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The last known American veteran of World War I died Sunday at his home in West Virginia. Former U.S. Army Corporal Frank Buckles was 110 years old... Buckles wanted to serve when World War I broke out, and his lie to the recruiter made it possible. Shortly afterward, at age 16, he deployed to Europe as an ambulance driver. He saw the horror of war close up, ferrying the wounded from the trenches to primitive field hospitals. Later, he drove German prisoners back to Germany. Buckles left the army in 1920 and years later he went to work for a...

Washington (CNN) -- Frank Buckles, the last living U.S. World War I veteran, has died, a spokesman for his family said Sunday. He was 110.

Numbers come precisely from the agile mind and nimble tongue of Frank Buckles, who seems bemused to say that 4,734,991 Americans served in the military during America's involvement in the First World War and that 4,734,990 are gone. He is feeling fine, thank you for asking. The eyes of the last doughboy are still sharp enough for him to be a keen reader, and his voice is still deep and strong at age 107. He must have been a fine broth of a boy when, at 16, persistence paid off and he found, in Oklahoma City, an Army recruiter who...

It is the spontaneous gestures that tell the story behind the ceremony, the moments of real emotion that cut through it all to lay bare the thoughts on people’s minds. Today, as Henry Allingham struggled in vain against the infirmities of old age as he attempted to rise to his feet, it told a powerful story of remembrance and loss. Almost everyone knows the name of Henry Allingham now - and Harry Patch and Bill Stone, Britain’s surviving veterans from the First World War. The last living reminders of a generation that sustained such terrible losses, they are the symbols...

American entrepreneur Gregg Bemis finally gets courts go-ahead to explore the wreck off IrelandIt is the best known shipwreck lying on the Irish seabed, but it is only today that the owner of the Lusitania will finally begin the first extensive visual documentation of the luxury liner that sank 93 years ago. Gregg Bemis, who bought the remains of the vessel for £1,000 from former partners in a diving business in 1968, has been granted an imaging licence by the Department of the Environment. This allows him to photograph and film the entire structure, and should allow him to produce...

58 years later, records unsealed in Rosenberg spy case After 58 years, historians and journalists will have a chance to examine the secret grand jury testimony of witnesses in the espionage case against Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. The couple was investigated in 1950, tried in 1951 for conspiracy to commit espionage and convicted and sentenced to death in 1953. Cold War scholars are hoping the grand jury transcripts will shed light on some nagging questions about the case -- primarily, just how strong the case was against Ethel Rosenberg. The National Security Archive, the American Historical Association, the Georgetown University...

I never thought the day would come. But here it is! Being an Armenian -- like playing women's basketball at Rutgers, losing money on Enron, and contracting AIDS in Africa before it -- is now relevant and topical. Hell, yes. I feel so damn temporarily important, and I wouldn't trade it for having sold steroids to sluggers or resisted arrest in Los Angeles or, for that matter, having rented storefront from Barney Frank. Bask, fellow Armenians! Bask. Ours is the world and all that's in it -- and, which is more, we'll have a hairy son. Lest you've been comatose...

'You know," drawled Fred Thompson at a recent rally in Des Moines, Iowa, "you look back over our history and it doesn't take you long to realize that our people have shed more blood for other people's liberty than any other combination of nations in the history of the world." This is an interesting statement, and not only because Fred Thompson has a good shot at being the Republican nominee for president in 2008, and an outside chance of winning. It's also interesting because of who Thompson is. Fred Thompson is a Washington lobbyist. That's not what his campaign highlights,...

It is not often that servicemen have to fight a double war - one on the home front and one overseas. Training at the Tuskegee Airfield in Alabama was segregated But this is exactly what America's legendary Tuskegee Airmen did, more than 60 years ago. While they were fighting the Nazis abroad, they were battling racism at home. Their double victory has been honoured by Congress, which has presented the survivors of America's first black air squadron with the Congressional Gold Medal. The medal, which is the highest civilian award bestowed by Congress, can also be awarded to military...

The words drifted across the frozen battlefield: 'Stille Nacht. Heilige Nacht. Alles Schlaft, einsam wacht'. To the ears of the British troops peering over their trench, the lyrics may have been unfamiliar but the haunting tune was unmistakable. After the last note a lone German infantryman appeared holding a small tree glowing with light. 'Merry Christmas. We not shoot, you not shoot.' It was just after dawn on a bitingly cold Christmas Day in 1914, 90 years ago on Saturday, and one of the most extraordinary incidents of the Great War was about to unfold. Weary men climbed hesitantly at...

Much has been said and written today about the fact that we have reached a dubious milestone (1000 US dead) in the Iraq War. The deaths of so many American service personnel has energized anti-war activists and pundits and again we are hearing the words like quagmire and bloodbath bandied about carelessly. While I do not intend to demean the bravery and sacrifice of US soldiers in Iraq or minimize the tragedy that every death or injury entails, I do think that it might be helpful to put the current casualty figures in some type of historical perspective. The last...

Austrian Emperor to Take Command at Vienna Headquarters War Fever at Capital Crowds Cheer Outbreak of Hostilities and Demonstrate at Friendly Embassies Outbreak of Food Riots Prices Soar as Hostilities are Declared and the Government Steps in to Regulate There Manifesto From Emperor Forced to Grasp the Sword, He Says, to Defend the Honor of His Monarchy France Fears a Great War Army Moves to the Frontier - Belief in Paris That Russia Will Not Desert Servia VIENNA, July 28- Upon the issue of the formal declaration of war against Servia today Emperor Franz Josef gave orders for the removal...