Just when you thought it couldn't get worse, The Washington Post reports this week that in addition to the escalating sexual assault problem in the the military, there have been an uncomfortable number of sex crimes, convictions and what can only be called criminal...
Military Sex Assault Stories Overwhelm Today’s News
The sex assault problem in the military is turning out to be a poison that has infected every branch, and it just seems to be getting worse as more women enlist and rise through the ranks. Just when military women were celebrating the successful storming of the...
Burn pit scandal! IG says $5 mln wasted on unused incinerators
The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) released a report today that says the Army paid $5 million for two massive incinerators to burn trash on a forward operating base (FOB) in Afghanistan, but then never used them. The incinerators,...
What Would Richard Holbrooke Say?
Yesterday would have been uber-diplomat Richard Holbrooke's 72nd birthday. He died December 13, 2010 while on the job as our top envoy to Afghanistan, and one can't help thinking that whatever 1960's idealism still existed in terms of making that country a better...
How the CIA is Wrecking Polio Eradication in Pakistan
It may sound melodramatic but one of the most tragic examples of blowback from our terror war in Pakistan is that the Taliban there are now trying to prevent Pakistani children from getting the polio vaccine, which has been available to Americans since the 1950's and...
A Word (or Two) on the Petraeus ‘Apology’
Looking perhaps a little smaller, bereft of his familiar chestful of medals or his over-starched ACUs (Army Combat Uniform), (Ret.) Gen. David Petraeus began his road to public redemption this week with a speech designed to make him look contrite over an extra-marital...
Mainstream Lookback at Iraq: Yes, You Can Scream Now
Twitter has been on fire today with myriad quips, snarks, I told you sos and above all, honest lamentations on the 10th anniversary of the American invasion of Iraq. There's also something else -- blowback on the mainstream punditocracy and media sheeplesphere, not so...
Finally: Mainstream Compares COIN to Waterloo
The Battle of Waterloo was a decisive defeat for the Emperor Napoleon: his losses forced his abdication, restored King Louis XVIII to France's throne, and sent the former emperor away for the rest of his days in exile on the isle of Saint Helena. In other words, it...
Convenient “Clerical Error” Gives Rosy Picture of Afghan Progress
Let's hope that newly minted Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel will live up to some of our expectations and not be afraid to tell it like it is. Let's start with Afghanistan. We just found out today that an alleged data entry glitch in the Pentagon program that spits...
Gen. Allen: Afghanistan ‘Graveyard’ Swallows Another Career
This week Marine Corps General John Allen joined a long and lamentable list of American leaders who have succumbed to the ancient affliction that conventional rhetoric has deemed the "graveyard of empires." He is not the first, but given that the United States seems...


