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Click video: Troops Choice. Obama: "Fox News has such the hook up with Armed Frorces t.v...... is that the Commander in Chiefs choice?"

1:42 p.m.: SPIEGEL ONLINE has learned that Obama has cancelled a planned short visit to the Rammstein and Landstuhl US military bases in the southwest German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. The visits were planned for Friday. "Barack Obama will not be coming to us," a spokesperson for the US military hospital in Landstuhl announced. "I don't know why." Shortly before the same spokeswoman had announced a planned visit by Obama.

A video that the MSM won’t show you. In fact the Obama campaign doesn’t have it on their website and no transcript can be found for this speech in Colorado Springs. Peculiar… Unfortunately for the Obama campaign the speech can be had on YouTube. (Video Included)

The Largest re-up in American History so worth the look.. it will make you proud. God Bless our Troops, God Bless America!

WASHINGTON, July 10, 2008 – The Senate has confirmed Army Gen. David H. Petraeus as commander of U.S. Central Command and Army Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno to receive his fourth star and succeed Petraeus as commander of Multinational Force Iraq. The full Senate confirmed Petraeus by a vote of 95-2 and Odierno by a 96-1 margin. Odierno is the Army’s 3rd Corps commander and served as commander of Multinational Corps Iraq for 14 months. The changes put Petraeus -- who implemented the U.S. surge into Iraq -- in charge of U.S. military forces in a dangerous part of the...

Congress should repeal the "don't ask, don't tell" law because the presence of gays in the military is unlikely to undermine the ability to fight and win, according to a new study released by a California-based research center. The study was conducted by four retired military officers, including the three-star Air Force lieutenant general who in early 1993 was tasked with implementing President Clinton's policy that the military stop questioning recruits on their sexual orientation. "Evidence shows that allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly is unlikely to pose any significant risk to morale, good order, discipline or cohesion," the...

PANAMA CITY (Reuters) - Panama has ruled out hosting a U.S. military base to replace one in Ecuador which is being reclaimed by the Quito government, a senior Panamanian official said on Friday. Panama -- along with Peru and Colombia -- had been tipped as a possible site to replace the Manta air base in western Ecuador, a key strategic asset in Washington's campaign to stop Latin American cocaine from reaching the United States.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate John McCain wants the U.S. military to be much larger than current expansion plans envision, an adviser to the Arizona senator said this week. The Bush administration has begun expanding the U.S. Army and Marine Corps to create a combined strength of around 750,000 active duty troops -- a process backed by McCain's Democratic rival, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois. But McCain believes an Army and Marine Corps with a combined strength of up to 900,000 troops is necessary, said Randy Scheunemann, an adviser to the candidate on foreign policy and national security. "Sen....

President Bush has awarded Former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), General Peter Pace the US’s highest civilian award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Not surprisingly, he is once again enduring a “moral lynching” at the hands of liberal media and homosexual activists across the nation.  Controversy began plaguing General Pace, a Catholic, after his March 12 statement that homosexual acts are immoral and therefore, should not be condoned by the military.[1]  Following this statement, General Pace was maligned and ultimately lost his position as JCS Chairman, making him the first in over forty years to hold...

"Don't ask, don't tell" was a compromise that has been vilified since its inception in 1993. Former President Bill Clinton had campaigned that he would lift the ban barring LGBT people from serving in the military and allow them to serve openly. Once in office, he ran into opposition, and "don't ask, don't tell" (DADT) was born. A compromise that makes neither side happy, the policy prohibits the military from asking service members about their orientation and requires the military to discharge members who acknowledge openly that they are LGBT. Fast forward 15 years and now, even politicians who supported...

I have said all long that I am against having Muslims in the U.S. Military. One reason is that they can physically turn on their comrades. Another is that they can aid the enemy by giving them intelligence. For the rest.... http://islaminaction08.blogspot.com/2008/06/former-us-officer-training-hamas.html

WASHINGTON: The American military is set to promote a woman to the rank of four-star general for the first time. Lieutenant General Ann Dunwoody, a logistics specialist with 33 years of military service, has been nominated to receive a fourth star and take charge of the US Army's Materiel Command. “I am very honoured, but also very humbled, today with this announcement,” General Dunwoody said. “I grew up in a family that didn't know what glass ceilings were. This nomination only reaffirms what I have known to be true about the military throughout my career ... that the doors continue...

