Free Republic

The State Department’s Counter Terrorism (CT) Bureau apologized on Tuesday for promoting a controversial Muslim scholar whose organization has reportedly backed Hamas and endorsed a fatwa authorizing the murder of U.S. soldiers in Iraq. The apology came on the heels of a Friday Washington Free Beacon report detailing the CT Bureau’s promotion of Sheik Abdallah Bin Bayyah, the vice president of a radical Muslim scholars group that was founded by a radical Muslim Brotherhood leader who has called “for the death of Jews and Americans.” Bin Bayyah himself is one of several clerics who endorsed a 2004 fatwa, or religious...

Have you ever noticed coins on a gravestone, and wondered why they were there? When a U.S. service member or loved one leaves a coin on a gravestone it has special significance. Though the meaning of this custom has changed over time, it’s a tradition with a long history.The idea of leaving coins with the departed dates back as far as the Greeks and Romans. According to Greek mythology, the River Styx separates the living from the dead and Charon, the ferryman of Hades, will not carry your soul across without a payment. So unless you had a coin, your...

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama says the U.S. has deployed 80 military personnel to Chad to help located more than 200 girls kidnapped in Nigeria.

A Saudi solider devoured a snake alive during military training that was watched by the Gulf kingdom’s interior minister Prince Mohammed bin Nayef. Arar newspaper published pictures showing the soldier biting into the reptile’s head before going down into its body. The paper said the drill involving an elite army unit was intended to demonstrate the troops’ ability to adapt to various natural conditions.

Teacher orders boy, 10, to remove Help for Heroes wristband worn in memory of Lee Rigby 'because it might cause offence' By Mark Duell PUBLISHED: 04:33 EST, 12 March 2014 A teacher allegedly ordered a 10-year-old boy to take off his Help for Heroes wristband because it could cause offence. Tracy Tew was shocked when her son Charlie was put on a report card at Maldon Primary School in Essex after he refused to take off the charity rubber bracelet sold to honour injured soldiers. Charlie wears the wristband - bought at the Colchester Military Festival - in honour of...

Apparently the Russian solider who is seen threatening to shoot unarmed Ukraine forces because he is following his orders was not told today Russian president Vladimir Putin denied sending troops inside the Ukraine...

Gov. Scott Walker: It’s ‘Unfathomable’ That Nat’l Guard Member Posted These Photos Online Feb. 19, 2014 10:25am Dave Urbanski Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker said it’s an “outrage” that a now-suspended National Guard member posted photos making light of military funerals online. Spc. Terry Harrison was suspended after posting photos making light of military funerals. (Image source: WISN-TV) “To me, it’s just completely unacceptable,’ the Republican governor told WISN-TV in Milwaukee. “It’s an outrage. It’s unfathomable to me that people who are not just service members, but who were picked to be in this highly specialized area, wouldn’t be sensitive enough...

U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan are now forced to fight a two-fronted war. Before each deployment, these soldiers understand fully that day after day they will do battle against relentless terrorists with shifting loyalties and unspeakable hatred. But what none of them could have foreseen was the killing field that would open from their rear: the Continental United States. Our government’s incessant tightening of already restrictive ROE (Rules of Engagement), compounded by the failed COIN (Counterinsurgency) strategy—also known as “winning hearts and minds”—has made an otherwise primitive enemy formidable. Our best and brightest come home in body bags as politicians and...

Roman Tritz’s memories of the past six decades are blurred by age and delusion. But one thing he remembers clearly is the fight he put up the day the orderlies came for him. “They got the notion they were going to come to give me a lobotomy,” says Mr. Tritz, a World War II bomber pilot. “To hell with them.” The orderlies at the veterans hospital pinned Mr. Tritz to the floor, he recalls. He fought so hard that eventually they gave up. But the orderlies came for him again on Wednesday, July 1, 1953, a few weeks before his...

London (AFP) - Two Muslim extremists were on Thursday found guilty of the gruesome murder of a British soldier in broad daylight on a London street. Michael Adebolajo, 29, and Michael Adebowale, 22, hacked to death soldier Lee Rigby as he walked back to his barracks in Woolwich, southeast London, in May.

We don't spend much time examining the underpinnings on which our lives rest. We remember the cops and firefighters and EMTs when we need them -- and when we need them, we really need them -- but otherwise, we've got things to do, or think about doing, or get out of doing. We may volunteer to do some work for our church or political party or civic club. Or maybe not. We may vote, or not. We sit in classrooms listening to another lecture. Or maybe even giving one. We take the kids to school on the way to work....

