Army Pvt. Bradley Manning plans to plead guilty to 10 of the 22 charges against him in the hopes of being allowed to speak in open court and expand upon the political motives that moved him to release the largest document dump of U.S. military and State Department materials in U.S. history.

If allowed to make a statement, it would be his first ever public account of why he leaked sensitive information.

In court filings, he said that he provided classified material to WikiLeaks hoping to "spark a domestic debate on the role of our military and foreign policy in general." He admitted to leaking detailed US war logs from Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as a video showing an American helicopter gunship strike in Baghdad, which WikiLeaks later edited and released, titling it "Collateral Murder."

Prosecutors can choose to reject his guilty plea — which carry a maximum sentence of up to 20 years — and pursue the more serious charges, including allegations that the leaks directly benefitted al-Qaeda, a charge that could lead to life imprisonment, according to the Telegraph.

"It's taking responsibility for the release of WikiLeaks but criticizing the way the government has targeted it… [this] is an alternative way to get his [ideals] into the public record,"Nathan Bradley, spokesman for the Bradley Manning Support Group, said. "This is an opportunity for Manning to make the statement that WikiLeaks is a conduit to help the American people."

As The Telegraph reports, despite any statements that Manning may make, they are likely to be ignored as prosecutors have already indicated that are likely to go forward with the trial and press for the more serious charges.

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This past fall, the Army found out the results of a probe meant to determine if psychiatrists were reversing soldiers' PTSD diagnoses to save the government money by denying them medical retirements. Months later, they still don't want anyone knowing what's in those files. The Army has refused to release the results of the so-called Madigan inquiry, and attempts to get the report through Freedom of Information Act requests have all been denied.

"George Wright, an Army spokesman at the Pentagon, told NBC News that 'concerns brought up in the Madigan matter will be addressed' in a separate forthcoming report by the Army's Task Force on Behavioral Health," reports NBC News's Rebecca Ruiz. ("Madigan" is the Madigan Army Medical Center in Tacoma, Washington.) According the same report, three Seattle-based news agencies have been denied Freedom of Information Act requests on the inquiry.

That's troubling because the Madigan inquiry was an internal probe into whether forensic psychiatrists at Madigan Army Medical Center were reversing PTSD diagnoses to save the federal government money. This group of forensic psychiatrists had reversed more than 300 diagnoses, suggesting these were more than just cautious second opinions. The evidence: 

"Rubber Stamping" PTSD. In memo obtained by the Seattle Times, a Madigan psychiatrist told his colleagues during a lecture that a soldier diagnosed with PTSD could eventually receive $1.5 million. He warned his colleagues to be discerning when diagnosing PTSD. "He (the psychiatrist) stated that we have to be good stewards of the tax payers dollars, and we have to ensure that we are just not 'rubber stamping' a soldier with the diagnoses of PTSD," reads the memo, which was published by the Seattle Times on February 6, 2012.

The Only Hospital to Use Forensic Psychiatrists as Screeners. Forensic psychiatrists were involved in the screening of the patients at Madigan and Madigan was the only hospital that used forensic psychiatrists this way, the Army said on February 4, 2013. "A subsequent review of 431 Madigan cases — some of which had been overturned — led to PTSD diagnoses for 150 soldiers by last October," reports Ruiz, using information given to her by Senator Patty Murray (D-Wash).

Retaliation? On February 18, 2013, Dr. Russel Hicks was suspended by the Madigan Army Medican Center, and action that he believes was "in retaliation for information he offered Army investigators who last year examined diagnoses of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) at the hospital."

Secrecy. The Seattle Times, The News Tribune of Tacoma and KUOW, a Seattle public radio station, were all denied FOIA requests, and have exhausted all of their appeal options. The Army says its because it contains confidential health information, but it also means no one can no how the diagnosis decision were arrived at.

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It sounds ridiculous, but it's true. Dennis Rodman and Kim Jong-un sat side by side at an exhibition basketball game in Pyongyang, with the former Chicago Bulls bad-boy telling the North Korean leader that he "had a friend for life".

