The midsummer heat reflected off the flightline at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base in North Carolina. It was the summer of 1990 and the beginning of Operation Desert Shield. The entire base was in full deployment mode, with planes forming a long line for departure, sequenced by priority. I climbed the ladder into the second airplane and handed a briefcase full of cash and checks to the noncommissioned officer.

It was reminiscent of an old gangster movie payoff scene, with the cash neatly stacked and bound by rubber bands. I also showed the young airmen a small metal safe, crammed in with the deployment gear, where they could store the money.

As I exited the plane, I understood for the first time the significance of my wartime mission as the base chief financial officer.

My job included assembling a small cadre of financial troops. Once our team landed in Saudi Arabia, their tasks ranged from tracking and funding the daily costs of the war to paying the troops.

They worked 12-hour days, cashing personal checks, purchasing local goods and services, and balancing the books. They also worked with the contracting team to buy fresh food, portable showers, and construction support.

In the days before online banking, cashing personal checks was a daunting challenge for deployed airmen and their families. As troops cashed checks, their spouses drew from the same accounts back home, making an accurate cash balance nearly impossible to maintain. This led to confusion and, more critically, overdrawn accounts.

At the time, my first officer was a young female lieutenant who was legally responsible for our base’s financial account. But local restrictions on women conducting business with men meant a male junior noncommissioned officer discussed contract terms with local vendors over cups of tea while the female lieutenant could only observe and occasionally nod in agreement.

To complete a transaction, she counted out the cash payment to her male assistant, who in turn recounted the money before handing it to a local merchant. The Saudi men simply wouldn’t accept payments from a woman.

Our systems were somewhat antiquated back then, and tracking operational expenditures against our installation budget was dicey at best. The deployed finance team boxed dozens of vouchers each week and mailed them back to the states, where we sorted through pay stubs and invoices, oftentimes months after the money was spent.

I often felt as though I was juggling a dozen balls in the air, trying desperately not to violate any appropriation laws and guidelines while ensuring our base checkbook remained solvent.

Fortunately, the war was relatively short; however, the intensity of financial support continued after the war ended. As troops began returning home, our finance teams met each arriving aircraft. If we were lucky, we snagged our base members to ensure their overseas pay entitlements were discontinued and avoid overpayments before they left with their families.

Even as the base began settling back into normal training operations, the war-related financial demands rolled on. We replaced used equipment and repaired damaged gear. We restocked aircraft munitions and parts and replenished supply inventories.

My experience echoed that of Syracusan general Hermocrates circa 400 B.C.: “[Carthaginians] have abundance of gold and silver, and these make war, like other things, go smoothly.”

Operation Desert Shield/Storm was an overwhelming success and marked the first major U.S. war since Vietnam. Matching airpower with resources and financial support was an intense yet rewarding experience.

I had assumed it was a once-in-a-career opportunity to defend our country during war — I was mistaken.

Ten years later, I was a senior colonel at Langley Air Force Base, Virginia, serving as the chief financial leader for Air Combat Command. I was in the base gym playing basketball when my assistant said I needed to come to the office immediately. I had been summoned to the commander’s conference room, where we were briefed on the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

The colonel commander I served with at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base during Operation Desert Storm was now the commander of ACC as a four-star general. Once again, we would support a major war together, albeit on a much larger scale. This time, I would be responsible for ensuring financial support for the war by directing operations from 14 major bases.

Like my previous war experience at a single base, quickly scrambling finance teams to myriad overseas locations was an around-the-clock operation. And the challenge of ensuring the tight linkage between war and money was multiplied exponentially.

Dozens of deployed finance offices were established in the Middle East and at Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean. Tracking purchases at these deployed locations became an enormous challenge as financial documents were boxed and mailed to a single command location at Shaw Air Force Base, South Carolina, for processing. I once visited and was shocked to see boxed financial documents stacked to the ceiling.

Deployed finance offices also supplied currency to the base exchange service, but there were weight restrictions, and we had to reserve the allotment for high-priority cargo. Consequently, we could not provide coins.

To solve this problem, we worked with the Army & Air Force Exchange Service to use “pogs,” which were thin cardstock cutouts of coins in 5¢, 10¢, and 25¢ denominations to use as change. Technically, pogs were considered gift certificates that were redeemable at any base exchange.

They featured pictures of fighter jets, tanks, historical figures, and military insignia. Pogs were used during Operation Iraqi Freedom and have now become collector’s items.

In addition to maintaining supplies and salaries, money could help bolster spirits.

As any commander or first sergeant can attest, maintaining high morale is integral to a ready fighting force. Seemingly routine actions like troop pay became especially important as financial teams updated pay accounts for promotions and hostile pay entitlements, allowing troops to see the financial rewards of their hard work. Our mantra was, “Troops take care of fighting the war; we take care of their pay.”

But our work wasn’t limited to pay stubs. We once bought sumo wrestling suits! During the initial troop buildup, our forces were on hold, waiting for the order to attack.

So when the troops were not training, local commanders sought opportunities for them to blow off steam and have fun.

Sumo wrestling, a troop favorite, featured large, bulky costumes that resembled the “Michelin Man” commercial. The objective was to put two opponents in a ring and have them bounce off each other until one tumbled.

But benefits could also stir interbranch sensitivities.

A bomber commander asked me about the fiscal legalities of providing free haircuts and free Stars and Stripes newspapers for his deployed airmen at Diego Garcia. The Air Force shared the remote location with the Navy, whose sailors were afforded these benefits free of charge. The commander said the perceived double standard had become a real morale issue.

