BattlelandTroops
A freshly-minted Air Force pilot has completed his training with only one leg. First Lt. Ryan McGuire is the first-ever in Air Force history to do so. “I hope this shows people to never give up on their dream,” he says. “You have to keep your goals in mind and have faith in yourself.” McGuire lost his lower right leg in a boating …
BattlelandTroops
Privateers, strictly speaking, are private individuals who have been granted the power by a government to attack enemy ships in the government’s name. Privateering was a key part of naval warfare from the 16th to 19th centuries. But a pair of Congressional Research Service reports, released Friday by the invaluable Steven Aftergood of …
BattlelandWeapons
That’s bad news. We always knew we couldn’t trust our Pakistani allies to keep valuable technology like the heavily-modified MH-60 Black Hawks, used to ferry Navy SEALs to Osama bin Laden’s Pakistani lair, from the reverse-engineering whizzes of the Middle Kingdom. You may recall reports that the commandos had to abandon one of the …
BattlelandPresident Obama
Well, that was fast. A couple of days ago, Marine General James “Hoss” Cartwright was reported to be a shoe-in to become the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs. Meanwhile, Army General Marty Dempsey was still finding his way around his new office as that service’s chief of staff (he’s only been there a little over a month).
But …
BattlelandTroops
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2j1u2Cc-Os&feature=youtu.be]
Later Wednesday, the Army releases a trio of new ads designed to get young folks interested in serving. There’s one for leadership (above), another citing opportunity, and a third emphasizing education. They have that momentous musical theme in the background that …
BattlelandPresident Obama
As the unflappable Adm. Mike Mullen prepares to sail into the sunset of retirement from his current post as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, squalls have kicked up about who will succeed him. Early-front runner, Marine General James “Hoss” Cartwright, has been bucked off the list. Reported to be President Obama’s favorite …
BattlelandTerrorism
OK…so the House Homeland Security Committee is holding a hearing Wednesday morning on “Threats to the American Homeland after Killing Bin Laden: An Assessment.” The list of those testifying includes Peter Bergen, identified in the witness list as a “CNN terrorism analyst;” Evan F. Kohlmann, ID’d as an “MSNBC terrorism analyst;” and …
BattlelandPolitics
Defense Secretary Robert Gates sometimes seems the only adult in Washington, especially when compared to Congress (a.k.a. Romper Room). He offered up what he described as his “last major policy speech in Washington” on Tuesday at the American Enterprise Institute, that neo-con nest behind Washington’s famous Mayflower Hotel.
In …
BattlelandPentagon
After two months of stalemate, the allies are considering stepping up their war game over Libya. The war’s two key boosters – Britain and France – may decide to send a handful of helicopter gunships to pepper targets around Triploi. The French, apparently, have already chosen to do so, and said the British had as well. But the …
BattlelandPolitics
Christopher Hitchens isn’t an arms-control expert (thank God), but he is a damn fine writer, master polemicist and certifiable Big Thinker. He’s come up with his own nuclear non-proliferation regime over on Slate. Bottom line:
The possession of illegally acquired nuclear weapons remains a huge threat and burden to neighboring states
…
BattlelandVeterans
Here’s our final dispatch from Gayla Romanowsky, who has been filing to Battleland from the new Significant Others Support Group at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington. Her husband, Dave, served in Iraq, where he earned a Bronze Star and Purple Heart. Gayla attended the sessions, funded by the non-profit Walter Reed Society, to …
BattlelandSomalia
Alas, there’s no X to mark the spot where the treasure is buried. This is the fascinating report — The Economics of Piracy — we cited a couple of weeks ago that noted Somali pirates can make up to $79K annually plying their trade. Finally got a copy of it, here, from the author, Peter Middlebrook of Geopolicity in the UAE.
He …
BattlelandWeapons
Sure…we know it’s officially known as the F-22 Raptor. But Harold Camping’s prediction that the Rapture is coming Saturday at 6 p.m. — no matter where you are — has lots of folks in a tizzy. Some of them, no doubt, are looking for clues to the future online by typing “Rapture” into Google and other search engines. If the end of …
