All Entries in the "Military, War, Occupation," Category

Oklahoma fathers of dead service members rally against war funding

Fathers of two military personnel killed in Iraq rallied Thursday against a $37 billion U.S. military funding bill.

The fathers of two fallen service members criticized the U.S. House‘s approval of $37 billion in spending on wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. The fathers called for a troop reduction and a renewed focus on fighting terrorism.

Full Story: Oklahoma fathers of dead service members rally against war funding | NewsOK.com.

Documentary Reveals the Price Paid in Blood for the Senseless War in Afghanistan

Sean Smith’s brutal, uncompromising film from the Helmand frontline shows the horrific chaos of a 10 year old war.

Video at link

Full Story: Documentary Reveals the Price Paid in Blood for the Senseless War in Afghanistan | World | AlterNet.

Army report: Service is failing suicidal soldiers

Record number of deaths the result of brass not seeing or doing nothing about signs of stress such as drug abuse

An Army report on the record number of soldier suicides says the trend reflects a rise in risky behavior including drunken driving and drug abuse in a military stretched to the breaking point by the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The report says the Army is failing its soldiers by missing signs of trouble, or by looking the other way as commanders try to keep to tight schedules required to meet deployment schedules.

The Army vice chief of staff, Gen. Peter Chiarelli, said Thursday that statistics on levels of drug and alcohol abuse, car accidents and crime suggests that soldiers are taking more risks while discipline has slipped.

Full Story: Army report: Service is failing suicidal soldiers – Military Suicides – Salon.com.

Fallen Soldiers’ Families Denied Cash as Insurers Profit

The package arrived at Cindy Lohman’s home in Great Mills, Maryland, just two weeks after she learned that her son, Ryan, a 24-year-old Army sergeant, had been killed by a bomb in Afghanistan. It was a thick, 9-inch-by- 12-inch envelope from Prudential Financial Inc., which handles life insurance for the Department of Veterans Affairs.

Inside was a letter from Prudential about Ryan’s $400,000 policy. And there was something else, which looked like a checkbook. The letter told Lohman that the full amount of her payout would be placed in a convenient interest-bearing account, allowing her time to decide how to use the benefit.

“You can hold the money in the account for safekeeping for as long as you like,” the letter said. In tiny print, in a disclaimer that Lohman says she didn’t notice, Prudential disclosed that what it called its Alliance Account was not guaranteed by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., Bloomberg Markets magazine reports in its September issue.

Full Story: Fallen Soldiers’ Families Denied Cash as Insurers Profit – Bloomberg.

American Soldiers Brainwashed with “Positive Thinking”

The U.S. military has become increasingly excited about positive psychology techniques. Maybe a better route would be to offer soldiers respect for their critical thinking

While U.S. military psychiatrists are prescribing increasing amounts of chill pills, America’s psychologists are teaching soldiers how to think more positively about their tours in Afghanistan, Iraq, and wherever else they are next ordered to kill the bad guys and win the hearts and minds of everyone else.

The U.S. Army is planning to require that all 1.1 million of its soldiers take intensive training in positive psychology and emotional resiliency. Army Research Psychologist Capt. Paul Lester, who leads the assessment of the program, told the National Psychologist (“Army to Train its Own in Positive Psychology,” July/August 2010), “As far as I can tell this is the largest, deliberate, psychological intervention in human history. . . . We don’t know when the global war on terrorism is going to end so we’re preparing to have to be engaged for a long period of time.”

Lester said the program would develop “communication skills, cognitive reforming skills and help soldiers not to catastrophize — don’t think of the worse case scenario about every potential problem.” The program also teaches soldiers to focus on “expressing appreciation” and “correcting negative views of ambiguous events.”

Full Story: American Soldiers Brainwashed with “Positive Thinking” | World | AlterNet.

Department of Defense can’t account for 96 percent of money administered in Iraq reconstruction fund.

Yesterday, the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) released its findings on how the money was spent from a special Iraq reconstruction fund set up by the Department of Defense (DOD) between 2003-2007. The account used Iraqi oil money to fund the reconstruction of Iraq. SIGIR concluded that 96 percent of the $9.1 billion the reconstruction program cannot be accounted for by the DOD:

A US federal watchdog has criticised the US military for failing to account properly for billions of dollars it received to help rebuild Iraq. The Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction says the US Department of Defence is unable to account properly for 96% of the money. Out of just over $9bn (£5.8bn), $8.7bn is unaccounted for, the inspector says. [...]

The funds in question were administered by the US Department of Defence between 2004 and 2007, and were earmarked for reconstruction projects. But, the report says, a lack of proper accounting makes it impossible to say exactly what happened to most of the money.

Full Story: Think Progress » Department of Defense can’t account for 96 percent of money administered in Iraq reconstruction fund..

U.S. audit finds Pentagon can’t account for $8 billion in Iraqi funds

The reconstruction money was from oil revenue it was entrusted with between 2004 and 2007, according to a newly released audit that underscores a pattern of poor record-keeping.

The Defense Department is unable to properly account for $8.7 billion out of $9.1 billion in Iraqi oil revenue entrusted to it between 2004 and 2007, according to a newly released audit that underscores a pattern of poor record-keeping during the war.

Of that amount, the military failed to provide any records at all for $2.6 billion in purported reconstruction expenditure, says the report by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, which is responsible for monitoring U.S. spending in Iraq. The rest of the money was not properly deposited in special accounts as required under Treasury Department rules, making it difficult to trace how it was spent.

Though there is no apparent evidence of fraud, the improper accounting practices add to the pattern of mismanagement, reckless spending and, in some instances, corruption uncovered by the agency since 2004, when it was created to oversee the total of $53 billion in U.S. taxpayer money appropriated by Congress for the reconstruction effort.

Full Story: U.S. audit finds Pentagon can’t account for $8 billion in Iraqi funds – latimes.com.

OPS: This is in addition to the $8.5 Billion (IN CASH, ON PALLETS) that Brenner disappeared.

80% of Post-Traumatic Stress Sufferers Lost Symptoms After Taking Ecstasy — Study’s Results

Study’s conclusion — new drug could “offer sufferers a vital window with reduced fear responses where psychotherapy can take effect.”

After MDMA-assisted psychotherapy, over 80% of sufferers from post traumatic stress disorder no longer met the diagnostic criteria for PTSD, as compared to only 25% in the control group. This study, just released, was conducted by Michael Mithoefer, M.D. (and his colleagues) and is published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Psychopharmacology.

According to the media release, MDMA could “offer sufferers a vital window with reduced fear responses where psychotherapy can take effect.” MDMA is also called Ecstasy.

On the killing fields of 1914-19, the malady being studied was called “shell shock”; in World War Two, “battle fatigue” or “combat exhaustion”; and now, in the era of military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, PTSD. It can be caused, for example, by experiencing random explosions, being wounded, or seeing buddies torn open or killed.

Full Story: 80% of Post-Traumatic Stress Sufferers Lost Symptoms After Taking Ecstasy — Study’s Results | Drugs | AlterNet.

WikiLeaks and the War

The New Yorker:

Among the ninety-one thousand or so documents from the Afghan war released by WikiLeaks Sunday is an incident report dated November 22, 2009, submitted by a unit called Task Force Pegasus. It describes how a convoy was stopped on a road in southern Afghanistan at an illegal checkpoint manned by what appeared to be a hundred insurgents, “middle-age males with approx 75 x AK-47’s and 15 x PKM’s.” What could be scarier than that?

Maybe what the soldiers found out next: these weren’t “insurgents” at all, at least not in the die-hard jihadi sense that the American public might understand the term. The gunmen were quite willing to let the convoy through, if the soldiers just forked over a two- or three-thousand-dollar bribe per truck; and they were in the pay of a local warlord, Matiullah Khan, who was himself in the pay, ultimately, of the American public. According to a Times report this June (six months after the incident with Task Force Pegasus), Matiullah earns millions of dollars from NATO, supposedly to keep that road clear for convoys and help with American special-forces missions. Matiullah is also suspected of (and has denied) earning money “facilitating the movement of drugs along the highway.”

That is good to know. The Obama Administration has already expressed dismay that WikiLeaks publicized the documents, but a leak informing us that our tax dollars may be being used as seed money for a protection racket associated with a narcotics-trafficking enterprise is a good leak to have. And the checkpoint incident is, again, only one report, from one day. It will take some time to go through everything WikiLeaks has to offer—the documents cover the period from January, 2004, to December, 2009—but it is well worth it, especially since the war in Afghanistan is not winding down, but ramping up. (Also very helpful: Raffi Khatchadourian’s piece for The New Yorker on WikiLeaks and its founder, Julian Assange.)

Full Story: Close Read: WikiLeaks and the War : The New Yorker.

Inside the Fog of War – Reports From the Ground in Afghanistan

A six-year archive of classified military documents to be made public on Sunday offers an unvarnished, ground-level picture of the war in Afghanistan that is in many respects more grim than the official portrayal.

The secret documents, to be released on the Internet by an organization called WikiLeaks, are a daily diary of an American-led force often starved for resources and attention as it struggled against an insurgency that grew larger, better coordinated and more deadly each year.

The New York Times, the British newspaper The Guardian and the German magazine Der Spiegel were given access to the voluminous records several weeks ago on the condition that they not report on the material before Sunday.

Full Story: Inside the Fog of War – Reports From the Ground in Afghanistan – NYTimes.com.

Toxic legacy of US assault on Fallujah ‘worse than Hiroshima’

The shocking rates of infant mortality and cancer in Iraqi city raise new questions about battle

Dramatic increases in infant mortality, cancer and leukaemia in the Iraqi city of Fallujah, which was bombarded by US Marines in 2004, exceed those reported by survivors of the atomic bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, according to a new study.

Iraqi doctors in Fallujah have complained since 2005 of being overwhelmed by the number of babies with serious birth defects, ranging from a girl born with two heads to paralysis of the lower limbs. They said they were also seeing far more cancers than they did before the battle for Fallujah between US troops and insurgents.

Their claims have been supported by a survey showing a four-fold increase in all cancers and a 12-fold increase in childhood cancer in under-14s. Infant mortality in the city is more than four times higher than in neighbouring Jordan and eight times higher than in Kuwait.

Full Story: Toxic legacy of US assault on Fallujah ‘worse than Hiroshima’ – Middle East, World – The Independent.

Kucinich, Ron Paul: Get US troops out of Pakistan

Two US lawmakers — a Republican and a Democrat — proposed a bill this week demanding the withdrawal of all US troops in Pakistan, where they are conducting covert operations against militants.

“We have known that US forces have been operating in secret inside the territories of Pakistan without congressional approval,” Democratic Representative Dennis Kucinich said Friday, pointing to reports the United States was stepping up its presence there.

He said the House of Representatives was expected to take up the resolution next week. The measure was introduced late Thursday.

Full Story: Kucinich, Ron Paul: Get US troops out of Pakistan | Raw Story.

Mental disorder in the Military has increased by 64% from 2005 to 2009

Mental illness costing military soldiers

The number of soldiers forced to leave the Army solely because of a mental disorder has increased by 64% from 2005 to 2009 and accounts for one in nine medical discharges, according to Army statistics.

Last year, 1,224 soldiers with a mental illness, such as post-traumatic stress disorder, received a medical discharge. That was an increase from 745 soldiers in 2005 or about 7% of medical discharges that year, according to personnel statistics provided to USA TODAY.

