Defense & Military

Rep. John Garamendi (D-Calif.), a reliable vote against the nuclear-modernization status quo in the House Armed Services Committee, told disarmament advocates this week that the Joe Biden administration should pause development of the next U.S. intercontinental ballistic missile. It was one of two steps Garamendi said Biden should take as part of the administration’s nuclear […]

In another flurry of nominations, the Joe Biden administration announced this week plans to nominate Michael Connor as the second-in-command of the army’s civil works division. Connor, who is currently a partner at the D.C. law firm Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr, LLP, will need a Senate greenlight before he takes over as Assistant […]

BY MATTHEW BEINART President Joe Biden announced this week he is nominating Frank Kendall, a former top acquisition official at the Pentagon, as the next secretary of the Air Force and Heidi Shyu, the Army’s former lead acquisition executive, to be the next undersecretary of defense for Research and Engineering. Both nominations were announced Tuesday […]

The U.S. Senate voted Tuesday to approve the nomination of Colin Kahl’s nomination for the Pentagon’s top policy job on a party-line vote of 49-to-45. President Joe Biden’s pick to be undersecretary of defense for policy, Kahl failed to win a single Republican vote, Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), the top GOP member on the Senate […]

President Joe Biden announced Wednesday he has forwarded the nomination of Frank Kendall III to be secretary of the Air Force to the Senate. The nomination has been referred to the Senate Armed Services Committee. The White House announced Tuesday that Kendall, a former acquisition official at the Pentagon, is the administration’s pick as the […]

President Joe Biden announced Tuesday he will nominate Frank Kendall, a former top acquisition official at the Pentagon, as the next secretary of the Air Force and Heidi Shyu, the Army’s former lead acquisition executive, to be the next undersecretary of defense for Research and Engineering. Kendall, an Army veteran, last served in the Pentagon […]

The U.S. Senate voted Tuesday to approve the nomination of Colin Kahl’s nomination for the Pentagon’s top policy job on a party-line vote of 49-to-45. President Joe Biden’s pick to be undersecretary of defense for policy, Kahl failed to win a single Republican vote, Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), the top GOP member on the Senate […]

President Joe Biden on Friday announced his intent to nominate Deborah Rosenblum to be assistant secretary for nuclear, chemical, and biological defense at the Department of Defense. The nuclear, chemical, and biological defense program, currently led on an acting basis by Brandi Vann, is charged with detecting, defending against and responding to threats posed by […]

The prime contractor for the Ground Based Strategic Deterrence wrapped up a key review for the program and set a cost and schedule baseline for the Air Force’s next-generation, nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missile. Northrop Grumman, which holds a $13 billion Air Force engineering and manufacturing development contract to build the first tranche of Ground Based […]

In an online forum this week, Sen. John Tester (D-Mont.) vowed to use his appropriations gavel to keep the Air Force’s next-generation nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missile “on track,” while a former senior pentagon official said congressional support for the program was broad but not deep. Tester delivered recorded remarks to an audience of just under […]

Weeks after Republican nuke hawks panned his performance at a nomination hearing, the Senate Armed Services Committee this week voted 13-13, along party lines, to advance Colin Kahl’s nomination for the Pentagon’s top policy job. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) will now have to make a motion to discharge Kahl’s nomination to bring a […]

Secretary of State Anthony Blinken this week said that the U.S. and its allies must strengthen their militaries, improve readiness and maintain an effective nuclear deterrent as part of efforts to modernize alliances and respond to changing threats, China and Russia. U.S. nuclear forces, Blinken told an audience at NATO headquarters in Belgium, must be […]

Nuclear weapons are one of a trilogy of high-spend programs likely to affect defense budgeting decisions for years, the chair of a House Appropriations panel said this week in an online hearing. “Cyber security, nuclear modernization and overseas contingency operations funding sound like they’re three unrelated topics,” Rep. Betty McCollum (D-Minn.), chair of the House […]

Secretary of State Anthony Blinken on Wednesday said that the U.S. and its allies must strengthen their militaries, improve readiness and maintain an effective nuclear deterrent as part of efforts to modernize alliances and respond to changing threats, China and Russia. U.S. nuclear forces, Blinken told an audience at NATO headquarters in Belgium, must be […]

Weeks after Republican nuke hawks panned his performance at a nomination hearing, the Senate Armed Services Committee on Wednesday voted 13-13, along party lines, to advance Colin Kahl’s nomination for the Pentagon’s top policy job. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) will now have to make a motion to discharge Kahl’s nomination to bring a […]

