pentagon

McKinnon extradition on hold until February

Gary McKinnon's potential extradition to the U.S. for hacking military systems is on hold for the next few weeks, McKinnon's lawyer has told ZDNet UK.

On Tuesday, McKinnon appeared at the High Court in London for an oral hearing about his extradition. McKinnon has always admitted hacking into the NASA and Pentagon systems--a crime for which he could face up to 70 years in prison if he were found guilty by a U.S. court--but denies causing damage to the extent claimed by the U.S.

Late last December, McKinnon sent a confession to Keir Starmer, the … Read more

Cree wins contract to light the Pentagon

LED manufacturer Cree has been awarded a contract from the U.S. Department of Defense to supply over 4,200 recessed LED lights for the Pentagon, the company announced Tuesday. Financial details were not disclosed.

Testing commissioned by the U.S. government determined that Cree's LR24 recessed LED lights would offer a 22 percent energy reduction compared with fluorescent lights, and save the Pentagon 140 tons of carbon dioxide emissions per year.

The government also commissioned a cost analysis that showed the lights would yield a payback of less than four years once things like energy savings, maintenance, and … Read more

Buzz Out Loud 795: New Zealand judge misses entire point of Internet

In the news today, NBC fails to medal in its online streaming of the Olympics, but Google never fails to meddle (by driving up and down your private roads). OK, that was a Tom joke. Also, the Obama text dissected (but not in a political way), the Pentagon and its fake cat brains, and how to vote better. Listen now: Download today's podcast

EPISODE 795

FCC outs HTC Dream’s dimensions: It’s smaller than the iPhone 3G http://www.engadget.com/2008/08/25/fcc-outs-htc-dreams-dimensions-its-smaller-than-the-iphone-3g/

iPhone 3G reception just fine, say curious Swedes with engineering degrees http://www.engadget.com/2008/08/25/iphone-3g-reception-just-fine-say-curious-swedes/ … Read more

What it means to be an analyst

The New York Times ran an article over the weekend (here) describing efforts by the Pentagon and the Bush Administration to influence the opinions of military analysts, primarily retired military officers, who contribute to coverage of the Iraq War and other topics by newspapers and TV news programs.

The Times article claimed that the Pentagon's influence turned these analysts into sock puppets, a claim supported by this quote from Robert S. Bevelacqua-- a military analyst himself:

"It was them saying, 'We need to stick our hands up your back and move your mouth for you.'"

Now, the … Read more

Reality check for the Army's high-tech makeover

The Pentagon is no stranger to overpriced equipment and cost overruns, but it may never have seen a program quite like the U.S. Army's long-running and hugely ambitious Future Combat Systems initiative.

For this fiscal year alone, Congress has allocated some $3.5 billion in funding for FCS, en route to what is expected to be a total tab of $160 billion or so by the middle of the next decade. But $160 billion doesn't buy what it used to: the Government Accountability Office has been lamenting recently that the overall estimated FCS tab remains at that … Read more

Taking the easy way out when it comes to China

Here's a headline you could have found crossing the news wires any time in the last decade: "Pentagon worried, China upgrading cyberwarfare capabilities."

But now Uncle Sam is really starting to fret. A new Pentagon report to Congress on the state of China's military (PDF) describes the People's Liberation Army as being on a march to acquire a more potent information technology-fighting capacity.

Looking more than a decade over the horizon, the Pentagon expects China to try to gain expertise that would allow it to strike foreign communications and logistics nodes, as well as financial … Read more

Satellite shoot-down: myths and questions

The Pentagon scored a point for missile defense advocates last week when an SM-3 missile launched from the USS Lake Erie whacked a defunct satellite in orbit and shattered it into thousands of tiny (and presumably harmless) pieces. But it did leave some questions hanging in the air: Was the mission really necessary? Was it worth the cost? How much of a threat was the hydrazine fuel, really? Did we escalate a space weapons race? Herewith some thoughts on those matters:

MSNBC: "Five myths about the satellite smash-up"

ArmsControlWonk.com: "4 Questions from Geoff Forden"

Buzz Out Loud 665: Run, Alex, run!

EPISODE 665

Video: Missile hits satellite target

One shot was all it took for the Pentagon to decommission with extreme prejudice a spy satellite that first failed to operate and then started on a steady descent toward Mother Earth.

A Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) streaked skyward from the USS Lake Erie late Wednesday and whacked the satellite while it was still 130 or so miles up in space--and whizzing along at 17,000 miles per hour.

Defense Department officials quickly pronounced the mission a success, not just in hitting the satellite at all, but also in apparently rupturing its fuel tank. The rationale for the target shoot was … Read more