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Military Tag

Posted by Mike LaChance on April 14, 2016 15 Comments
Vladimir Putin is acting out aggressively again. On Tuesday, Russian military jets flew extraordinarily close to a U.S. Navy ship in the Baltic Sea. This wasn't an isolated incident, either. According to various reports, the Russians carried out this maneuver multiple times over two days and American defense experts are stunned. This report from the Military Times puts the incident in perspective:
Russian attack aircraft just flew within 30 feet of a U.S. Navy ship In one of the most aggressive actions in recent memory, Russian warplanes conducted “simulated attacks” on the a U.S. Navy vessel in the Baltic Sea on Tuesday, repeatedly flying within 30 feet of the ship, according to a defense official.

Posted by Mike LaChance on April 09, 2016 17 Comments
Bret Baier of FOX News recently did a report on how the military has shrunk under Obama, and the response was so great, he went back and aired interviews that didn't make it into the program. Baier spoke with three of Obama's former secretaries of defense, and they all told a similar story. The Washington Free Beacon has more:
Obama’s Former Pentagon Chiefs: Military Suffered From Overbearing, Inexperienced White House The U.S. military has been hindered by an overbearing and inexperienced White House under President Barack Obama, according to each of his three former defense secretaries, causing the Pentagon to struggle to carry out operations and make decisions.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on March 17, 2016 7 Comments
Last week I wrote about the fact that Navy SEALs are forced to share combat rifles, are short on live ammo for training, and are purchasing their own gear.  This week, assistant commandant of the United States Marine Corps, General John Paxton, told Congress that he does not believe the Marines are ready for another war. The Stars and Stripes reports:
If the Marines were called today to respond to an unexpected crisis, they might not be ready, a top Marine general told the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday.

Gen. John Paxton, assistant commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps, testified to lawmakers that the Marines could face more casualties in a war and might not be able to deter a potential enemy.

“I worry about the capability and the capacity to win in a major fight somewhere else right now,” he said, citing a lack of training and equipment.

Paxton, along with the vice chiefs of the Army, Navy and Air Force, spoke to the Senate committee on the readiness challenges facing each service after 15 years of war and recent budget cuts.

Posted by Mike LaChance on March 10, 2016 4 Comments
An American Air Force veteran from New Jersey has been found guilty of trying to join the terror group ISIS. It's upsetting when anyone does this but particularly when it's someone who served in our armed forces. FOX News has the story:
US Air Force vet found guilty of trying to join ISIS A federal jury on Wednesday found an Air Force veteran guilty of trying to join the Islamic State, in one of the first U.S. terror trials involving suspected ISIS ties.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on March 09, 2016 15 Comments
According to the Washington Times, the U. S. military under Obama has shed so many troops and weapons that it is "only marginally able" to defend the nation.  At least one Republican presidential nominee, Ted Cruz, has laid out detailed plans for rebuilding our nation's military, and a recent revelation about Navy SEALs starkly illustrates exactly how important this goal actually is. SEALs who've met with Representative Duncan Hunter (R-CA) have confided that the Navy is so short of combat rifles that SEALs have to share them, rotating rifles amongst returning and deploying teams. CBS News reports:
Navy SEAL teams don't have enough combat rifles to go around, even as these highly trained forces are relied on more than ever to carry out counterterrorism operations and other secretive missions, according to SEALs who have confided in Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif. After SEALs return from a deployment, their rifles are given to other commandos who are shipping out, said Hunter, a former Marine who served three combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. This weapons carousel undercuts the "train like you fight" ethos of the U.S. special operations forces, they said.
According to Hunter, money is not the problem, and citing one reason for the problem, a SEAL explains that the slow-moving bureaucracy can take as long four years to approve new combat rifle purchases.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on February 09, 2016 52 Comments
Despite studies that clearly demonstrate that women underperform and cause their entire unit to underperform in combat training, the left still seems enamored of the idea that women should be forced upon the military in these combat positions.  Indeed, now all branches of the military, including special ops, are required to accept women. The next obvious step is selective service.  If men are required by federal law to register for selective service at age eighteen, why not all women?  This is going to be a problem for the femisogynist left who really only wanted that whole equality thing to go so far.  Now, they are faced with the logical consequences of their politically correct nonsense. Army and Marine Corps chiefs have already stated that it's time to register women for selective service, so this opens a new can of worms for the progressive left.  While I couldn't find push back from progressives yet, it will come. Now, though, they are focusing on Ted Cruz who rightly argues that it is "nuts" to draft women into the military because this now includes combat positions. The Wall Street Journal reports:
Ted Cruz said Sunday a proposal to include women in the Selective Service registration was a product of out of control political correctness and warned against putting a woman soldier near a dangerous “psychopath” in a combat situation.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on February 04, 2016 24 Comments
Only a year ago, Obama was berating Russian president Vladimir Putin for his "KGB mentality" and "old expansionist ideas."  Now, however, Obama wants to quadruple military spending in Europe. CNN reports:

President Barack Obama's administration said Tuesday it was seeking to expand U.S. military spending in Europe four-fold in a bid to reassure allies still unsettled by Russia's incursion into Ukraine.

