The base for the 200 Marines and twelve aircraft has not been announced, but they are to join the Marine Expeditionary Brigade-Afghanistan.

The system experienced tremendous success in Iraq, and is expected to produce the same results in Afghanistan.

The mountainous topography of the country is the Government Accountability Office’s lone concern, as the aircraft has not been tested in such high altitudes.

Marine officials, however, disagree and stand by the Ospreys ability to save lives.

-C. Doucet

Thank you!

Semper Fi

Always remember.

Semper Fi.

Sen. Al Franken’s Service Dogs for Veterans Act was a part of the Defense Authorization bill voted on by Congress on Thursday. The House and Senate both approved the measure. It now heads to President Barack Obama’s desk.

The legislation, which was co-sponsored by Johnny Isakson (R-GA), will establish a pilot program and study for organizations that provide disabled veterans with service dogs.

Veterans Affairs will provide about 200 service dogs to former service members. Half would go to people with mental disabilities and half to those dealing with physical ailments.

Franken’s bill, which will take some time to implement due to the time needed for training, will cost about $5 million.

The impact a service dog has on the life of a disabled veteran is overwhelming.  This is one earmark that I approve of. 

She will make a stop in Norfolk, VA to pick up Marines.  The ship will remain in NY for ten days and be open to the public. 

The ship’s motto is: “Strength forced through sacrifice. Never forget.”

Gaffney offers examples of those missteps:

1. President Obama replaced the commander of the U.S. and allied forces in Afghanistan with Gen. Stanley McChrystal, but then refused to provide him with the troops necessary to be successful.  Gen. McChrystal and his superiors have requested as many as 60,000 additional troops.  Instead the administration gave them 13,000.   The outcome= unecessary deaths of our military men and women.  Gaffney wrote “morale in Afghanistan reportedly has plummeted” and “restrictive rules of engagement” and not enough troops in an expansive area are to blame for the needless deaths over the past few months in this terror stricken area.

2. The administration has received congressional approval for numerous cuts in defense spending.  “Particularly hard hit have been the budgets for modernization and replacement of aging and worn-out equipment,” said Gaffney.  What is the true cost of this budget shortfall? The deaths of ill-equipped military personnel.

3. Despite numerous uniformed leaders arguing that a repeal of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy would degrade the “good order and discipline” vital to military forces, President Obama spoke to gay activists on October 10th in DC and repeated his campaign pledge to end the policy.

Gaffney ends his opinion piece with a question that I would love comments on: Can President Obama “euchre today’s commanders to go where their predecessors wisely refused to venture…”while simultaneously slashing their budgets, exhibiting disrespect for their professional judgment and jeopardizing their missions?” 

We are in a time of war.  Our military personnel should be priority one in our minds, and most certainly in our Presidents.

