“Mission Accomplished” — the banner behind President George W. Bush while aboard the U.S. Navy aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln — grandly declared that invasion of Iraq, launched just 26 days prior, on March 20, 2003, was over.

The invasion consisting of the armed forces of the United States, United Kingdom, Australia and Poland, had overrun the country in a little over three weeks and would soon climax with the overthrow of the Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein. As of that moment, President Bush had achieved a stunning victory, more so even than that of his father in 1990-1991.

Few would have conceived that this seeming end to what President Bush called the “Axis of Evil” was, in fact, only beginning. Some clue, however, might have been derived from the act of self-sacrifice late in the campaign that produced its sole Medal of Honor recipient, Paul Ray Smith.

Born in El Paso, Texas, on June 24, 1969, Paul Ray Smith was nine when his parents, Ivan Smith and Janice Pvirre, moved to Tampa Bay, Florida. There, Smith took a shine to carpentry, even serving as a carpenter’s assistant, and automobiles, rebuilding a friend’s dune buggy. In 1988 he graduated from the Tampa Bay Vocational Technical School, then enlisted in the United States Army in October 1989.

As early as then, Smith told his family he had settled on his life’s ambition: “I want to be a soldier, get married and have kids.”

After training at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, in 1996 Smith was assigned to the 9th Engineer Battalion in Germany, where he met his wife, Birgit and went on to have a son and a daughter.

He then transferred to Company B, 11th Engineer Battalion to participate in Operation Joint Endeavor, upholding stability in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1996, and the similar Operation Joint Guardian, patrolling the streets of Gnjilane, Kosovo, from 1999 to May 2001.

In the spring of 2002, he attained the rank to Sergeant First Class and in August he completed the Advanced Non-Commissioned Officer Course.

In January 2003 Smith’s combat engineer unit moved to Kuwait, where it was attached to the 2nd Battalion, 7th Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division. There he trained his troops intensely in preparation for Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Once launched, Operation Iraqi Freedom’s progress was marked by inconsistency on the enemy’s part. Some Iraqis fought ferociously; others crumbled under the weight of corrupt leadership, faulty training and unreliable weaponry. The Americans could not be sure of what they were up against until first contact.

As of April 3, B Company, 2nd Battalion had advanced roughly 185 miles in 48 hours with the 3rd Infantry Division. On April 4, it was part of a 100-man blocking force taking up positions on the highway a little over a mile east of Baghdad International Airport.

There, the Americans had constructed an impromptu aid station in a walled enclosure and a tower for about 100 casualties. Smith, leading a 16-man detail and with combat earth mover, was constructing an EPW (enemy prisoner of war) holding area when some of his men reported 50 to 100 Iraqis had occupied the tower — commandeering the courtyard and by all appearances, determined to make a fight of it.

Besides his two platoons, Smith was backed up by a Bradley fighting vehicle and three M113 armored personnel carriers. Hastily organizing a defense, he moved up under fire to personally engage the enemy. Nearby, the Bradley was damaged and as its ammunition ran low, it withdrew to replenish. One of the APCs was disabled by a rocket-propelled grenade and a 60mm mortar round. Smith rushed over to evacuate its three wounded crewmen.

Judging it possible that the enemy might overrun the aid station and that the wounded troops were in jeopardy, Smith then returned to the M113 and, disregarding his own safety under withering fire, he manned its exposed .50-caliber machine gun. Nearby a fellow SFC Timothy S. Campbell, led a team into the tower and killed all the Iraqi combatants they found there.

The fight ended with as many as 50 Iraqis dead. SFC Smith was found where he fell, with 13 holes in his armor jacket and bullets in his neck and brain. After the American advance resumed, Baghdad fell on April 9, followed by Kirkuk on the 10th and Tikrit on the 15th. On May 1, the President announced the “end of major combat operations.”

For his role in defending the wounded, Campbell was awarded the Silver Star. After being honored by his comrades and shipped home, Smith received the Bronze Star, Purple Heart, and Army Commendation Medal with four Oak Leaf Clusters. In accordance with his expressed wishes — he loved to fish — his remains were cremated and scattered in the Gulf of Mexico. He also has a marker in Arlington National Cemetery.

On April 4, 2005, two years after his death, Smith’s 11-year-old son, David, came to Washington, D.C. and received the Medal of Honor from President Bush. Smith had done all he could to accomplish his mission, but affairs in Iraq were not quite over. The years from 2004 to 2007 would see six more American servicemen receive the Medal of Honor — five of them posthumously.

Major military installations in the United States are unprotected from drone attacks, despite policies that mandate otherwise, a Pentagon watchdog report warns.

The problem appears to be bureaucratic confusion over which bases should be covered, according to a Jan. 20 Department of Defense Inspector General report. The result is some startling lapses in counter-unmanned aerial system defenses, even at installations that have experienced multiple drone incursions.

For example, Luke Air Force Base, Arizona, “where F-35 training takes place for 75 percent of the world’s F-35 pilots, is not designated as a covered facility or asset,” according to the report.

US base commanders to have more say in defeating drone intrusions

Under Section 130i, Title 10, of the U.S. Code, counter-drone defense is mandated for installations that fall under one of nine categories that range from nuclear missiles to weapons testing facilities. But training bases are not on the list.

“DOD officials told us that training is not covered,” the report said. “Therefore, the installation officials cannot use C-UAS capabilities to prevent [unmanned aerial system] activity while training on the F-35s.”

Officials investigated 10 Defense Department sites that have suffered drone incursions, including the Air Force’s Plant 42 in Palmdale, California, a government-owned, contractor-operated facility that produces spare parts for the Global Hawk and other drones. The plant, which suffered several drone incidents in 2024, is included on the Air Force’s list of covered sites. But “Air Force officials told us that Plant 42 is not covered, while “DOD officials could not tell us whether or not it is covered,” the report noted.

The report also cited the Supervisor of Shipbuilding, Conversion and Repair, USN, Newport News facility, where contractors perform construction and maintenance of aircraft carriers and submarines. The report — which was heavily redacted — blocked out details on any incidents there. But unidentified drones flew for weeks over military installations in Virginia in 2024, generating fears that it could be a prelude to something more sinister.

A 2020 DOD memo requires C-UAS packages to be tested in an operational setting before being submitted for Section 130i approval. But the various armed services have different policies for submitting those packages, such as different requirements for organizational and leadership approvals.

“Therefore, a large percentage of installations do not have operational approval to use C-UAS capabilities,” the report noted.

DOD has also issued more than 20 policies that failed to offer clear guidance regarding C-UAS deployment on U.S.-based installations, according to the report.

In 2025, DOD established the Joint Interagency Task Force 401 to coordinate C-UAS efforts. The DOD IG recommended that the new task force review existing policies and issue a “consolidated DoD policy that defines: (1) clear roles, responsibilities, and authorities; (2) requirements for covered designation for facilities and assets; and (3) a standardized and streamlined process for section 130i packages.”

The findings of the IG report match those from a series of wargames conducted by the U.S. Army’s Joint Counter-Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems Office and the RAND Corp. think tank. The exercises studied the drone threat to military bases in the U.S.

Researchers found a hodgepodge of varying policies, such as rules of engagement for disabling drones, between the 500 or so military bases in the U.S. Under Section 130i, some base commanders had authority to shoot down marauding drones, while others could face criminal prosecution.

The JCO/RAND study also found confusion over who has responsibility for protecting bases. The wargames “emphasized the need for a framework to integrate, enable, and synchronize state, local, tribal, and territorial authorities into counter-drone operations at or near military bases,” researchers said.

The vulnerability of bases in the U.S. has become a concern after last year’s Operation Spiderweb, in which Ukrainian drones attacked airbases and destroyed parked aircraft deep inside Russia. Experts worry that if Ukraine could smuggle drones into Russia aboard trucks and launch a surprise attack, terrorists and other adversaries could do the same in the U.S.

Just days before the New England Patriots secured a spot in the 2026 Super Bowl and moved within reach of a record seventh championship title, U.S. Marines were passengers aboard the team’s private jet en route to Norway.

The Marines deployed to Bardufoss on a combination of military and commercially chartered aircraft – including a Patriots-branded Boeing 767 – to begin preparations for a Norwegian-led winter exercise scheduled for March, the Marine Corps told Military Times.

Roughly 3,000 Marines are expected to join other U.S. forces and some 25,000 personnel from a dozen nations for Cold Response 26. A significant portion of the American contingent hails from the 2nd Marine Division, based at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina. The drills are designed to test collective defense capabilities, U.S. readiness and interoperability with NATO allies under the harsh conditions of the Arctic.

The aircraft the Marines traveled on are part of a fleet operated by Omni Air International, which is under contract with the U.S. Transportation Command to provide chartered flights for military personnel. Omni Air operates two Patriots-owned 767s that are used for team travel as well as a range of other flights, including humanitarian missions and military charter services, according to the company.

Nicknamed “AirKraft” after team owner Robert Kraft, the planes are painted in the Patriots’ red, white and blue, and emblazoned with the franchise’s six Lombardi Trophies on their tails. Inside, the cabins have been retrofitted with all first-class seats and features a state-of-the-art in-flight entertainment system.

“The 767 we have typically carries 260 people, but since we didn’t have a need to travel 260 people, we wanted to utilize the space on the plane to give more space for people,” Jim Nolan, the chief operating officer of Kraft Sports + Entertainment, said.

The Patriots are set to face the Seattle Seahawks in the Super Bowl.

The families of two Trinidadian men killed in an American military strike on an alleged drug-smuggling boat in October filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the United States government on Tuesday. The case marks the first legal challenge of its kind to President Donald Trump’s policy targeting vessels along narco-trafficking routes in the Caribbean Sea and the eastern Pacific Ocean.

The lawsuit, filed in Massachusetts in conjunction with the American Civil Liberties Union and the Center for Constitutional Rights, names the U.S. government as a defendant and seeks damages for the deaths of Chad Joseph, 26, and Rishi Samaroo, 41, both from Las Cuevas in Trinidad and Tobago.

According to the complaint, Joseph and Samaroo “had been fishing in waters off the Venezuelan coast and working on farms in Venezuela,” and were returning home to Trinidad when their boat was struck by a missile. The suit claims neither men had ties to drug cartels, and describes the military operation as unlawful and extrajudicial.

“These premeditated and intentional killings lack any plausible legal justification,” the complaint asserts. “Thus, they were simply murders, ordered by individuals at the highest levels of government and obeyed by military officers in the chain of command.”

Trump, in a post on Truth Social on Oct. 14, announced American forces carried out a “lethal kinetic strike” that killed six men aboard a vessel “affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization (DTO) conducting narcotrafficking” in international waters off the coast of Venezuela. The president included a 33-second surveillance video showing a small boat being struck and exploding. It was the fifth such strike conducted by the U.S. military.

Between Sept. 2 and Jan. 26, the military blew up 36 vessels, purportedly as part of its counternarcotics efforts in the Caribbean and Pacific Ocean. The strikes have killed at least 116 people, according to data compiled by Military Times.

The White House on Tuesday characterized the Oct. 14 attack as a lawful military operation carried out to protect Americans.

