Free Republic

Chief Warrant Officer 5 Ralph E. Rigby just became the last Vitenam War draftee to leave the Army. He retired after 42 years spent there. Rigby always had a love for vehicles and had just started his own mechanic shop when he received a draft notice during the Vietnam War. His first, joking response to the message was: “I don’t have to put up with this! I can just move to Canada like everyone else, and avoid all of this.” His mother, though, had this message for him: “No Way! You are not a quitter. We do not quit in...

Off-the-shelf fix for veteran hospital waiting lines “To care for him who shall have borne the battle and his widow and orphan”. This Abraham Lincoln quote on a plaque in front of the Veterans Administration building is a succinct mission for the VA. Our veterans have earned our best efforts toward this end. Congress recently acted in a rare bi-partisan fashion to ease the scandalous backlog. Nine million “Veterans Choice” cards allow access to care outside the VA for veterans living at least 40 miles from a VA facility or on very long wait lists. I applaud the efforts of...

It is a battle to send a drone supersonic - and pits China against Britain. Experts have claimed that China's drone, called Dark Sword, is under secret development. It was unveiled in 2006 at an airshow, but has since disappeared from public view.

The head of the troubled Phoenix veterans’ hospital was fired Monday as the Veterans Affairs Department continued its crackdown on wrongdoing in the wake of a nationwide scandal over long wait times for veterans seeking medical care and falsified records covering up the delays. Sharon Helman, director of the Phoenix VA Health Care System, was ousted nearly seven months after she and two high-ranking officials were placed on administrative leave amid an investigation into allegations that 40 veterans died while awaiting treatment at the hospital. Helman had led the giant Phoenix facility, which treats more than 80,000 veterans a year,...

When Textron AirLand first announced the Scorpion—a lightweight surveillance and strike aircraft—last year, it raised a few eyebrows. Now the American company is talking about the first two potential customers for the diminutive jet. Namely, Nigeria and the United Arab Emirates. Neither country has bought the Scorpion … yet. But the company is pitching the aircraft as a solution for featherweight and middle-size countries looking for an advanced combat plane that doesn’t break the bank. This is especially the case for countries that need eyes in the sky—and the ability to go after insurgents.

On June 22, 1941, Nazi German launched Operation Barbarossa, a massive attack on the Soviet Union that was the largest invasion in history. More than three million German soldiers, 150 divisions and 3,000 tanks comprised three mammoth army groups that created a front more than 1,800 miles long. The Germans expected to face an inferior enemy—the Slavs whom Adolph Hitler called untermenschen. Giddy from victories in Poland and France, Hitler and many in his military high command believed it was the destiny of Germany to invade Russia. “The end of the Jewish domination in Russia will also be the end...

Hitler as a Youth "The other side of Adolf Hitler has been suddenly exposed by a letter the post office had lost all these years and suddenly delivered it to the address where he lived as a boy. The problem, they were decades too late. "Hitler wanted to be an artist. He was a painter. He applied to attend art school and waited patiently for a letter of acceptance. That letter never came and Hitler’s dream career was never to be. Was this simply fate?

Today I was visited by a young man who claimed his brother was killed in Afghanistan. He claimed his brother was a Rifleman and gave the 0311 MOS. I don't recall the unit he claimed his brother was with.Something about his story just raised a red flag.The claim was he was raising money to send care packages to troops. I thanked him, told him I was sorry about his brother, but that I wanted to check the website first.The site on his "receipts" stated the charity's site was www.thepatriotproject.com (which I found didn't exist), but the man said it was...

The Gettysburg Address November 19, 1863 Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether...

I have a Carl Gustaf 1915 Mauser. I rifle has threading at the end of the barrel for a blank attachment. I also have what looks like a yellow hard plastic clyinder that fits exactly over all the threading. Was this originally part of the rifle and does it ad value to it.

Really interesting pictures of WW2 at Iwo Jima.

