tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-84712762012-01-27T23:32:14.604-05:00aka This Fucking "overseas contingency operation" <i>"This is the Army, son. Your opinion doesn't matter. - Roger. Acknowledged. I'd figure I'd proffer it, just in case."~LT G</i>... Famous last words of a Milblog.madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.comBlogger19748125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-58275205316412445282012-01-27T23:12:00.000-05:002012-01-27T23:32:14.615-05:002012-01-27T23:32:14.615-05:00

NEW YORK (AP) -- Twitter, a tool of choice for dissidents and activists around the world, found itself the target of global outrage Friday after unveiling plans to allow country-specific censorship of tweets that might break local laws.It was a stunning role reversal for a youthful company that prides itself in promoting unfettered expression, 140 characters at a time. Twitter insisted its

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-87006368478418267412012-01-26T23:20:00.001-05:002012-01-26T23:20:35.810-05:002012-01-26T23:20:35.810-05:00

DAVOS, Switzerland (AP) - An influential member of the Saudi royal family warned Wednesday that unless the Middle East becomes a nuclear weapon-free zone, a nuclear arms race is inevitable and could include his own country, Iraq, Egypt and even Turkey. Prince Turki Al Faisal said the five permanent U.N. Security Council members should guarantee a nuclear security umbrella for Mideast countries

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-8543138944975960812012-01-26T22:56:00.000-05:002012-01-26T22:57:56.004-05:002012-01-26T22:57:56.004-05:00

Sam LaHood, the son of U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and the head of the International Republican Institute's (IRI) Cairo office, was blocked from departing Egypt earlier this week. He, along with a dozen other colleagues from American non-government organizations (NGO), have been placed on an Egyptian "no-fly" list, officials with IRI told Yahoo News Thursday.The younger LaHood was

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-69711004356770295732012-01-26T22:44:00.000-05:002012-01-26T22:45:09.702-05:002012-01-26T22:45:09.702-05:00

WASHINGTON — The United States has arrested and charged an Iranian semiconductor scientist with violating U.S. export laws by buying high-tech U.S. lab equipment, a development likely to further worsen Iranian-U.S. tensions. Prison records show the U.S. is holding Seyed Mojtaba Atarodi, 54, a microchip expert and assistant professor at Tehran's prestigious Sharif University of Technology, in a

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-29430278454126026932012-01-26T22:25:00.000-05:002012-01-26T22:26:57.273-05:002012-01-26T22:26:57.273-05:00

JERUSALEM — Israeli intelligence estimates, backed by academic studies, have cast doubt on the widespread assumption that a military strike on Iranian nuclear facilities would set off a catastrophic set of events like a regional conflagration, widespread acts of terrorism and sky-high oil prices. The estimates, which have been largely adopted by the country’s most senior officials, conclude that

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-12461311031062045252012-01-26T22:09:00.000-05:002012-01-26T22:10:17.199-05:002012-01-26T22:10:17.199-05:00

Libya's regular army and array of militias have been torturing loyalists of slain dictator Moamer Kadhafi, several of whom have been killed in custody, human rights groups charged on Thursday. Amnesty International said that despite promises, Libya's new rulers have made "no progress to stop the use of torture", as Doctors Without Borders suspended its work in the third-largest city Misrata over

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-89224426917886331502012-01-26T22:04:00.000-05:002012-01-26T22:05:16.489-05:002012-01-26T22:05:16.489-05:00

Iranian courts have sentenced two bloggers to death for "spreading corruption," and government security forces have arrested four other journalists, in the lead-up to the nation's March elections."In the past two weeks, security forces have reportedly arrested four journalists," the U.S. State Department said in a statement, "including Shahram Manouchehri, Sahamedin Bourghani, Parastoo Dokouhaki,

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-23950261383733510842012-01-25T23:00:00.000-05:002012-01-25T23:01:19.097-05:002012-01-25T23:01:19.097-05:00

BEIJING (AP) - Deadly clashes between ethnic Tibetans and Chinese security forces have spread to a second area in southwestern China, the government and an overseas activist group said Wednesday. The group Free Tibet said two Tibetans were killed and several more were wounded Tuesday when security forces opened fire on a crowd of protesters in Seda county in politically sensitive Ganzi prefecture

