A pair of U.S. Navy counter-mine vessels that are homeported in Bahrain arrived in Singapore this week, according to a U.S. Fifth Fleet spokesperson.

The Independence-class littoral combat ships USS Santa Barbara and USS Tulsa entered the U.S. Seventh Fleet area of responsibility earlier in the week, the spokesperson said, stopping first in Malaysia for a port call.

Each ship is equipped with a mine countermeasures mission package designed to detect and destroy naval mines.

“Tulsa and Santa Barbara are conducting scheduled maintenance and logistics stop in Singapore,” the spokesperson said.

The two nations, according to the spokesperson, have an agreement to allow littoral combat ships to operate primarily from Singapore as a logistics and maintenance hub.

As of Monday, the USS Canberra, the other Bahrain-based LCS with a mine countermeasures package, was in the Indian Ocean, parts of which are in the U.S. Fifth Fleet area of responsibility.

The US Navy decommissioned Middle East minesweepers last year. Here’s what they did.

The U.S. Navy previously deployed four Avenger-class mine countermeasures ships in the Middle East, but they were decommissioned in 2025 after each serving for over 30 years.

Those minesweepers are made of wood and fiberglass and possess a nonmagnetic signature and low acoustic footprint that allows them to operate inside and near a mine zone.

The vessels used acoustic devices, electromagnetic tools, cables and cutters to hunt, detonate and destroy over 1,000 mines off of Kuwait during the Gulf War.

Three Independence-class littoral combat ships with a mine countermeasures mission package replaced those vessels in 2025.

The LCS with the MCM package is made of aluminum and can only operate outside the mine threat zone.

These ships deploy unmanned surface and underwater vehicles, along with an attached Sikorsky MH-60S Seahawk helicopter, to identify and destroy mines.

The migration of the two littoral combat ships with the MCM package could be a strategic repositioning by the U.S. Navy, according to Dr. Steven Wills, a navalist for the Center for Maritime Strategy and a U.S. Navy veteran who served aboard a mine countermeasures ship.

“I think that was a desire to just reduce the number of targets,” Wills said.

The LCS has a 57mm MK-110 gun system and a SeaRAM self-defense system, but it isn’t as defensively capable as a destroyer, which wields a vertical launch system, according to Wills.

U.S. service members will now be granted religious exemptions from grooming standards only on “sincerely held religious beliefs,” according to a recent Pentagon memorandum.

Current service members and those applying for military service who request an exception for religious reasons must provide “a sworn written attestation affirming the requester’s belief is sincerely held and religious in nature,” according to the March 11 Department of Defense memorandum.

In their requests, service members must provide statements describing the specific religious beliefs that are held and explanations of how the current clean-shaven grooming standard conflicts with their exercise of religion, per the memo.

Troops must also provide evidence that their religious beliefs are “sincerely held,” such as personal testimonies or corroborating statements from religious leaders or community members.

False statements can be subject to disciplinary action under Article 107 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice or denial of ascension, the statement says.

The memo, signed by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, first circulated on the unofficial U.S. Army Subreddit r/Army page Tuesday. Task & Purpose was the first to report on the memo. A Pentagon official confirmed the memo’s authenticity to Military Times on Thursday.

Previously, the military granted shaving waivers for facial hair for a variety of faiths, including Norse Pagan, Sikh and others, but following a September 2025 speech by Hegseth to military leaders, a slew of memos and a review on grooming and appearance standards surfaced.

This new guidance follows Hegseth’s newfound commitment to physical fitness and grooming standards for troops, calling for “no beardos” and leaving some religious groups worried about the department’s adherence to religious rights of service members.

“No more beards, long hair, superficial, individual expression. We’re going to cut our hair, shave our beards and adhere to standards,” Hegseth said in the September 2025 speech to military leaders.

This March memo states that unit commanders must provide a written assessment of the requester’s sincerity of religious belief and specific information regarding the requester’s current and anticipated work, like use of protective equipment or scheduled deployments, when forwarding requests to the “decision authority.”

The memo did not elaborate on who or what department is considered the authority on this matter.

“Decision authorities must review requests for accommodation on an individual basis, applying the ‘compelling government interest’ and ‘least restrictive means’ criteria,” the memo says.

The memo states that military departments are required to provide training on “applicable laws and procedures” to unit commanders and personnel involved in reviewing religious-based requests for exception from grooming standards for facial hair.

Religious accommodations related to grooming standards that have already been approved must be reevaluated within 90 days of these new guidelines, the memo reads.

“To prevent abuse and maintain military combat readiness, determining the sincerity of a religious belief in whether a military policy, practice or duty substantially burdens a service member’s exercise of religion is a critical component of the review process,” the memo states.

The memo says that decision authorities must consider any evidence that the request is based upon personal preference. They must get input from a first-line supervisor on the individual’s character, as well as from a military chaplain on the nature of the religious belief and from other sources at the unit commander’s discretion.

An attachment of the memo states that a legal advisor must give counsel to the deciding official to ensure compliance with the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and other applicable policies. Service members whose applications are denied may voluntarily separate, according to the memo.

Implementation plans must be submitted to the under secretary of defense for personnel and readiness within 30 days of the memo’s release date.

A U.S. F-35 fighter jet was forced to make an emergency landing after flying a combat mission over Iran, U.S. Central Command confirmed on Thursday.

The pilot, who was able to guide the aircraft to a U.S. air base in the region, is in stable condition, a command spokesperson said.

CNN first reported the incident, with sources telling the outlet the aircraft was struck by an Iranian munition.

“We are aware of reports that a U.S. F-35 aircraft conducted an emergency landing at a regional U.S airbase after flying a combat mission over Iran,” Navy Capt. Tim Hawkins said in an emailed statement.

The incident is under investigation.

Prior to Thursday’s incident, the U.S. had lost four manned aircraft across the month of March.

Six U.S. airmen were killed on March 12 when their KC-135 refueling aircraft crashed in western Iraq during combat operations.

On March 1, three U.S. F-15E Strike Eagle fighter jets were shot down by a Kuwaiti F/A-18 in a friendly fire incident. All six F-15 crew members ejected and were safely recovered.

A total of 13 U.S. service members have been killed during combat actions against Iran and roughly 200 wounded.

While the majority of the wounded troops have since returned to duty, 10 are considered seriously injured, CENTCOM announced Monday.

President Donald Trump on Thursday drew a parallel between U.S. strikes on Iran and Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor decades ago, as he defended the war against Tehran at a meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi in Washington.

“We wanted surprise. Who knows better about surprise than Japan? Why didn’t you tell me about Pearl Harbor?” Trump said when a journalist asked why he had not told allies about his war plans.

“You believe in surprise, I think much more so than us.”

Takaichi’s eyes widened, and she shifted in her chair as Trump, seated beside her in the Oval Office, evoked the moment that drew the U.S. into the Second World War.

The Japanese attack on the U.S. naval base in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on Dec. 7, 1941, killed 2,390 Americans, and the U.S. declared war on Japan the next day.

U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt called it “a date which will live in infamy.”

The U.S. defeated Japan in August 1945, days after U.S. atomic bomb attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki killed hundreds of thousands of civilians.

Shigeaki Mori, an atomic bomb survivor who spent decades researching the forgotten American prisoners of war killed in the Hiroshima attack, has died at age 88.

The historian died on March 14 at a Hiroshima hospital, according to Japanese media reports.

Mori was just eight years old when the B-29 carrying the earth shattering “Little Boy” bomb dropped on the city. Less than a mile and a half from the center of the blast, Mori was thrown into a nearby stream that protected him from the firestorm that followed.

“I found myself inside the mushroom cloud,” Mori would later write. “It was so dark that when I held my hands up about 10 centimeters in front of my face, I couldn’t see them.”

In the ensuing days, Mori scavenged for food and water but only found piles of charred bodies instead. When he did find water, it was poisoned with radiation. Unknowingly, Mori drank it anyway.

As a young man, Mori worked at a brokerage house and, later, at a piano manufacturer. “But I’d always wanted to be a historian,” he told The New York Times in 2016.

And so the budding historian began spending his weekends researching the aftermath of the Aug. 6, 1945, bombing. Mori conducted his own interviews with survivors, double-checking official histories with contemporary newspaper reports.

“There were so many mistakes in the histories,” he told the Times.

One interview with a local university professor, however, set Mori on a decades-long quest. The professor had found a list of names in a government archive and, not sure what to do with them, handed them off to Mori.

