In Depth Analysis, Commentary, and Publications
For decades, China has engaged in a fervent game of “catch-up” with U.S. military capabilities. This effort, which has ballooned China’s defense spending to 620 percent of its 1990 level, is beginning to bear real fruit. While still far from achieving military parity, China’s military technology and doctrine are quickly coalescing into a coherent form of warfare,...
All figures in millions of dollars. * The Senate NDAA transferred authorization for THAAD O&M and Procurement obligations to the Army. The Senate Appropriations Committee transferred appropriation obligations for Aegis BMD to the Navy and THAAD to the Army. ** Military construction is appropriated by a different subcommittee than the Senate Defense Appropriations subcommittee. The...
In discussions of Iran’s regional missile proliferation, Lebanese Hezbollah and Yemen’s Houthi rebels tend to dominate the conversation. This focus is for good reason: Hezbollah today possesses an estimated 130,000 rockets and short-range missiles, and the Houthis have fired over 250 projectiles into Saudi Arabia since 2015. Yet Iran’s strategy of arming proxies with rockets...
Recent Pentagon actions have produced considerable uncertainty in the future of homeland ballistic missile defense. In August 2019, Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering Dr. Michael Griffin cancelled the Redesigned Kill Vehicle (RKV) program, a long-running effort to replace the kill vehicles on older Ground-Based Interceptors (GBI) designed to defend the nation from a long-range ballistic...
On October 1, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) celebrated the 70th anniversary of its founding. Among the pageantry was a military parade in which the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) performed a highly orchestrated show of strength, exhibiting many of its strategic weapon systems. While China has regularly held such displays in the past, this...
Originally published in The Hill. The attacks on the oil facilities at Abqaiq and Khurais in Saudi Arabia are neon flashing warning signs of the threat presented by the proliferation of low flying precision guided weapons like drones and cruise missiles. These attacks were highly successful, despite the apparent presence of air defenses. This illustrates...
New missile defense plans depend upon the success or failure of one thing: a new layer of space-based sensors. At the January release of his administration’s new missile defense policy review, President Donald Trump announced the beginning of a “new era” for missile defense. To be sure, a new period of missile threats has already...
Tensions with Iran are once again increasing. The slow implosion of the nuclear accord, Iran’s harassment of cargo ships, and the downing of a U.S. unmanned aircraft have made plain the risk of conflict between Iran and the United States. The dispute should also draw attention to the questionable preparedness of the United States and...
Tensions with Iran are once again high, making plain the risk of unexpected conflict between Iran and the United States. In the event of such a conflict, the United States would likely rely heavily on regional missile defense architectures like the European Phased Adaptive Approach, or EPAA, designed to protect NATO from ballistic missile attacks...
Next week, people from across the missile defense community will gather at an annual symposium in Huntsville, Alabama, to consider how to adapt U.S. missile defense efforts to the challenge of renewed competition with Russia and China. A centerpiece of their discussions will be the emergence of advanced hypersonic missile threats and what to do...
