As veterans come back from Iraq and Afghanistan, it's the heartfelt tokens of appreciation that will really make a difference. The University of Phoenix deserves recognition for stepping up to the plate and donating tickets to the Superbowl...
CNN joined the right wing conspiracy when they ran a report showing the noted improvements to Haifa Street, one of Baghdad's most famous boulevards. The Haifa I saw, last summer, was definitely on an upswing, businesses were spontaneously popping up and violence was down over 70%.
Last summer when I was in Haifa, this was the view from the humvee
as we pulled away from an apartment complex
The shoddy quality of this video is due to CSPAN, but the message is pristine. This young sergeant got up and spoke his mind, fortunately there were cameras present. Last year, someone gave Congressman Murtha a piece of his mind...
If ever there was a crime that deserved the death penalty, surely that crime would be 9/11. I just got back from Europe where the latest disagreement brewing is whether or not those convicted of carrying out the attacks on September 11th should be put to death...
Sadr City, Bagdad: Staff Sergeant Dukes with the 1st platoon "blacksheep" 118th Military Police Company (Airborne) of Fort Bragg takes time out of his busy schedule to take prisoners to the roof, to get fresh air. The military police are assigned the task of teaching Iraqi Police modern police work, including the treatment of prisoners.
Who planted the bomb? Who threatened the politician? Where are the weapons caches? The detainee or prisoner may have the answer to all of these questions, or he may just be the hapless victim of circumstance, a poor guy in the wrong place at the wrong time...
MRAPs arrive at Haditha Dam in the Fall of 2007
Senators will call for an investigation into an internal report stating that field commanders were given a lower priority for the acquisition of MRAPs (Mine Resistant Ambush Proctected vehicles). I spoke to many procurement specialists in both Afghanistan and Iraq. I can assure you no one purposely sought to deny the troops in the field anything that could save a life...
Iraqi police have been trained to the point where they really
do take care of most of the day to day business, especially in
Anbar. Please note, this Iraqi has his finger off the trigger, as
taught to him by some well-disciplined Devil Dog.
Many have cried to put an end to the war in Iraq and they may just get their wish. As I write about my experiences in Iraq and read the dispatches of the people who are still there, I have a difficult time calling the "war" in Iraq a "war" at all...
And in the "I'm still important category" Muqtada al Sadr has declared another six months of cease fire after threatening to lift the "cease fire". Of course, the fact that breakaway Shia factions were threatening to kill him and that the Iraqi Army has largely withdrawn from the sectarian violence game has also helped calm the situation in much of Shia regions of Iraq...
CNN is attempting to make a concession without appearing completely discredited for all the shoddy reporting of doom and gloom over the past year. CNN cameras poked in and out of neighborhoods, especially after a "flashy" event, to keep up the illusion of a desperate Iraq.
Sgt. McGee loading up some of the "scarce"
equipment in Afghanistan.
During the last debate, Obama made a statement about the military that just didn't cut the mustard. I spoke with a buddy of mine, Army Sgt. Anthony McGee, currently stationed in Gardez, Afghanistan. I last saw Sgt. McGee, a former Marine, in November. Anthony had these comments that I have reprinted with the Sergeant's permission...
Children gather around American troops all the time.
They like to ask for candy or practice their English.
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- A disabled, wheelchair-bound man blew himself up on Monday in a northern Iraqi police station, killing a top police official and wounding six police officers, police told CNN. Thousands of pilgrims are trekking to Karbala for al-Arbaeen, one of the holiest days of the Shiite calendar...
Most of us expect something to happen when we plug in an appliance or flip a switch, but in Iraq flipping a switch to get power is a key part of fighting terrorism. The strategy to combat a counter-insurgency consists mainly of improving the living conditions; that means bringing a national infrastructure neglected by dictatorial socialism and asphyxiated by a decade of sanctions to a functional level for a growing population with an increasing appetite for energy...
Army Captain, Pete Hegseth is back in Iraq and writing from the front. Pete makes outstanding points about the latest political push to derail the successes in Iraq. Hegseth is more than a thinker, he's an actual doer. Rarely have I met anyone who has put so much at stake for his personal beliefs...
At Habbaniya, in the Anbar province I embedded with the Marines who run the Iraqi Army firing range. It was a long day of firing the AK-47, a rattling weapon that is inaccurate and clunky. Like any Marine, I was very happy when a fellow devil dog handed me the well-known M-16 that we all know and love...
Note: This is what happens when mommycrats try to run wars.
BAGHDAD, Iraq — The Pentagon and Marine Corps authorized the purchase of 84,000 bulletproof vests in 2006 that not only are too heavy but are so impractical that some U.S. Marines are asking for their old vests back so they can remain agile enough to fight...
While in Afghanistan, I was embedded with a unit of soldiers whose job it was to chase the Taliban. We heard rumors of the Taliban "owning property" in Afghanistan, but it usually amounted to a group of armed men shutting down a road until the authorities chased them away...
Pete Hegseth just filed another dispatch from Baghdad. He noted something extraordinary that most people back home do not understand...
There is a disturbing tendency, in military medicine, to over medicate and vaccinate. Some servicemen have resisted the mandatory vaccinations...to no avail...
Prince Harry is/was in Afghanistan, which has put that war zone back in the news. It's good to see the prince went down south to join his countrymen in arms, but there is a problem with the British presence in Afghanistan...