The trend matches other recent indicators that show a growing emotional toll on a military that has been fighting for seven years in Iraq and nine years in Afghanistan, the Army and veterans advocates say.

Full Story: Mental illness costing military soldiers – USATODAY.com.

After long wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, U.S. military begins to treat mental injuries as combat wounds

The 300-pound bomb blasted Marine Staff Sgt. James Ownbey’s mine-resistant truck so high that it snapped power lines before it slammed to the dusty ground in western Iraq.

Ownbey, knocked briefly unconscious by the blast, awoke to suffocating black smoke and a swirling cloud of dirt. He felt for the vehicle’s door, then stumbled into the sunlight where he was joined by the rest of his woozy, three-man crew. Their bodies were sore, but they looked fine.

A Marine general visiting from Washington heard about the blast and came to see the survivors. As Gen. James F. Amos laid a hand on Ownbey’s neck, his aide snapped a picture, proof of the new vehicle’s efficacy against insurgent bombs.

Full Story: After long wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, U.S. military begins to treat mental injuries as combat wounds — washingtonpost.com.

Newsweek — We’re Not Winning. It’s Not Worth It.

Time to Get Out of Afghanistan —-

Here’s how to draw down in Afghanistan.

Full Story: Haass: Time to Get Out of Afghanistan – Newsweek.

Army suicides hit record number in June

Thirty-two soldiers took their own lives last month, the most Army suicides in a single month since the Vietnam era. Eleven of the soldiers were not on active duty. Of the 21 who were, seven were serving in Iraq or Afghanistan, the Department of Defense said.

Army officials say they don’t have any answers to why more and more soldiers are resorting to suicide.

“There were no trends to any one unit, camp, post or station,” Col. Chris Philbrick, head of the Army’s suicide prevention task force, told CNN. “I have no silver bullet to answer the question why.”

Last year, a record-breaking 245 soldiers committed suicide. The Army seems on track to surpass that number this year, as 145 soldiers have taken their lives in the first half of 2010.

Full Story: Army suicides hit record number in June – Yahoo! News.

Rachel Maddow: The hard choice in Afghanistan

‘Each Additional American Life Sacrificed To A Goal We Know We Won’t Reach Is A Moral Outrage’

U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke: We’re in Afghanistan because it really matters. We’re in Afghanistan because if we fail in Afghanistan, it will have a direct, immediate danger to us. It will increase al-Qaeda’s worldwide reach. They will come back with the Taliban in all likelihood, and they will gain a worldwide success which will be very dangerous for our national security interests. So we have to be clear. The American public needs to be clear on why we’re in Afghanistan. This is not Vietnam, a war which I participated in as a State Department civilian in the lower Mekong Delta when I entered the government. This is not the Balkans. It’s not Iraq. This is quite different, and this one relates directly to our safety at home.

RM: But we tried to do counterinsurgency in Vietnam, too, pretty explicitly. … When you look back at those efforts, all those years ago, do you really have confidence that a foreign country can help create a state somewhere else, that we really can stand up an Afghan government?

Holbrooke: I think we can if we do it right. . . . The fundamental difference is the one you and I just already mentioned. It matters to our homeland security. Vietnam did not, although at the time, the administrations in power did say it did, but they were wrong. … It’s a process which is not easy, and you only embark on it if you decide that it is absolutely critical for the U.S. national interests, which it is.

That’s the argument. That’s the case that the Obama Administration makes for the war in Afghanistan now,

Full Story: The Rachel Maddow Show – Maddow: The hard choice in Afghanistan.

The Lonely, Dangerous Fight Against Christian Supremacists Inside the Armed Forces

In his fight against British imperialism, Mahatma Gandhi described the life cycle of successful civil disobedience: “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.” Mikey Weinstein, the 55-year-old founder of the Albuquerque, New Mexico-based Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF), likes to quote it, knowing full well he’s crossed the line into a bloody-knuckle brawl. Over the past year, Weinstein and his organization have recorded a tremendous string of victories in the fight against Christian supremacists inside the armed forces.

In January, the MRFF broke the story on the Pentagon’s Jesus Rifles, where rifle scopes used in Afghanistan and Iraq were embossed with New Testament verses. In April, he got the military to rescind its invitation to the Reverend Franklin Graham to speak at May’s National Prayer Day because of Islamophobic remarks. Most shockingly, MRFF received its second nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize in late October. These high-profile victories have earned him the enmity of the hardcore Christian Right and the mentally unstable. And the crazies are getting crazier. Weinstein and his family are bombarded with hate mail, from the grammatically incorrect and easy to dismiss – “I hope all your kids turn out gay as hell, take it in the ass, and get aids and die!!!!” – to the kind of threats that immediately make you leap out of your chair and double-check that the doors and windows are locked. (MRFF has referred multiple death threats on Mikey, his family, and MRFF employees to the FBI.)

Unlike Gandhi, Mikey’s no pacifist. Aggression rises up in his voice like a white shark’s fin breaks the waves. In a recent conversation, Mikey bragged how a punk wouldn’t shut up in a movie. When a confrontation ensued and the man took a wild swing, Mikey put him down. None of this is surprising. Weinstein boxed during his Air Force days, his face marked by a strong jawline sitting below a bald head on top of a stocky body – a cross between Rocky Marciano and Butter Bean. Simply put: Mikey Weinstein can be a brute and a zealot. He knows this and admits it freely. But he believes it’s the only position a reasonable person can take when confronted with a faction dedicated to mutating the U.S. military into “a weaponized Gospel of Jesus Christ.”

Full Story: t r u t h o u t | The Lonely, Dangerous Fight Against Christian Supremacists Inside the Armed Forces.

Female Veterans Struggle To Stay Off Streets

More than 240,000 female service members have been deployed to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but for many, reintegrating into civilian life and trying to find employment is not within their reach.

The Department of Veteran Affairs has acknowledged that women are nearly four times as likely as men to end up homeless.

In Los Angeles, outreach efforts are under way to get them off the streets and into the VA’s transition assistance program.

Full Story: Female Veterans Struggle To Stay Off Streets : NPR.

Thousands of Soldiers Unfit for War Duty

More than 13,000 active-duty Army soldiers — the equivalent of four combat brigades — are sidelined as unfit for war because of injury, illness, or mental stress.

In an unmistakable sign that the Army is struggling with exhaustion after nine years of fighting, combat commanders whose units are headed to Afghanistan increasingly choose to leave behind soldiers who can no longer perform, putting additional strain on those who still can.

The growing pool of “non-deployable” soldiers make up roughly 10 percent of the 116,423 active-duty soldiers currently in Iraq and Afghanistan. Thousands more Army reservists and National Guard soldiers are also considered unfit to deploy, a growing burden on an Army that has sworn to care for them as long as needed.

Full Story: Thousands of Soldiers Unfit for War Duty.

Why We Must Reduce Military Spending

Rep. Barney Frank:

As members of opposing political parties, we disagree on a number of important issues. But we must not allow honest disagreement over some issues to interfere with our ability to work together when we do agree.

By far the single most important of these is our current initiative to include substantial reductions in the projected level of American military spending as part of future deficit reduction efforts. For decades, the subject of military expenditures has been glaringly absent from public debate. Yet the Pentagon budget for 2010 is $693 billion — more than all other discretionary spending programs combined. Even subtracting the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, military spending still amounts to over 42% of total spending.

It is irrefutably clear to us that if we do not make substantial cuts in the projected levels of Pentagon spending, we will do substantial damage to our economy and dramatically reduce our quality of life.

Full Story: Rep. Barney Frank: Why We Must Reduce Military Spending.

So Much for Holder’s “Forceful Response”

Despite Obama berating BP for its criminal “recklessness,” it turns out the Defense Department is still buying a whole lot of oil from them – to wit, at least $980 million worth. BP’s still-valid contracts make it the Pentagon’s largest single supplier of fuel, leading us to wonder what part of “talking out of both sides of your mouth” they don’t understand.

“BP is an active participant in multiple ongoing Defense Logistics Agency acquisition programs.” – Defense Logistics Agency spokesman Mimi Schirmacher.

Full Story: So Much for Holder’s “Forceful Response” | CommonDreams.org.

Iraq withdrawal ‘an exercise in semantics’‘

Stability’ Mission In Iraq Won’t Mean End of Fighting

President Obama has set an August deadline for the end of the combat mission in Iraq. Here at this makeshift desert camp in the insurgent badlands of northern Iraq, a mission is under way that is not going to stop then: American soldiers hunting terrorists and covertly watching an Iraqi checkpoint staffed by police officers whom the soldiers say they do not trust.

“They’re not checking anybody, and they’re wondering why I.E.D.’s are getting in to town,” said Staff Sgt. Kelly E. Young, 39, from Albertville, Ala., as he watched the major roadway that connects Baghdad with Mosul, regarded as the country’s most dangerous city. He referred to improvised explosive devices, the military term for homemade bombs.

The August deadline might be seen back home as a milestone in the fulfillment of President Obama’s promise to end the war in Iraq, but here it is more complex. American soldiers still find and kill enemy fighters, on their own and in partnership with Iraqi security forces, and will continue to do so after the official end of combat operations. More Americans are certain to die, if significantly fewer than in the height of fighting here.

Full Story: ‘Stability’ Mission In Iraq Won’t Mean End of Fighting – NYTimes.com.

VA hospital may have infected 1,800 veterans with HIV

A Missouri VA hospital is under fire because it may have exposed more than 1,800 veterans to life-threatening diseases such as hepatitis and HIV.

John Cochran VA Medical Center in St. Louis has recently mailed letters to 1,812 veterans telling them they could contract hepatitis B, hepatitis C and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) after visiting the medical center for dental work, said Rep. Russ Carnahan.

Carnahan said Tuesday he is calling for a investigation into the issue and has sent a letter to President Obama about it.

“This is absolutely unacceptable,” said Carnahan, a Democrat from Missouri. “No veteran who has served and risked their life for this great nation should have to worry about their personal safety when receiving much needed healthcare services from a Veterans Administration hospital.”

Full Story: VA hospital may have infected 1,800 veterans with HIV – CNN.com.

Senate Republicans block measure to provide additional benefits to homeless veterans.

Today, Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) brought her bill — the Homeless Women Veterans and Homeless Veterans With Children Act — to the Senate floor seeking unanimous consent. Murray said the bill would “expand assistance for homeless women veterans and homeless veterans with children and would increase funding and extend federal grant programs to address the unique challenges faced by these veterans.” However, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) objected on behalf of Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) to this seemingly non-controversial issue:

McCONNELL: Madam president, reserving the right to object and I will have to object on behalf of my colleague Sen. Coburn from Oklahoma. He has concerns about this legislation, particularly as he indicates in a letter that I’ll ask the Senate to appear on the record that it be paid for up front so that the promises that makes the Veterans are in fact kept. So madam president I object.

Watch it:

Full Story: Think Progress » Senate Republicans block measure to provide additional benefits to homeless veterans..

