Free Republic

WEST POINT – A West Point instructor was found dead in Atlantic City Sunday afternoon. Atlantic City police are investigating, but there is no indication of foul play at this time, West Point’s public affairs office said in a news release Monday afternoon. Maj. Benjamin Recla, 34, was an instructor in the Department of Civil and Mechanical Engineering, and was an officer representative for the West Point Flying Team. He was a member of the West Point class of 2004 and was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the aviation branch of the Army. “I wish to extend to his...

The nation's military would most likely disobey Donald Trump if he instituted such campaign promises as torturing suspected terrorists and killing family members if he were to become president, retired Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden said. "If he were to order that once in government, the American armed forces would refuse to act," Hayden Friday told HBO talk-show host Bill Maher. Hayden once directed both the CIA and the National Security Agency. "You’re required not to follow an unlawful order," he told Maher. "That would be in violation of all the international laws of armed conflict.

The oppressive secret state has promised harsh retaliation for joint military exericises proposed by South Korea and the US next month. Kim Jong-un's regime has branded them "preparations for war" – amid spiralling tensions after North Korea's recent nuclear test and rocket launch. Pyongyang's Supreme Command of the Korean People's Army said: "All the powerful strategic and tactical strike means of our revolutionary armed forces will go into preemptive and just operations to beat back the enemy forces to the last man if there is a slight sign of their special operation forces and equipment moving to carry out the...

Looking at the case of Sergeant First Class Charles Martland, the highly decorated Green Beret who refused to stand by and do nothing when he was confronted with pure evil, one would think that as a result of how he faced down evil in Afghanistan that he would be given another medal to pin on his uniform. Unfortunately quite the contrary is the case. Instead of being rewarded for having the courage to do the right thing, Sergeant First Class Martland may well be facing the end of his military career. Martland, along with his former commander Captain Daniel Quinn...

Key evangelical leaders are staunchly opposing a proposal to register women for the military draft, saying it would weaken America's military readiness and is at odds with traditional male-female relationships. "A nation relying on female combatants is a nation that has been brought to its knees by political correctness," said Andrew Walker of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. Recently in Congress, Army and Marine Corps leaders testified in favor of registering women for the Selective Service. "Not only Evangelicals, but also Catholics and Christian pacifists should speak out," Chelsen Vicari of the Institute on Religion and...

Donald Trump on Friday cited an apocryphal story about a U.S. general who purportedly dipped bullets in pigs' blood to execute Muslim prisoners a century ago in an effort to deter Islamic terrorism. Speaking at a rally in North Charleston, South Carolina, Trump reiterated his claim that the U.S. should "go much further" than waterboarding suspected terrorists, telling the story of Gen. John Pershing in the Philippines, who Trump said captured 50 Muslim prisoners a century ago and dipped 50 bullets in blood. "And he lined up the 50 people and they shot 49 of those 50 people, and he...

Obama Invites Enemy Spies to U.S. Military Brainstorming Sessions One catastrophic intelligence flap after the next. February 15, 2016 Humberto Fontova This very week General James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence, testified that Castro's spies remain a serious security threat to the U.S.: "The threat from foreign intelligence entities...is persistent, complex, and evolving. Targeting and collection of US political, military, economic, and technical information by foreign intelligence services continues unabated. Russia and China pose the greatest threat, followed by Iran and Cuba..." (General James Clapper, Washington D.C. Feb 9, 2016.) But two weeks ago (Jan. 26-29th) when the U.S....

When our national focus was still sane, the United States Department of Defense had a singular goal: defending the U.S, while maintaining the capability to wage war on two fronts. What did that look like? If the United States were drawn into a two front war like World War II, we would be able to triumph. So what happens when you take on so many priorities that the objective actually becomes more elusive? We should ask the Pentagon after they implement Directive E 4715.21, or the directive relating to "Climate Change Adaptation and Resilience." The directive comes as a direct...

When asked if women should be required to sign up for the military draft at last weekend's GOP debate in New Hampshire, several candidates voiced their approval. After all, the military has opened all combat roles to women. Following the debate, Sen. Ted Cruz disagreed with his rivals. He called the proposal "nuts."Lt. Gen. (US Army-Ret.) William "Jerry" Boykin appears to agrees with the Texas senator. Boykin, the executive vice president of the Family Research Council, sent an urgent email to supporters on Tuesday noting how concerned he was after last weekend's GOP debate. He said the new proposal to make women sign...