In fact, if Vice Magazine hadn't uploaded pictures, we might not believe it.

However, there's more to the story than that. NK News has published a long article from Nate Thayer that looks at the Kim family's love of certain aspects of American culture — such as Disney, Eric Clapton and the NBA.

The Chicago Bulls seem to have been the Kims' team of choice. Thayer picks up on a picture of Kim Jong-un's brother Kim Jong-chol wearing a Chicago Bulls jersey with Dennis Rodman’s number on it, and points to a 2006 report that said Kim Jong Il owned video library of "practically every game Michael Jordan played for the Chicago Bulls".

Interestingly, that report seems to suggest that Jordan was originally slated to visit the Hermit Kingdom in 2001.

Intrigued, Max Fisher of the Washington Post did some digging and found the original story from the San Diego Union-Tribune. Here's a key passage:

Jordan’s management team was approached about the athlete making a goodwill trip to Pyongyang to meet Kim. The North Korean government, according to documents obtained by The San Diego Union-Tribune, sent a letter authorizing the request, and Samsung, a South Korean electronics company interested in promoting reunification of the Koreas, had offered to underwrite the venture.

Jordan respectfully declined.

So, Rodman appears to be second choice to Jordan in North Korea's eyes at least.

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Aerial refueling has been around since the early days of aviation, but it's still a fascinating idea.

Here's how it was done in 1923, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons:

Things have come a long way since then. Now, when fighter jets need to refill their tanks, they approach a KC-135 Stratotanker.

Once they're in range, the KC-135's "boomer," who lies on his stomach with his head supported by a chin rest, controls the flying boom — basically a tube — to get it into the fighter's fuel receptacle, according to the Aviationist.

Per the YouTube description, this video of the process was taken by Staff Sgt. Robert Barne. The boom operator appears at the 0:49 mark.

SEE ALSO: How Boeing's Mechanics, Engineers, and Electricians Build Planes In Record Time

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An internet project aimed at producing defense weapons using 3D printing techniques claims to have created a completely plastic lower for an AR-15. 

Defense Distributed also say they have test fired it successfully, shooting a full 600 rounds through the weapon with no issues.

It's a major breakthrough for Defense Distributed — the last time they tested a lower receiver it failed after only six rounds. The company has also successfully tested high capacity magazines.

Here's the video of the gun in action:

The group may be a little way off creating full semiautomatic rifle yet, however. An AR-15 rifle has two major components — the upper, which houses the bolt and gas system, and the lower, which holds the trigger and buttstock. The final, and most difficult step, will be building an upper receiver which doesn't melt. Either way, the world is one step closer to seeing a downloadable weapon.

3D printing of weapons is of course a controversial topic, but Defense Distributed maintains their weapons are perfectly legal.

SEE ALSO: Defense Distributed Owner and CEO says magazine bans won't work >

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Over the next decade — if the current-law sequester cuts and spending caps hold — US defense spending will fall to EU-like levels. That is certainly too low if the US is to remain a global military superpower as opposed to becoming a “regional hegemon” in the words of my friends at the Heritage Foundation. (The Obama White House might well prefer this trajectory but would rather the “peace dividend” be used to finance government rather than lower budget deficits.)

OK, we don’t want that. But that will be then. This is now. And given budget realities, the sequester should immediately force Obama’s Pentagon, argues AEI’s Mackenzie Eaglen, “to confront the primary drivers of imbalanced defense spending, including military and civilian bureaucratic overhead, excess infrastructure, and runaway compensation costs.” I would also add in the $70 billion in Pentagon nondefense-related spending identified by Senator Tom Coburn.

Eaglen offers several recommendations:

1.  When trying to slash excess overhead and infrastructure, Pentagon leaders should aim to shrink the bureaucracy while preserving core military capabilities. To do this, they need to begin collecting better information internally. The Pentagon does not currently assess the most affordable mix of military, civilian and contractors in its employment.

