More Than Missiles: China Previews its New Way of War
The Issue China’s October 1 display of military hardware revealed a nation seeking to supplant the United States as the dominant military and technological power in the Asia-Pacific region. Many…
Category: Commentary
Don’t Waste This Lesson: How drone attacks reveal fixable flaws with American air defenses
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…
Trump’s 2019 Missile Defense Budget: Choosing Capacity over Capability
The administration’s budget request for FY 2019 prioritizes near-term readiness against limited but growing ballistic missile threats from sources such as North Korea. This choice, however, falls short of connecting missile defense efforts to the reality of renewed great power competition as articulated in the National Defense Strategy.
Dissecting the Big Missile Defense Plus-up
Missile defense funds are likely to grow—a lot. In addition to a September reprogramming of an additional $249 million for the Missile Defense Agency for FY 2017, appropriations for FY 2018 could exceed $11 billion, over $3 billion more than the president’s original request. This would make for the highest level of missile defense funding in a decade…
FY17 Budget Squeezes MDA’s Research and Development
The recently released $7.5 billion FY17 budget request for the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) represents an $822 million reduction from last year’s enacted budget. These cuts are essentially divided between…
MDA and the Color of Money
This study explores the growing competition for scarce dollars at the U.S. Missile Defense Agency (MDA). It traces the authorities, roles, and missions assigned to the agency and the growing…