Veterans

What was the Battle of Belleau Woods, the Slain Marines at which Trump called “Losers” and “Suckers”?

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Jeffrey Goldberg at the Atlantic reported yesterday on what he was told by four members of Trump’s entourage about the president’s 2018 visit to France. He had been scheduled to visit the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery near Paris, but it was raining and he made excuses. Goldberg’s sources told him that […]

Congress

We’ve been Sunk by Chickenhawks like Trump, but will the Veterans in Congress Save Us?

Tomdispatch

By Nan Levinson | ( Tomdispatch.com) – If you still follow the mainstream media, you’re probably part of the 38% of registered voters who knew something about the op-ed Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) published in the New York Times early in June, exhorting the president to use the Insurrection Act to “restore order to our […]

Afghanistan

On Memorial Day: How the US Lost its “Battle of Aqaba” to the Coronavirus

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – On July 6, 1917, Auda Abu Tayy led his Howeitat tribesmen in a successful attack on the Ottoman port of Aqaba in what is now Jordan but was then the Ottoman Empire. The Arabs of the Hejaz or Western Arabia and the Transjordan had allied with the British to revolt […]

Epidemics

Memorial Day: Why veterans are particularly vulnerable to the coronavirus pandemic

The Conversation

By Jamie Rowen | – As the nation takes a day to memorialize its military dead, those who are living are facing a deadly risk that has nothing to do with war or conflict: the coronavirus. Different groups face different degrees of danger from the pandemic, from the elderly who are experiencing deadly outbreaks in […]

Afghanistan

Celebrated to Death: Memorial Day Is Killing Us, says an Afghanistan Vet

Tomdispatch

[Note for TomDispatch Readers: Here’s a way to support TomDispatch in tough times and end up with a good book while you’re stuck at home in this pandemic moment. For a donation of $100 ($125 if you live outside the U.S.), you can get a signed, personalized copy of Erik Edstrom’s striking new work, Un-American: […]

Afghanistan

What Americans Don’t Know About the hardships of Military Families

Tomdispatch

By Andrea Mazzarino | – ( Tomdispatch.com ) – As each of my husband’s Navy submarine deployments came to an end, local spouses would e-mail me about the ship’s uncertain date of return. They were attempting to sell tickets to a raffle in which the winner would be the first to kiss her returning sailor. […]

Pentagon

If America is going to Fight Forever Wars, Should we Bring back the Draft?

Tomdispatch

By Nan Levinson | – (Tomdispatch.com) – Bizarrely enough, the spate of phone calls from recruiters began a couple of years ago. The first ones came from the Army, next the Marines, and then other branches of the military. I’m decades past enlistment age. I’ve been publicly antiwar for most of that time and come […]

Displaced and Refugees

It’s Not Just Vets: Refugees and War-Crime Victims are also Vulnerable to Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder

The Conversation

By Arash Javanbakht | – Mental health is often used in political discourse and arguments. Post-traumatic stress disorder was the subject Jan. 8, when Rep. Ilhan Omar (D.-Minn.), herself a Somalian refugee who had spent years in a refugee camp in Kenya, said: “Every time I hear conversations around war, I find myself being stricken […]

Veterans

A Different Kind of War Wound Afflicts America

Arnold R. Isaacs

(Tomdispatch.com) – When an announcement of a “Moral Injury Symposium” turned up in my email, I was a bit startled to see that it came from the U.S. Special Operations Command. That was a surprise because many military professionals have strongly resisted the term “moral injury” and rejected the suggestion that soldiers fighting America’s wars […]