Victoria Police Chief Frank Elsner wants to meet with the Integrated Road Safety Unit after a ticket issued by one of its members led to a storm of reaction on social media and in the community. Debbi Ferguson, a military veteran of 20 years, was pulled over by an IRSU officer as she and a number of other drivers accompanied the body of Pte. Steven Allen from Victoria International Airport to a funeral home on Remembrance Day. Allen, a 20-year-old Victoria High School graduate, died Nov. 3 in a training exercise in Wainwright, Alta. The traffic officer, a member of...

As an online writer, I come across a fair number of memes. Some of them are cleverly arranged to convey a well thought out message. There’s also ones like this: PICTURE ON LINK The sign on the left conveys an obvious fact: it’s pretty hard to hold “pro-choice” beliefs (or hold anything at all) if somebody’s already killed you. The logic behind the sign on the right, however, is a little more hazy. The second message seems to imply that holding pro-life values is somehow incompatible with being pregnant–an odd notion. For although their efforts certainly aren’t easy, pregnant woman...

Sgt. Gustavo Antonio Arroliga-Lopez, a Marine recruiter in Woodbridge and a native of Nicaragua, takes the Oath of Allegiance during Monday’s naturalization ceremony at the National Museum of the Marine Corps. Four Marines were among the 26 newest citizens hailing from 20 different countries. (Photo by John Hollis ) Four Marines were among the group of 26 candidates from 20 different countries to officially become American citizens during Monday’s naturalization ceremony at the National Museum of the Marine Corps. Leon Rodriguez, the director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, administered the Oath of Allegiance and presented each of the candidates...

We are all driven by our belief systems. For instance, we know Christianity can and has propelled simple men to great heights of honor and integrity in the never ending struggle against evil. I offer America as an example. ISIS fighters have a belief system too, to which they devote their lives - Islam The one answer Obama and all other apologist will never be able to answer truthfully is this. What passage in the Koran contradicts the actions of ISIS? Tell me that MF'rs!!

Matty’s back! Days after The Post exposed the military’s wrongful, 16-month-long separation of injured Army Spc. Brent Grommet and his war dog, Matty, the two were finally reunited on Friday. “I’m about the happiest I’ve ever been,” Grommet, 23, told The Post. Grommet and Matty, who specialized in detecting IEDs, were injured when one exploded near them in Afghanistan. Grommet came back with PTSD, traumatic brain injury, migraines, severe chronic back pain and breathing problems. Under Robby’s Law — signed by Bill Clinton in 2000 — military dog handlers have the first right to adopt their animals if injured together....

Mark Paffrath, a Navy Veteran was fired from his hotel job when he posted two photos and a short video of parked Homeland Security vehicals in the parking garage.

n a recent opinion piece in The New York Times, geriatrician Louise Aronson advocated for a new type of building, one designed with an aging population in mind, which, she suggests, might be dubbed “silver” architecture. The idea came to her after taking her father to a top-notch, “green” medical center that was surprisingly unaccommodating for older patients. Sure, sustainability is important, but a building needs to do more than perform efficiently and attract millennials. Aronson notes: Such approaches once may have made sense from a business perspective, but current demographic realities are creating financial and practical reasons to build...

HMCS Toronto crew members are being hailed as heroes after rescuing people from a fire while on shore leave in Turkey. “Six members of the crew provided first response to a fire and assisted in the evacuation of the building, saving lives,” the Department of National Defence said. It all happened in Antalya, Turkey, on Friday. The crew were in a restaurant when a fire broke out. Trained in fire fighting and first responding, they went to work.

Six years ago the White House press corps received President Obama like teenage girls at a Justin Beiber concert. His vision of hope would propel him past Franklin Delano Roosevelt as the greatest President of the people. His amnesty for 13 million illegal aliens would make him more viable than Abraham Lincoln and his three years as a U.S. Senator would give him the leadership necessary to top Washington as the greatest president in American history. [snip]