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THE DAY OF AUGUST 26, 2007, began like any other for the soldiers of Charlie Company, 2-505 Parachute Infantry Regiment (from the 82nd Airborne Division) -- with a mission in the city. Over a year into its deployment to Samarra, Iraq, and now working on the three-month extension announced by Secretary of Defense Gates in the spring, the company knew the city like the back of its collective hands and had its operational routine down to a science, whatever the mission it might be tasked with. On this morning, that mission was to establish a defensive perimeter around a block...

Fallen soldiers given highway salute Hundreds line Hwy. 401 bridges to bid goodbye to fallen troopers In a brilliant and emotional show of support, a sea of red and white lined the overpasses east of the city last night in honour of the three soldiers killed in Afghanistan last week. Hundreds of people stood on several overpasses from Northumberland County to Durham, most either wearing Canada's colours or waving a Canadian flag, as the convoy carrying the three fallen members of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry made its way along Hwy. 401. "I think it's wonderful," Linda Thomson, 50,...

June 20, 2007: After weeks of maneuvering in and around Baghdad, U.S. and Iraqi forces have isolated and cornered large numbers of terrorists in Diyala province (northeast of Baghdad), and especially in the provincial capital, Baqouba. This is a major operation, with 9,000 Americans and a thousand Iraqi troops (and police) involved. In addition, there are several hundred local irregulars, who have switched sides. This is a big change in the Baghdad suburbs. While tribal leaders and warlords in the west (Anbar province) have been turning on terrorist groups, especially al Qaeda, for several years, the gangs of Baghdad were...

HUNTINGDON, Tenn. - The family of Pvt. William Bernice Clark never had a funeral for him, never got to say goodbye and never really accepted his fate among the fallen during the Normandy D-Day landings in World War II. That was until his dog tag was discovered in the sands of Omaha Beach. On Wednesday _ exactly 63 years after that tragic day _ the aged tag was returned to his native Tennessee. "This feels like an ending," said the soldier's first cousin, 79-year-old Lota Park, who along with another cousin accepted the dog tag at a ceremony in the...

TAMPA - Dick Linn sits inside Room 109 at the La Quinta Inn, lost in the glow of his laptop. He's 53, a traveling software salesman far from his Virginia home. He's also the father of Marine Lance Cpl. Karl Linn, 20, who was killed during an ambush near Haditha, Iraq, in January 2005. Each month, the war creates new Dick Linns across the country. Despite the presence of support groups and counseling, many of them still grieve alone. But Linn and others like him have discovered a safe haven in a quiet corner of the Internet. The popular Web...

WASHINGTON — Recommendations from U.S. generals and the new Iraqi government will determine how many U.S. troops will remain in Iraq, President Bush said Monday, casting aside reports that sharp troop reductions are in the works ahead of November's midterm election. Gen. George Casey, head of Multinational Force in Iraq, met with Bush last Friday, at which time the two reviewed joint U.S.-Iraqi force operations to secure Baghdad as well as actions in Ramadi aimed at securing that city by running out members of Al Qaeda. The president said the two also discussed troop levels, but no decisions have been...

WASHINGTON — Murky procedures, lack of oversight and inadequate resources led to mistakes in the way U.S. troops treated Iraq and Afghanistan detainees. But two Pentagon reports, released publicly for the first time, found no widespread mistreatment or illegal actions by the military. A human rights group called the reports released Friday a whitewash that ignored countless documented accounts of detainee abuse. One report detailed several incidents involving U.S. special operations forces in 2003-04. It said interrogators fed some Iraqi detainees only bread and water for up to 17 days, used unapproved interrogation practices such as sleep deprivation and loud...

Alright, these plans are tentative, but I think that if we are able to enlist enough willing participants we'll be able to demonstrate our presence. Protest Warrior-and presumably, other patriotic, conservative organizations-is planning to counteract the malicious influence of the hardcore, reflexively anti-American left, who have designated March 19th-the anniversary of the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom-as the date for staging a bilious, contemptible display of their hatred for everything this nation-and its allies in the War on terror-stands for. Anyone interested in combating the pernicious influence of their timeworn-but still potent-ideology should get in touch with me, either via...