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-86618966676597271932012-01-25T22:42:00.000-05:002012-01-25T22:43:04.861-05:002012-01-25T22:43:04.861-05:00

BANI WALID, Libya: Libya’s ramshackle government lost control of a former stronghold of Muammar Qaddafi on Tuesday after local people staged an armed uprising, posing the gravest challenge yet to the country’s new rulers.Elders in Bani Walid, where militias loyal to the ruling National Transitional Council (NTC) were driven out in a gun battle a day earlier, said they were appointing their own

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-83379820622392398832012-01-25T22:25:00.000-05:002012-01-25T22:26:47.720-05:002012-01-25T22:26:47.720-05:00

MOGADISHU, Somalia — The Navy SEALs that took down Osama bin Laden were behind the daring raid in Somalia that rescued to people kidnapped by pirates, an official confirmed to The Associated Press on Wednesday.The team parachuted into Somalia under cover of darkness Wednesday and crept up to an outdoor camp where an American woman and Danish man were being held hostage. Soon, nine kidnappers were

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-78998549843804976342012-01-24T00:08:00.000-05:002012-01-24T00:09:07.672-05:002012-01-24T00:09:07.672-05:00

Blindfolded and handcuffed to each other on a barren hilltop, Pakistani soldiers wait for death at the hands of a merciless Taliban fighter.Fifteen men were lined up for execution, the chilling scene captured on film by the Taliban for a video released as a warning to the Pakistani army operating near the Afghan border.The Frontier Corps soldiers were seized last month in what the Taliban said

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-86908690310333194592012-01-23T23:00:00.000-05:002012-01-23T23:01:43.647-05:002012-01-23T23:01:43.647-05:00

WASHINGTON—The Supreme Court ruled Monday that police violated the Constitution when they attached a Global Positioning System tracker to a suspect's vehicle without a valid search warrant, voting unanimously in one of the first major cases to test privacy rights in the digital era. The decision offered a glimpse of how the court may address the flood of privacy cases expected in coming years

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-13765497994055042562012-01-23T22:43:00.001-05:002012-01-23T22:43:54.523-05:002012-01-23T22:43:54.523-05:00

Tensions in the Gulf could reach a breaking point as a senior Iranian official said Iran would “definitely” close the Strait of Hormuz if an EU oil embargo disrupted the export of crude oil. Mohammad Kossari, deputy head of parliament's foreign affairs and national security committee, issued the warning in respone to a decision by the European Union on Monday to impose an oil embargo on Iran

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-14786029421473448432012-01-23T22:30:00.000-05:002012-01-23T22:31:09.487-05:002012-01-23T22:31:09.487-05:00

Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul told The Daily Caller that being “detained” by the Transportation Security Administration at the Nashville airport Monday was a major ordeal that underscores flaws in TSA’s procedures that affect tens of millions of passengers every year.“It was a big headache,” Paul said in a phone interview. “I missed my speech here. I was supposed to speak to the Right to

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-85226003282247755032012-01-22T23:51:00.001-05:002012-01-22T23:51:41.025-05:002012-01-22T23:51:41.025-05:00

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-81589181732859060732012-01-22T22:15:00.000-05:002012-01-22T22:16:52.677-05:002012-01-22T22:16:52.677-05:00

MOSCOW: Several objects resembling living beings were detected on photographs taken by a Russian landing probe in 1982 during a Venus mission, says an article published in the Solar System Research magazine.Leonid Ksanfomaliti of the Space Research Institute of Russia's Academy of Sciences published a research that analysed the photographs from the Venus mission made by a Soviet landing probe,

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-76514127078359530602012-01-22T19:04:00.000-05:002012-01-22T19:05:36.296-05:002012-01-22T19:05:36.296-05:00

ISLAMABAD (AP) - Anxious to accelerate peace moves, top-level U.S. officials have held talks with a representative of an insurgent movement led by a former Afghan prime minister who has been branded a terrorist by Washington, a relative of the rebel leader says. Dr. Ghairat Baheer, a representative and son-in-law of longtime Afghan warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar (Gul-bu-DEEN HEK-mah-tyar), told The

