Editorial: Global Reach, Global Power

“Top Gun: Maverick” captured movie audiences with a plot built around the mission to destroy a fictional country’s uranium enrichment facility hidden deep in a remote mountain range. ... In June, we saw the remake: The Air Force executed the real thing as seven B-2 ...

Editorial: Preparing for a Fight

It is a law of survival, if not physics: In war, any advantage wielded by one side will be countered with an opposite, if not equal force, in a continuous back-and-forth until one or the other capitulates. The resultant innovation...

Editorial: Air and Space Dominance 

The Trump administration arrived in Washington promising to restore America’s military, reinvigorate deterrence, and bring back its warrior ethos. These are not things that can change overnight, but there is evidence of progress. Topics that were gingerly avoided six months...

Editorial: Eyes on the Prize

News coming out of the White House since President Donald J. Trump’s inauguration Jan. 20 is striking in its velocity. The subjects of his Executive Orders and policy memos were unsurprising, fulfilling oft-repeated campaign promises, but  the speed, volume, and details—or lack of them—caught everyone ...

Editorial: Risk & Reward

A nation that budgets more than $840 billion for national defense has reason to believe it is well-insured. But circumstances change. What was good enough before may not be good enough for long. 

Editorial: Relearning Old Lessons 

The risk of world war today has never been greater since 1940—and the United States has arguably never been less ready. Waking the nation up to that fact should be a top priority for our national leaders, though precious little has been said or will ...

Editorial: An Unfulfilled Offset Strategy

In the absence of a rival superpower in the 1990s, and with the miscalculations of the post-9/11 counterinsurgency campaigns, the successive administrations, the Pentagon, and Congress managed to squander America’s technological edge.

Editorial: A Lesson Learned 

The principles of the Powell Doctrine and the effective deterrence that it should yield remain relevant today as we contemplate a new Cold War with China and two regional conflicts in which American policy is deeply intertwined.

Editorial: Re-Optimize Now  

Having focused the services’ modernization efforts around seven Operational Imperatives designed to accelerate the injection of new capabilities into the force, Kendall is now setting his sights on organizational impediments to change.

Editorial: Power Up

The conflicts in Israel and Ukraine could not be more different. The lessons for Americans could not be greater.

Editorial: Build an Air Force

To achieve that, Congress and the Pentagon must make a strategic shift in priorities, providing an additional redirecting of $10 billion to $20 billion annually to the Department of the Air Force. This is the only way to remain ready today while modernizing for tomorrow.

Editorial: An Airman Will Be Chairman

For the first time in 18 years, an Airman will be the commander in chief’s top military adviser, and not a moment too soon. As Chairman, Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. will have an opportunity to exert influence across the joint enterprise, including how requirements ...

Editorial: Youth and Consequences

How is it, the public wondered, that our military trusts people so young with secrets so large? ... The fact is, the military could not function if it didn’t trust volunteers in their teens and early 20s with security clearances.

Editorial: Why Recruiting is in Crisis

Today’s recruiting challenges are systemic to our national circumstances. The military is in a more competitive environment than ever, at a time when other societal changes are also working to the services’ disadvantage.