Beach Reads: Defense One’s Top Picks for your iPad

Here are a few articles written by our staff and contributors to mull over while you’re on vacation.

DC's Political Paralysis "Means More Casualties" for Untrained Soldiers
The best place to learn how Washington’s budget impasse is putting troops at risk is the Army’s National Training Center, which has cancelled rotations for the first time since 1981. By James Kitfield

Iraq’s Descent Into Madness, With No Americans in Sight
Prison breaks, car bombs and cozying up to Iran? This is not what was supposed to happen. By Joshua Foust

When Would Cyber War Lead to Real War?
The method of an attack does not dictate the means of reprisal. By Vincent Manzo

Dispatch from Afghanistan: They Don't Want to Fight, Neither Do We
In Nangarhar Province, with the war clock ticking, commanders know the Afghans cannot fight on their own -- or simply will not.  “There is no commitment to victory.” By Carmen Gentile

What Ash Carter Gets Wrong about Nuclear Weapons Spending
It’s hard to imagine how Deputy Defense Secretary Ash Carter could get it so wrong in Aspen about nuclear weapons spending. But wrong he is. By Kingston Reif

Obama's Whistleblower Witchhunt Won't Work at DOD
The U.S. has tried something like President Obama’s 'Insider Threat Program' before. It didn’t work then and it won’t work now. By Gabe Rottman

Want Syria? Convince Dempsey
For more than a year, President Obama’s senior military advisor has deflected calls to send the U.S. military into Syria. Convince Gen. Martin Dempsey it won’t be another Iraq and maybe you’ll get your war. By Kevin Baron

An Afghan Game of Chicken
By conducting a public feud, Obama and Karzai are putting their gains at risk in Afghanistan. By Michael Hirsh

Hard Choices for the New Middle East
Five strategic dilemmas the administration must address in the Middle East. By Colin H. Kahl

Goodbye Anti-War, Hello Anti-Secrecy

Unable to stop war, the peace movement believes information freedom could be next. To them, Snowden, Manning and Assange are heroes. And it’s not just a cause, it’s an identity. By Kevin Baron

Why the Founding Fathers Would Object to Today’s Military
Today’s endless, undeclared and increasingly secret use of U.S. force is exactly what the founding fathers feared most. By Gregory D. Foster

Forget the Troops, Can the Afghan Government Lead?
Sure, the Pentagon hypes Afghan forces taking the security lead, but there’s a “gigantic truth that we keep missing.” By Stephanie Gaskell

(Image by Anton Gvozdikov via Shutterstock)