Paul Richter. Los Angeles Times, 04 January 2010.
http://articles.latimes.com/2010/jan/04/nation/la-na-obama-nuclear4-2010jan04

Excerpt:

A core issue under debate, officials said, is whether the United States should shed its long-standing ambiguity about whether it would use nuclear weapons in certain circumstances, in hopes that greater specificity would give foreign governments more confidence to make their own decisions on nuclear arms.

Colin Clark. DoD Buzz, 14 December 2009.
http://www.dodbuzz.com/2009/12/14/gates-picks-perry-for-qdr-panel/

Excerpt:

Rep. Ike Skelton, chair­man of the House Armed Services Committee, announced his selec­tions for the QDR panel today. Skelton named one of the Army’s most inno­v­a­tive thinkers, retired gen­eral Robert Scales, and for­mer Air Force his­to­rian Richard Kohn to the inde­pen­dent panel on the Quadrennial Defense Review.

Rep. Buck McKeon, rank­ing mem­ber of the HASC, announced his picks for the QDR panel last week: Jim Talent, the Missouri Republican who served in the House and Senate until 2006 and Eric Edelman, for­mer under­sec­re­tary of defense for pol­icy from 2005 until January 2009.

Loren B. Thompson. Lexington Institute, 14 December 2009.
http://www.lexingtoninstitute.org/budget-moves-buoy-defense-industry

Excerpt:

First, even before President Obama decided to send 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan, the administration had already decided to spend more on overseas contingencies in 2011 that the $130 billion it planned to spend in 2010. Second, Jason Sherman of insidedefense.com reported this month that the White House will support increasing the regular defense budget (not including overseas contingencies) by $14 billion above what was planned for 2011, meaning it will rise from the $542 billion forecast in May to $556 billion. Third, Vago Muradian of Defense News reported this weekend that total increases above the May plan for the regular defense budget across the 2011-2015 spending period will reach $100 billion.

Editor’s Comment:

Looks as if the Obama administration’s plan to reduce Federal expenditures on war (contingency) operations and to hold increases in the base Pentagon budget to dollar inflation have come unraveled at less than a year into the budgeting plan and the administration. It is a shame, because it is so unnecessary.

Sheryl Gay Stolberg. New York Times, 12 December 2009.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/13/us/politics/13obey.html

Excerpt:

“It is stunning,” he remembers telling Mr. Obama, “to listen to Johnson talk to Dick Russell, the conservative old wise head in the Senate from Georgia — it is terrible, gut-wrenching to listen to them both say, ‘Well, we know this is damn near a fool’s errand, but we don’t have any choice.’ ”

Rick Maze. Defense News, 10 December 2009.
http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?i=4414781&c=AME&s=TOP

Excerpt:

The former lawmaker is Jim Talent, a Missouri Republican who served in the House and Senate until he lost a 2006 re-election bid. He was an adviser to the presidential campaign of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney.

The former Bush administration official picked by McKeon is Eric Edelman, who, as undersecretary of defense for policy from 2005 until January 2009, had responsibilities in areas including bilateral relations, war planning, missile defense and special forces issues.

Christi Parsons and Julian E. Barnes. Los Angeles Times, 23 November 2009.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-na-troop-costs23-2009nov23,0,3233273.story

Excerpt:

…in a memo early this month, obtained by The Times‘ Washington bureau, the Pentagon’s own comptroller produced an estimate that broke with the customary Defense formula and did include construction and equipment.

That memo said the yearly cost of a 40,000-troop increase would be $30 billion to $35 billion — at least $750,000 a person. An increase of 20,000 would cost $20 billion to $25 billion annually, it said — a per-soldier cost equal to or greater than the White House estimate.

Roxana Tiron. The Hill, 18 November 2009.
http://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/68515-pentagon-budget-drop-anticipated

Excerpt:

CBO also projects that carrying out the Pentagon’s plans in its 2010 budget request — excluding overseas contingency operations in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere — would require defense resources averaging $567 billion annually (in constant 2010 dollars) from 2011 to 2028. That amount is about 6 percent more than the $534 billion the Obama administration requested for the 2010 budget, excluding overseas contingency funds, according to Goldberg.

