Category Archives: military news

International news, military news, national news

So long, Omar the Chechen

th

Omar the Chechen is dead.

It took a while to confirm that the Islamic State leader had bought it in a U.S.-led attack, but the terrorist group has confirmed The Chechen’s death.

So, what does this mean?

To me, it means a couple of things.

First, it signals that our efforts to eliminate terrorist leaders is gaining ground. The U.S. military — the one that some politicians keep saying is “losing” — is showing that it remains quite a capable fighting force.

Second, The Chechen’s death should not be seen as a final “victory” in this ongoing war against the despicable terrorist organization. It only means that we must keep up the fight and must pursue the enemy — in the worlds of one-time GOP presidential nominee John McCain — “to the gates of hell” if need be.

http://www.timesofisrael.com/islamic-state-says-senior-commander-killed-in-iraq/

Omar al-Shishani was born in what was once known as the Soviet Union. He was just 30 years of age.

The fight must go on. There likely will be another madman who’ll step into Omar the Chechen’s shoes.

His death, though, does suggest that ISIS has suffered yet another in a lengthening string of key tactical defeats.

Let there be many more of them.

International news, military news

U.S. redoubles efforts to protect civilian lives

drone strikes

U.S. drone strikes have killed perhaps as many as 116 civilians since 2009, according to the White House.

What, then, is the response from the commander in chief, Barack Obama? He issued an executive order today that redoubles our military’s efforts to avoid killing civilians in future drone strikes.

I can hear it now from critics of the president.

* He’s soft on terrorists.

* Obama isn’t really committed to killing Islamic killers.

* We’re trying to conduct a “politically correct” air war against these monsters.

It’s all crap!

What the executive order signifies to me is that we’re better than the bad guys, who actually target civilians. They seek to go after so-called “soft targets” at airport terminals, train stations, shopping malls, schools, residential neighborhoods.

Our aim in launching these manned and unmanned air strikes has been to take out military targets — which we are doing with considerable effectiveness.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/white-house-at-least-64-to-116-civilians-killed-in-drone-strikes-since-2009/ar-AAhRCSZ

The White House figures are at odds with some independent estimates of civilian deaths, which place the number a good bit greater.

However, let us not give short shrift to U.S. military policy that seeks to minimize these deaths.

Sure, we didn’t always follow that doctrine. U.S. aerial bombardments during World War II targeted civilian population centers specifically. But that was then.

We are able in this modern age to launch air strikes with remarkable precision and accuracy. Are they always successful? Are we able to carry these strikes without inflicting death and injury on civilians? Of course not.

We shouldn’t change our standards to match the barbarism committed by our enemies.

local news, medical news, military news

Faith in VA medical care remains strong

veteran-health-care-1140x641

I hereby declare that my faith in the Department of Veterans Affairs health care system remains strong.

I told you I’d inform you of what I learned from my health-care provider regarding an injury I suffered while walking with my wife through the ‘hood the other day.

Her diagnosis? “You’ve injured something in your knee,” she said. She said I need to use an over-the-counter anti-inflammatory drug, keep the compression bandage wrapped around my sore knee, and “rest it as much as you can.”

There. Problem solved … I hope.

As is almost always the case, my appointment this morning at the Thomas E. Creek Veterans Health Care Center in Amarillo went like clockwork.

I showed up at 7 a.m. to get blood drawn at the lab; I was out of there by 7:25.

I grabbed a burrito at a nearby convenience store, brought it back and wolfed it down while waiting for my 8 a.m. appointment with my nurse practitioner.

She called me back at 8:15. We visited. I told her about my injury. She took a look at my leg and said, “Yep, it’s swollen.” She gave me her diagnosis and her proposed remedy.

I walked out of the Lone Star Team clinic at 8:50.

Not bad at all.

I still have this minor hitch in my step stemming from the “pop” I felt while walking the other morning with my wife and Toby the Puppy.

I also told you I’d keep the faith. It’s working well for me.

https://highplainsblogger.com/2016/06/va-might-face-a-stern-test-soon/

 

 

 

International news, military news, national news, political news

Another key GOP thinker dumps Trump

brent

Brent Scowcroft isn’t a Republican In Name Only.

He’s been a solid GOP wise man for decades. He also served with distinction in the U.S. Air Force, earning three stars and retiring as a lieutenant general.

Scowcroft today endorsed Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton to be the next president of the United States.

If you place much value in these endorsements, this is a big deal.

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/06/brent-scowcroft-endorses-hillary-clinton-224677

Scowcroft served as national security adviser to two Republican presidents: Gerald Ford and George H.W. Bush. He knows war and he understands the value of international alliances.

