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Hagel Repeals Drone Service Medal Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel has repealed a medal created just two months ago to recognize the achievements of drone pilots and cyber specialists, ordering that a separate “distinguishing device” be used instead. Then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta on Feb. 13 announced the Distinguished Warfare Medal for pilots of unmanned aircraft and cybersecurity operators who had “an extraordinary impact on combat operations” even though they did not serve on the battlefield. Veterans groups complained that the medal would unfairly be ranked above the Bronze Star with Combat “V” and the Purple Heart, two medals designed to acknowledge the service and sacrifice of troops who served in combat… —article by Brendan McGarry in Military.com (Apr. 15, 2013)
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Hagel Repeals Drone Service Medal

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel has repealed a medal created just two months ago to recognize the achievements of drone pilots and cyber specialists, ordering that a separate “distinguishing device” be used instead.

Then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta on Feb. 13 announced the Distinguished Warfare Medal for pilots of unmanned aircraft and cybersecurity operators who had “an extraordinary impact on combat operations” even though they did not serve on the battlefield.

Veterans groups complained that the medal would unfairly be ranked above the Bronze Star with Combat “V” and the Purple Heart, two medals designed to acknowledge the service and sacrifice of troops who served in combat…

—article by Brendan McGarry in Military.com (Apr. 15, 2013)

atidd:

Israelis Soldiers refuse to serve in Gaza (by SocialTV)

“To refuse, I needed more courage. Because in all these things I did in the military I was surrounded with a group of men that did the same thing, I was in such a herd atmosphere that these things seemed natural. So I say here whole heartedly that it took me more courage to refuse than to do all of the things I did in the military.”

FBI’s abuse of the surveillance state is the real scandal needing investigation

The Petraeus scandal is receiving intense media scrutiny obviously due to its salacious aspects, leaving one, as always, to fantasize about what a stellar press corps we would have if they devoted a tiny fraction of this energy to dissecting non-sex political scandals (this unintentionally amusing New York Times headline from this morning - “Concern Grows Over Top Military Officers’ Ethics” - illustrates that point: with all the crimes committed by the US military over the last decade and long before, it’s only adultery that causes “concern” over their “ethics”)…

So all based on a handful of rather unremarkable emails sent to a woman fortunate enough to have a friend at the FBI, the FBI traced all of Broadwell’s physical locations, learned of all the accounts she uses, ended up reading all of her emails, investigated the identity of her anonymous lover (who turned out to be Petraeus), and then possibly read his emails as well. They dug around in all of this without any evidence of any real crime - at most, they had a case of “cyber-harassment” more benign than what regularly appears in my email inbox and that of countless of other people - and, in large part, without the need for any warrant from a court…

But, as unwarranted and invasive as this all is, there is some sweet justice in having the stars of America’s national security state destroyed by the very surveillance system which they implemented and over which they preside…

Put another way, having the career of the beloved CIA Director and the commanding general in Afghanistan instantly destroyed due to highly invasive and unwarranted electronic surveillance is almost enough to make one believe not only that there is a god, but that he is an ardent civil libertarian…

— Glenn Greenwald writing in Guardian.co.uk (Nov. 13, 2012)


(Source: Guardian)

The German military will in future be able to use its weapons on German streets in an extreme situation, the Federal Constitutional Court says. The ruling says the armed forces can be deployed only if Germany faces an assault of “catastrophic proportions”, but not to control demonstrations. The decision to deploy forces must be approved by the federal government… After World War II the new constitution ruled that soldiers could not be deployed with guns at the ready on German soil, the BBC’s Stephen Evans reports from Berlin. The court has now changed that, saying troops could be used to tackle an assault that threatens scores of casualties. — excerpts from “German Court Widens Army’s Internal Crisis Role” in BBC.com (Aug. 17, 2012)
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The German military will in future be able to use its weapons on German streets in an extreme situation, the Federal Constitutional Court says.

The ruling says the armed forces can be deployed only if Germany faces an assault of “catastrophic proportions”, but not to control demonstrations.

The decision to deploy forces must be approved by the federal government…

After World War II the new constitution ruled that soldiers could not be deployed with guns at the ready on German soil, the BBC’s Stephen Evans reports from Berlin.

The court has now changed that, saying troops could be used to tackle an assault that threatens scores of casualties.

— excerpts from “German Court Widens Army’s Internal Crisis Role” in BBC.com (Aug. 17, 2012)

Former Special Forces Officers Slam Obama Over Leaks on Bin Laden Killing

(CNN) — A web video featuring former special forces officers accuses President Barack Obama of taking too much credit for the killing of Osama bin Laden and allowing classified information about the raid to become public.

The ad also includes former Navy SEALs.

The organization behind the ad, the Special Operations OPSEC Education Fund, has posted the 22-minute web video on its website. A spokeswoman says the group has raised about $1 million toward an advertising campaign in some key swing states.

Over a picture of Obama, the video’s narrator says that the group’s mission is to stop politicians from using sensitive intelligence about the bin Laden raid and other clandestine programs for political benefit…

Another former Navy SEAL in the video, Scott Taylor, says of the bin Laden raid: “If you disclose how we got there, how we took down the building, what we did, how many people were there, that it’s going to hinder future operations, and certainly hurt the success of those future operations.” …

Smith said the ad campaign pays no heed to political affiliation, and the organization describes itself as nonpartisan and says its focus is on protecting intelligence agents and special operations officers, not on politics.

But it shares an office with two Republican political consulting firms in Alexandria, Virginia. Its spokesman Chad Kolton worked for the Bush administration as a spokesman for the Director of National Intelligence.

Taylor has run for the Republican nomination for Congress in Virginia; Smith said he is a registered Republican but votes independently.

— Excerpts from an article by Dugald McConnell and Brian Todd writing for CNN.com (Aug. 16, 2012)

Unintended causation and endless war

And whatever else is true, it’s impossible to evade the fact that Endless War will inevitably degrade the citizenry of the country that engages in it. A country which venerates its military above all other institutions, which demands that its soldiers be spoken of only with religious-like worship, and which continuously indoctrinates its population to believe that endless violence against numerous countries is necessary and just — all by instilling intense fear of the minorities who are the target of that endless violence — will be a country filled with citizens convinced of the virtues and nobility of aggression.

— Glenn Greenwald (Aug. 8, 2012)

“It cannot be right that armies can deploy a weapon because they believe it is useful, while leaving civilians who have no choice in the matter at risk long after the fighting is over.”


Depleted uranium is an urgent moral issue of our time. Its use threatens civilian populations for generations after any war is ended. Its use threatens metabolic functions of any organism that drinks groundwater contaminated by depleted uranium dust. Its use threatens our own soldiers, but in order to continue using depleted uranium munitions our military feels the need to insist that there is no danger.

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