John Ismay
@johnismay
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Reporter, The New York Times. Formerly of @amnesty, @KPCC, & U.S. Navy EOD. Iraq vet. [email protected]
Washington, DC
Joined July 2012
Just found out we've lost three EOD Techs to suicide in the past three weeks. There is a 24/7 hotline for Techs, their friends and family at 1.888.412.0470 + the FB group After the Long Walk here: Please reach out if you or someone you love needs help.
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Remember the video of a guy getting beat on by feds in Portland and responding with double-birds? He's Chris David, a 6'2" 280-lb 53 yr old fmr SeaBee and varsity wrestler from USNA '88
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Javelin has been getting lots of press while the less well-known NLAW has been stacking Russian armor
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Inside the TR: Reactor Department was the first to go down. Dr's estimated 50-67 could die. Other senior officers wanted to co-sign Crozier's letter, but he declined saying the burden was his alone to bear. Story w/ @Tmgneff @EricSchmittNYT @helenecooper
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SECNAV bashes CO he fired as “too naïve or too stupid to be a commanding officer” if he thought a letter he wrote to help his crew wasn’t going to leak. So what happens? Someone leaks us Modly's audio. w/ @JournoGeoffZ making his debut in @NYTimesAtWar
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“I’m appalled and disappointed at the feds’ behavior — that whoever led them and trained them allowed them to become this way,” Mr. David said. “This is a failure of leadership more than it is a failure of their own individual behavior towards me.”
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He thought it wasn't worth going down and risking potential covid exposure before, but Chris told me "it reached that threshold when I saw Pinochet-type behavior from our own government. That’s what got me out there".
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A mystery munition first seen in Ukraine two weeks ago is an advanced countermeasure deployed by Russian Iskander-M ballistic missiles to evade air-defense systems. Story w/ analysis by @CAT_UXO and @ArmsControlWonk:
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Protester to police: ‘Traitors get the rope, traitors get the fucking rope. Wait til we come back with rifles, motherfucker. You think that’s an idle threat?’
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"Every organization reflects the nature of its leader," he said of the feds on the streets of Portland. "There are some leaders in that organization who have become seriously lost. I see it as a breakdown of leadership on a very fundamental level.".
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He laughed and said of the cop who beat him with a baton "That little dude was really laying into me, wasn’t he?".
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‘Wait til we come back with rifles,’ he said. ‘I’ll see you from 600 yards’
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He wasn't paying close attention to the protests until he saw the video of feds in cammies grabbing protesters off the street and tossing them in rented minivans. That made him get on the bus and head down to the protests himself last night.
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"There was no attempt to de-escalate" on the part of the feds, he said. "They’re pissed that I'm standing in their way and I’m not moving.".
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Watching the video today, he thought of the cammied feds "They looked like little shrimps compared to me. I’m only 6’ 2” that’s not extraordinarily tall, that really surprised me.".
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Suffice it to say I enjoyed the hell out of talking to Chris. You can follow him at @Tazerface16.
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He gave props and thanks to a street medic named Tabs, who helped him after he walked away from the feds, and later got him into an ambulance.
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"Some bomb technicians who studied photos of the device [. ] suggested that the bomb sent to CNN had hallmarks of fake explosives — the kind more typically depicted on television and in movies, rather than devices capable of detonating"
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The United States will re-open its embassy in Kyiv, and Pres. Biden is expected to nominate Bridget Brink as ambassador, Sec. Blinken and Sec. Austin announce to Pres. Zelensky in secretive visit to Kyiv. Millions more authorized in military aid to Ukraine
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He laughed at his Twitter account blowing up today, saying he had like 8 followers before all this happened. "My life has turned pretty dramatically weird over the past 12 hours," he told me. "I’m a pretty private person.".
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Two lessons here: 1) speed of light vs. speed of sound re: blast overpressure, 2) if you can see the explosion, it can see you.
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Police just shut down the post-curfew protest at Capitol Hill. Protesters shouted ‘pigs’ at police, called them ‘traitors’ and said ‘you’ll get the noose too’
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Chris didn't leave the hospital until around 5:30 a.m. and took an Uber home. When we spoke earlier this evening, he still had not gone to sleep yet.
