Free Republic

Retired neurosurgeon Dr. Ben Carson told the Dave Ramsey show on Wednesday that the Department of Veterans Affairs should be folded into the Department of Defense and VA facilities should only be used for specialized care like traumatic brain injuries and limb replacement procedures. “The size of government has to be reduced significantly. There’s a lot of stuff that we’re doing that doesn’t make any sense. We have a Department of Veterans Affairs. We don’t need a Department of Veterans Affairs. Veterans Affairs should be in under the Department of Defense, and it should be smooth transition,” said Carson. The...

New Defense Department guidelines allow commanders to punish journalists and treat them as “unprivileged belligerents” if they believe journalists are sympathizing or cooperating with the enemy. The Law of War manual, updated to apply for the first time to all branches of the military, contains a vaguely worded provision that military commanders could interpret broadly, experts in military law and journalism say. Commanders could ask journalists to leave military bases or detain journalists for any number of perceived offenses. […] A person deemed “unprivileged belligerent” is not entitled to the rights afforded by the Geneva Convention so a commander could...

...Sadly, the Army that stayed cohesive in Iraq and Afghanistan even after losing 5,000 dead is now being broken again by an ungrateful, ahistorical and strategically tone-deaf leadership in Washington. The Obama administration just announced a 40,000 reduction in the Army’s ranks. But the numbers don’t begin to tell the tale. Soldiers stay in the Army because they love to go into the field and train; Defense Secretary Ashton Carter recently said that the Army will not have enough money for most soldiers to train above the squad level this year. Soldiers need to fight with new weapons; in the...

The Department of Defense notified lawmakers Friday that teams will visit two military installations in the United States — Fort Leavenworth in Kansas and the Naval Brig in Charleston, S.C. — to conduct “site surveys” looking into transferring a “limited number” of Guantanamo detainees, Pentagon and Capitol Hill sources told Fox News. The move, coming on the same day Secretary of State John Kerry marked the re-opening of the U.S. Embassy in Cuba, has already triggered a backlash on Capitol Hill. But, despite existing congressional restrictions on moving the detainees to U.S. soil, the notice itself suggests officials are wasting...

Platte River Networks was used by Clinton to maintain 'homebrew' server in her New York State house which held her State Department emails She handed over the server and a thumb drive this week to FBI after emails were found to contain 'above top secret' material Her White House campaign is said to be in 'panic' over the growing scandal which comes out of probe into US diplomats' deaths in Benghazi Daily Mail Online can reveal Denver, Colorado, based firm was sued for illegally accessing master database of US phone numbers It was also accused of causing chaos to White...

Wilmington, Delaware (CNN) -- Police have found homicide victim John Wheeler's cell phone, according to a taxi driver who was interviewed by investigators this week. Athel Scott told CNN National Correspondent Susan Candiotti that police told him they found the cab driver's number in the phone of Wheeler, the former Pentagon official who was found dead in a Delaware landfill. He said investigators wanted to know how his number got there. Scott... says he told the police he didn't have any idea. "I never got a call from the man. I don't know him... He's never been in my cab....

U.S. Army Rangers drill in 2011. A Pentagon spokesman said the military’s elite forces need more diversity, and without, the nation’s security could very well be compromised. “We don’t know where we will find ourselves in the future,” said Army Col. Michael Copenhaver, who’s published a paper on diversity among the special operating forces, USA Today reported. “One thing is for sure: We will find ourselves around the globe. And around the globe you have different cultural backgrounds everywhere. Having that kind of a diverse force can only increase your operational capability.” The comments came as USA Today requested...

There are things which make you just upset, like the liberal progressive left and media accomplices’ rage over the shooting of a lion in Africa but abject disregard and disdain reference Planned Parenthood dismembering babies and selling their body parts. But this story has me dog fighting mad and seriously pissed off. As reported ten days ago by Western Journalism, “A Navy officer and Marine reportedly returned fire at the shooter who killed five service members in Chattanooga, Tenn., even though current policy does not permit military members to carry firearms on facilities such as those where the attack occurred....

As private citizens stand guard at military recruiting centers across the nation, the Army has released a warning to its personnel and recruits, stating that armed citizens should be treated as a “security threat”. Travis Tritten of Stars & Stripes reports: The Army has warned its recruiters to treat the gun-toting civilians gathering at centers across the country in the wake of the Chattanooga, Tenn., shooting as a security threat. Soldiers should avoid anyone standing outside the recruiting centers attempting to offer protection and report them to local law enforcement and the command if they feel threatened, according to a...

Capitol Hill Republicans are demanding Secretary of Defense Ash Carter make changes to the policy of prohibiting personal firearms on Department of Defense property. U.S. Rep. Scott Rigell, R-Va., penned a letter signed by 67 other members of the House as well as Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan. and Sen. John Boozman, R-Ark. Wednesday to Carter calling for the change in light of the attack in Chattanooga last week that left five service members dead. “The American people want to know what we are doing to give their sons and daughters the highest probability that they can go to work in...

