The Commandant General Royal Marines' Prize in the Peregrine Trophy 2011 competition went to LA(Phot) Si Ethell fora portfolio including this image. The FSG (Fire Support Group) of Charlie Company 40 Commando Royal Marines, at FOB (Forward Operating Base) Jackson in Afghanistan engaging insurgents following contact at PB (Patrol Base) Paylae.
The Old Guard troops typically escort remains and fire three-volley salutes at military funerals. When taking photos, they have middle-of-the-night run-ins with rabbits, foxes and deer in the cemetery, which is situated on the estate where Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee once lived. Using head lamps to light their way, they've tripped in shallow holes and brushed aside countless spider webs. They've paused at seeing freshly dug graves prepared for the next day's funerals.
One soldier, Spc. Raymond Piron, 22, of Detroit, says he was working one night in an old section of the cemetery when he felt something tap him on the shoulder. He turned around, but he was alone.
Before this summer, Spc. Craig Green, 21, of Dover, Del., a broad-shouldered, tough-looking Iraq war veteran, says that when it came to walking cemeteries at night, "you couldn't pay me to do it."
At least one of the soldiers, Sgt. Yvens Saintil, 26, of Philadelphia, who has done two tours in Iraq, says he has friends buried in the cemetery. He has taken time to find their graves and pay respects, even though his duties didn't include photographing their graves.
"At first I was kind of sad a little bit, but it's just part of the mission to continue your mission," Saintil says while standing in the columbarium shortly after sunrise on a recent morning.
The mission is called Task Force Christman, in honor of Pvt. William Henry Christman, an Easton, Pa., native and Civil War soldier who was the first soldier buried at Arlington. The troops executing it are from Delta Company of the 1st Battalion of the 3rd U.S. Infantry Regiment, known as the Old Guard — the Army's official ceremonial unit, which provides escorts to the president and helps put on military funerals.
The Department of Defense announced today the appointment of four dual-status commanders in support of relief efforts for Hurricane Irene, marking the first time the dual commander concept has been implemented in support of a natural disaster.
While others may be appointed in the coming days, the initial list of dual-status commanders appointed by the state governors and the Department of Defense for Hurricane Irene is as follows:
Brig. Gen. James Trogden III, North Carolina Army National Guard;
Brig. Gen. Carolyn Protzmann, New Hampshire Air National Guard;
Brig. Gen. Michael Swezey, New York Army National Guard; and
Col. Donald Lagor, Rhode Island Air National Guard.
When agreed upon by the Secretary of Defense and the governor of an affected state, dual-status commanders can direct both federal active-duty forces and state National Guard forces in response to domestic incidents. The concept is intended to foster greater cooperation among federal and state assets during a disaster.
The nation’s governors led the creation of this new opportunity for collaboration. Dual-status commanders ensure that state and federal military forces will work effectively together, when states request federal forces through the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Through this improved leadership, forces responding to Hurricane Irene will be better able to avoid duplication of effort, and provide the life-saving capabilities that governors request.
The dual-status commander concept was formulated in 2009. In March 2011, the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security and the bipartisan 10-member Council of Governors adopted the “Joint Action Plan for Unity of Effort,” strengthening support to governors when they request military assistance for disaster response.
The Department of Defense announced today a unit to deploy as part of the upcoming rotation of forces operating in Afghanistan. The announcement involves one brigade combat team totaling about 3,200 soldiers. The scheduled deployment date for this unit is December 2011.
Specific unit:
3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division, Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Wash.
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| Graphic from Lock'n'Load Publishing. Click to enlarge |
China's state news agency accused the United States Thursday of "exaggerating" the threat posed by its military, after a report said the Asian nation was expanding its maritime power.
The US defence department said in its annual report to Congress that China was increasingly focused on naval power and had invested in hi-tech weaponry that would extend its reach in the Pacific and beyond.
Xinhua said many people in China found it "weird" that the United States, which spends far more on its military than any other country in the world, should highlight Chinese expenditure.
"The report... exaggerated the threat incurred by China's military development in 2010 to the Asia-Pacific region," Xinhua said in a commentary.
"For many in China, it is weird that the Pentagon, whose expenditures reached nearly $700 billion and accounted for over an appalling 40 percent of the world's total in 2010, routinely points its finger at China."