WASHINGTON — The Army and Air Force discharged a disproportionate number of women in 2007 under the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that prohibits openly gay people from serving in the military, according to Pentagon statistics gathered by an advocacy group. While women make up 14 percent of Army personnel, 46 percent of those discharged under the policy last year were women. And while 20 percent of Air Force personnel are women, 49 percent of its discharges under the policy last year were women.

The Supreme Court's decision in Boumediene v. Bush is being hailed in many quarters as a great victory for civil rights and the rule of law. It is not. In fact, it is a watershed in judicial hubris, and in the continuing trend in our society to convert every form of decision making into a lawsuit. For the first time in our history, the Supreme Court has rejected the considered judgment of both the Congress and the president on an issue of national security. The writ of habeas corpus, a bulwark of domestic liberty, has been extended to foreign nationals...

WASHINGTON — Ever since the Army lost its warplanes to a newly independent Air Force after World War II, soldiers have depended on the sister service for help from the sky, from bombing and strafing to transport and surveillance. But the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have frayed the relationship, with Army officers making increasingly vocal complaints that the Air Force is not pulling its weight. In Afghanistan, Army officers have complained about bombing missions gone awry that have killed innocent civilians. In Iraq, Army officers say the Air Force has often been out of touch, fulfilling only half of...

Washington, DC — Just about everyone in America knows that Sunday, June 15, is Father's Day. The "Day for Dads" has been celebrated on the third Sunday of June since 1966, when President Lyndon Johnson decreed it to be so. Those who make and sell power tools and greeting cards have been grateful ever since. Somehow, it just isn't the same for June 14th — Flag Day — and by no coincidence, the U.S. Army's anniversary. Father's Day is traditionally memorialized with gifts, cards and calls for dear old dad. Flag Day is all but forgotten. But this year, with...

SANTA BARBARA, Calif., June 13 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Former Republican Congressman Bob Barr has published an op-ed in todays Wall Street Journal calling for the repeal of "don't ask, don't tell," the policy which prohibits gay men and lesbians from serving openly in the military. Barr, who was a member of Congress from 1995 to 2003, opposes same-sex marriage as well as efforts to classify gays and lesbians as members of a constitutionally protected minority class. On the gays-in-the-military issue, however, Barr feels differently. In the Wall Street Journal op-ed, he argued that allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly in...

WASHINGTON -- Sixty-four years ago this week, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt came on the radio and implored Americans to "devote themselves in a continuance of prayer invoking thy help to our efforts." The "effort" of which he spoke was Operation Overlord, the D-Day landing of 150,000 American and Allied troops at Normandy. The risks were so great that Winston Churchill told the people of Britain: "The invasion has been launched. The result is with God." FDR described it as "a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our republic, our religion and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity."...

The deeper problem here is the belief that the best way to deal with insurgents is to address the "root causes" of the grievance that purportedly prompted them to take up arms. But what most of these insurgencies seek isn't social or moral redress: It's absolute power. Like other "liberation movements" (the PLO comes to mind), the Tigers are notorious for killing other Tamils seen as less than hard line in their views of the conflict. The failure to defeat these insurgencies thus becomes the primary obstacle to achieving a reasonable political settlement acceptable to both sides. This isn't to...

US Defense Secretary Robert Gates states that the low casualty rates are a sign of "real progress" in Iraq. Additionally, and equally as important, the number of Iraqi casualties has dropped significantly during the month of May as well. The drop in casualties on both sides is largely accredited to the heightened security measures taken in and around the country. The increase of 30,000 troops as requested by President Bush as well as the resistance al-Qaeda faced by Sunni tribal leaders are among the reasons for the low casualty rates. My question is why is the bloody-thirsty liberal media not...

For the American Left, there are many reasons to withdraw from Iraq: we're caught in the middle of a sectarian civil war, the Iraqi government is a perfidious ally, Iraq is a diversion from the real war against al Qaeda in Afghanistan, and so on. Some of these arguments are strategically shortsighted, others are based on false premises (such as the fact that the sectarian civil war is over in Iraq and bin Laden is in Pakistan, not Afghanistan), but at least they are more or less logically coherent. What makes almost no sense is the proposal that we turn...