“The October 14th strike was conducted against designated narcoterrorists bringing deadly poison to our shores,” White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly told Military Times. “President Trump used his lawful authority to take decisive action against the scourge of illicit narcotics that has resulted in the needless deaths of innocent Americans.”

The lawsuit invokes the Death on the High Seas Act, which enables the relatives of people who die in international waters to sue for wrongful death; and the Alien Tort Statute, a 1789 law allowing foreign nationals to bring civil claims in U.S. courts for violations of international law, including human rights abuses.

The plaintiffs contend, “even if the United States’ lethal strike against Mr. Joseph and Mr. Samaroo occurred during an armed conflict — which it did not — their killings violated customary international law.”

“They constituted an intentional killing of civilians who were not members of an organized armed group engaged in an armed conflict with the United States and were not directly participating in military hostilities against the United States,” the plaintiffs added.

The Department of Justice did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The Pentagon declined to comment on ongoing litigation.

The personal watercraft dips into the water. The sun glints off its fiberglass deck.

There’s no Kenny Powers, but “The Sound of Silence” rings out. From where? That’s between the Coastie and his maker.

In its ever-evolving fight on the U.S.-Mexico border, the U.S. Coast Guard has unveiled its latest tool: the Jet Ski.

First utilized in 2024 for Rescue Swimmer Stan Team members as well as the Coast Guard Auxiliary, Coasties have begun Jet Ski training off the shores of San Diego, California, as a component of a newly implemented effort to shore up America’s southwest border.

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At the time of publication the service did not get back to Military Times regarding the deployment of the humble Jet Ski, but a Jan. 14 Coast Guard video finds Coasties riding the waves around San Diego in sleek, powerful all-black Jet Skis.

The Coast Guard is in the midst of an overall facelift as part of Force Design 2028, a plan introduced by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem last May to transform the service into a “stronger, more ready, and capable fighting force,” Military Times previously reported.

In fiscal 2025, the Coast Guard recruited the most new, active-duty enlisted service members since 1991, according to a service release.

However, no word as to whether the Jet Ski — and the Coast Guard’s slogan of “They say money can’t buy happiness, but have you ever seen a sad person on a Jet Ski?” — has played a role in hitting those recruiting numbers.

The aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and three accompanying warships have arrived in the Middle East, bringing a renewed potential that President Donald Trump could opt to order airstrikes on Iran over its crackdown on protesters.

The carrier, along with three destroyers, “is currently deployed to the Middle East to promote regional security and stability,” U.S. Central Command said Monday on social media.

The strike group was in the Indian Ocean, Central Command said, and not in the Arabian Sea, which borders Iran. It will bring thousands of additional service members to the region, which has not had a U.S. aircraft carrier since the USS Gerald R. Ford was ordered in October to sail to the Caribbean as part of a pressure campaign on then-Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

Trump told reporters last week that the ships were sent to the region “just in case.” “We have a massive fleet heading in that direction, and maybe we won’t have to use it,” he said.

Trump earlier had threatened military action if Iran carried out mass executions of prisoners or killed peaceful demonstrators during a crackdown on protests that began in late December. At least 5,973 people have been killed and more than 41,800 detained, according to activists. The official Iranian death toll is far lower, at 3,117 dead.

More recently, Trump appeared to have backed away from possible action, claiming Iran halted the hangings of 800 detained protesters. He has not elaborated on the source of the claim, which Iran’s top prosecutor called “completely false.”

However, Trump appears to be keeping his options open. On Thursday aboard Air Force One, he said his threatened military action would make last year’s U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear sites “look like peanuts” if the government proceeded with planned executions of some protesters.

In addition to the aircraft carrier, the U.S. military said the Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle fighter jet now has a presence in the region.

Analysts who follow flight-tracking data have noticed dozens of U.S. military cargo planes also heading to the region.

The activity is similar to last year when the U.S. moved in air defense hardware, like a Patriot missile system, in anticipation of an Iranian counterattack following the bombing of three key nuclear sites. Iran launched over a dozen missiles at Al Udeid Air Base days after the strikes.

Anyone who’s ever sat under a special daylight lamp to combat the winter blues knows that strategically applied light can have a dramatic impact on exhaustion levels and overall mood. But can that effect also work for sailors standing watches at all hours in dark ship corridors and compartments?

That’s what researcher Eliza Van Reen is on a mission to prove. Van Reen, whose company Circadian Positioning Systems has worked on fatigue mitigation with NASA and sailboat racing crews, is now working with the Navy to show that her system could solve the thorny issue of establishing healthy circadian rhythms at sea.

A custom lighting “installation” that controls how and when sailors are exposed to light over the course of their ships is now underway on a Navy Arleigh Burke-class destroyer, Van Reen said in an interview with Navy Times.

“[There’s] a small device that you can bring around that’s a little bit bigger than a cell phone, a little bit smaller than an iPad, that has custom LED chips in it that we’ve kind of hand-selected that can generate the intensity, spectral characteristics and so forth that are required to facilitate circadian rhythm alignment, alertness, or facilitate the transition from wake to sleep,” Van Reen said. “We have controllers … that allow for light recipes to be automatically delivered to kind of accommodate the operational schedule. So it allows us to deliver circadian targeted lighting that facilitates circadian alignment with the operational schedule.”

That “light recipe” is determined in part by data from a wearable patch that affixes to a sailor’s tricep, under the uniform, and can collect sleep cycle data for weeks without needing a recharge, staying stuck on through showers and everyday wear.

With other wearables, “you always have adherence and compliance issues, sometimes with people taking watches off and forgetting to put them back on,” Van Reen said. “So the patch seemed like a form factor where continuous data was allowed to be collected with more reliability.”

The “vetted and tested” algorithms that Van Reen’s company employs use that data to determine when to provide light to sailors, and in what combinations of brightness and quantity.

Crucially, it’s not enough to just replicate daylight for sailors, or to keep the lights bright from the start of their watch to the end. Rather, Van Reen said, there are specific times in a sailor’s own circadian pattern where light has optimum value. And that’s also where the concept of curated “light recipes” comes in.

“There’s certain information we can collect that will allow us to estimate circadian phase reliably,” she said. “You want to be delivering a specific type of light, so think intensity, spectral characteristics, either including certain things or pulling out certain things, to kind of control the type of light that’s being delivered at the right time — which is not necessarily clock time … Circadian phase is the important component here.”

To prove the administered light is making a difference to fatigue levels, Van Reen, in partnership with the National Atmospheric and Oceanographic Administration, is collecting saliva samples from sailors during parts of the experiment. The samples are used to measure melatonin levels every half-hour across a multi-hour stretch within a three-day test period. Brown University, in another collaboration, will help to process the samples and assess the data, she said.

“So we’re really trying to collect gold standard data that we’re able to map back on to the physiological regulation of sleep and wake,” she said.

While the current experiment involves a deployed destroyer, the first light installation experiment on an active ship began last summer and the end date has not been determined. For Van Reen, however, her work with the Navy on circadian rhythms dates back to 2018.

Following the pair of deadly ship collisions in summer 2017 involving the destroyers John S. McCain and Fitzgerald, the Naval Postgraduate School awarded her a small contract to develop the circadian light technology. Follow-on funding came from the Small Business Innovation Research program.

“We’ve been kind of jumping around within the Navy, who we work with,” Van Reen said.

Nearly a decade after the collisions — in which watchstander fatigue was explicitly cited as a factor — this remains a common contention. Another fatigue prevention experiment on the USS Gerald R. Ford carrier strike group began last year, with some 1,600 sailors equipped with Oura rings to track their sleep data and allowing commanders access to that information so they can make timely decisions about force employment.

John Cordle, a Navy human factors engineer who has since retired, lamented that the initiative, known as the Command Readiness, Endurance and Watchstanding program, or CREW, had yet to become a program of record after years of small and medium-scale experiments.

“It’s an example of a fleet initiative that needs to find a home up in Washington, but has yet to become interesting enough for that to happen,” he said.

Meanwhile, the problem of sailor fatigue continues to be a costly one for the Navy. Fatigue was cited as a contributor in the 2024 collision of two inflatable landing craft that injured three dozen sailors and caused $48 million in damage; and in the carrier USS Harry S. Truman’s collision with a merchant vessel last February.

Van Reen said her goal is to move past the research phase and reach a system that the Navy can deploy broadly and with consistent results. She declined to get specific about how much the light installation cost, but said it wasn’t comparable to “missiles, or anything like that.”

“In the grand scheme of things, it is affordable,” she said.

Brown water issues are reportedly burdening residents of military housing on certain bases as the military continues its campaign to improve service member quality of life.

Personnel who live in base housing have long cited struggles with lackluster living conditions, but recent photos from Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst show a alarming trend of water discoloration.

At least four pictures of murky water from residents at Joint Base MDL circulated on the popular Air Force amn/nco/snco page this past month, prompting United Communities, which operates privatized military housing on the base, to address the issue in a statement.

“We are working in close coordination with Joint Base leadership and their water team to resolve water discoloration issues as they arise,” the Jan. 9 statement reads.

United Communities pointed at the installation as the water provider and stated that the base is responsible for the water plant and overall quality of water. The organization added that they only own and maintain the water mains within the housing areas.

A Joint Base MDL official confirmed the authenticity of the memo to Military Times on Friday and shared a copy.

“Access to safe, reliable water is a basic expectation, and when issues arise our top priority is to respond quickly and in coordination with our United Communities housing partners,” base officials said in a statement provided by the spokesperson. “We are actively engaged to ensure both immediate and long-term solutions are in place.”

United Communities noted in the memo that they recently contracted with Paetzold Construction to run an additional water line within certain neighborhoods. That project is set to begin within the next month, with completion slated for late winter, the memo stated.

“This new line will improve the water loop and ensure a continuous flow of water in and out of the neighborhood,” the statement says.

The base spokesperson, meanwhile, told Military Times the discoloration is believed to be from sediment in portions of the water distribution system.

The upgrades, like the new main water line designed to create a “better loop,” are meant to improve the continuous flow of water and prevent sediment from settling in the pipes, the spokesperson added.

The United Communities statement claims that residents can run cold water until the discoloration clears, and adds that those impacted should avoid running hot water to prevent sediment from entering the water heater. The housing manager also noted that a maintenance team can flush the resident’s water heater if hot water continues to be discolored.

In response to how long water discoloration issues have been reported at the base, the spokesperson said isolated reports can occur at any installation, but the base is focused on a permanent solution.

“The infrastructure upgrades currently underway are the result of a deliberate engineering and planning process designed to address the root cause of the issue and ensure the long-term reliability of the system for our families,” the spokesperson said.

The McGuire Drinking Water System obtains water from the Potomac-Raritan-Magothy aquifer, a groundwater source, according to the base’s latest water consumer confidence report.

The latest water consumer confidence report for Joint Base MDL, which was published in June 2025, monitored the water from Jan. 1, 2024 to Dec. 31, 2024. It found that the tap water met the drinking health standards for the Environmental Protection Agency and the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection.