China's People's Liberation Army -- the largest armed force in the world -- is extremely secretive about its defence programmes, which benefit from a huge and expanding military budget boosted by the nation's runaway economic growth.
Beijing announced earlier this year that military spending would rise to 601.1 billion yuan ($91.7 billion) in 2011 and also said it was developing its first stealth fighter jet.
Even as American soldiers and marines remain locked in mortal combat, debates rage over how deeply to cut the military. Cuts ranging from $400 billion to $1 trillion over five to ten years are on the table. As none of these discussions appear grounded in any determination of what our strategic needs might be in an uncertain future, I may be wasting my words in pointing out that this appears to be a particularly bad time to think about reducing our military capabilities. Rather, I wish to rail against the one thing that almost always happens when the country undertakes an ill-thought-out reduction of its military might: the senseless elimination of land forces.
After the Soviet Union’s demise, the U.S. Army’s 18 combat divisions were cut to ten. And before 9/11 Secretary Rumsfeld was proposing to cut that force to eight. Let’s put that in perspective. The combat troops within a division (infantry, artillery, armor) are only a fraction of the division’s total strength; the rest serve in crucial logistics and other support roles. If one took all the “trigger pullers” in the nation’s ten Army and two Marine divisions, there would be barely enough to fill half a college football stadium. This lack of manpower was so detrimental to our war efforts that during the peak of the fighting in Iraq serious consideration was given to adding two more combat divisions to the Army. It never happened. And now that our commitment in Iraq is winding down, the Army is once again bracing itself for the possibility of losing two of its ten divisions.
A soldier from the Irish Guards is seen during a patrol in the Tor Ghai area of Helmand, Afghanistan. The Irish Guards were operating with troops from E Company 2 Parachute Regiment at the time. The operation was launched to push insurgents out of an area know to be a strong hold around Patrol Base (PB) 3.
The Army announced today the award of two contracts to BAE Systems Land and Armaments, L.P., Troy, Mich. ($449,964,969), and General Dynamics Land Systems, Inc., Sterling Heights, Mich. ($439,715,950), for the Ground Combat Vehicle (GCV) program technology development phase. These contractors have been selected to develop competitive, affordable and executable designs for a new Army Infantry Fighting Vehicle (IFV) over the next 24 months.
The contract awards follow the Department of Defense’s formal approval of the GCV program to enter the technology development phase. Approval of this first major milestone builds on months of ongoing collaboration between the Army and the Office of the Undersecretary of Defense (Acquisition, Technology and Logistics) to successfully develop, build and field an affordable, effective and suitable IFV.
“The Army enthusiastically welcomes the formal launch of the Ground Combat Vehicle program, which will provide much needed protection and mobility to soldiers in combat,” said Secretary of the Army John McHugh. “Given the economic environment the nation currently faces, the Army recognizes that it is imperative to continually address requirements as we build a versatile, yet affordable, next-generation infantry fighting vehicle.”
The department’s GCV acquisition strategy, which emphasizes affordability and a seven-year schedule, calls for aggressive exploration of GCV IFV capabilities trade-space via continued requirements and affordability analysis during the 24-month technology development phase. As the Army finalizes GCV requirements during this phase of the formal acquisition process, these efforts will enable the Army to realize program schedule and affordability objectives. The Army remains committed to a seven-year schedule as the appropriate amount of time necessary to design, develop, build and test the next-generation infantry fighting vehicle.
To develop a successful program with well-informed decision points at each major milestone, the Army will undertake a three-pronged approach during the first phase of this effort. First, contractors will work collaboratively with the Army to develop competitive, best-value engineering designs to meet critical Army needs. Concurrently, the Army will initiate an update to its GCV IFV analysis of alternatives and conduct separate technical and operational assessment of existing non-developmental vehicles. Results from this assessment, along with contractors design efforts, will inform GCV requirements to support the next program milestone and facilitate a full and open competition for the next phase of the GCV program.
“This is an important milestone in our Army's modernization program. GCV is the first combat vehicle designed from inception for an IED environment. It will provide armor protection and the capability to maneuver cross-country with the nine-man infantry squad." said Army Chief of Staff Gen. Martin E. Dempsey.
The Army’s overall strategy for developing GCV is consistent with efforts to implement acquisition reform and best acquisition practices.
