Reuters – U.S. and German navy ships have cornered Somali pirates who seized a Japanese-owned chemical tanker more than a month ago and are demanding a ransom.
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Nuclear Warfare – Calculating the Risks in Pakistan
Washington Post – Thomas Ricks reports a small group of U.S. military experts and intelligence officials convened in Washington for a classified war game last year, exploring strategies for securing Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal if the country’s political institutions and military safeguards began to fall apart.
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Iranian Navy – Iranian Navy receives stealth-capable submarine
Novosti -Iran’s Navy commissioned Wednesday a domestically designed and produced light submarine featuring extended stealth capability and strong firepower.
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Operations Other Than War – US Navy ship providing aid, medicine to Bangladeshi cyclone victims
Associated Press – The amphibious assault ship USS Kearsarge was performing maritime security operations off the coast of Somalia when Tropical Cyclone Sidr hit southwestern Bangladesh. The ship rushed toward south Asia, traveling 3,000 miles over five days and reaching the Bangladesh coast on Nov. 22, to begin helping thousands of people left hungry, homeless and without clean water. The storm killed more than 3,200 people.
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US Navy – An Invader In Navy's Home Waters
Washington Post – The Army likes to brag that it’s got a significant navy of its own — even if there isn’t a destroyer or aircraft carrier in it.
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Royal Navy – Navy would struggle to fight a war
Daily Telegraph – The Royal Navy can no longer fight a major war because of years of under funding and cutbacks, a leaked Whitehall report has revealed.
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Geopolitics – A Disciplined Defense: How to Regain Strategic Solvency
Foreign Affairs – The United States now spends almost as much on defense in real dollars as it ever has before — even though it has no plausible rationale for using most of its impressive military forces. Why? Because without political incentives for restraint, policymakers have lost the ability to think clearly about defense policy. Washington’s new mantra should be “Half a trillion dollars is more than enough.”
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Afghanistan – In Counterinsurgency Class, Soldiers Think Like Taliban
Wall Street Journal – An inside look at the US Army’s new Afghanistan Counterinsurgency Academy.
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US Navy – China blames U.S. for denial of ship visit to Hong Kong
New York Times – China blocked the visit of a U.S. aircraft carrier battle group and other American warships to Hong Kong last week in retaliation for the Bush administration’s proposed upgrading of Taiwan’s Patriot antimissile batteries, the state media reported Thursday.
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Geopolitics / Pakistan – It's The Tribes, Stupid!
The Atlantic – Robert Kaplan says that quelling anarchy in Iraq, Pakistan, and elsewhere, will require building on tribal loyalties-not imposing democracy from the top down
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US Navy – US protest at China navy refusal
BBC – The US has formally protested to China over its refusal to allow a number of US ships to dock in Hong Kong.
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Geopolitics / Africa – The Next Frontier
The Atlantic – Robert Kaplan says the creation of AFRICOM, the U.S. military’s new Africa Command, offers the hope of steady, low-key progress in the war on terror.
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Operations Other Than War – US helicopters fly in cyclone aid
BBC – Helicopters from the USS Kearsarge have begun delivering relief supplies to survivors of the devastating cyclone that hit southern Bangladesh 10 days ago.
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Fourth Generation Warfare – Unheralded military successes
Los Angeles Times – Robert Kaplan on how low-cost, low-risk operations such as those in Colombia and the Philippines show what the U.S. can achieve.
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Geopolitics / India – America's Strategic Opportunity With India: The New U.S.-India Partnership
Foreign Affairs – The rise of a democratic and increasingly powerful India is a positive development for U.S. interests. Rarely has the United States shared so many interests and values with a growing power as we do today with India. By reaching out to India, we have made the bet that the future lies in pluralism, democracy, and market economics.
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US Navy – The Navy's New Flat-Earth Strategy
The Atlantic – Robert Kaplan on the new U.S. collaborative plan for policing the seas
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US Navy – Admiral 'Perplexed' by Snub at Hong Kong
Associated Press – The top U.S. military commander in the Pacific said he’s “perplexed and concerned” by China’s last-minute decision to deny a U.S. aircraft carrier entry to Hong Kong for a previously scheduled port visit.
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US Navy – Aegis Make Over
Defense Technology International – Its origins date back to the 1970s. Yet the U.S. Navy’s Lockheed Martin-built Aegis weapon system will have to soldier on well into the 2030s. The arrival of the Aegis-equipped Ticonderoga-class cruiser USS Bunker Hill (CG 52) at BAE Systems San Diego Ship Repair, Calif., will herald a major renovation for this most widely-used naval combat system in service today.
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Swedish Navy – Sweden's Next Spy Ship
Defense Technology International – Sweden is going ahead with a plan to replace its current signal intelligence (Sigint) vessel, the 1,400-ton HMS Orion (A 201) built in the 1980s, with the much larger, 3,600-ton HMS Carlskrona (M 04) that is to be converted from its current role as a training ship to a Sigint platform.
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Iraq – Inside the Surge
New Yorker – Jon Lee Anderson writes that the American military finds new allies, but at what cost?
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Nuclear Warfare – U.S. Secretly Aids Pakistan in Guarding Nuclear Arms
New York Times – Over the past six years, the Bush administration has spent almost $100 million on a highly classified program to help Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistanís president, secure his countryís nuclear weapons???But with the future of that countryís leadership in doubt, debate is intensifying about whether Washington has done enough to help protect the warheads and laboratories, and whether Pakistanís reluctance to reveal critical details about its arsenal has undercut the effectiveness of the continuing security effort.
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Geopolitics / Long War – Can the War on Terror Be Won? – How to Fight the Right War
Foreign Affairs – It can, but only if U.S. officials start to think clearly about what success in the war on terror would actually look like. Victory will come only when Washington succeeds in discrediting the terrorists’ ideology and undermining their support. These achievements, in turn, will require accepting that the terrorist threat can never be eradicated completely and that acting as though it can will only make it worse.
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US Navy – US bolsters platforms to defend Iraq's oil
Daily Telegraph – The US-led coalition is building a permanent security base on Iraq’s oil pumping platforms in the Gulf to act as the “nerve centre” of efforts to protect the country’s most vital strategic asset.
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Iraq – Iraqis Wasting An Opportunity, U.S. Officers Say
Washington Post – Thomas Ricks writes that senior military commanders in Iraq now portray the intransigence of Iraq’s Shiite-dominated government as the key threat facing the U.S. effort in Iraq, rather than al-Qaeda terrorists, Sunni insurgents or Iranian-backed militias.
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Royal Navy – No Tanking
Defense Technology International – A British Defense Ministry decision to halt air-to-air refueling of its Nimrod MR2 maritime patrol and surveillance aircraft will almost certainly curtail the aircraftís operational availability in Afghanistan and Iraq.
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