US MILITARY FORCES, THE PENTAGON, & INTELLIGENCE :

Washington Post, 15 May 08, by Karen DeYoung
Gates: U.S. Should Engage Iran With Incentives, Pressure
'The United States should construct a combination of incentives and pressure to engage Iran, and may have missed earlier opportunities to begin a useful dialogue with Tehran, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said yesterday.'

International Herald Tribune, 14 May 08, by Conrad Mulcahy
U.S. officers battle visa hurdles for Iraq aides
'... given the risks the interpreters took, and [Colonel Michael] Zacchea and others are taking up the cause. They have created a growing network of aid groups, spending countless hours navigating a byzantine immigration system that they feel unnecessarily keeps their allies in harm's way. There is, they say, a debt that must be repaid to the Iraqis who helped the most. To them it is an obligation both moral and pragmatic.'

The New Yorker, 19 May 08, by Sue Halpern
Annals of Psychology: Virtual Iraq
'Using simulation to treat a new generation of traumatized veterans. ... Like Virtual Vietnam, Virtual Iraq is a tool for doing what's known as prolonged-exposure therapy, which is sometimes called immersion therapy.'

Christian Science Monitor, 07 May 08, by Jill Carroll
A soldier's quest to save Iraqi, Afghan interpreters
'Targeted by insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan, they find a haven in America.'

Washington Post, 01 May 08, by Ann Scott Tyson
Mullen Cites U.S. 'Vulnerability'
'The nation's top military officer warned yesterday that the transition to a new American president will mark a "time of vulnerability" as the United States fights two wars, and he said military leaders are already actively preparing for the changing of the guard.'

Christian Science Monitor, 01 May 08, by Howard LaFranchi
U.S. death toll rises as it digs in against Iraq's Shiite militias
'At least 47 US soldiers were killed in Iraq in April, making it the deadliest month since September. Many of the casualties are a result of the recent assault on the Mahdi Army.'

International Herald Tribune, 24 Apr 08, by Thom Shanker
New jobs set for 2 U.S. commanders with Iraq role
'A Pentagon plan to elevate General David Petraeus and his former deputy means that the two commanders most closely associated with President George W. Bush's current strategy in Iraq will have responsibilities over the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan extending into the next administration.'

International Herald Tribune, 23 Apr 08, by David Stout
Petraeus, top U.S. general in Iraq, nominated for a higher post
'General David Petraeus, who has commanded United States troops in Iraq for the past year, will be nominated to head the United States Central Command, which oversees military operations across a wide swath of the Middle East, Africa and Asia, Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced Wednesday.'

Washington Post, 24 Apr 08, by Dan Eggen
CIA Foresaw Interrogation Issues
'The CIA concluded that criminal, administrative or civil investigations stemming from harsh interrogation tactics were "virtually inevitable," leading the agency to seek legal support from the Justice Department, according to a CIA official's statement in court documents filed yesterday.'

Washington Post, 24 Apr 08, by Dana Milbank
What the Family Would Let You See, the Pentagon Obstructs
'... the de facto ban on media at Arlington funerals fits neatly with an effort by the administration to sanitize the war in Iraq.'

Washington Post, 22 Apr 08, by Josh White and William Branigin
Gates Assails Pentagon on Resources for Battlefields
'Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates yesterday criticized the U.S. military services for not moving aggressively enough to provide critical resources to the battlefields in Iraq and Afghanistan, saying it has been "like pulling teeth" to get the Pentagon's conventional Cold War bureaucracy to adapt to the needs of current wars.'

New York Times/AP, 21 Apr 08
Pentagon chief says Air Force should do more
'While Gates' comments were directed mainly at the Air Force, his concern about faster fielding of unmanned surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft included a broader appeal to the entire military. The Army, Navy and Marine Corps have been expanding their fleets of drone aircraft.'

New York Times, 22 Apr 08, by Patricia Cohen
Talking Veterans Down From Despair
'The veterans hot line is part of a specialized effort by the Department of Veterans Affairs to reduce suicide by enabling counselors, for the first time, to instantly check a veteran’s medical records and then combine emergency response with local follow-up services. It comes after years of criticism that the department has been neglecting tens of thousands of wounded service men and women who have returned from war zones in Iraq and Afghanistan.'

