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‘The Phantom’ Fouled the Latrine; We Had to Find Him Before Sarge Flushed Us All Down the Toilet

by Heath Hansen It was 0530 hours the morning our first sergeant kicked open the door to our tent, and told us to “get the fuck outside and form it up!” Late the previous night, we returned to base from a 10-day mission in Afghanistan. I could see through a …

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Serbia Launches ‘Unprecedented’ Military Buildup on Border With Kosovo, White House Says

Belgrade has launched an “unprecedented staging of advanced Serbian artillery, tanks, and mechanized infantry units” at the border with Kosovo, a senior U.S. official told reporters on Friday. The White House urged Serbia to pull back what it said is a large military deployment from its border with Kosovo amid …

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The Recurring Shock of Chinese Espionage: A Short History of Collective Amnesia

COMMENTARY by Susan Katz Keating When the Senate Intelligence Committee holds a hearing this week to address Chinese malign influence inside the United States, lawmakers ought to be given a cache of memory assistance devices. Perhaps that will stop them from succumbing anew to the amnesia that has plagued our …

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Attack on Kosovo Monastery: In Search of the Masterminds

RFE/RL Balkan Service Kosovar police have searched homes and buildings in a northern, ethnic-Serb-dominated district where an attack on an Orthodox monastery left four people dead, including a police officer. Roads into the village of Banjska, where the monastery is located, remained blocked by police on September 26, and authorities …

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‘I Miss the Battlefield’: A Warrior Longs for the Clarity of Combat

by Jim Lechner Editor’s note: Army Ranger (Ret) Jim Lechner wrote the following hymn to comradeship and patriotism – an essay that reverberates among those who long for the lost clarity of war. A veteran of multiple Special Operations missions, Lechner was wounded in the 1993 Battle of Mogadishu in …

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Mold, Sewage, and Rot in the Barracks: How Did the US Military Sink So Low?

ANALYSIS by John “Wolf” Wagner Mold, raw sewage, broken windows, and fire systems that don’t work. The Government Accountability Office recently highlighted these and other severe problems plaguing military barracks across the services. The problems also include non-existent maintenance and repairs, poor cleaning services, a lack of accountability, and more. …

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A Jeep, a Soldier, Some Booze, and One Very Rough Night in Camp

by James Woods Editor’s note: Reader James Woods sent this story about his father in law, who had an interesting time one night after dark during WWII. My father in law was assigned to the HQ company of an engineer unit as a driver during WWII. The unit was going …

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The F-35, Lost and Found: As Questions Mount, Will Others Now Ground the Aircraft?

ANALYSIS by John “Wolf” Wagner If others also begin to ground the aircraft, we may be looking at a much more serious problem with our platform. Now that investigators have found a debris field for the Marine Corps F-35B that was ‘lost’ Sunday after the pilot ejected, the questions are …

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‘They Were a Brotherhood’: Working With Mercenaries in the Congo

 by William Boudreau    Editor’s note: Former American diplomat William Boudreau encountered mercenaries during his career with the Foreign Service. Here are his recollections and observations about them. I will not advocate for a humanitarian award for any mercenary I have known. However, they embrace humanity. My point is they …

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MiG Pilot Viktor Belenko: ‘I Am the Luckiest Man Alive’

by Susan Katz Keating In retrospect, it seems fitting that I met Viktor Belenko in Reno. He was a gambler hanging out in a gambling town, surrounded by pilots in their fast moving aircraft, barreling wildly around pylons. I went there many years back, looking for stories to be found …

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