The list contained the names of 12 American airmen who had been shot down over the area on July 28, 1945. They had been killed alongside the Japanese when their fellow Americans had dropped the bomb. Their deaths had gone unrecognized, with both governments keeping quiet about their presence in the city.

“When I first learned of the American victims, I realized that none of them had been officially recognized as a victim of the atomic bomb. It was shocking to me,” Mori told Stars and Stripes in 2015.

It took him three years before he found anyone connected to the Americans.

Eventually, in the 1970s, declassified American documents backed up his findings. His subsequent book, “A Secret History of U.S. Servicemembers Who Died in Atomic Bomb,” detailed the fate of the airmen.

Mori worked tirelessly to bring the death of the Americans to light — building a memorial for them at his own expense and advocating for their inclusion at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. The name of the first airman was added to the peace memorial in 2004; the additional 11 were added in 2009.

In 2016, Mori was recognized by former President Barack Obama, who was the first sitting president to visit Hiroshima. The pair’s subsequent embrace at the memorial grounds gained international attention.

“My ultimate hope is to send out a message that war deprives people of everything,” Mori told Stars and Stripes in 2008. “We should never repeat the mistake.”

The Pentagon on Thursday said it is seeking roughly $200 billion to sustain its war in Iran, as senior military officials acknowledge that the Islamic Republic retains “some capability” to attack American assets and allies in the Middle East.

Asked about the figure during a press briefing, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said “that number could move,” before adding in a blunt aside: “It takes money to kill bad guys.”

“We’re going back to Congress and our folks there to ensure that we are properly funded,” Hegseth said.

He asserted that the request would help fund the ongoing mission, accelerate replenishment of weapons systems that have been expended in the fight, and rebuild depleted stockpiles to prepare for future deployments.

The White House on Sunday said the United States’ military campaign against Iran — dubbed Operation Epic Fury — had cost American taxpayers $12 billion as of that day. The opening salvo of the war was carried out by U.S. and Israeli forces on Feb. 28.

Now nineteen days in, Hegseth declined to outline how or when the war could end, aside from underscoring that the U.S. was “very much on track.”

“It will be at [President Donald Trump’s] choosing ultimately, where we say, ‘Hey, we’ve achieved what we need to on behalf of the American people to ensure our security,’” Hegseth said. “No time set on that, but we’re very much on track.”

Hegseth billed Thursday’s rounds of strikes as the “largest strike package yet” in the U.S. offensive against Iran, “just like yesterday was.”

“We’re hunting, we’re striking, death and destruction from above,” the defense secretary said. “To date, we’ve struck over 7,000 targets across Iran and its military infrastructure. That is not incremental. That is overwhelming force applied with precision.”

Gen. Dan Caine, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recognized the scale of Iran’s arsenal.

“They came into this fight with a lot of weapons,” he said in the Thursday press briefing, emphasizing that U.S. forces continue to be “aggressive and assertive” in targeting missile stockpiles and drone launch sites.

Caine noted that the military dropped 5,000-pound bunker-buster bombs into Iran’s underground storage facilities, which held a cache of coastal-defense cruise weapons and other support equipment.

“These weapons are bespokely designed to get through concrete and or rocks, and function after penetrating those barriers,” he said.

WASHINGTON, March 18 (Reuters) — President Donald Trump’s administration is considering deploying thousands of U.S. troops to reinforce its operation in the Middle East, as the U.S. military prepares for possible next steps in its campaign against Iran, said a U.S. official and three people familiar with the matter.

The deployments could help provide Trump with additional options as he weighs expanding U.S. operations, with the Iran war well into its third week.

Those options include securing safe passage for oil tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, a mission that would be accomplished primarily through air and naval forces, the sources said. But securing the Strait could also mean deploying U.S. troops to Iran’s shoreline, said four sources, including two U.S. officials.

Reuters granted the sources anonymity to speak about military planning.

The Trump administration has also discussed options to send ground forces to Iran’s Kharg Island, the hub for 90% of Iran’s ​oil exports, the three people familiar with the matter and three U.S. officials said. One of the officials said such an operation would be very risky. Iran has the ability to reach the island with missiles and drones.

The United States carried out strikes against military targets on the island on March 13 and Trump has threatened to also strike its critical oil infrastructure. However, given its vital role in Iran’s economy, controlling the island would likely be viewed as a better option than destroying it, military experts say.

Any use of U.S. ground troops — even for a limited mission — could pose significant political risks for Trump, given low support among the American public for the Iran campaign and Trump’s own campaign promises to avoid entangling the U.S. in new Middle East conflicts.

Trump administration officials have also discussed the possibility of deploying U.S. forces to secure Iran’s stocks of highly enriched uranium, one of the people familiar with the matter said.

The sources did not believe a deployment of ground forces anywhere in Iran was imminent but declined to discuss specifics of U.S. operational planning. Experts say the task of securing Iran’s uranium stockpiles would be highly complex and risky, even for U.S. special operations forces.

A White House official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: “There has been no decision to send ground troops at this time, but President Trump wisely keeps all options at his disposal.

“The president is focused on achieving all of the defined objectives of Operation Epic Fury: destroy Iran’s ballistic missile capacity, annihilate their navy, ensure their terrorist proxies cannot destabilize the region, and guarantee that Iran can never possess a nuclear weapon.”

The Pentagon declined to comment.

The discussions come as the U.S. military continues to attack Iran’s navy, its missile and drone stockpiles and its defense industry.

The U.S. has carried out more than 7,800 strikes since launching the war on Feb. 28 and damaged or destroyed more than 120 Iranian vessels so far, according to a factsheet released on Wednesday by the U.S. Central Command, which oversees the roughly 50,000 U.S. troops in the Middle East.

US casualties

Trump has said his goals go beyond degrading Iran’s military capabilities and could include securing safe passage through the strait and preventing Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.

Ground forces could help broaden his options to address those goals, but carry significant risk. Even without any direct conflict in Iran, 13 U.S. troops have been killed so far in the war and about 200 have been wounded, although the vast majority of the injuries have been minor, the U.S. military says.

For years, Trump has railed against his predecessors for getting involved in conflicts and has vowed to keep the United States out of foreign wars. But more recently he has refused to rule out the possibility of “boots on the ground” in Iran.

A senior White House official told Reuters that Trump has various options for acquiring Iran’s nuclear material but has not decided how to proceed. “Certainly there are ways in which it could be acquired,” the official said, adding: “He hasn’t made a decision yet.”

In written testimony to lawmakers on Wednesday, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said Iran’s nuclear enrichment program had been obliterated by strikes in June and the entrances to those underground facilities had been “buried and shuttered with cement.”

The sources said the discussions on U.S. reinforcements go beyond the arrival of an Amphibious Ready Group next week in the Middle East, with an attached Marine Expeditionary Unit that includes more than 2,000 Marines.

But one of the sources noted that the U.S. military was losing a significant number of forces with the decision to send the USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier to Greece for maintenance after a fire on board the vessel.

Trump has also oscillated on whether the U.S. should secure the Strait of Hormuz.

After initially saying the U.S. Navy could escort vessels, he called on other countries to help open the key water way. With little interest from allies, Trump on Wednesday mused about simply leaving.

“I wonder what would happen if we ‘finished off’ what’s left of the Iranian Terror State, and let the Countries that use it, we don’t, be responsible for the so called ‘Strait?,’” Trump posted on Truth Social.

(Reporting by Phil Stewart, Idrees Ali, Erin Banco and Gram Slattery; additional reporting by Steve Holland; Editing by Don Durfee and Rosalba O’Brien)

WASHINGTON, March 18 (Reuters) — China does not currently plan to invade Taiwan in 2027 and seeks to control the island without the use of force, the U.S. intelligence community said on Wednesday, striking a measured tone on one of the world’s biggest potential flashpoints.

The assessment in the intelligence agencies’ annual report on global threats comes as Beijing has stepped up pressure on Taiwan with frequent military drills, even as U.S. President Donald Trump has played down the risk of Chinese military action while he is in office.

The Pentagon late last year said the U.S. military believed China was preparing to be able to win a fight for Taiwan by 2027, the centenary of the founding of its People’s Liberation Army, and was refining options to take Taiwan by “brute force” if needed.

“China, despite its threat to use force to compel unification if necessary and to counter what it sees as a U.S. attempt to use Taiwan to undermine China’s rise, prefers to achieve unification without the use of force, if possible,” the U.S. intelligence agencies said in the report.

