The Navy’s ongoing struggle to meet recruitment missions and the Marine Corps’ growing concerns over the shrinking pool of possible enlistees topped a Senate panel’s hearing on personnel issues facing the sea services last week.
The Navy predicts it will be 6,200 enlistees short of its...
On Nov. 16, U.S. Missile Defense Agency and Navy sailors aboard USS John Finn (DDG-113), an Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense System-equipped destroyer, fired a Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) Block IIA guided missile that successfully intercepted and destroyed a mock Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) during a flight test demonstration in the broad ocean area northeast of Hawaii in November 2020. MDA photo.
The Pentagon is taking the first steps to provide Guam with a persistent, 360-degree...
The following is the April 25, 2023, Environmental Protection Agency Inspector General’s report: EPA Region 9 Must Continue Oversight Throughout the Decontamination and Closure of the Red Hill Facility.
From the report
The EPA’s regulatory oversight of authorized state programs for underground tanks or drinking water quality would not reasonably have identified the sequence of events that led to the drinking water contamination incident. According to the Navy, an improperly executed fuel transfer...
https://news.usni.org/2023/04/26/epa-inspector-general-report-on-red-hill-facility
The following is the April 2023 Government Accountability Office report, Military Housing: DoD Can Further Strengthen Oversight of Its Privatized Housing Program.
From the report
What GAO Found
The Department of Defense (DOD) has taken steps to implement statutory requirements from the Fiscal Year 2020 National Defense Authorization Act (2020 NDAA). These statutory requirements were designed to increase assistance to residents of privatized housing, ensure DOD has adequate personnel to conduct...
https://news.usni.org/2023/04/11/gao-report-on-military-housing
PEARL HARBOR, Hawaii – Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard & Intermediate Maintenance Facility successfully undocked USS Charlotte (SSN 766) Jan. 26 from Dry Dock #3. The undocking was a major milestone in the submarine’s engineered overhaul availability.
Cutting the Navy’s ship maintenance backlog will require recruiting and retaining skilled workers in the nation’s public and private shipyards, the nominee to head the sea service’s acquisition office testified Wednesday.
Nickolas Guertin appeared...
The following is the Dec. 1, 2022, Congressional Research Service report, Afghanistan: Background and U.S. Policy in Brief.
From the report
The aftershocks of Afghanistan’s watershed year of 2021 continue to reverberate within Afghanistan, throughout its region, and in the United States. In 2021, U.S. and international forces departed after nearly two decades of operations in Afghanistan; the internationally backed Afghan government and its military forces collapsed; and the Taliban, a Sunni...
https://news.usni.org/2022/12/02/report-to-congress-on-afghanistan-and-u-s-policy
USS Chancellorsville (CG-62), USNS Maury (T-AGS-66) US Navy Photos
Two Navy ships christened with names tied to the Confederacy should be renamed, according to the commission tasked with purging Confederate names from the Department of Defense.
According to the latest report released on Tuesday, The Naming Commission recommended new names for Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser USS Chancellorsville (CG-62) and the oceanographic survey ship USNS Maury (T-AGS-66).
The Japan-based cruiser...
https://news.usni.org/2022/09/13/commission-recommends-renaming-two-navy-ships-with-confederate-ties
The following is the Aug. 29, 2022, report from the Naming Commission on recommended changes to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and the U.S. Naval Academy to rename assets named for those affiliated with the Confederacy.
From the report
This is Part II of the Naming Commission’s Final Report, which addresses assets on the United States Military Academy (USMA) at West Point and the United States Naval Academy (USNA) at Annapolis and fulfills the requirements mandated by the National...
https://news.usni.org/2022/08/30/military-naming-commission-report-on-u-s-military-academies
The U.S. Army Europe and Africa Command Commanding General Gen. Christopher G. Cavoli delivers a speech during the 7th Army Training Command change of command ceremony at Tower Barracks in Grafenwoehr, Germany, June 2, 2021. U.S. Army
The nominee to be the next top commander of United States forces in Europe told the Senate Armed Services Committee this week that he “looks forward to the accession” of Finland and Sweden to NATO to bolster the alliance’s defenses, particularly in the Baltic Sea...
Kim Jong Un in front of a the North Korea intercontinental ballistic missile. KCNA Photo
The United States needs to deploy its Next Generation Interceptor by 2028 or sooner to keep pace with North Korea’s accelerating ballistic missile program, most recently demonstrated in Pyongyang’s successful test-firing of an intercontinental ballistic missile Thursday, Air Force Gen. Glen VanHerck told the Senate Armed Services Committee.
While saying he was “comfortable with where we are today based on...