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MANAMA, Bahrain (AP) — Marine Gen. James F. Amos, the face of opposition in the military to lifting the ban on gays serving openly, now acknowledges his concern has proven unfounded that repeal would undermine the war effort. In fact, he says, Marines have embraced the change. In an Associated Press interview, Amos called the repeal in September "a non-event."

<p>PENSACOLA NAVAL AIR STATION, Fla. — The Navy's Blue Angels have been thrilling audiences for more than six decades with their acrobatic flying in fighter planes, but a new era of federal budget worries and proposed deficit cutting has some inside and outside the military raising questions about the millions it costs to produce their shows.</p>

According to an explosive document, investigators from the U.S. military’s top investigative office found evidence that a Pentagon survey pivotal to the [DADT] repeal was engineered months prior to its release, and was deliberately skewed in later media leaks, with the intention of swaying Congress towards repeal despite opposition from combat troops. An unredacted version of the April 2011 report by the Defense department’s Inspector General was leaked to the conservative Center for Military Readiness, and a slightly redacted version was confirmed as authentic by a Defense spokesperson to LifeSiteNews.com. The authors found that Jeh Johnson, a co-chair of the...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Pentagon chief Leon Panetta has decided to end the ban on gays serving openly in the armed services and certify that repealing the 17-year-old prohibition will not hurt the military's ability to fight, officials said Thursday. His decision, which was expected, comes two weeks after the chiefs of the military services told Panetta that ending the ban would not affect military readiness.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to certify that gays can serve openly in the armed services

(Reuters) - Defense Secretary Robert Gates bluntly told Marines on Sunday that they won't be able to opt out of their enlistment just because they disagree with a government decision to end a ban on gays serving openly in the military. Gates, who is on a tour of Afghanistan to bid farewell to the troops before stepping down at the end of the month, was quizzed by a Marine sergeant about the controversial policy during a question and answer session at a base in southwestern Helmand Province.

On Tuesday, Defense Secretary Robert Gates released a long-awaited Pentagon working-group report on the repeal of the "don't ask, don't tell" policy enacted under President Bill Clinton. Most troops, the review found, would not object to a repeal. Some troops made strong arguments in favor of repeal. As one service member noted, "We need all available men and women who are willing to serve their country, no matter what their sexual orientation is." Another said, "We shouldn't turn people away because of things they do in their private life." One gay service member noted that a repeal would "take a...

Signaling the growing seriousness of the Obama administration's commitment this year to ending the military's ban on gays serving openly in the armed forces, the Defense Department said Sunday that it will release a long-awaited report on the matter earlier than planned because senators are eager to vote on whether to repeal the policy. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates has ordered the report to be released on Nov. 30, one day earlier than planned, "to support Congress's wish to consider repeal before they adjourn," Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said Sunday. The Senate is slated to vote again on a defense...

Defense Secretary Robert Gates has no plans to stay on at the Pentagon through the end of President Obama’s first term in office. Gates, whose service now spans one Republican and one Democratic administration, told reporters at the Pentagon on Thursday that he has already made up his mind about his departure date, but refused to disclose any more details. Gates told Foreign Policy magazine earlier this year that the logical point for his departure would be in 2011 to give the president enough time to pick the appropriate successor before the 2012 reelection season starts in earnest. “Having a...

Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell confirmed to the Pentagon press corps that Defense Secretary Robert Gates called Florida pastor Terry Jones this afternoon to express his “grave concerns” about a planned Koran burning because it could place US military lives at risk. Morrell said Gates placed a call between 4 and 4:30 p.m. today and engaged the pastor in a “very brief conversation." "The Secretary expressed his grave concerns to the pastor that going forward with the Koran burning would put the lives of American servicemembers at risk, especially in Iraq and Afghanistan and he urged him not to proceed...

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates frequently makes the point that Congress funds Defense Department personnel far more easily than it does State Department employees. "There are about 6,000 FSOs," or Foreign Service officers, he told an audience in San Francisco this month. He drew laughter when he added that former secretary of state "Condi Rice used to say, 'We have more people in military bands than they have in the Foreign Service.' She was not far wrong." Well, maybe Gates should take a closer look at those military bands during his campaign to trim defense spending. My interest was triggered...

