Free Republic

In battle, one of the hardest challenges is saving the wounded. Medical professionals encounter injuries not normally seen in peacetime, and many times see multiple life-threatening injures requiring immediate treatment on the battlefield. Another problem is moving patients across hot desert sands on bumpy roads in Iraq, which can be logistically challenging and uncomfortable for the patient. And there is always the danger of roadside bombs. To solve these problems, military aeromedical planners developed what is now an efficient medical evacuation system that moves patients from where they were injured to definitive care quickly and safely. Along the way, patients...

BALAD AIR BASE, Iraq (AFPN) -- Each MQ-1 Predator unmanned aerial vehicle mission flown in the Iraqi sky begins and ends here. Predator operators deployed here put the aircraft in the air and make sure it lands safely. Sitting side by side in the “cockpit,” enlisted Airmen and officers work as a team providing top cover to Soldiers on the ground. Pilots and sensor operators with the 46th Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron here each play a key role in the successful Predator mission. While technology allows pilots to control the aircraft from the U.S., Predator takeoffs and landings must be controlled...

FORT DIX, N.J. (AFPN) -- C-5 Galaxy aircrews must tape over some white lights in the cockpit of their huge aircraft before missions into a “blacked out” environment when they must use night vision goggles. Sometimes crews use flashlights or even pull circuit breakers and light bulbs for other light systems to minimize the visual “wash out” effects lights have on their sensitive goggles. Then Air Mobility Battlelab innovators here came up with a solution. This week, command officials at Scott Air Force Base, Ill., approved use of the C-5 Aviator Night Vision Lighting system. This is a portable “clip-on”...

NELLIS AIR FORCE BASE, Nev. (AFPN) -- U.S. Air Force Air Demonstration Squadron, “Thunderbirds,” officials announced their new pilots for the 2006 demonstration season which includes the first female demonstration pilot in the 52-year history of the Thunderbirds. Capt. Nicole Malachowski, of the 494th Fighter Squadron at Royal Air Force Lakenheath, England, joins the team as the first female demonstration pilot on any U.S. military high performance jet team. Lt. Col. Kevin Robbins, from the Air Force Weapons School at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev., and Capt. Ed Casey, of the 56th Training Squadron at Luke AFB, Ariz., also were selected for...

A tribute to fallen HEROES  from the staff and visitors at FreeRepublic.com, FreedomUSA.org and Veterans for Constitutional Restoration (VetsCoR)  During the course of this country's history brave men and women have stepped forward from time to time, answering the country's call to fight against would-be tyrants, dictators and despots,  and to defend the individual freedom that is our birthright.  Many of these brave men and women have paid the ultimate price. It is to these brave men and women of the Army, Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps, Coast Guard, and Merchant Marine that we dedicate this page, and to...

FRAMINGHAM -- When Collin Kelly arrived at Edgell Grove Cemetery to place flowers on soldiers' graves yesterday, he discovered a crowd of people and decades of emotions buried deep. The cemetery visit by the young boy, whose effort to honor dead veterans has made him a national media celebrity this past week, attracted a large group of onlookers: veterans, reporters, patriotic well-wishers and people grieving the loss of loved ones laid to rest at Edgell Grove.

WASHINGTON, April 25, 2005 – America today honored eight American servicemen who died trying to rescue American hostages in Iran 25 years ago. A ceremony here, on the 25th anniversary of their deaths, brought together the families of those killed, their comrades and those servicemembers who carry on the special operations mission. In November 1'7' Iranian militants took 53 Americans in the U.S. Embassy in Tehran hostage. It was the most egregious violation of the principles of diplomacy in the history of statecraft, L. Bruce Laingen, the highest-ranking American taken hostage, said at today's ceremony. On April 25, 1'80, the...

Sadly, watching the end of Hardball tonight, I just realized that today is the 25th anniversary of Operation Eagle Claw, the heroic, but doomed mission to rescue the American hostages held for over a year in the US embassy in Tehran.

The sergeant stationed just west of Baghdad was once again recounting the dangers of being on the front line - sometimes with dark humor. He referred to how the "muj" (mujahideen or insurgents) were the gang that couldn't shoot straight, but still represented a considerable threat. "They're horrible shots," he wrote in an e-mail to his family, "but every once in awhile they get lucky. We lost another Marine the other day." This is the first war in which American GIs and military families can communicate freely and in real time via e-mail and cellphone, while gathering endless amounts of...

WASHINGTON - It was a quarter-century ago this month, April 24, 1980, that the secret American raid into Iran to rescue 53 hostages from the U.S. Embassy in Tehran collapsed in disaster on a make-shift airstrip in the middle of the Iranian desert. The embarrassingly public failure of the raid, code-named Operation Eagle Claw, was a low-water mark for the Carter administration and for our military as well, still struggling to get back on its feet in the wake of the debacle in Vietnam just five years before. Eight American servicemen died when the raid came apart with the fiery...

Johnny finally came marching home again on a rainy day in late March in the town of Quincy, Mass. The town turned out to pay its respects to Edward Alan Brudno and to 47 other hometown sons who made the ultimate sacrifice in a war no one wanted. Al Brudno was one of the longest-held American prisoners of war during Vietnam: He endured nearly eight years of torture and solitary confinement that began when he was shot down over North Vietnam in October 1965. He was 25 then. He survived to come home with the other POWs who were freed...

Story Number: NNS050405-13 Release Date: 4/5/2005 2:49:00 PM WASHINGTON (NNS) -- Upon review of an intelligence community report regarding the case of Capt. Michael Scott Speicher, Secretary of the Navy Gordon England directed the Chief of Naval Personnel to convene a board to review the classification of Speicher’s status as Missing/Captured. Speicher’s, aircraft was shot down Jan. 17, 1991, the first day of the Gulf War. In October 2002, England changed Speicher’s status from Missing in Action to Missing/Captured. The report provides an update for the Offices of the secretaries of Defense and Navy concerning intelligence community actions between November...