Mullen said he was inspired to write the essay after receiving a constant stream of legitimate, if troubling, questions while visiting U.S. military personnel around the world, including, "What if a Democrat wins?" and, "What will that do to the mission in Iraq?" "I am not suggesting that military professionals abandon all personal opinions about modern social or political issues," Mullen wrote. "What I am suggesting - indeed, what the nation expects - is that military personnel will, in the execution of the mission assigned to them, put aside their partisan leanings. Political opinions have no place in cockpit or...

Air Force Lt. Col. Darryl Sheets has been a pilot for 13 years, but when he switched to the new Osprey troop and cargo carrier, "it was like learning how to fly all over again." Even if you're just along for the ride, like civilians who got a demonstration Wednesday morning, the CV-22 Osprey takes some getting used to. Especially at the moment of truth, when this one-of-a-kind, helicopter-airplane hybrid switches from one mode of flight to the other - in midair. Critics disagree, but the Pentagon insists it worked out all the bugs for pilots such as Sheets during...

"Now hear this." Aboard ship, every announcement from the bridge is preceded by that phrase. Here in the Big Apple it's "Fleet Week." Set to coincide with Memorial Day Weekend, an opportunity for the citizens of America's most-populous metropolitan area to see and touch the hardware the U.S. Navy, Coast Guard and Marine Corps use to defend this land. More importantly, it is a chance for our countrymen to meet and actually talk with a serving member of the U.S. Armed Forces. Notably, nearly all of the Marines and sailors aboard the USS Kearsarge (LHD-3) and a good number of...

SEATTLE (AP) — The military cannot automatically discharge people because they're gay, a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday in the case of a decorated flight nurse who sued the Air Force over her dismissal. The three judges from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals did not strike down the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy. But they reinstated Maj. Margaret Witt's lawsuit, saying the Air Force must prove that her dismissal furthered the military's goals of troop readiness and unit cohesion. The "don't ask, don't tell, don't pursue, don't harass" policy prohibits the military from asking about the sexual...

Ninth Circuit Rules Against Military's 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' By Pete Winn CNSNews.com Senior Staff Writer May 21, 2008 (CNSNews.com) - The future of the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy was cast into doubt on Wednesday. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, Calif., ruled that it is no longer enough for the military to state the policy -- which says that "homosexuality is incompatible with military service" -- when it discharges members of the armed services it discovers to be homosexuals. In a split decision, a three-judge panel ruled that the U.S. Air Force will have...

BLOOMER, Wis. - A new Marine who's graduating from Bloomer High School this month won't be able to wear his military uniform during the commencement ceremony.

Found this on Youtube today, and it's worth a minute of your time to view. The song is "Find You Waiting" by Christian rockers Decemberadio. I know these guys personally and they are an incredible group of young men who are not afraid of speaking God's word to their audiences.

The GI Film Festival (GIFF) will present films from new and established international and domestic filmmakers that honor the heroic stories of the American Armed Forces and the worldwide struggle for freedom and liberty. Some of the films screened will be fan favorites. Others will be screened for the first time. All will in some way express the courage and selflessness of our fighting men and women and the value of their work.

Horror novelist Stephen King talking to High School students had this to say about literacy: "The fact is if you can read, you can walk into a job later on. If you don't, then you've got, the Army, Iraq, I don't know, something like that. It's not as bright." Now literacy is critically important and I applaud efforts to get people to read. But it’s the example he uses that is offensive. He assumes that people who go into the military do so because they have no other choices and because they are illiterate. This is clearly not true. If...

YANGON, Myanmar - The United States delivered its first relief supplies to Myanmar on Monday, as the U.N. urged the reclusive nation to open its doors to foreign experts who can help up to 2 million cyclone victims facing disease and starvation. Snip Britain's opposition leader called for air-dropping aid if Myanmar's military government remains adamant. Snip The U.S. military C-130 cargo plane, packed with 14 tons of supplies, flew out of the Thai air force base of Utapao and landed in Yangon, capping prolonged negotiations to persuade Myanmar's military government to accept U.S. help. Snip Though international assistance has...

