Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s in for a strafing on Capitol Hill today. He’s appearing before the Senate Appropriations Committee’s defense subcommittee, but he’s likely to face tough questions on the Defense Department’s …
Afghanistan
Vets Lost in Translation: From the Battlefield to the Office
Follow Marine veteran Matthew Litton as he hunts for work at a RecruitMilitary job fair in Philadelphia.
Picture a young man who joined the military shortly after high school. As an infantryman, he shipped out several times …
The War Machines
Ready or not, robot wars are coming.
That was made clear in the skies over Pakistan a week ago, when an unmanned drone killed al-Qaeda’s No. 2 leader with a missile strike. And it’s happening on the ground in Afghanistan, …
“Lights! Camera! GAO?”
Battleland recalls when Government Accountability Office reports were issued with light-blue covers, not the dark-blue ones they’ve been sporting for a couple of decades. And when G.A.O. stood for General Accounting Office, until Congress decided that sounded too meek (GAO works only for Congress; for years reporters called it the …
“We are fighting a war in the FATA.”
Drone Ops: Getting Better All the Time
The dust has settled near the North Waziristan village of Hassu Khel, where a U.S. Hellfire missile killed al-Qaeda’s No. 2, Abu Yahya al-Libi, on Monday. The recent flurry of unacknowledged U.S. drone attacks scored its biggest prize since Navy SEALs took out Osama bin Laden 13 months ago, leaving the White House to flex its might …
White House Says al-Qaeda’s No. 2 Killed
A drone strike in Pakistan has netted a big fish: al-Qaeda’s No. 2, Abu Yahya al-Libi, according to White House spokesman Jay Carney.
Asked about al-Libi’s reported death at Tuesday’s White House briefing, Carney initially was equivocal: “I can tell you that our intelligence community has intelligence that leads them to …
“We also reached agreement on reverse transit from Afghanistan with three Central Asian partners: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan. These agreements will give us a range of new options and a robust and flexible transport network we need.”
Situation Normal: Afghanistan Fouled Up
A trifecta of trouble in three Pentagon inspector-general reports released Thursday concerning the U.S. military’s continuing struggle to build Afghan security forces so U.S. troops can come home.
Here is the first finding …
Building a Secure Afghanistan
Much of the more than $600 billion the U.S. has spent over the past decade in Afghanistan has gone into developing its security forces – the Afghan army (ANA) and police (ANP). Major William Nordai, a member of the Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), returned from Afghanistan last June after spending a year in the northern part of the …
WIA
Earlier this month, Taylor Morris became a member of perhaps the most elite group among the 2.5 million U.S. men and women who have served in Afghanistan and Iraq. Ten troops have won the Medal of Honor. Only five have lost pieces of all four of their limbs.
The Aftershocks of War
We’ve had a flurry of books written by troops recounting their battles in Afghanistan and Iraq. Now come the books detailing the battles fought once they got home.
Mike Scotti served with the Marines in both Iraq and Afghanistan, and saw war’s horrors up close and personal. When he came back home, he gradually felt himself being …
Trash Talk…
Trash can be deadly. You can get a hint of that from the contract solicitation issued Tuesday by the Defense Logistics Agency’s European disposition office seeking “hazardous waste services in southwest Asia.”
Lord …