PAUL’S DEFENSE BRIEF (PDB) – The French President’s bold call to open a new “strategic debate” in Europe on the role of nuclear deterrence without the US deserves praise. Relying on the U.S. long term is not an option. AGREED.
The EU has excluded the US from a new $163 billion Security Action for Europe (SAFE) funding package as it charts a path toward greater strategic autonomy, and quick rearmament with less reliance on the US for weapons.
Italy opposes EU plans to raise $870 billion in defense spending, spoiling the bloc’s show of bravura in the face of Russian aggression and Trump’s demands that Europeans defend themselves.
Canada will partner with Australia to build a new Arctic Over The Horizon Radar (A-OTHR), a $4 billion project. It should provide critical, new early warning capabilities and help close radar coverage gaps in the ever-more strategic region.
Faced with threats of economic punishment and annexation from the Trump team, Canada shifts its traditional defense links with the US to Europe and other regions.
FOR YOUR EYES ONLY – Here’s a roundup of today’s other top defense stories ending the week from conservative national security expert PAUL CRESPO.
Not the President’s Daily Brief, but almost as good – PAUL’S DEFENSE BRIEFING – the PDB:
NATIONAL SECURITY
In rare rebuke, key GOP congressional defense leaders warn Trump not to abandon NATO post, Pacific buildup plans.
2 West Point grads think it’s time for a military academy for cyber, space, and robotics.
Pentagon calls for more offensive cyber capability. The status quo will no longer be accepted as Team Trump moves to combat adversaries in the digital world.
HOMELAND DEFENSE
New space-based interceptors called for in Trump’s Golden Dome missile defense initiative are all about destroying threats as quickly and as far away from the US homeland as possible.
HOMELAND SECURITY
Trump moves to close gaps in the San Diego border fence in one of the most fortified stretches in the southwest for decades, beginning with a border security push in the 1990s.
As the Pentagon weighs shifting billions of dollars in funding, Hegseth plans to step up spending on the Air Force and offensive and defense space operations.
The GOP leaders of the Senate and House Appropriations defense subcommittees have laid out how the money in the fiscal 2025 continuing resolution should be spent, including on more F-35 fighter jets, C-130s and UH-60 helicopters.
In a sweeping travel ban being discussed by the Trump team, 22 of the 43 countries are in Africa.
PENTAGON WOKE WATCH
IT WAS A MISTAKE THAT WAS ALWAYS GOING TO BE CORRECTED. The Pentagon restored some webpages highlighting the wartime contributions of Navajo Code Talkers and other Native American veterans on Wednesday, after outcry.
GOP lawmakers suggest DOD cut climate change initiatives from the budget, including advancing technology and funding hybrid electric vehicles.
Grants aimed at eliminating carbon emissions by warships, DEI in the Navy, and developing ‘equitable’ AI are among $580 million in spending cuts announced recently by SECDEF Hegseth.
Dem lawmakers demand the Trump administration restore removed webpages celebrating troops. NOT IF THEY ARE CLEARLY DEI.
US POWER OVERSEAS
The Carl Vinson Carrier Strike Group carried out trilateral naval drills this week in the East China Sea with Japanese and South Korean navies, the first time this year.
A sizable contingent of F-35A Joint Strike Fighters from Hill Air Force Base in Utah have arrived in England.
Why isn’t AFRICOM in Africa. US Africa Command was in the political crosshairs even before it stood up 18 years ago in Germany.
CHINA THREAT
PERFECT! – China is the top priority in the Trump team’s national security strategy, but that’s balanced with a sharpened focus on the Western Hemisphere, defense experts say.
How Trump can limit China’s arms exports. For countries that previously relied on Russian military equipment, China can offer options from a similar family of equipment. Increasing arms revenue is key to China’s goal of military modernization.
RUSSIA THREAT – UKRAINE WAR
Ukraine launches drone attack on Russia’s air defenses, boats and a helicopter in occupied Crimea, presumably launched from drone boats.
EU presses on with steel ‘porcupine strategy’ for Ukraine. Putin’s demand that Western allies stop providing military aid and intelligence to Ukraine is quietly being ignored.
Massive explosion rocks a key bomber base deep inside Russia. A Ukrainian drone attack targeted Russia’s Engels Air Base in the Saratov region, 300 miles from Ukraine’s border.
Poland eyes 1 million landmines for borders with Belarus, Russia. It also plans to boost domestic landmine production as the country, along with Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, say they will pull out the Anti-Personnel Mines Convention.
Nuclear experts pour cold water on the US idea to restore and run the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, occupied by Russian forces since start of the war.
Norway’s coastal rangers a few hundred kilometers from a Russian naval base in Murmansk Oblast, want new drones to find threats at sea.
Want to end the Ukraine conflict? Look at Finland’s ‘Winter War’ against Russia. In any negotiation over ending a war, history can be a powerful tool.
IRAN THREAT/ISRAEL WARS
The last Houthi attack was months ago. But the US military has now launched an open-ended campaign in Yemen. Why now?
NORTH KOREA THREAT
North Korea warned Japan against stationing long-range land-based missiles on Kyushu, accusing the country of furthering a “history of aggression.”
INTERNATIONAL SECURITY
France and India kicked off a dual carrier strike group exercise today with the three-day-long Varuna exercise in the Indian Ocean with the FS Charles De Gaulle (F91) and INS Vikrant (R11).
Sudan army recaptures presidential palace from the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) rebel militia after two years of war.
US MILITARY
The Air Force may have to keep its aging KC-135 tankers flying beyond their planned 2050 retirement.
DARPA eyes quantum sensors that are easier to buy, tougher in the field. The sensors can provide localized position, navigation, and timing (PNT) data to supplement or even replace hackable and jammable space-based GPS and other radio receivers.
END of PDB
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of American Liberty News.
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Now where did all that new money come from to arm up defense? Why has the US been the whipping boy and bank for all these nations defense all these decades while they coasted along. Seems simple to me.
Where does this leave the U.S.? It leaves us no longer writing the checks to defend the world against Russia and china. This is the best of possible outcomes.
What Russian agression? Did Russia invade the Baltic states or Poland when the joined NATO, despite those joinings breaking a 1990’s agreement not to expand NATO to the esst? It seems to me that the U.S. and NATO have been the provocateurs. Thank God President Trump is trying to bring sanity back to doplomacy.
About time & long overdue OK & we can reduce our NATO impact
About time they stood up and defended themselves.
GOOD!! Finally the DEADBEATS get that the US is NO LONGER the Financial SUcker! That POST WWII culture is over!! The Socialists have been chipping away at America for the last 70 years, corruptes out CULTURE, created the DEEP STATE, which is CLEARLY STILL IN PLACE and fighting back–we have 4 years to castrate as much of it as we can. Its TIME for SCOTUS to take these “LAWFARE cases from the ACtivist District Judges tah have TAKEN a power they DO NOT HAVE, and got away with it and solidified it under BIDEN and now it has to be UNDONE! ANd it will be, even ROberts knows its has to be slapped down from a UDICILA OVERREACH which is in HIS purview, and no need to have Congress involved.