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A retired Air Force 3-star general who leads the US Air Force Academy alumni association refused yesterday to condemn the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, saying "we weren’t going to pick sides in any of this”
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This evening the U.S. Air Force Academy's Association of Graduates condemned the Jan. 6 attack attack on the Capitol and signaled that grads who participated may be ejected from their organization
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New on @NYTimesAtWar: Capt. Brett Crozier, former commanding officer of USS Theodore Roosevelt, has tested positive for Covid-19. Story w/ @EricSchmittNYT
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To keep Ukraine's howitzers firing, the Pentagon will increase its production of 155-mm shells six-fold, to 90,000 rounds per month -- raising ammunition production in the U.S. to the highest levels since the Korean War. Story w/ @EricLiptonNYT
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Just in: US State Dept email says the $675 million in PDA-20 will include 1,000x 155mm Remote Anti-Armor Mine System projectiles. Containing 9x scatterable mines each, RAAMS rds are cluster weps but not banned by the Cluster Munitions Conv. or the Anti-Personnel Landmine Treaty.
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This, after retired Lt. Col. Larry R. Brock, Jr., a 1989 USAFA graduate, played a prominent role in the assault and carried zip ties onto the Senate floor
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The end of America's chemical weapons arsenal may come as early as Friday, when the last Sarin-filled M55 rocket is cut apart by robots. NYT reporters went to Pueblo, Colo. and Richmond, Ky. to document the final acts of a lethal era.
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Capt. Brett Crozier, who was removed as commanding officer of the U.S.S. Theodore Roosevelt, has tested positive for Covid-19
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National Guard soldiers mobilized for inauguration security have been moved from the Capitol to sleep in a nearby parking garage, which is still in use by vehicles. It’s cold, full of car exhaust, and has one bathroom
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When I was EOD LNO on Nimitz, the CSG Ops asked me one day how large a car bomb on the pier would have to be to sink the carrier. He didn’t believe me when I said ‘nuclear.’.
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44 years after women first entered the nation's service academies, Sydney Barber will become the first Black woman to lead the Brigade of Midshipmen at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. (cc: @SistersofB).
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The Navy kicked out 45 sailors this past week for refusing the Covid-19 vaccine — the first ones separated since the Nov. 28 deadline for vaccinations expired. Thousands more may be shown the door
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A new investigation by @conflictarm in Kyiv revealed that microchips and other parts made by companies based in the U.S. and other Western nations are found in almost all captured Russian weapons and equipment, from encrypted radios to cruise missiles
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In 2003 one of my EOD instructors called BLU-97 bomblets "engineer killers." In 2014, as a new jschool grad, I knew there must be a story there. Been reporting it out ever since. We published today in @NYTimesAtWar
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If you're a member of the Pentagon press corps and received this email sent at 6:12pm Eastern tonight, the information it contains is false. The last time the U.S. used cluster munitions was a TLAM D-1 strike on Yemen in December 2009.
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Three judges in Indianapolis tried to visit a strip club, but it had just closed -- at 3 a.m. So they went to the White Castle nearby, and got into a drunken brawl that left two of the judges hospitalized with gunshot wounds
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I spoke with Mayor @PeteButtigieg about his plan to create a national expectation of voluntary service for young Americans. If elected, he'd start work on Day 1 to get 250,000 Americans serving, and build that to 1 million by 2026
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I've never seen an O6 with a Navy Distinguished Service Medal before. Can only imagine that USS Jimmy Carter did some incredible things on his watch that we'll hear about 75 years from now, or possibly never.
Capt. Melvin Smith commanded USS Jimmy Carter (SSN 23) 2015-2017 — that's him as CO in the Jolly Roger photo. 👀. Also a member of the "Next Generation," a group of eight Black #submarine officers to command @USNavy subs in first 20 years of 21st century. #BlackHistoryMonth
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In my first go at writing an obit for The Times, I got to speak with Ruby Bridges about her mother’s life. And what a life it was
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His attacker said “You came here to invade,” but Mahud Villalaz explained he was already an American citizen. The man splashed acid on Villalaz's face anyway
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This is a good spot. All the markings here track: HB11 is the correct DODIC/NALC for M30A1 GMLRS Alternate Warhead; NSN is correct; the lot number beginning VGT17K tracks for mfr code VGT = Vought Corp., the original MLRS contractor, and 17K = manufactured in October 2017.
#Ukraine: Ukraine received new rockets for HIMARS/M270- here we can see a pod of M30A1 guided rockets. M30A1 differs from previously seen M31A1/A2 by an alternative warhead with 182000 preformed spheroid steel/tungsten fragments and is designed to be used against soft targets.