The U.S. military has, since 2001, cremated some of the remains of U.S. service members killed in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere in a Delaware facility that also cremates pets, a practice that ended Friday when the Pentagon banned the arrangement.

The following was a comment I received from a reader with regards to my article Self Loathing Patriots. It is a bit long and does contain some vulgar language, but is definatley worth reading. It goes a long way to show how we are truely viewed around the world by those people who do matter, rather than we Michael Moore and Nancy Pelosi would have us believe we are viewed as... "“Before I came over here I thought we (the Australian Army) were pretty hot.. was I ever wrong!...The Yanks (I hope you don’t mind me using that word) are...

A second American aircraft carrier steamed into the Persian Gulf Tuesday as the Pentagon ordered military commanders to develop new options for attacking Iran. CBS News national security correspondent David Martin reports that the planning is being driven by what one officer called the "increasingly hostile role" Iran is playing in Iraq - smuggling weapons into Iraq for use against American troops.

CLEARWATER — This month's death of Army Spc. Arturo Huerta-Cruz in Iraq cast a spotlight on troops serving in the U.S. military who are not American citizens. Huerta-Cruz, 23, was born in a small town in rural Mexico and moved to Clearwater with his family when he was 10. He was a legal permanent resident, or a "green card" soldier. That made him an exception. Noncitizens account for about 5 percent of the troops in all the branches of the U.S. military. Noncitizens now must have green cards to enlist. But as the nation fights wars on two fronts, some...

Petraeus's appointment as combatant commander of Central Command was set in motion several weeks ago, with the firing of then-combatant commander Adm. William Fallon. The administration let him go not for opposing a possible strike against Iran, as was widely speculated, but for arguing too often with Petraeus over troop levels in Iraq. Petraeus, who may be the most well-read analytical mind in the military, wanted to maintain troop levels, rather than reduce them for use in Afghanistan and for other contingencies -- to say nothing of relieving strains on the army. But Fallon and Pentagon generals wanted troop levels...

I received this list of facts about Iraq in an email from my beloved mother-in-law. You should be able to verify all of these facts on the Department of Defense website: http://www.defenselink.mil/ Facts: - 47 countries' have reestablished their embassies in Iraq. - The Iraqi government currently employs 1.2 million Iraqi people. - 3100 schools have been renovated, 364 schools are under rehabilitation, 263 new schools are now under construction; and 38 new schools have been completed in Iraq. - Iraq's higher educational structure consists of 20 Universities, 46 Institutes or colleges and 4 research centers, all currently operating. -...

By Associated Press WASHINGTON - Barack Obama said if he is elected president, he will repeal the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that prevents gays from serving openly in the military. The Illinois senator and Democratic presidential candidate said he would not require his Joint Chiefs of Staff to be opposed to the policy, which was introduced during the Clinton administration. He said his priority for the Joint Chiefs would be that they make decisions to strengthen the military and keep the country safe, not their position on the policy. “We’re spending large sums of money to kick highly qualified...

BAGRAM, Afghanistan — U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan now top 32,000, the highest number of American forces in the country since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion that toppled the Taliban. The rise in force levels is a response to an increasingly violent insurgency that is spreading into new parts of the country. The top American commander in Afghanistan has requested three more brigades — about 7,500 more troops — and the Pentagon has promised that more U.S. troops will be sent to Afghanistan next year. Following the 2001 ouster of the Taliban, the U.S. had fewer than 10,000 troops in the...

All military services met or exceeded their recruiting goals for March, Defense Department officials reported today. This makes the 10th straight month the services have hit their recruiting marks. All of the services have surpassed their recruiting goals for fiscal 2008 to date. The Army brought in 101 percent of its 6,000-recruit goal for March, and the Marines finished with a two-month streak of 137 percent of its 1,632-recruit goal. The two services recruited 6,066 and 2,234 new members, respectively. The Air Force and Navy both hit 100 percent of their respective goals of 2,093 and 2,909 recruits. In the...