The U.S. “assesses that Chinese leaders do not currently plan to execute an invasion of Taiwan in 2027, nor do they have a fixed timeline for achieving unification,” the report said.

It reiterated previous views that the PLA was making “steady but uneven” progress on capabilities it could use to capture the democratically governed island.

China’s embassy in Washington did not respond immediately to a request for comment.

Taiwan’s de facto embassy in Washington also did not respond immediately.

Trump, who has repeatedly touted his “great relationship” with Chinese leader Xi Jinping, has downplayed the threat of the Chinese drills around Taiwan and said Xi told him he will not attack Taiwan while the U.S. president is in office — something Beijing has never confirmed.

China views Taiwan as its own territory and has never renounced the use of force to take the island under its control. Taiwan rejects Beijing’s sovereignty claims, saying only the island’s people can decide their future.

Pressure on Japan to intensify

Despite concerns in the U.S. and abroad about Trump’s inclination to back Taiwan, his administration in December unveiled a record $11 billion sale of weapons for the island, angering Beijing, which says such arms deals must end.

Nonetheless, some Japanese officials have worried Trump may be prepared to soften support for Taiwan in pursuit of a trade accord with China, a move they fear will embolden Beijing and spark conflict in an increasingly militarized East Asia.

Tokyo had been unnerved by muted U.S. rhetorical support for Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi after her remarks last year that a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan could bring about a Japanese military response. Trump reportedly told her privately not to escalate the ensuing diplomatic row with Beijing.

In Wednesday’s report, the U.S. intelligence agencies called Takaichi’s remarks on Taiwan a “significant shift” for a Japanese leader, a framing that is likely to irk Tokyo just a day ahead of a delicate visit by her to the White House. Takaichi has maintained her stance was consistent with Japan’s longstanding policy.

“China is employing multidomain coercive pressure that probably will intensify through 2026, aimed both at punishing Japan and deterring other countries from making similar statements about their potential involvement in a Taiwan crisis,” the report said.

(Reporting by Michael Martina, Patricia Zengerle and David Brunnstrom; Editing by Franklin Paul, Rod Nickel)

Editor’s note: This report has been updated.

MacDill Air Force Base in Florida has lifted a shelter-in-place order that was enacted earlier Wednesday after officials said a threat had been made against the Tampa-based installation.

“Shelter in place has been lifted and the gates are open and will resume normal FPCON Charlie operations,” the base, home of U.S. Central Command, said in a Facebook post. “The threat to MacDill Air Force Base has been cleared and we appreciate everyone’s patience and cooperation.”

The shelter-in-place order came days after a suspicious device was found at the visitors center at the Dale Mabry Gate on Monday, causing traffic to be diverted to the Bayshore Gate, according to a local NBC outlet.

After Monday’s incident, MacDill raised its security level to FPCON CHARLIE.

“This posture allows us to implement deliberate security measures proactively,” the base said on social media earlier this week. “All personnel should remain vigilant, follow the direction of security forces, and report any suspicious activity immediately.”

The base has been leading the United States’ military campaign against Iran, Operation Epic Fury, since the U.S. and Israel began their joint offensive on Feb. 28.

An agreement between the Justice Department and the Department of Veterans Affairs allows the VA to put veterans under guardianship if they are unable to make their own health care decisions.

A memorandum of understanding announced last week by the department gives VA attorneys the legal authority to enter into state court guardianships or conservatorship proceedings in cases where veterans don’t have family or legal representation to determine medical treatment.

VA officials say the process will help hundreds of veterans hospitalized at VA facilities who are unable to transition to more appropriate settings.

“Our new partnership with the Justice Department reflects our ongoing commitment to ensuring that every veteran receives timely, appropriate care, even in complex cases,” VA Secretary Doug Collins said in a release.

VA officials said the agreement is aimed at helping roughly 700 veterans languishing in VA facilities, but the announcement, which noted that the agreement includes some veterans who are “either homeless or at risk of homelessness,” raised concerns among advocates that the authority could be applied to a larger population of veterans, such as those living on the streets.

Carl Blake, CEO of Paralyzed Veterans of America, said court-ordered guardianships or conservatorships could result in a veteran’s loss of rights or lead to unnecessary institutionalization.

Blake asked how the VA previously met the needs of incapacitated veterans and whether they would have access to their own legal representation — paid for by the VA — if necessary.

“Guardianship can severely — or permanently — restrict an individual’s autonomy, civil liberties, and access to community-based supports,” Blake said in a statement on March 13. “Veterans who have served our country deserve care that honors their dignity, preserves their rights, and supports their ability to live in the community with appropriate services.”

Under the program, VA attorneys can ask a state court to determine if a veteran needs a court-appointed guardian to “represent the veteran’s best interests” to determine appropriate medical care, VA Press Secretary Pete Kasperowicz said in an email to Military Times.

According to Kasperowicz, the decisions would be made with “full due-process and process rights for the veterans involved and continuous court supervision of the guardian,” and the court — not the VA — would appoint the representative.

Despite the VA’s assurances, California Rep. Mark Takano, the ranking Democrat on the House Veterans Affairs Committee, said the agreement puts VA in a position where it is responsible for a veteran’s well-being as well as the “legal driver of stripping veterans of their rights.”

“Guardianship should always be a last resort, after all less restrictive options have been exhausted, to ensure veterans’ rights are protected. Veterans fought for our freedom and theirs. The federal government should not be engineering ways of taking it away,” Takano said in a statement on March 11.

Kasperowicz said the agreement is not an effort to institutionalize veterans against their will. Instead, he said, it provides the VA an avenue for removing veterans already stuck in VA hospitals who could benefit from other settings.

“We are trying to get them in the most appropriate care setting for their needs,” he said.

Blake asked the VA and Justice Department to commit to transparency, allowing for public scrutiny and independent oversight to ensure that affected veterans do not lose their civil liberties.

“VA must carefully consider any broad use of guardianship as a care-planning shortcut and adopt policies with robust safeguards,” Blake said.

WASHINGTON, March 17 (Reuters) — The U.S. aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford, deployed in operations against Iran, is expected to temporarily pull into port after a fire on board, U.S. officials said on Tuesday, the 18th day of the war with Tehran.

The carrier, America’s newest and the world’s largest, is currently located in the Red Sea. It is expected to temporarily go to Souda Bay on the Greek island of Crete, the two officials said.

The warship has been deployed for nine months, including taking part in operations against Venezuela in the Caribbean prior to arriving in the Middle East. The length of the deployment has raised questions about morale of the sailors on board and the readiness of the warship.

The officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, did not say how long the Ford was expected to remain in Crete.

One of the officials said nearly 200 sailors were treated for smoke-related injuries when the fire broke out in the ship’s main laundry area. The fire took hours to bring under control and had an impact on roughly 100 sleeping berths.

One service member was flown off the ship for injuries, the official said.

The New York Times first reported the extent of the damage on board the warship. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

After the fire initially broke out, the U.S. military had said that there was no damage to the ship’s propulsion plant and the aircraft carrier was fully operational.

The United States has carried out strikes against more than 7,000 targets since it started operations against Iran on Feb. 28.

The Ford, with more than 5,000 sailors aboard, has more than ​75 military aircraft, including fighter aircraft like the F-18 Super Hornets. The Ford has sophisticated radar that can help control air traffic and navigation.

The supporting ships, such as the Ticonderoga-class guided missile cruiser USS Normandy, Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyers USS Thomas Hudner, USS Ramage, USS Carney and USS Roosevelt, include surface-to-air, surface-to-surface and anti-submarine warfare capabilities.

(Reporting by Idrees Ali and Phil Stewart; Editing by Howard Goller)

The U.S. Marine Corps is hosting celebrations to honor the Harrier aircraft and its service members as it reaches its end of service life.

The Harrier Sundown celebration will “honor the legacy of the aircraft and the Marines who served with it,” according to a Tuesday Marine Administrative message. The sundown celebration will be hosted by the 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing at the Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point, North Carolina, from June 1 to 4, the memo states.

The AV-8B Harrier II+ will reach the end of its planned service life in fiscal year 2026, per the message. The last flight was flown by Marine Attack Squadron VMA 231 and its official deactivation is set for September.

The message says that the Corps will continue the Tactical Aircraft Transition Plan, which means switching to an all-fifth generation tactical air fleet to modernize their aviation capabilities. The plan increases fleet squadrons to 12 primary aircrafts.