Tuesday's ransacking of Bab al-Aziziya, long the nexus of Gadhafi's power, marked the effective collapse of his 42-year-old regime. But with Gadhafi and his powerful sons still unaccounted for — and gunbattles flaring across the nervous city — the fighters cannot declare victory.
In an address given from an unknown location and broadcast on the Al-Ouroba TV, Gadhafi asked: "Why are you letting them wreak havoc?" The Syria-based satellite station is owned by Iraqi dissident Mishaan Jibouri and has been supporting Gadhafi as well as Syria's embattled leader Bashar Assad.
Sounding subdued and without his usually fiery rhetoric, Gadhafi said he would fight "the aggression with all strength until either victory or death."
The channel earlier quoted the Libyan leader as saying he had left the Bab al-Aziziya compound in a "tactical move" after 64 NATO airstrikes reduced it to rubble.
In New Brunswick, N.J., a building superintendent opened the door to apartment No. 1076 one balmy Tuesday and discovered an alarming scene: terrorist literature strewn about the table and computer and surveillance equipment set up in the next room.
The panicked superintendent dialed 911, sending police and the FBI rushing to the building near Rutgers University on the afternoon of June 2, 2009. What they found in that first-floor apartment, however, was not a terrorist hideout but a command center set up by a secret team of New York Police Department intelligence officers.
From that apartment, about an hour outside the department's jurisdiction, the NYPD had been staging undercover operations and conducting surveillance throughout New Jersey. Neither the FBI nor the local police had any idea.
Since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the NYPD has become one of the country's most aggressive domestic intelligence agencies. A months-long investigation by The Associated Press has revealed that the NYPD operates far outside its borders and targets ethnic communities in ways that would run afoul of civil liberties rules if practiced by the federal government. And it does so with unprecedented help from the CIA in a partnership that has blurred the bright line between foreign and domestic spying.
Now that such a heinous event has occurred on American soil I'm sure we'll end up with a Department of Homeland Stability
According to White House sources, seismologists at the US Geological Survey now believe the quake was caused by slippage along a previously unknown flaw in the Earth's crust that will be named Bush's Fault.
As the battle in Libya appeared at stalemate, it was an open secret that foreign military advisers were working covertly inside the country providing guidance to rebels and giving tactical intelligence to NATO aircraft bombing government forces.
Diplomats say members of the alliance and partners in the Middle East were engaged in an undercover campaign on the ground in Libya. The operation was kept separate from the NATO command structure to avoid compromising its mandate from the United Nations — to protect civilians.
These largely unseen supporters helped to transform the ragtag rebel army into the force that stormed Tripoli.
On Tuesday, French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe acknowledged the presence of the advisers, telling Europe-1 radio that France had contributed "a few instructors" to train rebel fighters.
As a staggered nation scrambled after Sept. 11, 2001, to anticipate possible next targets, there was a widespread sanitizing of publicly available information suddenly viewed as tipsheets and road maps for terrorists.
But what also resulted, as shown by an Associated Press review for the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, were some befuddling inconsistencies — telling private pilots not to fly over nuclear reactors, for example, and then not allowing them access to plant locations.
It was all based on a fear that seemingly innocuous fragments of information could be paired to hatch an attack. If authorities couldn't be sure what information might help, they concluded it was best to keep as much secret as possible. Or if total secrecy couldn't be justified, at least make the information much harder to obtain.
Security-sensitive information wasn't just the coordinates of the nation's nuclear power plants, or the locations of massive inventories of dangerous chemicals, or detailed maps of potentially explosive natural gas pipelines. Withheld from public view were things that average citizens might need to know: emergency response plans for public buildings in Idaho, building blueprints in Delaware, and drinking water test results in Texas.
The summer winner at the box office is a movie about chimps dominating humans in a rise to power. There are riots in the streets in Europe. There is political upheaval at home, with frequent demands for drastic change in Washington, including overtures from zealous political groups assaulting federal power. America is fighting a foreign war. And all across the country, citizens are yearning for strong leadership from both parties to settle things down and bring America its accustomed stability once again.
