Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission. Here’s a reminder of a stark reality: When President Joe Biden finally ended the disastrous Afghan War in 2021, the Pentagon war budget went up by roughly $50 billion. The Afghan War was costing America almost...
Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission. Did you know the Russia-Ukraine War is a great “investment” for the United States? A terrific opportunity to kill lots of Russians and to destroy lots of their military equipment at a relatively cheap cost to...
Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission. In 1985, President Ronald Reagan was attacked for visiting a German military cemetery in Bitburg, West Germany, because that cemetery included forty graves of members of the Waffen-SS, the combat branch of the...
Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission. I remember seeing the first Rambo flick (“First Blood”) in a movie theater in 1982 when I was nineteen and rooting for Sly Stallone’s character against the police and national guardsmen who are sent to kill...
Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission. Clearly, on this 22nd anniversary of 9/11, the dogs of war have won and continue to win. It hasn’t mattered that, over the last 16 years, after a 20-year military career, I’ve written hundreds of articles...
Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission. As a retired Air Force officer and military historian, I'm familiar with all kinds of euphemisms about killing, e.g. "precision bombing" and “collateral damage.” Just as it's easier to kill at a distance,...
Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission. As the Ukrainian counteroffensive against Russia grinds on (or falters?), as U.S. disaster relief for Hawaii is tied to more military aid for Ukraine, as depleted uranium shells join cluster munitions as...
Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission. In today’s New York Times send-out, I saw the following story: Ukraine’s Forces and Firepower Are Misallocated, U.S. Officials Say American strategists say Ukraine’s troops are too spread out and need to...
Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission. When others asked the truth of me, I was convinced it was not the truth they wanted, but an illusion they could bear to live with. ~ Anaïs Nin War, among other things, is a place of illusion. With the...
Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission. I was reading an article from 2007 by an Air Force master sergeant, “We are called Airmen,” only to stumble on these lines: You have to be able to understand what part you play in America's defense. You have...
