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OMAHA, Neb., July 30, 2008 – As competitors were hurrying from one competition to the next at the 28th National Disabled Veterans Wheelchair Games, some paused between venues to commit to history their accounts of their military service and the impact it’s had on their lives. Steve Hollingshead, an audiovisual specialist for the Department of Veterans Affairs, puts a microphone on retired Army Lt. Col. Jim Howe, before conducting an interview for the Veterans History Project. Defense Dept. photo by Donna Miles  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Tucked quietly away from the brightly lit competitions, Steve Hollingshead from...

This is a rare creature that has been captured on camera just recently.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A dazzlingly detailed image released by NASA scientists on Tuesday shows the chaotic conditions in which stars are born and die -- in this case in a huge nebula in another neighborhood of our Milky Way galaxy. The image, made from a series of 48 shots taken by the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope in spring and summer of 2005, depicts star birth in a new level of detail. It provides a view spanning a distance of 50 light years across of the Carina Nebula. A nebula is an immense cloud of hot interstellar gas and dust. This...

WASHINGTON, April 15, 2007 – Coalition forces killed and captured several extremists in Afghanistan over the past few days, U.S. military officials reported. Coalition forces detained an extremist and discovered makeshift bomb-making material in a compound in Afghanistan’s Paktika province today. The compound consisted of multiple safe houses that use natural terrain to facilitate the movement of fighters from Pakistan. The bomb-making materials were destroyed in place. No shots were fired and no one was injured during the operation, officials said. Meanwhile, Afghan National Army and coalition troops operating in Afghanistan’s Helmand province received rocket-propelled grenade and small-arms fire...

BOGOTA, Colombia - Authorities captured a fugitive right-wing warlord Tuesday accused in massacres and of running a murderous criminal band involved in drug trafficking and extortion, officials said. Ever Veloza, one of the few top paramilitary bosses who fled into hiding rather than embrace a government peace deal, was arrested in the turbulent banana-growing Uraba region on the Caribbean coast, police said. Better known by his alias "Hernan Hernandez," Veloza once commanded the Banana and Calima blocs of the United Self-Defense Forces, known by its Spanish initials as AUC. The two blocs are blamed for hundreds of murders of human...

WASHINGTON — Coalition Forces captured a suspected al Qaeda in Iraq military planner and detained 14 other suspected terrorists during multiple operations today, military officials reported. -- In Mosul, Coalition Forces detained two suspected terrorists including an alleged al Qaeda military planner who is suspected of attacks in Muhalabiyah. -- In Baghdad, five suspects were detained with alleged ties to a makeshift bomb procurement and operations cell. Coalition Forces northeast of Balad also detained six suspected terrorists who have alleged ties to foreign fighter operations. -- Two more people with suspected ties to al Qaeda foreign fighters were detained today...

BAGHDAD, Oct. 25, 2006 – Special Iraqi army forces, aided by coalition advisors, captured a death squad leader and three people believed to have been involved in the kidnapping of a U.S. soldier in separate raids in the Iraqi capital’s Sadr City neighborhood, military officials reported. Officials said Iraqi and coalition forces had credible intelligence on the location of an insurgent leader personally involved in and directing widespread death squad activity for numerous murder cells in eastern Baghdad. The ground assault force also planned to act on credible intelligence indicating that criminals involved in the kidnapping of a U.S. soldier...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 3, 2006 – Iraqi army and coalition forces detained two suspected insurgents and captured a sizable cache Sept. 29 in a combined operation in Khan Bani Saad, Iraq, south of Baqubah, military officials reported. Soldiers with 2nd Battalion, 2nd Brigade, 5th Iraqi Army Division, and 1-68 Combined Arms Battalion, 3rd Heavy Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, made the find as part of ongoing operations in the town and surrounding villages. The cache consisted of a rocket-propelled-grenade launcher, four RPG rounds, one sniper rifle, three hand grenades, seven AK-47 assault rifles, several rounds of 7.62 mm ammunition and...

JERUSALEM, Israel -- The Israeli government announced today that it captured a key Hezbollah operative during commando raids deep into Lebanon, and that it was currently holding twenty Hezbollah fighters as prisoners-of-war. Over the past week, Israel has conducted two deep-penetration operations behind enemy lines, to attack Hezbollah positions in Tyre and Baalbek where they believed civilians might also be present. Stung by international criticism that it has bombed civilians by accident in Lebanon, "we have preferred to risk the lives of our own soldiers than to kill innocents," military sources told NewsMax. The Israeli cabinet met this morning in...

