Rapid Fire Nov. 15, 2012: Chinese Leadership | No US Cyber Bill
Xi Jinping will not only take over from Hu Jintao as China’s next President in March 2013, but as of today he chairs both the Central Military Commission (CMC) and the Communist Party. This breaks from precedent, as it took Hu a couple of years to consolidate these three functions. Asia Times | Xinhua (i.e. literally the party line) | Lowly Institute.
Senate majority leader Harry Reid [D-NV] said that work on the FY13 defense bill will start after the thanksgiving recess, while “cybersecurity is dead for this Congress” (see also Bloomberg | Federal News Radio). This frees up time to work on higher priorities, like passing legislation on recreational hunting.
It emerged during a joint press conference with the US and Australian secretaries of defense and state that Australian Special forces may stay in Afghanistan beyond 2014.
The Commonwealth Institute’s Project on Defense Alternatives argues in a new report [PDF] that the USA’s defense posture and budgeting should be reset. This translates into prescriptions for a fleet of 9 aircraft carriers, stopping LCS procurement, and other cost-cutting measures.
The Pentagon is sending mixed signals about whether feedback on its Better Buying Power 2.0 policy should be sent within on or two months, and where to send it. To play it safe, contact the Office of Manufacturing and Industrial Base Policy here by December 15.
The Joint Precision Approach and Landing Systems program team (JPALS – part of PMA-213) received an award from the National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA) last month for their use of modeling and simulation. NAVAIR.
French conglomerate Lagardere will sell its 7.5% share in EADS by the end of next year.
Greece’s defense budget is headed to a further reduction in 2013, to 3.3 billion euros ($4.2B) or barely more than half of its 2009 level, according to a statement by Defence Minister Panos Panagiotopoulos. To what extent Greece’s relatively high military spending was either transparent or necessary became a subject of great dispute as the country faced mounting solvency problems.
