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The leader of U.S. military efforts to fight ISIS in Iraq says the terror group came within 25 kilometers (15.5 miles) of the Baghdad airport. Offering what appeared to be previously unreported details, Gen. Martin Dempsey told ABC's "This Week" that the United States had to risk bringing in low-flying attack helicopters to keep ISIS at bay. "The tool that was immediately available was the Apache [helicopter]. The risk of operating in a hostile environment is there constantly," the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said. "You're not going to wait until they're climbing over the wall," Dempsey said....

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz accused top U.S. military officials of behaving like “social workers” in Iraq and Syria rather than showing military strength. In an interview Tuesday night with Fox News’ Sean Hannity, Mr. Cruz said he was disappointed by responses from Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Martin Dempsey after he questioned them at a Senate hearing on the administration’s plan to defeat the Islamic State. “Frankly, their answers were far more those you would expect of a social worker, than of military leaders,” Mr. Cruz said. The Republican senator, who is considering a...

US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Dempsey told the Congress on Tuesday that he recommends deploying US ground forces against the Islamic State (ISIS) in Iraq, in a direct contradiction of US President Barack Obama's largely hands off approach. Speaking before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Dempsey backed the coalition being formed against ISIS, but said if the limited airstrikes do not stop ISIS's advance he would push Obama to take the attack to the ground, reports the New York Times. "My view at this point is that this coalition is the appropriate way forward. ...But...

Senator Carl Levin (D-MI) thinks folks were hearing things during General Martin Dempsey’s testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee this morning. When asked if he thought Dempsey’s comments, that a limited American troop presence could be required in certain circumstances in the fight against ISIS, meant the general was opening the door to ground troops, Levin looked at reporters as if they were a dog that had just been shown a card trick. “No,” Levin said. “He said they’re not needed.” Levin was pressed on Dempsey’s comments, in which the general said that a specific mission, such as the...

President Obama has repeatedly declared there will be no combat troops on the ground in Iraq to fight the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. But a Senate hearing Tuesday with top US military officials revealed that pronouncement is on very shaky ground—there is now no question ground troops are under active consideration at the highest levels of government. General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in his opening remarks he isn’t ruling out asking Obama for ground troops. “To be clear, if we reach the point where I believe our advisers should accompany Iraqi...

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...

What is the enduring lesson of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, when the Bush administration overestimated and, in some cases, exaggerated the threat posed by Saddam Hussein? Some say it's to be skeptical of government officials who are making the case for war. I say the legacy should be skepticism toward government officials, period—all of them. Their hidden agendas can shade the case for peace as well as war, which might explain why there's no consensus among so-called experts about the threat posed today by ISIS. On a scale of zero to panic, Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint...

To get an idea of why this White House has placed America in what Senate Armed Services Committee ranking Republican James Inhofe of Oklahoma calls "the most dangerous position we've ever been in as a nation," we turn to one of Obama's biggest mainstream media devotees. In "The Promise," the fawning book about Obama's first year in office by ex-Newsweek columnist Jonathan Alter, we read of a May 2009 meeting with the presidents of Pakistan and Afghanistan on how to "Disrupt, dismantle and defeat al-Qaida." Alter writes, "Nothing much concrete was accomplished ... . The session was kicked off not...

The United States’ top military officer is in Vietnam for historic talks with Communist Party officials, as part of the latest effort to expand defense ties between the two former foes. General Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, meets Thursday in Hanoi with Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung and Defense Minister Phung Quang Thanh. Before entering a closed-door meeting, Dempsey told reporters the visit is “one of the highlights” of his career. It is the first time since 1971 a chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has visited Vietnam. Vietnam’s defense ministry said the talks...

Clint Dempsey at FUSE event With Three Days Grace in 2006. Credit: G. Gershoff/WireImage/Getty Images. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Jun 17, 2014 / 12:55 pm (CNA).- U.S. soccer fans went wild on Monday as team captain Clint Dempsey scored a goal during the first minute of the club’s opening World Cup game against Ghana. The goal is among the quickest in World Cup history and the fastest scored by an American during the World Cup games, adding to numerous records help by the acclaimed player, who is also the first American to score in three different World Cups. Perhaps less...