WASHINGTON, July 11, 2006 – Three bombs detonated just north of Baghdad's international zone today, killing a reported 15 Iraqi civilians and an Iraqi policeman, U.S. military officials said. Reports indicate two terrorists wearing suicide vests blew themselves up, and a makeshift bomb was detonated. Four local nationals also were wounded. Iraqi soldiers from 5th Brigade, 6th Iraqi Army Division and coalition forces responded to the scene. In other news from Iraq, soldiers from 2nd Battalion, 4th Brigade, 2nd Iraqi Army Division, captured an entire terrorist bomb-making cell during a series of raids in Mosul yesterday. Working on a tip...

SIERRA VISTA, Ariz. - Bolstered by National Guard troops, the U.S. Border Patrol in Arizona picked up significantly fewer illegal immigrants in June than it did during the same period last year, according to agency data. However, immigrant rights advocates doubt that lower numbers in Arizona reflect a significant decrease in illegal crossings. The data come nearly two months after President Bush asked states to send soldiers to the Mexican border to help the federal government's effort to curb illegal immigration. The Border Patrol's Yuma Sector saw the most dramatic decrease in migrant arrests, posting a 48 percent drop —...

WASHINGTON, July 7, 2006 – Iraqi army forces conducted an early morning raid today in eastern Baghdad, Iraqi police repelled a terrorist attack in Baghdad today, and coalition forces killed two terrorists and detained five during a raid yesterday, military officials reported. The Iraqi army raid was part of Operation Together Forward, the Iraqi government's plan to improve security conditions in Baghdad. Insurgents immediately engaged the forces, and a firefight ensued. The purpose of the raid was to capture an insurgent leader responsible for numerous deaths of Iraqi citizens, officials said. Police from 2nd Battalion, 4th Brigade, 1st National Police...

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Malaysian police have captured 12 Islamist militants, most of them from Indonesia, who are suspected to have planned terrorist attacks in the region, the Star newspaper said on Tuesday. The dozen men belonged to Indonesia's Darul Islam movement and were arrested recently after six months of police surveillance in the Malaysian state of Sabah, on Borneo island, the daily said. It did not say when the men had been picked up. Police had seized firearms and documents from the men, including bomb-making instructions downloaded form the Internet, the paper said. The men, including at least two...

Iraqi Commandos conduct clearing operations with U.S. soldiers from 1st Battalion, 184th Infantry Regiment during Operation Clean Sweep in south Baghdad, Oct. 28-29, 2005. More than 350 houses were searched and nearly 50 terror suspects were detained. U.S. Army photo by Spc. Dan Balda 'Clean Sweep' Captures Terror Suspects The goal of Operation Clean Sweep was to clear neighborhoods of terrorist activity. By U.S. Army Spc. Dan Balda 4th Brigade Combat Team BAGHDAD, Iraq, Nov. 18, 2005 — Iraqi and U.S. forces recently detained dozens of terror suspects during searches in south Baghdad in Operation Clean Sweep, a mission...

PASADENA, Calif. (AP) - A dazzling photo taken by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope shows colossal pillars of cool gas and dust, giving scientists an intimate look at the star-forming process. The image released Wednesday shows the columns stretching out like fingers similar to an iconic photo taken of the Eagle Nebula by the Hubble Space Telescope in 1995. While the Hubble visible-light image was dubbed "Pillars of Creation," NASA describes the Spitzer infrared image as "cosmic mountains of creation." The image reflects a region in space known as W5, in the constellation Cassiopeia 7,000 light years away, which is dominated...

Police in Britain leak PC guidelines to avoid offending Muslim suspectsZafar Khan, chairman of Luton Council of Faiths (Photo: Luton & Dunstable on Sunday) Police officers in England's Bedfordshire county have been told to take off their shoes and not interrupt anyone praying during raids of Muslim homes, according to leaked guidelines. The 18-point guide, under development before the recent London bombing attacks, says "the Muslim community feels victimized and suspicious of counter terrorist police operations and in the current climate a search at a British Muslim household has the potential to become a critical incident and come under...

Hawra suffered severe burns when she was caught in a cross-fire between terrorists and coalition forces. As she recuperates, her spirit motivates injured troops at the aid station. BAGHDAD, Iraq, Sept. 14, 2005 — By the time she was 15 years old, Hawra had already suffered a lifetime of pain. Her father was killed by the old regime; then, one year ago, her sister was killed when she and Hawra were caught in a cross-fire between terrorists and Coalition Forces. Hawra was trapped in the burning car, leaving her with severe burns on both her legs. She was taken to...

