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President Theodore Roosevelt in 1907, at the dawn of what would be called the “American Century,” sent the Great White Fleet on a 14-month-long world cruise, Consisting of four naval squadron including four battleships each accompanied by their escorts, it was a signal that America had arrived as a world power and was going to be a player. By sending five warships into Alaskan territorial waters while President Obama visited the 49th state to eat bear-killed salmon, rename Mt. McKinley, and warn of non-existent climate change,, China has made a similar statement that it intends this to be the Chinese...

It does not bode well that an Obama administration that assures us that the nuclear deal with Iran will not be violated by the mullahs is clearly looking the other way as Iran’s ally Russia blatantly violates the 1987 Intermediate Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty signed with the former Soviet Union. The Obama White House is sitting on a Pentagon risk assessment report completed last month that states “that the breach involved a new missile that violates the limits set by the treaty. The treaty bans holding, producing, or flight-testing ground-launched ballistic or cruise missiles with ranges of between 310 miles...

Arms Buildup: A senior weapons developer tells Congress that Beijing's massive defense buildup, emphasizing precision-guided and other advanced weapons, has placed the U.S. and its shrinking military at serious risk. 'I am very concerned about the increasing risk of loss of U.S. military technological superiority," Frank Kendall, deputy undersecretary for acquisition, said Wednesday. "We're at risk, and the situation is getting worse." He was testifying before the House Armed Services Committee at a hearing on the subject of defense and technological change. The Chinese were paying attention to U.S. military dominance in the early 1990s after we won the arms...

Defense Spending: The venerable A-10 Warthog, designed to stop Soviet tanks, and the perfect weapon to "degrade and destroy" the Islamic State, as President Obama promised, faces a budgetary chopping block. We have noted the irony of how Obama was going to war against the Islamic State with weapons systems he had scrapped, ending the production runs of the F-22 Raptor and Tomahawk cruise missiles. They were dismissed by the administration as relics of the Cold War even as Russia was rearming and trying to reassemble the old Soviet Union. We've also mentioned the phasing out of the A-10 Thunderbolt,...

Defense: China has just tested a new intercontinental ballistic missile that can deliver up to 10 independently targeted nuclear warheads, using technology given to them on President Clinton's watch to launch communications satellites. The Dec. 13 test of the DF-41 was the third for the new weapon. But it marked the first test of a multiple independently targetable re-entry vehicle, or MIRV, technology and raises by an order of magnitude the nuclear threat to the U.S. as China continues its massive arms buildup. And disturbingly, the threat is in large part of our own making. "The DF-4, which could be...

National Security: It won't generate the buzz that torture allegations do, but a provision in the defense spending bill requires the White House to explain why Russia developed a cruise missile in breach of a 1987 treaty. President Ronald Reagan coined the phrase "trust but verify" regarding dealing with the Russians for good reason. American security was to be guaranteed through the strength of our will and the genius of our technology, not through pieces of parchment, handshakes, clinking glasses at conferences, or reset buttons. Enter President Obama and the age of flexibility, back-stabbing our allies on things like missile...

Defense Threat: China conducts its third test in a year of a hypersonic glide vehicle designed to evade our missile and other defense systems, including the Aegis defense system guarding our carrier battle groups. As we downsize our military, scale back weapons procurement and development, China proceeds at top speed towards weapons designed to counter our once-huge technical advantage and qualitative superiority. Case in point is the third flight test of a hypersonic glide vehicle (HGV), dubbed the WU-14 by the Pentagon, following earlier tests on Jan. 9 and Aug. 7 of this year. The U.S. Navy is particularly concerned,...

Defense: Members of Congress warn that the State Department is working on arms accords to demilitarize space and ban anti-satellite weapons, leaving Russia and China with a huge lead in military space capabilities. On Jan. 17, 2012, then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton issued a statement announcing the Obama administration's intention to work with the European Union on an International Code of Conduct for Outer Space Activities. It was supposed to be sort of a "rules of the road" for space-faring nations to deal with issues such as the accumulating space junk jeopardizing satellites and manned space activities such as the...

National Defense: The president launches attacks on the Islamic State with two weapons systems that were targeted for elimination by the administration years before their usefulness ended or any replacements were ready. With the decision to launch air and missile strikes against Islamic State targets in Syria, in addition to ongoing strikes in Iraq in what is said to be the start of a long and sustained campaign to "degrade and destroy" the terrorist group, President Obama has stumbled upon a revelation: The military whose budgets he's slashed and weapons systems he opposed is suddenly quite useful. As the Washington...

National Security: Beijing is moving fast on a maneuverable, hypersonic glide vehicle designed to evade America's defenses, including the Aegis ballistic missile system guarding our carrier battle groups. On Aug. 7, China conducted a second test of its hypersonic glide vehicle (HGV), known as the WU-14, yet another example of its relentless pursuit of high-tech weaponry as the United States abandons what the administration dismisses as Cold War weaponry. The first test, conducted in January, saw China's HGV reach speeds in the vicinity of Mach 10, about 10 times the speed of sound. In the latest test, according to Internet...