I elevated the issue to the lawyers at the Pentagon, but we couldn’t change it. At the time, Navy regulations allowed sailors to receive those services gratis while they were at sea; the Air Force did not offer similar benefits.

Today, as U.S. forces are once again engaged in hostilities abroad, defense financial officials are juggling accounts to fund a war while supporting the troops. Once again, military lethality is proving to be closely tied with strong financial support.

During my 40-year career, I served in the Air Force from the Vietnam War through Operation Iraqi Freedom. I had a bird’s- eye view on how money and war are inextricably linked. As Milanese commander Gian Giacomo Trivulzio told King Louis XII: “To carry on war, three things are necessary: money, money, and yet more money.”

This Reflection from The War Horse was edited by Kim Vo, fact-checked by Jess Rohan, and copy-edited by Mollie Turnbull.

The close attention that Beijing is paying to the new USMC strategy became clear about a year ago when the Global Times [环球时报] published an unusual editorial decrying Washington’s new determination to deploy anti-ship missiles proximate to China. Arguing that the new American strategy aims to correct a U.S. Navy prioritization for “open ocean control” rather than “close-quarters engagement in confined waters,” this article concludes that Washington’s effort to “control maritime chokepoints [aims to] curtail the freedom of rivals to operate at sea … [and] introduces new risks … .”

A much more detailed study of the new USMC strategy appeared in early 2025 in the naval magazine Modern Ships [现代舰船]. This Chinese assessment noted with considerable alarm that the USMC was experimenting with unmanned surface vessels capable of firing the stealthy LRASM anti-ship cruise missile and that these units could alternatively serve as forward scouts, fixing targets for long-range U.S. military fires. Still, this analysis underlines some weaknesses of the USMC strategy, including the range limitations of related sensors and drones, and even characterized the air-defense capabilities of the USMC as “precarious.” Another study in this same magazine had earlier drawn attention to the logistics quandaries raised by the new strategy.

A 2026 Chinese analysis in another Chinese navy-affiliated magazine, Shipborne Weapons [舰载武器], offers a sharper critique of the Marines’ new approach, noting that the creation of the Marine Littoral Regiments (MLR) “actually represents campaign preparation by the USMC to militarily intervene in China’s unification.” At the outset, this study notes that many American think tanks raised doubts about the strategy, suggesting that forward bases without sea and air control could prove “untenable.”

There is a recognition in this analysis that the new mobile missile launchers that are being deployed by the USMC are small, light, and thus “not easily discovered by … surveillance.” In the end, this study concludes that the USMC strategy is vulnerable because the “U.S has no way to quickly establish air superiority. This could take weeks or months and would entail massive losses.”

Among the most remarkable pieces written by Chinese experts on the new USMC direction is one that was published in translation recently by the China institute at U.S. Naval War College (NWC). That translation deserves extra attention due to the fact that it was written by senior active-duty Chinese Navy officers and also because it was published originally in a sensitive internal circulation Chinese military journal too.

Though this piece does not touch directly on the sensitive Taiwan issue, and it also explicitly notes the USMC strategy aims at deterrence of Beijing, it nevertheless explains that the new USMC deployments amount to “continuous penetration and encroachment into our near seas” and argues that China must “establish effective countermeasures.” Notably, this high-level rendering links the USMC strategy to China’s improving submarine force in significant detail, observing that forward deployed Marine forces could deploy “hydro-acoustic arrays and other assets to establish barrier zones and monitoring areas to track Chinese submarine operations.” Similar arguments are made that U.S. deployments could degrade Chinese air defenses by employing drone swarms “to overwhelm our radar tracking capacity.”

The Chinese Navy authors caution against applying resource-intensive assets to defeat such American asymmetric tactics. However, the conclusion of the article is rather disturbing since it argues that China must counter this posture by deploying a Chinese “proactive offensive posture, aggressively expand[ing] our operational reach, [and] project[ing] forces forward.” Elaborating, they counsel: “We must maintain and normalize forward-deployed forces, extend[ing] undersea combat capabilities as far forward as feasible.”

This conclusion and other aspects of these Chinese-language analyses raise some rather uncomfortable questions for U.S. defense planners. The final translation done by NWC strongly hints that the Chinese Navy may be adopting a more aggressive approach as a direct reaction to the forward lean in American strategy. This seems to be a very clear manifestation of the so-called ‘security dilemma,’ wherein two powers’ defensive measures develop into a dangerous escalatory spiral. Moreover, there is a clear recognition by Chinese strategists that forward USMC elements could be vulnerable due to logistics challenges and lack of proper air and missile defenses. It would not be the first time that the USMC was deployed haphazardly in East Asia at the cost of many American lives.

Understanding these dynamics, American leaders should recalibrate and opt to rely less on forward defense. Alternatively, the USMC should aim to embrace the strategic depth of the Pacific and its myriad island archipelagos (e.g. the Philippines) in a less costly, less risky, more sustainable, and clearly defensive strategy.

Lyle Goldstein is director of the China Initiative at Brown University’s Watson School and concurrently serves as director of the Asia Program at the think-tank Defense Priorities.

Watching the Military Spouse Commission’s inaugural meeting on Monday, I wanted to see meaningful accountability. As a military spouse, mother of an autistic child and founder of the Military Family Advocacy Group, I have every reason to want this commission to succeed.

But I came away disappointed.