2. The department must develop tools to effectively match supply and demand for internal labor in order to understand which jobs may be eliminated and which competencies need additional staffing. Without these simple tools at its disposal, it is not surprising the Pentagon has thus far been unable to size the workforce correctly.

3. Efforts to close additional bases have been unsuccessful. One proposal of note by a senior Air Force official, for example, is for the Pentagon to select installations for closure based on the community’s interest in conversion and their ability to thrive in commercial redevelopment.

In other words, the Pentagon needs to bring in a) some business rationality and b) Big Data.

SEE ALSO: Here's 7 boondoggles the military should cut right now >

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Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki said armed conflicts will break out in Iraq and Lebanon if Syrian rebels topple Bashar al-Assad, according to an interview he gave to Adam Schreck and Qassim Abdul-Zahra of the Associated Press.

"The most dangerous thing in this process is that if the opposition is victorious, there will be a civil war in Lebanon, divisions in Jordan and a sectarian war in Iraq,"Maliki said, adding that peace should be achieved through dialogue.

Maliki's stark words may be an attempt to protect the Shiite Crescent— the geographical link between Shiites in power from Iran, Iraq, Lebanon and Syria.

"The removal of Assad by a Sunni government will weaken the Iraqi Shiites" by emboldening Iraq's Sunnis, Baghdad-based political analyst Hadi Jalo told AP. "Any reasonable person would be surprised if the Iraqi government ... refrains from supporting Assad."

Maliki's comments come at a time when his Shiite-led Iraqi government faces increasing threats.

The major outside threat to Iraq is radical Sunni rebels from Jabhat al-Nusra— the highly effective frontline force that controls controls large swathsof eastern Syria — which isled by veterans of al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI).

"The Sunnis in [Iraq's Anbar province] are helping with weapons and ammunition," the leader of a powerful rebel group in eastern Syria powerful told Reuters. "Their days (of fighting) will come soon and Inshallah (God willing) we will go to jihad with them. Those Sunnis are our brothers."

Inside Iraq another AQI offshoot, Islamic State of Iraq (ISI), is making a comback and recently called on Sunnis to rise up against the Shiite-led Iraqi government.

Lebanon has seen a rise in attacks on both sides of its border with Syria and the government — led by Iranian proxy Hezbollah — would be largely cut off from its benefactor were Damascus to fall. Sectarian tensions are rising as Syrian refugees pour into the country.

SEE ALSO: Radical Syrian Rebels Are About To Blur The Border With Iraq

SEE ALSO: Israel Faces Increasing Danger As Assad Weakens

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It was the opening days of Operation Desert Storm on Jan. 19, 1991 when fighter jets were roaring through Iraqi airspace — and anti-aircraft crews were waiting for them with surface-to-air missiles (SAM).

According to Lucky-Devils, a military website that recounts much of the engagement, U.S. F-16s were trying to attack a rocket production facility north of Baghdad. The account continues:

As the flight approached the Baghdad IP, AAA [Anti-Aircraft Artillery] began firing at tremendous rates. Most of the AAA was at 10-12,000ft (3,658m), but there were some very heavy, large calibre explosions up to 27,000ft (8,230m). Low altitude AAA became so thick it appeared to be an undercast. At this time, the 388th TFW F-16’s were hitting the Nuclear Research Centre outside of the city, and the Weasels had fired off all their HARMs in support of initial parts of the strike and warnings to the 614th F-16’s going further into downtown went unheard.

But for many of the F-16 pilots that day, they had to deal with SAM missiles locking on to them, forcing them into evasive maneuvers. Maj. ET Tullia (Callsign: Stroke 3) had to dodge six of those missiles, at times banking and breathing so hard that he was losing his vision.