The Pentagon’s Threat to the Republic

The New York Times’ David Brooks minimized General Stanley McChrystal’s remarks in Rolling Stone magazine as “kvetching.” For the Times’ Maureen Dowd, McChrystal and his “smart-aleck aides” were merely engaging in “towel-snapping” jocularity. The Washington Post editorial board noted that Afghan President Hamid Karzai called McChrystal the “best commander of the war,” and concluded that the general should be retained as the Afghan commander. The Post and Times’ editorial boards have called for the replacement of President Obama’s key civilian advisors on Afghanistan. Meanwhile, these papers and many others have downplayed the critical issue that dominates this sad affair – the fundamental importance of civilian supremacy in military policy and decision-making.

There is no more important task in political governance than making sure that civilian control of the military is not compromised and that the military remains subordinate to political authority. Unfortunately, President Obama has demonstrated too much deference to the military, retaining the Bush administration’s secretary of defense as his own; appointing too many retired and active-duty general officers to such key civilian positions as national security adviser and intelligence tsar; and making the Pentagon’s budget sacrosanct in an age of restraint.

The reappointment of General David Patraeus as commander of forces in Afghanistan places the general on an extremely high political plateau that makes it more difficult to discuss alternatives to the failed counter-insurgency strategy, and places too much influence in the hands of the Pentagon on decisions involving war and peace. President Obama recognized the McChrystal affair as a challenge to civilian control and leadership, but the appointment of Petraeus enhances the political power of the military and could become an obstacle to the president’s exercise of civilian control in the near term. Too many influence people view Petraeus as the answer to our Afghan problems; he isn’t.

Full Story: t r u t h o u t | The Pentagon’s Threat to the Republic.

Rolling Stone’s McChrystal Profiler, Says Troops Are Happy That General Was Ousted

The Rolling Stone correspondent whose profile of Gen. Stanley McChrystal upended America’s Afghan war leadership says that soldiers on the ground are happy that the brash and sometimes reckless general was ousted by President Obama.

Michael Hastings tells Huffington Post in a phone interview from Afghanistan, where he is embedded with U.S. troops: “Over here, soldiers were happy that he got fired. I’ve had a number of people come up to me, I got an email from a Marine this morning [Thursday]: ‘Hey man, you did great work. All the guys in my company think it’s good McChrystal is not there because he was putting or lives at risk.”

Hastings adds he was “very surprised” by the resignation, assuming that McChrystal was unfireable. Taking note of the general’s “tense relationship” with the president, Hastings says that Obama had to push out McChrystal to “prove that he was in control” and not a weak leader.

Full Story: Michael Hastings, Rolling Stone’s McChrystal Profiler, Says Troops Are Happy That General Was Ousted.

3 US Soldiers Speak Out on McChrystal’s Firing, Petraeus as Replacement, and the Unending War in Afghanistan

President Obama says the Afghan war will continue as planned despite his firing of General Stanley McChrystal over disparaging comments made by McChrystal and his aides about top US officials. Obama has named General David Petraeus, head of the US Central Command and architect of the surge in Iraq, as a successor. The firing of McChrystal comes at a perilous moment in the Afghan war, with June now the deadliest month for the NATO force since the 2001 invasion. We speak to three soldiers: Brock McIntosh, an Afghan war vet who has filed for conscientious objector status; Victor Agosto, who was jailed after refusing to deploy to Afghanistan after serving in Iraq; and Camilo Mejia, the first GI who served in Iraq to have publicly resisted the war.

Free: Transcript, Video, Audio, Mp3 download

Full Story: 3 US Soldiers Speak Out on McChrystal’s Firing, Petraeus as Replacement, and the Unending War in Afghanistan.

Switch to Petraeus Betrays Afghan Policy Crisis

Despite President Barack Obama’s denial that his decision to fire Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal as commander in Afghanistan and replace him with Gen. David Petraeus signified any differences with McChrystal over war strategy, the decision obviously reflects a desire by Obama to find a way out of a deepening policy crisis in Afghanistan.

Although the ostensible reason was indiscreet comments by McChrystal and his aides reported in Rolling Stone, the switch from McChrystal to Petraeus was clearly the result of White House unhappiness with McChrystal’s handling of the war.

It had become evident in recent weeks that McChrystal’s strategy is not working as he had promised, and Congress and the U.S. political elite had already become very uneasy about whether the war was on the wrong track.

In calling on Petraeus, the Obama administration appears to be taking a page from the George W. Bush administration’s late 2006 decision to rescue a war in Iraq which was generally perceived in Washington as having become an embarrassing failure. But both Obama and Petraeus are acutely aware of the differences between the situation in Iraq at that moment and the situation in Afghanistan today.

Full Story: Switch to Petraeus Betrays Afghan Policy Crisis.

Obama Administration Keeping Blackwater Armed and Dangerous in Afghanistan

Jeremy Scahill:

Blackwater is up for sale and its shadowy owner, Erik Prince, is rumored to be planning to move to the United Arab Emirates as his top deputies face indictment for a range of alleged crimes, yet the company remains a central part of President Obama’s Afghanistan war. Now, Blackwater’s role is expanding.

On Friday, the US State Department awarded Blackwater another “diplomatic security” contract to protect US officials in Afghanistan. CBS News reports that the $120 million deal is for “protective services” at the US consulates in Herat and Mazar-e-Sharif. Blackwater has another security contract in Afghanistan worth $200 million and trains Afghan forces. The company also works for the CIA and the US military and provides bodyguards for US Ambassador Karl Eikenberry as well as US lawmakers and other officials who visit the country. The company has four forward operating bases in Afghanistan and Prince has boasted that Blackwater’s counter-narcotics forces have called in NATO airstrikes.

The new security contract was awarded to one of Blackwater’s alter egos, the United States Training Center, despite the indictments of five senior company officials on bribery, weapons and conspiracy charges. Its operatives in both Afghanistan and Iraq have been indicted for killing innocent civilians. The Senate Armed Services Committee has called on the Justice Department to investigate Blackwater’s use of a shell company, Paravant, to win training contracts in Afghanistan. Despite these and numerous other scandals, the State Department once again awarded the company a lucrative contract.

Full Story: Obama Administration Keeping Blackwater Armed and Dangerous in Afghanistan | The Nation.

General Petraeus Starts Moving the Goalposts on Afghanistan Withdrawal

When asked about the July 2011 deadline to begin troop withdrawals from Afghanistan, General Petraeus says “I support the policy of the president.” This past week, though, in testimony before Congress in hastily arranged hearings, he made his position more clear. He supports the policy of the president,” but thinks “we have to be very careful with time-lines,” and he might even try to convince the president to renege on his promise to the American people as July 2011 comes closer.

He’s a concern troll. He’s kowtowing to the principle of civilian control of the military, but his function in the debate is to constantly hem and haw, sapping support for strong action in favor of a position with which he does not (and maybe never did) agree.

Now, Petraeus is a cool customer and an experienced hand at testifying before Congress. When faced with an adversarial questioner, he rarely shows his cards and tends to filibuster them out of time, sticking closely to the “I support the president” talking point. That’s what makes his performance this week slightly shocking. The masked slipped.

Full Story: Derrick Crowe: General Petraeus Starts Moving the Goalposts on Afghanistan Withdrawal.

Alert issued for Afghans gone AWOL from Texas base

U.S. military investigators are asking law enforcement nationwide to be on the lookout for Afghan military members who went AWOL while training in Texas, though none is believed to be a national security threat, officials said Friday.

Air Force spokesman Gary Emery said 17 Afghans disappeared from Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio one-by-one over the last 18 months, but a federal law enforcement official says seven have been accounted for. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because privacy rules prevent disclosure of details about individual cases.

The men were vetted by the military and aren’t believed to be connected to one another or to any terrorist group, Emery said. All had been studying English as a precursor to training sponsored by the U.S. and Afghan militaries.

“I don’t think that anybody’s really concerned that this is any sort of a plot or that they’re looking to do anybody any harm,” he said.

Full Story: The Associated Press: Alert issued for Afghans gone AWOL from Texas base.

Gates Demands Congress OK War Funds by July 4

Warns Pentagon Will Do ‘Stupid Things’ in Less than 3 Weeks

Speaking during a Senate Appropriation Defense Subcommittee hearing today, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates demanded that the $33 billion war funding bill be approved by Independence Day.

President Obama had promised that the emergency war funding bill passed last year would be his last one, and that future war expenses would be paid for with a record defense budget. This promise fell by the wayside, however, in the wake of December’s escalation pledge.

“We begin to have to do stupid things if the supplemental is not passed by July 4,” Gates warned. Exactly what these would be and how we would be able to tell the difference from ordinary Pentagon strategy was not clear.

Full Story: Gates Demands Congress OK War Funds by July 4 — News from Antiwar.com.

‘Discovery’ of Afghan riches a pro-war PR scam?

A New York Times report announcing the US has found $1 trillion-worth of mineral deposits in Afghanistan has some observers wondering if the news is part of a public-relations effort to bolster support for the Afghanistan war as the mission’s death toll continues to climb.

An article in Sunday’s New York Times announces that “previously unknown deposits — including huge veins of iron, copper, cobalt, gold and critical industrial metals like lithium — are so big and include so many minerals that are essential to modern industry that Afghanistan could eventually be transformed into one of the most important mining centers in the world, the United States officials believe.”

The article cites an “internal Pentagon memo” as saying Afghanistan could become the “Saudi Arabia of lithium” — the mineral used in the production of rechargeable batteries, such as those found in cell phones and laptops. It cites “a small team of Pentagon officials and American geologists” as having made the discovery.

Full Story: ‘Discovery’ of Afghan riches a pro-war PR scam? | Raw Story.

McChrystal Faces Massive Failure in Afghanistan in Next Few Months

The Afghan population in the Taliban heartland is not cooperating with U.S. and NATO forces.

Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal confronts the specter of a collapse of U.S. political support for the war in Afghanistan in coming months comparable to the one that occurred in the Iraq War in late 2006.

On Thursday, McChrystal’s message that his strategy will weaken the Taliban in its heartland took its worst beating thus far, when he admitted that the planned offensive in Kandahar City and surrounding districts is being delayed until September at the earliest, because it does not have the support of the Kandahar population and leadership.

Equally damaging to the credibility of McChrystal’s strategy was the Washington Post report published Thursday documenting in depth the failure of February’s offensive in Marja.

The basic theme underlined in both stories – that the Afghan population in the Taliban heartland is not cooperating with U.S. and NATO forces – is likely to be repeated over and over again in media coverage in the coming months.

Full Story: McChrystal Faces Massive Failure in Afghanistan in Next Few Months | | AlterNet.

Commission outlines $1 trillion in defense budget cuts

A bipartisan commission of defense experts has released a plan that would reduce the US’s defense spending by nearly $1 trillion over 10 years — a plan sure to gather support from progressives and libertarians, but unlikely to pass through Congress.

The commission’s report comes at a time when public concern about the US’s national debt has hit a fever pitch, and the claim that nearly $1 trillion can be saved from defense spending will certainly color future debates about what government services to cut.

The Sustainable Defense Task Force, put together at the behest of Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) to “explore options for reducing the defense budget’s contribution to the federal deficit without compromising the essential security of the US,” recommends saving $200 billion by reducing the presence of US troops in Western Europe and the Far East, and reducing total troop strength to 1.3 million.

Full Story: Commission outlines $1 trillion in defense budget cuts | Raw Story.

