In Depth Analysis, Commentary, and Publications
The 2018 National Defense Strategy calls renewed strategic competition with major powers the central challenge of our time. The 2019 Missile Defense Review (MDR) represents the Trump administration’s attempt to adapt US missile defense policy, posture, and programs to this challenge. Upon the document’s public release in January 2019, President Trump stated that it marked...
Just over a year ago, then-Deputy Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan announced that the 2020 defense budget would be the “masterpiece” that would finally align Pentagon spending with the new direction of the National Defense Strategy. The release of the new budget follows the January 2019 release of the Missile Defense Review, which laid out...
The Trump administration has today released its long-awaited Missile Defense Review (MDR). Initiated pursuant to both congressional and presidential direction, the report represents an attempt to adapt U.S. missile defense policy, posture, and programs to the strategic environment of great power competition. The United States and its allies face a more complex and challenging aerial...
In missile defense circles, commentators frequently remark that that there are only so many islands or ships in the Pacific on which to put radars. Reading through recent missile defense budget requests, however, one is struck by the fact that the Pentagon seems to have doubled down on a strategy of building a chain of...
Abandoning 360-degree coverage would make air defenses more vulnerable and undermine their mission Press reports and statements from U.S. Army leadership suggest that omnidirectional capability for the Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor, or LTAMDS, may be slipping away as the threshold requirement it deserves to be. Air defenders and joint forces under their...
Recent statements by President Trump and National Security Adviser John Bolton indicate the United States may soon withdraw from the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty. The INF Treaty was a landmark achievement in arms control, eliminating nearly 3,000 nuclear delivery vehicles from U.S. and Soviet arsenals. Originally concluded between the United States and the...
On August 1, Congress passed the FY 2019 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). The bill authorizes a total of $10 billion for the Missile Defense Agency, $51 million more than the Trump Administration request. The authorization includes relative reductions to programs that were forward financed in the final FY 2018 omnibus appropriations bill and supplements...
Rethinking the push for program transfer When the U.S. Missile Defense Agency was created in 2002, the expectation was that it would initially develop missile defense systems but then transfer responsibility for their procurement to the military services that would operate them. The process has not worked out quite as expected. Missile defense capabilities have...
Several decades ago, former Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone once described his country as a “big aircraft carrier” from which to defend against Soviet aircraft. Although such an analogy fails to capture the richness and depth of the U.S-Japan alliance, it did say something important about Japan’s unique geographic and strategic position. Today’s air and...
Later this spring, the Trump administration will release its 2018 Missile Defense Review (MDR), which is expected to better align U.S. missile defense policy with the present security environment. President Barack Obama’s 2010 Ballistic Missile Defense Review (BMDR) reflected the security environment of the time and the aspirations of the Obama administration. In particular, technological...