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Fun fact: the Confederate who fired on Ft. Sumter and started the Civil War has a U.S. Army base named after him. The commander of the Union soldiers he fired on does not
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In 1965 my dad started the Swift Boat program in Vietnam. Those brave sailors served honorably and did dangerous work. Guys like Rick Reed had no right to trash it for partisan gain 1/
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Russia’s guided weapons have repeatedly failed in Ukraine, and now Moscow’s inventory of them is running low. Here���s why
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“A supermassive black hole, a trapdoor in space-time through which the equivalent of 4 million suns have been dispatched to eternity, leaving behind only their gravity and a violently bent space-time” - @overbye
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Not everyone has left yet. Bullhorn guy to cops: ‘It’s time for the police and military to bite the hand that’s been feeding them’
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8’ tall metal barricades going up on 18th Ave tonight just north of Constitution Hall to block pedestrian traffic. Worker tells me the exclusion area for the inauguration will be at least 1/3 larger than he’s seen for any other govt event, w/ 2 and 3 layers of fencing in parts
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On USS Oldendorf (DD 972) I stood bridge watches with immigrants who were working towards their US citizenship. They kept me and the ship off the rocks. They did their duty and performed magnificently. They kept their side of the bargain and then some. Now this, @DeptofDefense?
Immigrant troops were promised citizenship in exchange for enlisting. But Uncle Sam is backing out of the deal.
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Can’t put the camera on these folks without it being obvious, but I hope you can at least hear the conversation they’re having
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When I called the 102nd Intelligence Wing's command group office early this afternoon, it was pretty apparent they were not having a good day
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We obtained early analysis of the pipe bombs discovered near the DNC and RNC on Wednesday. Both devices incorporated mechanical timers, and a cellphone was found by the one of them
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Great. Now it's gonna write a book.
UNTANGLED: Two police officers helped return a seal to the water after it got caught in plastic on the beach in Ocean Shores, Washington.
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“What we absolutely won’t do is take personnel advice from a talk-show host or the Chinese military,” Mr. Kirby told reporters on Thursday. “Now maybe those folks feel like they have something to prove; that’s on them.”
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For everyone tweeting on the 30th anniversary of Desert Storm about how brilliant the air campaign was, know that the U.S. did a lot of incredibly stupid things like drop high explosive bombs on chemical weapons depots, such as the one at Al Muthanna.
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If the submersible Titan is on the bottom at 12,500 feet, the chances of rescue are limited and there are very few remotely operated vehicles capable of operating at those depths
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President Biden has nominated Adm. Lisa Franchetti to serve as Chief of Naval Operations. If confirmed, she will become the first woman in the U.S. Navy's 247-year history to lead the service.
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Their work is occasionally made easier by motorists who advertise their right to bear arms with […] “molon labe” — a defiant message from ancient Sparta, which roughly translates as “come and take them.”. Increasingly, thieves are doing just that .
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It’s 8:09 p.m. and I think if you multiplied the number of protesters here by the number of reporters, you’d get the number of cops on-site
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The folks who are left are either complaining about being portrayed as ‘violent Trump mobs’ or are having some very interesting theological arguments
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"Two Marines, standing by the runway at the Kabul airport, acknowledged that they were living a moment of history. A little earlier, they said, someone walked by after exiting one of the helicopters cradling a poorly folded American flag: It had just come down off the embassy".
Those wearing bracelets can board the helos. But for thousands of Afghans who worked with Americans for 20 years, there were no bracelets. From @Tmgneff in Kabul:
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The magazine aisle at my local Safeway is a surprisingly bleak place where overweight men without body armor have to tote expensive suppressed SMGs and multiple flash-bangs while riding motocross bikes through a suburban hellscape just to survive
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While looking at a spreadsheet full of data and photos that kept growing over the past two months, a clear picture of Russia’s disregard for the Law of Armed Conflict emerged
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Kate Wilder passed every test at the Special Forces Officer School in 1980 but was prevented from graduating. An investigation determined she had been discriminated against and she was awarded a backdated diploma
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Guard soldier in the Capitol flips double-birds at a plaque bearing Speaker Pelosi’s name as his buddies take photos. He is now under investigation
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The cluster weapon the U.S. will provide to Ukraine is the 155-mm M864 projectile, loaded with 72 DPICM grenades that are identical to those used with earlier M483 rounds. The dud rate on these submunitions has been observed at 14% in real-word conditions
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Looked out my hotel room at Ramstein AFB and what catches my eye but…
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Some quick math on #BeirutBlast: though it's difficult to precisely measure the explosive yield of 2,750 tons of AN due to age/deterioration, the publications I have say in a worst-case scenario it could have had as high as 42% the power of TNT
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With today's Medal of Honor ceremony for TSGT John Chapman, I want to acknowledge the great reporting of @SeanDNaylor who has been on the story of Takur Ghar from the beginning: &
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Battlefield commission. Badly wounded. Fought through contact. Ensured his entire team was evacuated before himself, walking on broken legs. But MoH paperwork at the time apparently never went through. This is a hell of a story
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The US will send HIMARS to Kyiv, likely loaded with M31 GMLRS rockets that each carry 200 lbs of explosives - slightly more than the 192 lb TNT equivalent in a Mk-82 500-lb bomb. By comparison, 155-mm artillery shells carry about 18 lbs of explosives each.