Victory: Peace Groups Permanently Shut Down Army Experience Center in Philadelphia

Army announcement made just days before planned protest. Several large demonstrations, non-violent civil resistance and regular vigils contributed to its demise.

WASHINGTON – June 11 – Franklin Mills Mall, Philadelphia, PA – A coalition of thirty peace groups has proven triumphant in their goal of forever shutting down the “Army Experience Center” in a suburban shopping mall in Philadelphia. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported today that the Army plans to permanently close the facility.  http://www.philly.com/philly/news/local/96031939.html

After almost two years of glorifying the “Army experience” and U.S. wars through video and war games, the Army Experience Center at Franklin Mills Malls announced it will shut down on July 31, 2010.  The $13 million, 14,500 square foot Army Experience Center at Franklin Mills Mall boasts dozens of video game computers and X-Box video game consoles with various interactive, military-style shooting games.  The facility has sophisticated Apache helicopter and Humvee simulators that allow teens to simulate the killing of Arabs and Afghans.  Philadelphia Inquirer reporter Rob Watson compared the Army Experience Center to “a heavy dose of candy cigarettes.”

Full Story: Victory: Peace Groups Permanently Shut Down Army Experience Center in Philadelphia | CommonDreams.org.

No letup in Marine attempted suicides

Marines are trying to kill themselves at a record pace this year despite a 2009 program aimed at stemming the problem, according to Marine Corps data.

Eighty-nine Marines tried to commit suicide through May, most commonly by overdose or lacerations, according to statistics and the Marine Corps suicide prevention program officer, Navy Cmdr. Aaron Werbel. At that rate, there could be more than 210 attempted suicides this year.

There were a record 164 attempted suicides in 2009.

With 21 confirmed or suspected suicides by Marines this year, the Corps is on track to near last year’s record number of 52, Werbel says. The Marine Corps suicide rate in 2009 was 24-per-100,000, the highest in the military, Marine records show. The latest demographically adjusted suicide rate among civilians in 2006 was 20 per 100,000, federal records show.

Full Story: No letup in Marine attempted suicides – USATODAY.com.

Brain Injuries Remain Undiagnosed in Thousands of Soldiers

The military medical system is failing to diagnose brain injuries in troops who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, many of whom receive little or no treatment for lingering health problems, an investigation by ProPublica and NPR has found.

So-called mild traumatic brain injury has been called one of the wars’ signature wounds. Shock waves from roadside bombs can ripple through soldiers’ brains, causing damage that sometimes leaves no visible scars but may cause lasting mental and physical harm.

Officially, military figures say about 115,000 troops have suffered mild traumatic brain injuries since the wars began. But top Army officials acknowledged in interviews that those statistics likely understate the true toll. Tens of thousands of troops with such wounds have gone uncounted, according to unpublished military research obtained by ProPublica and NPR.

Full Story: On The Hill: Brain Injuries Remain Undiagnosed in Thousands of Soldiers.

Watchdog Group Urges Defense Department to Cancel BP Contracts Worth More than $2 Billion

A Washington consumer advocacy group wants the Department of Defense (DoD) terminate its business relationship with BP and a BP subsidiary due to what an official with the group calls the energy’s giant’s history of “willful transgression of U.S. laws.”

Citing the ongoing Gulf oil disaster and BP’s history of criminal convictions, Public Citizen Monday called on the Pentagon to suspend and ultimately debar BP and its subsidiaries from serving as a federal contractor, and terminate six current contracts worth $2.1 billion to BP, the group says in a letter to President Obama and Defense Secretary Robert Gates.

BP Oil International Ltd., a wholly-owned subsidiary of BP, has six contracts with DoD totaling more than $2.1 billion, primarily for fuel delivery.

Full Story: On The Hill: Watchdog Group Urges Defense Department to Cancel BP Contracts Worth More than $2 Billion.

PBS’s ‘This Emotional Life’: Memorial Day — Remembering Military Suicides

For some families, this Memorial Day will be especially hard. Their loved ones — spouses, parents, sons and daughters — didn’t die the hero’s death. They were one of 160 soldiers last year who committed suicide, despite the military’s unprecedented effort to stem the tide.

How does it happen? After surviving harrowing combat, why would a young soldier decide to take his or her own life? The Army is spending $50 million to figure it out, and we may get an answer in a couple of years. But for some, that will be too late.

While no one can truly understand the tormented heart and mind that would lead someone to actually pull the trigger, swallow the pills, position the rope that will end a life, there are some conditions that can certainly explain the despair. The story of Ryan’ Doc’ Krebs, featured on The Wounded Platoon (Frontline May 18, 2010), gives some clues.

Full Story: Brigadier General (Ret) Stephen N. Xenakis, M.D.: PBS’s ‘This Emotional Life’: Memorial Day — Remembering Military Suicides.

Sad milestone: Cost of US wars ‘passes $1 trillion’

Cost of US wars; Enough to give Pell Grants to all 19 million US college students for 9 years…

The cost of the United States’ wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have cost taxpayers more than one trillion dollars, a Massachusetts nonprofit said Sunday, marking a grim milestone on the eve of the Memorial Day holiday.

According to the group, the threshold was crossed Sunday at 10:06 am ET, based on Congressional appropriations for the wars. To date, the group notes, $747.3 billion has been appropriated for the U.S. war in Iraq and $299 billion for the war in Afghanistan.

The group, National Priorities Project, conveyed the size of US war spending by highlighting other things that could have been bought with the money. For example, for the price of America’s two wars, the US could give $5,500 in Pell grants to all of America’s 19 million college students for the next nine years. One trillion would also pay the entire healthcare bill for 294 million people, or 440 million children, the group says.

Full Story: Sad milestone: Cost of US wars ‘passes $1 trillion’ | Raw Story.

Lost a leg in Iraq, all but forgotten at home

If the Army needs proof that Ryan Hallberg suffered a loss when he was injured by a roadside bomb in Iraq, it need look no farther than 4 inches below his right knee. There’s nothing there.

Despite an amputation from his injuries, Hallberg has twice been denied a $50,000 insurance benefit because he has been told by the federal insurance office administering the program that “there is not enough medical information to support your loss.”

Similar cases are emerging across the country about the same program, established five years ago to address the growing number of troops coming hope with traumatic injuries from Iraq and Afghanistan. U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, whose office has become involved in Hallberg’s case, called it an example of “government bureaucracy gone amok.” A recent Government Accountability Office audit is critical of how claims from the program have been denied.

Full Story: Lost a leg in Iraq, all but forgotten at home | StarTribune.com.

US eyes plan for unilateral military strike on Pakistan

US military planners are looking at options for a unilateral strike in Pakistan, for use if a successful attack on US soil is traced to Pakistani tribal areas, The Washington Post reported late Friday.

US retaliation would be contemplated only under extreme circumstances, unnamed senior military officials told the Post.

These circumstances might include a catastrophic attack that convinced President Barack Obama that the ongoing campaign of CIA drone strikes was insufficient.

“Planning has been reinvigorated in the wake of Times Square,” one official told the newspaper.

Full Story: US eyes plan for unilateral military strike on Pakistan | Raw Story.

Shot in Iraq, soldier gets bill for missing equipment

As Americans prepare to honor fallen soldiers this Memorial Day, one former Oregon National Guard member is wondering why he’s being charged more than $3,000 for military gear that was lost after he was shot.

Gary Pfleider, a six-year veteran of the Guard, received a Purple Heart after he was shot by a sniper in Iraq. Some time later, he received a somewhat less gratifying award: A bill for $3,175 for military equipment that was lost when he was shipped out of Iraq for medical treatment.

CBS affiliate KVAL in Eugene, Oregon, reports:

Full Story: Shot in Iraq, soldier gets bill for missing equipment | Raw Story.

$260 Billion U.S. Aid Already Spent to “Rebuild” Afghanistan? A laugh and a half!

According to James A. Lucas, the War in Afghanistan has cost the U.S. taxpayer $260 billion. Lucas translates this into White House rhetoric as being “money for the rebuilding of Afghanistan.”

Then he challenges:

Ann Jones, a former humanitarian worker in Afghanistan, not long ago blew the whistle on this scam. The author of Kabul in Winter, she reported that between 2002 and 2008 the U.S. pledged $10.4 billion for development but delivered only $5 billion of that amount, 47 percent of which was paid to American experts, who often were unqualified, instead of going to unemployed Afghans who were supposed to benefit from this aid.

Two more of Ms. Jones’ revelations:

1) Public teachers and administrators often leave Afghan institutions to work for private contractors for more money. The Afghan institutions are therefore weakened not strengthened. U.S. money often goes to private contractors for their “literacy programs,” etc.

Full Story: $260 Billion U.S. Aid Already Spent to “Rebuild” Afghanistan? A laugh and a half! | Corrente.

Memorial Day 2009: After Laying Wreath, Pres. Obama Did What Bush Never Did – Visited Graves of Iraq, Afghanistan Heroes

Video at link

Tea baggers are criticizing the president for missing the wreath-laying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery this Memorial Day — even though pres. Reagan, Bush and Bush also missed ceremonies — but they have conveniently forgotten that last year he did something George W. Bush never did. He visited the graves of soldiers who were killed in Afghanistan, as well as those whose lives were wasted in George Bush’s unnecessary and immoral invasion of Iraq.

Full Story: Pensito Review » Memorial Day 2009: After Laying Wreath, Pres. Obama Did What Bush Never Did – Visited Graves of Iraq, Afghanistan Heroes.

Obama Not the Only Recent President to Miss Tomb of the Unknown Soldier Ceremony

Three presidents in recent history missed the Arlington ceremony: Reagan, Bush, and Bush.

The great thing about having Facebook friends who watch Glenn Beck is that you don’t have to. It’s like having Jon Stewart in your news feed, only not nearly as funny.

That’s how I know that the big tea bagging deal at the moment is the idea that Pres. Obama is betraying the troops by spending Memorial Day weekend in Chicago, and therefore will miss laying a wreath on the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetary. Instead, Vice Pres. Biden will perform the ritual while Obama and the First Lady participate in a service at Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery in Elwood, Ill.

One immediately wonders if any past president has committed a similar omission without being called a commie, and David Corn, writing for Politics Daily did the research. Turns out three presidents in recent history missed the Arlington ceremony: Reagan, Bush, and Bush.

Full Story: Pensito Review » Obama Not the Only Recent President to Miss Tomb of the Unknown Soldier Ceremony.

DoD Investigating Nine Cases of “Terrorism-Related Acts” by US Military and Contractors?

Jeremy Scahill:

Buried within the new Department of Defense Inspector General’s report, “Contingency Contracting: A Framework for Reform,” is the eye-opening revelation that the Defense Criminal Investigative Service has nine open investigations into alleged “Terrorism-Related Acts” by “U.S. contractor personnel, U.S. Military, Government personnel.” No other details are provided. DCIS is the criminal investigative agency working for the DoD’s Inspector General.

I called the IG’s office and asked them for information on these nine “terrorism-related” cases. “When it comes to individual cases or ongoing investigations, they’re not going to comment on that,” a spokesperson told me.

The “terrorism-related” investigations are part of more than 220 open investigations in DCIS’s “Global War on Terror Investigations.” Many of these relate to bribery, false claims, theft and export violations. DCIS agents have federal law enforcement authority and have authority to make arrests.