The squadron is transitioning to a F-35B Lightning II aircraft, and the Corps is expecting to have a full fifth generation fleet in their tactical aircraft by 2030.

The sundown week will include events hosted by the 2nd MAW units, local governments and businesses and the Marine Corps Aviation Association, the release states. Many of the events are free to attend, but some, like the gala and the gold tournaments, will require payment, per the message.

Other events currently set for the celebration are a social, a picnic, a squadron and simulator open house, and the sundown ceremony, according to the release.

Additional information on registration and details will be made available on the website as the event approaches.

Read the full MarAdmin here.

The U.S. Navy is taking steps toward remedying ongoing maintenance delays by enlisting the help of artificial intelligence and robotic systems, the service announced.

The sea service reached an agreement with the Pittsburgh-based Gecko Robotics, the company confirmed Tuesday, to deploy tech capable of streamlining repairs and reducing maintenance delays for a surface fleet that continues to be stretched thin.

The contract will begin as a 5-year, $54 million indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity deal that will soon see Gecko begin work on 18 ships assigned to the Navy’s U.S. Pacific Fleet.

To expedite what has in recent years become a headache for naval readiness, Gecko uses drones, wall-climbing robots and fixed sensors to gather data on components, decks, welds and hulls.

That information, paired with AI tools, is used to identify current and potential structural issues that may remain hidden to the naked eye.

“A single robotic evaluation and digital rendering of a flight deck eliminated over three months of potential maintenance delay days,” the company release stated about one such procedure.

These measures have expedited maintenance “up to 50 times faster and more accurately than manual methods,” the company added.

“Readiness isn’t just a metric, it’s all that matters,” Jake Loosararian, co-founder and CEO of Gecko, said in the release. “This growing partnership is about unfair advantages Gecko is deploying to our Navy; and how prediction, through our robotics and AI products, ensure our brave men and women are the most advantaged in the world in their fight to defend freedom.”

In fall 2024, then-Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Lisa Franchetti unveiled a goal of having 80% of the Navy’s fleet ready to deploy at any given time by 2027.

Obstacles to reaching that goal materialized quickly, however, with a Government Accountability Office report in December 2024 highlighting a readiness rate among the Navy’s amphibious warfare ships of just 46% between 2011 and 2020. This rate, in turn, significantly hindered Marine Corps deployment and training plans.

In August 2025, that rate reportedly dipped to just 41%, resulting in a more than five-month gap in Marine Expeditionary Unit deployments that year and further straining resources amid the Trump administration’s push to counter the illicit drug trade in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The 80% plan, meanwhile, was picked up by Franchetti’s successor, Adm. Daryl Caudle, who called the rate “an ambitious but essential readiness goal.”

“Achieving this requires shorter maintenance cycles, increased spare-parts availability, improved training pipelines and targeted upgrades across the fleet,” Caudle wrote for Military Times in December.

“Readiness is not a budget line — it is a promise to the American people that their Navy will never arrive late to a fight."

The Department of Veterans Affairs is developing a tool that will analyze veterans’ disability claims applications for fraud — a program VA officials say could identify providers or companies that abuse the system.

The tool will not, however, be used to pursue potentially fraudulent past claims, a concern that arose recently among veterans following a congressional hearing that divulged the program’s development.

Using a Microsoft data analytics program, the VA program will use information gleaned from forms known as Disability Benefits Questionnaires to identify patterns in language or omissions that could indicate fraud.

VA Press Secretary Pete Kasperowicz said the effort, expected to be rolled out sometime this year, is designed to detect filings from companies that pose as legitimate medical providers or file claims on behalf of veterans and charge them excessive fees.

The number of for-profit companies that assist veterans with disability claims has skyrocketed since 2006, when criminal penalties were removed for those who charge veterans for the service. The PACT Act — the landmark legislation that expanded disability benefits to millions of veterans exposed to burn pits and other pollutants — also has presented these companies with business expansion opportunities.

While these companies market themselves as helping veterans navigate the challenging VA claims process and get appropriate disability ratings, veterans’ advocates say the businesses, which they refer to as “claim sharks,” prey on veterans and charge them exorbitant fees.

While veterans are permitted to hire companies or attorneys to appeal claims decisions, the law prohibits anyone from charging for assistance with initial filings.

But that hasn’t stopped for-profit companies from stepping in. And while some may offer legitimate services, others have been targeted by the VA as bad actors.

Over the past 10 years, the department sent “cease and desist letters” to at least 40 companies, according to an investigation by The War Horse and NPR published in December. The VA will use the Power Business Intelligence program to look for fraud.

“[The program] relies on manual data entry and analysis to help identify patterns that may help VA identify when organized fraud rings are posing as legitimate medical providers and preying on Veterans (for example, by excessively charging them),” Kasperowicz said in an email to Military Times.

In 2024, the VA Office of Inspector General said of nearly 32,000 claims completed in 2022, 69% contained “one or more indicators” of potential fraud risk, with an estimated monetary value of $390 million.

Given the amount of money, it’s no wonder the VA is being proactive in investigating disability compensation claims, said David Pineda, an Army veteran who runs a company that helps veterans with claims.

“In education, there were diploma mills where people were using GI Benefits to go to schools — these mills were unethical and illegal and [the VA] cracked down on it. In this space here, it’s a similar thing happening. Some organizations are DBQ mills,” Pineda said in an interview.

During the traditional claims application process, a VA Compensation and Pension examiner completes a veteran’s DBQ and assesses a veteran’s medical records, physical abilities, medications and daily activities. The review determines a veteran’s disability rating which sets the level of benefits and disability compensation.

This claims process can be navigated without cost to the veteran; with assistance provided by accredited veterans service officers at veteran organizations like the American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars; through veterans service officers at state and county governments; and at the VA.

For-profit companies can assist veterans for appeals, but some companies unlawfully are charging for initial assistance and in other cases, are charging enormous fees on backdated benefits awards.

One Army veteran who spoke to Military Times said Trajector Medical, one of the companies on the VA’s cease and desist list, provided little assistance and after he canceled his contract, charged him thousands.

The new program is designed to look at discrepancies in DBQs identified by the VA inspector general, such signs of alterations, incorrect contact information, information from a medical examiner more than 100 miles from a veteran’s address or contradicting findings that may indicate fraud.

James Smith, deputy executive director of the VA’s Policy and Procedures for Compensation Service office, said in a February congressional hearing that to develop the program, the VA would scan DBQs back to 2010, which would give it the data and patterns needed to identify future problems.

But a story on Smith’s disclosure in Stars and Stripes generated concerns among veterans that the tool would be used to identify fraudulent claims filed in the past 16 years.

“When veterans hear that the VA is scanning private DBQs for fraud, the community at large interprets this as ‘they’re coming after me,’ whether they have committed fraud or not,” said Clayton Simms, a Marine Corps veteran who created a YouTube channel, The CivDiv, to discuss veterans issues.

VA Press Secretary Peter Kasperowicz said Monday that this is not the case. The VA is only using older claims “to analyze patterns that could indicate fraud and are using that analysis to look at new claims,” he said.

“Those older claims won’t be reopened or reprocessed,” Kasperowicz said. “No veteran’s claim or benefit will be reduced or denied because of this effort.”

In its January 2024 report, the inspector general made five recommendations to the department for improved training and reporting processes and authenticating DBQs, including developing a system for identifying inauthentic or potentially fraudulent questionnaires.

A bill is under consideration in Congress that would require the VA to identify and report instances of fraud in DBQs. The legislation would require the VA to establish a process for veterans and claims processors to report suspected fraud.

VA officials said in the February hearing that the legislation would be a duplication of efforts.

“VA’s been proactive in this space,” Smith said. “We recognize that there are some problem players out there, but we’ve developed training that the claims processors are required to take so that they can understand their responsibility to potentially identify fraudulent DBQs, as well as a defined process for them to report suspected fraudulent DBQs up.”

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to include information obtained by The War Horse and NPR through a Freedom of Information Act request.

Joe Kent, one of the United States’ top counterterrorism officials, announced his immediate resignation on Tuesday, arguing that President Donald Trump had been led into an unnecessary war with Iran — in part by undue influence from Israel.

In a letter addressed to the president and posted to social media, the director of the National Counterterrorism Center claimed that the Islamic Republic “posed no imminent threat to our nation.”

