Ideas
Rein in the National Security Council
Created as a coordinating body, the NSC has become a policymaking powerhouse whose White House status hides it from oversight.
Science & Tech
Report: Weapons AI Increasingly Replacing, Not Augmenting, Human Decision Making
A new survey of existing and planned smart weapons finds that AI is increasingly used to replace humans, not help them.
Ideas
Yemen Has Become the Graveyard of the Obama Doctrine
The human costs of facilitating Saudi Arabia’s proxy war have been enormous, and there’s no end in sight.
Threats
Maritime Tensions Grow Between Rising China and Rearming Japan
The most dangerous flashpoint in the South China Sea could be a Japanese warship, not a disputed isle.
Defense Systems
High anxiety: US needs resilient satellites, nets to avoid a space crisis
A new assessment highlights the potential for an instability crisis in space as the United States and China vie for the high ground.
Policy
EXCLUSIVE: ISIS ‘Will Fight to the Death’ for Mosul, Says Top Peshmerga General
The Kurds’ chief of staff, who dreams of Kurdish independence, hopes the American military stays long after Mosul.
Science & Tech
How the US Air Force is Rapidly Mobilizing For Cyber War
New ideas about defense and new tables of organization are reshaping the service’s ideas about battle.
Defense Systems
Air Force moves ahead with GPS III preparations
The service gives Lockheed Martin a $395 million contract modification for work on the ninth and tenth of the 32-satellite constellation.
Ideas
Progress or Oppression—You Decide, Obama Tells the UN in His Final Address
From mass migration to North Korea’s nukes, Obama’s lofty speech contained little guidance about how to resolve the world’s intractable problems.
Policy
The Intelligence Picture Over Iraq and Syria Has Gotten Much Cloudier
The leader of Air Combat Command says new players on the battlefield are complicating the air fight against ISIS.
Defense Systems
Pentagon wants an imaging sensor that can think
Under the ReImagine program, researchers seek to develop a programmable array of pixels that can use machine learning to react to what they’re seeing, as a way to improve situational awareness.
Science & Tech
Tomorrow’s Downed Pilots May Be Rescued by an Osprey-Black Hawk Team
A U.S. Air Force chief of staff who was shot down over Serbia has reenergized the debate over the best way to do combat search and rescue.
Science & Tech
The Air Force Is Starting to Think About Its Next Strike Aircraft
Service leaders are laying groundwork for a new strike capability — even as they work to unground their F-35s.
Ideas