Meanwhile, ET became separated from the rest of the package because of his missile defensive break turns. As he defeats the missiles coming off the target, additional missiles are fired, this time, from either side of the rear quadrants of his aircraft. Training for SAM launches up to this point had been more or less book learning, recommending a pull to an orthogonal flight path 4 seconds prior to missile impact to overshoot the missile and create sufficient miss distance to negate the effects of the detonating warhead. Well, it works. The hard part though, is to see the missile early enough to make all the mental calculations.

The following video apparently shows footage through the view of Tullia's heads-up display that day, and around the 3:00 mark, you can hear the warning beeps that a missile is locked on. Although the video is a bit grainy, the radio chatter is incredible, and coupled with his heavy breathing — makes you realize that fighter pilots need to be in peak physical condition to do what they do.

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The Pentagon has approved flights ofLockheed Martin's F-35 after the fleet was grounded with engine trouble, Tony Capaccio of Bloomberg reports.

On February 22 F-35 flights were suspended following the discovery of a crack in a turbine blade on one of the 51 fighter jets.

SEE ALSO: The Entire Fleet Of F-35s Has Been Grounded

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One of Asia’s most notorious drug kingpins has reportedly been executed in China for the massacre of 13 Chinese sailors - with his final moments being broadcast live on national television.

On Friday afternoon - nearly one year after he was captured following an international manhunt - 44-year-old Naw Kham was paraded before the cameras alongside three accomplices also convicted of the 2011 Mekong river massacre in Thailand .

At 2.19pm local time the stony-faced men were bundled into vans by black-clad security forces in the southwestern city of Kunming. By 2.55pm, they were dead, killed by lethal injection.

“Execution implemented,” read an online post from Yunnan province’s Public Security Bureau.

The lead-up to the executions received rolling coverage on China’s state-run CCTV news channel with live analysis from a top Beijing law professor and China’s anti-drug tsar, Liu Yuejin.

“We can see that Naw Kham fears death,” Renmin University criminologist Han Yusheng, told the channel.

“Although he is a cold-blooded murderer, he is still terrified knowing his final day has arrived.”

Liu Yuejin, head of China’s anti-drug unit, told CCTV: “Naw Kham is apparently a Buddhist. But his life has been dedicated to shooting, crime and murder. He is, by nature, a brutal killer with no regard for life.”

The coverage also featured a chilling face-to-face interview with the death-row drug lord, apparently recorded on February 27.

“I haven’t been able to sleep for two days. I have been thinking too much. I miss my mum,” Naw Kham said. “I don't want my children to be like me. I want them to study and work properly. I am afraid of death. I want to live. I don't want to die. I have children. I am afraid.”

Naw Kham was one of southeast Asia’s most notorious drug lords - an elusive gangster who was compared to Osama bin Laden and who allegedly commanded an armed militia of some 100 men in the Golden Triangle region between Burma, Thailand and Laos.

He became a household name in China after being blamed for the slaughter of 13 Chinese sailors during an ambush on the Mekong River in October 2011.

The incident triggered a massive international manhunt with Chinese security forces at one point considering deploying a drone to eliminate Mr Naw. In the end, they opted to take him alive.

“Some analysts had even said the hunt for Naw Kham could be as difficult as the hunt for bin Laden,” the Global Times reported this week.

Following a painstaking investigation, Naw was finally caught in Laos on April 25 last year and extradited to China.

In September, he and three accomplices – named as Hsang Kham, Yi Lai and Zha Xika – were convicted of the massacre. They were later sentenced to death.

The decision to broadcast some of the convicted traffickers’ final moments sparked controversy online. Liu Xiaoyuan, a Chinese lawyer, said “parading” the prisoners on live television was both an “ethical and legal violation.”

But state media insisted the prisoners’ rights had been “fully respected”. “The men's personal belongings will be transferred to their family members,” reported the Global Times.

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Efforts like the one being led by Bill Gates and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg have reduced the number of children paralyzed by the polio virus from 350,000 in 1998 to fewer than 225 cases in 2012.

But the last remnants of the the debilitating disease must be wiped out in Nigeria, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, or else it will make a comeback.