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I'm watching responses pour in in realtime. 300 so far. Please spread this far and wide And thanks to all who've rogered up so far.
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One reason I love working at @nytimes: two weeks ago I got an email from @kashhill asking if I can help on a story, and it was a rollercoaster of fun reporting through the holidays with her, @CFSchuetze and @Aaron_Krolik on a story that made my eyes pop
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Trying to destroy munitions from the sky like this does not work as well as air planners think. Ordnance is durable. Some of the weapons you hit will detonate sympathetically, sure. For the rest, you've blown open secure storage and made it available to anyone with a pickup truck.
On Oct. 16, after all #Coalition personnel and essential tactical equipment departed, two Coalition F-15Es successfully conducted a pre-planned precision airstrike at the Lafarge Cement Factory to destroy an ammunition cache and reduce the facility’s military usefulness.
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Videos show more evidence of widely banned cluster munitions in Ukraine. Story w/ @evanhill & perspective on Russia's post-1991 use of them from @MarkHiznay of @hrw
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This is how you do it — identify the weapon and maker, get the year of manufacture, compare it against known transfers, establish accountability.
A verified image first acquired by @bellingcat shows the attack included Russian-manufactured 300mm Smerch rockets with 9N235 cluster munitions. The 2019 manufacture date, after Russia stopped selling these arms to Ukraine, indicates that the attack was launched by Russia.
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The Army loves to tell a story about Iraqi POWs naming MLRS “Steel Rain” back in 1991. The only problem is that it’s completely untrue. We’re setting the record straight today in @NYTimesAtWar
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One of the most serious federal cases involved Lonnie L. Coffman of Falkville, Ala. In the bed of his truck, officers found what they described as an M4 assault rifle and magazines loaded with ammunition
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A strike in Ukraine points to the use of cluster munitions, banned by most countries
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When a German security researcher who bought the SEEK II on eBay used the device on himself, a message popped up, asking to connect to a U.S. Special Operations Command server to upload the new “collected biometrics.”
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Thank you everyone for the tweets in support of @NYTimesAtWar. It's great to hear from readers, friends, and colleagues today. It really means a lot.
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At factories in Pennsylvania and Iowa, 100-pound steel shells are formed in 2,000-degree furnaces and filled with high explosives — offering Kyiv a lifeline of ammunition
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In Bezruky, PTM-1S scatterable landmines fell from the sky and blew up among civilians who have no part in the war. Excellent reporting from @Tmgneff in harm's way on the ground in Ukraine
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The Navy has charged a seaman apprentice with deliberately starting the fire that destroyed the U.S.S. Bonhomme Richard last July
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A brief explainer on HIMARS and GMLRS headed to Kyiv and why the U.S. won’t be sending ATACMS missiles
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Markings on remnants of a Hwasong-11 recovered in Ukraine show that North Korea continues to send newly manufactured short-range ballistic missiles to Russia, according to a new @conflictarm investigation
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Having filled out an SF-86 for an initial TS/SCI investigation and two periodic re-investigations myself, this is spot-on
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The @CostsOfWar project estimates America's post-9/11 wars have displaced at least 37M people. @StateDept data: since Jan. '17, the US admitted 95% fewer Iraqis & 91% fewer Somalis over the same time period at the end of the Obama administration
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Former commanding general of 1st Marine Division is relieved of his duties nearly a year after nine service members died in an AAV training accident off San Clemente Island
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When my father died in January at age 94, he left this world with his honor intact like Zumwalt did. Reed did not.
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My Uncle Lou is 92 years old, was drafted in 1943, fought across Western Europe as an Army Combat Engineer, and just signed up to contribute to @nytimesatwar. I brought him to the DC Bureau this morning and we talked about stories. Join us
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It’s called Rickover Hall.
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“Everyone has such a personal experience in Afghanistan that it cannot necessarily predict how a person will react to news of the withdrawal,” Mr. Mayne said, “because of the scars that a lot of folks have left over there.” w/ @David_Philipps
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24 hrs after we announced @NYTimesAtWar was shutting down, I managed to publish a very AtWar-esque piece here on a WW2-era bomb detonating in a Polish shipping canal. Keep faith alive -- we'll report these kinds of stories every chance we get
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