News

Danes Tout $340M Stanflex Frigate for US Navy – But What’s Real Cost?

July 13, 2017 Breaking Defense

Bryan Clark was unconvinced. “The Iver Huitfeldt uses mostly commercial components that may not be rated for the run time” — the sheer wear and tear of long deployments — “and potential effects of (battle) damage that US ships are expected to experience,” he told me.

House Bill’s Defense Fund Faces Tough Odds in Senate

July 11, 2017 CQ Roll Call

The fund "reflects an unusual willingness by Congress to give up some of their oversight prerogatives in favor of giving DOD more funding now," said Katherine Blakeley of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

SECNAV nominee supports studying small aircraft carriers to outfit future fleet

July 11, 2017 Inside Defense

The Senate Armed Services Committee's version of the fiscal year 2018 defense policy bill directs the Navy to begin designing a smaller carrier. Three entities conducted recent Navy force structure assessments: the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, the Mitre Corp. and the Navy's assessment division in the office of the chief of naval operations (N81), all of which recommended the service add smaller aircraft carriers to its future fleet.

Life support: The Navy’s struggle to define a LCS bare minimum

July 9, 2017 Defense News TV

In the meantime, the Navy has maintained that it needs at least 52 small surface combatants, ultimately made up mostly of littoral combat ships, to do security cooperation exercises with allies and the low-end missions the LCS was purchased for in the first place, said Bryan Clark, a retired submariner and analyst with the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

China’s Submarine Dream (And Nightmare for the U.S. Navy): ‘Hunt for Red October’ Subs

July 6, 2017 The National Interest

“If it is well-built, a rim-driven pump jet would be a quieter propulsion system than traditional propellers, and could be quieter than shaft-driven pump jets like those on some U.S. submarines,” Bryan Clark, a retired U.S. Navy undersea warfare officer and analyst the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

Briefs

Understanding NATO’s Concept for Deterrence and Defense of the Euro-Atlantic Area

May 20, 2024 Katherine Kjellström Elgin, Sean Monaghan, Sara Bjerg Moller

NATO, the largest and most powerful military alliance in history, turned seventy-five in April. In July, the leaders of NATO will return to the city where its founding document, the Washington Treaty, was signed in 1949. Most people have heard of NATO. Fewer know its most important document is the Strategic Concept, which is updated every decade or so, and sets the Alliance’s strategy. An even smaller group know about NATO’s “Concept for Deterrence and Defence of the Euro-Atlantic Area.”

Studies

More of the Same? The Future of the Russian Military And Its Ability to Change

March 18, 2024 Katherine Kjellström Elgin

Assessing the type of threat that Russia is likely to pose in the aftermath of the war in Ukraine is a critical challenge for the United States and its allies. What will the Russian military look like in the future? Some argue that the Russian military will remain a significant threat – and perhaps become a very different and even more serious one. This argument holds that the Russian military will reconstitute in a relatively short time frame and may reform according to lessons learned during the war in Ukraine. Others argue that the Russian military will pose a far less formidable conventional threat going forward. Not only has the war against Ukraine exposed fundamental weaknesses in the Russian military, the argument goes, but Moscow’s ability to address those weaknesses will be limited by available manpower, sanctions, and export controls.

Briefs

2023 Annual Report

January 30, 2024

For nearly three decades, CSBA has provided consistent, high-quality, and innovative research on defense strategy, budgets, and the security environment.

Briefs

An Ongoing and Necessary Renaissance: NATO’s Nuclear Posture

January 25, 2024 Eric Edelman, Franklin C. Miller

President Putin’s nuclear saber-rattling while the war in Ukraine has raged, along with lurid nuclear threats by Russian officials and propagandists, have once again focused attention on NATO’s nuclear mission. As the alliance approaches a summit in Washington later this summer, it is an appropriate time to review its nuclear posture.

Studies

Strengthening the Phalanx: Layered, Comprehensive, and Distributed Air and Missile Defense in the Indo-Pacific

January 17, 2024 Carl Rehberg, Herbert Kemp

One of the most critical operational challenges the United States is likely to confront in a future conflict, particularly in the Indo-Pacific theater, is the threat of massed precision-guided air and missile attacks on overseas ports, bases, and other vital facilities. DoD has invested significant resources to defend against ballistic missile attacks on the United States, as well as its forward bases and forward-operating forces. However, it cannot still defeat large numbers of ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and unmanned aerial systems.

Studies

Inconsistent Congress: Analysis of the 2024 Defense Budget Request

October 17, 2023 Travis Sharp

After increasing the Department of Defense (DoD) budget in real terms during seven of the past eight fiscal years, Congress has now pivoted toward restraining spending by passing the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023. Approved in early June as part of the debt ceiling deal, the law imposes a liberating limit on defense. It unshackles defense spending from parity with nondefense spending but still caps military budgets at or near current spending levels for the next two fiscal years while brandishing the threat of a lowered defense cap and potential sequestration if Congress delays in passing full-year appropriations for any budget account.

More of the Same? The Future of the Russian Military And Its Ability to Change

Strengthening the Phalanx: Layered, Comprehensive, and Distributed Air and Missile Defense in the Indo-Pacific

Inconsistent Congress: Analysis of the 2024 Defense Budget Request

Evaluate Like We Operate: Why DOD Should Evaluate Weapons Systems as Networked Force Packages, Not Individual Platforms

Extending Deterrence by Detection: The Case for Integrating Unmanned Aircraft Systems Into the Indo-Pacific Partnership for Maritime Domain Awareness

Beyond Precision: Maintaining America’s Strike Advantage in Great Power Conflict

The Decisive Decade: United States–China Competition in Defense Innovation and Defense Industrial Policy in and Beyond the 2020s

Speeding Toward Instability? Hypersonic Weapons and the Risks of Nuclear Use

Air Power Metamorphosis: Rethinking Air Force Combat Force Modernization

Innovating for Great Power Competition: An Examination of Service and Joint Innovation Efforts

2023 Annual Report

Featured Event

Report Release Webinar: Strengthening the Phalanx: Layered, Comprehensive, and Distributed Air and Missile Defense in the Indo-Pacific

Danes Tout $340M Stanflex Frigate for US Navy – But What’s Real Cost?

House Bill’s Defense Fund Faces Tough Odds in Senate

SECNAV nominee supports studying small aircraft carriers to outfit future fleet

Navy Steers Well Away from An LCS Frigate

Life support: The Navy’s struggle to define a LCS bare minimum

China’s Submarine Dream (And Nightmare for the U.S. Navy): ‘Hunt for Red October’ Subs

Latest Publications

Understanding NATO’s Concept for Deterrence and Defense of the Euro-Atlantic Area

More of the Same? The Future of the Russian Military And Its Ability to Change

2023 Annual Report

An Ongoing and Necessary Renaissance: NATO’s Nuclear Posture

Strengthening the Phalanx: Layered, Comprehensive, and Distributed Air and Missile Defense in the Indo-Pacific

Inconsistent Congress: Analysis of the 2024 Defense Budget Request