Radical islamic militants are preventing that from happening by attacking clinics, health workers, and police who travel with vaccinators to administer the vaccine to children.

Earlier this month in northern Nigeria, armed men linked to Islamist extremist group Boko Haram killed nine people at a clinic after a local cleric denounced polio vaccination campaigns and local radio programs saying the campaigns are part of a foreign plot to sterilize Muslims.

The province, Kona, is now the epicenter of polio infections in Africa as it has refused to participate in the vaccination campaign.

In Pakistan a total of 18 people have been killed in the last three months, including a police officer who was escorting a polio team in the tribal areas in the country's northwest.

The cultural suspicions may be even messier in Pakistan where came to light that CIA hired a Pakistani doctor to give out hepatitis B vaccine in Abbottabad in March 2011 in an apparent effort to get DNA samples from Osama bin Laden’s hide-out.

"Boko Haram and the Taliban in Pakistan and Afghanistan share a common ideology and common strategy and ... their targets are similar," Shehu Sani, president of the Civil Rights Congress of Nigeria, told the Guardian. "Boko Haram have targeted police stations, politicians, religious clerics who speak out against them and people engaging in polio vaccination programmes."

The tactics have been effective as polio infections have doubled in Pakistan since 2009, new cases are on the rise in Afghanistan, and a polio virus traced to Pakistan was recently found in sewers in Cairo, Egypt (which hasn't seen a case since 2004).

Gates, Microsoft's 57-year-old co-founder, who has donated an estimated $28 billion to charity through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, is determined to completely eradicate the disease.

"Polio's pretty special because once you get an eradication you no longer have to spend money on it," Gates told The Times of India. "It's just there as a gift for the rest of time ... All you need is over 90 percent of children to have the vaccine drop three times and the disease stops spreading ... The great thing about finishing polio is that we'll have resources to get going on malaria and measles."

David Scales of The Disease Daily notes that the key to success in the remaining infected areas is "regaining trust of both the local people and religious leaders," which led northern Nigeria to resume polio vaccinations after a 2003 boycott. Until then, the polio teams need more protection.

Pakistanis aren't so optimistic about solving it through cultural outreach.

"There is only one lasting solution to this and that is to militarily defeat the Taliban once and for all,"according to an editorial in the Pakistan Express Tribune.

Polio, a highly infectious viral disease that can cause permanent paralysis in a matter of hours, usually infects children living in unsanitary conditions.

SEE ALSO: Bill Gates: Polio Will Be Eradicated In Six Years

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Security officials say hundreds of Muslim residents have thrown firebombs and rocks at police outside a church in the south of Egypt.

They accuse local Christians of providing a safe haven for a missing woman suspected of converting.

Six policemen and a dozen Christians were wounded in the clashes late Thursday in the town of Kom Ombo, near the Aswan High Dam.

Tensions rose after a 36-year-old Muslim woman disappeared five days ago. She was allegedly spotted outside the Mar Gergis church in Kom Ombo on Thursday.

Officials say within a few hours, hundreds of Muslims gathered outside the church and tried to storm it, believing she was hiding inside.

Police erected checkpoints around the church Friday in anticipation of more protests. Officials spoke anonymously in line with regulations.

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Fourteen people were killed in a shootout Friday as Malaysian authorities tried to end a three-week standoff with about 200 members of a Filipino clan occupying a village in eastern Malaysia, police said.

Members of a Muslim royal clan from the southern Philippines landed in the coastal village of Lahad Datu in Sabah state on Feb. 9 to claim the territory as their own, citing ownership documents from the late 1800s.

Twelve clan members and two Malaysian police commandos were killed early Friday in a 30-minute shootout, Sabah Police Chief Hamza Taib said. Malaysian authorities were tightening a security cordon around the village when members of the clan opened fire, he said, adding that three policemen were injured in the shootout. He said the standoff was ongoing.

"We don't want to engage them but they fired at us. We have no option but to return fire," Hamza told the Associated Press by telephone.

Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak was quoted by The Star newspaper as saying he had given security forces the authority to take whatever action they thought necessary to end the standoff. He said he regretted the bloodshed.

"I am very sad over the incident because what we had wanted to prevent, which is bloodshed, had actually happened," Najib said.

The village was occupied by a group led by Agbimuddin Kiram, a brother of the head of a Filipino Muslim royal clan. The group earlier ignored appeals from Philippine President Benigno Aquino III to leave immediately or face prosecution at home on charges of triggering an armed conflict.

Filipino officials, citing Malaysia's ambassador to the Philippines, Mohamad Zamri Mohamad Kassim, said earlier Friday that 10 members of the clan surrendered to police following the shootout, while the rest fled and were being pursued by Malaysian authorities.

But Hamza said no one had surrendered. He said clan members remained holed up in the village and that the security operation was ongoing.

"We will assess the situation again. We want them to surrender peacefully. If they still insist, we have no choice, but there is no time frame," he said.

The Philippine government reiterated its appeal to the group to give up its arms and return home. "The continued defiance has to stop for the peaceful solution of this incident," said Defense Ministry spokesman Peter Paul Galvez.

The Philippines requested that medics aboard a Philippine navy ship near the village be allowed onshore to treat any of the Filipinos who may have been wounded Friday and take them and the others back to the country. There was no immediate response to the request.

Earlier Friday, Kiram told Philippine radio station DZBB in Manila that Malaysian police surrounding the village opened fire and that his group fought back. He said there were fatalities on the Filipino side, but there was no independent confirmation.

"They suddenly came in; we had to defend ourselves," Kiram said. Sounds of shots were heard in the background while he was being interviewed by phone.

On Tuesday, Aquino urged Kiram's older brother in the southern Philippine province of Sulu, Sultan Jamalul Kiram III, to order his followers to return home and called their action a "foolhardy act" that was bound to fail.

The standoff elevated the Sabah territorial issue, which has been a thorn in Philippine-Malaysian relations for decades, to a Philippine national security concern. The crisis erupted at a crucial stage of peace negotiations — brokered by Malaysia — between the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the largest Muslim rebel group in the southern Philippines.

Aquino has said that the standoff may have been an attempt to undermine his government on the part of those opposing the peace deal, including politicians and warlords who fear being left out in any power sharing arrangements.

___

Associated Press writers Teresa Cerojano and Oliver Teves in Manila, Philippines, contributed to this report.

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So this is fun.

A guy in Poland built a gigantic revolver. Then he fired it.

RT reports that "It took Mr (Ryszard) Tobys around 2,500 hours to construct, since most of the parts had to be built by hand."

The revolver fires 5 oz. bullets and is supposedly certified by Guinness World Records. The Pentagon has not yet contacted Tobys for potential contracts.

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It’s all “Guns ‘N Roses” for the multi-billion dollar firearms industry, still blossoming in the United States. With strong lobbies, like the National Rifle Association, guns ‘n ammo are big business with big influence.

The NRA’s best known spokesman,Wayne LaPierre, has pulled down an annual salary, close to a million dollars. In addition to fighting against gun control legislation, the NRA frequently takes its firepower to the courts, backing people and groups to expand gun ownership and access rights.

However, the NRA doesn’t always win every battle it chooses. For example, as Lawyers.com Editor-in-Chief Larry Bodine reported, the 10th Circuit recently ruled that the Second Amendment does not cover conceal carry weapon permits. Check out the article and the infographic below for more information on guns and firerarm laws in America.

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The line between North and South Korea is one of the most nerve-wracking borders on Earth. Although the Korean War is technically over for the U.S., the North and South are still very much at war — maintaining guard towers and thousands of troops facing each other, waiting for the next invasion.

The buffer zone created by the 1953 Armistice between North and South is called the de-militarized zone (DMZ), although there's a huge military presence. This border is filled with fencing, mines, and troops on both sides with itchy trigger fingers. 