The meeting raised legitimate concerns about housing, spouse employment and income, childcare, continuity of medical and mental healthcare and veteran healthcare. Each deserves attention. However, what I did not hear was substantive discussion of the specific TRICARE barriers that leave vulnerable families with coverage on paper but inadequate access to treatment.

The barriers also include denials of services that treating clinicians consider medically necessary; explanations that rely on internal manual provisions without meaningfully addressing clinical evidence; concerns about the independence of appeals; burdensome provider certification requirements; and issues within the Autism Care Demonstration.

After 12 years under the Autism Care Demonstration, will applied behavior analysis finally become a permanent TRICARE medical benefit? Will military families receive the same enforceable mental health parity protections afforded to Americans in civilian health plans subject to federal parity law?

For children with substantial support needs, these are consequential questions. Their development does not pause while adults debate administrative responsibility.

Another barrier comes in the form of inaccurate provider directories that can conceal care deserts behind the appearance of adequate networks.

MFAG’s ABA provider directory audit summary documented at least one issue in 171 of 195 listings across six South Carolina audits — 87.7%. The most common issue involved providers recorded as no longer employed at, or not providing services at, the listed location.

These findings describe the audited listings, not a nationally representative sample. They do not establish that every flagged provider was unavailable everywhere. They raise a practical question: How can families find care when the information directing them to it is unreliable?

Our findings sit alongside longstanding federal concerns. In 2024, the Government Accountability Office estimated that most behavioral health provider listings in the TRICARE network directories it examined contained inaccuracies, including incorrect locations and telephone numbers.

The Military Family Advocacy Group’s preliminary summer field intake adds a human dimension. Participating families reported missed duty hours, difficulty concentrating and consideration of early military separation linked to autism care denials.

Providers described uncompensated administrative work and disruptions to treatment. These self-reported experiences do not establish military-wide prevalence or prove causation. They identify concerns the commission should investigate: healthcare barriers can consume spouses’ working hours and undermine service members’ ability to focus on their duties.

Denials deserve equally serious scrutiny. A clinician’s recommendation does not automatically establish coverage under every applicable benefit rule. But families deserve explanations that address the evidence, distinguish medical necessity from coverage exclusions and identify the authority behind the decision.

A manual citation identifies a rule. It does not establish that the rule is clinically justified or beyond reform.

TRICARE provides multiple appeal levels, including reconsideration and, in qualifying cases, an independent hearing. However, its published process places final decision-making authority with DHA leadership or the assistant secretary of defense for health affairs. That structure warrants examination of whether review is sufficiently independent, clinically informed and timely.

MFAG brought these concerns to the new Military Spouse Commission.

As of this writing, we have received no response. An inaugural meeting cannot address every submission, but meaningful engagement requires a transparent process for evaluating concerns and reporting what happens next.

The meeting’s emphasis on legislative solutions also left a critical question unanswered: Which problems require Congress, and which can departmental leadership address now?

Congressional offices have repeatedly directed MFAG back toward DHA and its departmental leadership. Families should not have to shuttle between institutions while responsibility remains unresolved.

Some reforms require legislation or appropriations. DHA’s position within the department does not erase statutory limits. But those limits should be identified specifically. The commission should ask which barriers arise from statute, regulation, agency policy, contract administration or failures to enforce existing requirements.

Then it should recommend action at the appropriate level.

A credible next step would be a dedicated TRICARE review involving affected families, treating clinicians, disability advocates and providers. Its priorities should include denial explanations, appeal independence, certification burdens, Autism Care Demonstration restrictions and verified appointment availability.

Recommendations should identify responsible offices, deadlines and measurable outcomes. Success should mean families obtaining appropriate care sooner, with fewer preventable interruptions and administrative obstacles.

Autistic children, people with disabilities and beneficiaries with intensive medical and mental health needs must be explicit priorities. Their needs cannot disappear beneath broad promises to improve access.

One meeting does not determine whether this commission will succeed. But the opening discussion fell short of confronting the barriers that matter most to many families already struggling.

We want the commission to prove our skepticism wrong. Its access to national leadership creates an opportunity to demand answers and advance meaningful reform.

Whether it becomes a viable solution or another bureaucratic dog-and-pony show will depend on what changes after the livestream ends.

Mariah Wilkins is the executive director and principal policy advisor of the Military Family Advocacy Group.

“Gold Star Family” has increasingly become a general designation for families who lose a loved one serving in the Armed Forces. This usually comes from compassion for grieving military families.

But compassion should not require us to erase meaningful distinctions our nation deliberately established.

The tradition began during World War I with the service flag. A blue star represented a family member serving during wartime; a gold star replaced it when that member died. As the National Archives’ history demonstrates, the original tradition did not use today’s precise eligibility language. It would be inaccurate to claim every early Gold Star was limited to enemy-caused deaths.

But the history doesn’t end there.

Congress later established the Gold Star Lapel Button and defined its eligibility. Under 10 U.S.C. §1126, it identifies next of kin of service members who died during the World Wars and specified hostilities, or through qualifying enemy action, conflict with an opposing foreign force, international terrorist attacks or certain overseas peacekeeping operations.

The Department of Defense recognizes a separate emblem: the Lapel Button for Next of Kin of Deceased Personnel. It recognizes active-duty and qualifying reserve deaths that do not meet the Gold Star Lapel Button criteria.

The Army regulations published in the Federal Register place the two buttons in consecutive provisions and assign them different eligibility requirements.

