Tag Archives: Air Force

Pentagon Opens All Military Positions to Women

Women will be allowed to hold any job in the United States military — including those in combat units — following a historic announcement by Defense Secretary Ash Carter on Thursday.

Carter said at a news conference that for the first time ever, women in the U.S. military will be allowed to do jobs from which they were previously barred, given they meet specific standards.

“They’ll be allowed to drive tanks, fire mortars and lead infantry soldiers into combat,” Carter reportedly said, according to a recap posted on the Department of Defense’s official website. “They’ll be able to serve as Army Rangers and Green Berets, Navy SEALs, Marine Corps infantry, Air Force parajumpers and everything else that was previously open only to men.”

The jobs will formally become available to women next month, according to the Department of Defense posting, though Carter acknowledged that it will take some time for full integration.

Carter said at the news conference that leaders from all branches of the military had spent the past three years studying the assimilation of women into the previously men-only positions, according to the Department of Defense. Leaders from the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Special Operations Command didn’t indicate that women should be barred from any job.

While the Marine Corps reportedly asked that certain jobs be kept men-only, like machine gunner and fire support reconnaissance, the Department of Defense quoted Carter as saying “we are a joint force and I have decided to make a decision which applies to the entire force.”

The news wasn’t immediately welcomed by everyone.

Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona) and Rep. Mac Thornberry (R-Texas), the chairmen of the Armed Services Committees in their respective legislative houses, released a joint statement in which they said Carter’s decision “will have a consequential impact on our servicemembers and our military’s warfighting capabilities.” They said they want time to review the materials that played into Carter’s decision, including a 1,000-page report from the Marine Integrated Task Force.

One of the findings of that report, according to a September 2015 news release, was that all-male units generally outperformed integrated units in tests designed to simulate combat situations.

“We expect the Department to send over its implementation plans as quickly as possible to ensure our Committees have all the information necessary to conduct proper and rigorous oversight,” McCain and Thornberry said in the statement, adding that they also wanted to see the department’s stance on if changes to the Selective Service Act might now be required.

Major California Fire Jumps Highway

The “Rocky fire” in California has jumped a highway that firefighters had tried to make a firebreak and has now burned over 62,000 acres.

Fire crews have the fire 12 percent contained as veteran firefighters told reporters they’ve never seen an unpredictable fire like this one.

“I’ve been a firefighter for almost 20 years and I’ve heard 30-year and 40-year firefighters say that this is unprecedented,” firefighter Steve Kaufmann told KCRA.

The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection says the flames were pushing north and striking areas that had not burned in years.

“There were too many (spot fires) for us to pick up,” Battalion Chief Carl Schwettmann of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection told the San Francisco Chronicle. “With these drought-stricken fuels, it’s just moving at an extremely high rate of speed.”

Close to 3,100 firefighters are battling the blazes.  The Air Force Reserve has called up soldiers to give some relief to the firefighters.  C-130 Hercules planes from the Reserves has also joined the fight dropping fire retardant on the fire zone.

The good news is that no buildings were burned on Monday.

ISIS Member Accidentally Gives Up Command Center Location Via Social Media

While ISIS has been successfully using social media to recruit new members and radicalize those sympathetic to their cause, some members are posting items that undermine their own case.

The U.S. military said a recent post by a “moron” helped them take out an ISIS command and control center.

“These guys that are working down at Hurlburt (Florida), they’re combing through social media. And they see some moron standing at this command and control capability for Da’Esh, ISIL. These guys go, ‘ah we got an in,'” Gen. Hawk Carlisle, commander of Air Combat Command, said during a Monday speech in Arlington, Virginia.

Twenty-two hours later, the center no longer existed.

“Long story short…three JDAMs take the entire building out,” Carlisle said in the speech to the Air Force Association.

A JDAM is a device that guides bombs to their targets using a global positioning system and internal navigation system.

ISIS has recruited around 3,400 westerners and at least 200 Americans using social media according to Nicholas Rasmussen of the National Counterterrorism Center.

Air Force Veteran Charged With Attempting To Join ISIS

A U.S. Air Force veteran is jailed on charges of attempting to join the Islamic terrorist group ISIS.

Tairod Nathan Webster Pugh is facing charges of attempting to provide material support to terrorists and providing resources to a terrorist organization.  He also was charged with obstruction of justice for destroying thumb drives containing evidence of his online interaction with the terrorist group.

Pugh had lost his job as an airplane mechanic, which was based in the middle east.  After the job loss, he traveled from Egypt to Turkey with the intent of sneaking into Syria.

