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President Obama insists he will not have “boots on the ground” in the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), but the line between a combat and advisory role is blurry. Obama plans to send more than 1,600 troops to Iraq as “advisers” to the military, and all of them could find themselves in harm's way. About 800 of the troops are providing security for diplomatic personnel and property, including infantry soldiers and Marines. Although they do not have a combat mission, they are armed and prepared to defend themselves. Several hundred more troops will work closely...

One of the things we predicted when the infamous crime against nature was dropped as a bar to military service was an inevitable descent into moral and sexual debauchery in our armed forces. And we were right. Homosexual conduct is immoral, unnatural and unhealthy. There are a host of pathologies associated with male homosexual conduct, including random, promiscuous, anonymous sex, a highly elevated risk of HIV/AIDS and a proclivity toward sexual violence. This is not a lifestyle any rational society, let alone its military, should embrace or support. Now we are getting more information about just how twisted and dangerous...

Testifying on Capitol Hill Tuesday in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey said that although "we're not there yet," the United States may eventually need to deploy U.S. ground troops to fight ISIS if a coalition and airstrikes fail to get the job done against the terror army. “My view at this point is that this coalition is the appropriate way forward. I believe that will prove true but if it fails to be true and if there are threats to the United States then I of course would...

Phyllis Bennis is a Melissa Harris-Perry fave. How bonkers-left is Bennis? She's a defender of Iran and its nuclear ambitions, and wants Israel wiped off the map, to be replaced by a single Palestinian state. On today's MH-P, Bennis once again put her radical views on display, arguing that many US soliders aren't truly volunteers, but are "forced in by poverty and lack of other opportunities." "That's absolutely ridiculours," responded Iraq war veteran Earl Catagnus Jr. View the video here.

Gay military service personnel may now serve openly, and now former top Pentagon officials believe that another group should be afforded the same treatment: transgendered Americans. A report issued Tuesday by retired Maj. Gen. Gale S. Pollock, former acting surgeon general of the Army; Brig. Gen. Clara Adams-Ender, former chief of the U.S. Army Nurse Corps; and Brig. Gen. Thomas A. Kolditz, a Yale University professor and professor emeritus at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, opened the door for ending a de-facto “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy for transgendered individuals, the Washington Examiner reported.

His remarks about Ferguson, Mo., and the Michael Brown incident got most of the attention, but the president’s comments on Iraq may be much more important in the long run — and certainly more depressing. The president has never recognized and still refuses to accept the threat posed by the Islamic State. ~snip~ So the bottom line is, is that the situation on the mountain has greatly improved and Americans should be very proud of our efforts. Because of the skill and professionalism of our military and the generosity of our people, we broke the ISIL siege of Mount Sinjar,...

Beau Bergdahl has been returned to “active duty.” Apparently, that means a desk job while the Army considers what should be done with this young enlisted soldier. Bergdahl was held for five years by the Taliban since walking away from his post one night in 2009. President Obama greeted Bergdahl’s relieved parents in Rose Garden at the White House in a move widely criticized. And that was even before Americans learned that the Obama administration had traded young Bergdahl for five of the most murderous Taliban detainees from our facility at Guantanamo Bay. Duty. There seems to be much confusion...

Some members of the armed services, all of whom are currently deployed in war zones, will soon be notified by the Defense Department that they will be involuntarily discharged from the military at the end of their current tours. Why? “Budget cuts.” It’s as simple as that. Shockingly, too, hundreds of Army captains have already been handed the devastating news, according to the New York Post, and more officers are expected to get it, if they haven't already, soon enough. For obvious reasons, this is an outrageous and heartless way to “thank” combat veterans: What is astonishing is that the...

The Commander in Chief of the most powerful military the world has ever seen has a new mission for the brave young men and women who signed up to fight for our great nation: caring for tens of thousands of illegal immigrant children and putting their lives on the line to protect Muslims.