Pictured is an MOD search dog, trained in detecting explosives, with his handler. The Ministry of Defence Police (MDP) has one of the largest Dog Sections of all British Police Forces. General Purpose (GP) Police Dogs and their handlers are deployed at 23 Dog Sections across the United Kingdom. The GP teams are trained and licensed in accordance with the National Police Dog Assessment Model. Selected teams will undertake further training to enable them to deploy in a tactical firearms support role alongside firearms officers. The Force operates several classifications of specialist search dogs which are deployed to search and indicate the presence of explosives and drugs, as well as firearms. All dog teams within the Force Dog Section undertake regular Refresher Course and Continuation Training which is delivered by accredited instructors.
During a morning town hall forum with members of the Army’s Senior Executive Service, Secretary of the Army John McHugh today announced creation of the Institutional Army Transformation Commission, a panel charged with finding new ways to make the Army a more “agile, cost-effective organization.”
“We’re not just asking people to change the way they budget,” McHugh said. “We’re asking them to change the way they think.”
Earlier this year, McHugh created a short-term task force to examine the Army’s organizations and business practices to identify both short-term improvements and long-term structural changes within the institutional Army -- the so-called Generating Force. To date, that task force has launched efforts to root out overlap and redundancies in research and development, review temporary organizations and task forces to see if they are still needed, consolidate and streamline the requirements process, reform installations management, optimize Army acquisitions, and make changes in human capital management.
“While I’ve been encouraged by the task force’s early work, the simple fact is that large-scale institutional transformation takes years to mature before agile, cost-effective organizations emerge -- with a culture of continuous improvement incorporated in all activities,” McHugh said. “This commission will implement changes already identified through the short-term task force, assess and identify new opportunities, and continue to function for the next three years. This longer term, more enduring approach is historically and practically necessary and will help make continuous transformation a part of Army culture.”
McHugh explained his focus on restructuring the institutional Army by noting that the Army is loosely divided into two separate organizations -- the operational Army, which are deployed forces, currently in the fight in Afghanistan and Iraq; and the institutional Army, or generating force, which prepares, trains, educates and supports those troops.
“To an outsider, there are no visible differences between these two parts of the Army,” McHugh said. “In one assignment, they might be driving an MRAP (mine resistant ambush protective vehicle) through Afghanistan, and in the next, providing stateside training to other soldiers in how to use the vehicle. In the first, he or she is part of the operational Army; in the second, the institutional Army.”
Since the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq began, the operational Army -- the sharp tip of the spear -- has experienced dramatic and continuous change, quickly adapting to changes in terrain, mission and the enemy it faces. But the institutional Army looks much the same, structurally, as it has since the early to mid-70s.
The AgustaWestland AW159 Lynx Wildcat (previously called the Future Lynx) is an improved version of the Westland Super Lynx military helicopter. The AW159 will serve in the battlefield utility, search and rescue and anti-surface warfare roles. The helicopter has been ordered for the British Army and Royal Navy. It is to enter service with the Army in 2014 and with the RN in 2015.
“When I look at a guy who has to report to drill every month, as a manager and as a hirer, I have to think about that,” he said. “I know he’s gonna be asking for a lot of days off, and that isn’t easy to give. Some guys come back from the war with all sorts of issues, which is understandable, but I have to deal with that. Honestly, I think about it twice before I hire them.”
“Everybody wants to support the troops until they have to share in the hardship and sacrifice,” I said. “Then all of a sudden that bumper sticker or that flag pin doesn’t mean anything anymore.”
The battle to control Libya has entered its final phase when Muammar Gaddafi must make a choice: to seek a negotiated exit or to defend his capital to the last bullet.
Rebels with support from NATO warplanes have, over the past 48 hours, taken key towns around Gaddafi's stronghold in Tripoli in a dramatic series of advances which cut the city off from supplies of fuel and food.
Rebel offensives have, in the past, turned into headlong retreats. But if they hold their ground, the end of Gaddafi's 41-year rule will be closer than at any time since the conflict began six months ago.
A U.S. official said that for the first time in the conflict, government forces on Sunday fired a Scud missile -- an act that was pointless from a military point of view but signaled the desperation of pro-Gaddafi forces.
"The Libyan regime may or may not collapse forthwith but it now looks like it will happen sooner or later," said Daniel Korski, a fellow at the European Council for Foreign Relations.
He added: "The manner of its collapse, however, and the method of the rebel takeover will be just as important as the conduct of the war."