Full Story: DoD Investigating Nine Cases of “Terrorism-Related Acts” by US Military and Contractors? | The Nation.

What Do You Call A Country Willing to Incinerate Innocent People? America.

Brian Cloughley:

According to the website Pakistan Body Count, over 1000 civilians have been killed by American drone attacks on Pakistan.

The number of so-called al Qaeda who have been killed is said to be 30 or so. But even if the number of al Qaeda killed by drone missiles was the same as the number of civilians – at a thousand – it doesn’t make the video games any less illegal and immoral.

Kathy Kelly and Josh Brollier, reporting eye witness testimony of a Pakistan social worker of the scene after a drone attack:

The social worker recalled arriving at a home that was hit, in Miranshah, at about 9:00 p.m., close to one year ago. The house was beside a matchbox factory, near the degree college. The drone strike had killed three people. Their bodies, carbonized, were fully burned. They could only be identified by their legs and hands. One body was still on fire when he reached there. Then he learned that the charred and mutilated corpses were relatives of his who lived in his village, two men and a boy aged seven or eight. They couldn’t pick up the charred parts in one piece. Finding scraps of plastic they transported the body parts away from the site. Three to four others joined in to help cover the bodies in plastic and carry them to the morgue.

Full Story: What Do You Call A Country Willing to Incinerate Innocent People? America. | Corrente.

General Petraeus’s Secret Ops

A secret military directive signed last September 30 by General David Petraeus, the Centcom commander, authorizes a vast expansion of secret US military special ops from the Horn of Africa to the Middle East to Central Asia and “appears to authorize specific operations in Iran,” according to the New York Times.

If President Obama knew about this, authorized it and still supports it, then Obama has crossed a red line, and the president will stand revealed as an aggressive, militaristic liberal interventionist who bears a closer resemblance to the president he succeeded than to the ephemeral reformer that he pretended to be in 2008, when he ran for office. If he didn’t know, if he didn’t understand the order, and if he’s unwilling to cancel it now that it’s been publicized, then Obama is a feckless incompetent. Take your pick.

If Congress has any guts at all, it will convene immediate investigative hearings into a power grab by Petraeus, a politically ambitious general, and the Pentagon’s arrogant Special Operations team, led by Admiral Eric T. Olson, who collaborated with Petraeus. And Congress needs to ask the White House, What did you know, and when did you know it?

Full Story: General Petraeus’s Secret Ops | The Nation.

US soldier beaten after reporting crimes: officials

A US soldier who blew the whistle on his comrades over possible drug use and the deaths of three civilians in southern Afghanistan suffered a severe beating in retaliation, officials said Tuesday.

The soldier was beaten after telling authorities about illicit drugs and then, while recovering in hospital, recounted his comrades’ alleged role in the deaths of three Afghan civilians, said two officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The soldier was “beaten within an inch of his life,” one of the officials told AFP.

US Army authorities last week said they were investigating the “unlawful” deaths of three Afghans as well as allegations of illegal drug use, assault and conspiracy.

Full Story: US soldier beaten after reporting crimes: officials – Yahoo! News.

Conservatives Contradicted: Most Polls Support Gays Serving Openly In Military

Seeking to undermine a breakthrough deal that could enable Congress to overturn the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, a prominent social conservative organization is touting a poll that says a majority of Americans believe military brass, not lawmakers, should make the decision on whether gays should serve openly in the military.

But the supposed weight of the poll as an attempt to prevent an end to “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” (DADT) doesn’t hold up on two counts, however.

The poll at issue, paid for by FRC Action, the legislative action arm of Family Research Council, is belied by many other opinion surveys that find broad American support for the ability for gays to serve in uniform without hiding their sexuality. Further, the impact of the FRC Action poll is moot, given the fact that the nation’s highest uniformed officer also has given his blessing to end the 17-year-old “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy.

Full Story: On The Hill: Conservatives Contradicted: Most Polls Support Gays Serving Openly In Military.

Glenn Greenwald – The absence of debate over war

“You would hardly know, from following this year’s election campaign or the extensive coverage of last week’s primaries, that America is at war. . . .

The Washington Post’s Fred Hiatt ponders how little attention our various wars received during the primary campaigns that were just conducted: “You would hardly know, from following this year’s election campaign or the extensive coverage of last week’s primaries, that America is at war. . . . those wars, and the wisdom of committing to or withdrawing from them, have hardly been mentioned in the hard-fought campaigns of the spring.” Hiatt is right in that observation, and it’s worth examining the reasons for this.

One significant cause of America’s indifference to the wars we are waging is that those wars have virtually no effect on the overwhelming majority of Americans (at least no recognized effect), while they impose a huge cost on a tiny sliver of the population: those who fight the wars and their families. Hiatt acknowledges that fact: “it’s yet another reminder of American society’s separation from its professional military.” If anyone would know about that, it’s the endless-war-loving, nowhere-near-a-battlefield Fred Hiatt.

Full Story: The absence of debate over war – Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com.

Obama’s War Supplemental: Recent Reports Strengthen The Case Against It

Members of Congress with any inclination to balk at President Obama’s massive emergency war-funding request have found their case strengthened by two recent reports that question many of the administration’s key premises and assumptions.

The reports from the Congressional Research Service and Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction raise concerns ranging from the existential to the procedural.

Just for starters, there’s the lack of an exit strategy, signs of a slipping timeframe for troop drawdowns and the mixed results thus far of the troop “surge.” There’s also the matter of seemingly unrealistic goals for training Afghan security forces, poor planning of infrastructure projects, pervasive corruption within the Afghan government and the lack of contracting oversight. Finally there’s the concern that some of the individual funding requests seem inflated, in certain areas the Pentagon isn’t spending the money it already has and billions of dollars in requests don’t appear to genuinely qualify as emergency spending — the only thing Obama vowed he would ever use an emergency spending bill for again.

The Senate is expected to vote on the budget request this week, and possibly even as early as Monday. The House is expected to vote after the Memorial Day break.

Full Story: Obama’s War Supplemental: Recent Reports Strengthen The Case Against It.

1,000 American Deaths In Afghanistan: A Sad Milestone

A suicide bomb attack in Kabul overnight claimed the lives of 18 people, including five U.S. servicemen. This attack pushed the war effort in Afghanistan past one of those grim milestones. Per today’s New York Times:

On Tuesday, the toll of American dead in Afghanistan passed 1,000, after a suicide bomb in Kabul killed at least five United States service members. Having taken nearly seven years to reach the first 500 dead, the war killed the second 500 in fewer than two. A resurgent Taliban active in almost every province, a weak central government incapable of protecting its people and a larger number of American troops in harms way all contributed to the accelerating pace of death.

This grim occasion — and the Times noting of the acceleration in U.S. deaths — reminds me that I’m often left with the impression that most observers regard counterinsurgency as a “soft” form of military engagement, more public relations than warmaking. This isn’t the case. The strategy actually demands that countersurgent forces accept greater risks. Here’s the relevant material from the U.S. Army/Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual.

Full Story: 1,000 American Deaths In Afghanistan: A Sad Milestone.

Bill for Afghan war could run into the trillions

Bill for Afghan war could run into the trillions

The U.S. Senate is moving forward with a 59-billion-dollar spending bill, of which 33.5 billion dollars would be allocated for the war in Afghanistan.

However, some experts here in Washington are raising concerns that the war may be unwinnable and that the money being spent on military operations in Afghanistan could be better spent.

“We’re making all of the same mistakes the Soviets made during their time in Afghanistan from 1979 to 1989, and they left in defeat having accomplished none of their purposes,” Michael Intriligator, a senior fellow at the Milken Institute, said Monday at a half-day conference hosted by the New America Foundation and Economists for Peace and Security.

“I think we’re repeating that and it’s a history we’re condemned to repeat,” he said.

Full Story: Bill for Afghan war could run into the trillions | Raw Story.

OPS: I heard it again today reported on  Hartmanns’s show: “There are only  about 100 Taliban in Afghanistan…the militarys plan is to force them into the hills. “  So HOW MUCH ARE WE SPENDING ON 100 PEOPLE?

Army recalls 44,000 helmets that failed ballistic tests

The US Army has recalled 44,000 helmets that failed ballistic tests and federal authorities are investigating the firm that manufactured them, officers said on Monday.

The helmets, made by ArmorSource in Hebron, Ohio, were issued to American troops since 2007, including an unknown number of soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, Brigadier General Pete Fuller told reporters.

“We don’t know where they (helmets) are. So they could be on some soldier’s head in either Iraq or Afghanistan. They could also be anywhere else in the world,” Fuller said.

Full Story: Army recalls 44,000 helmets that failed ballistic tests | Raw Story.

More troops hospitalized for mental health than any other reason

More U.S. troops were hospitalized for mental health disorders than any other reason in 2009.

Mental health hospitalizations throughout the military topped injuries, battle wounds and even pregnancy and childbirth for the first time in 15 years of tracking by the Pentagon’s Medical Surveillance Monthly report.

USA Today’s Gregg Zoroya broke the news Friday.

Mental health care accounted for almost 40% of all days spent in hospitals by servicemembers last year, the report said. Of those hospitalizations, 5% lasted longer than 33 days. For most other conditions, fewer than 5% of hospitalizations exceeded 12 days, the report said.

In 2009, there were 17,538 hospitalizations for mental health issues throughout the military, the study shows. That compares with 17,354 for pregnancy and childbirth reasons, and 11,156 for injuries and battle wounds.

Full Story: More troops hospitalized for mental health than any other reason | Raw Story.

Gates takes aim at ‘gusher’ of defense spending

US Defense Secretary Robert Gates is vowing to rein in the Pentagon’s mushrooming budget and bloated bureaucracy, hoping to succeed where his predecessors mostly failed.

After having scaled back some major weapons programs, the former CIA director wants to cut up to 15 billion dollars a year in overhead costs, saying the United States can no longer afford a “gusher” of defense spending.

But Gates is venturing into treacherous political territory, as American lawmakers view cuts in defense programs as taboo, especially any changes to pay or benefits for service members and veterans.

After a May 8 speech that called for a modest overall rise in defense funding coupled with cost-saving measures, right-leaning commentators accused Gates and President Barack Obama of scheming to gut the American military.

Full Story: Gates takes aim at ‘gusher’ of defense spending | Raw Story.

OPS:  Here’s some perspective – click to enlarge

‘Nobody is winning,’ admits McChrystal

The weakness of the Kabul government is hindering attempts by US and Nato forces to gain much ground from the insurgents

Afghan President Hamid Karzai arrived in London yesterday as US generals express doubts that the fight against the Taliban is having any success.

The US and Nato commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, who was boasting of military progress only three months ago, confessed last week that “nobody is winning”. His only claim now is that the Taliban have lost momentum compared with last year.

Mr Karzai’s reception in London and Washington highlights the political dilemma of the US and UK in Afghanistan since both have more or less openly denounced the corruption of his regime and the mass fraud at the polls by which he was re-elected last year.

Full Story: ‘Nobody is winning,’ admits McChrystal – Asia, World – The Independent.

OPS: This has destroyed  us just as it did the Soviet Union.

President Obama, Bringing the Truthiness on Afghanistan

Michael Moore: Video

President Obama told reporters on May 12, 2010, that “we’re beginning to reverse the momentum of the insurgency” in Afghanistan.