This relic of the Cold War has seen plenty of very hot engagements: Over 300 American and South Korean, and almost 400 North Korean soldiers were killed in firefights in 1969, and there are numerous instances of infiltrators from the North being scared back only by the sound of warning shots.

The Korean War may seem like it's over, but the armistice of 1953 only brought on a stalemate and both North and South are still at war.

At the 38th parallel lies the de-militarized zone (DMZ), with troops stationed along both sides in case the other decides to attack.

And attacks have happened many times. North Korean soldiers killed two US Army officers here in 1976 at "The Bridge of No Return"— named because captured NK prisoners hardly ever wished to go back home.

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Sports writer Joe Posnaski was more than surprised when the Army invited him down to Fort Leavenworth to talk about "Moneyball" back in 2008.

Like the cash-strapped baseball team in Michael Lewis' book-turned movie, the military was facing a conundrum of sorts: it has to trim spending and preserve its effectiveness in the changing face of modern conflict.

Marc Tracy of The New Republictalked to Posnaski about it: 

"They wanted to try to get into the mindset of a group of people that don't have the resources," said Posnaski, "and how they would try to overcome those things. They really were focusing on Moneyball and how the A's did it with less."

Doing "it" with less is a matter of life and death for the military, which has zero room to mess up, with China launching cyber attacks, Islamists storming around Africa, and Iran and Israel at each other's throats.

Tracy makes the point that COIN, or COunter INsurgency, is the "Moneyball" of modern military doctrine.

Here's some of his interview with a retired Army colonel:

"What we liked about Moneyball is that on the face of it, they looked at baseball and said, 'The things we believe we know are based on mistaken premises, and if we take a look at baseball differently, we will see solutions we would not see,'" said Col. Gregory Fontenot (Ret.), the director of the University of Foreign Military and Cultural Studies, who hosted Posnanski. "Counterinsurgency requires you to look at problems from perspectives you hadn't previously considered."

Tracy attributes COIN to "Baby Boomers""like David Petraeus," but Petraeus was just one half of the COIN equation. The other half was Marine Corps General James N. "Mad Dog" Mattis, who co-wrote the official COIN doctrine with Petraeus.

The Marine Corps' own history of fighting small wars should indicate that Petraeus might have been peeking at Mattis' test more so than leading the effort himself — and that makes sense, seeing as the Marine Corps' 2010 budget was $29 billion, while the Army's was $283 billion.

Nonetheless, the theme here is correct: The military is going to have to do more with less. Already America is seeing a likely boost in cyber capabilities and special forces, with a harsh aversion to the phrase "boots on the ground"— the U.S. has no plans for another massive (and expensive) military incursion any time soon, if it's avoidable.

Not to mention that things could get even worse under sequestration (ugh).

Yes, it's "Moneyball" for the Pentagon from here on out. As for Posnaski's meeting with the military, he said, "we ended up just talking a whole lot of baseball."

SEE ALSO: The most elite special forces in the US >

SEE ALSO: How the Chuck Hagel era will reshape the face of American warfare >

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Iranian sniper teams are now hunting "genetically mutated" rats in Tehran's streets, according to Umberto Bacchi of The International Business Times.

The capital's residents kill about one million rats annually, but the rats continue to become larger and more prevalent.

SEE ALSO: Watch Iran's $40-Million Oil Rig Collapse Into The Sea

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In a world with Weapons of Mass Destruction, deterrence is key.

The recent discovery "Chinese" hackers of probing America's electrical grid serves as a reminder of a potential cyber attack that could far surpass the destructive impact of Stuxnet, which is believed to have been released by the U.S. and Israel to attack Iranian industrial machinery.

Tom Simonite, of MIT Tech Review, recently confirmed that a devastating attack on the grid is a viable option:

“Nations have had the capability to make attacks that could have caused loss of life for many years,” Jason Healy, director of the Cyber Statecraft Initiative of the Atlantic Council, told MIT.