The base spokesperson said the McGuire Drinking Water system is regularly tested in accordance with the EPA in the Safe Drinking Water Act and the NJDEP Safe Drinking Water Act Rules.

But in an independent water quality testing conducted by TapWaterData, it found that even though Joint Base MDL’s water meets all federal standards, it still contains four contaminants above EPA’s health-based guidance.

That test recommended that a certified water filter be used to reduce exposure. The platform’s data was last updated at the end of March 2024.

Issues with base housing are not new to service members, as others have recently claimed to face similar challenges.

On other bases around the country, there have been reports of black mold, contaminated water and asbestos in the ceilings and walls, resulting in health and readiness issues for residents as well as out-of-pocket costs.

In October 2025, Change the Air Foundation conducted a survey of 3,401 service members and families from 57 military installations across 30 states and Washington, D.C. to determine the effectiveness of the current systems and policies in place for military housing.

The survey found that at least 97% of those surveyed had at least one significant or dangerous issue in their military housing, with over 50% reporting water damage and 35% reporting water contamination, discoloration and unusual taste or odor.

“After my son went to the ER twice in a week for very elevated heart rate, we emergency evacuated out of our house,” an active Marine service member in Florida said of their housing in the survey.

Congress is aware of this issue, with a proposed law introduced on Jan. 15 coined the Military Occupancy Living Defense Act, or MOLD ACT.

The act would require privatized military housing companies to bear all financial responsibility for mandated mold inspections and refund military families’ payments made through their Basic Allowance for Housing when their previous homes were uninhabitable.

It would also require the Defense Department to establish standards for acceptable levels of humidity, ventilation, dampness and water intrusion.

But certain topics in the legislation, like reimbursement, have faced questions from legal experts and military families on proper enforcement.

Marines who choose to reenlist in fiscal year 2027 could be eligible for up to $50,000 in selective retention bonus kickers, the service announced.

Those with a current contract expiration between Oct. 1, 2026 and Sept. 30, 2027 could be eligible for the Selective Retention Bonus Program and the Broken Service SRB Program, according to a recent MarAdmin.

The statement highlights the service’s priority in retention goals for the Marine Corps’ enlisted force.

“It is imperative the Marine Corps builds upon past successes and continues to prioritize retaining the best and most talented Marines,” the memo reads.

Marines who reenlist on the day of or following the release of the message are eligible for the SRB for FY27, per the message. The service is offering seven SRB kickers in that fiscal year.

Some of the kickers are meant as incentives for Marines to make lateral moves into the cyber, special operations and drone technician fields, among other specialties.

“Marines who execute a LM with reenlistment into one of these PMOSs for 84 months of additional obligated service will rate a $50,000 incentive in addition to the PMOS bonus,” the message states.

The Corps is offering other kickers for lateral moves into certain jobs listed in the program.

The release lists the full eligibility requirements, kicker amounts for each program and MOS bonus eligibility.

The move echoes a similar one made by the Marine Corps Reserve in November 2025 in which select personnel were eligible for one-time pay bumps for extending their service.

Read the full MarAdmin here.

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941 had drama aplenty to go around, but one of the standouts did not involve a battleship, but a humble repair ship moored nearby. Capt. Cassin Young’s actions that day gave a new meaning to the slogan “Don’t give up the ship,” though later, aboard a heavy cruiser, he would carry those words to a watery grave.

Young was born in Washington, D.C. on March 6, 1894 and his choice of a naval career carried him through to graduation at the U.S. Naval Academy in June 1916. After entering service on the battleship Connecticut in 1919, he served aboard submarines R-23 and R-2 to herald a career frequently involving the submersibles. After serving in the Eleventh Naval District from 1935 to 1937, he commanded Submarine Division Seven at New London and Groton, Connecticut.

On Dec. 6, 1941, Young commanded the repair ship Vestal, which he fatefully brought alongside the battleship Arizona. The next day, he found his vessel under air attack, hit by two Japanese bombs and debris from Arizona when it exploded. Young’s citation described his extraordinary actions thereafter:

“Young proceeded to the bridge and later took personal command of the 3-inch antiaircraft gun when blown overboard by the blast of the forward magazine explosion of the U.S.S. Arizona, to which the U.S.S. Vestal was moored. He swam back to his ship. The entire forward part of the U.S.S. Arizona was a blazing inferno with oil afire in the water between the two ships; as a result of several bomb hits, the U.S.S. Vestal was afire in several places, was settling and taking a list. Despite the severe enemy bombing and strafing at the time, and his shocking experience of having been blown overboard, Commander Young with extreme coolness and calmness, moved his ship to an anchorage distant from the U.S.S. Arizona and subsequently beached the U.S.S. Vestal upon determining that such action was required to save his ship.”

While climbing back aboard Vestal, Young noticed some of his men abandoning ship, but stopped them with shouts of “Come back! We’re not giving up this ship yet!” Noting that the after section of his ship was flooding, he hailed a passing tugboat to help maneuver Vestal clear of Battleship Row, to finally be beached at Aiea Shoal.

For his conspicuous gallantry Young was awarded the Medal of Honor for “distinguished conduct in action” at Pearl Harbor.

Promoted to captain and given the command of the heavy cruiser San Francisco in February 1942, Young went on to take part in the battles that began turning the naval tide in the Pacific, including the nocturnal Battle of Cape Esperance on Oct. 11-12 and the carrier clash at Santa Cruz on Oct. 26. This led to the three-day climax of the naval battles at Guadalcanal.

On the night of Nov. 12, Japanese Vice Admiral Hiroaki Abe led a naval force, to bombard Henderson Field. Centered around the 27,500-ton battleships Hiei and Kirishima, his force also consisted of one light cruiser and 11 destroyers.

Advancing to meet them was a scratch force commanded by Rear Adm. Daniel J. Callaghan. Arranged in a single column of destroyers and light cruisers, a few had the latest screen grid radar, although none of those was deployed up front.

The first of two critical naval engagements began with the opposing vanguard destroyers passing one another in the night. It ended the next day with the Americans losing light cruisers Atlanta and Juneau and destroyers Barton, Cushing, Laffey and Monssen, while the Japanese lost destroyer Akatsuki and battleship Hiei.

Both commanding admirals were in the thick of the action.

Early on, Hiei’s 14-inch guns blew away San Francisco’s fore turrets. Responding to a message that his flagship was firing in error on the USS Atlanta, on which Rear Adm. Norman Scott had been killed, Callaghan signaled “Cease firing own ships.”

His ship, however, had also been firing on destroyer Akatsuki, which after hitting Atlanta with two torpedoes, was caught in a lethal crossfire from Atlanta, San Francisco and O’Bannon, and sank with nearly all hands.

Moments later, San Francisco was hit by more than a dozen shells from the Japanese Kirishima and destroyers Inazuma and Ikazuchi, killing Callaghan and almost all of his staff —including Young.

Kirishima was grazed by only one 8-inch shell, but retired on Adm. Abe’s orders. Although in a position to deliver the coup de grace to his American opponents, the Japanese admiral, wounded and understandably shaken by the confusion and devastation around him, ordered his battleships to turn for home.

Hiei, slow on its northward run, was hit by 50 shells, including some from San Francisco’s rear battery and Portland’s forward turrets. As it painfully crawled northward, an internal boiler collapse ground Hiei to a halt.

By dawn most ships that could were retiring. The destroyer Aaron Ward lay dead in the water.

Yudachi, its crew evacuated by Samidare, lay burning along with the abandoned hulks of American destroyers Cushing and Monssen. Hiei, unable to move, lay off Savo Island with Yukikaze standing by to assist or evacuate.

Portland, steaming in circles, paused for an attempt at self-repair and then, as its path brought it within range of Yudachi, finished off the destroyer with an 8-inch salvo.

At 1100 hours, torpedo wakes crossed San Francisco’s bow, launched by submarine I-26. A minute later one of them struck the previously torpedoed Juneau with cataclysmic results — all but 10 of its 700 crewmen, including the famous five Sullivan brothers, were lost in the ensuing magazine explosion.

Later, the tug Bobolink came up from Tulagi to take Aaron Ward in tow. This stirred a response from Hiei’s gunners, 13 miles away, which in turn drew a counter response from Henderson Field, the target that Adm. Abe had failed to neutralize the night before.

Now its U.S. Marine Corps bombers dealt his flagship such damage that Abe gave up trying to save it. After Yukikaze evacuated the crew, Hiei went down stern-first, the first Japanese battleship loss of World War II.

Elsewhere, Atlanta edged its way to Kukum to land its survivors. Judged beyond salvaging, it too was scuttled.

It had been a calamitous night for the Americans in terms of men and ships, but the grim sacrifice of Callaghan and Scott— who were both awarded posthumous Medals of Honor — had won the strategic victory by protecting Henderson Field and the reinforcements from the enemy guns.

Far more, however, had been won than an airfield and the lives of soldiers. That night and on Nov. 15, in which the battleship Kirishima was sunk, the initiative in the Pacific War passed from the Japanese to the Americans.

Among those who sacrificed themselves for that pivotal victory, was Young, who posthumously received the Navy Cross for his valor during the desperate fighting in Ironbottom Sound.

I was in southern Afghanistan in May 2014 when a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device detonated near me while covering a routine patrol as a public affairs specialist.

It was something I had done a dozen times before, but in a flash I was on my back, ears ringing, lungs full of dust.

The blast knocked me out cold. When I came to, nothing was where it had been. The explosion left me with a traumatic brain injury and partial deafness in my right ear, with tinnitus that still rings to this day. I deal with memory loss, light sensitivity and sudden moments of confusion or panic that attack without warning.

So, when the possibility to test a virtual reality therapy program developed by Neurova Labs became available, I took it — not as a paid endorsement or promotional experiment, but as a disabled veteran looking for something that might actually help. I went into the process cautiously. PTSD and traumatic brain injuries do not present the same way for everyone, and there is no universal solution.

I am not a medical professional nor can I explain the underlying science in clinical terms. What I can offer here is a firsthand account of what this three week experience looked like and what, if anything, changed.

The therapy, first launched in 2024, follows a structured but approachable format. The program is designed as a three-week regimen, with two active weeks of VR sessions conducted four days per week.

Each session lasts between 45 minutes to an hour. Every session begins with a warm-up using a commercially available application that emphasizes fast-paced interaction with a virtual pistol. It is engaging and requires focus, coordination and quick reactions.

That warm-up is followed by the core Neurova Labs environment, which centers on a target practice-style scenario. Each session includes five rounds, roughly lasting five minutes apiece. The pace is steady and immersive, requiring sustained attention without becoming overwhelming.

The session ends with a cooldown phase that is intentionally slower and more abstract. This final segment uses calming sounds, soft music and shifting colors, with only limited interaction. The goal is clearly to bring the body down from heightened alertness into a calmer state.

I was skeptical going in, particularly about whether something so technology-driven could meaningfully impact symptoms rooted in trauma. What surprised me most was how quickly I noticed the changes, starting with my sleep regimen.

Before starting the program, I routinely woke up very early in the morning, often around 4 or 4:30 a.m., and struggled to fall back asleep. By the second week of therapy, I was sleeping later and more consistently, often until around 8:30 a.m.