According to his administration’s own report given to Congress last week, that’s not true. The insurgency is growing in size and capabilities. Simply put, the president’s continued troop increases aren’t working.

Full Story: President Obama, Bringing the Truthiness on Afghanistan | MichaelMoore.com.

Afghan war costs now outpace Iraq’s

The monthly cost of the war in Afghanistan, driven by troop increases and fighting on difficult terrain, has topped Iraq costs for the first time since 2003 and shows no sign of letting up.

Pentagon spending in February, the most recent month available, was $6.7 billion in Afghanistan compared with $5.5 billion in Iraq. As recently as fiscal year 2008, Iraq was three times as expensive; in 2009, it was twice as costly.

The shift is occurring because the Pentagon is adding troops in Afghanistan and withdrawing them from Iraq. And it’s happening as the cumulative cost of the two wars surpasses $1 trillion, including spending for veterans and foreign aid. Those costs could put increased pressure on President Obama and Congress, given the nation’s $12.9 trillion debt.

Full Story: Afghan war costs now outpace Iraq’s – USATODAY.com.

Obama Scraps Iraq Withdrawal

David Swanson

So, we elected a president who promised a withdrawal from Iraq that he, or the generals who tell him what to do, is now further delaying. And, of course, the timetable he’s now delaying was already a far cry from what he had promised as a candidate.

What are we to think? That may be sad news, but what could we have done differently? Surely it would have been worse to elect a president who did not promise to withdraw, right?

But there’s a broader framework for this withdrawal or lack thereof, namely the SOFA (Status of Forces Agreement), the unconstitutional treaty that Bush and Maliki drew up without consulting the U.S. Senate. I was reminded of this on Tuesday when Obama and Karzai talked about a forthcoming document from the two of them and repeatedly expressed their eternal devotion to a long occupation.

Full Story: Obama Scraps Iraq Withdrawal | Let’s Try Democracy.

Pentagon rethinking value of major counterinsurgencies

Nearly a decade after the United States began to focus its military training and equipment purchases almost exclusively on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, U.S. military strategists are quietly shifting gears, saying that large-scale counterinsurgency efforts cost too much and last too long.

The domestic economic crisis and the Obama administration’s commitment to withdraw from Iraq and begin drawing down in Afghanistan next year are factors in the change. The biggest spur, however, is a growing recognition that large-scale counterinsurgency battles have high casualty rates for troops and civilians, eat up equipment that must be replaced and rarely end in clear victory or defeat.

In addition, military thinkers say such wars have put the U.S.’s technologically advanced ground forces on the defensive while less sophisticated insurgent forces are able to remain on the offensive.

Full Story: Pentagon rethinking value of major counterinsurgencies | McClatchy.

US troops executing prisoners in Afghanistan, journalist says

he journalist who helped break the story that detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq were being tortured by their US jailers told an audience at a journalism conference last month that American soldiers are now executing prisoners in Afghanistan.

New Yorker journalist Seymour Hersh also revealed that the Bush Administration had developed advanced plans for a military strike on Iran.

At the Global Investigative Journalism Conference in Geneva, Hersh criticized President Barack Obama, and alleged that US forces are engaged in “battlefield executions.”

“I’ll tell you right now, one of the great tragedies of my country is that Mr. Obama is looking the other way, because equally horrible things are happening to prisoners, to those we capture in Afghanistan,” Hersh said. “They’re being executed on the battlefield. It’s unbelievable stuff going on there that doesn’t necessarily get reported. Things don’t change.:

Full Story: US troops executing prisoners in Afghanistan, journalist says | Raw Story.

US Commanders Forced To Reconsider Pace Of Iraq Troop Pullout

American commanders, worried about increased violence in the wake of Iraq’s inconclusive elections, are now reconsidering the pace of a major troop pullout this summer, U.S. officials said Tuesday.

The withdrawal of the first major wave of troops is expected to be delayed by about a month, the officials said. Waiting much longer could endanger President Barack Obama’s goal of reducing the force level from 92,000 to 50,000 troops by Aug. 31.

More than two months after parliamentary elections, the Iraqis have still not formed a new government, and militants aiming to exploit the void have carried out attacks like Monday’s bombings and shootings that killed at least 119 people – the country’s bloodiest day of 2010.

Full Story: US Commanders Forced To Reconsider Pace Of Iraq Troop Pullout.

Robert Gates Says Urgent Need For Big Cuts At Defense Department

Warring against waste, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Saturday he is ordering a top-to-bottom paring of the military bureaucracy in search of at least $10 billion in annual savings needed to prevent an erosion of U.S. combat power.

He took aim at what he called a bloated bureaucracy, wasteful business practices and too many generals and admirals, and outlined an ambitious plan for reform that’s almost certain to stir opposition in the corridors of Congress and Pentagon.

“The Defense Department must take a hard look at every aspect of how it is organized, staffed and operated – indeed, every aspect of how it does business,” he said in a speech at the Eisenhower Presidential Library and Museum in the former commander in chief’s home town. Gates, also a Kansas native, addressed a crowd of about 300 from the steps of the library at a ceremony marking the 65th anniversary of Nazi Germany’s surrender in World War II

Full Story: Robert Gates Says Urgent Need For Big Cuts At Defense Department.

OPS: Here is some perspective on the Pentagon’s budget (graph): http://www.1psheet.com/wp-content/ChartsGraphs/GlobalMiltaryspend2009.gif

Pentagon asking Congress to hold back on generous increases in troop pay

The Pentagon, not usually known for its frugality, is pleading with Congress to stop spending so much money on the troops.

Through nine years of war, service members have seen a healthy rise in pay and benefits, with most of them now better compensated than workers in the private sector with similar experience and education levels.

Congress has been so determined to take care of troops and their families that for several years running it has overruled the Pentagon and mandated more-generous pay raises than requested by the George W. Bush and Obama administrations. It has also rejected attempts by the Pentagon to slow soaring health-care costs — which Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates has said are “eating us alive” — by raising co-pays or premiums.

Now, Pentagon officials see fiscal calamity.

Full Story: Pentagon asking Congress to hold back on generous increases in troop pay.

OPS: For some perspective on the absurdity of the Pentagon’s position see this graph

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) is playing a major role in blocking a House bill that has a record number of co-sponsors.

The legislation, sponsored by Rep. Walter Jones (R-N.C.), is one of the more straightforward bills in Congress. It would add three words to the Navy Department’s name, changing it from the Department of the Navy to the Department of the Navy and Marine Corps.

Full Story: What’s in a name? Just ask former Navy pilot hero McCain – TheHill.com.

US likely to disclose size of nuclear stockpile: report

US President Barack Obama will likely reveal the size of the US nuclear stockpile at a major UN nuclear disarmament summit next week in New York, The Washington Post reported Saturday.

Citing unnamed officials, the newspaper said various factions in the Obama administration had debated for months whether to declassify the numbers.

But now the administration is seeking a dramatic announcement that will further enhance its nuclear credentials as it tries to bolster the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the paper noted.

Full Story: US likely to disclose size of nuclear stockpile: report – Yahoo! News.

OPS: This will drive the Reich, and their propaganda arms, out of their Fascist little minds. And provide them with fodder, in this election year,  that will be non-stop.

Hedges Joins Kucinich, Scahill for Teach-In on Ending U.S. Wars

Did Congress declare war on Afghanistan according to the rules set forth in the Constitution? According to David Swanson, who joined Chris Hedges, Jeremy Scahill, Ann Wright and Josh Steiber for a teach-in Thursday on Capitol Hill, that one depends on how you slice it, and it has to do—surprise!—with money.

For his part, Hedges brought his experience from covering wars in the Middle East, Latin America and Europe to bear on the larger discussion, moderated by Rep. Dennis Kucinich, about what Congress must do to end the current wars and secure peace in the Middle East. —KA

Full Story: Hedges Joins Kucinich, Scahill for Teach-In on Ending U.S. Wars – Truthdig.

War propaganda from Afghanistan

- Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com -

The New York Times yesterday excitedly declared that the imminent Battle of Kandahar “has become the make-or-break offensive of the eight-and-half-year [Afghanistan] war” and is “the pivotal test of President Obama’s Afghanistan strategy.” As Atrios suggests, there never is any such thing as “make-or-break” because we never leave no matter how completely our war and occupation efforts fail. That’s what led to the countless Friedman Units of the Iraq War: the endless proclamations that The Next Six Months will be Decisive, only to be repeated at the end of the six-month period of failure as though the prior one never happened.

Just consider what’s being said now about how the Kandahar offensive is the “make-or-break” battle of the war and the “pivotal test” for Obama’s war strategy by comparing it to what was said a mere two months ago about the now clearly failing assault on Marjah:

Full Story: War propaganda from Afghanistan – Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com.

Army Officer Orders Troops Not To Commit Suicide

Thousands of soldiers, their bald eagle shoulder patches lined up row upon row across the grassy field, stood at rigid attention to hear a stern message from their commander.

Brig. Gen. Stephen Townsend addressed the 101st Airborne Division with military brusqueness: Suicides at the post had spiked after soldiers started returning home from war, and this was unacceptable.

“It’s bad for soldiers, it’s bad for families, bad for your units, bad for this division and our Army and our country and it’s got to stop now,” he insisted. “Suicides on Fort Campbell have to stop now.”

Full Story: Army Officer Orders Troops Not To Commit Suicide.

OPS:  If a soldier is ordered to not commit suicide, and does it anyway, does the military then NOT pay his/her family the benefits?

“Anybody’s Son Will Do” – Video

In 1983, the National Film Board of Canada produced a  film…Arguably the best anti-war film ever made, … it scared the hell out of the U.S. military machine, which has done its best to “disappear” it.

In 1983, the National Film Board of Canada produced a 57-minute film, “Anybody’s Son Will Do”. Arguably the best anti-war film ever made, and tailored for public television, it scared the hell out of the U.S. military machine, which has done its best to “disappear” it. For years it has been nearly impossible to find a copy, but some kind soul has posted it on YouTube where it can be seen in six segments.

[OPS: link to the video in six parts can be found at the "Full Story" link below]

The film shows the process by which young men become psychologically engineered to kill or die on command. While the model used is the U.S. Marine Corps, it’s made clear that the modern techniques for creating soldiers are refined, dehumanizing and universal

Military forces will take boys as young as the law allows, as witness African militias that, unrestrained by regulation, recruit children as young as ten. People into their twenties, having begun to think for themselves to too great a degree, tend not to be sufficiently malleable. In the U.S., recruitment below age 17 is not legal. However, as war has become ever more computerized, need is growing for tech-savvy recruits who can kill coolly and indiscriminately from great distances, as if playing video games. The military has become very good at video games.

Full Story: OpEdNews – Article: “Anybody’s Son Will Do”.

US military launches top-secret robotic spacecraft – Yahoo! News

A US Air Force unmanned spacecraft has blasted off from Florida, amid a veil of secrecy about its military mission.

The robotic space plane, or X-37B, lifted off from Cape Canaveral atop an Atlas V rocket at 7:52 pm local time (2352 GMT) Thursday, according to video released by the military.

“The launch is a go,” Air Force spokeswoman Major Angie Blair told AFP.

The lift-off appeared to proceed as planned without major problems, judging by the commentary in the Air Force webcast.

Full Story: US military launches top-secret robotic spacecraft – Yahoo! News.