About one thousand U.S. Marines poured from helicopters and armored vehicles into Taliban-controlled villages in southern Afghanistan on Thursday in the first major operation under President Barack Obama’s strategy to stabilize the country. The offensive was launched shortly after 1 a.m. Thursday local time (4:30 p.m. EDT Wednesday) in Helmand province, a Taliban stronghold and the world’s largest opium poppy-producing area. The goal is to clear insurgents from the hotly contested region before the nation’s Aug. 20 presidential election. The Marines have not suffered any serious casualties and have seen only a sporadic resistance, said Lt. Abe Sipe, a spokesman for the unit. “The enemy has chosen to withdraw rather than engage for the most part,” Sipe said. “We had a couple of heat casualties, but not deemed serious in nature at this time.” The operation came as U.S. military announced that one of its soldiers was missing and believed captured by insurgents in eastern Afghanistan on Tuesday. The missing soldier was not involved in the Helmand operation. Officials described the offensive — dubbed Khanjar or “Strike of the Sword” — as the largest and fastest-moving of the war’s new phase and the biggest Marine offensive since the one in Fallujah, Iraq, in 2004. It involves four Marine companies — about 1,000 troops — who fanned out as part of a larger effort supported by a total of about 4,000 Marines from the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Brigade, plus 650 Afghan forces. British forces last week led similar, but smaller, missions to clear out insurgents in Helmand and neighboring Kandahar province. “Where we go we will stay, and where we stay, we will hold, build and work toward transition of all security responsibilities to Afghan forces,” Marine Corps Brig. Gen. Larry Nicholson said in a statement. Pakistan’s army said it had moved troops from elsewhere on its side of the Afghan border to the stretch opposite Helmand to try to stop any militants from fleeing the offensive. It gave no more details, but U.S. and Pakistani officials have expressed concern that stepped-up operations in southern Afghanistan could push the insurgents across the border. Transport helicopters carried hundreds of Marines into the village of Nawa, some 20 miles south of the provincial capital of Lashkar Gah, in a region where no U.S. or other NATO troops have operated in large numbers. The troops took many insurgents by surprise, dropping behind Taliban lines, said Capt. Drew Schoenmaker, from Greene, New York. “We are kind of forging new ground here. We are going to a place nobody has been before,” said Schoenmaker, 31, who commands Bravo Company of the 1st Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment. Daybreak brought the sporadic crackle of gunfire. Medical helicopters circled overhead and landed, indicating possible early casualties among the Marines. A Marine unit in Nawa traded gunfire with a group of some 20 insurgents, while Afghan troops exchanged small arms fire with militants after they were attacked with rocket propelled grenades fired from several houses. A Cobra helicopter circling overhead for most of the day fired rockets at a tree line nearby. Other troops walked through fields of corn and past mud-wall homes. Only a handful of villagers dared to venture outside. A roadside bomb early in the mission wounded one Marine, but he was able to continue, spokesman Capt. Bill Pelletier said. Southern Afghanistan is a Taliban stronghold but also a region where Afghan President Hamid Karzai is seeking votes from fellow Pashtun tribesmen. The Pentagon is deploying 21,000 additional troops to Afghanistan in time for the elections and expects the total number of U.S. forces there to reach 68,000 by year’s end. That is double the number of troops in Afghanistan in 2008 but still half as many as are now in Iraq. The Taliban, who took control of Afghanistan in 1996 and were ousted from power following a U.S.-led invasion in 2001, have made a violent comeback, wreaking havoc in much of the country’s south and east, forcing the United States to pour in the new troops. Pelletier said troops in Thursday’s operation were sent in by a mixture of aircraft and ground transport under the cover of darkness. The operation aims to show “the Afghan people that when we come in, we are going to stay long enough to set up their own institutions,” Pelletier said. Once on the ground, the troops will meet with local leaders, hear their needs and act on them, Pelletier said. “We do not want people of Helmand province to see us as an enemy. We want to protect them from the enemy,” Pelletier said. Thousands of British forces, fighting under NATO command, have been in Helmand since 2006 with broadly the same strategy, but security has deteriorated. They have met with stronger resistance than initially expected against Taliban fighters bankrolled by the vast opium and heroin trade. Reversing the insurgency’s momentum has been a key component of the new U.S. strategy, and thousands of additional troops allow commanders to push and stay into areas where international and Afghan troops had no permanent presence before. While Marine troops were the bulk of the force, recently arrived U.S. Army helicopters were also taking part in the operation. In March, Obama unveiled his strategy for Afghanistan, seeking to defeat Al Qaeda terrorists there and in Pakistan with a bigger force and a new commander. Taliban and other extremists, including those allied with Al Qaeda, routinely cross the two nations’ border in Afghanistan’s remote south. Last year, NATO and Pakistani forces cooperated in a series of complementary operations on the border, but the overall commitment of Islamabad to Washington’s aims in Afghanistan has long been questioned. Pakistan has frequently been accused in the past of failing to stop — and sometimes aiding — the movement of insurgents into Afghanistan from its side of the border. The governor of Helmand province predicted Operation Khanjar would be “very effective.” “The security forces will build bases to provide security for the local people so that they can carry out every activity with this favorable background and take their lives forward in peace,” Gov. Gulab Mangal said in a Pentagon news release. Obama aims to boost the Afghan army from 80,000 to 134,000 troops by 2011 — and greatly increase training by U.S. troops accompanying them — so the Afghan military can take control of the war. The White House also is pushing forces to set clear goals for a war gone awry, provide more resources and make a better case for international support. There is no timetable for withdrawal, and the White House has not estimated how many billions of dollars its plan will cost. Elsewhere in Afghanistan, insurgents captured an American soldier on Tuesday, said Capt. Elizabeth Mathias, a U.S. military spokeswoman. The missing soldier was not part of the Helmand operation. “We are using all of our resources to find him and provide for his safe return,” Mathias said. Mathias did not provide details on the soldier, the location where he was captured or the circumstances. Afghan Police Gen. Nabi Mullakheil said the soldier went missing in the Mullakheil area of eastern Paktika province, where there is an American base. Zabiullah Mujaheed, a spokesman for the Taliban, could not confirm that the soldier was with any of their militant forces. A myriad of insurgent groups operate in eastern Afghanistan, and the Taliban is only one of them. The soldier was noticed missing during a routine check of the unit on Tuesday and was first listed as “duty status whereabouts unknown,” a U.S. defense official said on condition of anonymity because details are still sketchy. Two U.S. defense sources said the soldier “just walked off” post with three Afghan counterparts after he finished working. They said they had no explanation for why he left the base. He was assigned to a combat outpost, one of a number of smaller bases set up by foreign forces in Afghanistan, the officials said. The most important insurgent group operating in that area is known as Haqqani network and is led by Siraj Haqqani, whom the U.S. has accused of masterminding beheadings and suicide bombings. The Associated Press contributed to this report.