That distinction matters.

The government did not create two emblems accidentally. Every military loss deserves recognition, while different circumstances carry different official designations.

A family that loses a service member to illness, suicide, an automobile or training accident or another non-hostile circumstance has suffered a devastating loss. Their loved one’s service mattered. They deserve compassion, support and appropriate recognition.

But grief alone does not make two circumstances identical. Recognizing a distinction is not the same as measuring whose grief matters more.

We would not call every veteran who suffered an injury a Purple Heart recipient. That does not diminish the veteran’s injury or suffering. It simply acknowledges that the Purple Heart has defined eligibility requirements and represents a particular form of sacrifice.

The Gold Star deserves the same respect for accuracy.

This is especially important when dedicating a Gold Star Families Memorial Monument.

Medal of Honor recipient Hershel “Woody” Williams created the memorial project as a permanent place of remembrance. Its monuments bear the words: “Gold Star Families Memorial Monument, a tribute to Gold Star Families and Relatives who sacrificed a Loved One for our Freedom.”

At its center is the silhouette of a saluting service member, representing the legacy of those who, in the Woody Williams Foundation’s words, “paid the ultimate sacrifice for our Freedom.”

The foundation sometimes uses broader language to describe those it serves. I do not speak for the foundation or claim Woody adopted the distinction I defend. I ask that a memorial bearing the Gold Star name be described with the precision reflected in the government’s separate emblems.

Woody understood that the family also serves and carries a service member’s loss for generations. Ensuring those families and their loved ones are never forgotten demands precision in describing the memorial and those it honors.

We can honor every military loss without collapsing every form of military bereavement into the Gold Star. We can support grieving families while respecting distinctions Congress and the military established. Correct designations take nothing from another family; they recognize each sacrifice honestly and appropriately.

As the father of Sgt. Clinton K. Ruiz, who was killed in action in Afghanistan on October 25, 2012, I do not write this lightly or without compassion for other bereaved families. I write because we have a responsibility to preserve the congressionally recognized meaning of the Gold Star for the service members whose deaths meet that solemn designation and for the families who must carry it.

Some will find this distinction uncomfortable or accuse those of us defending it of being exclusionary. So be it.

Preserving the historic and congressionally recognized meaning of the Gold Star is a hill I am willing to die on — not because other families’ grief matters less, but because the sacrifice represented by the Gold Star must never be diluted into something it was never intended to mean.

As Gold Star Mother’s and Family’s Day approaches, let us honor every loss, recognize every sacrifice appropriately, respect every designation and protect the meaning of the Gold Star.

Tony Ruiz is a Gold Star father and U.S. Navy submarine veteran.

The effort to implement the Warfighting Acquisition System — transforming the acquisition system around speed, accountability and mission relevance — is both necessary and overdue.

However, if this reform is to deliver its full promise, it must extend beyond headquarters processes, portfolio structures and contracting authorities. Acquisition reform needs to migrate to the last tactical mile — where warfighters confront real-world friction, adapt in real time and generate operational lessons that should shape requirements, accelerate integration and compress acquisition timelines.

The true test of these reforms will not be how quickly decisions move through the system, but how effectively the system learns from the edge, where combat effectiveness is ultimately determined. The avenue to more certain victory leads to and from the warfighter, embracing analysis at the last tactical mile.

America’s warfighters operate at the edge, just as good operations analysts — like those in my own organization — must do in a fast-moving acquisition ecosystem. Successful acquisition reform will need insights from the edge, empowered by empirically trained analysts (uniformed and civilian) who understand systems, tactics, strategy and operations as seen from the perspective of the sailor, soldier, airman, guardian or Marine.

Speed in acquisition will not be achieved by process reform alone. Analysis at the tactical edge is often overlooked but in need of energy and capital to capture insights that drive decisions. Rapid acquisition to field systems that provide military utility demands a continuous learning loop between those who build capability and those who employ it under actual operating conditions — and the ability to measure results quickly.

In this loop, field-level insights should not be treated as downstream feedback after system deployment; they must become upstream drivers of requirements refinement, system integration and prioritization.

By institutionalizing this feedback loop, the department can reduce costly redesign cycles, shorten decision timelines and field capabilities that are not only delivered faster but have greater military value. This is consistent with the department’s own shift toward “speed of relevance,” operational outcomes, and fulfilling the promise to the warfighter.

The department does not need to build this learning architecture from scratch. Proven models already exist in pockets within the force. The Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory, for example, works closely with warfighters to test and analyze new systems. The operator perspective gets fused early into the technical development process, which then allows fielding at speed. This approach to development can outpace program-of-record development, even when going after the same warfighting gaps.

But this warfighter-centric approach should not be confined to formal military innovation organizations alone. Operator-informed analysis must extend across the defense ecosystem, accelerating integration, reducing acquisition timelines and scaling trusted results.

This is not mere assertion. When acquisition works, whether rapid or otherwise, it does so in part because analysts got in the foxhole, in the aircraft, or inside the combat information center to assess, validate and inform acquisition efforts from the point of view of the warfighter.

I know, because my analysts have led that kind of impactful work. We have designed and executed tests of prototypes in the real world, providing independent technical analysis of performance. Analysis at the tactical edge has uncovered critical problems that have to be addressed before warfighters can safely use systems. It has also revealed new tactical use cases for systems — ones that weren’t anticipated by the manufacturer.