18 veterans commit suicide each day

Troubling new data show there are an average of 950 suicide attempts each month by veterans who are receiving some type of treatment from the Veterans Affairs Department.

Seven percent of the attempts are successful, and 11 percent of those who don’t succeed on the first attempt try again within nine months.

The numbers, which come at a time when VA is strengthening its suicide prevention programs, show about 18 veteran suicides a day, about five by veterans who are receiving VA care.

Access to care appears to be a key factor, officials said, noting that once a veteran is inside the VA care program, screening programs are in place to identify those with problems, and special efforts are made to track those considered at high risk, such as monitoring whether they are keeping appointments.

Full Story: 18 veterans commit suicide each day – Army News, news from Iraq, – Army Times.

AMERICA ABANDONS HOMELESS VETERANS! : Veterans Today

U.S. Government Surrenders Sacred Land at National Veterans Home to Wealthy Homeowners for a Public Park

How could such a brazen invasion possibly occur in America with the strongest national defense in the world? And how could the takeover happen on land that was exclusively deeded to America’s Military Veterans 122 years ago as a permanent and safe haven to heal from defending our nation?

Incredulously, this land was permanently deeded as a National Veterans Home, yet there are more than 20,000 homeless Veterans who must fend for themselves on the dangerous streets of Los Angeles. On the other hand, this rich and infamous gang of modern-day robber barons lives safely and luxuriously in their multi-million dollar mansions.

Full Story: ROBERT ROSEBROCK: AMERICA ABANDONS HOMELESS VETERANS! : Veterans Today.

Fisk says Western forces must pull out of the region

Robert Fisk, an internationally renowned journalist who has covered many of the conflicts, believes that all Western forces should be completely withdrawn from the region.

In an interview with Gulf Times, Fisk said he had spoken out against the Iraq war before it began, and even declared before troops invaded that “this is going to be a catastrophe.”

Having spent much of his career writing about Middle Eastern conflicts, Fisk has a strong connection with the region. This is clearly indicated by the way that he speaks about the people here as well as the fact that he resides in Lebanon.

And despite his British background, he is vehemently opposed to Western military intervention in the region.

“It (the Iraq war) was about oil,” he said, adding “if the major export product of Iraq had been asparagus or potatoes, the 82nd airborne would not have gone into Baghdad.”

Full Story: Gulf Times – Qatar’s top-selling English daily newspaper – Qatar.

US to remove all its forces from Iraq by 2011: Biden

US Vice President Joe Biden has said that the Obama Administration is committed to end its combat mission in Iraq by August this year and remove all of its troops from the country as scheduled by the end of 2011.

“We remain committed to end our combat mission in Iraq this summer, by the end of August 2010, and in accordance with the US-Iraqi security agreement that was signed a couple of years ago to remove all US forces from Iraq by the end of 2011,” Biden told reporters in his remarks at the White House.

“As we complete this security transition, we will continue to work to build a lasting partnership with Iraqi people and their government based on the many shared interests we have that go beyond the military cooperation we've had of late, including the economy, education, cultural exchanges, and the development of a strong economy for Iraq,” he said.

Earlier, Biden yesterday commended Iraqi forces in taking the lead in the killing of top two al-Qaida leaders in Iraq.

Full Story: US to remove all its forces from Iraq by 2011: Biden – US – World – The Times of India.

DynCorp Audit Finds Poor Controls On Millions Of Dollars In Afghan Police Program

The private contractor that trains the Afghan police force, a U.S. military program long criticized for wasting money, has failed to document millions of dollars in expenses, according to a leading defense audit agency.

A November 2009 audit by the Defense Contract Audit Agency, made public Friday by a Senate subcommittee on contracting oversight, uncovered serious deficiencies in how DynCorp International tracks payroll, bills from subcontractors, cost vouchers and millions of dollars in labor costs. In sum, the audit found many of DynCorp’s billing and financial controls to be inadequate.

The audit is notable for providing the first hard look at the company’s financial accountability in Afghanistan, where since 2004 it has played a key role training the Afghan National Police. This effort is critical to the drawdown of U.S. troops.

Full Story: DynCorp Audit Finds Poor Controls On Millions Of Dollars In Afghan Police Program.

Defense Spending Is Much Greater than You Think: more than $1Trillion a year « Wake-up Call

That’s right: more than $1TRILLION a year.

When President Obama presented his budget recently for fiscal year 2011, he proposed that the Pentagon’s outlays be increased by about 4.5 percent beyond its estimated outlays in fiscal 2010, to a total of almost $719 billion. Although many Americans regard this enormous sum as excessive, few appreciate that the total amount of all defense-related spending greatly exceeds the amount budgeted for the Department of Defense.

In fiscal year 2009, which ended last September, the Pentagon spent $636.5 billion. Lodged elsewhere in the budget, however, other lines identify funding that serves defense purposes just as surely as—sometimes even more surely than—the money allocated to the Department of Defense. On occasion, commentators take note of some of these additional defense-related budget items, such as the Department of Energy’s nuclear-weapons program, but many such items, including some extremely large ones, remain generally unrecognized.

Since the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, many observers probably would agree that its budget ought to be included in any complete accounting of defense costs. After all, the homeland is what most of us want the government to defend in the first place.

Full Story: Defense Spending Is Much Greater than You Think: more than $1Trillion a year « Wake-up Call.

Joint Chiefs Chair: No, No, No. Don’t Attack Iran.

We are all screwed if Iran gets a nuke. And we may be just as screwed if the United States attacks Iran to keep Tehran from getting that nuke.

Okay, I’m paraphrasing a bit. But that’s the core of the message from America’s top military officer, who reiterated today his canyon-deep reservations about any military solution to the Iranian nuclear crisis. Sure, U.S. strikes might set back Tehran’s atomic weapons program — for a while. But the “unintended consequences” of a hit on Iran’s nuclear facilities could easily outweigh the benefits of that delay, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen told a forum at Columbia University.

“Iran getting a nuclear weapon would be incredibly destabilizing. Attacking them would also create the same kind of outcome,” Mullen said. “In an area that’s so unstable right now, we just don’t need more of that.”

Full Story: Joint Chiefs Chair: No, No, No. Don’t Attack Iran. | Danger Room | Wired.com.

Lie to Congress; Get a Fourth Star

Alexander the Not So Great

By RAY McGOVERN

U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Keith Alexander may well be harboring the thought attributed to prevaricator Oliver North upon being spared punishment — and instead getting rewarded handsomely — for lying about the Iran-Contra Affair: “Is this a great country or what!”

Gen. Alexander, Director of the National Security Agency since August 2005, is about to become what the Army describes as “dual hatted.” The Senate is about to confirm him to another highly sensitive leadership position requiring the utmost integrity and fidelity to the Constitution when he has shown neither.

Despite that, after sizing up the enormous challenge of running the new U.S. cyber-warfare command, Sen. James Inhofe, R-Oklahoma, looked at Gen. Alexander and added, “And you’re the right person for it.”

Not for the first time, neither Inhofe nor his colleagues seem to have done their homework. Or maybe it is simply the case that Congress now accepts being lied to as part of the woodwork in the Capitol.

Full Story: Ray McGovern: Lie to Congress; Get a Fourth Star.

Veteran commits suicide in front of Dayton VA center

Jesse Charles Huff walked up to the Veterans Affairs Department’s Medical Center on Friday morning wearing U.S. Army fatigues and battling pain from his Iraq war wounds and a recent bout with depression.

The 27-year-old Dayton man had entered the center’s emergency room about 1 a.m. Friday and requested some sort of treatment. But Huff did not get that treatment, police said, and about 5:45 a.m. he reappeared at the center’s entrance, put a military-style rifle to his head and twice pulled the trigger.

Huff fell near the foot of a Civil War statue, his blood covering portions of the front steps.

Full Story: Veteran commits suicide in front of Dayton VA center.

US Afghan commander: ‘We have too many contractors’

The US commander in Afghanistan said Friday that the military is wasting money by employing too many private contractors to do jobs better done by soldiers or local Afghans.

“We have created in ourselves a dependency on contractors that is greater than it ought to be,” General Stanley McChrystal told an audience of French officers and military experts at France’s defence university in Paris.

“I think we’ve gone too far. I think that the use of contractors was done with good intentions so that we could limit the number of military. I think in some cases we thought it would save money. I think it doesn’t save money.”

Full Story: US Afghan commander: ‘We have too many contractors’ – Yahoo! News.

OPS: ’bout time they figured that out. Privatization is NEVER less expensive

Feingold bill seeks end to ‘counterproductive’ war in Afghanistan

S military presence in Afghanistan may have rare bipartisan consensus in Washington, but a bipartisan trio of lawmakers are dissatisfied with the open-ended occupation and are calling for a change in strategy.

New legislation introduced by Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) and Reps. Jim McGovern (D-MA) and Walter Jones (R-NC) would require President Barack Obama to implement a flexible timetable to withdraw troops from Afghanistan and update Congress on its progress every three months.

“A large, open-ended presence in Afghanistan is counterproductive to our global fight against al Qaeda,” said Feingold, who assailed the idea of a “nation-building strategy in a country that isn’t even Al-Qaeda’s base” and called for a “timetable to end our massive presence in Afghanistan.”

Full Story: Feingold bill seeks end to ‘counterproductive’ war in Afghanistan | Raw Story.

Disposable Soldiers

The mortar shell that wrecked Chuck Luther’s life exploded at the base of the guard tower. Luther heard the brief whistling, followed by a flash of fire, a plume of smoke and a deafening bang that shook the tower and threw him to the floor. The Army sergeant’s head slammed against the concrete, and he lay there in the Iraqi heat, his nose leaking clear fluid.

“I remember laying there in a daze, looking around, trying to figure out where I was at,” he says. “I was nauseous. My teeth hurt. My shoulder hurt. And my right ear was killing me.” Luther picked himself up and finished his shift, then took some ibuprofen to dull the pain. The sergeant was seven months into his deployment at Camp Taji, in the volatile Sunni Triangle, twenty miles north of Baghdad. He was determined, he says, to complete his mission. But the short, muscular frame that had guided him to twenty-two honors–including three Army Achievement Medals and a Combat Action Badge–was basically broken. The shoulder pain persisted, and the hearing in his right ear, which evaporated on impact, never returned, replaced by the maddening hum of tinnitus.

Then came the headaches. “They’d start with a speckling in the corner of my vision, then grow worse and worse until finally the right eye would just shut down and go blank,” he says. “The left one felt like someone was stabbing me over and over in the eye.”

Full Story: Disposable Soldiers.

U.S. Army To Court Martial ‘Birther’ Officer For Refusing To Follow Obama’s Orders

NBC News reports that the Army will court martial Lt. Col. Terry Lakin because of his refusal to deploy to Afghanistan. Lakin is part of the discredited “birther” movement, and as such believes that orders from President Obama are “illegal.”

Read more from NBC News here. Watch Lakin’s video below explaining why he believes Obama is not a natural born citizen.

WATCH:

Full Story: Terry Lakin, ‘Birther’, To Be Court Martialed By US Army.