Nuclear Threat: Beijing's strategic military buildup continues with the unveiling of a road-mobile missile capable of delivering up to 10 atomic warheads anywhere in America. Time to show some flexibility, Mr. President? While President Obama was playing the back nine, and as it was confirmed that the Russians had developed a cruise missile, the R500, which violates 1987's Intermediate Nuclear Forces treaty, the Chinese were busy as well. They now have a mobile intercontinental nuclear missile with no other purpose than to make war against the U.S. The announcement of the DF-41's existence was not exactly approved by the Chinese...

Russian Aggression: Instead of a foreign policy that's a blend of Neville Chamberlain and Monty Python, the U.S. should trade flexibility for some backbone, scrap the reset button and start digging some missile silos. It takes a lot to make Jimmy Carter look like Winston Churchill. But President Obama, who bats not an eye as a Russian warplane buzzes a U.S. warship in the Black Sea, has accomplished that with his pusillanimous policy regarding Moscow's creeping anschluss in Ukraine. Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's comparison of current events to the days before World War II is on the mark. On...

Disarming America: The U.S. has announced plans to place 50 nuclear missiles in storage as part of its commitment to the New START Treaty signed with Russia, ignoring Moscow's violation of another arms treaty. The Pentagon announced Tuesday the United States' Strategic Force Structure designed "to comply with the New START Treaty," as a Defense Department press release notes. It means that 50 Minuteman III missiles — out of a current force of 450 — will be removed from their silos and stored away. The silos will be kept "warm," that is, available for future use and for re-insertion of...

Defense: Budget cuts, sequestration and indifference to maintaining what was once "the arsenal of democracy" have led to units that are not deployment-ready and soldiers with weapons their grandfathers could have used. The standing ovation given at the State of the Union to Sgt. 1st Class Cory Remsburg, seriously wounded in an Afghan war that his commander in chief did not believe was winnable, was well deserved. It also served as a tribute to all the heroes we send into battle, particularly under rules of engagement that often make the proverbial "one hand tied behind your back" a preferable option....

National Security: While the administration guts the U.S. military, Pentagon experts warn that as soon as five years from now our missile defenses might pose little problem for China's new hypersonic strike vehicle. Behaving as the world power they are becoming, the Chinese are building state-of-the-art hypersonic missiles that Pentagon officials warn could overpower U.S. defenses in five years. As we recently mentioned, China's defense ministry has confirmed the Jan. 9 test of a hypersonic glide vehicle, known as the WU-14. It was designed to evade our missile and other defense systems, such as the Aegis sea-based missile defense guarding...

Power Shift: Despite the White House's much-lauded pivot to the Pacific, the Navy's Pacific commander warns that an increasingly hostile and assertive China threatens U.S. air and sea superiority in the region. If jaws didn't drop, they should have last week when Adm. Samuel J. Locklear III, chief of U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM), said: "Our historic dominance that most of us in this room have enjoyed is diminishing, no question." U.S. naval and air superiority, particularly in the Pacific, has been taken for granted. But as Obama administration budget cuts and the effects of sequestration take their toll, our position...

Defense: Breaking yet another promise, this one to Congress, the administration jeopardizes our national security with plans to eliminate an entire squadron of intercontinental ballistic missiles and destroy its silos. Yet another example of what President Obama meant in 2012 when he promised Russian President Dmitry Medvedev at the Nuclear Security Summit in Seoul, South Korea, that after his re-election he would have more "flexibility" on defense issues, comes on the news that an ICBM squadron would be scrapped to comply with the New START Treaty — even as both the Russians and Chinese deploy new ballistic missiles. A document...

Military Superiority: As China does its own Pacific pivot, a new report reveals that Beijing's strategic bomber is equipped with a land-attack nuclear missile and an armed drone nearly identical to one of ours developed through cyberespionage. To the casual observer, the Chinese Hongzha-6 (H-6) bomber is not that impressive. The two-engine medium-range jet is a variant of the old Soviet Tu-16 Badger. That plane first flew in 1959 and versions have been deployed by the Chinese Air Force since 1968. A prototype H-6 was used to airdrop China's first three-stage thermonuclear device at the Lop Nor Nuclear Weapon Test...

Global Power: Moscow launches four ICBMs in a large-scale nuclear drill as Chinese state media, brandishing detailed maps, show how Beijing's nuclear submarines can attack U.S. cities. We press "reset," they press "launch." In March 2009, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton presented Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov with a red "reset button" to symbolize improved ties. The era of confrontation when American presidents demanded the tearing down of walls was over. From now on, we would make nice. Fast-forward to 2012, when President Obama met with Dmitry Medvedev, Russia's then-president and now prime minister, at the Nuclear Security Summit in...

Defense: The firing of two nuclear commanders in a week adds to a body count that suggests we have either the most corrupt and incompetent general staff in history or our military is being reshaped for other purposes. The Obama administration, which has fired no one over scandals such as its Fast and Furious Mexican gun-running operation, its criminal negligence in the terrorist attack on our Benghazi diplomatic mission, or the use of the IRS to target and intimidate political foes, seems to have a curious obsession lately about ethics and competence in the U.S. military. Last week the Air...