The complexity of the counter-IED fight in Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom offers a clear case where warfighter feedback alone was not enough to assess a technology’s utility. So many counter-IED systems were being pushed to the warfighters that it became important to understand which systems worked under which conditions.

Yet one of the most challenging problems in analysis is proving a negative. In other words, if an IED did not go off, was that because of the counter-IED system or not? Our analysts deployed alongside Marine Corps units to collect data and employed complex statistical methods to make that determination. Lives were at stake, and our analyses made a difference.

The department’s shift to the Warfighting Acquisition System is both necessary and timely. Victory on future battlefields belongs to the nation that can create military advantage through rapid acquisition and wartime adaptation. That much is clear. But enduring speed does not come from process redesign alone. It comes from building an acquisition enterprise that learns from the warfighter — where data is analog and results require deep insight to interpret.

If the department fully integrates such a learning loop, it will do more than shorten timelines. It will create a force that adapts faster, integrates better and delivers combat-relevant capability at the pace warfare demands. This is how acquisition reform becomes warfighting advantage.

Dr. Katherine A. McGrady is the president and chief executive officer of CNA, which operates the Center for Naval Analyses, a federally funded research and development center that pioneered the field of operations analysis in support of the U.S. Navy during World War II.

Rep. Pat Harrigan, R-N.C., moved to do that with H.R. 10159, legislation sponsored by Rep. Richard Hudson, R-N.C., and backed by members of both parties across North Carolina’s congressional delegation. The U.S. House agreed to the motion by voice vote on Sept. 14.

The bill represents much more than a 20-acre land conveyance. It represents years of work by North Carolinians trying to correct a failure in veterans’ care.

The Fayetteville State Veterans Home was North Carolina’s first state veterans home. In 1994, during the administration of then-Gov. Jim Hunt, the state general assembly authorized the home and provided the state matching funds necessary to begin the project. Federal construction funding followed, and the 150-bed facility opened in 1999.

The issues that would eventually plague the home did not emerge overnight.

Hurricane Matthew struck the region in 2016, and Hurricane Florence brought additional flooding and water-intrusion concerns in 2018. Just weeks after Florence, a state facility assessment found that a portion of the roof “leaks badly and needs replacement.”

By 2022, the State Construction Office had identified millions of dollars in structural deficiencies. By late 2023, state officials concluded the facility could no longer remain occupied. Eighty-five veterans from 19 counties were living there when relocation began, and the home closed in February 2024.

What followed did not fit neatly into a partisan blame game. State officials, legislators, veterans, families and community partners worked through a difficult question: What should replace this failed, yet critically important, facility?

At one point, renovation was formally recommended. Ultimately, North Carolina moved toward constructing a new veterans home.

This year, that effort culminated in a state budget providing the funding and authority to rebuild it, including a $40 million state commitment. But money alone could not build the home. North Carolina still needed a place to put it.

A novel solution emerged: approximately 20 acres of federal property at Fort Bragg.

With that solution came a small but consequential legal hurdle. North Carolina could appropriate money for the project, but it could not simply take land belonging to the U.S. Army.

Rep. Hudson and members of North Carolina’s congressional delegation worked to provide the legal pathway. H.R. 10159 would authorize the Secretary of the Army to convey the property to North Carolina for the specific purpose of constructing a state veterans home. It is narrow legislation that solves a specific problem: The state has committed resources, and a parcel has been identified, but North Carolina cannot transfer federal property to itself.

On Sept. 15, H.R. 10159 was received by the U.S. Senate and referred to the Senate Armed Services Committee, where it now awaits further action.

Even if enacted, the work does not end there. A survey acceptable to the Army must establish the parcel, and environmental and real-estate due diligence must occur. North Carolina must cover the conveyance costs.

Those hurdles are why coordination has mattered. Rep. Hudson and Democratic Gov. Josh Stein’s administration, as well as North Carolina Secretary of Military and Veterans Affairs Jocelyn Mitnaul Mallette, have each played a role in moving the state and federal pieces toward the same objective.

Coordination with the Department of Veterans Affairs remains another hurdle.

The VA administers the State Home Construction Grant Program, the same type of federal-state partnership that helped make the original Fayetteville home possible. The VA may fund up to 65% of eligible construction or renovation costs. Critically, the program also operates on a calendar: An initial application is due by April 15 for consideration on the following fiscal year’s priority list.

To be sure, Senate passage of H.R. 10159 will not, by itself, build a veterans home. The Army will still have work to do. North Carolina will still have obligations to meet. The VA will still have its own process. But that is exactly why rapid Senate action matters.

Each step has to line up with the next, and the danger is that, after years of work, the project becomes another example of what could have been rather than what government actually delivered.

Earlier this week, I sat in Rep. Hudson’s office and learned more about his senior staff’s efforts to work with the administration of Democratic Gov. Josh Stein on this issue.

As the North Carolina legislative chairman for the Veterans of Foreign Wars, what struck me was not that Republicans and Democrats suddenly agreed on everything. They certainly do not. What stood out was that, on this problem, those disagreements did not prevent the work from continuing.

A Democratic governor and his administration, members of a Republican-led general assembly, North Carolina’s congressional delegation, federal agencies, veterans organizations and community leaders have all confronted parts of this problem and diligently sought solutions that bring those pieces together.

The VFW Department of North Carolina supports H.R. 10159 and is calling for prompt consideration by the Senate so Congress can complete its portion of this process.

The state has committed its resources, and the House has acted. These are not easy legislative accomplishments, and they should not be wasted.

