Joint Concept For Competing: The Best Way For The Pentagon To ‘Compete’ With China?

1945 – Last month the Joint Chiefs of Staff published a directive entitled Joint Concept for Competing, aimed at defining strategic competition and explaining how the U.S. armed forces will go about it. But because the concept’s framers define it as “adversary agnostic,” it’s hard to judge how commanders and their political masters will put it into effect at particular places and times.

For the Sake of Ceremony: Should the US Navy Continue Its Airborne Forward Air Controller Program?

War on the Rocks – The current trajectory of the forward air control program indicates declining relevance due to neglect, changing operational paradigms, and preservation for the sake of tradition. Naval aviation’s commitment to this mission and alignment with previous tenets are atrophying, and the program’s future is at a crossroads. 

Fighting DMO, Part 5: Missile Salvo Patterns and Maximizing Volume of Fire

CIMSEC – There is more to the lethality of a volume of fire than sheer numbers. Missile salvos can take on different patterns, both in how the missiles are arranged within a single salvo, and how multiple salvos can be arranged together into a combined volume of fire. These patterns reflect how the aspects of concentration and distribution apply to the weapons themselves, and how these configurations apply within salvos and between salvos. Different patterns will affect how a volume of fire takes shape and can multiply the threat it poses. Commanders and autonomous missiles can leverage these patterns to increase tactical advantage by changing how salvos are maneuvered throughout key elements of the fight. These patterns have considerable tactical implications for defending against missiles and maximizing offensive volume of fire.

Navy will extend service life of destroyer Arleigh Burke

Defense News – After decades of service, the guided-missile destroyer Arleigh Burke — the first of its class — appeared likely ready to retire. Commissioned in 1991, the warship may have in recent years started mapping out its shadowbox for when its reaches the end of its expected 35-year service life, in fiscal 2026. But Big Navy has other plans. Naval Surface Force Atlantic announced this week that the Arleigh Burke will continue plying the seas through fiscal 2031, when the ship will be 40 years old.

The Navy Isn’t Too Woke – It is America

CIMSEC – In the 1970s and early 1980s, it was not uncommon to find critics on the left disparaging military servicemembers in terms that cast them as immoral and bloodthirsty agents of the American war machine. These attacks were unjustified and well beyond reasonable debate about the size and shape of, or even the need for, the armed forces. They fed a distorted narrative about American military life that deterred many young people from even considering service. Critics on the right who claim without evidence that the military is now corrupted by wokeness are committing the same sin. In fact, the military is full of smart, dedicated, and tough men and women. The true corruptors are those who refuse to rise above partisan politics to serve the nation and a greater cause.

Creating a Sea Change: TF 76/3, Adaptation, Experimentation, and the Joint Force

Modern War Institute – In the Indo-Pacific, the naval services are turning strategic planning guidance into operational reality. Two commands, Expeditionary Strike Group Seven and the 3rd Marine Expeditionary Brigade, recently embarked on an eighteen-month period of experimentation and naval power revitalization, creating Task Force 76/3 (TF 76/3). The implication of the new command extends beyond the Indo-Pacific region and naval services. TF 76/3 offers a template for the joint force to address issues of force design, interoperability, littoral warfare, and maritime campaign planning.