“It is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby,” Kent said.

Kent described what he characterized as a “misinformation campaign” driven by high-ranking Israeli officials and echoed by the American media — a campaign that he said undermined Trump’s “America First platform and sowed pro-war sentiments to encourage a war with Iran.”

“This echo chamber was used to deceive you [Trump] into believing that Iran posed an imminent threat to the United States,” he continued, adding, “This was a lie and is the same tactic the Israelis used to draw us into the disastrous Iraq war.”

Kent — a retired U.S. Army Green Beret — also invoked a deep personal loss. His wife, Senior Chief Petty Officer Shannon Kent, a military cryptologist, was killed in 2019 by a suicide bomber in Manbij, Syria, along with three other Americans.

“As a veteran who deployed to combat 11 times and as a Gold Star husband who lost my beloved wife Shannon in a war manufactured by Israel, I cannot support sending the next generation off to fight and die in a war that serves no benefit to the American people nor justifies the cost of the American lives,” he wrote.

At least 13 U.S. service members have been killed in the current conflict with Iran, and more than 200 have been wounded, according to the Pentagon.

Asked about Kent’s resignation, Trump replied, “I always thought he was a nice guy, but I always thought he was weak on security.”

“When I read his statement, I realized that it’s a good thing that he’s out because he said that Iran was not a threat,” the president told reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday, insisting that “Iran was a threat.”

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Kent’s resignation.

Marines can now complete their handgun qualification using a pistol equipped with a red dot optic, according to a policy change announced in a Marine Administrative Message last week. However, there is a caveat: the optic — an M17 Romeo red dot — must be purchased and issued by the Marine’s unit.

Exactly how many Marines will receive the optics remains unclear. Military Times requested comment from the Marine Corps’ Marksmanship Program Management team and Training and Education Command but did not receive a response in time for publication.

Over the past decade, pistol-mounted red dot optics have surged in popularity among civilian shooters and police. Today, most major handgun models offer optics-ready variants.

Experts say the system provides a clear advantage over traditional iron sights. Rather than aligning the front and rear sights, shooters can focus on the target while placing a projected aiming point over it — a literal red dot. It not only simplifies the shooting process, especially under stress, but affords quicker target acquisition.

The Marine Corps update follows a broader set of changes developed through the service’s Marksmanship Campaign Plan, an initiative launched in 2024 to overhaul training and improve combat lethality.

Additional changes announced in the March 12 message include:

• A shift from annual qualification to deployment-focused training cycles;
• Replacing “destroy” targets with “drill” targets during annual rifle qualification;
• Adoption of updated Lethality Factor scoring metrics at combat schools.

Similar to the red dot policy, a limited number of Marines will also be authorized to qualify with Glock pistols instead of the standard M17 or M18. That exception applies only to Marines assigned to Marine Forces Special Operations Command and embassy security duty, the only units in the Corps currently issued Glock handguns.

As the “M17” designation implies, the optic is designed for use with the military’s M17 and M18 handguns, both of which — along with the optic itself — are manufactured by SIG Sauer.

In October 2024, SIG announced that the Army officially endorsed the Romeo red dot by adding it to the Approved Accessory List for the M17. And a year before that marked another milestone, when the optic received a NATO Stock Number, or NSN.

As the company explained in a press release, an NSN identifies the product as a “standardized material,” which in turn “streamlines the procurement process for all NATO members and partner countries.”

HOUSTON — An Afghan immigrant whose family said he had been evacuated from his home country after working for years with U.S. forces died at a Texas hospital after immigration authorities detained him, according to authorities.

Federal immigration officials called Mohommad Nazeer Paktyawal a “criminal” who had been arrested for alleged fraudulent use of food stamps and for theft. Officials also said Paktyawal had not provided any record of his military service.

#AfghanEvac, a San Diego-based group that helps resettle Afghans who assisted the U.S. during the two-decade war, pushed back against the federal government’s claims about Paktyawal, one of several people who have died in recent months after being detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.

“Calling a man a criminal without a conviction while claiming there is ‘no record’ of service without checking interagency systems looks less like fact-finding and more like damage control,” said Shawn VanDiver, president of #AfghanEvac. “The government should be explaining how a 41-year-old father of six died less than 24 hours after entering ICE custody.”

A cause of death is still pending from the Dallas County Medical Examiner’s Office. But Paktyawal’s family said he was not ill.

“We still cannot understand how this happened. He was only 41 years old and was a strong and healthy man. His children keep asking when their father will come home,” the family said in a statement.

Paktyawal was arrested by ICE on Friday and during his medical intake exam at a Dallas ICE field office, he complained of shortness of breath and chest pain, Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Lauren Bis said in a statement Monday.

Paktyawal was taken to Parkland Hospital in Dallas and on Saturday, his tongue became swollen and he received treatment. But later in the morning, medical staff had to perform CPR on him. He was pronounced dead at 9:10 a.m. CDT.

“No one in ICE custody is denied access to proper medical care,” Bis said.

His death was still under investigation, ICE said.

U.S. Rep. Julie Johnson, who on Monday had visited the Dallas ICE field office where Paktyawal was held, said the Department of Homeland Security and ICE have had a history “lying and misrepresenting” the background of people they arrest or encounter.

“He was not a violent criminal, as President Trump likes to say when he’s rounding up these folks. He was working as a baker,” said Johnson, a Democrat who represents parts of Dallas County. “He was providing for his family and contributing to our economy. And so we have a lot of questions of why was this gentleman targeted? Why was he picked up? And why did he die in their custody?”

ICE said Paktyawal had been arrested for committing fraud against SNAP, the government’s biggest food aid program, on Sept. 16. ICE said he had also been arrested for theft by Garland police on Nov. 1.

A Dallas County District Attorney’s Office spokesperson said there is an active case regarding SNAP benefits fraud of $200 or more, a third-degree felony, against Paktyawal that had not been resolved.

Police in the Dallas suburb of Garland said Paktyawal was arrested on Nov. 1 after being accused of not paying for groceries and merchandise from a Walmart.

The case in Garland, a misdemeanor, had not yet been filed with the district attorney’s office, according to the spokesperson.

Paktyawal had previously served alongside U.S. military special forces in Afghanistan for a decade and came to the United States following the withdrawal by U.S. troops and the takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban in August 2021.

“The U.S. brought him here because of the role Afghans like him played in supporting the American mission,” VanDiver said.

Paktyawal, who was married, had been living in Richardson, a suburb of Dallas.

Johnson said she had been told by his family that he had applied for asylum and his case was pending. But Johnson said ICE agents are claiming that Paktyawal had missed his asylum appointments.

Deaths in ICE custody have soared during Trump’s second term.

The agency reported 14 custody deaths from the start of the government’s fiscal year Oct. 1 through Jan. 6, well on pace to surpass the previous 12-month count of 24. ICE reported 12 custody deaths in the 2024 fiscal year and 12 in the previous three years combined.

ICE has increased the number of people in its detention centers to more than 70,000 from about 40,000 at the start of Trump’s second term. It plans to spend $38.3 billion to boost capacity to 92,600 beds by the end of November, including converted warehouses that house up to 10,000 each.

Associated Press writers Elliot Spagat in San Diego, Jamie Stengle in Dallas and Rebecca Santana in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON, March 16 (Reuters) — The number of U.S. troops wounded in the war against Iran has risen to about 200, the U.S. military said on Monday, as the conflict entered its third week.

The U.S. military’s Central Command said the vast majority of those wounded had suffered minor injuries and 180 troops had already returned to duty. Ten of the injuries are serious, it said.

Troops had been injured in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Bahrain, Iraq, and Israel, Central Command added.

Thirteen U.S. troops have been killed since Iran launched strikes against U.S. military bases following ⁠the start of the conflict on Feb. 28.

Iranian attacks have also struck diplomatic missions, hotels and airports, and damaged energy infrastructure in Arab Gulf states.

Last week, Reuters reported that as many as 150 U.S. troops had been wounded in the conflict, highlighting the danger from Iranian strikes.

The United States, meanwhile, has carried out strikes against more than 7,000 targets in Iran.

About a dozen MQ-9 drones have been destroyed in the war, said a U.S. official on Monday, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aerial vehicle can loiter at altitudes of around 50,000 feet for more than 27 hours, gathering intelligence with sophisticated cameras, sensors and radars.

The Reaper, which entered service with the U.S. Air Force 16 years ago, can be equipped with weapons such as air-to-ground missiles.