Navy SEALs ordered to remove ‘don’t tread on me’ Navy Jack from uniforms 10:44 AM 11/01/2013 Carl Higbie Author, 'Battle on the Home Front' The Navy Jack is the ‘don’t tread on me’ flag, one that has earned a revered place in America’s naval history and a beloved place in sailor’s hearts, through its use for over two centuries. This symbol of America’s naval ferocity has spanned our country’s entire existence, flying from the masts of the Continental Navy during the war of independence, to today’s War on Terror. In fact, an amendment to the Navy code called SECNAV Instruction...

Five IDF soldiers were wounded near the city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza on Thursday evening. An initial investigation has found that terrorists detonated an explosive device as IDF soldiers were operating in the area, preparing to blow up the terror tunnel that was recently discovered by IDF soldiers, leading from Gaza into an Israeli kibbutz. As the soldiers crossed the border fence, the device was detonated, wounding the five soldiers who were taken by helicopter to the Soroka Hospital in Be’er Sheva. The IDF responded by opening fire at terrorists who were in the ara.

THE Australian War Memorial has abandoned a proposal to remove the words "known unto God" from the Tomb of the Australian Unknown Soldier after the personal intervention of Tony Abbott. The memorial's governing council decided at its meeting in August to replace two inscriptions on the tomb at the Canberra memorial with words from a speech by Paul Keating. The memorial's director, former Liberal Party leader Brendan Nelson, announced the changes in an unscripted National Press Club speech six weeks ago on a day when attention was focused on the swearing in of the new government. It was several days...

Two “Middle Eastern soldiers” training at Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri were arrested for trying to abduct a 12 year-old local girl for sex.KHOU reported, via Free Republic: Two men training at Fort Leonard Wood are in custody after deputies say they tried to abduct a 12-year-old girl in Pulaski County Friday afternoon.Mohammed Mahmoud Omar Mefleh, 34, and Antoine Clela, 31, were charged with enticement of a child and harassment.The victim told police she was playing with a sibling in her yard when Mefleh and Clela approached her several times and tried to lure her into their vehicle. She told...

Obama’s game is simple, to make the shutdown as painful as possible to average Americans and blame the GOP for it. Every day he is lecturing us about how the GOP can open up the government by passing the budget that he demands. The house GOP/conservatives have countered by sending the Obama Senate separate spending bills that would stop Obama antics to hurt ordinary Americans. Naturally Obama rejects those. The GOP is also countering by calling Obama out on these specific actions, like his kicking WWII vets out of the WWII National Memorial and American citizens out of the DC...

Camouflaged clothing that mimics squid skin is being developed to hide soldiers from night vision equipment.Most camouflage materials used to disguise soldiers and vehicles during the day show up easily when viewed through night vision goggles and infrared cameras. This is because leaves and other foliage reflect infrared light in a different way to other fabrics and materials. However, scientists at the University of California Irvine have created a new “stealth” coating that can change the way it reflects infrared light on command. The films, which are around 100,000 times thinner than a human hair, can be switched on and...

With the President poised to strike in Syria and the Congress set to vote on the issue the week of Sep. 9, the debate about U.S. military intervention in the two-year-old civil war is already happening amongst the American public. Some Americans have made their voices known to their representatives, while many others have said the U.S. should stay out of the conflict, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll. In the poll, only 20% said the U.S. should take action, although that was up from 9% last week. Even if it's clear the Assad regime used chemical weapons on civilians, only...

The Forgotten War, it's called. Which is why it was so good to have it remembered so ceremoniously and extensively this past weekend on the 60th anniversary of the tenuous armistice -- certainly not peace -- that has uneasily endured on the Korean peninsula ever since. The Korean War is worth remembering and so are all those who fought in it, the living and the dead, the great and small, the worthless politicians who knew only how to continue it and the unsung heroes who died in the snow and ice. And let there be no mistake: It was a...

The Seattle news station has the video story online. This soldier was deployed and had a friend watch his dog. When he came back, he found out his friend had either given away or sold his dog. His dog is microchipped and registered to him so it won't be an issue once he finds him. The more people who see this, the better his chances are of finding his dog. http://seattle.craigslist.org/sno/pet/3956713351.html