That’s why he’s backing Clinton over her presumptive Republican rival, Donald J. Trump.

“Secretary Clinton shares my belief that America must remain the world’s indispensable leader,” Scowcroft said in a statement, touting her experience as secretary of state. “She understands that our leadership and engagement beyond our borders makes the world, and therefore the United States, more secure and prosperous. She appreciates that it is essential to maintain our strong military advantage, but that force must only be used as a last resort.”

Trump doesn’t get it.

He wants to build walls. He wants to remove the United States from its most important military/political alliance — the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. He wants to ban Muslims from entering the United States.

That doesn’t make the world safe, let alone “secure and prosperous.”

I can hear some of my Republican/Trump supporter friends now. They’ll blow off Scowcroft’s endorsement as being “irrelevant.” They’ll laugh it off. Scowcroft’s a has-been, they’ll say.

No. He’s a distinguished American patriot.

 

military news, national news

They fought to save the world

On June 6, 1984, President Ronald Reagan went to the Normandy coast of France to honor the 40th anniversary of the invasion that took place there.

He paid tribute to “the boys of Pointe du Hoc,” the U.S. Army Rangers who scaled the cliffs overlooking Omaha Beach on that horrifying day.

They had sailed across the English Channel to free Europe from tyranny.

Thirty-two years after that memorial commemoration, President Reagan’s speech is worth watching yet again.

I won’t try to glorify it here.

These men saved the world. God bless them all.

 

military news, national news, political news

Three words launched campaign to save the world

Eisenhower_d-day

“OK. We’ll go.”

Right then and right there, with those words, the order went out from the supreme commander of Allied forces in Europe.

The invasion of Europe was on.

General of the U.S. Army Dwight D. Eisenhower faced a terrible dilemma. The weather over the English Channel had been horrible. The invasion of France had been delayed once already. Hundreds of thousands of men had assembled and prepared in Great Britain for Operation Overlord.

Ike then caught a bit of a break. The weather was going to cooperate — more or less — on June 6, 1944. That’s when he decided to issue the order.

The men set out in ships. They boarded landing craft and hit the French coastline along five beachheads. American and British soldiers stormed four of them; Canadians stormed the fifth one.

Eisenhower had drafted two statements in preparation for that event, one to proclaim victory on the beach, the other to take full responsibility in case it went badly. He didn’t have to deliver the latter statement.

It has become fashionable in the present day to invoke Ike’s memory as we discuss the merits of the individuals seeking the U.S. presidency. Those who defend the current Republican presumptive nominee’s lack of government experience often cite Eisenhower’s own lack of such qualifications when he ran for president in 1952.

No, he didn’t have that kind of experience. All he did, though, was save the world from tyranny.

Eight years after saying simply, “OK. We’ll go,” the presidency became his for the taking.

So it was on this day 72 years ago that thousands upon thousands of young men followed their commander’s order.

May God bless them all.

military news

As for Ali’s anti-war protest …

muhammad-ali-refuses-army-induction

So much has been written and spoken for nearly 50 years about the time Muhammad Ali refused induction into the armed forces, I hesitate to mention anything about it here.

Awww, but I will anyway.

The Champ’s death Friday saddens me beyond measure. I’ll be grieving for a long time.

I do want to set the record straight, though, on what I believe has been a mischaracterization of Ali’s refusal to be drafted.

It’s been reported that he did so in 1967 out of conscience. He had converted just three years earlier to Islam. He told the Houston draft board he couldn’t serve in the armed forces because of religious conviction, that he couldn’t carry out orders to kill other human beings.

I get that.

What has not been discussed in all the commentary about Ali’s death, though, is that he could have filed as a conscientious objector and still served in the armed forces — in a non-combat role.

No Pentagon bureaucrat in his or her right mind ever would send the reigning heavyweight boxing champion of the world — especially someone such as Muhammad Ali, for crying out loud! — to any training center to be schooled in the combat arms: infantry, armor or artillery.

I served in a basic training company in Fort Lewis, Wash., with a young man who was a conscientious objector. When we completed our boot camp training in October 1968, he got orders for artillery school in Fort Sill, Okla. He hit the ceiling. The last time I saw him before I departed for aircraft maintenance school in Fort Eustis, Va., he was marching into the orderly room to file a protest over the orders he received. I hope he got them changed.

Muhammad Ali would have been given a special assignment, much as Joe Louis received when that former heavyweight champion saw duty during World War II. The Army was full of clerical jobs or other rear-echelon assignments that would have kept Ali far from harm’s way.