The new spending would increase to $3.4 billion under the new plan, which is set to be formally unveiled next week as part of Obama's final presidential budget.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on December 14, 2015 34 Comments
Bowe Bergdahl, who reportedly left his post to go look for al Queda, was charged with desertion and misbehavior before the enemy.  Today, it was announced that Bergdahl will face a court martial and a possible life sentence. CNN reports:

U.S. Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl will face a military court on charges of desertion and endangering fellow soldiers, the U.S. Army announced Monday.

Gen. Robert Abrams, the commander of U.S. Army Forces Command, ordered the court-martial on Monday, breaking with the U.S. military officer overseeing Bergdahl's preliminary hearing who recommended that Bergdahl be referred to a special court-martial and face no jail time.

Abrams on Monday ordered Bergdahl's case to a general court-martial, which means Bergdahl could face life imprisonment if convicted of "misbehavior before the enemy by endangering the safety of a command, unit or place."

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 12, 2015 16 Comments
Tibor Rubin passed away a few days ago at age 86. I didn't recognize the name when I saw some articles about his passing. Now I'm glad I've done some research. Tibor Rubin was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor by President George W. Bush in 2005. That would have been remarkable in itself, since the award is so rarely given. But the award was not for service in Iraq. It was for service in the Korean War.  Stars and Stripes reported at the time:
Just minutes after Tibor Rubin received his medal of honor at a White House ceremony Friday, he announced he still wanted to do more for his country. “I’m working on my second Medal of Honor,” the Korean War veteran said, smiling proudly. “This country has done so much for me. I never figured this was going to happen. I’m just as happy as I can be.” ....

Posted by Amy Miller on November 24, 2015 37 Comments
Today U.S. officials confirmed that the Turkish military fired upon a Russian jet when it repeatedly violated Turkish airspace near the Turkey-Syria border. The jet crash landed in the Jabal Turkmen area of the coastal Syrian province of Latakia, and it is now believed that both pilots have died under fire from rebel Turkmen forces. More via Fox News:
U.S. defense official said that two Turkish F-16s fired heat-seeking air-to-air missiles at the Russian aircraft. “This will get complicated,” the official said. Tuesday's incident is the first time since the 1950s that a Russian or Soviet military aircraft has been publicly acknowledged to have been shot down by a NATO country, according to Reuters. Russia's main stock index dropped more than 2 percent after the incident, while Turkish stocks fell 1.3 percent amid fears of an escalation between the two countries. Russia said the Su-24 was downed by artillery fire, but Turkey claimed that its F-16s fired on the Russian plane after it ignored the warnings.
Fox has posted amateur video claiming to show the crash:

Posted by Mike LaChance on November 13, 2015 20 Comments
At a political breakfast event in New Hampshire this week, Hillary Clinton enthralled the guests at her table with a story about the time she tried to join the Marine Corps. Glenn Kessler reports at the Washington Post:
Hillary Clinton’s claim that she tried to join the Marines “He looks at me and goes, ‘Um, how old are you. And I said, ‘Well I am 26, I will be 27.’ And he goes, ‘Well, that is kind of old for us.’ And then he says to me, and this is what gets me, ‘Maybe the dogs will take you,’ meaning the Army.” One Clinton story that has often been greeted with skepticism is her claim, first made in 1994, that she once tried to join the Marines in 1975. On the campaign trail, she brought up the story again. Can this story be confirmed?