A Sign of Empire Pathology

More US military personnel have taken their OWN lives than have died in action

Here is a shocking statistic that you won’t hear in most western news media: over the past nine years, more US military personnel have taken their own lives than have died in action in either the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan. These are official figures from the US Department of Defence, yet somehow they have not been deemed newsworthy to report. Last year alone, more than 330 serving members of the US armed forces committed suicide – more than the 320 killed in Afghanistan and the 150 who fell in Iraq (see wsws.org).

Since 2001, when Washington launched its so-called war on terror, there has been a dramatic year-on-year increase in US military suicides, particularly in the army, which has borne the brunt of fighting abroad. Last year saw the highest total number since such records began in 1980. Prior to 2001, the suicide rate in the US military was lower than that for the general US population; now, it is nearly double the national average.

A growing number of these victims have been deployed in Iraq or Afghanistan. What these figures should tell us is that there is something fundamentally deranged about Washington’s “war on terror” – which is probably why western news media prefer to ignore the issue. How damning is it about such military campaigns that the number of US soldiers who take their own lives outnumber those killed by enemy combatants.

Full Story: A Sign of Empire Pathology.

Evidence that Depleted Uranium is intended as a weapon of genocide

Now that the horrors of Depleted Uranium are being revealed to the world, we can expect for apologists to begin moving into the next phase of damage control within the coming months. It will likely be claimed that the depopulation of much of the Middle East was an unfortunate result of the DU that the Pentagon used because it was not aware of the health effects it would have.

This article is meant to demonstrate why this is not the case. The radioactive waste is intentionally used to depopulate and economically cripple the nations that the United States government declared war on. A declassified memorandum from 1943 explains how radioactive material can be used as a gas warfare instrument.1 It mentions that:

As a gas warfare instrument the material would be ground into particles of microscopic size to form dust and smoke and distributed by a ground-fired projectile, land vehicles, or aerial bombs. In this form it would be inhaled by personnel. The amount necessary to cause death to a person inhaling the material is extremely small. It has been estimated that one millionth of a gram accumulating in a person’s body would be fatal. There are no known methods of treatment for such a casualty

Full Story: Evidence that Depleted Uranium is intended as a weapon of genocide « Wake-up Call.

Survey: Troops shift political parties

Political party affiliation has fallen sharply among those wearing the uniform today, a new Military Times survey shows.

An exclusive survey of some 1,800 active-duty troops shows the percentage of self-identified Republicans has decreased by one-third since 2004, from 60 percent to 41 percent, while the percentage of self-identified independents has nearly doubled to 32 percent during the same period.

These career-oriented officers and mid-grade and senior enlisted members are still far more conservative than liberal, but they are less likely today to identify with the GOP, the survey shows.

Full Story: Survey: Troops shift political parties – Navy News, news from Iraq – Navy Times.

U.S. officials say Pakistani spy agency released Afghan Taliban insurgents

The recent capture of the Afghan Taliban’s second in command seemed to signal a turning point in Pakistan, an indication that its intelligence agency had gone from helping to cracking down on the militant Islamist group.

But U.S. officials now believe that even as Pakistan’s security forces worked with their American counterparts to detain Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar and other insurgents, the country’s Inter-Services Intelligence directorate, or ISI, quietly freed at least two senior Afghan Taliban figures it had captured on its own.

U.S. military and intelligence officials said the releases, detected by American spy agencies but not publicly disclosed, are evidence that parts of Pakistan’s security establishment continue to support the Afghan Taliban. This assistance underscores how complicated the CIA-ISI relationship remains at a time when the United States and Pakistan are battling insurgencies that straddle the Afghanistan border and are increasingly anxious about how the war in that country will end.

Full Story: U.S. officials say Pakistani spy agency released Afghan Taliban insurgents.

The Cover-Ups That Exploded

The Pentagon is reeling after two lethal episodes uncovered by diligent journalism show trigger-happy U.S. Army helicopter pilots and U.S. Special Forces slaughtering civilians, then seeking to cover up their crimes.

The World Wide Web was transfixed Monday when Wikileaks put up on YouTube a 38-minute video, along with a 17-minute edited version, taken from a U.S. Army Apache helicopter, one of two firing on a group of Iraqis in Baghdad at a street corner in July 2007. Twelve civilians died, including a Reuters photographer Namir Noor-Eldeen, 22, and a Reuters driver, Saeed Chmagh, 40.

At a press conference in Washington, D.C., Wikileaks said it had got the footage from whistle-blowers in the military and had been able to break the encryption code. The Pentagon has confirmed the video is genuine.

Full Story: t r u t h o u t | Alexander Cockburn | The Cover-Ups That Exploded.

Iraq: Seven Years of Occupation

In the last seven years, one million Iraqis have been killed and millions more injured and displaced from their homes.

On April 9, 2003, exactly seven years ago, Baghdad fell under the US-led occupation. Baghdad did not fall in 21 days, though; it fell after 13 years of wars, bombings and economic sanctions. Millions of Iraqis, including myself, watched our country die slowly before our eyes in those 13 years. So, when the invasion started in March of 2003, everyone knew it was the straw that would break the camel’s back.

I still remember the day of the fall of Baghdad very clearly, as if it happened yesterday. My family and I had fled to my uncle’s home in southern Baghdad because our neighborhood, located near Baghdad’s airport, was bombarded by US airplanes in the days before. I remember the first US tank rolling down the street with a US soldier, wearing black gloves, waving his hand and some people waving back. That was one of the sadist day of my life, not only because Baghdad fell under a foreign occupation, but also because I knew it would be the beginning of another disastrous chapter in Iraq’s history. Now, when I look back at all that happened under the occupation, I find that I was, unfortunately, right.

In the last seven years, one million Iraqis have been killed and millions more injured and displaced from their homes. The country’s infrastructure was destroyed and Iraq’s civil society has been severely damaged. A video posted this week by WikiLeaks is not an exception to how the US occupation operated in Iraq all along, but rather an example of it. While the video is shocking and disturbing to the US public, from an Iraqi perspective it just tells a story of an average day under the occupation. But even from the Pentagon’s perspective, that attack was nothing exceptional. Reuters demanded an investigation into this particular attack because two of its employees were killed in it, and the Pentagon has already conducted an investigation that cleared all soldiers who took part of the attack of any wrongdoing. The video does not show an operation that went wrong, or where “rules of engagement” were not followed. It is simply how the US military has been doing business in Iraq for seven years now.

Full Story: Iraq: Seven Years of Occupation | CommonDreams.org.

Former Army Colonel: U.S. Military Leaders Have ‘Forfeited’ Their Purpose

Andrew Bacevich: US Military Leaders Have ‘Forfeited’ Their Purpose With Afghan Victory Claims (VIDEO)

Nine years after the U.S. military invaded Afghanistan, military leaders have “unwittingly forfeited” their claim to providing an important service to society, according to retired U.S. Army Colonel and Boston University professor Andrew J. Bacevich.

In an interview with Bill Moyers, Bacevich argues that admissions from Gen. David Petraeus and Gen. Stanley M. McChrystal that there is no military solution in Afghanistan are historic and ultimately undermine the American officer corps’ purpose to demonstrate that war can work

Bacevich: After Vietnam, this humiliation that we had experienced, the collective purpose of the officer corps, in a sense, was to demonstrate that war worked. To demonstrate that war could be purposeful. That out of that collision on the battlefield, would come decision, would come victory.

And that soldiers could claim purposefulness for their profession by saying to both the political leadership and the American people, ‘This is what we can do. We can in certain situations solve very difficult problems by giving you military victory.’

Well here in the year 2010, nobody in the officer corps believes in military victory…

Full Story: Andrew Bacevich: US Military Leaders Have ‘Forfeited’ Their Purpose With Afghan Victory Claims (VIDEO).

Cost estimate for F-35 to soar, Pentagon says

Defense Department officials have told Congress that the already ballooning costs of the F-35 joint strike fighter are likely to soar much higher when new estimates are completed in the summer.

In the Selected Acquisition Report for the F-35, a detailed document sent to Congress on Thursday, the Pentagon said it expects that cost studies now under way will produce estimates dramatically higher than those used in recent months to prepare the 2011 defense budget request.

Based on figures in the document, the average cost of one F-35 — $62 million when the program was launched in 2002 — could rise to $115.5 million, not counting inflation, by the time all 2,457 planes that the U.S. plans to buy are built.

Including inflation, the government now expects each F-35 to cost an average of $133.6 million. But even that figure could swell to more than $150 million when revised estimates are completed in June.

Full Story: Cost estimate for F-35 to soar, Pentagon says | Business | Dallas Business, Texas Busine….

Iraq slaughter not an aberration

- Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com

I was just on Democracy Now along with WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange discussing the Iraq video they released yesterday, and there’s one vital point I want to emphasize. Shining light on what our government and military do is so critical precisely because it forces people to see what is really being done and prevents myth and propaganda from distorting those realities. That’s why the administration fights so hard to keep torture photos suppressed, why the military fought so hard here to keep this video concealed (and why they did the same with regard to the Afghan massacre), and why whistle-blowers, real journalists, and sites like WikiLeaks are the declared enemy of the government. The discussions many people are having today — about the brutal reality of what the U.S. does when it engages in war, invasions and occupation — is exactly the discussion which they most want to avoid.

Full Story: Iraq slaughter not an aberration – Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com.

Military can’t find its copy of Iraq killing video

After being pressed to release its version of the WikiLeaks clip, U.S. CENTCOM says it can’t locate the footage

The U.S. military said Tuesday it can’t find its copy of a video that shows two employees of the Reuters news agency being killed by Army helicopters in 2007, after a leaked version circulated the Internet and renewed questions about the attack.

Capt. Jack Henzlik, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command, said that forces in Iraq have not been able to locate the video within its files.

“We’re attempting to retrieve the video at this time,” Henzlik said.

Full Story: U.S. Military | All about American forces, Afghanistan, Iraq – Salon.com

Ernest “Fritz” Hollings: Afghanistan – Not Necessary

With the President of Afghanistan campaigning against us, it is time we learn that Afghanistan is not necessary – that it’s necessary to “be gone.”

One of the best writers and observers of the war in Afghanistan, David Ignatius of The Washington Post, writes,: “The coming battle for control of this ancient crossroad city [Kandahar] will be the toughest challenge of the war in Afghanistan – not because it will be bloody, necessarily, but because it will require the hardest item for U. S. commanders to deliver, which is an improvement in governance.” Question: Are we to ask GIs to lay down their lives for “an improvement in governance?” Is this kind of war necessary? After eight years of trying?

I was “a hard charger” on the war in Vietnam. In fact, the motion for the last $500 million that went into the Vietnam War was made by me on the Senate Appropriations Committee. I thought the Vietnamese were willing to fight and die for democracy. Some were, but a lot more were willing to give up their lives over ten years for communism. Now I have learned people want different types of government other than democracy. I’ve been to Hanoi; visited John McCain’s prison, and the people of Vietnam are happy.

In 1966, I was off shore Hanoi on the aircraft carrier, Kitty Hawk – as our brave pilots bombed POL supplies in Hanoi, only to precariously land back on the carrier and be court-martialed if they strayed to other targets. I felt the strategy of “build and destroy” at the same time was wrong. In World War II we cleared the area and kept it cleared. In Vietnam, we cleared the area in the daytime and let the Viet Cong come in at night. Are we to spend another eight years force feeding democracy in Afghanistan?

Full Story: Afghanistan – Not Necessary | Economy In Crisis.