Category: Army News

Bradley Manning, the traitorous former soldier who released thousands of classified documents to the media and was sentenced to 35 years in prison broke into tears (see photo above for an example) when prison officials told him that he needed a haircut according to Yahoo News;

“I felt gross — like Frankenstein’s monster wandering around the countryside avoiding angry mobs with torches and pitchforks,” she wrote in a blog post from prison. Feeling “humiliated, hurt and rejected,” she felt like “giving up” and said she “cried and cried and cried and sniffled a little bit, and then cried some more.”

But Manning, in comments sent from prison to Yahoo News, says she has now overcome her despair and is once again ready to fight the U.S. government in court.

[…]

“Plaintiff feels like a freak and a weirdo,” Manning asserts in her complaint, “not because having short hair makes a person less of a woman — but because for her, it undermines specifically recommended treatment and sends the message to everyone that she is not a ‘real’ woman.”

Yes, Manning is going to sue the Army so he can grow his hair long like a “real woman”, you know, even though he isn’t according to any DNA test that the Army wants to do on him. But, yeah, allowing transgender people to serve openly in the military is a good idea and it doesn’t present any special problems what-so-ever. By the way, Manning should feel like a freak, because he is – a freak and a gigantic crybaby.

Thanks to Marine_7002 for the link.

Bobo sends us the directive message from the Department of the Army opening 13-series (Artillery) occupational specialties to women.

So, I guess the Army isn’t wasting time waiting for the Secretary of Defense to open up jobs to women. You’ll notice that down there in paragraph 3, it also announces the requirement of the mandatory Sexual Harassment/Assault Response and Prevention (SHARP) Training prophylactic soon after their arrival in a unit.

I guess the Navy’s blimp broke free from it’s tether and took off from Maryland to Pennsylvania yesterday. I found an article that said that the experiment with the big balloon was supposed to end on October 5th. So here we are three weeks later and the craft decides to go AWOL. I guess it came down in Pennsylvania according to Yahoo News.

Two US F-16s fighter jets were scrambled to pursue the so-called JLENS blimp as it floated northeast of Washington at an altitude of about 16,000 feet (4,875 meters).

The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) said the huge balloon-like structure finally landed in Montour County in Pennsylvania, at around 4:00 pm (2000 GMT.) A military recovery team was en route to the area to collect the runaway aircraft.

The broken tether lines took down power lines as they dragged along the ground. But, hey, it was just country folks who were inconvenienced/endangered. The Navy says that this happens frequently in Afghanistan where they also use the 18th Century technology, they break loos in bad weather and then crash. So you’d think that they would be able to anticipate a problem a little earlier and take precautions. But, like I said, the balloon didn’t go towards any urban areas where the important people live.

Editor’s Note Some of the articles I linked to said that the blimp was Navy – since I wrote the post last night, the media changed some of the stories to read Army so, yes, I made a mistake by not checking the sources again this morning. Sorry, Navy.

The Washington Examiner reports that Army Secretary John McHugh mentioned the issue of registering women for selective service hen he spoke to the Association of the US Army convention the other day.

“If your objective is true and pure equality, then you have to look at all aspects and at some point Selective Service will have to be one of those things considered very carefully,” McHugh said on the first day of the Association of the United States Army’s annual meeting in Washington.

The Supreme Court last visited the issue in Rostker v. Goldberg (1981). In a 6-3 decision, Justice Rehnquist wrote the majority opinion;

Since women are excluded from combat, Congress concluded that they would not be needed in the event of a draft, and therefore decided not to register them…Men and women, because of the combat restrictions on women, are simply not similarly situated for purposes of a draft or registration for a draft.

So, with the Defense Department contemplating removal of the barriers keeping women from serving in combat specialties, they also remove any barrier to registering draft-aged women for selective service as well. I mean, if we’re all still concerned about equality here. With the good, comes the bad. Suck it up, cupcake.

Thanks to Chief Tango for the link to the Washington Examiner.

Former POW and Senator John McCain tells the Boston Herald that if deserter Bowe Bergdahl only faces an Article 15 like his lawyer said would be an appropriate punishment, well, McCain would then conduct a Senate investigation of the case and the way the military handled the legal aspect;

“If it comes out that he has no punishment, we’re going to have to have a hearing in the Senate Armed Services Committee,” said McCain, who chairs the committee. “And I am not prejudging, OK, but it is well known that in the searches for Bergdahl, after — we know now — he deserted, there are allegations that some American soldiers were killed or wounded, or at the very least put their lives in danger, searching for what is clearly a deserter. We need to have a hearing on that.”

Of course, the lawyer, Eugene R. Fidell says that’s command influence;

“Sen. McCain’s comments are deeply disturbing and constitute unlawful congressional influence in a sensitive pending military justice matter,” Fidell said. “This is particularly troubling because he is chairman of the committee that confirms all military promotions, as well as all nominations to the highest uniformed and civilian positions in the Army.

Keep in mind that it’s only Fidell who has said that the presiding officer at Bergdahl’s Article 32 hearing recommended an article 15. We haven’t heard that from the Army yet.

I guess it wasn’t command influence when the President released five high-value terrorists and hosted Bergdahl’s parents at the Rose Garden for a press conference. Maybe the lawyer should work harder at keeping his client out of pot-smoking parties, that might prevent some of this command influence.

Thanks to Chief Tango for the link.

The Washington Post reports that Major Lisa Peplinski Jaster a 37-year-old Reservist from Houston is on track to graduate from Ranger School soon.

“She still hasn’t completed all of the requirements,” the official said. “But what are her odds of graduating now? They’re really, really good.”

Jaster is a 2000 graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., and would be older than most graduates — male or female. She is a frequent participant in CrossFit training exercises and has been a contestant in weightlifting competitions.

I don’t care whether you’re male or female, going through that course at that age is an accomplishment, graduating from it makes you a star. Politics of the whole “female Rangers” aside, congratulations to the major.

Thanks to Chief Tango for the link.