BattlelandNational Security
The Senate has voted 63 to 33 against a filibuster designed to thwart repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” The law still lives, but only by a thread. After 17 years, it is expected to die tomorrow this afternoon in a final Senate vote, and clear the way for openly gay men and women to serve their country in uniform for the first time in history.
BattlelandNational Security
The Air Force has released its probe into the first combat loss of the Pentagon’s troubled V-22 tilt-rotor aircraft. It happened near Qalat, Afghanistan, in April, killing four of the 20 aboard, including the chief pilot. The $116 million V-22 had to make a fast landing and flipped after its nose gear collapsed when it ran into a ditch. …
BattlelandNational Security
You’ll recall the Air Force claims its F-22 fighter is the world’s best. Heck, at $350 million a pop, it should be. Too bad they didn’t invest in RustOleum when they were building it.
The Government Accountability Office reports:
Corrosion of the aluminum skin panels on the F-22 was first observed in spring 2005, less than 6 months
…
BattlelandNational Security
The Obama Administration’s Thursday assessment of its Afghan policy is a classic of the genre: it suggests progress while delaying decisions, offers few data points, and tops it off by blaming a reluctant ally — in this case, Pakistan — as the root of the problem because of the “safe haven” it provides Taliban fighters. Nonetheless, …
BattlelandNational Security
We’ve written before on the U.S. military’s quest to be able to attack targets anywhere in the world even more quickly than we currently can. Why take hours to destroy a “fleeting” — that’s the word that’s usually used — nuclear-related or terror target when time is of the essence? This has been a big issue among some hawks, although …
BattlelandNational Security
The White House has just released a summary of its classified review of Afghan war policy, concluding that if it’s not working well, at least slow and erratic progress is being made. The study, once viewed as a key pivot point in the war, dimmed in importance after the U.S. and its NATO allies conceded they’d be leading the fight against …
BattlelandNational Security
The House voted 250 to 175 Wednesday night to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” Didn’t they do that back in May?
BattlelandNational Security
In military terms, “fire for effect” means putting iron on target. That’s what makes the Air Force’s decision to ban its personnel from websites posting Wikileaks’ classified documents so strange: all it does is highlight Air Force impotence, because curious airmen can scroll through the documents on their home computers, just like …
BattlelandNational Security
The Marine commandant says he opposes ending “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” because allowing openly gay Marines to serve could get leathernecks killed.
As the Pentagon’s own Stars and Stripes newspaper reports:
Ultimately, the voices of forward-fighting combat Marines who worried about unit cohesion in the Pentagon’s survey swayed Marine
…
BattlelandNational Security
The Navy has relieved the commander of a mine-sweeper for having an “unduly familiar relationship” with his female second-in-command. The case, believed to be the first firing of the top two officers on the same ship for fraternizing with one another, is generating a tidal wave of commentary on Navy-related blogs. Some old salts cite it …
BattlelandNational Security
In an August story on the Army’s overwhelmed mental-health corps, we noted:
One anonymous mental-health professional told researchers last year that he spends a quarter of his time on “really sick people who never should have been let in [the military] to begin with.”
The Pentagon has just formally acknowledged his off-handed …
BattlelandNational Security
Air Force helicopter rescue units in Afghanistan have begun carrying blood on their missions again because so many U.S. troops are now being wounded there.
BattlelandNational Security
Back in September, I posted about this crash of a B-52 bomber after a pair of Navy choppers did some illicit dipping into Lake Tahoe. The B-52 crashed in 1994, during practice for an upcoming air show, killing all four on board. The Air Force has just released its probe into the July 28 crash of a C-17 cargo plane in Alaska…during …