The time it took me to fall asleep also shortened. That alone had a noticeable effect on my mood and energy throughout the day.

Sleep was not the only area where I saw improvement. Over the course of the three weeks, I noticed a shift in how I reacted to stress. As a freelance writer and creative, my work involves deadlines, travel and uncertainty. Combined with the broader stress of daily life, it is easy to slip into a constant state of anxiety.

During this period, I found that my fight or flight response did not take over as quickly, and when it did, I was able to step out of it faster than before. The stress was still there, but it felt more manageable.

That distinction matters.

For many people with PTSD, the challenge is not avoiding stress altogether, but shortening the amount of time the body stays stuck in a heightened state. Being able to regroup more quickly can change the course of an entire day.

Another encouraging aspect of the experience was seeing how actively the software is being developed. The program is still in its testing phase, and during my three weeks of use the program received multiple updates. That signaled an ongoing effort to refine and improve the product rather than treating it as a finished, static solution, which happens with a lot of the treatment programs offered to veterans today.

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Accessibility may be the most significant strength of the Neurova Labs approach. Traditional treatment pathways, particularly within the Department of Veterans Affairs, can be difficult to navigate. Appointments, long waits, unfamiliar clinical environments and administrative hurdles can themselves become sources of stress. For many veterans, that friction leads to disengagement from treatment entirely.

This model removes many of those barriers. As long as you have the headset, therapy can be done at home, on your schedule and in an environment you control. Morning sessions with coffee, afternoon sessions between work obligations or evening sessions after a difficult day are all possible. That level of autonomy changes how treatment feels. It becomes something you opt into rather than something you endure.

I spoke with other users who approach the program differently. One former Marine described using the therapy as a situational tool — logging sessions before or after known stressors rather than following a strict schedule. That flexibility suggests a broader range of use beyond structured programs, which may be especially helpful for veterans balancing work, family and ongoing care.

It is also important to be clear about what this is not. This is not a cure-all, and it is not a replacement for counseling, psychiatric care, or other evidence-based treatments. Neurova Labs does not present it that way.

What it offered me was an entry point. Feeling tangible improvement in one area made me more open to continuing therapy elsewhere, including reengaging with the VA and seeking additional counseling when needed.

Over the last three weeks my quality of life improved. I slept better. My mood was steadier. Social interaction felt less overwhelming.

As the company continues to refine its product and explore wider availability, accessibility may ultimately be its most meaningful contribution: Treatment that meets veterans where they are, rather than forcing them into systems they distrust.

That alone has the potential to keep more people engaged in care. For me, the biggest takeaway was simple. For the first time in a long time, I felt hopeful. That alone made it easier to keep going.

Under the Trump administration, wait times for mental health care at the Department of Veterans Affairs have increased while morale among employees has plummeted with the loss of 40,000 people, Senate Democrats said in a new report released Thursday.

Actions taken by President Donald Trump, VA Secretary Doug Collins and the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, in the past year have affected services and research at the VA, harmed workers and delayed care and benefits to veterans, said Connecticut Sen. Richard Blumenthal, ranking Democrat on the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee.

According to the report, appointment wait times for new patients for mental health care now average 35 days and have grown in 15 states to more than 40 days — twice the VA’s standard — with veterans in Maryland waiting the longest with an average of 54 days. At one Ventura, California, VA clinic, wait times for behavioral health treatment rose to 121 days after seven of its 12 mental health providers left following a return to office mandate.

The VA has also lost 40,000 employees in the past year, 88% of whom worked in the Veterans Health Administration, according to the report. Beginning last year, the VA originally targeted 80,000 jobs for elimination through voluntary retirements, resignations and layoffs but later said it would trim 30,000 through attrition.

In December, the VA announced it plans to cut an additional 26,000 jobs from the Veterans Health Administration through attrition this year.

Collins has maintained that VA services have not been affected and health care jobs have been preserved. According to the report, however, the VA has lost roughly 1,000 physicians, 3,000 registered nurses, 700 social workers and 1,500 schedulers. In addition, the Veterans Benefits Administration has lost 1,500 claims examiners.

The disruptions, job losses and policies that have stymied treatment, research and services have created an environment that will have a “damaging and dangerous impact … that will be felt for years to come,” said Blumenthal.

“The trend we are seeing is frightening and deeply alarming because it will have a negative impact on our veterans,” Blumenthal said during a press call with reporters Thursday. “It rings a bell for all our veterans and all Americans that we will see a diminished and greatly reduced VA if it continues on the current trend line.”

VA spokesman Peter Kasperowicz said Wednesday that the VA shed 30,000 — not 40,000 — employees in 2025 and has updated its operational requirements and organization charts and determined that an additional 26,000 positions, many of which have been empty for more than a year, are no longer needed.

Kasperowicz added that no employees at VHA will be removed and “care and benefits won’t be affected at all.”

Regarding mental health wait times, Kasperowicz said current patients wait less than six days while new patients face an average of 19 days to be seen.

He questioned how the report could make the claims that they were nearly twice that long and said the authors should provide documentation to support their claims. The spokesman did not include documentation regarding his own claims.

“Sen. Blumenthal sat on his hands throughout the entirety of the Biden Administration, when VA failed to solve all of its most serious problems,” Kasperowicz said.

Addressing employees and reporters in Baltimore, Maryland, this month, Collins said the cuts will not affect veteran services as they take into account unfilled vacancies and efficiencies.

“There are safety valves for every hospital and clinic in this system. If they need somebody, they can hire somebody,” Collins said. “We will make accommodations to make sure they get whoever they need if they have a position that takes away from patient quality, patient care.”

According to the report, in the past year: veterans waiting for decisions on old claims appeals have seen waits for a decision grow by nearly 1,000 days to 3,541 days; those struggling to make mortgage payments faced foreclosure after the VA cancelled a servicing purchase program designed to help them; and 75,000 students saw their education bills go unpaid after the department failed to issue checks for several education programs.

Blumenthal said VA employees have faced harassment and retaliation, the end of their collective bargaining rights under a March executive order and cancellation of contracts that provide vital health care support and services.

The “chaos,” he said, has resulted in loss of hospital beds, delays, and in some cases, loss of access to care for veterans, including abortion services and transgender care and staffing shortages.

“Veterans are increasingly paying the price for this Administration’s self-sabotage. And hard-working, talented VA employees are demoralized and exhausted by the malice and incompetence of their leadership,” Blumenthal said in the report.

The senator and others, including some Republicans, have noted that the VA has blocked attempts to obtain data and information from the department on the decisions and changes at the department under the Trump administration.

Blumenthal said he repeatedly has asked for detailed information on hundreds of contracts that were cancelled last year and has received no responses from the department.

“The VA has never been less forthcoming with facts or less transparent. They have refused disclosures to many of the questions posed by bipartisan groups of myself and my colleagues. The VA has refused to provide basic information,” Blumenthal said.

During a House Veterans Affairs Committee hearing Thursday, Republican Rep. Mike Bost of Illinois, the committee’s chairman, also expressed outrage at the VA’s lack of transparency — in his case, providing testimony to his committee beforehand so the members could review it and formulate questions.

“This is the second time this week that the committee did not receive the testimony from VA in a timely manner. It is incredibly frustrating for staff and members to try to prepare for a hearing without having testimony to review prior to the hearing. If this were not such an incredibly important hearing, I would consider forbidding VA to be able to testify today,” Bost said.

The VA is planning to reorganize the Veterans Health Administration, which oversees health care for more than 9 million enrolled veterans, and engages in $1 trillion in contracts to provide veterans access to private care in their communities for up to 10 years.

In announcing the contracts this month, Collins said they would “dramatically improve” the VA’s ability to provide quality health care to veterans.

During the House hearing, VA Chief Financial Officer Richard Topping said he did not believe that the VA needed any new legislation to engage on the contracts.

But during the press conference, Blumenthal said that he hoped his fellow senators would insist that any kind of major outlay by the VA to community care would be “accompanied by safeguards” that would ensure the VA be held accountable.

“I’m hoping not only my Republican colleagues, but also veterans and their advocates … the veteran service organizations who represent veterans so well … will join in this effort to put safeguards and guardrails on that community care and limit it if it is affecting adversely the VA’s care for veterans,” Blumenthal said.

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to include a response from the VA.

Neurable, a consumer neurotechnology startup, has partnered with the Air Force to study whether electrode-studded headphones can track service members’ cognitive fitness, much like Garmin smartwatches have monitored Space Force members’ physical fitness, company and government officials said this month.

The $1.2 million project adds to the Pentagon’s growing investment in the $3 billion market for brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) — helmets, earbuds, other wearable devices and medical implants that use artificial intelligence to make sense of brain signals.

Elon Musk’s Neuralink, perhaps the most high-profile implantable example, has enabled clinical trial patients who cannot move or speak to type words that they imagine. Since at least the 1970s, the Defense Department has funded the development of BCIs that, among other things, restore eyesight and control prosthetic arms.

Now, advances in AI enable BCIs to interpret or change brain activity with unprecedented accuracy and speed. So much so that some scientists and neuroethicists say the capacity to monitor signals that reveal a warfighter’s or a veteran’s mental states, visual perceptions or inner dialogue may outpace the ability to shield that data from misuse.

“One could certainly imagine how enforced use of such devices could create a very dystopian basis for behavioral control,” warned James Giordano, director of the National Defense University’s Center for Disruptive Technology and Future Warfare and Georgetown University Medical Center’s former chief of neuroethics studies.

Consequently, any accessing or use of neural data must require “ongoing, active informed consent,” so active and retired military have the chance to opt in or out without penalty, he said.

Giordano, who was sharing his personal views and not speaking on behalf of any government agency, added, “The security of the neurological data used for that individual — and in that individual’s wellbeing only — is paramount. It goes beyond simple HIPAA.”

He was referring to the 1996 Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, a law regulating healthcare providers that predates global Wi-Fi and does not cover most app and algorithm developers, commercial cloud providers or consumer wearable designers.

Neurable and Air Force officials say that the non-invasive cognitive fitness tracker will build upon technology in the firm’s consumer BCI product — Master & Dynamic luxury headphones containing fabric electroencephalogram, or EEG, sensors and electrically conductive inks to gauge mental focus.

The $500 device, which launched last June, deploys an algorithm that maps brainwaves to ground-truth markers of focus — users’ speed and accuracy in finishing tasks, while undistracted and distracted. When the wearer’s brainwaves resemble those tied to flagging attention, the headphones sync with an app that alerts the user: “You’ve earned a Brain Break.”

The Air Force-funded BCI project will use other headset models, such as noise protectors or helmets, said Neurable co-founder Adam Molnar, who helped secure $4 million for prior military research and development work.

The study will measure cognitive performance with and without pressure — for instance, memory skill with and without sleep deprivation — against brainwaves to identify brain activity associated with optimal and suboptimal performance, according to Neurable.

The idea is that alerting service members to significant brain signal changes throughout the day — or, providing “neurofeedback” — will train them to adjust their behavior and brainwaves to hit peak performance.

“This is all within this concept of readiness. How do we make sure that we have a ready and able defense?” said Molnar, who anticipates wrapping development within two years.

