It was less than a week ago that we noted General Dynamics had landed a Pentagon contract to help tend to the bruised brains of troops suffering from Traumatic Brain Injury. We took note of it because we’ve seen big defense contractors increasingly move into the medical field in recent years. The latest evidence surfaced Tuesday, …
Troops
No Idle Boast: A Soldier’s Tattoo Becomes Truth
Tattoos are as old as war. Lots of soldiers get them, with military motifs, girlfriend’s names, or various guns, skulls or dragons adorning their skin. Some get something less ornate. Private First Class Kyle Hockenberry had For those I love I will sacrifice stitched into his flesh. He had no idea how prescient he was.
Dispatches from the Third Front: Part III — The Curveball
In January, I spent a month embedded with the 1st Brigade, 4th Infantry Division in Kandahar. For four weeks, I went from outpost to outpost, and midway through that month, I heard from my old wingman that he too was in theater. Because I had to return to the U.S. to finish school, Travis Parker and I made plans for me to try and …
Of Wives and War
Every war generates its own poignancies. Some are in that twilight zone of fearful waiting and longing, felt by those the soldier has left behind since before the Trojan War happened, or didn’t, more than 3,000 years ago.
Amalie Flynn married a Navy officer shortly after 9/11, and has experienced the separation only a military …
Ain’t Gonna Study War No More…
There’s a military-history professor down Texas way by the name of Joyce Goldberg who has given up teaching military history after nearly 30 years. Increasingly, she writes in the Chronicle of Higher Education, her classes have been filled with recent military veterans more interested in binding their own mental war wounds than …
The Cuts Are Coming!
Republican staffers on the House Armed Services Committee are warning that the cuts are coming and the results will be dire:
— Resultant force structure is insufficient to decisively win an engagement in one theater while defending vital national interests in another.
— Jeopardizes ability to respond to potential contingencies
…
“Allied” Ambush?
The New York Times front-pages a story Tuesday on a 2007 attack on U.S. troops — in which an Army major was killed — as a deliberate blow designed to show the Americans that the Pakistani military can’t be pushed around. It’s like throwing gasoline on a fire, given Adm. Mike Mullen’s declaration last week — long overdue, according …
When War Comes: Why Don’t We Plan Better for Detainee Medical Care?
In just about every war, the military ends of taking care of prisoners of war (POWS) or other detainees. However, military medical providers receive very little standardized training on detainee care. Why don’t we train better for that?
I am recently back from teaching at a course on the Law of Armed Conflict in Switzerland. …
Getting the Story Out – Lessons From Fallujah
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_w2i0VDptM]
TOKYO – The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan may be winding down, but news reporters still go out daily to cover US troops risking their lives in combat zones — stories that can serve the purposes of both news organizations and the military alike.
The Institute for Defense …
Growing Afghanistan Doubts
Concern inside the U.S. military that Afghanistan is not going to end well is heating up. It’s always been simmering, but now seems to be coming to a slow boil. Lately, at least in private conversations with officers up and down the chain, the concerns are becoming louder.
“There is no endgame and there hasn’t been one from …
AWOL Moms and Dads
Adults admire the sacrifices of our nation’s fighting forces. But it’s the kids of those doing the fighting who have given up maybe even more: parentless childhoods. You’re reading about these kids today for a few moments. But what they’re enduring lasts for years. The Army’s Fort Drum Mountaineer newspaper interviewed several of …
Follow the Money
Back when I first started covering the military some dozen or so wars ago — in the late 1970s — General Dynamics was busy building the F-16 jet fighter and a plethora of other weapons. But it sold the F-16 line to Lockheed in 1993, and spun off its missile and space divisions, too. It seems to be moving into a different line of …
Chart of the Week
I thought it might have been Wednesday’s, where I plotted the amazing growth in U.S. air drops into Afghanistan over the past several years. Then this one stopped me cold. It’s in the Army’s just-released study into the nature and number of U.S. troops wounded in Afghanistan, conducted by the Army’s Dismounted Complex Blast Injury …