A royal name change for Canada's navy and air force will be announced Tuesday, and the army will also be renamed, in a move that taps Canada's military heritage.By: Shelldrake
The Maritime Command and Air Command will again be known as the Royal Canadian Navy and Royal Canadian Air Force, while the Land Force Command will be renamed the Canadian Army.
The name changes will be officially announced Tuesday by Defence Minister Peter MacKay, and events marking the transition are scheduled to take place simultaneously across the country.
According to a Canadian Forces document obtained by CBC News on Monday, the move restores the historic names of the three branches of the Forces, and the initiative is being billed as "an important and recognizable part of Canada's military heritage."
"These were the services that fought and emerged victorious from the Second World War and Korea and contributed to the defence of Europe and North America from the early days of the Cold War. These were also the services that paved the way in terms of international peacekeeping missions," says the note, which appears to have been sent to Canadian Forces members.
The branches were renamed in 1968 when they were unified under one central command named the Canadian Armed Forces. That unified command is expected to remain in place when the old names are restored.
The US and South Korea have begun a joint military drill to improve combat readiness on the Korean peninsula.
The annual Ulchi Freedom Guardian exercise brings together 530,000 forces in Korea and abroad, using computer programmes to simulate war situations.
North Korea has reacted furiously to the exercises, which run for 10 days.
It called them "an undisguised military threat" and a "wanton challenge to peace" in the official Rodong Sinmum newspaper last week.
Hollywood might poke fun at the Army’s liberal use of acronyms and abbreviations, perhaps with good reason: There are nearly 1,100 acronyms and approximately 2,000 operational terms in the Field Manual 1-02, the Army and Marine Corps’ manual of operational terms and graphics.
A team of Army terminologists is working to change that.
Carlos Soto, a terminologist with the Fort Leavenworth, Kan.-based Combined Arms Doctrine Directorate Joint Multinational Doctrine Division, said the philosophy of his group is simple: Because soldiers were taught English before joining the Army, why try to teach them a new language?
“There is no reason for the U.S. Army to create a word if the English language suffices,” he said.
One of the chief culprits is the liberal use of acronyms to shorten or simplify military terms. Only they’re not always shorter and far too often they don’t simplify anything. “Acronyms are fun to create, but you sit there during a briefing, and after the 20th acronym [that] you don’t understand, the briefing becomes useless,” said Dave Turek, chief of the Joint and Multinational Doctrine Division Combined Arms Doctrine and co-author of FM 1-02.
A soldier from the The 1st Batallion The Scots Guards is pictured with a Light Machine Gun (LMG) near the village of Inzgule, Helmand, Afghanistan. Developed from the Minimi Light Machine Gun following experience in Iraq and Afghanistan, the LMG is a belt-fed suppression weapon. It provides the section commander with the capability to impose sustained suppressive fire onto an objective out to 300m and increases the overall firepower available to the section commander. The LMG complements the Light Support Weapon and enhances the effectiveness of all section weapons across the spectrum of Infantry operations.
A soldier rushes through a stream during a training exercise in Kenya. The 4th Battalion The Rifles (4 RIFLES) were in Kenya undergoing intensive training to be the British Army's next Spearhead Lead Element - a rapid response force ready to tackle a world-wide crisis at 24 hours notice. This can range from a major domestic terrorist attack to the evacuation of British nationals overseas. Around 700 personnel left their Wiltshire base and were joined by other units including artillery and engineers for a five week intensive exercise at the British Army Training Unit Kenya, otherwise known as BATUK.
China launched its first aircraft carrier for a maiden run on Wednesday, a step likely to boost patriotic pride at home and jitters abroad about Beijing's naval ambitions.
The long-awaited debut of the vessel, a refitted former Soviet craft, marked a step forward in China's long-term plan to build a carrier force that can project power into the Asian region, where seas are spanned by busy shipping lanes and thorny territorial disputes.
"Its symbolic significance outweighs its practical significance," said Ni Lexiong, an expert on Chinese maritime policy at the Shanghai University of Political Science and Law.
"We're already a maritime power, and so we need an appropriate force, whether that's aircraft carriers or battleships, just like the United States or the British empire did," he said in a telephone interview.
