Free Republic

Last week’s Washington Post bombshell, the news that the Justice Department has given immunity from prosecution to the former State Department staffer who maintained Hillary Clinton’s “homebrew” email server, is forcing Mrs. Clinton and her apologists to alter their media strategy.For months it has been obvious that a serious criminal investigation of the former secretary of State’s reckless mishandling of classified information has been underway. Yet Camp Clinton has maintained that the government is merely engaged in a “security inquiry” that is focused on the physical server itself -- not a probe of criminal suspects. This has never made sense....

Hillary Clinton is in trouble. Really big trouble. According to the Washington Post, the same prosecutor who took down General David Petraeus for improper possession of classified information is now looking into Hillary Clinton's email server. Earlier this week, an intelligence Inspector General revealed Clinton did in fact have at least four pieces of top secret, classified information passed through and stored on her private email server. The investigation is being overseen by two veteran prosecutors in the Justice Department’s National Security Division. One of them helped manage the prosecution of David H. Petraeus. As a reminder, Petraeus plead guilty...

video only at link.

Women love a man in a uniform. Men love a woman out of a uniform. Old verities stand affirmed by the intelligence that ousted the director of the Central Intelligence Agency. General David Petraeus commanded U.S. forces in Afghanistan. But what man is really in command when face-to-face with a determined Paula Broadwell? The author of the appropriately titled "All In" conquered Petraeus in a way that neither the Taliban nor al Qaeda could. Terrorists aren't the only ones who target generals. Broadwell gives new meaning to "hagiographer." The overused term, which 99 percent of the time tells us more...

Thanks to my fellow veterans: I remember the day I found out I got into West Point. My mom actually showed up in the hallway of my high school and waited for me to get out of class. She was bawling her eyes out and apologizing that she had opened up my admission letter. She wasn't crying because it had been her dream for me to go there. She was crying because she knew how hard I'd worked to get in, how much I wanted to attend, and how much I wanted to be an infantry officer. I was going...

Ann Barnhardt of Colorado, who made a video response to General Petraeus and Senator Lindsey Graham, after the two called for restraint of the First Amendment with regard to Islam. Barnhardt blasts both men with fury and righteousness, then reads hateful passages from the Koran, just before ripping out the offending page and burning it. Her readings show why the Koran is such an evil book and why it deserves the flames -- it calls for murder, deceit, torture, rape and homosexual pedophilia. This young woman does indeed have more balls than most men. Her two videos are embedded below.

A grown woman in public office who acts like Lindsay Lohan has no business comparing one of America's finest generals to Charlie Sheen. But anti-war Democratic Rep. Lynn Woolsey has never shown any restraint when it comes to trashing America's military leaders before the world. That's because being a Code Pink liberal -- like being a Hollywood brat -- means never having to apologize for your reckless words and deeds. Woolsey took to the House floor on Wednesday to report on her "Congressional Progressive Caucus Peace and Security Task Force" hearing with critics of the Afghanistan war. She parroted Rolling...

LONDON — Prime Minister David Cameron said Monday that a British aid worker killed in an American rescue raid in Afghanistan last week may have been killed by a grenade detonated by a United States special forces unit — not in an explosion of a suicide bomber’s vest detonated by her Taliban captors, as the American command in Afghanistan suggested when it confirmed her death on Saturday. A grim-faced Mr. Cameron appeared at a news conference at 10 Downing Street to say he had learned of “this deeply distressing development” Monday from the top American and NATO commander in Afghanistan,...

An organized effort is underway worldwide orchestrated by a powerful Islamic political body to criminalize speech that "offends" Muslims. As much as that may sound like some fantastic conspiracy theory, these Muslim leaders broadcast their group's every move on their website—yet America's ruling elites refuse to listen. The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) is the second largest inter-governmental organization after the United Nations representing 57 member states which seek to criminalize speech that violates the archaic tenets of Sharia law. The OIC is comprised of the kings and heads of state of all Islamic countries numbering its membership at...

Obama appointed a liar to lead us to victory in Afghanistan? So said Harry Reid in 2007. The video is Harry Reid calling General Petraeus a liar is here.

