Saturday NatSec Roundup

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; For he today that sheds his blood with me Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile, This day shall gentle his condition; And gentlemen in England now abed Shall think themselves accursed they were not here, And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day. 

• The USS John F. Kennedy seems to be coming along more smoothly than the USS Gerald R. Ford. Not surprising; things just come more easily to the Kennedys.
• Jim Goldgeier has some ruminations on how the fall of the Berlin Wall affected US domestic politics, and in particular the internal politics of the GOP. I think this fits in well with Eric Levitz’ piece on the ideological affinities between the GOP and Putin’s Russia.
• The F-22 and the F-35 can finally talk with one another! This is a good piece on what’s at stake, and what the problems have been getting to this point.
• Good discussion of what the civilian national security workforce does. I think it would be useful for Democratic candidates to take care about throwing around the “fraud and waste” term with respect to the defense budget; the real issues are strategic, and don’t have much at all to do with the exceedingly professional corps of civilian bureaucrats.
• Turns out the shape of the room matters for wargaming outcomes?
• This afternoon I will be making the dreadful mistake of seeing Midway… My bar for evaluation is “Better than Pearl Harbor?” which should be a low bar to clear. Speaking of which, this is not an appropriate way to celebrate…