Molnar added that the Space Force has a “really cool program where they’re using the Garmin watch,” embedded with heart rate, blood oxygen and other wrist-worn sensors, “to help improve cardio fitness and physical activity‚” but “we don’t really have that for the brain.”

A comparable neurofeedback tool, he said, may spur “more robust brain health practices, not just for defense, but also for possibly identifying Parkinson’s or Alzheimer’s disease indicators a decade before you feel your first symptom.”

Air Force Research Laboratory officials said that Neurable’s fabric-based sensing technology may aid multiple operations, inside and outside of the cockpit.

“I suspect that there are a large number of military members for whom a real-time fatigue or cognitive state monitor would be appealing if they thought it would make them more effective at executing the mission,” William Aue, cognitive neuroscience section chief at the Air Force Research Laboratory’s 711th Human Performance Wing, said by email.

Let them ‘make their mind up’

Some neuroethicists, however, cautioned that the use of brain wearables may also invade troops’ privacy and foster prejudice.

“We need to be much more reflective on, much more concerned about and much more focused on the implications of altering a person’s brainwaves,” through neurofeedback training, “as compared to having them work out more or do more pull-ups,” said Jared Genser, a lawyer and co-founder of the Neurorights Foundation, a group advocating for the legal protection of people’s brain data.

Similarly, Giordano said, “The concept of personalized medicine must be applied here,” meaning that military leaders must tailor training and performance metrics to the limits of each individual’s brain and body, so “that you don’t get plateaus, and you’re not beginning to see performance decrement or performance fatigue.”

The Neurorights Foundation’s Medical Director Sean Pauzauskie, a neurologist in the UCHealth University of Colorado system, added that cognitive fitness standards may overstep the proposed right to freedom from algorithmic bias based on neural data interpretations.

“If the warfighter’s brain is incapable of the appropriate plasticity to achieve the desired [mental] state,” through neurofeedback training, “they could be discriminated” against by their superiors, Pauzauskie said.

Also, EEG data flowing into and out of consumer wearables can reveal several diseases, including epilepsy and mild cognitive impairment, as well as a range of emotions.

Via email, Molnar responded to such concerns, saying, “Neurable’s focus is on supporting human performance and safety, not enforcing neurological conformity.”

“Any feedback provided by our systems is designed to be informational and user-centered, helping individuals understand factors like cognitive workload or fatigue,” he added, “much like a heart-rate monitor provides insight into physical exertion.”

Neurable officials said the system’s sensors filter out all EEG data not needed by its algorithms and encrypt the limited amount of necessary data in transit.

“Even if someone hacked someone’s brain data, they would not be able to make sense of it,” Molnar said.

The Air Force’s Aue confirmed that, during experiments, the Air Force lab anonymizes EEG data streaming from Neurable’s wearables, adding that the information is “challenging to interpret without the algorithms we use to process the raw data.”

But, such protections may not stop adversaries from decoding wearable-based intelligence in the future, as AI becomes smarter and devices utilize more EEG data.

Already, in the laboratory, algorithms can narrow down a person’s identity into a “mindprint” of their mental processing or “brainprint” of their brain structures, based on EEG data from a medical headcap, Pauzauskie noted.

Likewise, Genser explained, EEG data that is out into the open, if isolated from a person’s name and identity, will remain deidentified but only for a period. The problem is that, as generative AI-powered software develops, “you are going to be able to decode a lot more information from the data that escaped, enabling the data to be reidentified and traced back to you personally.”

In an email, Molnar acknowledged that as “AI continues to accelerate research and development, it is prudent to anticipate how capabilities might evolve and to establish safeguards early.”

He suggested additional ethical review, clear boundaries on acceptable uses, and dialogue across technologists, ethicists, policymakers and technology users.

Aue, who has been working on other research with Neurable for four years, said in an email that research study participants “are fully informed about the nature of the work before participating.”

That said, as the technology matures, conversations “need to occur about the ethical use of the technology and what military doctrine might entail,” he added.

Giordano said that the key to any adoption of AI-based neurotech in the military is mandatory informed consent during and after service.

Personnel must receive updates on any adverse effects and information on “the availability or non-availability of continuity of care if things go wrong,” he added. “That way, they can make their mind up.”

Reading the minds of wounded warriors?

Due to AI, implantable brain devices, much as non-invasive brain wearables, now offer troops and veterans novel insights into themselves — and possibly the same intel to adversaries, too.

For instance, new eyesight neuroprostheses rely on AI to “bridge artificial vision and neural tissue,” said Christopher Steele, chief of strategy at the Pentagon-backed nonprofit Medical Technology Enterprise Consortium. The consortium provided $2 million to help develop a prototype.

The camera-equipped BCI uses AI to decode brain signals that convey the landscape a person’s eyes are trying to see. AI then translates data from the camera and other external sensors focused on that view into artificial signals that the mind understands as shapes and motion.

Finally, AI compares the desired and perceived scenes and adjusts the artificial signals to show more detail, said Steele, a former director of the Army Medical Research and Development Command.

This self-adjusting AI, while a potential breakthrough for visually-impaired warfighters, also introduces risks, Giordano said.

“The AI that provides continuous closed-loop signals between the eye and the brain is not monitored,” he explained.

As such, it may self-adapt in a way that falsifies images, omits certain elements of the view or delays transmission of an image, any of which may result in a loss of situational awareness, Giordano said.

Compounding the problem, when the AI “system itself is vulnerable to hacking,” an adversary can monitor or corrupt the warfighter’s visual input, he added.

“If we deploy this device downrange” in a combat zone, ”can it be hacked by an enemy?" Steele said. “We are concerned about the hacking of any medical capability.”

Currently, the system only operates in clinical trials that are subject to HIPAA, and other protections include hardware isolation, encryption and AI guardrails that prevent unsafe adaptation, he added.

Yet, as Giordano cautioned, self-learning AI, by design, can learn good or bad behavior that may override guardrails.

Another military funding arm, the Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Research Program, is underwriting clinical trials to evaluate Braingate, a forerunner to Musk’s Neuralink implant that translates words a patient imagines into audible speech.

The Defense Department’s $2.3 million contribution aims to help people with ALS — a disease associated with military service — who cannot move or talk.

This advance is “foundationally fantastic” for people with various neuro-motor conditions who can think of speech but not generate motor output to move their mouths, meaning “they’re communicatively locked in,” Giordano said. The device “allows these individuals the autonomy of communication.”

At the same time, because the device reads signals in the motor cortex that show attempts at moving the mouth, the tool allows for “what might be regarded as mind-reading,” Giordano said.

Currently, human beings, military or not, have no legal right to be free of mind-reading.

Neither international human rights law nor federal regulations safeguard mental privacy, mental autonomy (“free will”) or neural data, according to the Neurorights Foundation.

Only four states — California, Colorado, Connecticut and Montana afford protection to “neural data” within their state consumer data privacy laws. And one country, Chile, has adopted a constitutional amendment to protect “mental integrity.”

As the Foundation’s Genser notes, one of the only countries with a national-level set of principles on the ethical use of BCIs, China, may be the least likely to use it.

He is pressing for “clear limits” on the purposes for developing and using neurotech and neural data in the military, subject to strong oversight that safeguards the health and autonomy of service members.

“If we don’t have any tools or standards around the national security implications of emerging neurotechnologies, then how is our military different than any other military?” Genser posited.

As an illustration of unregulated brain alteration, he pointed to the CIA’s MKUltra program, a Cold War-era mind-control experiment that tested LSD and other psychedelic drugs on soldiers and others, sometimes with permanent psychological and physical harm.

“The last thing we want is for neurotech to be the next version of MKUltra,” Genser said, “not using drugs, but using neuro-stimulation or other neural approaches to alter brain activity.”

Aliya Sternstein is an investigative journalist who covers technology, cognition and national security. She is also a research analyst at Georgetown Law. Her writing on the intersection of public health and constitutional rights has appeared in the Stanford Law Review, Arizona Law Review, and other law and health academic journals.

The U.S. Army has ordered several dozen additional active-duty soldiers to prepare for a possible deployment to Minneapolis if needed, a defense official said Wednesday, amid protests over the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement crackdown.

The defense official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive plans, confirmed that members of an Army military police brigade who are stationed at Fort Bragg in North Carolina have been given prepare-to-deploy orders.

If deployed, the troops would likely offer support to civil authorities in Minneapolis, according to the official, who stressed that such standby orders are issued regularly and they do not necessarily mean that the troops would end up going.

About 1,500 active-duty soldiers from the Army’s 11th Airborne Division based in Alaska also have received similar standby orders. President Donald Trump has threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act, a rarely used 19th century law that would allow him to use active-duty troops as law enforcement.

That threat followed protests that erupted in Minneapolis after a federal immigration officer killed resident Renee Good on Jan. 7. Trump quickly appeared to walk back the threat, telling reporters a day later that there wasn’t a reason to use the act “right now.”

“If I needed it, I’d use it,” Trump said. “It’s very powerful.”

When asked about the latest orders, which were reported earlier by MS Now, the Pentagon said it didn’t have information to provide at this time.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat and frequent target of Trump, has urged the president to refrain from sending in more troops and, in a statement Tuesday, invited him to visit Minnesota and “help restore calm and order and reaffirm that true public safety comes from shared purpose, trust, and respect.”

In his second term, Trump has pushed traditional boundaries by using troops in American cities, often over the objections of local officials, amid federal operations targeting illegal immigration and crime.

Trump deployed federalized National Guard troops to Los Angeles last June after protesters took to the streets in response to a blitz of immigration arrests. Ultimately, he sent about 4,000 Guard members and 700 active-duty Marines to guard federal buildings and, later, to protect federal agents as they carried out immigration arrests.

He also mobilized Guard troops in places like Chicago and Portland, Oregon, but has faced a series of legal setbacks. Trump said in December that he was dropping that push for the time being.

“Don’t try to tell the British that America won the last war or make wise-cracks about the war debts or about British defeats in this war,” came the sage advice from the U.S. War Department in 1942.

A then-seven-page pamphlet, issued to American GIs about to travel overseas to Britain, was intended to ease any friction between the young servicemen and the local populace.

According to librarian John Pinfold who wrote the subsequent introduction, the pamphlet, dubbed “Instructions for American Servicemen in Britain 1942,” attracted quite a bit of attention in Britain.

An editorial in the London Times on July 14, 1942, suggested that it “ought to be acquired by British readers in quantities unequalled even by the many works of Edgar Wallace or Nat Gould.”

“None of their august expositions” the author continued, “has the spotlight directness of this revelation of plain common horse sense understanding of evident truths.”

The succinct, direct view of how the British were seen by outsiders presents a unique snapshot of the nation’s character — and while instructive at the time, certainly lends itself to some present-day laughs.