Reasons why more resources would be required in the long run include the likelihood of growing military pay and benefits; a projected increase in the cost of operating and maintaining aging equipment as well as newer and more complex systems; plans to develop advanced weapons systems to replace aging ones; and investments in advanced intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance systems to meet emerging security threats.

John Byrne. 70news.com, 18 November 2009.
http://www.70news.com/2009/11/18/gen-wesley-clark-calls-for-exit-from-afghanistan/

Excerpt:

You’ve got to “figure out where you’re going,” Clark told the House Armed Services subcommittee on oversight and investigations. “How do we get out of here? Because our presence long term there is not a good thing. We’re playing into the hands of people who don’t like foreigners in a country that’s not tolerant of diversity. And that’s not going to change.”

Editor’s Comment:

“If you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there.” ~ Lewis Carroll. (English Logician, Mathematician, Photographer and Novelist, especially remembered for Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. 1832-1898)

Spencer Ackerman. The Washington Independent, 18 November 2009.
http://washingtonindependent.com/68174/army-data-shows-contraints-on-troop-increase-potential

Excerpt:

[Lawrence] Korb … said a more realistic troop increase for Afghanistan would be 10,000 soldiers until the drawdown of troops from Iraq “begins in earnest.” There are currently 120,000 U.S. troops remaining in Iraq, almost twice the total in Afghanistan, though Gen. Raymond Odierno, the commander of U.S. troops in Iraq, told Congress in September that he plans to reduce that total to around 50,000 by August 30, 2010. Alternatively, Korb said, Obama could speed up the pace of redeployment out of Iraq in order to relieve the stress on the force… But under current Pentagon policy, soldiers would still need to receive at least 12 months of recuperation time back in the U.S. before potential assignment in Afghanistan.

Colin Clark. DoD Buzz, 17 November 2009.
http://www.dodbuzz.com/2009/11/17/qdr-panel-stalls-loses-warner/

Excerpt:

House-Senate conferees added eight members to the QDR panel that will be picked by congressional defense committee leaders and it looks as if Warner was uncomfortable with the additions… Mackenzie Eaglen at the conservative Heritage Institute led the push for a panel to keep its eye on the QDR — the law establishing the QDR requires such a panel but it has sometimes been ignored in the past.

Christopher Drew. New York Times, 14 November 2009.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/15/us/politics/15cost.html

Excerpt:

…even if Mr. Obama opts for a lower troop commitment, Afghanistan’s new costs could wash out the projected $26 billion expected to be saved in 2010 from withdrawing troops from Iraq. And the overall military budget could rise to as much as $734 billion, or 10 percent more than the peak of $667 billion under the Bush administration.

Steve Hynd. News Hoggers, 12 November 2009.
http://www.newshoggers.com/blog/2009/11/obama-to-ask-for-greater-chinese-involvement-in-afghanistan.html

David Rogers. Politico, 10 November 2009.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1109/29357.html

Excerpts:

Under almost all scenarios before Obama, billions more than the contingency funds requested in his 2010 budget will be needed…

Most estimates of how much more the Pentagon may need now run in the range of $30 billion to $40 billion.

Yaroslav Trofimov. Wall Street Journal, 30 October 2009.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125686434305817635.html

Spencer Ackerman. The Washington Independent, 29 October 2009.
http://washingtonindependent.com/65640/historically-unimportant-intelligence-board-may-actually-become-important

Megan Scully. Government Executive, 28 October 2009.
http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/1009/102809cdpm1.htm

Karen DeYoung. Washington Post, 27 October 2009.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/26/AR2009102603394.html

For the fulltext and a key excerpt from Matthew P. Hoh’s resignation letter see http://www.comw.org/wordpress/dsr/resignation-letter-of-matthew-p-hoh.

For CBO report see:
http://www.comw.org/wordpress/dsr/withdrawal-of-u-s-forces-from-iraq-possible-timelines-and-estimated-costs