Gates Poised to Cut Pricey Weapons

Lawmakers had opposed Prez's bid to cut money

(NEWSER) - In a shift, the White House looks likely to win over Congress in its bid to cut $1.7 billion in funding for the F-22 fighter jet, Politico reports. Congress had looked set to support the measure last week, but the administration is pressing hard with Defense Secretary Robert Gates leading the charge. And Democrats don’t want to undercut Obama at a key moment on health care when polls suggest his support is waning. More»

(NEWSER) - Conventional wisdom has it that Barack Obama will ask Robert Gates to keep his post as Secretary of Defense, but there’s no conventional wisdom about how wise that is. “It has more minuses than pluses,” opines one ex-Pentagon official, but others disagree. Some pros and cons:

• Gates would ensure a smooth wartime transition. (But that’s what the uniformed military leaders who actually run the war are for, and why they’re not appointed.)

...bullet would be non-lethal

(NEWSER) - The Pentagon certainly has imagination when it comes to making up dream weapons. It's put out a new list of weapons small businesses should try to design for it, and one of them is a "Nonlethal Warhead of Miniature Organic Precision Munitions," or what Wired describes as, "one part bazooka round; one part suicidal drone; one part stun round." Essentially, the Army wants a bullet that can acquire a target, close in on it in less than 20 seconds, and then somehow incapacitate it without killing it. More»

A look back at the retiring defense secretary's career

(NEWSER) - With Robert Gates, who has served eight presidents over four decades, about to retire, the Washington Post looks back at how Gates operated in the Pentagon. He’s been “careful, conservative, and consensus-oriented,” writes Greg Jaffe, and he’s “earned a reputation as the most ruthlessly efficient defense secretary in decades.” So what can we learn from his tenure?

• Buy time. Defense Department reviews following troop surges in Iraq and Afghanistan gave Presidents Bush and Obama a sense of the military’s trajectory—and they bought time against critics calling for quick drawdowns.

Unmanned craft will take out Gadhafi targets

(AP) - President Obama has approved the use of armed Predator drone aircraft in Libya to improve the precision of low-level attacks on ground targets, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said today. The first Predator mission was flown today, but the unmanned aircraft—armed with Hellfire missiles—turned back early because of poor weather conditions, said Marine Gen. James Cartwright. More»