Posted by Amy Miller on November 13, 2015 3 Comments
Late yesterday the Pentagon announced that it launched a drone strike against Islamic State terrorist Mohammed Emwazi, the man who served as the "face" of the group's gruesome and infamous beheading videos. Emwazi, also known as "Jihadi John," was wounded a year ago during airstrikes in Anbar Province that killed 10 terrorists and wounded at least 40 others. Emwazi had joined tribal leaders from around the region in a bunker near the Iraqi-Syrian border to pledge their allegiance to ISIS leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi. Intelligence following the strikes was muddied, but officials believed that Emwazi was taken to a local hospital before being returned to ISIS headquarters. Over the past year, western officials have conducted extensive surveillance in an effort to determine Emwazi's whereabouts---and if reports are correct, they finally found him. Yesterday's strike hit outside of the de facto ISIS capital of Raqqa in northern Syria. Officials have yet to confirm whether or not Emwazi died in the attack; Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said, "We are assessing the results of tonight’s operation and will provide additional information as and where appropriate.” A U.S. senior official told CNN that authorities are confident that the strike was successful; a second source said that authorities positively identified Emwazi before they launched the drone at the vehicle Emwazi was riding in.

Posted by Vijeta Uniyal on November 03, 2015 20 Comments
China has been a global hub for manufacturing counterfeit electronics and consumer goods, but as the Asian giant asserts its dominance in the Asian Pacific and beyond, its defense establishment is using the same approach to modernise its vast armed forces.  Despite its large standing and reserve army, Chinese Armed Forces technologically lags behind US, Russian and NATO forces. China has decided to manufacture ‘counterfeit’ high-end defense technology on a large scale to overcome its existing strategic weakness. According to a recent report published by the US Naval Institute, China is using military espionage and reverse engineering to build a modern army with “cloned weapons.” Using cyber espionage and by making secret deals with US arms buyers, China has managed to obtain advance US weapons technology. China is reportedly also targeting Russia in its quest for high-end military technology. The Chinese often buy single units of Russian advanced military systems on a “trial” basis and reverse-engineer the weaponry to produce a large-scale Chinese version:

Posted by Amy Miller on October 28, 2015 13 Comments
Earlier this week, the Pentagon announced that the U.S. Navy planned on sending a destroyer into disputed waters in the South China Sea. In the first of a series of missions, the USS Lassen would breach the 12-mile "buffer" zone around the man-made islands in the Spratly archipelago as a way of challenging China's belligerent assertions of sovereignty in those waters. Today, China rebuked the US for this "freedom of navigation" patrol, protesting it as a form of harassment, and announced that they had "shadowed" the Lassen:
The U.S. destroyer sailed within 12 nautical miles of Subi Reef, one of seven artificial islands built up by China in the past year.

Posted by Amy Miller on October 27, 2015 9 Comments
Defense Secretary Ash Carter has laid out a new plan for U.S. forces sent overseas to "degrade and defeat" ISIS. The Obama Administration has fielded several month's worth of criticism over the ineffectiveness of current strategy; Carter's changes reflect a growing need to take a more active role. From ABC News:
The changes are intended to build on the Obama administration’s strategy to fight ISIS in Iraq and Syria where the tactical fight against the terror group has stalemated. “The changes we’re pursuing can be described by what I call the 'three R’s': Raqqa, Ramadi, and Raids,” Carter said in testimony today before the Senate Armed Services Committee. The idea of more raids builds on Carter’s previous comments a Pentagon news conference Friday that there would be more raids similar to the one where American special operations forces assisted Kurdish troops in the rescue of 70 hostages held by ISIS.

Posted by Amy Miller on October 26, 2015 7 Comments
China, Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam have spent years debating whose sovereignty holds supreme over territory in the South China Sea. Back in 2014, China began the work of turning the Subi and Mischief reefs in the Spratly archipelago into permanent land forms; before China began this massive dredging project, these "islands" would disappear during high tide. Now, however, China has laid exclusive claim to the new islands, as well as a 12 nautical mile buffer zone around them. China has jealously guarded this territory, but the United States Navy is about to defy that claim. Tonight, the Navy will send the USS Lassen through those waters and into the 12 mile buffer zone surrounding the Spratly archipelago in the first of a series of missions into the area. Via Reuters:
The ship would likely be accompanied by a U.S. Navy P-8A surveillance plane and possibly P-3 surveillance plane, which have been conducting regular surveillance missions in the region, according to the defense official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Posted by Amy Miller on October 26, 2015 6 Comments
Last week, U.S. Forces teamed up with Kurdish Peshmergas to rescue captives held at an Islamic State compound in northern Iraq. The mission freed around 70 hostages, but led to the death of Master Sgt. Joshua L. Wheeler---the first U.S. service member to die in combat in Iraq since 2011. After the mission was complete, the Kurdistan Regional Government---the same body who requested the raid and the help of U.S. forces---released footage from a helmet cam worn by one of the Kurdish soldiers. Watch (the footage is intense, but not NSFW): According to CNN, a U.S. military official has confirmed the authenticity of the video.
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