In the decade after 9/11, just how much did the U.S. military have to recalibrate to fight the wars it found itself launching in Afghanistan and, 18 months later, in Iraq? This week, on Command Post, we discuss the retooling of the American armed forces with Eric Schmitt of the New York Times — co-author of Counterstrike: The Untold …
Navy
Ten Years After 9/11, Is It Now Time to Be Scared of China?
As the commentaries, retrospectives and meditations pile up ten years after 9/11, expect quite a few in their closing paragraphs to look toward the next grand geo-political challenge facing the U.S. A decade of costly adventurism in the Middle East and Afghanistan, many will argue, distracted U.S. policy making from the new realities of …
Not Only That: They Missed
A tough week is nearly over. It’s been pouring nonstop in the East, floods are inundating the northeast, GOP presidential candidates are hectoring one another, fires are racing across Texas, President Obama’s pleading for work from Congress, and someone turned the lights out in San Diego.
Just thank God you’re not Commander Mark …
Ex-Navy Secretary Foresees Naval Failure on Horizon
Former naval aviator and Navy Secretary John Lehman — never one to mince words — asks Is Naval Aviation Culture Dead? in the latest issue of Proceedings, the monthly journal of the independent U.S. Naval Institute. He traces is all back to 1991’s Tailhook convention, a Las Vegas gathering of naval aviators who subjected dozens of …
Right Where We’ve Always Wanted Us
Philip Stephens of the Financial Times recently pens a rather pessimistic piece on what Libya said about “Britain’s pretensions of influence.” Noting that the “campaign has stretched the armed forces to their limit,” he calls it a “last hurrah.” Now, the underlying tone of the piece is his criticism of PM David Cameron’s desire to …
Taking Stock: The U.S. Military a Decade After 9/11
The 10th anniversary of 9/11 closes in on us this week. Try as you might, you will not be able to avoid it. Amid the pathos and bathos, it’s time to take a knee and conduct a map check.
Just to cut to the chase: you can’t argue with success, and on 9/12 most Americans were petrified a second wave of attacks was likely. It hasn’t …
Anchor Steam Aweigh
Kind of nice to know some things never change, according to the Standard newspaper of Hong Kong:
Happy hours have been extended again in Wan Chai bars – some 4,000 American marines and sailors are in town.
Just think of it as more hard-earned American dollars ending up in Chinese pockets.
Chomp! Let’s Take a Big Bite Out of the Army! Chomp! Chomp!
The last time something so dangerous came from the sea was when Jaws hit screens across America in the summer of 1975. This time, the looming menace from the littorals are Navy advocates who see no problem slashing the Army in the coming budget battles and using some of the savings to keep a sleek and powerful 300-ship U.S. Navy …
“Hop Gun”
Proud Navy pilots around the world are grimacing at this picture of one of their prized, but wounded, F-18 warbirds hitching a recent ride. Air Force loadmasters packed the dewinged Super Hornet into the cavernous belly of their C-5 cargo plane for a nearly 8,000-mile hop from Kandahar, Afghanistan, to San Diego. The plane’s brakes …
SEAL’s Best Friend
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Even if you’re not one of those so-called “dog persons” — and I’m not — you’ve got to find this video affecting. It’s Hawkeye, the Labrador retriever of Jon Tumilson. He was a Navy SEAL and chief petty officer first class, one of 30 U.S. troops killed in Afghanistan August 6 when …
“Raunchy” Captain Gets to Stay, For Now
The Navy earlier this week decided that the former No. 2 officer aboard the carrier USS Enterprise — who achieved notoriety last December when his off-color shipboard videos became public — gets to stay in uniform. But Captain Owen Honors career is likely over, and could be selected for early retirement in the coming days.
Pullin’ Gs with the Blue Angels
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Always fun to watch the Navy’s Blue Angels fly — especially when their exploits are as skillfully edited as in the above video. WARNING: Do not watch on a large-screen monitor right after eating.
Walter Reed, In Transit
There was a pretty big movement of U.S. troops this weekend, and here’s betting you didn’t even hear about it. Some 200 wounded military personnel traveled five miles from the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., to Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland. That’s because, on September 15, after 102 years in operation, …