Nuclear weapons are one of a trilogy of high-spend programs likely to affect defense spending decisions for years, the chair of a House Appropriations panel said Tuesday in an online hearing. “Cyber security, nuclear modernization and overseas contingency operations funding sound like they’re three unrelated topics,” Rep. Betty McCollum (D-Minn.), chair of the House Appropriations […]

A Pentagon official pulled out of a scheduled public briefing about plutonium pit production at the Savannah River Site this week because of a gag order imposed by a Biden Administration review, a group advising the South Carolina government on nuclear matters said. Drew Walter, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for nuclear matters, was […]

A Pentagon official pulled out of a scheduled public briefing about plutonium pit production at the Savannah River Site on Monday because of a gag order imposed by a Biden Administration review, a group advising the South Carolina government on nuclear matters said. Drew Walter, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for nuclear matters, was […]

Nuclear hawks lit into Colin Kahl, President Joe Biden’s nominee for the Pentagon’s top policy post, after Kahl declined to offer unconditional support for key missile modernization programs during a Thursday hearing in the Senate Armed Services Committee. Sens. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.), Deb Fischer (R-Neb.) and Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) all tried, but all they got […]

The Senate Armed Services strategic forces committee will retain some of its nuclear backbone in the 117th Congress with Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.), who has a major nuclear constituency in the form of the Triad’s land-based leg, retaining her leadership role. That’s less nuclear leadership than the panel, which writes policy for nuclear forces and […]

The Senate Armed Services strategic forces committee will retain some of its nuclear backbone in the 117th Congress with Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.), who has a major nuclear constituency in the form of the Triad’s land-based leg, retaining her leadership role. That’s less nuclear leadership than the panel, which writes policy for nuclear forces and […]

The former head of the National Nuclear Security Administration is one of the hundreds of people who will be caught up in the Joe Biden administration’s purge of Pentagon advisory boards this month. Ex-Administrator Lisa Gordon-Hagerty got a spot on the Defense Policy Board during the eleventh hour of the Donald Trump administration, shortly after then-Secretary of […]

The former head of the National Nuclear Security Administration is one of the hundreds of people who will be caught up in the Joe Biden administration’s purge of Pentagon advisory boards this month. Ex-Administrator Lisa Gordon-Hagerty got a spot on the Defense Policy Board during the eleventh hour of the Donald Trump administration, shortly after […]

A review of nuclear modernization is among the top items for Kathleen Hicks, if the Senate confirms her as Deputy Secretary of Defense. Hicks, 50, has been involved on the inside and outside of the Pentagon since 1993, most recently as a senior vice president of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). She […]

A review of nuclear modernization is among the top items for Kathleen Hicks, if the Senate confirms her as Deputy Secretary of Defense. Hicks, 50, has been involved on the inside and outside of the Pentagon since 1993, most recently as a senior vice president of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). She […]

A Democratic House staffer who has worked the nuclear weapons and strategic systems portfolio for the House Armed Services Committee for a decade has taken a Pentagon post with a similar bailiwick in the Joe Biden administration. Leonor Tomero will be deputy assistant director for nuclear and missile defense programs after inauguration day, the administration […]

In his Senate nomination hearing this week, Secretary of Defense designate Lloyd Austin, since approved for a floor vote in the upper chamber, would not commit outright to supporting the National Nuclear Security Administration’s plan to build two factories to produce new plutonium pits. The Senate confirmed Biden to lead the Pentagon on Friday. “Maintaining […]

In his Senate nomination hearing Tuesday, Secretary of Defense designate Lloyd Austin would not commit outright to supporting the National Nuclear Security Administration’s plan to build two factories to produce new plutonium pits. “Maintaining a credible, reliable, safe and sustainable nuclear capability is of utmost importance, of the highest importance. And so [pits] is a […]

A Democratic House staffer who has worked the nuclear weapons and strategic systems portfolio for the House Armed Services Committee for a decade will get a Pentagon post with a similar bailiwick in the Joe Biden administration. Leonor Tomero will be deputy assistant director for nuclear and missile defense programs after inauguration day, the publication […]

The commander of U.S. nuclear forces, who met with President-elect Joe Biden’s (D) transition team recently, worried this week that the civilian nuclear weapons complex faces problems bigger than a potential slip in plutonium-pit production. Under the 2021 National Defense Authorization Act passed into law this month over President Donald Trump’s veto, U.S. Strategic Command […]