A lack of diligence preparing America's critical infrastructure has made its grid especially vulnerable. A recent survey of the computers behind the machinery in utilities such as power plants, water treatment centers, traffic controls uncovered more than 500,000 potential targets.

Martin LaMonica, also of MIT Tech Review, reported that a recent poll of individuals involved in critical infrastructure showed that these problems are systemic:

Seventy percent of the nearly 700 respondents said they consider their SCADA systems to be at high or severe risk. One third of them suspect that they have been already been infiltrated.

Consequently, Washington-area think tanks are already envisioning the outcome of a U.S. without power. From Simonite:

Healysaid that [Atlantic Council] researchers are trying to work out the trying to work out the economic effects of an extended power outage, with a view to sketching out guidelines for when a military response was justified.

Causing an extended power outage doesn't take much, as both articles indicate. The main vulnerability is that U.S. utility control systems were never designed to protect against the risks of being connected to the Internet.

"A utility worker may set up a wireless access point at a transformer to connect to the company network,"LaMonica writes, but without encryption "this sort of practice leaves this piece of grid infrastructure exposed, industry executives said."

By taking over the computers and network gear that connect to controllers of industrial systems, hackers could overload and blow all of the transformerson those systems at the same time.

Though experts say an attack from China is unlikely — due in large part to the country's vested interest in American innovation — "electronic WMDs" may have to be recognized alongside nukes, or bios, or chems.

"When you have a potential situation where you're dealing with human lives in terms of death and in some cases the same kind of destruction you see from other weapons of mass destruction, then that becomes a whole different ballgame," Dave Aitel, CEO of security firm Immunity, told BI.

Healy told MIT the fact a power grid attack hasn't occurred indicates, much like in the case of other WMDs, that “deterrence is working at the highest level.”

Unfortunately there are actors likeIran, Al Qaeda, and various lone wolves who can't be so easily deterred. Experts say that the main reason is lack of technology and funding, but those same experts say it's only a matter of time.

SEE ALSO: Chinese hackers have a weapon that no one is talking about >

SEE ALSO: How the U.S. invited Iranian hackers to attack America's banks >

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The US Air Force has awarded Lockheed Martin an indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract with a ceiling of $6.9 billion to upgrade the service’s fleet of F-22 Raptor stealth fighters.

Lockheed said that ”The Air Force uses this to authorize the Incremental Modernization capability efforts such as Increment 3.1, Increment 3.2A and Increment 3.2B”

“F-22 modernization provides upgrades that ensures the Raptor maintains air dominance against an ever advancing threat – with capabilities such as advanced weapons, multi-spectral sensors, advanced networking technology and advanced anti-jamming technology.”

Under increment 3.1 upgrade the fleet of radar evading 5th generation planes will get synthetic aperture radar (SAR) with ground mapping capability as well as the ability to carry eight 113kg (250lb) Small diameter bombs, in 2014; the increment 3.2A will see additional electronic protection measures and upgrades to the Link-16 data link system and its ability to work with the jets sensor suite.

In 2017, increment 3.2B will see the software and hardware upgrade to allow the Raptor to use the AIM-120D and AIM-9X missile systems, although a limited ability will be added before this date.

The use of the AIM-9X with an Helmet Mounted Display (initially not implemented on the plane) would give the F-22 an HOBS (High-Off Bore Sight) capability currently lacking.

Further upgrades as part of 3.2B will see further improvements to the electronic protection system and an upgrade to the aircraft geo-location system.

Increment 3.3 is in the pipelines but will be funded from another proposal at a later date and no further details as to what this will actually be is available.

The upgrades will give the costly and troubled stealth fighter, whose dominance of the skies has been debated since the Eurofighter Typhoons involved in the Red Flag Alaska exercise last year achieved some (simulated) Raptor kills, the capability to perform effectively in both air-to-air and air-to-surface missions.

Something the F-35 should sometime do as well.

David Cenciotti has contributed to this post

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