Late Monday night, Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, posted a note on Facebook regarding the swap of five senior Taliban commanders for SGT Bowe Bergdahl. Dempsey addresses the accusations that Bergdahl may have deserted his post in Afghanistan, but allows that any investigation will depend on what Bergdahl says. If thatÂ’s the case, there will be no true investigation. Dempsey also fails to acknowledge the six Americans who were killed during searches for Bergdahl. In response to those of you interested in my personal judgments about the recovery of SGT Bowe Bergdahl, the questions about...

The debate continues over the value of the trade executed to return US soldier Bowe Bergdahl from captivity, especially focusing on the circumstances of Bergdahl’s capture. The chair of the Joint Chiefs, General Martin Dempsey, issued a statement today that the Army would indeed investigate those circumstances and the allegations of desertion in due course. Dempsey argued, though, that this question is and should be separate from the duty of the US to get him back from his captors: The Army will investigate charges that rescued Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl deserted his post in Afghanistan, Joint Chiefs Chairman Martin Dempsey...

As I say, I'm inclined to be generous, and put some of this down to the natural torpor and ineptitude of government. But Hillary Clinton and General Martin Dempsey are guilty of something worse, in the secretary of state's weirdly obsessive remarks about an obscure film supposedly disrespectful of Mohammed and the chairman of the joint chiefs' telephone call to a private citizen asking him if he could please ease up on the old Islamophobia. Forget the free-speech arguments. In this case, as Secretary Clinton and General Dempsey well know, the film has even less to do with anything than...

With diplomacy having failed miserably to resolve the Russian annexation of Crimea, and soon East Ukraine (and with John Kerry in charge of it, was there ever any doubt), the US is moving to the heavy artillery. First, moments ago, the US DOE announced in a shocking announcement that it would proceed with the first draw down and sale of crude from the US strategic petroleum reserve, the first since June 2011, in what it said was a "test sale to check the operational capabilities of system infrastructure", but is really just a shot across the bow at Putin for...

Minutes after the American consulate in Benghazi came under assault on Sept. 11, 2012, the nation's top civilian and uniformed defense officials -- headed for a previously scheduled Oval Office session with President Obama -- were informed that the event was a "terrorist attack," declassified documents show. The new evidence raises the question of why the top military men, one of whom was a member of the president's Cabinet, allowed him and other senior Obama administration officials to press a false narrative of the Benghazi attacks for two weeks afterward. Gen. Carter Ham, who at the time was head of...

Yesterday was a red letter day--or perhaps it should be called an Islamic green letter one--for U.S. intelligence. For the first time I can recall, the top legislator on a congressional oversight committee actually made clear what motivates our enemies in what used to be called euphemistically the “War on Terror,” ... What makes this incontrovertible statement so noteworthy? It is the fact that the intelligence community is not allowed to say it. Under Obama administration guidelines, for intelligence officers–and for that matter, law enforcement, Homeland Security and military personnel–to talk about Islamic jihadism and shariah as the motivation for...

SIMI VALLEY, Calif.—The U.S. military's top commanders, groping for ways to cope with a shrinking Pentagon budget, have agreed to a plan that would curb the growth of pay and benefits for housing, education and health—prized features of military life that for years have been spared from cuts. Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in a weekend interview that without such changes, the cost of military personnel would soon rise to 60% from about half of the defense budget. "What we have asked these young men and women to do over the last 10 years,...

A young Christian girl beheaded in Syria. The sign of extremism and fanatics, the long beards, is present in each and everyone of these subhuman Muslims who killed this small child, in their jihad to Allah – inspired by the Quran. This is Obama, Britain, France, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Turkey funded and supported handiwork. Don’t put your support behind any of these people, whether for military action in Syria, asylum, immigration, another hate preaching mosque. This is what is moving into your town, your country, your society, your neighborhood: video... This video is written with false propaganda claiming...

... President Bashar al-Assad did not personally order last month's chemical weapons attack near Damascus that has triggered calls for US military intervention, and blocked numerous requests from his military commanders against opponents in recent months, a German newspaper has reported, citing unidentified, high-level national security sources. ...

At the National Review, December 14, 2011, there is a past article entitled "John Kerry reporting for duty ... to the Muslim Brotherhood." In that article, it says that the Obama administration described the organization as a "largely secular" and moderate organization. Just two years later, Kerry said that the overthrow of these same "moderates" constituted a return of Democracy to Egypt. Now we hear Kerry and Co. saying that the Syrian rebels are "moderates," too. Riiiiight. The ones that are cannibals? The ones that even Turkish newspapers have past documention on as being caught with 2kg of Sarin gas...