The US Army is far more heavily engaged around the world than projected when it began slashing force size several years ago, and its commitments will be hard to maintain in the long run as troop numbers shrink, General Ray Odierno said on Friday. Odierno, the Army chief of staff, said decisions about cutting the size of the force from 570,000 to the current 490,000 were made several years ago when Pentagon planners expected a peaceful Europe, a declining commitment in Afghanistan and no return to Iraq. Instead, he said, the Army is regularly using three brigades in eastern Europe...

Army chief of staff Gen. Ray Odierno said on Friday he has no plans to arm recruiters or add security patrols to military recruitment centers in the wake of the Islamist terror attacks on unarmed, unguarded military offices in Chattanooga, Tennessee on Thursday. Odierno basically said he doesn’t trust his troops to handle their weapons properly.Also on Friday, the Marine Corps ordered recruiters to not wear their uniforms at work for ‘force protection.’Gunnery Sgt. Thomas J. Sullivan, one four Marines killed in Islamist terror attack in Chattanooga, Thursday, July 16, 2015. Photo: Screen grab.Odierno made his comments at a breakfast...

[vanity post] The DoD effort to push perverse sexuality and gender identity into our faces extends to the lowest echelon levels of the military. This crap isn't pushed only by senior, cabinet-level, political appointee-level office of the Pentagon. We face it at the in-your-town level of the base and laboratory and warship. This is pushed by commanders at the military base in your state. Here's an example: Here's the (innocuous) bio of this particular speaker: http://www.asaie.army.mil/Public/ES/oeidocs/Amanda_Simpson_Bio.pdf

In fact, captured terrorists went out of style a long time ago, so that’s not the actual change. Until recently — like, say, two weeks ago — the Department of Defense used the term unlawful combatant as the label for terrorists captured by American military and intelligence forces as a way to distinguish them from uniformed soldiers of a recognized state authority in a straight-up fight. Their new manual dispenses with that term, the Federation of American Scientists noticed today (via Steven Aftergood and Olivier Knox): When it comes to Department of Defense doctrine on military treatment of detained persons,...

Environonsense pretty well covers the gamut from the moronic to the vile that eco-politics now exemplifies Begin with brainwashed college students absurdly demanding their institution of ‘higher learning’, Western Washington University, rescind the masters degree awarded a state senator for admitting being a “climate agnostic.” Sen. Doug Ericksen, who holds a degree in political science and environmental policy, seems to have used the term to illustrate how man-made climate change has become a religion rather than science-based theory. Evidently, that, along with his removing verbiage from legislation referring to climate change as being a threat to the state, was enough...

In the latest of many flagrant examples of how tax dollars are wasted, government-issued credit cards were used by Department of Defense (DOD) employees to make more than $4 million in personal charges, including at casinos and strip clubs. During a one-year period the agency charged 20 million transactions for $3.4 billion on government credit cards, according to a DOD Inspector General report issued this month. About $3.2 million of it was spent at casinos and nearly $1 million on personal expenses, including about $100,000 at strip clubs by 646 card holders. The casino charges were made through 4,437 transactions...

Full title: Judicial Watch: Defense, State Department Documents Reveal Obama Administration Knew that al Qaeda Terrorists Had Planned Benghazi Attack 10 Days in Advance Administration knew three months before the November 2012 presidential election of ISIS plans to establish a caliphate in Iraq Administration knew of arms being shipped from Benghazi to Syria (Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today that it obtained more than 100 pages of previously classified “Secret” documents from theDepartment of Defense (DOD)and the Department of State revealing that DOD almost immediately reported that the attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi was committed by the...

Washington (CNN)—Security conditions at U.S. military bases were raised Thursday night, because of growing concern of a jihadist threat in the U.S. It comes hours after FBI Director James Comey raised the prospect there are thousands of ISIS followers online in the U.S. "We have a general concern, obviously, that ISIL is focusing on the uniformed military and law enforcement," Comey told reporters Thursday. The order was signed by Admiral William Gortney, head of the command. "We have the same concern about the potential threat posed by violent homegrown extremists," said Captain Jeff Davis, spokesman for the U.S. Northern Command...

The head of a powerful House panel is threatening to withhold defense funding over the department's alleged stonewalling in a probe of the controversial swap of five Taliban leaders for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl. Former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel had initially pledged to respond to questions, when lawmakers first demanded to know why the Pentagon had not given Congress the requisite 30-day notice before proceeding with the May 31 prisoner trade. But nearly a year later, the Pentagon has released only a trickle of highly redacted emails from before the swap. Republican lawmakers now plan to attempt the unusual step of...

World Net Daily is reporting: A Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute course approved by the Department of Defense is under fire for labeling the Bible, the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence sexist materials. The Daily Caller reported the class given by the DEOMI, an organization with a mission to provide a “world-class human relations education,” was actually removed from the group’s website upon questioning. But the fact they were there at all – and approved by the Defense Department for use – was alarming enough to some who saw irony in the fact U.S. military service members are...