“Pugh, an American citizen and former member of our military, allegedly abandoned his allegiance to the United States and sought to provide material support to ISI[S],” Assistant Attorney General for National Security John Carlin said. “Identifying and bringing to justice individuals who provide or attempt to provide material support to terrorists is a key priority of the National Security Division.”

U.S. intelligence officials say that at least 150 Americans are fighting with the terrorist group in Iraq and Syria.

Air Force Makes “So Help Me God” Optional

The Air Force has announced that they will no longer require anyone to say “so help me God” when they enlist or renew their services to the armed forces.

The move comes in response to an atheist who said he would not say that part of the oath when re-enlisting.

“The Air Force will be updating the instructions for both enlisted and commissioned Airmen to reflect these changes in the coming weeks, but the policy change is effective now,” read an Air Force press release. “Airmen who choose to omit the words ‘So help me God’ from enlistment and officer appointment oaths may do so.”

The atheist threatened a lawsuit because he was told he could not re-enlist if he did not say the oath as written.  He had scratched out the phrase from his enlistment papers and would not say it when given the oral oath.

The anti-Christian American Humanist Organization had offered to represent the airman in suing the Air Force.

“We take any instance in which airmen report concerns regarding religious freedom seriously,” Secretary of the Air Force Deborah Lee James said. “We are making the appropriate adjustments to ensure our Airmen’s rights are protected.”

Air Force Removes POW Display Because of Bible

The Air Force is taking another step to remove any Christian emblems from being displayed anywhere on their bases.

This time, they removed a memorial to men missing in action because the display contained a Bible.

A veteran who visited the base discovered the Missing Man Table at Patrick Air Force Base removed last week.  The Missing Man Table is a remembrance of soldiers who are missing.  The table consists traditionally of an inverted glass, a red rose and a Bible among other items.

When questioned on the disappearance, the Air Force admitted they removed the display because there was a Bible in it.

The Air Force replaced the display with a POW/MIA flag while they claimed to be seeking “an acceptable solution” to the controversy they created with the removal and targeting of the Christian holy book as the removal of the display.

Officials say they plan to return the display but did not say if they would allow the Bible to be returned to its rightful place in the display.

Gideons Blocked From Air Force Base

Air Force officials have banned Gideon volunteers from giving Bibles to new recruits at Maxwell Air Force Base.

Gideon’s volunteer Michael Fredenburg told Fox News they were told by base officials to “get their Bibles out.”

The public affairs officer for Military Entrance Processing Command told Fox News that the Gideon’s claim was not “entirely” true.  Gaylan Johnson said that the Gideons have been banned from standing at a table and speaking with anyone who is a recruit.  They will still be able to put materials on a table.

The Gideons had been meeting recruits and handing out Bibles for over a decade.  Four days a week the Gideons would stand by a table, shaking the hands of those who had just enlisted and offering them a pocket-sized Bible.

Johnson told Fox that the Gideons are no longer allowed to be within the building to speak to anyone.  Johnson is claiming that this is a new command-wide policy against any organization that is not a member of the Federal Government.

Nuclear Missile Officers In Cheating Scandal

The men who have their fingers on the button have been cheating to keep them there.

Thirty-four nuclear missile launch officers have been stripped of their certification and duty after it was discovered they had been cheating on monthly required tests to maintain their positions.  The cheating was discovered during an unrelated investigation into drug use among Air Force officers.

Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James told reporters Wednesday that the officers were texting each other answers.  The tests were monthly exams on the operation of the missile systems.  In addition to the officers who actually cheated, any officer aware of the cheating who did not report the situation to superior officers were also removed from duty.

Three of the officers involved in the cheating scandal were also arrested as part of a drug sting that covered six bases in the U.S. and England.

The missile command system covers 450 nuclear missiles.

Anti-Christian Group Drives Air Force To Remove Nativity

The anti-Christian group Military Religious Freedom Foundation has forced the Air Force to remove a nativity scene from Shaw Air Force Base in South Carolina.

The plastic nativity scene included traditional Christmas elements like Mary, Joseph, assorted animals and Baby Jesus. According to the MRFF, the site emotionally troubled some Airmen from the base.

The Air Force removed the display within hours of the anti-Christian group contacting the Pentagon.

Shaw Air Force Base’s public affairs office did not return calls to Fox News’ Todd Starnes for comment about why they removed the display. However, Fox News’ commentator Sarah Palin said the action was not surprising.

“We see stories like this every day and yet leftwing pundits still claim that the so-called ‘War on Christmas’ is a figment of the imagination,” Palin told Starnes. “The War on Christmas is just the top of the spear in a larger battle to marginalize expressions of faith and make true religious freedom a thing of the past.”