The Lexington Institute’s Loren Thompson has a new paper in which he posits why Navy guys are beating out the Air Force and Army guys for the Pentagon’s “plum” jobs. Thompson says the days of equal apportionment among the services took a nosedive when Donald Rumsfeld became Defense Secretary and the trend is continuing. “An examination of forces driving the change suggests that the rising tide of Navy leaders is unlikely to recede anytime soon,” declares Thompson. One reason he cites is that both the Air Force and Army have “followed the example of the Marine Corps in posturing themselves as expeditionary warriors.” The Navy, on the other hand, views its aircraft carriers and submarines as “instruments of foreign policy as much as combat systems.” Of course, he notes that Rumsfeld’s belief that sea service leaders were “more ecumenical and imaginative” about transformation could be a reflection that the Navy guys “were just better at spinning him.”
Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. may have moved on from Air Force Chief of Staff to Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, but he is keeping an eye on the Air Force’s effort to “re-optimize for great power competition”—and is pleased by what he sees. At a Defense Writers Group meeting March…