BattlelandWeapons
Just a day after the Justice Department revealed a plot to siphon sensitive U.S. technology to Iran – some of which ended up in roadside bombs killing U.S. troops in Iraq – now comes word from the feds that an American is going to jail for trying to sell Iran parts for its fighter jets and attack helicopters.
MACON, GA. – A
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BattlelandPentagon
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta is going to have some fine vino come New Year’s Eve. The $10,000 bottle is a payoff on an offer made by a California restaurateur. It seems Panetta, then CIA director, dined last New Year’s Eve at the tony Sardine Factory owned by pal Ted Balestreri in Panetta’s hometown of Monterey:
“I was talking
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BattlelandTroops
Sure you know the military has the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines. But what about the Bloods and the Crips? Not to mention other street and prison gangs like the Asian Boyz, Gangster Disciples, Latin Kings, MS-13, Sureños, Tiny Rascal Gangsters, the Juggalos, the Aryan Brotherhood, Barrio Azteca, Texas Syndicate, along with …
BattlelandPolitics
It appears that we are finally withdrawing from Iraq after eight years there. It is about time. We went in with the stated objective of finding and destroying nuclear weapons and Iraq’s other weapons of mass destruction. We also decided to topple the Saddam Hussein regime with the stated objective of bringing democracy (and …
BattlelandPentagon
The Pentagon is always fretting about the Next Big Threat, and then spends billions planning for it. Unfortunately, the threat rarely returns the favor by showing up. Richard Danzig, the former Navy secretary (and chairman of the board of Battleland’s Command Post partner, the Center for a New American Security) has a new paper out …
BattlelandWeapons
We know what the past decade has been like in Afghanistan — 1,822 American troops killed, at a financial cost of a half-trillion dollars. Was it worth it? What will this country look like in a decade? Brian Katulis, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, and Stephen Biddle, an Afghanistan expert at the Council on …
BattlelandPentagon
A wireless war of words has broken out in Afghanistan between the Taliban and the U.S.-Afghan alliance fighting them:
Bits of information – not just bullets and bombs – are in the thick of the fighting in Afghanistan. U.S. forces feared they were losing the information war to the Taliban and now are fighting back with Twitter –
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BattlelandPentagon
Google News is a quick way to get up-to-date on areas of interest. I’ve got my Google News page weighted heavily toward military news, and it’s amazing to read what’s up there right now.
You get the impression from this trio of breaking news stories that the Pentagon and its suppliers are oblivious to the budgetary train wreck …
BattlelandPentagon
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UspUEjMLsdA]
The world’s biggest nuclear weapon — the infamous minivan-sized megaton B53 — died Tuesday, of old age. The five-ton bomb was about 50 years old. The Energy Department’s National Nuclear Security Administration announced its passing at the Pantex nuclear plant outside Amarillo, …
BattlelandVeterans
What kills most troops who die in their first year back home? Suicide? That’s a predictable response, but it’s wrong. It’s traffic accidents:
Government officials are worried about the number of young veterans getting into fatal car accidents after they return home from the battlefield. The ones dying most often tend to be young,
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BattlelandWeapons
Paper cuts are becoming an occupational hazard of covering the debate over how to trim Pentagon spending. If you feel like getting slashed with competing reports, a pair of studies released Tuesday should send you running for bandages.
Bottom line: we can cut spending if we defend less. But if we defend less, we’re going to lose a …
BattlelandWeapons
Improvised explosive devices are the leading killer of U.S. troops in Afghanistan and Iraq. Tuesday morning comes word from the U.S. Department of Justice of a plot that “caused thousands of radio frequency modules to be illegally exported from the United States to Iran, at least 16 of which were later found in unexploded improvised …
BattlelandPentagon
The fate of Futenma Air Station on Okinawa remains a thorn between the U.S. military and its Japanese hosts. As the city of Ginowan has grown up around the base, locals have been pushing to have it moved. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, now in Japan, agrees, but the push has been underway for 16 years. Larry Shaughnessy over at CNN’s …
