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For more than 60 years, most Americans have thought of nuclear weapons as an all-or-nothing game. The only way to win is not to play at all, we believed, because any use of nukes will lead to Armageddon. That may no longer be the game our opposition is playing. As nuclear weapons proliferate to places that might not share our reluctance to use them in small numbers, however, the US military may face a “second nuclear age” of retail Armageddon for which it is utterly unprepared.

Today, the results of a think-tank exercise to nudge the Pentagon. Top defense budget thinkers got together a week ago for a one-day "Strategic Choices Exercise," hosted by the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, in which four think tank teams were asked to rebalance the Pentagon's major capabilities against major budget cuts, and Situation Report got an exclusive peek. Each team was asked to build a strategy based on two scenarios: one, a $500 billion cut over the next 10 years, as directed by the current Budget Control Act, and another half that size, a $250 billion cut over 10 years. Each team used a "rebalancing tool" created by CSBA to make investment and divestment decisions under both scenarios using a set of more than 650 budget options to add or cut items from the DOD budget. For example, participants could decide if they wanted to cut retiring "legacy fighter" jets, buy additional destroyers, invest in directed energy research and development, or cut infantry combat training or DOD civilian personnel. "The idea was to see what specific divestments and investments each team would make, where they would take the risk and how well their strategies would work under the stress of budget cuts," CSBA's Todd Harrison told Situation Report by e-mail. Today, each of the five teams will reveal their findings on an event on Capitol Hill.

U.S. special operators, including Marines, have played a key role in helping the Colombian military reclaim areas of the country once controlled by violent guerrilla organizations known for kidnappings and producing illegal drugs, according to a new report released by a Washington think tank.

Senior US Defense Department officials are expected to present three budget-cutting scenarios to the defense secretary when they wrap up a wide-ranging review of military strategy at the end of this month, according to sources.

The Pentagon will request that Congress approve a budget for combat operations of about $79.5 billion, the least since 2005, as U.S. troops withdraw from Afghanistan, according to administration officials/.../

Military analysts, meanwhile, are calling for the Pentagon to invest in more advanced technologies for special operations forces. A new study by the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, said AFSOC’s reliance on a C-130 based aviation fleet ignores the combat environment that the U.S. military will face in the future.