From FOXNEWS.com

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,529788,00.html

 The ban on media coverage began in 1991, when President George H.W. Bush imposed it during the Persian Gulf War. It was meant to protect the privacy of grieving families.  It’s still too early to tell whether military families favor the new policy.

 Media interest has dwindled since the almost 40 reporters, photographers and camera operators turned out to document the arrival of Myers’ body. At some of the more recent casualty arrivals, the only media representative was a lone photographer from The Associated Press. Even if the media is not present, the Department of Defense films each casualty arrival for which consent is given and presents a recording to the family. Christie Woods initially declined media coverage of the return of her husband, Staff Sgt. Gary L. Woods Jr., of Lebanon Junction, Ky., who was killed along with Jason Pautsch. She changed her mind so family members who couldn’t travel to Dover would have the video, according to casualty assistance officer Sgt. Joseph Chapman.

While survivors are asked whether they consent to media coverage and want to travel to Dover, a policy memo issued by Defense Secretary Robert Gates states that media contact with family members will be allowed “only if specifically requested” by the family.

AP

This was the first positive reported test since the VA warned vets treated at three clinics that there might be a risk.

The VA did report that hepatitis was found in 16 patients.  But then stated that it isn’t certain that the patients got the illnesses because of unsterilized equipment at a VA clinic.  According to the Associated Press, the VA is looking into the possible relationship between the two.

Earlier this year, the VA warned thousands of vets to get blood tests because they could have been exposed to contamination while getting colonoscopies in Murfreesboro, Tenn., and Miami.

The endoscopic equipment in question was also used at an ear, nose and throat facility in Augusta, Ga. All three sites failed to properly sterilize the equipment between treatments.

The VA has said it does not yet know if veterans who were treated with the same kind of equipment at its other 150 hospitals may have been exposed to the same mistake.  The VA has now instituted a nationwide safety training campaign.

To date, less than a third — 3,174 — have been notified of their test results.

In all, at least five veterans have tested positive for hepatitis B and 11 for hepatitis C, which is potentially life-threatening.

These are our veterans.  The heroes of our nation.  Yet, they receive medical treatment at subpar facilities who aren’t focused on top notch care.  Going to fight for our country and returning to a facility where you contract an infectious disease is appalling and unacceptable.  If the Obama administration wants to take a look at changing our health care system, how about starting with our veterans health care?

He was a lance corporal in April 1967 during the first battle at Khe Sanh, one of the bloodiest battles of the war. When his platoon was attacked, Calhoun continued to fire back with a machine gun and an M-16 and to throw grenades.

A Silver Star citation signed by Navy Secretary Donald Winter says Calhoun displayed “resolute determination, selfless sacrifice and unwavering dedication to duty.”

A report on Calhoun’s actions never reached the appropriate office during the war.