New York Times/AP, 20 Apr 08
Wars, guns and money
'No weapon is more important to tens of thousands of U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan than the carbine rifle. And for well over a decade, the military has relied on one company, Colt Defense of Hartford, Conn., to make the M4s they trust with their lives.'

New York Times, 16 Apr 08, by Thom Shanker
Pentagon Seeks Authority to Train and Equip Foreign Militaries
'Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates urged Congress on Tuesday to grant the Pentagon permanent authority to train and equip foreign militaries, a task previously administered by the State Department, and to raise the annual budget for the effort to $750 million, a 250 percent increase.'

International Herald Tribune, 22 Apr 08, by Lizette Alvarez
Recruitment of felons up in U.S. Army and Marine Corps
'Strained by the demands of a long war, the U.S. Army and the U.S. Marine Corps recruited significantly more felons into their ranks in 2007 than in 2006, including people convicted of armed robbery, arson and burglary, according to data released by a House committee.'

Human Events, 08-09 Apr 08, by General David H. Petraeus
Report to Congress on the Situation in Iraq
[pdf] 'It clearly is in our national interests to help Iraq prevent the resurgence of Al Qaeda in the heart of the Arab world, to help Iraq resist Iranian encroachment on its sovereignty, to avoid renewed ethno-sectarian violence that could spill over Iraq's borders and make the existing refugee crisis even worse, and to enable Iraq to expand its role in the regional and global economies.'

Washington Post, 10 Apr 08, by Peter Baker and Jonathan Weisman
Bush to Cut Army Tours to 12 Months
President Supports Suspending Pullout Of Forces in Iraq

Christian Science Monitor, 08 Apr 08, by Peter Grier
Petraeus to Congress: reassess Iraq before further troop cuts
'The US strategy would effectively end Bush's role in the war, pushing decisions to his successor.'

Christian Science Monitor, 10 Apr 08, by Jill Carroll
While reservists serve, their jobs don't always wait
'As the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan grind on, tensions are mounting between the military's civilian volunteers, trying to step back into their professions, and employers, straining at times to cope with a growing cadre of workers who are away at war for months then expect to regain their former jobs.'

Washington Post, 10 Apr 08, by Steve Vogel
The Young Lions of Able Troop
'To the Cadre on the Front Lines Of Improving Care at Walter Reed, The Challenge Can Rival Combat'

Washington Post, 03 Apr 08, by Dana Hedgpeth
Contracts for Body Armor Filled without Initial Tests
'Government auditors said yesterday that nearly half of 28 contracts to manufacture body armor for Army soldiers were completed without the gear ever going through an initial test.'

Christian Science Monitor, 03 Apr 08, by Tom McCawley
Pentagon overspent budget by $295 billion
'The Pentagon has gone hundreds of billions of dollars over budget in recent years on key weapons systems, including aircraft, ships, and satellite, said a government audit. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) said for the sixth year in a row that the Pentagon had significantly gone over budget, but according to a report presented to Congress this week, the problem is getting worse.'

International Herald Tribune, 02 Apr 08, by Mark Mazzetti
Pentagon is expected to close intelligence unit
'The Pentagon is expected to shut a controversial intelligence office that has drawn fire from lawmakers and civil liberties groups who charge that it was part of an effort by the Defense Department to expand into domestic spying. The move, government officials say, is part of a broad effort under Defense Secretary Robert Gates to review, overhaul and, in some cases, dismantle an intelligence architecture built by his predecessor, Donald H. Rumsfeld.'

International Herald Tribune, 01 Apr 08, by William J. Broad
Uniform patches hint at secret U.S. military programs
'The classified budget of the Defense Department, concealed from the public in all but outline, has nearly doubled in the Bush years, to $32 billion. That is more than the combined budgets of the Food and Drug Administration, the National Science Foundation and NASA. Those billions have expanded a secret world of advanced science and technology in which military units and federal contractors push back the frontiers of warfare.'

International Herald Tribune, 28 Mar 08, by C.J. Chivers and Eric Schmitt
Finding of fraud led to suspension of company supplying arms to Afghanistan
'When the United States Army decided this week to suspend the main supplier of munitions to Afghan security forces from future federal work, it did so after a field investigation documented what it called an act of fraud. ... the army's Procurement Fraud Branch visited an Afghan ammunition storage site in January after the shipment arrived. There, investigators found that ammunition certified as Hungarian was actually made in China, according to the memorandum.'