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (Army News Service, Aug. 18, 2005) – The youngest winner in the 60-year history of the All-Army Photography Contest captured her award-winning image with a $10 disposable camera. Ten-year-old Brittney Rankin won the civilian division’s monochrome people category of the 2004 All-Army Photography Contest with a photo titled “Shadow Friends.” During a Morale, Welfare and Recreation Summer Youth Photo Class at U.S. Army Garrison-Michigan at Selfridge, instructor Jim Wilkie passed a disposable camera around and each participant took five photographs. Rankin photographed the feet of classmates and their instructor who were reaching high into the air for the...

BALTIMORE - The Hubble Space Telescope has given astronomers a sneak preview of what they might see July 4 when a NASA probe strikes a comet, creating a cosmic display that may be visible with the naked eye in part of the Western Hemisphere. One of a series of photos taken by the orbiting observatory while preparing for the Independence Day encounter shows a 1,400-mile plume of dust spewing from the comet toward the sun. Johns Hopkins University astronomy professor Paul Feldman said light from the sun most likely heated a pocket of volatile gas trapped beneath the surface, causing...

WASHINGTON (AP) - In a phone call between President Nixon and the man who would become "Deep Throat," the president instructed FBI official Mark Felt to aggressively pursue the case against the gunman who shot George Wallace. There must be no public suspicion of a cover-up, Nixon said, in the wounding of the Alabama governor who was then running for president. The May 15, 1972, phone call is believed to be the only tape-recorded conversation between Nixon and Felt, the No. 2 FBI official. Nixon expressed satisfaction when Felt told him the suspect had some cuts and bruises. "I hope...

CARACAS - Venezuela recalled its ambassador in Bogotá on Thursday after the Colombian government admitted paying a bounty for a leading guerrilla allegedly kidnapped in Caracas and handed over to Colombian police. Colombian Defense Minister Jorge Alberto Uribe, who admitted making the payment, was a ''participant in a crime which may have international implications,'' said Venezuelan Vice President José Vicente Rangel. The recall of Ambassador Carlos Santiago Ramírez was the latest and harshest step in the increasingly bizarre dispute over Rodrigo Granda, a senior member of the guerrilla Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC. The clash could affect relations...

The purpose of FreeRepublic.com's multiple message boards is to limit the topics for each board to particular topics. Posting the same message on all the boards defeats the purpose of multiple-boards for special topics. It is very annoying to see the same message on every bulletin board. PLEASE! DO THE READERS A FAVOR. STOP CROSS-POSTING YOUR MESSAGES!

WASHINGTON - U.S. troops have found a suspected chemical factory in Iraq and officials were trying to determine late Sunday whether it was involved in making chemical weapons, U.S. officials said. The plant is near the city of An Najaf, which U.S. troops reached Sunday on a push to Baghdad, the officials said. President Bush and other U.S. officials say ridding Saddam Hussein's regime of chemical and biological weapons is the main objective of the war. Saddam's government denies it has any chemical, biological or nuclear weapons or programs to produce them. Asked at a news conference in Qatar Sunday...

No details yet. Follows on news of Bin Laden associate from Iran/Afghan border surrenders to Saudi authorities.

A former POW in Iraq names an Ashley-based reservist in a complaint against the U.S. Army. And he compared the treatment at his camp to the abuse that's making international news. Hossam Shaltout said widespread mistreatment from soldiers in Camp Bucca, where he was imprisoned last year, was as inhumane as that depicted in recent photos from Camp Abu Ghraib in Iraq. Shaltout described Camp Bucca as a "torture camp" where soldiers beat and humiliated prisoners, had them lie naked atop each other or pose in sexual positions. "They wanted us to have sex with each other," Shaltout said. He...

Iraq (AP) -- U.S. forces moved a step closer to the most wanted man in Saddam Hussein's regime Wednesday, detaining his four nephews in a pre-dawn raid and capturing another top fugitive thought to be a paymaster in the anti-U.S. insurgency. In the Sunni Triangle region that has been the heart of the guerrilla war, a car bomb exploded in front of a police station in the town of Baqouba, killing the driver and two other Iraqis and wounding 31, including civilians and police. Outside Samarra, U.S. troops killed eight Iraqis after their patrol came under fire. The detention of...