The U.S. Army is moving forward to replace the Cold War-era M9 9mm pistol with a more powerful handgun that also meets the needs of the other services. As the lead agent for small arms, the Army will hold an industry day July 29 to talk to gun makers about the joint, Modular Handgun System or MHS. The MHS would replace the Army's inventory of more than 200,000 outdated M9 pistols and several thousand M11 9mm pistols with one that has greater accuracy, lethality, reliability and durability, according to Daryl Easlick, a project officer with the Army's Maneuver Center of...

It’s an Obama world.The US Air Force kicked Christian Gideon’s volunteers off base in March. The Bibles were too offensive and violated the separation of church and state rule.But US military personnel are expected to adhere Islamic practices during Ramadan.Stars and Stripes reported: U.S. personnel accustomed to drinking their coffee on the drive to work will have to put that habit on hold for about a month. It’s one of a few lifestyle changes Americans will have to make during the holy month of Ramadan.Ramadan is the ninth month of the Islamic calendar. Officials expect Ramadan to begin at sunrise...

The American military is facing a serious personnel issue: More than two-thirds of today's youth are too uneducated, have behavior issues, and are not physically fit enough for service. "We're trying to make decision makers see this is a national-security matter — and they need to prioritize it," retired Maj. Gen. Allen Youngman told The Wall Street Journal.

* In the United States today, the names Apache, Comanche, Chinook, Lakota, Cheyenne and Kiowa apply not only to Indian tribes but also to military helicopters. Add in the Black Hawk, named for a leader of the Sauk tribe. Then there is the Tomahawk, a low-altitude missile, and a drone named for an Indian chief, Gray Eagle. Operation Geronimo was the end of Osama bin Laden. Why do we name our battles and weapons after people we have vanquished? For the same reason the Washington team is the Redskins and my hometown Red Sox go to Cleveland to play the...

President Barack Obama has tapped the vice chief of the Army to take over the U.S. command in Afghanistan later this year as America pulls out its combat troops and leaves a force of about 10,000 to train and advise the Afghan military. …

The Obama administration has quietly repatriated a dozen detainees from a small U.S. military prison in Afghanistan, moving a modest step closer toward winding down the United States' controversial post-9/11 detainee system. President Barack Obama, in a letter to Congress released on Thursday, informed U.S. lawmakers that about 38 non-Afghan prisoners remained at the Parwan detention center outside of Kabul, down from around 50 a few months ago. A U.S. defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that a Frenchman, a Kuwaiti and 10 Pakistani prisoners were sent back to their respective home countries at the end of May....

10) In six short years as president, Obama has taken the Democratic Party from the One to done. While it’s way too early to write off the party even for 2014, the wounds created by supporting this colossal bozo will be even longer to heal than the wounds inflicted by Jimmy Carter. Obama said way more then he knows when he admitted that the problem is he’s president not emperor. 9) Remember when the Fawning News Media said that comedians would have a tough time making fun of Obama because he was so serious, so perfect, so black? Well the...

At a ceremony commemorating some of the bravest Americans of World War II, President Barack Obama reminded the "greatest generation" how the U.S. military has changed under his command, by slipping in references to immigrants and women. "Rock, I want you to know that Staff Sgt. Melvin Sabillo Martin, who is here today, is following in your footsteps. He just had to become an American first. Because Melvin was born in Honduras, moved to the United States, joined the Army. After tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, he was reassigned to the 82nd Airborne. And Sunday, he'll parachute into Normandy. "Wilson,...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The only American soldier held prisoner in Afghanistan has been freed by the Taliban

Last January 2013, then Defense Secretary, Leon Panetta, ordered the Joint Chiefs of Staff to study the feasibility of opening all military jobs to women by 2016. This would include more than 200,000 jobs that make up the core of the ground-level combat force in the Army and the Marine Corps. Opponents of women in combat argue, rightly in my opinion, that the military's physical standards must not be compromised to expand access because our military's fighting effectiveness is at stake. Hauling 50 pounds of equipment while walking 20 miles is a standard that must not be demoted as it...