(Reporting by Phil Stewart and Idrees Ali; Editing by Daniel Wallis and Rosalba O’Brien)

A federal judge issued a preliminary injunction Friday that temporarily reinstates a collective bargaining agreement between the Department of Veterans Affairs and its largest employee union.

Rhode Island U.S. District Court Judge Melissa DuBose ruled in favor of the American Federation of Government Employees National Veterans Affairs Council, ordering the VA to recognize the bargaining contract that represents roughly 300,000 VA employees.

In her decision, DuBose noted that an executive order issued in March, 2025 by President Donald Trump allowed federal agencies that are involved in national security to terminate union contracts, including the VA, which may provide medical care to the general public during national health crises.

But the VA did not cite national security concerns in ending the AFGE contract, DuBose said.

Instead, the VA cited cost and an inability to terminate employees for performance issues or bad conduct as reasons for terminating AFGE’s agreement.

“Other than the one, vague, post hoc statement about national security that appears in [a] declaration, there is zero indication from the [VA] that the termination decision would have been made or implemented without the retaliatory motive,” DuBose wrote.

She also said some unions clearly were favored over others in the VA’s decision process since the department did not terminate all agreements, and the termination did not follow the executive order, which allowed decisions on an “agency or subdivision basis and not union by union.”

The VA ended most of its collective bargaining contracts with federal unions last August, affecting thousands of employees represented by AFGE, the AFL-CIO, the National Association of Government Employees, the National Federation of Federal Employees, the National Nurses Organizing Committee/National Nurses United and the Service Employees International Union.

VA officials said the move would make it easier to “promote high-performing employees” and “hold poor performers accountable.”

“Too often, unions that represent VA employees fight against the best interests of veterans while protecting and rewarding bad workers,” VA Secretary Doug Collins said at the time. “We’re making sure VA resources and employees are singularly focused on the job we were sent here to do: providing top-notch care and service to those who wore the uniform.”

AFGE filed a lawsuit in November over the termination, which included the VA stopping the withholding of union dues from employees’ paychecks.

In their suit, AFGE officials said the move was harming employees and the union, with employees seeing a decline in benefits, such as a decrease in parental leave from 16 weeks to 12 weeks, and loss of safeguards, while the union has been losing members.

AFGE National President Everett Kelley said Friday that DuBose’ ruling holds the VA accountable. He added that AFGE will monitor the VA to make sure it complies with the decision.

“Secretary Collins singled out AFGE and our members for retaliation because we refused to stay silent about cuts and changes at the VA that would harm veterans. His decision to exempt other unions from the President’s executive order and then terminate AFGE/NVAC’s collective bargaining agreement made the retaliation impossible to deny,” Kelley said in a statement.

It’s not clear how long the reinstatement will last. The VA did not respond by publication to a request for comment.

But the department is likely to appeal the decision, and the outcome is uncertain. In a separate lawsuit filed by AFGE on behalf of all government employees, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled last month that the administration’s termination of collective bargaining agreements was not retaliatory, and it overturned a preliminary injunction put in place by a different federal judge.

Before the start of the second Trump administration, the VA had about 450,000 employees, nearly 80% of whom were represented by a union.

VA employee unions that were allowed to keep operating following the executive order included those representing 4,000 VA police officers, firefighters and security guards.

The two-star head of the command responsible for coordinating support for Ukraine left a tube of classified maps behind on a train in Europe, losing control of the sensitive material for 24 hours, a new report from the Department of Defense Inspector General’s office has found.

Then-Army Maj. Gen. Antonio Aguto, now retired, was also found to have sustained a concussion following a night of drinking to intoxication at a social event in Kyiv, leading to incoherence and confusion in a briefing the next day.

The report, released March 12, covers a period in April and May 2024 in which Aguto was commander of the Wiesbaden, Germany-based Security Assistance Group-Ukraine. Aguto relinquished command of the group in August 2024, having presided over its activation in 2022. He retired the same month.

Established with about 300 personnel, SAG-U was formed as a headquarters element “to build on the work of the 18th Airborne Corps, who originally deployed to Europe to reinforce NATO’s eastern flank and whose mission latter evolved to include coordinating the training and equipping of the Armed Forces of Ukraine,” according to an announcement at its founding.

The investigation, which was based on anonymous whistleblower reports and also included allegations of a “toxic” environment at SAG-U headquarters, provided a rare inside perspective on working conditions and morale at the small logistics support element. The investigation did not find Aguto personally responsible for the unit’s problems, though.

According to the investigation, which was based on interviews with Aguto and 33 other witnesses, along with extensive document reviews, the classified materials breach happened April 4, 2024, on a return trip from Ukraine to Germany on a chartered train with a Ukrainian crew.

Aguto had brought with him to Ukraine a set of maps classified Secret, hand-carried in a cylindrical tube due to their size. While a witness reported seeing a noncommissioned officer in the travel party carry the map tube onto the train, nobody saw it being taken off. Aguto would only be notified by his executive officer that the map tube was missing after he had returned to headquarters in Wiesbaden, according to the investigation; it was found on the train the next day and returned, apparently untouched, via staff with U.S. Embassy Ukraine.

While classified information is supposed to be transported by courier on trips such as this, no courier order was issued, the investigation found.

Aguto told investigators he took responsibility for the temporary loss of the maps as the “senior guy,” despite not being the one designated to physically carry materials on and off the train.

In the military, mishandling of classified information can carry with it severe penalties, particularly when the violations are intentional.

The subject was pushed into the national spotlight last May, when a signal group chat including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and then-National Security Council Director Michael Waltz unintentionally shared sensitive attack plans with journalist Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic.

While Hegseth said the disclosures included “no classified information,” a DoD IG report found some of the information matched that previously classified as Secret.

The IG recommended that the Secretary of the Army refer the matter of the documents’ improper transport by Aguto to the U.S. European Command Special Security Office.

The night of drinking addressed in the report took place May 13, 2024, during a nine-day trip to Ukraine. During a six-hour dinner in Kyiv described as a military engagement, a witness reported that Aguto drank approximately two 500 ml bottles of chacha, a Georgian brandy containing 40-50% alcohol.

Witnesses reported Aguto as drunk, and he told investigators he was “some level of intoxicated” following the dinner.

During a meeting in Aguto’s room following the dinner, two witnesses reported seeing him fall backward and strike the back of his head against a wall. In the morning, according to the report, he also had a noticeable mark on his forehead.

As he met staff in the hotel lobby ahead of a morning meeting with then-Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, witnesses reported Aguto acting lethargic and “not himself,” and staff said they suggested he cancel the meeting.

En route to the U.S. Embassy and running late, Aguto fell again, hitting his jaw on the concrete and tearing his jacket.

Aguto showed up to the meeting looking “completely disheveled” and “out of it,” according to the regional security officer. The U.S. ambassador to Ukraine reported worrying that Aguto had been drugged, according to the IG, and others reported him slurring words and acting “cognitively diminished.” He was later taken to a local hospital and diagnosed with a concussion.

Investigators found Aguto’s falls had been a result of “overindulgence” in alcohol, saying he should have considered the effects before drinking so much and did not receive a proper waiver to consume more than the two authorized alcoholic beverages.

Aguto disagreed, saying he “acted in good faith” and had received verbal permission from Gen. Darryl Williams, commander of U.S. Army Europe, to drink at the dinner in light of the “cultural significance” of drinking at such events.

While the IG did not substantiate further allegations that Aguto “belittled” staff and created a toxic work environment, witnesses responding to a climate survey reported grim work conditions that tanked morale. Living spaces, containerized units or cubicle-like spaces in an open warehouse, had little privacy and no Wi-Fi, unit members reported.

“The living spaces were described as prison-like, with living conditions and food ‘[w]orse than Iraq and Afghanistan and even Syria,’” the investigation stated. “The base dining facility had limited food choices and did not operate in the evenings or on weekends when many SAG-U members worked, and the quality was substandard and unhealthy.”

Brutal operational tempo and long work hours also contributed to burnout, surveys found.

“The nature of SAG-U’s work in an active war, plus specific higher echelon briefing requirements, coupled with the Ukrainian partner’s demands for rapid and detailed information output, contributed to MG Aguto’s demanding leadership style,” investigators determined. “MG Aguto’s direct and stern communication style was not well received by some subordinates subject to his critiques, especially members from other Military Services.”