For the veterans waiting for a new home, the measure of this effort will not be which party receives the credit. It will be whether government can overcome bureaucracy and partisanship long enough to finish the job.

Tanner Port is a U.S. Army veteran and the national legislative chairman at the Veterans of Foreign Wars Department of North Carolina.

President Trump’s February 2025 executive order, “The Iron Dome for America” (later rebranded as Golden Dome), directed the Department of Defense to protect U.S. citizens and infrastructure from all forms of aerial attack. The department took a first step toward assigning responsibility for a U.S. air and missile defense architecture by standing up the Golden Dome office. But critical elements of any near-term defensive shield remain outside its control: namely, the U.S. air and missile defense systems that have proven their worth on Ukrainian and Middle Eastern battlefields.

The Aegis system, for example, is a U.S. Navy program—though its ballistic missile defense component is funded by the Missile Defense Agency (MDA). Patriot interceptors, in turn, belong to the Army. Theater High Altitude Aerial Defense (THAAD) batteries and the Ground Based Midcourse Defense System (GMDS) are developed by the MDA but operated and maintained by the Army. U.S. Northern Command is responsible for U.S. air surveillance but relies heavily on radars belonging to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) — and so on.

The Golden Dome director’s position in the Defense Department hierarchy — reporting directly to the Deputy Secretary of Defense — reflects the urgency of the task. But it does not convey any actual authority to direct the decisions of the Army, Navy, Air Force, or Transportation secretaries.

Diffusion of responsibility is a recipe for failure.

For Golden Dome to work, the Defense Department must draw on lessons from some of its most successful Cold War innovations — specifically, the organizational innovations that made its game-changing technologies and operational concepts possible. Admiral Hyman Rickover, perhaps the leading exemplar of Cold War innovation, took nuclear propulsion from the blackboard to the fleet in just five years.

To quote Rickover: “Unless you can point your finger at the one person who is responsible when something goes wrong, then you have never had anyone really responsible.” Golden Dome fails this test, precisely because — according to the Defense Department itself — it is a “team effort” in which “we’re going to need all the services and agencies that do this kind of work to step up.”

Rickover took the opposite approach. If something was critical to the Navy’s nuclear propulsion program, he established de facto (and often de jure) control over it. For example, he successfully co-opted the Cabinet-level Atomic Energy Commission. Established in 1947 to oversee all U.S. nuclear matters, the AEC was a potential bureaucratic roadblock. At Rickover’s prompting, therefore, the Navy issued him orders to “report for duty with the Division of Reactor Development” in the AEC (and to the Navy for “additional duty”).

With one foot in the Navy and the other in the AEC, Rickover became the central U.S. authority for nuclear propulsion. This allowed him to coordinate the activities of two separate executive departments, often by proposing an action from one department and then convincing the other to approve it. His dual office, Naval Reactors, remains part of both the Navy and the Department of Energy (successor to the AEC) to this day.

The Rickover approach is not how the Pentagon normally does business. “I can assure you,” Rickover told Congress in 1979, “that having one individual responsible for a total program is a unique concept within the Department of Defense.” But Rickover made it his business to acquire unchallenged authority over all areas that concerned “his” reactors.

The Secretary of Defense must likewise assign total responsibility for Golden Dome, with autonomy and authority to match. This will entail taking the requisite authorities from their normal stewards and re-delegating them to the Golden Dome director.

For example, ballistic missile defense responsibility is currently bifurcated between Golden Dome and the Missile Defense Agency. MDA should be moved under Golden Dome. Similarly, airspace surveillance operations and modernization are divided between DoD and the FAA, with the latter contributing the lion’s share. The Golden Dome director must have a Rickover-like dual assignment in the FAA. And if homeland defense is indeed an urgent priority, DoD should take a hard look at whether the Aegis and Patriot programs should be moved under Golden Dome as well.

This process will be challenging, but far from impossible. And while Rickover’s nuclear power program is one of the most remarkable Cold War innovations, other success stories such as General Bernard Schriever’s Atlas ICBM and Undersecretary of Defense William Perry’s F-117 stealth fighter applied the same core insight: comprehensive organizational authority is just as important as any technological or industrial-base factor. DoD must heed this lesson if Golden Dome is to succeed.

Thane Clare is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

On Aug. 20, SBA proposed replacing nearly 1,000 industry-specific size standards and exceptions with 338 broader ones.

In common IT services categories, the threshold would rise from $34 million in average annual receipts to $531 million. SBA estimates 37,002 firms already in the federal market would newly qualify, holding more than 105,000 contracts worth about $71 billion in fiscal 2025.

SBA has legitimate reasons to act. The system is complicated, inflation has eroded the thresholds and businesses need room to grow. But that raises a narrower question: Should a $10 million SDVOSB compete for the same set-asides as an SDVOSB approaching $500 million?

An SDVOSB must be small under the standard assigned to a contract, in addition to being veteran-owned and controlled. If these thresholds hold, veteran-owned companies at dramatically different stages will compete head-to-head, and they are not similarly situated.

A firm with hundreds of millions in revenue has more capital, deeper past performance, bigger proposal teams and more room to absorb delayed payments, protests and lost bids. Most newly eligible firms will be $40 million to $200 million companies, and the advantage is the same.

We should want veterans to build $500 million companies. But a program built for veteran entrepreneurs should not pretend that gap does not exist.