Here’s just a small selection of “insightful” advice from the pamphlet:

• “BRITISH RESERVED, NOT UNFRIENDLY.”
• “The British have phrases and colloquialisms of their own that may sound funny to you. You can make just as many boners in their eyes.”
• “THE BRITISH ARE TOUGH. Don’t be misled by the British tendency to be soft-spoken and polite… The English language didn’t spread across the oceans and over the mountains and jungles and swamps of the world because these people were panty-waists.”
• “You will quickly discover differences that seem confusing and even wrong. Like driving on the left side of the road, and having money based on an ‘impossible’ accounting system and drinking warm beer.”
• “The British are beer-drinkers — and can hold it. The beer is now below peacetime strength, but can still make a man’s tongue wag at both ends.”
• “You will naturally be interested in getting to know your opposite number, the British soldier, the ‘Tommy’ you have heard and read about. You can understand that two actions on your part will slow up the friendship — swiping his girl, and not appreciating what his army has been up against.”
• “KEEP OUT OF ARGUMENTS. You can rub a Britisher the wrong way by telling him ‘we came over and won the last one.’ … Neither do the British need to be told that their armies lost the first couple of rounds in the present war. We’ve lost a couple, ourselves, so do not start off by being critical of them and saying what the Yanks are going to do.”
• “The British don’t know how to make a good cup of coffee. You don’t know how to make a good cup of tea. It’s an even swap.”
• “The British will welcome you as friends and allies. But remember that crossing the ocean doesn’t automatically make you a hero. There are housewives in aprons and youngsters in knee pants in Britain who have lived through more high explosives in air raids than many soldiers saw in first class barrages in the last war.”
• “Don’t show off or brag or bluster — ‘swank’ as the British say. If somebody looks in your direction and says ‘He’s chucking his weight about’ you can be pretty sure you’re off base. That’s the time to pull in your ears.”
• “It is always impolite to criticize your hosts. It is militarily stupid to insult your allies.”

A Marine veteran died during what base officials have described as a “security incident” at Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune on Jan. 13, according to Camp Lejeune and North Carolina police officials.

The incident was reported near Tarawa Terrace Elementary School at the North Carolina base that afternoon, Camp Lejeune officials said in a Jan. 13 release.

On-base schools and child development centers were placed on lockdown “out of an abundance of caution” while law enforcement responded, according to the release. The lockdown was later lifted and schools resumed normal operations.

“Law enforcement actions during the incident resulted in one fatality,” the release said.

The Camp Lejeune release did not identify the deceased, citing notification of next of kin.

On Friday, three days after the incident, the Jacksonville Police Department identified off-duty Jacksonville Police Department officer Philip Chiorino, 31, as the deceased. Police officials said Chiorino sustained life-threatening injuries and was later pronounced dead.

Chiorino had served in the Marines before coming to the department and lived on Camp Lejeune, Jacksonville Police Chief Jarad Phelps told reporters Friday. Chiorino was married to a Marine stationed at the base, an MCIEAST-MCB Camp Lejeune & MCAS New River public affairs official confirmed Wednesday.

According to the public affairs official, Chiorino served in the Marines from June 2014 to February 2024 and his jobs included working as a mortarman and Marine combat instructor. He deployed multiple times in support of Operation Inherent Resolve.

His awards and decorations include the Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medal with Combat Conditions, Marine Corps Good Conduct Medal and Sea Service Deployment Ribbon, among others. He held the rank of sergeant.

Chiorino was hired by the Jacksonville Police Department in 2024 and he most recently worked as a school resource officer, according to Phelps.

The Marine Corps has not released additional details on what led to Chiorino’s death.

The Naval Criminal Investigative Service is investigating the incident. The agency declined to comment Wednesday, citing the investigative process.

“NCIS remains focused on ensuring the safety and security of our Navy and Marine Corps communities as we carry out our mission to investigate and deter criminal and security threats to the Department of the Navy,” NCIS officials said in a statement to Military Times.

Gladys Mae West, whose mathematical work became the integral foundation for modern GPS, has died.

West, surrounded by family and friends, passed away peacefully on Jan. 17. She was 95.

Born in rural Dinwiddie County, Virginia, in 1930, West sought to leave her family farm from the beginning.

“I guess I found that a little bit contrary to what I had in my mind of where I wanted to go,” she told the BBC in 2018.

For most living in the Jim Crow South, career options were limited, but West didn’t want to stay and pick tobacco, corn or cotton for a living — or work in the nearby factory beating tobacco leaves into pieces for cigarettes and pipes.

One of the “hidden figures” in American history, West’s mind took her far from her life in rural Virginia.

“I thought at first I needed to go to the city. I thought that would get me out of the country and out of the fields,” she told the BBC.

“But then as I got more educated, went into the higher grades, I learned that education was the thing to get me out.”

One of the few female students to graduate Virginia State College with a degree in mathematics, West’s genius secured her a position in 1956 at the Naval Support Facility Dahlgren, then known as the Naval Proving Ground. She was just one of four Black employees and only the second Black woman hired at the facility.

One of those Black employees, Ira, would become her husband for more than 67 years before his passing in 2024.

As a programmer for large-scale computers and then a project manager for data-processing systems used in the analysis of satellite data, according to the Royal Academy of Engineering, “West began to analyze data from satellites, putting together altimeter models of the Earth’s shape.”

West would serve as the project manager for the “Seasat radar altimetry project, one of the first satellites that could remotely sense oceans,” the academy noted. “West introduced innovations, cutting her team’s processing time in half, and was recommended for a commendation in 1979.”

Throughout the 1980s West was at the forefront of designing, developing, testing and then programming an IBM 7030 “Stretch” computer to deliver increasingly precise calculations to model the shape of the Earth — an ellipsoid with irregularities, known as the geoid, according to the RAE.

Her pioneering algorithms and subsequent data ultimately underpinned the mapping functions of modern-day GPS. (While the mother of of GPS, West once professed that she preferred a paper map to get around.)

“I think that Dr. West is another one of those hidden figures in our military that play a critical role in the advancements that not only affected our ability to fire missiles accurately but also enable everyday life when you pick up your phone and you’re trying to find something,” retired Navy Rear Adm. Sinclair Harris said during a 2023 ceremony honoring West.

Despite West’s nonpareil accomplishments, it was only after Gwen James, a member of West’s university sorority, read the short biography she had submitted for an alumni function in 2017, that the mathematician’s contributions to the U.S. Navy and beyond came to light.

Despite knowing one another for 15 years, James had no inkling of West’s outsized impact.

“GPS has changed the lives of everyone forever,” James told The Free Lance-Star in 2018. “There is not a segment of this global society — military, auto industry, cell phone industry, social media, parents, NASA, etc. — that does not utilize the Global Positioning System.”

West retired from the naval facility in 1998 after more than 40 years of service, but she wasn’t done. Despite suffering a debilitating stroke that affected her hearing, vision, balance and mobility, West went on to earn her PhD from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University at the age of 70.

“All of a sudden,” she recalled to BBC, “these words came into my head: ‘You can’t stay in the bed, you’ve got to get up from here and get your PhD.’”

But getting up to quietly fight for success was nothing new for West.

“We have made a lot of progress since when I came in, because now at least you can talk about things and be open a little more,” West said regarding working women.

“But they still gotta fight.”

AL-HOL, Syria — The U.S. military said Wednesday it began transferring detainees from the Islamic State group who were held in northeastern Syria to Iraq to ensure they remain in secure facilities.

The move came after Syrian government forces took control of a sprawling camp housing thousands of IS detainees following the withdrawal of the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces as part of a ceasefire with the Kurdish fighters. The SDF still controls more than a dozen detention facilities with some 9,000 IS members.

U.S. Central Command said the transfer began on Wednesday and so far 150 IS members have been taken from Syria’s northeastern province of Hassakeh to “secure locations” in Iraq.

“Ultimately, up to 7,000 ISIS detainees could be transferred from Syria to Iraqi-controlled facilities,” the statement said, using a term to refer to the IS.

A convoy of armored vehicles with government forces moved into the al-Hol camp Wednesday following two weeks of clashes with the SDF, which appeared closer to merging into the Syrian military, in accordance with government demands.

At its peak in 2019, some 73,000 people were living at al-Hol camp. Their number has since declined with some countries repatriating their citizens.

The camp is still home to some 24,000, most of them women and children linked to the IS. They include about 14,500 Syrians and nearly 3,000 Iraqis. Some 6,500 others, many of them loyal IS supporters who came from around the world to join the extremist group, are separately held in a highly secured section of the camp.

There have been reports that some families fled during the chaos but there has been no official confirmation.

Families of IS militants plead to return home

An Associated Press journalist visited the camp Wednesday as scores of soldiers guarded the main entrance.

“Go inside and see the chaos that is happening. There are no clinics, no running water, no bread and no vegetables,” an Iraqi woman living in the camp said, after SDF fighters left the area. The woman, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of security concerns, called on the Iraqi government to repatriate her.

Another Iraqi woman, who also refused to give her full name out of fear of reprisal, told The Associated Press that her brother and uncle were held in jails in northeast Syria and called on authorities to release them so that she can all return home.

The Syrian government and the SDF announced a new four-day truce on late Tuesday, after a previous ceasefire broke down.

Northeast Syria was relatively calm on Wednesday. A drone attack killed seven soldiers and wounded 20 while they were inspecting a weapons depot abandoned by SDF fighters in the northeastern town of Yaaroubiyeh, the Defense Ministry said, blaming the Kurdish forces. The SDF in a statement denied it, saying the blast was triggered by soldiers moving the ammunition.

Kurdish fighters still in control of prisons with IS detainees

The SDF and the government traded blame over the escape Monday of IS members from a prison in the northeastern town of Shaddadeh. Many of the detainees were recaptured by government troops who took control of the jail, state media reported.

Under a deal announced Sunday, government forces were to take over the control of the prisons but the transfer did not go smoothly.

The largest detention facility, Gweiran Prison, now called Panorama, has held about 4,500 IS-linked detainees and still was in the SDF hands.

Defense Ministry spokesman Brig. Gen. Hassan Abdul-Ghani said in televised comments Tuesday night that the government “was and still is in direct confrontation” with the IS. He added that authorities are ready to take over prisons with IS members.

The IS was defeated in Iraq in 2017, and in Syria two years later, but the group’s sleeper cells still carry out deadly attacks in both countries. The SDF played a major role in defeating the IS.

Tom Barrack, the U.S. envoy to Syria, said in a statement Tuesday that the SDF’s role as the primary anti-IS force “has largely expired, as Damascus is now both willing and positioned to take over security responsibilities.”

He added that the “recent developments show the U.S. actively facilitating this transition, rather than prolonging a separate SDF role.”

More than 15 years ago, Danish platoon commander Martin Tamm Andersen was leading his countrymen and U.S. Marines through the heat and sand of southern Afghanistan after a Taliban attack.

As Andersen’s vehicle moved at the rear of the column, everything was normal — until in one instant the world turned sand-colored. His body shook violently.

“I had no idea what was going on,” he recalled. He ran his hands over his arms and legs to make sure they were still there.

When the dust settled, he saw one of his soldiers bleeding heavily from his face. Another had been hurled from the turret and lay on the ground, groaning in pain, his back broken in two places. The blast had torn the vehicle apart.

Andersen called in help from the U.S. Marines, who halted a firefight with the Taliban, returned to secure the site, treated the wounded and helped prepare them for evacuation.