Police arrest eight over Saudi bombings Swiss authorities have arrested and detained eight people in connection with last May's terrorist attacks on Westerners in Saudi Arabia. The Federal Police Office said those arrested, all foreign nationals, were being held on suspicion of providing logistical support to a criminal organisation. The string of bombings on Western residential compounds in Riyadh on May 12 has been linked to Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda network. Twenty-six people - including one Swiss - and nine attackers were killed in the bombings. “The police action was in the context of terrorism investigations, especially in connection...

Guarded by hundreds of armed rebels deep in a malaria-infested jungle, three American captives pass the time playing with a homemade deck of cards and dreaming of their families. The threat of death always hangs nearby. The three U.S. military contractors have been cut off from the outside world since their capture by rebels seven months ago. That isolation was broken when a Colombian journalist traveled for days over rough roads and jungle rivers with a rebel escort to interview them July 25 in remote southern Colombia. "They were nervous, and there were traces of fear on their faces," freelance...

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Taha Yassin Ramadan, No. 20 on the U.S. most-wanted list and Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s vice president, was handed over to U.S. forces in Mosul on Tuesday, the U.S. Defense Department said. Pentagon (news - web sites) spokeswoman Chief Diane Perry confirmed that he had been turned over to the U.S. Army Tuesday. Ramadan also served on Saddam's Revolutionary Command Council member. He was known as "Saddam's knuckles." Al-Jazeera, the Qatar-based satellite broadcaster, said Ramadan was captured by troops of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan Tuesday. He was wearing peasant clothing as a disguise, the...

<p>Public debate on substantive budget issues came to a halt Tuesday as Democrats leaders scrambled to explain why a handful of their members were caught speaking frankly about using the budget crisis to their political advantage.</p> <p>Members of a liberal Democratic group met behind closed doors Monday unaware that a microphone was broadcasting their words throughout the Capitol on about 500 "squawk boxes" that serve legislative offices, lobbyists and reporters.</p>

Al Jafr Prison doesn't appear on maps of Jordan. There are no photographs of the place available from the world's news services. The remote prison appears out of the southern desert as if some medieval apparition, with two towers anchoring a circular stone wall. Barbed wire is everywhere. The notorious prison was closed in the 1970s, but it reopened in the 1990s as a maximum security jail. "This is a prison," a Jordanian intelligence officer explains bluntly, "for terrorist detainees." It's also the place where the CIA has used a secret interrogation center since 9/11, U.S. News has learned. As...

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, March 5 — Osama bin Laden was in Pakistan as recently as last month and met there with his chief operational lieutenant, Pakistani security officials said today. The officials said material seized on Saturday during the arrest of the lieutenant, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, showed that Mr. Mohammed met with Mr. bin Laden sometime in February, possibly in Rawalpindi, the city adjacent to Islamabad where Mr. Mohammed was discovered on Saturday. "There is now no doubt that he is alive and well," a senior Pakistani government official said of Mr. bin Laden in an interview. "We have documents that...

<p>American forces in Iraq have captured a former spymaster believed to know about Iraqi espionage in the United States. In Baghdad, U.S. officials warned the self-proclaimed "mayor" not to arm his followers and conferred Thursday with civic leaders on how to restore order.</p>

Hubble captures 'perfect storm' in space Astronomers say images of a perfect storm have been captured by the Hubble Space Telescope. A storm - a region of turbulent gas and radiation which resembles a raging sea - has been discovered far out in space. The image is being released to commemorate the 13th anniversary of Hubble's launch, and shows a small area within a hotbed of star formation called M17. Also known as the Omega or Swan Nebula, it is located about 5,500 light years away, in the constellation of Sagittarius. Within the nebula, glowing gas is sculpted into furious...

SULAIMANIYAH, Iraq, March 17 — The highest-level officer to defect from Saddam Hussein’s army disappeared from his home in Denmark on Monday under mysterious circumstances, according to family members and a Danish state official. Gen. Nizar al-Khazraji, Saddam’s former army chief of staff, was seen by some as playing an important role in a post-war

U.S. Captures Big Afghan Arms Cache, Detain Seven Thu Sep 19, 7:39 AM ET BAGRAM, Afghanistan (Reuters) - U.S. special forces have captured seven men suspected of being Taliban fighters and truckloads of weapons in an operation near the border with Pakistan, the U.S. military said on Thursday. The arms found at Orgun-e, about 109 miles south of Kabul on Wednesday filled three trucks and included rockets, mines and two anti-aircraft guns, U.S. military spokesman Colonel Roger King said. He called it "a significant haul." "The anti-aircraft weapons are probably particularly significant in that we do a lot of movement...