He did discuss COIN principles, which begin with "securing and serving the people." Not the American people, mind you; but local populations within and of the Islamic world. It is the disastrous vacuousness of COIN doctrine that it ignores the existence of Islamic culture, Islamic law, as I've written many, many times, but it is the disastrous vacuousness of COIN doctrine that now, by the general's telling, influences all US military thinking. Worse than thinking, however, is how COIN doctrine manifests itself in unconscionable rules of engagement predicated on "courageous restraint" as a means, COIN theory goes, to make them...

General David Petraeus is a smart guy, one of the smartest in the U.S. government at present. But he’s no Middle East expert. Let’s examine two remarks he made in his congressional testimony. Before we do, though, promise me you will read paragraph 17 because there's a very explosive point made there you won't find anywhere else. Agreed? OK, let's go. Please note, by the way, that what he actually said is far milder than earlier leaks claimed. In addition, of course, Petraeus has to support White House policy, whatever he really thinks or knows. The Defense Department's recent Quadrennial...

Poor President Obama, he just can't bring himself to acknowledge the surge worked better than he and other skeptics, thought it would? I just don't understand why Senator Obama is being such a baby about the surge. Why can't he admit the obvious? It worked. Even as recently his Afghanistan speech last week: Today, after extraordinary costs, we are bringing the Iraq war to a responsible end. We will remove our combat brigades from Iraq by the end of next summer, and all of our troops by the end of 2011. That we are doing so is a testament to...

Through an admixture of military strategy, politics and diplomacy General Petraeus managed to do what none of his predecessors was capable of. When the scholarly general took over command of coalition troops in Iraq, the situation on the ground was chaotic. By the time he left, many former enemies had forged an alliance with the Iraqi and coalition forces. His accomplishment are many, his intellectual acumen is uncommon. [...]General Petraeus, indeed, has a distinguished career filled with admirable accomplishements I have no doubt he will continue to serve this country with honor and class. Because of all the above I...

Afghanistan has been a very tough endeavor.  Certainly, there have been important achievements there over the past seven years – agreement on a constitution, elections, and establishment of a government; increased access to education, health care, media, and telecommunications; construction of a significant number of infrastructure projects; development of the Afghan National Army; and others. But in recent years the resurgence of the Taliban and Al Qaeda has led to an increase in violence, especially in the southern and eastern parts of the country.  Numerous other challenges have emerged as well, among them:  difficulties in the development of governmental institutions...

You haven't heard much in the MSM because they've essentially stopped reporting anything from Iraq save a large bombing. Even when they do report about it, it's with a negative spin. They're pissed that George W. Bush had the nerve to order the surge and give Gen David Petraeus the tools needed to win. They wanted a loss and once it appeared we were victorious, all reporting stopped.

David Kilcullen writes that Afghanistan is still winnable. But only just. In a George Packer-edited New Yorker email interview Kilcullen summarizes the problem: (hat tip Small Wars Journal) (1) We have failed to secure the Afghan people. That is, we have failed to deliver them a well-founded feeling of security. Our failing lies as much in providing human security—economic and social wellbeing, law and order, trust in institutions and hope for the future—as in protection from the Taliban, narco-traffickers, and terrorists. In particular, we have spent too much effort chasing and attacking an elusive enemy who has nothing he needs...

BAGHDAD (AP) — As violence in Iraq recedes, neighboring states are pondering how to deal with an unwieldy country that could re-emerge as a key player along with Saudi Arabia and Iran in one of the world's most strategic regions.

Barack Obama and Joe BidenThe Democrat Foreign Policy Team: Their Judgment One Year Ago “I opposed this war from the beginning. I opposed the war in 2002. I opposed the war in 2003. I opposed it in 2004, and 2005 and 2006." --Barack Obama, September 12 2007“It's time to turn the corner in my view, gentlemen. We should stop the surge and start bringing our troops home. We should end a political strategy in Iraq that cannot succeed and begin one that can.” --Joe Biden, September 11 2007 [Click images to enlarge] September 11, 2007: General David Petraeus was in...