Remember the Real HeroesCol. Ken Allard (US Army, ret.) With the Final Four here this weekend and San Antonio Spurs playoff hopes riding high, you're likely to hear a lot of nonsense being talked about "heroes." Let an unheralded college forward, a Tony or a Manu hit a 30-foot jumper at the buzzer and "heroics" will be the preferred term, from headlines to conversations around the office coffee pot.  Sorry to differ, but athletic prowess makes great players, not heroes. So may I tell you about some folks who truly deserve that term? And why the words "unsung" and "hero" go...

SYRIAN Foreign Minister Walid Muallem said overnight Damascus is prepared for all scenarios in its worsening relationship with Washington, including the use of US military force. "A prudent person must make all his calculations, especially when we have to deal with an administration which knows how to strike but does not know how to withdraw," Mr Muallem said at the end of an Arab summit in Damascus. He was referring to Iraq where almost 160,000 American troops are stationed five years after invading the country to overthrow president Saddam Hussein. More than 4000 US soldiers have died since.

STOWE, Vt. (AP) - Bob Shannon is an avid hunter, a fishing guide and owns a tackle shop, but he sometimes struggles to get his own son out into Vermont's woods and fields. "He'll be sitting there with the video games," Shannon said of 9-year- old Alexander. "I finally had to lay down the law last summer: 'If it's a nice day, you're outside.'" Shannon's challenge reflects a larger problem plaguing many state governments: Revenue from hunting and fishing license sales is plunging because of waning interest in the outdoors. "We're losing our rural culture," said Steve Wright, a regional...

Like pensions and insurance, defence is one of those subjects to which too many people only pay attention when things go wrong. You might think, in the light of the past decade, that this would have changed. But you would be sadly mistaken. Even today, even after Iraq, few mainstream MPs without an immediate personal or constituency interest in the subject turn up in the Commons for defence debates. Many politicians who are thoughtful about a range of domestic issues still pass by on the other side when the conversation gravitates to the military. In this they reflect the British...

WASHINGTON — One of the Army's most Iraq-savvy generals is taking charge, at least temporarily, of arguably the most important command in the U.S. military, with responsibility for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. In a ceremony Friday at MacDill Air Force Base, Fla., Lt. Gen. Martin Dempsey is to assume command of U.S. Central Command from Navy Adm. William J. Fallon, who announced unexpectedly on March 11 that he was quitting. Fallon cited press reports that he was at odds with President Bush over Iran policy. Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who has denied that Fallon was out of step...

The United States Defence Department has developed a prototype of an aircraft armed with a laser gun that could destroy tanks 10 miles away. The Airborne Tactical Laser weapon is to be mounted on a Boeing aircraft and is capable of destroying targets up to 15km (10m) away, according to Defense Update online magazine. The ten-centimetre-wide beam will heat targets almost instantly to thousands of degrees and will slice through metal even at maximum range. It is intended both for battlefield use and for missile defense.

1. David Howell Petraeus was born in Cornwall, N.Y., on Nov. 7, 1952. His father, Sixtus, was a Dutch-born ship captain who met David's mother, Miriam, at the Seaman's Church Institute in New York. Sixtus later worked for a New York power company. 2. While he was a student at Cornwall Central High School, Petraeus appeared in school plays (including David Swan and The Devil and Tom Walker) and played on the soccer team. He was a member of the National Honor Society and was named a National Merit Scholarship finalist. 3. Reportedly, Petraeus's nickname was "Peaches." This may be...

Also compares Muslim terrorists to religious 'radicals' in Oregon JERUSALEM – Sen. Barack Obama's military adviser and national campaign co-chairman has implied U.S. politicians are afraid of Jewish voters in Miami and New York City and that American Jews are the "problem" impeding a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Merrill A. McPeak, a former Air Force chief of staff, also compared the Hamas and Hezbollah terrorist organizations to what he described as religious radicals in Oregon and claimed "born-again [Christians]" supported the war in Iraq to help Israel. Discussing Middle East politics during a 2003 interview with the Oregonian newspaper...

Some have accused the media of trying to undermine the war effort by swaying public opinion with images of flag-draped coffins returning from Iraq, but the visuals are justified and important, according to Associated Press President and CEO Tom Curley. Curley was the keynote speaker of the Sunshine Week dinner at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. on March 18. Curley defended the media's use of the controversial photographs as "moving and very unifying." "Well, we've all tried and we've all been turned down, and I think your question is another reminder we should keep trying," Curley said when...