Through a glass, darkly(click to view full) As part of the current coalition government’s defence reform efforts, the UK Ministry of Defence has begun issuing a bare-bones 10-year equipment plan of expected budgets, and graphics of planned expenditures by...
* Alan Krueger, Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers (to the White House), on the reason why US GDP contracted by 0.1% in Q4 2012: “Federal defense purchases declined at an annual rate of 22.2 percent in the fourth quarter of 2012, the largest quarterly...
* Non-profit Transparency International asserts [PDF] that a vast majority of countries exert little, if any, political oversight of defense policy or scrutiny of defense procurement. Only Australia and Germany are ranked as at “very low risk” of...
LMV in Afghanistan(click to view full) After some bad experiences with its up-armored Mercedes “Gelendevagen” in Afghanistan, Norway decided that they needed patrol vehicles with better protection. In 2006, therefore, they placed an order for 25...
* BAE will cut 300 jobs across 5 US states, two thirds of which at their Electronic Systems site in Nashua, NH, where 50 people were already laid off last year. * US AFRICOM is pondering establishing a base to operate UAVs out of a northwest African country such as...