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 …
BattlelandNational Security
The experts at the Congressional Research Service have just issued a chilling report entitled The Stuxnet Computer Worm: Harbinger of an Emerging Warfare Capability. Unfortunately, the title is a statement; there’s no question mark at the end. The Stuxnet’s initial target was apparently Iran’s nuclear program, and it’s obvious that …
BattlelandNational Security
Following Thursday’s Senate defeat of the effort to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” the Pentagon will continue to do what it has been doing for the past 17 years. It will keep on enforcing a ban on openly gay men and women serving in the military, although with considerably less ardor than in years past, Pentagon officials say. …
BattlelandNational Security
The Senate — for the second time this fall — blocked an effort to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” Thursday afternoon. The move all but kills any chance of over-turning the 17-year old ban on gays serving openly in the U.S. military for the foreseeable future.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid criticized Republican opponents of the …
BattlelandNational Security
The Air Force used to be all Stratofortresses and nuclear bombs. But just as it warplanes have become more precise at delivering ever-smaller weapons, its guards have become kinder and gentler at handling troublemakers. For several years, Air Force security personnel have been carrying Taser stun guns, as well as those that fire bullets. …
