Upon receiving the first reports that a U.S. Army staff sergeant allegedly had killed 16 Afghan civilians Sunday morning, Washington sprang into crisis mode. Top White House and Pentagon officials feared that the reaction in Afghanistan would dwarf the riots and retribution killings sparked by the burning of several Korans at a U.S. base three weeks earlier. Read full article > >

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Analysis: Crisis over Afghan killings may follow familiar script

PRESIDENT OBAMA spoke up forcefully on Tuesday about the massacre of Afghan civilians, allegedly by a U.S. soldier. He said that the United States “takes this as seriously as if it was our own citizens and our own children who were murdered” and promised to “spare no effort in conducting a full investigation.” Those were the right words. Following through with his commitment to “make sure that anybody who was involved is held fully accountable with the full force of the law” could help to repair damage with Afghans who are understandably outraged by the killings . Read full article > >

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Editorial Board: Obama’s troubled handling of Afghanistan

A mortuary supervisor at the heart of the Dover Air Force Base scandals has resigned, sparing the Pentagon from a decision on whether to fire him for allegedly lying to investigators, mutilating a corpse and retaliating against whistleblowers. Read full article > >

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Dover Air Base mortuary supervisor resigns

The Defense Department wants to add as many as 1,612 employees to oversee and audit contracts next year even as it plans for a 5 percent cut in the U.S. military’s budget. Spending on the workers would rise 14 percent, to $1.9 billion, in fiscal 2013, from $1.7 billion a year earlier, according to the Pentagon’s budget request. Staffs at two defense agencies that manage and audit contracts would increase 10 percent, to 17,226, during the same period. Read full article > >

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Pentagon builds auditing army as budget shrinks

The Defense Department wants to add as many as 1,612 employees to oversee and audit contracts next year even as it plans for a 5 percent cut in the U.S. military’s budget. Spending on the workers would rise 14 percent, to $1.9 billion, in fiscal 2013, from $1.7 billion a year earlier, according to the Pentagon’s budget request. Staffs at two defense agencies that manage and audit contracts would increase 10 percent, to 17,226, during the same period. Read full article > >

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Pentagon builds auditing army as budget shrinks

The Defense Department wants to add as many as 1,612 employees to oversee and audit contracts next year even as it plans for a 5 percent cut in the U.S. military’s budget. Spending on the workers would rise 14 percent, to $1.9 billion, in fiscal 2013, from $1.7 billion a year earlier, according to the Pentagon’s budget request. Staffs at two defense agencies that manage and audit contracts would increase 10 percent, to 17,226, during the same period. Read full article > >

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Pentagon builds auditing army as budget shrinks

The Pentagon’s brass talks about killing in the most antiseptic terms imaginable. “Kinetic operations” are launched. Targets are “serviced.” Enemies are “removed from the battlefield.” But threaten the military’s budget, and the language becomes gory and apocalyptic. In the past six months, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and other Pentagon officials have compared the arcane budget-cutting process known as sequestration, to: Read full article > >

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Panetta and other Pentagon officials are mad about metaphors

A U.S. reconnaissance plane returning to Africa after a mission in Afghanistan crashed, killing four Air Force personnel, including a senior airman from Upper Marlboro, the Pentagon announced. The Pentagon said the cause of the accident is under investigation. Read full article > >

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Md. airman one of four killed in Djibouti crash

If you are not prepared to go to war, you cannot threaten that “nothing is off the table” as you search for diplomatic solutions. Thus there are completed plans, updated daily, at Israeli military headquarters in Tel Aviv and at the Pentagon for carrying out attacks on Iranian facilities in a last-ditch effort to prevent Tehran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. Read full article > >

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At the Pentagon and in Israel, plans show the difficulties of an Iran strike

When authorities caught up to Yonathan Melaku, it was more than six months after a mysterious spree of overnight shootings at the Pentagon and other military buildings in Northern Virginia. Melaku was lurking in Arlington National Cemetery with a backpack filled with bags of ammonium nitrate and a can of black spray paint. Read full article > >

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Yonathan Melaku admits shooting at Pentagon, military buildings 

TEHRAN — For the American government, the crash of the RQ-170 drone in Iran was an embarrassment. For the Iranian government, it was a propaganda victory. And for at least one company, according to state radio, it could be a windfall. Read full article > >

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U.S. drone that crashed in Iran goes miniature

A Pentagon pilot program that uses classified National Security Agency data to protect the computer networks of defense contractors has had some success but also has failed to meet some expectations, according to a study commissioned by the Defense Department. Read full article > >

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Cyber defense effort is mixed, study finds

As President Obama stood at the podium in the Pentagon briefing room Thursday to outline the nation’s defense priorities, the military stood with him. Their primary audience was a few miles across the river — in Congress. Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, whose beloved army will face a significant troop reduction under Obama’s plan, was at the president’s side. Marine Corps commandant Gen. James F. Amos, whose service will also shrink, stood just behind him. And over Obama’s right shoulder loomed Gen. Ray Odierno, the former commander in Iraq who is now the army chief of staff. Read full article > >

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In creating new defense strategy, Obama attempts to outflank Congress

As the Pentagon confronts the prospect of cutting its budget about 10 percent over the next decade, some are warning that the potential impact on scientific innovation is being overlooked.

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The Next War: A Hidden Cost of Military Cuts Could Be Invention and Its Industries

PRESIDENT OBAMA pledged that the $489 billion in defense cuts he has proposed over 10 years would be governed by a concerted strategy, and on Thursday he delivered one. At the Pentagon, Mr. Obama unveiled a “strategic guidance,” which aides said reflected a considerable investment of his personal time and ideas. The president’s thesis is that the need for fiscal austerity coincides with a global “ moment of transition ,” in which the United States is winding down a decade of land wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and facing the need to turn toward a very different set of challenges, particularly in Asia. Read full article > >

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Editorial Board:
President Obama’s defense strategy rests on shaky assumptions