Sec. Gates's exit sparks talk of Hillary Clinton taking over at the Pentagon. Speculation in the nation's capital on who will replace Robert Gates at the Pentagon has centered on an intriguing possibility: Hillary Clinton. Gates told Foreign Policy magazine that he wants to step down as secretary of Defense sometime in 2011. A Republican, Gates was the only member of President George W. Bush’s Cabinet to stay on under Obama. “It would be a mistake to wait until January 2012 [to leave],” Gates said. “This is not the kind of job you want to fill in the spring of...

Virginia officials reacted with bipartisan dismay on Monday to Defense Department budget shifts that will cost the state thousands of jobs in coming years and will dramatically impact the economies of the Norfolk area and Northern Virginia. Most of the immediate reaction revolved around Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates's proposal to close the U.S. Joint Forces Command. It is a major employer in Hampton Roads, including Norfolk and Virginia Beach, whose elimination could translate into the loss of 6,100 military, civilian and contractor jobs in the region. But a proposal to slash the Pentagon's budget for military contractors over the...

WASHINGTON -- Officials briefed on the decision say Defense Secretary Robert Gates plans to eliminate a major military command in Norfolk, Va., and try to cut the Pentagon's use of outside contractors by 10 percent next year. The plan was to be announced at a Pentagon press conference on Monday. It is part of a broader effort to trim $100 billion from the military's mammoth budget in the next five years, as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan begin to wind down and Congress turns its attention more to domestic priorities.

All that mattered Wednesday was the mission. Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal deserved to be fired for the contemptuous remarks that he and members of his staff made to a reporter about President Obama and his national security team. But Obama would have been justified in sticking with McChrystal if, in the president's estimation, firing General Loose Lips would have done significant harm to the mission -- achieving our nation's goals in Afghanistan. Fortunately, Obama struck on a way to do what's best for the United States -- reaffirm the primacy of civilian command over the military -- without compromising the...

Defense Secretary Robert Gates will recommend that Gen. James Amos become the next commandant of the Marine Corps, according to a report in Tuesday's Washington Post. The newspaper quoted an anonymous military source saying that Gates passed over former Camp Pendleton Gen. James Mattis as well as Lt. Gen. Joseph Dunford, head of the base's I Marine Expeditionary Force. The newspaper said that Gates would submit the Amos nomination to President Barack Obama in a few days, and that he also will recommend that Dunford be elevated to assistant commandant. Amos, currently assistant commandant, would be the first commandant to...

Defense Secretary Robert Gates has signaled that the long-awaited and seriously over-budget Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle (EFV) may be the next high-profile project scrapped — the latest in a series of moves meant to streamline the Pentagon’s budget and refocus the military on future challenges. The EFV, an amphibious armored troop transport, was designed to replace the tired AAV-7A1, a 1970s-era vehicle that has had its service life extended several times as the Marine Corps has sought a replacement. Both vehicles occupy a specific niche that few vehicles in the world can (or try) to match. They are purpose-designed to transport...

In his first speech to the Navy League, Defense Secretary Robert Gates laid out a grim portrait of a smaller fleet, one with fewer aircraft carriers, few or no new submarines and a sharply curtailed expeditionary capability for the Marines. Gates told a somber audience today that he did “not foresee any significant top-line increases in the shipbuilding budget beyond current assumptions. At the end of the day, we have to ask whether the nation can really afford a Navy that relies on $3 to $6 billion destroyers, $7 billion submarines, and $11 billion carriers.” On top of that, as...

It was one of the most significant developments in the Obama presidency. We refer to the leak last week of an explosive top secret memo sent in January by the Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to President Obama's national security adviser, Gen. James L. Jones, deploring the lack of planning concerning Iranian nuclear aspirations should the administration's much ballyhooed outreach approach fail. In itself, the memo's conclusion is nothing less than stunning - a senior official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, characterized the document as "a wake-up call." Yet the very fact that this highly classified analysis was leaked...

CSPAN video featuring Defense Secretary Gates on revamping the US Export Control System in a very big way. The video may be viewed Here