Friday, March 21, 2025
Jason Sherman is a reporter for Inside Defense. For more than two decades -- including stints with Defense News and Armed Forces Journal -- he has covered the Pentagon, defense industry, the military budget, weapon system acquisition and defense policy formulation as well as reporting on technology, business, and global arms trade. Jason has traveled to more than 40 countries, studied medieval history at the State University of New York at Buffalo, and lives in Brooklyn.
With parts of the United States facing fuel shortages caused by Hurricane Katrina, Acting Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England wants the U.S. military -- the nation's largest single petroleum consumer -- to hunt for ways to conserve.
Some areas of the Pentagon's budget, particularly those accounts earmarked for new weapon systems, could be squeezed as the economic toll of Hurricane Katrina becomes clear, according to defense budget experts.
The aftermath of Hurricane Katrina is expected to shake up the Pentagon's Quadrennial Defense Review, according to Pentagon officials, underscoring the military's key role in relief and recovery missions following domestic disasters.
The Pentagon office charged with overseeing the U.S. military's transformation efforts believes the services are making progress in adopting new technologies and concepts that are essential to Information Age-combat operations.
Along with a massive flotilla to support the hurricane rescue and relief effort, the Navy has established a team to capture lessons on what parts of the rescue and relief operation go well, and which do not.
A new force planning construct central to the Quadrennial Defense Review is running into resistance from service leaders who are concerned that their prized weapon systems and combat capabilities could be cut without adequate analysis.
The Defense Department has appointed a three-star Army general to lead a new task force that will coordinate military support to civil authorities dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
U.S. combatant commanders should be given greater flexibility to launch "transformational" initiatives involving new technology and concepts they deem necessary to prosecute the global war on terrorism in their areas of responsibility, according to an influential advisory panel.
Gordon England, the acting deputy defense secretary, is considering significant organizational changes to the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Joint Staff in order to better prepare the Pentagon for stability operations.
Gordon England, the acting deputy defense secretary, has called for the Defense Department to recalibrate its effort to protect from terrorist attack a wide range of essential services and physical infrastructure that are essential to U.S. military operations around the world.
A Defense Department-chartered study is set to recommend options for establishing a civilian corps of nation-building experts that would relieve the military of non-combat stability and reconstruction activities in future operations similar to Afghanistan and Iraq.
The United States and South Korea have launched a two-week military exercise designed to improve their ability to fight North Korea, a long-standing mission that is increasingly the focus of fewer U.S. military personnel operating from new positions far from the demilitarized zone.
A senior advisory panel to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is drawing up recommendations for how to improve defenses against the scourge of U.S. forces in Iraq -- roadside bombs.
Gordon England, acting deputy defense secretary, is preparing to move the Quadrennial Defense Review into a final round of analysis that will set the stage for senior military leaders to determine the fate of weapon system programs worth billions of dollars, as well as the size and shape of the armed forces.
The Defense Department next week will simulate a devastating nuclear terrorist attack against Charleston, SC, in an exercise designed to improve military support to civil authorities dealing with the aftermath of such a catastrophe.
Saudi Arabia has deployed its most capable fighter aircraft to the United States to participate in the U.S. Air Force's premier airpower training exercise for the first time in more than two decades.
The Defense Department has proposed joint exercises with the Mexican armed forces as part of a gradual nurturing of military-to-military relations that the Pentagon regards as essential to improving defense of the U.S. homeland.
The Pentagon's acquisition executive has agreed to extend interim contracts to the shipyards developing the Navy's next-generation DD(X) destroyer, allowing the companies to keep engineering and design teams in place while the Defense Department considers a new acquisition strategy for the program.
The Defense Department has completed a new road map intended to guide future development of its quickly expanding inventory of unmanned aerial vehicles.
Acting Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England has directed U.S. forces to draw up plans to use non-lethal technologies in domestic missions such as protecting nuclear power plants and stopping suspicious ships in American waterways, according to Pentagon officials and documents.