Looking Into the New Year (II) – What Does Russia Want Now?

Part I here. 29 December 2009.  In the US, the games of the season are underway, whether it be the NCAA college football bowls or the intramural finger-pointing inside the beltway over the attempted bombing of a Detroit-bound airliner.  Parts of the US were buried under a new winter storm while other parts continued digging…

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The Shenlong Spaceplane: Hyperventilating Hypersonics or Real Threat?

"At a minimum, Washington should delay the planned 2010 retirement of the Space Shuttle until a new space plane can replace it, as a way to retain a deterring potential military capability. China’s unwillingness to comment on its military space plans, coupled with the Shenlong space plane, confirms its larger aversion to military transparency. The…

A Four Party Perspective on the Recent S300 Missile Sale to Iran

Unlike most sales, arms sales have a wider impact beyond the primary parties (buyer/seller) and indeed, the recent announcement of the long sought sale of an improved S300 system to Iran by Russia has a wider circle of interested parties and corresponding impact beyond those two. First, though, we begin with the buyer. Iran – Filling…

National Intelligence Estimate: Iran Stopped Bomb Effort In 2003…

… or did it?  Read Here:   — Some items of note: "We cannot rule out that Iran has acquired from abroad—or will acquire in the future—a nuclear weapon or enough fissile material for a weapon."   "We assess centrifuge enrichment is how Iran probably could first produce enough fissile material for a weapon, if…