The United States of America, 2020 President Hillary Clinton has been in office since January of 2017, after defeating Donald J. Trump in the closest and most litigated election in American history. Disliked as a candidate by the right, as President she is despised by Congress and most Americans, who are now well aware that an incompetent criminal sits in the Oval Office. The vast social engineering of the US military that rode roughshod over the armed services under Barack Obama is now legal policy. Open homosexuality is common in all branches. Transgenders who have undergone sex change operations, those...

The first woman in Tennessee and the fourth in the nation to enlist as a combat engineer in the Army went AWOL last month and is now considered a deserter, according to a military spokesperson. Erika Lopez made headlines in July when she enlisted for a role that could put her on the front lines of battle, just after the U.S. Army lifted its ban on women in combat roles. Ms. Lopez was in basic training at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, by September but was placed on convalescent leave by the end of the year, according to a local CBS...

To meet the Obama administration's goal of "implementing a robust diversity strategy" at the Department of Defense (DOD), the agency's director of diversity violated government rules by distributing hundreds of thousands of dollars to controversial leftist groups. Adding insult to injury, a "consulting" firm gets nearly half a million dollars from the DOD to help distribute the money to groups--even those that don't qualify--that support the Pentagon's "diversity strategy and program objectives." Among the recipients is the notorious open borders group League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), Minority Access Inc., a Maryland-based nonprofit committed to decreasing disparities and reducing...

Wartime U.S. presidents have taken keen personal interest in picking the most lethal gun for the military. But in President Obama's first foray into small-arms procurement for the armed forces, his Jan. 4 executive order on gun control directs the Pentagon to find ways to make not so much more lethal firearms, but safer ones. His direct order has brought a few snickers among retired combatants who argue that the commander in chief is issuing his directive at a time of more pressing small-arms priorities. The military, critics say, fields a flawed personal rifle and has spent more than a...

As part of his commitment to build the military "force of the future," Defense Secretary Ash Carter on Thursday announced a series of "family-friendly" initiatives to attract and retain "the best America has to offer." "We are not Google. We are not Walmart. We're war fighters. But that doesn't mean we should not be challenging ourselves just like the private sector," Carter told reporters at the Pentagon. [...] The Defense Secretary outlined the following initiatives: [...] Making military workplaces more accommodating to women when they return from maternity leave: The focus here is to make it easier for new mothers...

Washington D.C. is currently being bombarded with snowfall, so most government employees thought it would be best to take the day off. I mean, if it's dangerous, then sure - take the day. But it's pretty typical of the government to do nothing while others go about their business, isn't it? Check out what's happening during the blizzard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington, VA...

Forget looking the other way as illegals stream across the southern border. The Obama administration is now looking at having the federal government supply housing to thousands of illegals on several military bases, according to The Washington Examiner. The new surge of illegal immigrant youths has forced the federal government to look at an emergency plan to house them at six military bases at at least two federal worker centers, according to the administration. The Pentagon is beginning "site assessments" at bases as far north as North Dakota and Massachusetts. According to the newspaper, Alabama Republican Rep. Martha Roby unveiled...

OF COURSE 2015 was a miserable year; all years are miserable. It was a year of rampage killings and police brutality, of natural disasters and government corruption. There were ghastly terror attacks and devastating civil wars, floods of refugees and acts of unspeakable cruelty. Airliners were blown out of the sky. Priceless antiquities were destroyed. Politics seethed with incivility. Too many innocents died young, too many officials lied, too many victims suffered.You don't have to look far for proof that this has been an annus horribilis, and that things are getting worse. You never do. The conviction of decline routinely...

The Joint Chiefs of Staff has indirectly supported Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in a bid to help him defeat jihadist groups, a bombshell report by investigative journalist Seymour Hersh claims. Hersh writes in the London Review of Books that the group of senior military leaders who advise Secretary of Defense Ash Carter sent intelligence through Israel, Germany, and even Russia.

Jet-lagged from a long overseas trip, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel had just sat down with his wife for a quiet dinner at an upscale Italian restaurant in northern Virginia when his phone rang. It was the White House on the line. President Barack Obama wanted to speak with him. It was Aug. 30, 2013, and the U.S. military was poised for war. Obama had publicly warned Syrian strongman Bashar al-Assad that his regime would face consequences if it crossed a “red line” by employing chemical weapons against its own people. Assad did it anyway, and Hagel had spent the day...

The plans of the next president are personal to the officers of the Pentagon, who are threatening to quit if The Donald becomes commander-in-chief. Republican presidential candidate and business mogul Donald Trump has repeatedly vowed to build up the U.S. military if elected president. But it is not clear he will have the experienced commanders within the ranks to do it. In the halls of the Pentagon, there is a different plan afoot for the Trump presidency. Here, officers are privately contemplating what they would do should Trump become their commander-in-chief. And more often than not, they proclaim they will...