Attempts by Military Times to reach Aguto for comment were not immediately successful.

SAG-U, now commanded by Lt. Gen. Curtis Buzzard, continues to coordinate security force assistance to Ukraine.

The Pentagon has identified six service members who were killed on March 12 when a U.S. Air Force KC-135 refueling aircraft crashed during combat operations against Iran.

Maj. John “Alex” Klinner, 33, of Auburn, Alabama; Capt. Ariana G. Savino, 31, of Covington, Washington; and Tech. Sgt. Ashley B. Pruitt, 34, of Bardstown, Kentucky, were killed in the crash, the Pentagon announced. They were assigned to the 6th Air Refueling Wing, MacDill Air Force Base, Florida.

Also deceased are Capt. Seth R. Koval, 38, of Mooresville, Indiana; Capt. Curtis J. Angst, 30, of Wilmington, Ohio; and Tech. Sgt. Tyler H. Simmons, 28, of Columbus, Ohio, each of whom were assigned to the 121st Air Refueling Wing out of Rickenbacker Air National Guard Base in Columbus, Ohio.

“Our hearts are heavy as we mourn the loss of Alex, Ariana and Ashley,” U.S. Air Force Col. Ed Szczepanik, 6th Air Refueling Wing commander, said in a release Saturday. “To lose a member of the Air Force family is excruciatingly painful, especially to those who know them as son, daughter, brother, sister, spouse, mom, or dad. To lose them at the same time is unimaginable. Our hearts and minds are with the family, friends and loved ones of our fallen Airmen.”

The incident is under investigation.

Klinner was the chief of Squadron Standardizations and Evaluations at the 99th Air Refueling Squadron, the Air Force announced. He entered the Air Force in 2017 through the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps at Auburn University and would go on to deploy in 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2026.

Klinner’s awards include the Air Medal with oak leaf cluster, Aerial Achievement Medal, and Air and Space Commendation Medal with oak leaf cluster.

Savino was the chief of Current Operations Pilot at the 99th Air Refueling Squadron. She earned her active duty commission in 2017 through the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps at Central Washington University and deployed in 2020 and 2026.

Savino’s awards include the Air Medal and the Air and Space Commendation Medal.

Pruitt was an assistant flight chief of Operations and KC-135 instructor boom operator at the 99th Air Refueling Squadron, the service announced. She joined the Air Force in May 2017 and completed Career Enlisted Aviator training the following February.

Pruitt deployed in 2018, 2019, 2020 and 2026, according to her service record. Her awards include the Air Medal with silver oak leaf cluster, the Air and Space Commendation Medal with two oak leaf clusters, and the Air and Space Achievement Medal.

Koval was a KC-135R Stratotanker instructor pilot who enlisted in the Air Force in 2006 as a machinist and would later earn his commission in 2018. He was promoted to captain in November 2022.

Koval deployed in 2014, 2020, 2022, 2023 and 2026. His awards include the Meritorious Service Medal, the Air Medal, the Air and Space Commendation Medal with oak leaf cluster, and the Air and Space Achievement Medal.

A KC-135R pilot, Angst enlisted in the Ohio Air National Guard in May 2015 as a vehicle maintenance technician and would earn his commission in 2021, the service announced. He deployed in 2015 and 2026.

Angst’s awards include the Air and Space Commendation Medal, the Air and Space Achievement Medal, the Meritorious Unit Award, and the Air and Space Outstanding Unit Award.

Simmons was a KC-135R boom operator, according to the service. He joined the Air Force in 2017 and completed security forces technical training school in May 2018. He would deploy in 2018, 2023 and 2026.

Simmons became an inflight refueling specialist in April 2022, then a mobility force aviator in 2023. He was promoted to the rank of technical sergeant in May 2023. Simmons’ awards include the Air Force Commendation Medal.

“Today we mourn the loss of three remarkable Airmen whose service and commitment embodied the very best of our Ohio National Guard,” Maj. Gen. Matthew S. Woodruff, Ohio adjutant general, said of Koval, Angst and Simmons. “Their impact on their teammates and our mission will not be forgotten. Our thoughts and prayers are with their families, friends and fellow service members, and our entire Guard family stands with them as we grieve together during this difficult time.”

Numerous KC-135s are currently deployed to the U.S. Central Command area of operations, where crews have provided aerial refueling for other aircraft as a part of Operation Epic Fury.

The downed KC-135 is the fourth manned U.S. aircraft to be lost this month amid combat operations against the Islamic Republic.

A total of 13 U.S. service members have been killed during combat actions and roughly 140 more wounded — eight severely — across the opening two weeks of Operation Epic Fury.

Another service member, an Army National Guard officer who also served as a New York City policeman, died on March 6 following a non-combat incident.

“Our service members make an incredible sacrifice to go forward and do the things that the nation asks of them,” Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Dan Caine said Friday while speaking about the crash. “It’s a reminder of the true cost of the dedication and commitment of the joint force.”

A fundraising email distributed Thursday by a political action committee linked to President Donald Trump included a photo of a March 7 dignified transfer of a U.S. soldier killed by an Iranian drone strike in Kuwait.

The email, which was signed “President Donald J. Trump“ and paid for by Never Surrender Inc., promises to make donors part of a ”National Security Briefing Membership.” It was first pointed out on X by Patriot Takes.

The embedded photo of the dignified transfer, taken by White House photographer Daniel Torok, is included in the email and bracketed by icons featuring the text, “CLAIM YOUR SPOT,” which can be clicked on to donate.

In the photo, Trump, wearing a white USA baseball hat, salutes as a flag-draped casket of a fallen soldier is transferred by an Army carry team. The casket included the remains of one of six soldiers returned to U.S. soil that day, the first American casualties of Operation Epic Fury.

Less than one week later, the photo was used in the fundraising email.

“I’m the strong commander who stares down tyrants, obliterates terrorists, and never backs down,” Trump states in the email. “This is for patriots ready to stand with that kind of unbreakable strength. Not for the weak or the wavering.”

The email promises donors a series of private national security briefings and updates on “threats facing America ... border invasions, foreign adversaries, deep state sabotage, and every danger the fake news hides.”

“You’ll get the inside scoop DIRECT from me, President Trump,” the email continues, “the leader who’s rebuilt the greatest military in history, and put America First like no one else.”

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The six service members transferred on March 7 were killed when an Iranian drone evaded American air defenses and struck a makeshift operations center in Port Shuabia, Kuwait. The attack was among the opening salvos of the war between a U.S.-Israel alliance and the Islamic Republic.

The slain soldiers who were killed in the strike were identified as Sgt. Declan Coady, 20, of West Des Moines, Iowa; Capt. Cody Khork, 35, of Winter Haven, Florida; Sgt. 1st Class Nicole Amor, 39, of White Bear Lake, Minnesota; Sgt. 1st Class Noah Tietjens, 42, of Bellevue, Nebraska; Maj. Jeffrey O’Brien, 45, of Indianola, Iowa; and Chief Warrant Officer 3 Robert Marzan, 54, of Spotsylvania, Virginia.

A total of 13 U.S. service members have been killed during combat actions and roughly 140 more wounded — eight severely — across the opening two weeks of Operation Epic Fury.

Sgt. Benjamin N. Pennington, 26, of Glendale, Kentucky, died from wounds sustained during a March 1 enemy attack at Prince Sultan Air Base, Saudi Arabia.

Six U.S. airmen were killed on Thursday when a U.S. Air Force KC-135 refueling aircraft crashed during ongoing combat operations.

Another service member, an Army National Guard officer who also served as a New York City policeman, died on March 6 following a non-combat incident.

The U.S. is sending more reinforcements to the Middle East in support of the Iran war.

U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reportedly approved a request from U.S. Central Command for an element of an amphibious ready group and attached Marine Expeditionary Unit to help combat Iran’s regional attacks, the Wall Street Journal first reported Friday.

The supplemental forces would include up to 5,000 personnel and several warships, including the USS Tripoli, which is on its way to the Middle East from its homeport in Sasebo, Japan, the report said.

The Tripoli Amphibious Ready Group includes the America-class amphibious assault ship USS Tripoli, the San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock ships USS New Orleans and USS San Diego and the embarked 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit.

The 31st MEU, meanwhile, includes a ground combat element, which features a battalion landing team — an infantry battalion and combat support elements — of around 1,100 Marines and sailors.

