Uber-brainy defense intellectual Bernard Finel arrives at LoD to dish on the Pentagon, former SecDef Bob Gates and the F-22 program. How do we develop a strategic culture at DoD?

I generally favor redundancy. I have a Mac AND a PC. More options are good. But the reality here is the U.S. taxpayers can’t afford an extra engine for the F-35 anymore that I can afford an extra engine for my Toyota.

A supersonic Lockheed Martin F-35B Lightning II stealth fighter rode more than 41,000 pounds of thrust to a vertical landing March 18, 2010 for the first time, confirming its required ability to land in confined areas both ashore and afloat.

If you needed any clue to Gates’ propensity to jettison subpar performers regardless of prior success you need look no further than his tenure as President of Texas A&M University, where one of his first acts was to fire the winnings football coach in Aggie history. Gates would later joke privately that during his time at the CIA he’d overthrown governments of small countries with less blowback.