North Korea test fired artillery shells into waters near a disputed border on Wednesday, provoking a South Korean volley of warning shots, raising tensions between the rivals as they inch toward disarmament talks.
South Korea issued a verbal warning after three shots landed near their tense maritime border at around 1 p.m., and then in a tit-for-tat, the South returned three artillery rounds toward the same area about an hour later.
The South's response came after the government was heavily criticized for failing to react with force last year when North Korea shelled one of its islands, Yeonpyeong, in the same area.
Or the hype over Saddam Hussein being pulled out of his spider hole by soldiers of the same Joint Special Operations Command that killed bin Laden.
The Royal Navy has appointed a woman to command a frigate for the first time.
Lieutenant Commander Sarah West, 39, will take command of HMS Portland in April 2012. She has previously commanded four minehunters.
A Ministry of Defence spokesman said Lt Cdr West would complete a commanding officer designate course before taking up the position.
Women have been able to serve in the Royal Navy since 1994 and now make up just under 10% of the force.
They remain barred from some areas of service, such as the Royal Marine Commandos.
Lt Cdr West's previous naval experience has included serving in the Gulf.
Collins Epic Wargames really likes the Homes for Our Troops cause and we have decided to support it with a portion of every game sale from this day forward. Homes for Our Troops provides homes at no cost for severely-injured American veterans. The organization is rated 4 out of 4 stars by Charity Navigator. Connect with us on Facebook where we also just posted this announcement on our page and the Homes for Our Troops page. Here's our current main website - http://www.frontlinegeneral.com but you can also pick up our games through most FLGSs in the US, Canada, UK, Germany, Spain, and online through online retailers.
Working as a journalist in Europe, she interviewed Adolf Hitler in Vienna in 1933 and then vowed to fight against his persecution of Jews.
After the fall of France in 1940, Mrs Wake became a French Resistance courier and later a saboteur and spy - setting up escape routes and sabotaging German installations, saving hundreds of Allied lives.
She worked for British Special Operations and was parachuted into France in April 1944 before D-Day to deliver weapons to French Resistance fighters.
At one point, she was top of the Gestapo's most wanted list.
"Freedom is the only thing worth living for. While I was doing that work, I used to think it didn't matter if I died, because without freedom there was no point in living," Wake once said of her wartime exploits.
It was only after the liberation of France that she learned her husband, French businessman Henri Fiocca, had been tortured and killed by the Gestapo for refusing to give her up.
"I have only one thing to say: I killed a lot of Germans, and I am only sorry I didn't kill more," she once said.
She was Australia's most decorated servicewoman, and one of the most decorated Allied servicewomen of World War II.
On Monday, three hundred angry Afghans took to the streets in central Ghazni province carrying the bodies of two people they claimed had been killed during a raid by ISAF troops.
Pictured are Royal Marines from Fleet Protection Group (Scotland) (FPGRM)conducting boarding training on HMS Monmouth, to aid the Type 23 frigate during Counter Piracy Operations. They are using 5.56mm SA80A2 assault rifles mounted with fixed Laser Light Modules (LLMs) which can be used in different formations including Infra-Red mode used in conjunction with a Night Vision Unit.
There it is, spelled out pretty clearly. [Brant's note: this refers to a pull-quote in the article, not the image below] Marine Corps values are better than civilian sector values. Just like that, stated as a matter of fact and left unchallenged.
This attitude is not only applied to the everyday American, but extends to the civilian leaders of the military as well. General Stanley McChrystal was recently embarrassed in a Rolling Stone profile that documented some of the disdainful remarks by his staff directed against the Vice President, as well as other presidential appointees assigned to Afghanistan to work with McChrystal. An irreverent and openly hostile attitude at times to civilian control of the military was prevalent among McChrystal and his staff. Publication of that article eventually led to McChrystal’s resignation.
In the first chapter of his popular book Lone Survivor, Marcus Luttrell riffs negatively on everything from politicians, to the “liberal media,” to the public in general who insist on imposing “intrusive rules of engagement” and other silly things like the protection of human rights. The public should just let him do his job “killing bad guys”, he says. It goes on for pages!
I am beginning to wonder how long this attitude of broad disdain for civilians can persist within the military before the military will be considered completely out of touch.