International Herald Tribune, 25 Mar 08, by Steven Lee Myers and Thom Shanker
Bush given plan to put off further troop cuts in Iraq
'Troop levels in Iraq would remain nearly the same through 2008 as at any time during five years of war under plans presented to President George W. Bush on Monday by the senior American commander and the top American diplomat in Iraq, senior administration and military officials said.'

Christian Science Monitor, 25 Mar 08, by Peter Grier
U.S. military deaths in Iraq hit 4,000, but rate is slowing
'The pace of attacks – and US fatalities – has dropped since last June.'

International Herald Tribune, 19 Mar 08, by David M. Herszenhorn
Estimates of Iraq war cost were not close to ballpark
'At the outset of the Iraq war, the Bush administration predicted that it would cost $50 billion to $60 billion to oust Saddam Hussein, restore order and install a new government. Five years in, the Pentagon tags the cost of the Iraq war at roughly $600 billion and counting. Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel Prize-winning economist and critic of the war, pegs the long-term cost at more than $4 trillion. The Congressional Budget Office and other analysts say that $1 trillion to $2 trillion is more realistic, depending on troop levels and on how long the American occupation continues.'

New York Times, 23 Mar 08, by
Military Kin Struggle With Loss and a Windfall
'For some relatives of service members killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, the money feels, at first, like an affront, as if the government were putting a price tag on a loved one’s life. Others are thrown off balance by the sudden infusion of $500,000, spending with abandon to assuage grief or finding themselves besieged by hard-up friends and relatives. And the newfound wealth often strains relations among in-laws.'

Washington Post, 13 Mar 08, by Joby Warrick and Michael Abramowitz
Fallon's Resignation Is Not Seen as Step Toward Attack on Iran
'The abrupt resignation of the Pentagon's top Middle East commander has silenced one of the Bush administration's fiercest opponents of a unilateral military strike against Iran, yet top administration officials themselves do not see real prospects for military action before the end of President Bush's term, current and former U.S. officials say.'

International Herald Tribune, 11 Mar 08, by Thom Shanker and David Stout
Top U.S. commander in Middle East is retiring early
'Admiral William Fallon, the top American commander in the Middle East, whose views on Iran and other issues have seemed to put him at odds with the Bush administration, is retiring early, the Pentagon said Tuesday afternoon.'

International Herald Tribune, 13 Mar 08, by Mark Mazzetti and Scott Shane
Pentagon review cites tapes showing interrogations
'The Defense Department is conducting an extensive review of the videotaping of interrogations at military facilities from Iraq to Guantánamo Bay, and so far it has identified nearly 50 tapes, including one that showed what a military spokesman described as the forcible gagging of a terrorism suspect.'

International Herald Tribune, 11 Mar 08, by Thom Shanker
Proposal would let U.S. troops in South Korea have families with them
'The commander of American forces in South Korea is urging the Pentagon to allow thousands of troops stationed there to have spouses and children live with them during tours of duty.'

Christian Science Monitor, 06 Mar 08, by Patrik Jonsson
U.S. troops buy own gear for safety, style in battle
'Since 9/11, the market for tactical war gear has expanded from nearly nonexistent to nearly $150 million in sales each year, which includes sales directly to soldiers as well as to the Pentagon, according to industry sources.'

International Herald Tribune, 04 Mar 08, by Thom Shanker
Joint Chiefs chairman emphasizes U.S. role in Pakistan
'[Admiral Mike] Mullen said the United States was willing to offer assistance for things like training, transport helicopters and night-combat operations, but he stressed that he was bringing no specific proposals on this visit and that he would await formal requests from Pakistan's military.'

International Herald Tribune, 02 Mar 08, by Eric Schmitt and Thom Shanker
U.S. plan widens role in training Pakistani forces
'The United States military is developing a plan to send about 100 American trainers to work with a Pakistani paramilitary force that is the vanguard in the fight against Al Qaeda and other extremist groups in Pakistan's restive tribal areas, American military officials said.'

• Veterans History Project
• NewsHour : Base Realignments and Closures
• Knight Ridder : Veterans Issues

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