannot carry them out, the Central Intelligence Agency should be given the chance to perform them. The story of the scrubbed 2005 operation illustrates why the Pentagon is incapable...

These are the "birth pangs" of a "new Middle East," said Condi Rice last summer, as Israel pounded Lebanon. Unfortunately, the new Middle East may make us all pray for the return of the old. Hamas is today engaged in savage street-fighting with Fatah for control of Gaza. If Hamas prevails, it could convert this Palestinian enclave into a terrorist base camp between Israel and Egypt. In northern Lebanon, Islamic jihadists are battling the army for control of a Palestinian refugee camp. Scores are dead. On Wednesday, a seventh parliamentarian was assassinated with his son in a Beirut car bomb...

WASHINGTON, March 29 — Lapses in using a digital medical record system for tracking wounded soldiers have led to medical mistakes and delays in care, and have kept thousands of injured troops from getting benefits, according to former defense and military medical officials. The Defense Department’s inability to get all hospitals to use the system has routinely forced thousands of wounded soldiers to endure long waits for treatment, the officials said, and exposed others to needless testing. Several department officials said the problem may have played a role in the suicide of a soldier last year after he was taken...

Defense Secretary Robert Gates cautioned on Thursday the Army would face problems without emergency funds but insisted U.S. forces could fight a third war despite being stretched in Iraq and Afghanistan. He painted a mixed picture of the impact Iraq has had on U.S. military readiness at a time when Congress is considering tying a Bush administration request for emergency war funding to a deadline for pulling troops out of the conflict. Gates had raised concerns about a demand by some Democrats to set a deadline. He declined on Thursday to say what Congress should do or to discuss a...

WASHINGTON -- The armed forces, already struggling to meet recruiting goals, are considering expanding the number of noncitizens in the ranks -- including disputed proposals to open recruiting stations overseas and putting more immigrants on a faster track to US citizenship if they volunteer -- according to Pentagon officials. Foreign citizens serving in the US military is a highly charged issue, which could expose the Pentagon to criticism that it is essentially using mercenaries to defend the country. Other analysts voice concern that a large contingent of noncitizens under arms could jeopardize national security or reflect badly on Americans' willingness...

by Mark Finkelstein September 28, 2006 - 15:37 With one of his inimitable montages, Rush Limbaugh documented today the way in which the MSM got hung up on a handshake - one that apparently didn't come off between Afghan President Hamid Karzai and his Pakistani counterpart Pervez Musharraf during their recent White House visit. The media tea-leaf readers apparently imbue The Handshake That Didn't Happen with dire implications for the achievement of US goals in the region. Ironically, on the very same day, the MSM has yet to report on a major, positive development in the region that should bring...

WASHINGTON, Sept. 21 — Strains on the Army from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have become so severe that Army officials say they may be forced to make greater use of the National Guard to provide enough troops for overseas deployments. Senior Army officers have discussed that analysis — and described the possible need to use more members of the National Guard — with Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld’s senior adviser on personnel, David S. C. Chu, according to Pentagon officials. While no decision has been made to mobilize more Guard forces, and may not need to be before...