On April 2, 1982, Argentine Marines and Special Forces troops landed near Stanley, the capital of the Falklands and the largest community, and took control of the islands, establishing by force Argentina's historical claim to the islands. However, Great Britain's response was not what Argentina expected and a task force of naval ships and troops set sail on the 8,000 mile voyage to reclaim the Falklands setting the stage for a clash of the old and new worlds in this remote area of the South Atlantic.
Squad Battles Falklands lets you recreate this short, but sharp war between Great Britain and Argentina over what boiled down to little more than national honor. As the British player you can command some of the finest troops in the world, including the SAS, SBS, Paras and Royal Marine Commandos as you try to return British sovereignty to a part of the Commonwealth. Or as the Argentine player, your command includes Army commandos, paratroopers and the conscripts who fought with pride for the love of their country. The wind-swept, barren hills of the Islas Malvinas await you.
The Naval Special Warfare community was reeling in what one member called “shock and disbelief” Saturday after 22 of its own died in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan that also killed eight other U.S. service members, a civilian interpreter and seven Afghan soldiers.
The CH-47 Chinook crash, which occurred during a raid in Wardak province, is believed to be the biggest single loss ever suffered by the NSW community or in the 24-year history of U.S. Special Operations Command.
Of the 22 NSW members killed, 17 were SEALs and five were direct support personnel, according to the source in the NSW community. Two of the SEALs were from a West Coast SEAL unit, but the others were from Gold Squadron of Naval Special Warfare Development Group, or DevGru, sometimes known as SEAL Team 6, said the NSW source.
DevGru, based in Dam Neck, Va., is the Navy’s “Tier One” special mission unit that operates as part of task forces formed under the Joint Special Operations Command, Fort Bragg, N.C. It is the Navy’s equivalent to the Army’s 1st Special Forces Operational Command — Delta, or Delta Force. DevGru has four line squadrons — Blue, Gold, Red and Silver — plus a strategic reconnaissance element known as Black Squadron.
Each squadron is divided into three troops. The crash wiped out an entire troop in Gold Squadron, said the NSW source.
"I am deeply saddened by the loss of many outstanding Americans in uniform and of their Afghan counterparts earlier today in Afghanistan. Their courage was exemplary, as was their determination to make this a safer world for their countries and for their fellow citizens. We will stay the course to complete that mission, for which they and all who have served and lost their lives in Afghanistan have made the ultimate sacrifice. They and their families are in my thoughts, in my prayers and in my heart."
The Secretary of the Army John McHugh announced today a change in the length of future unit operational deployments from 12 months to nine months. This change will be fully implemented by April 2012, and applies to division-level-and-below units. This policy will not affect personnel or units currently deployed or deploying prior to Jan. 1, 2012. The deployment period for high demand and low density units and individual deployers will remain one year.
The reduced deployment length will improve soldier and family quality of life while continuing to meet operational requirements and is an important step in sustaining the all-volunteer-force. This policy change is consistent with secretary of defense policies for utilization of the total force. Implementation of this change is based on the projected demand for Army forces, and is contingent on global security conditions and combatant commander requirements.
McAfee, one of the leading IT security companies, has uncovered a five year-long hacking campaign against Western companies and international organizations including the UN conducted by a "foreign government" (almost certainly China). I can only conclude that our sick financial co-dependency with China, in which they loan us back our own money to buy more of their junk, has us so cowed that we are reluctant to offend the Chinese government by calling them out on these shenanigans.
Yes, this has become a rant. In my opinion, our relationship with China is the tip of an iceberg of some very fundamental, structural issues in American society.
One of the Canadian navy's four Victoria-class submarines will be restricted in its ability to dive deep beneath the seas because of rust, according to a document obtained by The Canadian Press.By: Shelldrake
A Feb. 9, 2010, briefing note prepared by Lt.-Cmdr. Helga Budden recommends repairing seven areas of general rust and three regions of localized pitting rust on HMCS Windsor.
Budden recommends the repair be carried out through a "protect and monitor" option which calls for grinding away and priming the corroded areas, with regular checks of those areas to be conducted once the submarine is operational.
But her note says that option would result in a new depth limitation for the submarine.
"Materiel safety of the submarine would be maintained through a depth limitation caveat on the Windsor's submarine safety document register," says the note, obtained under federal access-to-information legislation.
The note was based on research done by defence research scientists in Halifax.
