The US Air Force is poised to deliver the decision of the decade, with reports that the Long-Range Strike Bomber contract award could be announced as early as 27 October. Two key steps must take place, and Bloomberg reports that the first has already taken place.
After five months of hints, declarations, mixed messages, and dithering, the US is reportedly set to challenge Chinese claims in the South China Sea.
In an interview with Anthony Kuhn on Morning Edition, Bryan Clark discusses the U.S. Navy’s proposed freedom of navigation maneuvers in the South China Sea and the potential consequences of China’s increasingly sophisticated military capabilities.
On Thursday, President Barack Obama vetoed the $612 billion National Defense Authorization Act, the law that funds the Pentagon for the 2016 fiscal year. Nestled among the long list of defense and foreign policy projects funded by the bill is the European Reassurance Initiative, which — as its name suggests — signals the United States' renewed commitment to reassure NATO members that Washington will help preserve their territorial integrity, especially in Central and Eastern Europe, where fears of Russian aggressiveness run high.
The United States is facing an increasingly constrained fiscal environment, with the 2011 Budget Control Act (BCA) placing mandatory limits on spending. At the same time, all three legs of the U.S. nuclear triad—land-based, sea-based, and airborne—are due for extensive modernization.
Driving U.S. warships near China’s artificial archipelago is a routine operation and shouldn’t be seen as provocative, the U.S. Navy’s top officer said Thursday.
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