Free Republic

WASHINGTON, Sept. 11, 2007 – On the sixth anniversary of al Qaeda’s attacks on U.S. soil, White House officials released a “fact sheet” that takes stock of actions the United States and other nations have taken to confront the terrorist threat. The document, posted on the White House Web site and distributed to media outlets, notes the sacrifices of the attacks’ victims and responders and pays tribute to the armed forces, the law enforcement and intelligence communities, “and the thousands of others at the local, State, and Federal levels who protect our country, secure our liberty, and work to...

Terrorists are the greatest threat since Hitler, warns Reid By Toby Helm, Chief Political Correspondent (Filed: 10/08/2006) John Reid rounded on judges, politicians and commentators yesterday for failing to grasp that today's terrorists pose the greatest threat to the civilised world since Adolf Hitler. In his first speech on national security since becoming Home Secretary, Mr Reid said he had already found that those who should be "foremost in recognising the serious nature of the threat just don't get it". John Reid: 'Migrants can bring great skills' Portraying himself as a hardliner on security and immigration issues, Mr Reid said...

TOKYO - A 79-year-old Japanese man who went missing at the end of World War II and resurfaced nearly six decades later in Russia went back to his homeland Sunday to be reunited with relatives. Yoshiteru Nakagawa, who disappeared on Sakhalin island in 1945 when the Soviets took it over from Japan, arrived at New Chitose Airport on Japan's northern island of Hokkaido for the first time since he left Japan in 1939, when his family settled on Sakhalin. "Little did I dream of being able to come back to Japan," Nakagawa, who still lives on Sakhalin, said in halting...

FORT BLISS, Texas — Since 2003, a Department of Defense joint task force has provided more than 1,600 military members to help federal agencies along Arizona’s border with Mexico, a spokesman for the organization said Thursday. Joint Task Force North, which was established in 2004, from assets previously called Joint Task Force Six, has provided active duty, Reserve and National Guard forces, “Working under the task force, primarily supporting other lead federal agencies, such as the Border Patrol,” Armando Carrasco said. Those who have been detailed to Arizona border areas have worked in the Douglas, Naco, Nogales and Yuma areas,...

WASHINGTON, March 23, 2006 – Coalition forces rescued three hostages held by terrorists in Iraq since November in an early morning raid today, a Multinational Force Iraq spokesman said. "Based on intelligence that we recovered over the last 36 hours, an operation was planned and conducted, and those three hostages were rescued," Army Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch said during a briefing from Baghdad. "I'm happy to report all three are in good condition." The hostages, Christian peace activists, have undergone medical screening and are anxious to be reunited with their families, Lynch said. A fourth hostage, and the only American...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 6, 2005 – Iraqi and coalition troops operating in and around Baghdad seized 31 weapons caches in September, constituting the largest monthly haul of ordnance in that area since May, when 54 caches were uncovered, military officials reported. Coalition forces patrolling Baghdad's Radwiniyah district on Sept. 28 were approached by an Iraqi citizen who told the soldiers about a large weapons cache. The soldiers found 175 sticks of dynamite, 109 grenades, 149 rockets, mortar and artillery rounds, two rocket launchers, 46 anti-personnel mines and 20 pounds of TNT. U.S. soldiers acting on a tip from another Iraqi citizen...

Orleans council meets for first time since storm By JOE GYAN JR. jgyan@theadvocate.com New Orleans bureau KENNER -- Several New Orleans levees that failed during Hurricane Katrina and caused catastrophic flooding in parts of the city will be back to their pre-Katrina heights by the start of next year's hurricane season, a top U.S. Army Corps of Engineers official promised City Council members who met as a group Tuesday for the first time since the hurricane. But several council members who lost their homes in the storm said having the same level of levee protection as before -- capacity to...

MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. -- “Once captured, there is no comprehending what goes through your head,” said former Marine and Vietnam prisoner of war, Walter W. Eckes, 59, who spoke at the Camp Pendleton Naval Hospital’s 15th annual Prisoner of War/Missing in Action remembrance ceremony Sept 16. The first national commemoration for POWs/MIAs was July 18, 1979. Since then, Congress has passed yearly resolutions for the tribute. But in 1996, a presidential proclamation designated the third Friday in September as National POW/MIA Recognition Day. For the commemoration in 1991, the hospital planted a tree as a living memorial...

Israeli soldiers Saturday discovered four bombs planted near Jewish towns in Gaza amid concerns that terrorists are "seeding" the area with land mines at the rate of more than one a day. The four bombs discovered in northern and southern Gaza Saturday weighed more than 200 kilograms (440 pounds). Terrorists also shot a Kassam rocket Saturday at the Gush Katif town of N'vei Dekalim and opened fire on soldiers in the area as well as near the Egyptian border. No one was injured and no damage was reported. "In the past three weeks, we have discovered an explosive device on...

The purpose of FreeRepublic.com's multiple message boards is to limit the topics for each board to particular topics. Posting the same message on all the boards defeats the purpose of multiple-boards for special topics. It is very annoying to see the same message on every bulletin board. PLEASE! DO THE READERS A FAVOR. STOP CROSS-POSTING YOUR MESSAGES!

NAJAF, Iraq - U.S. helicopter gunships and fighter jets pounded Iraqi insurgents hiding in a sprawling cemetery Friday in the most intense fighting in this Shiite holy city since the fall of Saddam Hussein (news - web sites). The U.S. military said 300 militants were killed in the past two days. The clashes between coalition forces and militant Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army flared in Shiite communities across the country, killing dozens of other Iraqis, according to Iraqi officials and the militants. The fighting threatened to re-ignite the bloody, two-month Shiite insurrection that broke out in April — and...

Kerry Hides as Americans Fail to Warm to His Style Posted July 1, 2004 By Scott Stanley Jr. Washington insiders are saying that John Kerry is proving to be the laziest presidential candidate since Adlai Stevenson. For three days he has been hiding out at his wife's pickle farm in Pennsylvania without receiving important visitors of any kind, and tomorrow he heads for speeches in Cloquet, Minn., and Boomer, Wis., before stumping in Iowa river towns. Then it's back to one of his wife's mansions for Independence Day, remaining there Monday with nothing scheduled. There is speculation that Kerry will...

NAJAF, Iraq - Coalition forces fought on two fronts Tuesday, battling a Shiite-inspired uprising in southern Iraq (news - web sites) and Sunni insurgents in the violent city of Fallujah in clashes that have killed 20 American troops and at least 100 Iraqis since the weekend. Backers of fiery anti-American Shiite Muslim cleric Muqtada al-Sadr attacked coalition forces in three cities — Italians in Nasiriyah, Britons in Amarah and Ukrainians in Kut — after a weekend of fighting that was especially intense in the poor Shiite neighborhood of Sadr City in Baghdad. In the latest U.S. deaths, five Marines were...