This week, the Bombshell ladies welcome Lauren Fish of the Center for a New American Security to talk all things FY19 defense budget, including why this big funding increase may not be all that it seems.  While finding future employment for Navy SEALs on the skeleton track, we talk North Korea’s charm offensive, how we and maybe everyone else have totally lost the plot in Syria, and why the Munich Security Conference was the party everyone wanted to bail on.  We offer everything you wanted to know about security clearances and deployability (and then everything you didn’t know you wanted to know).  And oh yeah, Erin’s seen Red Sparrow.

• Center for New American Security, “The Bottom Line,” CNAS
• David Wharton, "'Peace Village,' a fake city just outside the DMZ, serves as metaphor for North Korean athletes at the Olympics," LA Times
• Motoko Rich and Choe Sang-Hun, "Kim Jong-un's Sister Turns On the Charm, Taking Pence's Spotlight," New York Times
• Scott Neuman, "'Dozens' Of Russian Mercenaries Reportedly Killed In U.S. Airstrikes In Syria," NPR
• Isabel Kershner, Anne Barnard, and Eric Schmitt, "Israel Strikes Iran in Syria and Loses a Jet," New York Times
• J. Dana Stuster, "Israel Strikes Iranian Targets in Syria after Drone Incursion," Lawfare
• Aaron Mehta, "Mattis: Unclear if Russia directed attack against U.S. allies in Syria," Military Times
• Eliot A. Cohen, "Witnessing the Collapse of the Global Elite," The Atlantic
• Henry Meyer and Patrick Donahue, "U.S.-Russia TEnsion Flares Over Nuclear Arms Control Now at Risk," Bloomberg
• William J. Antholis, "Rob Porter Is a National Security Scandal, Too," Politico
• Tara Copp, "It's official: DoD releases new 'deploy or get out' policy," Military Times
• Dahlia Lithwick, "Rob Porter's History of Domestic Abuse Wasn't a Secret. It's Just That No One Cared." Slate

This week the ladies of Bombshell return to regularly scheduled programming, re-introducing ourselves with our new Bombshell questions including everyone's favorite bars and least favorite books. Next we turn to our old friends Afghanistan and North Korea (wondering if we'll ever get a public debate on either), before wonking out to the Nuclear Posture Review and State of the Union address. Also, if you PT three times per day but don't log it in Strava does it even count, bro? Finally, a dazzling potpourri of pop-culture - even Radha weighs in.

Don't forget to send all your process valentines!  Bombshell Online Store

David D. Kirkpatrick, “Secret Alliance: Israel Carriers Out Airstrikes in Egypt, With Cairo’s O.K.,” New York Times

Max Fisher, “In Afghanistan’s Unwinnable War, What’s the Best Loss to Hope For?,” New York Times

Mia Bloom, January 27 Twitter status 

Thomas Gibbons-Neff, “Training Quick and Staffing Unfinished, Army Units Brace for Surging Taliban,” New York Times

Steve Inskeep, “U.S. Military Auditor Suggests The Afghan War Is Still At A Stalemate,” NPR

Anna Fifield, “North Koreans have tasted freedom through the markets. Sanctions could put that at risk.,” Washington Post

Victor Cha, “Victor Cha: Giving North Korea a ‘bloody nose’ carries a huge risk to Americans,” Washington Post

David Nakamura, February 1 Twitter status

James Acton, “Command and Control in the Nuclear Posture Review: Right Problem, Wrong Solution,” War on the Rocks

Patrick Tucker, “No, the US Won’t Respond to A Cyber Attack with Nukes,” Defense One

Patrick Tucker, “Strava’s Just the Start: The US Military’s Losing War Against Data Leakage,” Defense One