Nowhere is this more consequential than at the Department of Veterans Affairs, which by statute must set work aside for veteran-owned small businesses whenever two can perform it, and which awarded roughly a quarter of its prime dollars to SDVOSBs last year.

The veteran-owned IT firms that outgrew that program would walk back through the door and compete against the firm that won its first VA contract last year.

SBA acknowledges that a larger pool may reduce existing small businesses’ chances of winning, and says the greatest effect will fall on firms most similar in size to the new entrants.

In a set-aside decided on past performance, staffing depth and price, the firm most likely to lose is the one with the least of each: the emerging veteran-owned business the program exists to serve.

SBA also states it is “not possible for SBA to accurately predict which newly classified firms would be eligible for certification,” and expects firms near the threshold not to certify.

That may be true elsewhere. It is not true where certification is free, takes weeks and unlocks a category one agency funds at roughly $10 billion a year. And the data to test it already sit in SBA’s own systems: VetCert, SAM.gov and FPDS show every firm that has held or lost SDVOSB certification, its size and its awards.

Before finalizing, SBA should publish an analysis. How many larger firms would qualify on both size and ownership, what they already receive and where smaller SDVOSBs would face the most new competition?

Depending on the data, SBA should adopt an SDVOSB-specific safeguard. SBA already uses program-specific size definitions elsewhere, and Congress can settle any doubt about authority.

One option is a separate upper threshold for SDVOSB set-asides where the general standard would otherwise rise into the hundreds of millions. Something like $75 million, roughly twice today’s standard, would let a firm double before graduating. The principle matters more than the number.

Congress has a vehicle ready. The bipartisan Contract Our Veterans Act of 2026 would set a 5% government-wide goal for veteran-owned small business contracting. A goal is only as meaningful as the field it is measured against, and the same bill could define that field so the goal is met by veterans building companies, rather than by a few already large ones.

No soldier, sailor, airman, Marine, guardian or Coast Guardsman leaves the service and builds a $500 million company on day one. The SDVOSB program should be a working ladder to the open marketplace, not permanent shelter from competition. SBA can modernize and keep that ladder standing.

Comments are due Sept. 21, 2026, at regulations.gov, Docket SBA-2026-0199, and SBA must answer substantive comments in the final rule. If you own a veteran-owned business, tell SBA what this change would mean for you.

Justin Brown is CEO of The Nimitz Group, a Washington, D.C.-based government relations firm focused on veterans policy and federal procurement.

It was introduced to make civilians feel comfortable with what the military asks of its service members, shifting focus from the human beings carrying the weight to the audience watching them carry it.

America loves the perfect military family hanging in photos around the world: a service member reuniting with a supportive spouse and resilient kids — all smiles, happy tears and beautifully curated.

America kills to see a happy homecoming. We watch from the safety of our couches as loved ones run to embrace their hero.

I’ve lived that photo. I am that supportive wife who is proud of this life and its honorable purpose. My husband looks good in his flight suit, and my kids are strong as hell.

The issue isn’t the photo; it’s what exists outside the frame. The reality lives in the go-bag in the closet, tearful goodbyes, moldy base housing, paychecks stretched thin, deteriorating mental health and the solo-parenting that spouses do every day.

The photo op can’t hold it.

The reality lives within the human beings inside those uniforms: the service member who is scared, exhausted or living with post-traumatic stress disorder; the children who don’t understand; and the spouse who is angry because she has skin in the game.

We’ve decided the image of the hero is more important than the human wearing the uniform. The support is loud until they step out of the frame. The second they show exhaustion, fear or disagreement, support turns into silence, or worse, an accusation: “You signed up for this.”

Yes, we did, and proudly. But nobody signed up to have their basic humanity stripped away to become America’s pretty patriotism prop.

The second a service member says, “I am exhausted,” “My mental health is failing,” or “This policy is broken,” their limits become an inconvenience, and they are written off as a threat to morale. When a spouse speaks up about mold or destructive deployment schedules, she is framed as “ungrateful” and warned she’ll ruin her partner’s career. The institution offers performative “help” through commissions far removed from daily realities, while kids become collateral damage in a system that values silence over empathy.

The proof is in the current events section of every government-run newspaper. It’s just not the story the institution wants you to hear.

When asked if the deployment of the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln was getting too long, the response was, “Not nearly long enough.” When sailors and families raised legitimate alarms about mental health, leadership brushed it off, managed optics and expected everyone to endure. When independent press like Stars and Stripes exposes messy realities, they’re handled — shattering the illusion that service members are lethal war machines, rather than humans with limits.

When active-duty officers like Major Jason Watson raise their voice on the Capitol steps, leadership doesn’t ask why; they immediately condemn. Challenging broken policy is treated as a personal insult to fragile leadership that cares more about rank and optics than humanity. By hyper-focusing on protocol, leadership hands itself a convenient shield: It’s easier to court-martial a man than answer the uncomfortable questions he brought with him.

Which brings me back to the man in the flight suit.

My loyalty belongs to my husband, not an institution that sees him as a disposable asset, nor a leadership pushing a toxic narrative over well-being. My loyalty is to the human who willingly puts on that suit and honors his oath.

Loving my husband and being a proud military spouse does not mean silent compliance. It fuels the fire because my name sits next to his on our marriage certificate, and it’s the very reason I refuse to be quiet.

I can honor his service and still look military leadership in the eye and ask, “What are you doing to him?”

What happens to him directly impacts our family, and I refuse to let his humanity be a bargaining chip for a public relations campaign.

