Stevenson’s army, April 15

– Just Security has the biggest and best timeline on the US response to the coronavirus.
– WOTR has the second article on the Defense Production Act.
– WSJ says FEMA is understaffed [20% vacancies] and DHS has been shifting its budget to border operations.
– Even before Tuesday’s announcement, Trump wanted to cut WHO spending in half.

– Todd Harrison of CSIS warns DOD faces fiscal uncertainty.
– Mike Mazarr of Rand, who wrote the excellent book on planning the Iraq war [Leap of Faith], argues that US needs a new approach to power projection.

As you know, I often send around think-tank reports I believe raise valuable ideas. Today I want to highlight a lousy report by a good organization, CNAS. The report argues that somehow the US could find tactical military operations that could be kept secret yet have significant effects Lots of luck with that.

My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).