At the time, American and Danish troops were comrades in arms who risked their lives for each other in common cause.

Andersen can barely believe what has come of the U.S.-Danish alliance today as President Donald Trump escalates his threats to seize Greenland, a semiautonomous territory belonging to Denmark. Trump has repeatedly said the United States must take control of the strategically located and mineral-rich island, and views force as one way to get it.

“When America needed us after 9/11 we were there,” the 46-year-old veteran said in an interview with The Associated Press.

“As a veteran and as a Dane, you know, you feel sad and very surprised that the U.S. wants to take over part of the Kingdom of Denmark,” he said. “It’s a betrayal of the loyalty of our nation to the U.S. and to our common alliance, NATO.”

He spoke from the Danish War Museum in Copenhagen, where his armored personnel carrier that hit the improvised explosive device in 2010 in Helmand Province is on display.

Before his deployment to Afghanistan, Andersen had also served in Iraq. Good friends were killed and wounded in both wars. He believed his service in the U.S. wars served the cause of freedom and democracy.

‘It feels surreal’

As the U.S. intensifies its threats to seize Greenland, that initial shock felt by many across Europe has evolved into a profound sense of sadness, betrayal and fear of what such a move could mean for Europe’s security at a time of Russian aggression. Denmark’s prime minster has said it would mean the end of NATO.

For Danish veterans, it feels profoundly personal.

A NATO member since 1949, Denmark has been a stalwart ally to America. Forty-four Danish soldiers were killed in Afghanistan, the highest per capita death toll among coalition forces. Eight more died in Iraq.

“It feels surreal. It feels like it’s a bad joke somehow,” Andersen said. " I mean, you can’t really fathom that this is actually something that is being said out loud. It just seems too crazy.”

Packing away a medal and a U.S. flag

Søren Knudsen, a Danish veteran who served twice in Afghanistan, was watching television last year when he heard U.S. Vice President JD Vance say on Fox News that Denmark was “not being a good ally.”

Vance was making Trump’s argument that the United States needed to take more ”territorial interest” in Greenland for the sake of U.S. security, and accusing Denmark of “not doing its job.”

He could not believe it. In his Copenhagen home, the 65-year-old Knudsen keeps a photo of himself flanked by children in the Afghan city of Qalat.

The mission, as Knudsen understood it at the time, was to help the Americans safeguard the future of Afghanistan’s youth. At the end of his second tour, U.S. service members gave him an American flag as a parting gift.

For years he proudly displayed the framed flag and a U.S. Bronze Star honoring his service in Afghanistan alongside other medals from his military service.

He recently removed the medal and the flag in anguish and packed them away.

He told his wife that he will take them out of storage only when the U.S.-Danish alliance is restored.

Knudsen, who is the deputy president of the Danish Veterans Association, said he hears daily from other veterans who express sorrow and hurt at how the U.S. administration has turned against Denmark.

“Many veterans who have wounds, whether on their souls or their body, certainly feel this as a an offense straight to their heart,” he said.

Understanding U.S. security needs

Danish veterans are furious at how the White House rhetoric disregards the right to self-determination of Greenland and Denmark.

They also strongly object to Trump’s claim that Denmark, after fighting alongside U.S. forces in wartime, is incapable of protecting the West’s security interests in the Arctic.

Both Andersen and Knudsen say they understand concerns about security in the region but are convinced that Denmark is ready to continue doing whatever it takes within the NATO alliance to defend the region.

Both men describe maintaining a bond and friendship with American troops they served with.

Knudsen’s wife is American-born, and his brother-in-law is a U.S. Marine. They are convinced that their onetime comrades do not share Trump’s views about the Danes.

Danes often note that the U.S. already has access to Greenland under a 1951 defense agreement, and northwestern Greenland already houses the U.S. Pituffik military base that falls under the Pentagon’s Space Force.

It is the U.S. that has chosen to reduce its military footprint in Greenland in the past years — and Denmark and Greenland say they would accommodate a beefed up American military presence.

But Trump told the The New York Times last week that “ownership gives you things and elements that you can’t get from just signing a document.”

Knudsen says a U.S. invasion of Greenland “would probably bring me to tears.”

“I would be very sorry if it happened, because I would also see this as the final moments of the NATO alliance,” he said. “And I would probably see it as the final moment of my admiration and love of what has been the American experiment for 250 years.”

Associated Press writers Vanessa Gera and Claudia Ciobanu in Warsaw, Poland, Stefanie Dazio in Berlin and Lorne Cook in Brussels contributed to this report.

U.S. military forces boarded and took control of a seventh oil tanker connected with Venezuela on Tuesday as part of the Trump administration’s broader efforts to take control of the South American country’s oil.

U.S. Southern Command said in a social media post that U.S. forces apprehended the Motor Vessel Sagitta “without incident” and that the tanker was operating in defiance of President Donald Trump’s “established quarantine of sanctioned vessels in the Caribbean.”

The military command did not say whether the U.S. Coast Guard took control of the tanker as has been the case in prior seizures. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for more details. Southern Command said it had nothing to add to its post.

The Sagitta is a Liberian-flagged tanker and its registration says it is owned and managed by a company in Hong Kong. The ship last transmitted its location more than two months ago when exiting the Baltic Sea in northern Europe.

The tanker was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department under an executive order related to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

The post from U.S. Southern Command indicated the ship had taken oil from Venezuela. It said the capture of the tanker “demonstrates our resolve to ensure that the only oil leaving Venezuela will be oil that is coordinated properly and lawfully.”

The military command posted what appeared to be aerial footage of the Sagitta sailing on the ocean, but unlike in prior videos the clip did not show U.S. forces flying toward it in helicopters or landing on the deck of the ship.

Since the U.S. ouster of Venezuela President Nicolás Maduro in a surprise nighttime raid on Jan. 3, the Trump administration has set out to control the production, refining and global distribution of Venezuela’s oil products.

Officials in Trump’s Republican administration have made it clear they see seizing the tankers as a way to generate cash as they seek to rebuild Venezuela’s battered oil industry and restore its economy.

Trump met with executives from oil companies nearly two weeks ago to discuss his goal of investing $100 billion in Venezuela to repair and upgrade its oil production and distribution. He said at the time that the U.S. expected to sell at least 30 million to 50 million barrels of Venezuelan oil.

Trump told reporters on Tuesday that the U.S. already has taken 50 million barrels of oil out of Venezuela.

“We’ve got millions of barrels of oil left,” he said at the White House. “We’re selling it on the open market. We’re bringing down oil prices incredibly.”

The first tanker was seized off the coast of Venezuela on Dec. 10. Most of the other tankers also have been captured in the waters near Venezuela, with the exception of the Bella 1, which was captured in the North Atlantic.

The Bella 1 had been cruising across the Atlantic and nearing the Caribbean when on Dec. 15 it abruptly turned and headed north, toward Europe. The ship was ultimately captured on Jan. 8.

Congress is backing increases to the size of the U.S. armed forces this year, having passed and proposed final legislation that will raise and fund rises in end strength by more than 30,000 troops.

The fiscal 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, signed into law Dec. 18, allowed the defense and homeland security departments to increase the size of their services. The departments’ respective appropriations bills, released Tuesday, contain the funding needed to support the increases.

Under the legislation, the Army, Navy, Air Force, Space Force and Coast Guard will grow, with the Army and Navy seeing the largest increases.

According to the law and bills, the Army will grow to 454,000, up 11,700 from last year, while the Navy active-duty ranks will increase by 12,300 to 334,600.

The Air Force’s end strength will rise by 1,500 to 320,000, while the Space Force is slated to increase by 600 to 10,400.

In the Department of Homeland Security, the size of the Coast Guard will increase to 50,000, up from 44,500.

The Marine Corps will remain at 172,300.

The end strength of more than 1.3 million service members is the largest authorized active-duty force since fiscal 2023.

By law, however, the Defense Department’s reserve and National Guard components will see an overall decrease of 1,400 members, with the Army and Navy Reserves and Air National Guard expected to decrease by 3,800, 200 and 2,000, respectively.

The Marine Corps Reserve would grow by 1,500, while the Air Force Reserve is slated to increase by 500. The Army National Guard is expected to gain 3,000 members. The Coast Guard Reserve also will see an increase: The service hopes to have 8,500 Reserve members, up by more than 600.

Overall, the total end strength for reserve and National Guard forces would be more than 772,000 members, with total forces topping out at nearly 2.1 million members.

After suffering several years of recruiting shortfalls in the early 2020s, the services bolstered recruitment in fiscal 2025, with the Defense Department reaching an average of 103% of their recruiting goals.

The Coast Guard met its recruiting goals in 2024 for the first time since 2018, and in 2025, the service exceeded its targets by 121% — the highest accession numbers since 1991. The Coast Guard brought in 5,204 active-duty enlisted members in fiscal 2025; its goal had been 4,300 service members.

Both chambers must pass the proposed Defense and Homeland Security appropriations bills before Jan. 30 to avoid a partial government shutdown, or they must agree on a continuing resolution to keep portions of the federal government open after the end of the month.

Some Democrats have said they will vote against the proposed Homeland Security appropriations bill in objection to the administration’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations. ICE is funded by the bill.

House Appropriations Committee ranking Democrat Rep. Rosa DeLauro of California said Tuesday that while she understands her colleagues’ frustration with ICE, she does not believe that blocking the bill would affect the agency because it received $75 billion to support immigration enforcement in the reconciliation legislation known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

“I understand that many of my Democratic colleagues may be dissatisfied with any bill that funds ICE. I share their frustration with the out-of-control agency. I encourage my colleagues to review the bill and determine what is best for their constituents and communities,” DeLauro said in a statement.

Committee Chairman Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla., said the bills released Tuesday, which also included appropriations for the departments of labor and health and human services, education, transportation, housing and urban development, will fund investment in the “long arc of American leadership.”

“[The bills reflect] the core tenets of American strength: combat-ready forces, secure communities, effective education and health systems, and modern transportation,” Cole said in a press release.

The Defense Health Agency has clarified the U.S. military’s policy regarding chaperones during medical exams following several prominent cases of Army doctors taking indecent liberties with patients behind closed doors.

In a memo sent last month to military health system leadership, including military hospitals and dental facilities and support offices, acting DHA Director David Smith said patients have always had a right to a chaperone, but physicians now must offer them for sensitive medical exams or procedures.

Signage will inform patients that they have a right to a chaperone regardless of treatment, according to the memo, but in gynecological, breast or pelvic exams, they must be offered one.

“Having chaperones available is a crucial part of patient-centered care,” said Dr. Paul Cordts, DHA’s chief medical officer, in a statement released Thursday. “Chaperones can help protect both patients and health care staff.”

Last January, former Army physician Maj. Michael Stockin was sentenced to nearly 14 years in prison for sexually abusing patients at Madigan Army Medical Center, Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington.

Stockin had pleaded guilty to 41 violations of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, to include abusive sexual contact and indecent viewing with male patients under the auspices of medical exams.

In November, patients of Army Maj. Blaine McGraw, an OB-GYN at Carl R. Darnall Army Medical Center in Texas, filed a lawsuit against him alleging that he had secretly recorded and sexually exploited them during breast and pelvic exams.