Now, having said that, I do not know what was in Muhammad Ali’s heart when he said “no” to being inducted. It well might have been a broader statement against the Vietnam War, that under no circumstances could he don a military uniform while the nation was engaged in all-out war in Southeast Asia.

If that were the case, well, I respect that, too.

military news

Tragedy strikes the armed forces

Air-Force-Academy-Graduation-Thunderbirds-Flyover

Today was a terrible day for members of three of our nation’s armed forces.

First, a member of the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds crashed moments after taking part in a graduation ceremony flyover at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs.

The pilot managed to eject from the F-16 before it crash landed; happily, the pilot is OK. He managed a brief meeting later with President Obama, who was among those attending the ceremony; the president had given the commencement address.

Then it got much worse.

A U.S. Navy Blue Angels FA-18 jet crashed on a training mission in Tennessee. That pilot died in the crash.

And then …

Three U.S. Army soldiers died when their truck got caught up in floodwaters near Fort Hood, Texas. Six more soldiers are missing in that tragic event.

I mention this to call attention to the sacrifice that can occur even when our young men and women aren’t thrust into combat.

Our hearts break for the families of those who were lost today. I hope they know their nation grieves for them.

media news, military news

A vet opens fire … and that’s relevant to what?

1 Comment

gunman

A headline appeared in the Houston Chronicle that said a gunman has been identified as a “military vet.”

Is it just me, or is there a bit of generalizing here that resembles what happened to veterans of another era?

Someone tell me that’s not happening.

http://www.houstonchronicle.com/houston/article/Witness-says-Memorial-shooter-made-7953256.php?t=942f77db9c&cmpid=fb-premium

Returning service personnel are coming home from war in Afghanistan and, earlier, from Iraq. Many of them suffer from post traumatic stress disorder, the ailment once known as “shell shock.”

A gunman opened fire in Houston, killing at least one person, injuring others and then was killed by a police SWAT officer.

Here’s my concern.

I hope we don’t see news reports that seem to equate someone’s military service to a crime they might commit.

You might recall how it was often reported during the 1970s and 1980s when people committed violent crimes and the headlines often would say something like: “Vietnam vet goes berserk” or “Vietnam veteran suspected of killing children.”

Do you get where I’m coming from? There seemed to be some correlation made immediately that connected the perpetrator’s terrible deed to his service in Vietnam. That war, some have argued, turned returning soldiers into caricatures, even though they represented a tiny fraction of all the people who served with honor and distinction during that terrible conflict.

The vast majority of them did their duty, came home, readjusted to civilian life quickly, and became normal folks just doing whatever it is normal folks do.

I surely hope we do not paint returning veterans today with the same kind of broad brush that coated an earlier generation of warriors.

 

media news, military news

Two sources offer differing versions of same story

kyle

Two Internet websites are reporting something about an American war hero that differ in their emphasis.

One of them leans left; the other leans right. The specific subject of their analyses is an essay by former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who’s challenging contentions by yet another source about the veracity of a former Navy SEAL’s account of his battlefield exploits.

Here’s the right-leaning site:

http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2016/05/30/perry-jumps-defense-american-snipers-reputation-leftwing-media-attack/

Perry questions doubts raised about the late Chris Kyle’s medals. Kyle, who was shot to death after returning from multiple deployments to Iraq, reportedly fudged the number of Silver and Bronze stars he received for his work as a SEAL sniper.

Breitbart.com sides with Perry’s accusation that the doubts have served to smear the memory of Chris Kyle, whose military career was the subject of an acclaimed film “American Sniper.”

Here’s the left-leaning site:

http://deadstate.org/rick-perry-attacks-left-wing-media-for-doing-actual-journalism-on-american-sniper-chris-kyles-lies/

Deadstate.org says the report reflects journalists doing actual journalism.

Gov. Perry, quite naturally, disputes that side of the story.

Perry said the DD-214 — the Defense Department official record of every person’s military service — is the definitive source for this information.

Here’s my take.

I don’t particularly care whether Kyle received two Silver Stars or “merely” one of them, or that he received six Bronze Stars instead of just four, or five.

The man is a hero, no matter how you slice it.

As for whether the report constitutes a “smear,” and has “libeled” a dead man, I’ll make two quick points.

One is that you cannot libel someone who’s dead. The other is that the truth has yet to be determined. If the reporters who dug up the discrepancy in Kyle’s record have done so accurately, well, you cannot libel anyone by telling the truth.

I’m not going to obsess over the number of medals for valor Kyle earned while doing his duty.