Also included is the aviation combat element, which features tiltrotor and fixed-wing aircraft, transport and attack helicopters, ground support assets and air defense teams.

A combat logistics battalion with equipment and personnel capable of sustaining a MEU in austere environments for up to 15 days will also join the effort. This group includes medical, supply and explosive ordnance personnel, among others.

Requests for comment from the Pentagon and CENTCOM were not returned as of press time. The Navy told Military Times it would not be commenting.

The deployment of the Tripoli Amphibious Ready Group comes less than a year after a Military Times report found the readiness rate of the Navy’s amphibious assault ships had dropped to just 41% amid the Trump administration’s ramped-up effort to combat drug cartels in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The readiness issue at the time resulted in a more than five-month gap in MEU deployments.

Despite any strain, the U.S. continues to ramp up attacks on the Islamic Republic.

CENTCOM on Thursday said that American forces have struck roughly 6,000 targets inside Iran since the war began. More than 60 Iranian ships and over 30 minelayers have also been eliminated, CENTCOM announced.

Pentagon officials told senators in a classified briefing this week that the first six days of Operation Epic Fury cost American taxpayers an estimated $11.3 billion, according to a person familiar with the session.

The figure, however, omitted a range of war-related expenses, indicating the overall total is likely to rise.

An incident Thursday saw U.S. deaths in the Iran war nearly double after a U.S. Air Force KC-135 refueling aircraft crashed during ongoing combat operations.

All six crew members were killed in the crash, which was not caused by hostile or friendly fire, CENTCOM confirmed Friday. Two aircraft were reportedly involved in the incident, officials said, with the second aircraft landing safely.

A total of 13 U.S. service members have been killed during combat actions and roughly 140 more wounded — eight severely — across the opening two weeks of Operation Epic Fury.

The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency announced on March 4 that Marine Raider Pfc. Norton Retzsch, 25, had been accounted for on April 1, 2025 — thanks, in part, to 20-year-old DNA submitted to the military in 2006.

Kim Opitz, Retzsch’s great-niece, a freelance writer who lives in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, told Kare 11 News that her “mother never, never let us forget about him.”

Retzsch, a member of Company C, 1st Marine Raider Battalion, 1st Marine Raider Regiment, 1st Marine Division, I Marine Amphibious Corps, was first reported missing in action on July 9, 1943, during the Battle of Enogai on New Georgia in the Solomon Islands.

The New Georgia campaign, dubbed Operation Toenails, was led by Rear Adm. Richmond Turner, with amphibious forces landing at various points on New Georgia on June 30, 1943, beginning a campaign that lasted until the Japanese evacuated Vella Lavella on Oct. 7.

On July 9, Company C came under intense Japanese fire as they rushed toward enemy positions. In his post-war account, “Bloody Ridge and Beyond,” Marine Corps veteran Marlin Groft wrote, “All hell broke loose up front. C Company had blundered into a prepared killing field of Nambu machine gun nests, aided by snipers cleverly concealed in the surrounding trees.”

Retzsch was one of three Marines reported missing after the battle.

According to DPAA, from November to December 1947, units from the 604th Quartermaster Graves Registration Company searched for Retzsch, but after conducting an unsuccessful search of the Bairoko Harbor and Enogai Inlet, the case was closed.

Interred as an unknown at the Enogai Cemetery in 1943, Retzsch was then exhumed twice before final burial in Manila. The Marine’s remains were subsequently designated X-182, while Retzsch’s name was recorded on the Tablets of the Missing at the Manila American Cemetery and Memorial in the Philippines.

In 2019, however, “after researching losses on New Georgia,” according to DPAA, they “recommended disinterment of several Unknowns potentially associated with losses in the Bairoko-Enogai area.”

That’s where Opitz’s DNA, submitted to the military in 2006, came into play.

In 2025, DPAA, using dental and other DNA analysis, identified Retzsch’s remains and contacted his great-niece.

“It was like elation, like I’ve never felt so spiritually high,” Opitz told Kare 11 News. “He’s going to be brought home with honors.”

Retzsch will be buried on April 13, 2026, in Marana, Arizona.

In a United States War Department-issued “Line of Position” notebook, Capt. Robert A. Lewis begins like many service member letters, with a “Dear Mom + Dad.” But this log, dated Aug. 6, 1945, is unlike any other entry from World War II.

Lewis, the co-pilot of the B-29 Enola Gay, was en route to Japan from the Pacific island of Tinian when he began recording. Now, his account, written during and in the immediate aftermath of dropping the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, is for sale.

His “blow by blow description,” which includes his famous reaction: “My God what have we done,” has just been put up for sale by Dan Whitmore, a rare book dealer in Pasadena, California, the Washington Post was first to report.

The price: $950,000.

This will be the fifth time that Lewis’ record has appeared at auction: the first being sold for $37,000 by Sotheby’s in 1971. Lewis, present for the auction, reportedly said that he believed that the account was of great historical importance, adding that he “didn’t know what else to do with it.”

It sold once again for $85,000 at Sotheby’s in 1978; $391,000 at Christie’s in 2002 (as part of the Malcolm Forbes sale); and $543,000 at Heritage in 2022, according to Whitmore.

The eight-page account was made at the behest of William L. Laurence, a science writer for the New York Times, who received a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting on what he coined as the “Atomic Age.”

As the official historian of the Manhattan Project, Laurence was the only journalist to witness the Trinity test and the atomic bombing of Nagasaki. He was supposed to journey alongside Enola Gay’s crew but arrived too late at the bomber’s base on Tinian.

Over the course of the 12-hour flight from Tinian to Hiroshima and back again, Lewis “recorded both what he saw — including a sketch of the mushroom cloud over the city — and what he felt — apprehension, confusion, shock, awe — as he and his crew entered history,” according to the rare book dealer.

Much of Lewis’ writing occurred in near-total darkness, and as he notes, halfway through, he ran out of ink and finished his account in pencil.

Leaving the Pacific island at 2:25 a.m., Lewis recorded at 7:30 a.m. that “we are loaded, the bomb is now alive and it’s a funny feeling knowing its right in back of you. Knock wood. We started out climb to 30,000ft…well folks its not long now.”

As the B-29 approached the city, Lewis wrote: “There will be a short intermission while we bomb our target.”

At 8:15 a.m., the Enola Gay dropped the bomb.

“Little Boy” fell harmlessly for roughly 45 seconds before detonating, instantly killing 70,000 people in the initial blast. At least 100,000 deaths directly resulted from the attacks. A minimum of another 100,000 people also died from illnesses caused by radiation exposure in the weeks, months and decades that followed, according to the National Archives.

In that moment, Lewis wrote:

“We [Bob Caron our tail gunner] got excellent pictures and everyone on the shop is actually crossed out dumbstruck even though we had expected something fierce, it was the actual sight that we saw that caused the crew to feel that they were a part of Buck Rogers 25 century warriors. This essay on the bombing results could go on indefinitely by telling how huge it grew, even after an hour [and half.] [400] miles from the target, then the billow of smoke reached [5500] ft and contained very weird colors. But perhaps the Japs that are left can save me the trouble and let us know. We then headed ho[m]e on 150° and [our ship] sure had a happy [but puzzled crew]. Mission home was as briefed weather the same everyone got a few cat naps.”

Lewis, perhaps more reflective, later recorded in the days after the attack, “I am certain the entire crew felt this experience was more than anyone human had ever thought possible. It just seems impossible to comprehend. Just how many did we kill? I honestly have the feeling of groping for words to explain this … My God what have we done. If I live a hundred years I’ll never quite get these few minutes out of my mind.”

That later recollection was taped into place by Lewis shortly after the bombing. The yellowed tape, according to Whitmore, is still there.

In August 1945, Lewis was a confident, rambunctious 27-year-old with a reputation as a skilled pilot and determined ladies’ man. But the events of that summer day left him haunted.

In his later years, Lewis took to sculpture as a form of healing.

His piece — a mushroom cloud with streams of blood flowing down the side — was later given to Dr. Glenn Van Warrebey, an American psychiatrist who treated Lewis, seemingly for post-traumatic stress disorder.

According to the Washington Post, Whitmore has plans to exhibit the notebook at the New York International Antiquarian Book Fair, which begins April 30.

While there are two firsthand accounts of the Hiroshima bombing by the Enola Gay crew — the other being Theodore “Dutch” Van Kirk’s navigator’s log — only Lewis’ contains a uniquely emotional commentary of the day’s historic events.