US Army on Combating Weapons of Mass Destruction
The U.S. Army’s future ability to combat weapons of mass destruction (CWMD) in the 2015-2024 timeframe is the subject of a new Army doctrinal publication (pdf).
“The thrust of current Army CWMD capabilities … is to protect against and recover from WMD attacks,” the document explains. However, “The Army is deficient in the capabilities required to proactively detect, identify, track, and engage threat WMD networks before they can launch an attack.” See “The U.S. Army Concept Capability Plan for Combating Weapons of Mass Destruction for the Future Modular Force 2015-2024,” TRADOC Pamphlet 525-7-19, March 25, 2009.
The Army publishes a little-known annual journal called “Combating WMD,” the third issue of which has recently appeared. Each issue includes some noteworthy historical or doctrinal material.
January saw us watching whether the government would fund science. February has been about how that funding will be distributed, regulated, and contested.
This rule gives agencies significantly more authority over certain career policy roles. Whether that authority improves accountability or creates new risks depends almost entirely on how agencies interrupt and apply it.
Our environmental system was built for 1970s-era pollution control, but today it needs stable, integrated, multi-level governance that can make tradeoffs, share and use evidence, and deliver infrastructure while demonstrating that improved trust and participation are essential to future progress.
Durable and legitimate climate action requires a government capable of clearly weighting, explaining, and managing cost tradeoffs to the widest away of audiences, which in turn requires strong technocratic competency.