Stirring the pot is a key part of what Loren Thompson does. Thompson, go-to source for many defense reporters and defense analyst at the Lexington Institute, has put out an issue brief headlined: KILLING THE PRESIDENT’S NEW HELICOPTER WASTES $8 BILLION. (Those are his capital letters.…) Let the Pentagon and Congress know if you think Defense Secretary Gates is wasting billions or is he saving the taxpayers from an even more enormous cock up? Or something more subtle…

UPDATED: Prototype Made First Flight Last Week. Price Tag = $4 Million To $10 Million. Comments From Chief Engineer.
Christian has a really neat piece on a competitor for the COIN plane that Gen. Norton Schwartz, Air Force Chief of Staff, says he’s probably going to buy. Can the white scarf boys buy something this simple?

As North Korea continues to play the DefCon game, it’s time to analyze what kind of military response the U.S. might be able to mount should something really bad happen. Bottom line: the response would probably have to rely on the fear factor of killing some of the 58,000 U.S. troops in South Korea, on what China would do and how the good ole international community would react. The reasons for that prognosis are fairly simple: the US has committed so much of its troops and treasure to Iraq and Afghanistan for so long that the conventional military has little stretch left in it.