McGraw was charged in December with 54 counts of indecent visual recording, five counts of conduct unbecoming an officer and other charges. He is in pre-trial confinement awaiting court proceedings.

The American Medical Association recommends that physicians ensure that their patients are aware that chaperones are available on request and that doctors should always honor a patient’s request to have a chaperone — one that is an authorized member of the health care team.

Having a chaperone present, especially during sensitive exams, provides reassurance to the patients and “demonstrates an attention to the patients’ well-being,” according to the association’s code of ethics.

It also is helpful for the “more pragmatic goal of legal protection for the physician,” according to association guidance.

Under the new DOD policy, chaperones are available to serve as a safeguard for patients and staff and are members of the medical team who will maintain privacy but also would report any suspected inappropriate conduct.

The guidelines call for staff to try to provide a chaperone of a certain sex if requested and if one is not available, the exam can be rescheduled. If a patient declines a chaperone, the medical staff must document the request but also can decline to conduct an exam if it is sensitive in nature.

Personnel who may serve as chaperones include physicians, dentists, physician assistants, psychologists, social workers, nurses, medics and corpsmen, medical technicians and support assistants, medical residences and hospital volunteers.

Non-medical personnel such as sexual assault response coordinators, victim advocates or family advocacy personnel may be in a room at the request of a patient in the event of a violence-related exam but they will not count as chaperones, according to the new policy.

Regarding pediatric care, a chaperone is not required for normal checkups for children if a parent or guardian is in the room, but health care staff must offer a chaperone if an exam or procedure is beyond routine.

For adolescents ages 11-17, the policy will follow the guidance for adult chaperones.

“This system-wide chaperone policy is just one part of DHA’s broader commitment to protect all patients and maintain the highest standards of professionalism,” officials said regarding the new policy.

After the U.S. Marine raid on Makin Island on Aug. 17-18, 1942, Japanese garrisons in the Gilbert and Marshall islands got to serious work reinforcing their commands. These took different natures, with differing effectiveness. In the case of Tarawa Atoll in the Gilberts, the defenses focused on some 500 positions, combining solid concrete, resilient coconut logs and the sand that made up the island.

Central to the defenses was a mammoth bunker capable of accommodating 150 troops and an airfield in the middle of Betio, the largest island in the Tarawa group. When he arrived on July 20, 1943, to take command of some 5,000 men of the Special Naval Landing Force, Rear Adm. Keiji Shibazaki had boasted that it would take a million men and 100 years to take the island. The Marines took it in three days.

But at a high cost.

Tarawa proved a formidable target, not least because of an intelligence miscalculation that led to American landing craft being hung up quarter mile from the beachhead and resulting in hundreds of casualties before the Marines even reached the shore.

The Japanese started with a few disadvantages of their own. Betio airfield was quickly put out of action and U.S. Navy carrier planes also eliminated the air bases in the neighboring Marshalls as a threat.

Worse still, by a twist of fate, a fluke or skill, one of the U.S. destroyers managed to lob a 5-inch shell directly in the Shibazaki’s path as he left his concrete blockhouse — instantly killing him and several other senior officers.

The death of Shibazaki essentially cut off the head of the Japanese command structure, which is seemingly why the Japanese could not coordinate an early banzai charge to force the Marines back into the sea.

At least one of the few Japanese taken prisoner attributed one other, most vital factor. It was when he saw hundreds of Marines falling at the reef, while others exited their landing craft and kept on coming until they secured a toehold on the beach, that he began to doubt the outcome.

Among the Marines who made that formidable impression was a field-commissioned lieutenant named Alexander “Sandy” Bonnyman. From the first to the last day, his name came to be associated with the keystone of the Japanese defense.

Born in Atlanta, Georgia, on May 2, 1920, Bonnyman was in his infancy when his family moved to Knoxville, Tennessee, where his father was president of the Blue Diamond Coal Company. While at Princeton University, he majored in engineering and excelled in football, but dropped out after his sophomore to enlist in the U.S. Army Air Corps on June 28, 1932.

After training at Randolph Field, Texas, he was honorably discharged “by reason of flying deficiency.” After that he worked in the coal industry, moved to New Mexico and established his own copper mine business.

When the Japanese raid on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, Bonnyman was exempt from the draft because he ran a company producing strategically vital war material. In spite of that, in July 1942, he enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps as a private and trained in San Diego, California.

In October 1942 he shipped out aboard the SS Matsonia to the Solomon Islands. There, he served in a Marine Pioneer unit on Guadalcanal with such a demonstration of leadership qualities that he got a field commission as a second lieutenant in February 1943.

After another promotion to first lieutenant in September that year, Bonnyman saw his next combat at Tarawa on Nov. 20 as executive officer to the 2nd Battalion, Shore Party, 8th Regiment, 2nd Marine Division.

Surviving that first bloody day of the landings, he brought his civilian experience into play, along with his skill in shore party handling and beachhead logistics. When his party encountered resistance at the seaward side of Betio Pier, he organized and led a five-man detachment to charge over the open pier and secure it. He also obtained several flamethrowers and demolitions to blow up several enemy installations.

On Nov. 21, Bonnyman led a 21-man demolition team against the main bomb-proof shelter, which by then lay 40 yards ahead of the Marine lines, barring further progress.

Gathering grenades and explosive charges, he directed the fighting under heavy fire, then retired to gather up more. He led his men to the mouth of the giant bunker, killing many defenders, but by day’s end the Japanese bunker was still dominating the area.

Bonnyman and his detachment, backed up by Marine riflemen and a tank, renewed their effort on the 22nd, climbing to the top of the structure. At that point, about 100 Japanese, either losing their nerve or seeing the need to spread out their remaining forces from other positions, made a break out of the bunker — only to be picked off by Bonnyman’s Marines.

During the final fight at the bunker, Bonnyman and his detachment were followed by combat cameraman Norman Hatch, whose footage appeared in “With the Marines at Tarawa.” It included pictures of Bonnyman and his detachment firing at Japanese trying to escape their bunker, giving Bonnyman the distinction of being the first Medal of Honor recipient to be captured in the act.

Some returned fire and Bonnyman, firing from the forward edge of the bunker, killed three of them, then ordered more charges. However, just then Bonnyman was struck and mortally wounded by enemy fire. Yet his sacrifice inspired his men to carry on the fight to completion. After the next, final furious minutes of fighting, 13 of Bonnyman’s detachment were still standing, but the bunker was theirs and all of its defenders dead.

The Marines suffered no further casualties as they advanced the 400 yards beyond the bunker and on Nov. 23 Betio Island was declared secure. It had cost the Marines 1,021 dead and 2,110 wounded, as well as 687 Navy personnel, while the Japanese lost 4,690 dead, 17 taken prisoner and 129 Korean laborers likewise taken alive.

In 1947, 12-year-old Frances Bonnyman received a posthumous Medal of Honor for her father from Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal. Alexander Bonnyman was among 36 “non-recovered” Marines interred on the Betio battlefield until a later relative, Clay Bonnyman Evans, wrote a biography and an appeal in “Bones of my Grandfather: Reclaiming a Lost Hero of World War II.”

In August 2015, Bonnyman’s remains were recovered, identified and returned to his family. On Sept. 25, 2015, he was finally laid to rest at the family plot at West Knoxville’s Berry Highland Memorial Cemetery.

U.S. forces on Friday killed a terror leader in Syria who officials say had ties to the ISIS insurgent who carried out a Dec. 13 ambush there that killed two Iowa National Guardsmen and one U.S. civilian, U.S. Central Command announced.

Bilal Hasan al-Jasim, who U.S. officials called “an experienced terrorist leader” who also had ties to al-Qaida, was killed in a Jan. 16 strike in northwest Syria, a release stated.

“The death of a terrorist operative linked to the deaths of three Americans demonstrates our resolve in pursuing terrorists who attack our forces,” Adm. Brad Cooper, CENTCOM commander, said in a release. “There is no safe place for those who conduct, plot, or inspire attacks on American citizens and our warfighters. We will find you.”

Iowa Guardsmen Sgt. William Nathaniel Howard, 29, of Marshalltown, and Sgt. Edgar Brian Torres Tovar, 25, of Grimes, were killed by a lone gunman in the Dec. 13 attack in Palmyra. Both soldiers were assigned to 1st Squadron, 113th Cavalry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, which is currently deployed to the region in support of ongoing counter-terrorism operations.

Ayad Mansoor Sakat, a U.S. citizen serving as an interpreter, was also killed in the attack.

The U.S. military announced on Dec. 30 that it had carried out a series of retaliatory operations against the Islamic State in Syria, resulting in the death or detention of “nearly 25 ISIS operatives,” according to U.S. Central Command.

Over a nine-day period last month, U.S. and allied forces conducted 11 operations that killed at least seven ISIS fighters and destroyed four of the group’s weapons caches, according to a release.

The operations followed Operation Hawkeye Strike, a campaign — named for the two soldiers from the “Hawkeye State” — that involved U.S. and Jordanian forces striking more than 70 targets with over 100 precision-guided munitions, the military said.

Officials noted at the time that the operation included A-10 attack jets, F-15 Eagle fighter jets, Apache attack helicopters and the M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System.

Central Command said in December that ISIS had inspired at least 11 plots or attacks against targets in the United States throughout 2025.

In response, CENTCOM said its partner operations in Syria, which number more than 80 over the past six months, have resulted in more than 300 insurgents being detained and over 20 killed.

The Dec. 13 ambush, meanwhile, marked the first combat deaths during Trump’s second term and the first such attack since the government of former Syrian President Bashar Assad was overthrown in December 2024.

The U.S. Marine Corps and U.S. Navy have sealed a deal with L3Harris Technologies for 34 large T7 robots to support the services in explosive ordnance disposal missions.

The multiyear contract award, announced Wednesday, will see robots delivered to the services this year. The details of the award amount are not being disclosed at this time, an L3Harris spokesperson told Defense News.

The T7 is a robust robotic system with a highly maneuverable arm that can lift payloads weighing up to nearly 300 pounds and be fitted with a variety of interchangeable components that allow it to disarm bombs in diverse environments. Featuring a multicamera view, it can operate in a variety of confined spaces and also climb stairs.

The system delivers haptic feedback, or controlled vibrations, to give operators touch sensitivity as they are controlling the robotic arm, allowing them to dispose of dangerous materials from a distance with precision.

The award comes several years after the U.S. Air Force purchased 170 T7 robots in 2021 for its explosive ordnance disposal program. The first of those robots were delivered to Eglin Air Force Base in Florida in 2022. Service personnel tasked with EOD missions who trained on the T7 stated at the time that they preferred it due to its long battery life, speed and flexibility.

“Recognized by both the Navy and Marines for outstanding dexterity and performance, L3Harris T7 robotic systems will provide them a significant advantage for their most challenging EOD missions,” Dave Kornick, president of intelligence and cyber, space and mission systems for L3Harris, said in a statement to Defense News.

The contract with the Defense Department will also see L3Harris provide comprehensive training to all service personnel on all aspects of operating the robots.