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-24175741320306246622012-01-22T17:56:00.000-05:002012-01-22T17:57:44.664-05:002012-01-22T17:57:44.664-05:00

A 43-year-old Iranian military officer was shot to death on Saturday by two motorcyclists in the city of Khorramabad, local media reported.Another soldier was injured in the incident. The two assailants fled the scene, according to reports. The incident occurred when the motorcyclists fired shots at a group of soldiers who were on their way to an air force base located near the city, Israel's

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-87727719190920645722012-01-21T22:26:00.000-05:002012-01-21T22:27:58.969-05:002012-01-21T22:27:58.969-05:00

PARIS: France is suspending military operations in Afghanistan and may accelerate its planned troop withdrawal if the security situation does not improve, President Nicolas Sarkozy said on Friday after the killing of four more French soldiers.Sarkozy, addressing French diplomats after an Afghan security source said four soldiers had been killed and 17 wounded by an Afghan soldier in the Taghab

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-41587906480007197642012-01-21T22:04:00.000-05:002012-01-21T22:05:14.777-05:002012-01-21T22:05:14.777-05:00

(Reuters) - When Patty Tegeler looks out the window of her home overlooking the Appalachian Mountains in southwestern Virginia, she sees trouble on the horizon."In an instant, anything can happen," she told Reuters. "And I firmly believe that you have to be prepared."Tegeler is among a growing subculture of Americans who refer to themselves informally as "preppers." Some are driven by a fear of

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-61619295229376108632012-01-20T22:16:00.000-05:002012-01-20T22:17:19.552-05:002012-01-20T22:17:19.552-05:00

WASHINGTON/ISLAMABAD Jan 19 (Reuters) - A militant who acted as a senior operations organizer for al Qaeda was targeted and killed in one of two U.S. drone strikes launched against targets inside Pakistan last week, a U.S. official said.U.S. and Pakistani sources told Reuters that the target of the attack was Aslam Awan, a Pakistani national from Abbottabad, the same town where Osama bin Laden

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-62948374390917565292012-01-20T22:08:00.000-05:002012-01-20T22:09:25.522-05:002012-01-20T22:09:25.522-05:00

Military commanders in Afghanistan have stopped making public the number of allied troops killed by Afghan soldiers and police, a measure of the trustworthiness of a force that is to take over security from U.S.-led forces.The change in policy comes after at least three allied troops have been killed by the Afghan troops they trained in the past month and follows what appears to be the deadliest

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-36822292942007026452012-01-20T00:15:00.000-05:002012-01-20T00:16:10.502-05:002012-01-20T00:16:10.502-05:00

YOKOSUKA, Japan (AP) - It's getting a bit more crowded under the sea in Asia, where Andrew Peterson commands one of the world's mightiest weapons: a $2 billion nuclear submarine with unrivaled stealth and missiles that can devastate targets hundreds of miles (kilometers) away. Super high-tech submarines like Cmdr. Peterson's USS Oklahoma City have long been the envy of navies all over the globe -

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-18685397428159726622012-01-19T23:27:00.000-05:002012-01-19T23:28:35.045-05:002012-01-19T23:28:35.045-05:00

The Turkish newspaper Zaman reported Tuesday that Turkish intelligence has warned that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard is planning attacks on the American embassy and American consulates throughout the country. According to the report, Turkey’s security forces have warned police in all 81 districts throughout the country, telling them to remain alert and vigilant. The report states that according to

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471276.post-34919834889578299002012-01-19T00:55:00.001-05:002012-01-19T00:55:50.122-05:002012-01-19T00:55:50.122-05:00

BRUSSELS (AP) - The International Monetary Fund said Wednesday that it's aiming to increase its financial firepower by around $500 billion so it can give out new loans to help mitigate a worsening financial crisis. Responding to widespread speculation surrounding its funding requirements, the Washington-based institution said its staff estimates that countries around the world will need about $1

madtomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17609777902535328244noreply@blogger.com2