As the U.S. military faces increased competition from near-peer competitors, the chief of naval operations said March 29 he would start keeping details of some of the Navy’s most high profile technology programs closer to the vest. One example is laser technology, which will be critical for the service, Adm. John Richardson said during a Booz Allen Hamilton-hosted summit focusing on directed energy in Washington, D.C. “The implications of getting directed energy out on the field … will be transformational” for the service, he said. The Navy has already deployed the Laser Weapon System, or LaWS, a 30-kilowatt system, on the USS Ponce.

 “We cannot keep waiting to test prototypes or validate new weapons sitting in labs while our adversaries are testing relentlessly,” Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) said at the Directed Energy Summit, hosted by Booz Allen Hamilton.

The U.S. is lacking a sense of urgency, he said, after decades of overconfidence when it comes to quickly innovating and besting the technology of near-peer competitors, which have been investing and studying U.S. weaknesses. And budgetary uncertainty created by a string of continuing resolutions only adds to the U.S. disadvantage, he said. “Try winning the mile race when you spot your competition a lap. You can do that, but you have to be really, really fast,” Richardson said at Booz Allen Hamilton’s annual Directed Energy Summit. “We just aren’t. We’re far too bureaucratic.”

Mary Miller said the Pentagon has convened a group of representatives from all the military services and relevant agencies to work on the plan for how the Defense Department will use directed energy, such as high-energy lasers and radio frequency weapons. The plan is expected to be delivered internally sometime this fall and fully completed by early 2018, she said at Booz Allen Hamilton's Directed Energy Summit.

The service desperately needs more aircraft to provide more flying hours for its pilots and a low-cost OA-X could be just the answer the Air Force is looking for

Mark Gunzinger of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA) has no qualms about walking away. China, North Korea, Iran, Pakistan, India and Saudi Arabia possess various types of ballistic missiles with ranges of 500-5,500 km; some also have ground-launched cruise missiles. War-game exercises supported by the CSBA show the precarious situation of NATO members Poland, Lithuania and Latvia. These countries are bracketed by compliant, offensive Russian weaponry based in Kalingrad, Belarus and along Moscow’s border, says Gunzinger.  He says future ground-based strike systems could help the U.S. suppress Russia’s advanced integrated air defense systems and freedom of action in the event of a conflict. Those same weapons could also help the Pentagon overcome some of the military roadblocks put up by China and North Korea in the Western Pacific. China has fielded many types of conventional and nuclear medium-range missiles to restrict U.S. forces, and it appears that some of those missiles have recently been emplaced in silos in the South China Sea.