Rapid Fire 2012-23-02: Connected People

• Turkey plans to proceed with its F-35 plans according to Reuters, while the US Defense Acquisitions Board (DAB) recently met to recertify the program because of its 2010 Nunn-McCurdy rule breach. See also the Feb. 16 update of the F-35 CRS backgrounder [PDF]. Finally, the first F-35A tests with external weapons occurred a week ago, while the UK had its first F-35C test flight 2 days ago (short video).

• Anthony H. Cordesman at the centrist CSIS Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy is researching Iran’s ballistic and nuclear programs. Here’s his latest working draft [PDF]. He writes:

“There is no agreement as to exactly how far Iran has come in weapons design, over the nature of its nuclear weapons program if a dedicated program exists, how much is know about Iran’s various nuclear facilities, its future enrichment programs and how they will be concealed and protected.”

• Meanwhile the conservative, intervention-friendly Foreign Policy Initiative (FPI) will ask in a debate next month: time to attack Iran?