If America and the Department of Defense truly want to “support our troops,” they must start taking responsibility for inconvenient consequences. Stop demanding the perfect military family and start acknowledging the human beings inside the uniform; their limits, fears, exhaustion and truth.

Debunking the war machine and seeing soldiers as human beings is the absolute minimum. Human acknowledgment isn’t simply “the right thing to do”; it’s how a successful military culture is created. When a leader chooses humanity over optics, a foundation is built on genuine trust rather than quiet burnout.

Maybe then service members and families would willingly choose 20 years instead of walking away. After all, you can only push someone to their limit before they jump ship.

Alexa LeCureux is a military spouse and writer who explores the complexities of service, patriotism and family life in the armed forces. She has spent over a decade supporting her husband’s career, first as a loadmaster and more recently as an Air Force KC-135 pilot, while raising their children in military communities across the United States and overseas. Her writing reflects the lived experience of military families and the quiet weight of life behind the uniform.

Extensive damage to one of our most significant forward bases in the Middle East is likely to have profound tactical and strategic repercussions that are only now coming into focus.

The idea that this broad functioning hub, built over decades, was significantly degraded in the space of a few days by a regional player is unimaginable.

I have fond memories of Bahrain both from past port visits, where it provided much-needed rest and relaxation, decent shopping and fitness options, and from my time as a government trainer when I flew over for shipboard training once every six months. I always felt safe there.

That NSA Bahrain is now virtually uninhabitable, with families left in limbo, as described in recent reporting, is difficult to grasp.

The damage is estimated to be close to $400 million. Buildings reportedly harmed include the Fifth Fleet headquarters, a barracks, several warehouses, communications towers and a potable water station.

Ships, including several U.S. Coast Guard vessels, appear to have been relocated, along with a large portion of the staff and their facilities. Thankfully, no one was killed or severely injured at the base, according to U.S. military sources.

It’s important to understand that NSA Bahrain is more than just a headquarters. Among its many functions, the installation provides a regional naval operating base for U.S. Navy forces in the Middle East. NSA Bahrain is home to NAVCENT and U.S. Fifth Fleet, along with numerous tenant commands.

Whenever ships, aircraft, personnel or cargo are moving throughout the region, chances are they have been supported by NSA Bahrain.

The installation provides the physical infrastructure that keeps American military power continuously available in a strategically vital region. It is foundational to America’s ability to project maritime power in this critical theater.

The idea that the U.S. could not prevent and defend against a predictable attack on a Fleet Headquarters — and our sailors stationed there — is quite startling. It likely is just as alarming to our allies.

The depth of NSA Bahrain’s impact became clear as the stories of scarcities of parts, food, mail and supplies to the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln hit the news. Before long, pieces of the puzzle began falling into place as to the connection between ship supplies and the lack of a familiar resupply source.

Stretching supply lines that were once hundreds of miles away out to thousands of miles has far-reaching implications for forward-deployed ships and is likely to become a significant constraint in maritime operations.

Having deployed to the area multiple times, I can attest to such impacts. The fact that the U.S. did not preemptively — or at least expeditiously — evacuate families and dependents is truly mind-boggling. Even now, six months later, well over a thousand evacuated troops and their families are still in limbo, with many separated from pets and belongings due to the devastation.

The potential loss of NSA Bahrain is effectively the equivalent of losing an aircraft carrier. It could not have come as a surprise that Iran would attack it in retaliation, yet it — and those living and working there — were left exposed and the facilities inadequately protected from Tehran’s ballistic missiles.

The U.S. has superb air defense capabilities that could potentially have formed a near-impenetrable “dome” over our citizens, as they have over Israel and parts of Ukraine in recent history. Ballistic missile defense destroyers boast incredible defensive capabilities and could have been stationed effectively at sea to protect the Fifth Fleet Headquarters.

Instead, there is now talk of “reducing the footprint” of U.S. forces in the region, a “strategic retreat” that will have a significant impact on logistic support for our ships and troops in the region, making them even more vulnerable.

I commend Vice Adm. Curt Renshaw, the commander of Naval Forces Central Command, 5^th Fleet, and Combined Maritime Forces, for his honesty and candor when he told Bahrain evacuees at a town hall, “When we started this journey, there were some pretty clear rules. As we’ve moved on, we’re really in uncharted territory right now.”

Adm. Renshaw’s frustration is understandable. What is striking is not simply the physical damage, but the continuing uncertainty six months later surrounding the operational status and future of one of America’s most important naval headquarters — and importantly, the status of the personnel and their families.

What, precisely, is the current operational status of NSA Bahrain and the Fifth Fleet headquarters, and what capability did the U.S. lose when Iran demonstrated that it could strike this critical naval hub?

Fifth Fleet is still functioning, but the infrastructure from which it operated has been badly degraded. While there is certainly a need for operational security, it is important for the American people to understand how this situation happened, the magnitude of the impact and how repeating it can be avoided.

If NSA Bahrain is not reconstituted to something near its pre-attack capabilities, it will fundamentally change how the U.S. Navy operates, supplies and maintains its ships. It will also upend how we support regional coalition partners in the Gulf region.

It is my hope that it is resurrected with sufficient support and security to make it safe and viable again.

John Cordle is a retired Navy captain who commanded the destroyer USS Oscar Austin and the cruiser USS San Jacinto during his 30-year military career. He is a recipient of the U.S. Navy League John Paul Jones Award for Inspirational Leadership.