Posts filed under ‘Lessons Learned’
THE FRIDAY FOTO (February, 10, 2023)
MIND IF I BRING MY DOG, TOO?
(U.S. Air National Guard photo by Staff Sergeant Clayton Wear) Click on the photo to enlarge the image.
Master Sergeant Rudy Parsons, a pararescueman assigned to the Kentucky Air National Guard’s 123rd Special Tactics Squadron, rappels from the Big Four Bridge in Louisville, Kentucky, with Callie, a search and rescue dog last December.
When we first spotted this Air Force photo, we thought it was an amusing out-of-the-ordinary thing to do with a military service dog. But we learned that Callie was the first and — may still be — the only search and rescue dog in the entire U.S. military.
The need for such a military canine capability arose while Master Sergeant Parsons and his unit were assisting disaster relief operations in Haiti after the devastating 2010 earthquake.
Segments of Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC) played a big part in the relief effort. AFSOC’s Combat Controllers specialize in securing safe air fields in war- or disaster-wracked zones as well as providing air traffic control to get needed supplies and emergency assistance in and out safely. AFSOC’s Pararescuemen (PJs), like Parsons, are members of the sole U.S. military unit specially trained and equipped for search-and-rescue (SAR).
In 2010, however, Parsons and his teammates were frustrated with how difficult and slow it was to sift through the rubble of a collapsed school, where 40 children were believed trapped.
A few days into the search, the civilian Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) was finally able to land at Port-au-Prince’s crippled airport. They brought a dog to the schoolhouse debris and were able to clear it in about 20 minutes. There were no children or anyone else in rubble pile.
“It had been a couple days of wasted labor that could’ve been used to help save other lives,” Parsons said in a 2019 Air Force news story. “It was at that time that we kind of realized the importance and the capability that dogs can bring to search and rescue. Every environment presents different difficulties, but it’s all restricted by our human limitations.”
Parsons spearheaded developing the squadron’s Search and Rescue K-9 program. The effort, launched in 2018, was designed to increase the capabilities of disaster response teams through the use of canines specially trained in mountain rescue (rappelling plus ice, snow and alpine maneuvers), descending in a static line or freefall parachute drop.
The first was Callie, a Dutch Shepherd, who is still on the job. In August, the now 5-year-old 123rd Airlift Wing veteran was searching for missing people in eastern Kentucky floodwaters.
No word yet on whether Callie and her human colleagues are being sent to Turkey assist in search and rescue efforts following massive earthquakes that have killed thousands.
The Pentagon said February 8 it had transported two civilian urban search and rescue teams as part of the rapid U.S. relief effort.
THE FRIDAY FOTO (January 27, 2023)
THE COLOR OF THE WIND.
(U.S. Marine Corps photo by Staff Sergeant Jesus Sepulveda Torres) Click on the photo to enlarge the image.
MV-22 Osprey aircraft assigned to Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 162 prepare to take-off for a simulated raid during Marine Expeditionary Unit Exercise I at Auxiliary Landing Field Bogue, North Carolina on December 20, 2022. The raid was the culminating Marine Air Ground Task Force (MAGTF) mission for the exercise.
The colorful circles are made by two LED tip lights on the end of each rotor blade as they rotate. The colorful display has a practical safety purpose, it makes the Osprey more visible to other squadron aircraft in night flight formations (in a non-combat situation). On the ground, in the dark, the lights also alert other aircraft well as ground personnel nearby where the spinning blades are.
The Osprey can take off and land vertically like a helicopter but also fly horizontally (and faster) like and airplane when the rotors are tilted forward. These Ospreys are with the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit (26 MEU). An MEU, with about 2,000 Marines, a composite helicopter/tiltrotor squadron and a combat logistics battalion, is the smallest type of MAGTAF (pronounced MAG-TAFF) unit.
THE FRIDAY FOTO (December 30, 2022)
HE’S GOT THE WHOLE WORLD … ON HIS SIX.
(U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Zachary Rufus) Please click on the photo to enlarge the image.
Air Force Colonel Cameron “GLOVER” Dadgar, commander of the Nevada Test and Training Range flies over the range during an Exercise Red Flag 22-3 mission at Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada, on July 12, 2022.
For THE FRIDAY FOTO’s last posting of 2022, we thought we’d feature one of the many spectacular photos included in the Defense Department’s DOD in Photos 2022 collection. To see some more photos, click here. You’ll notice several of the pictures taken by service members over the past year have apeared in THE FRIDAY FOTO.
The Nevada Test and Training Range is the U.S. Air Force’s premier military training area with more that 12,000 square miles of air space and 2.9 million acres of land.
The “SIX” in this week’s headline refers to the military term “Check Your Six,” which means “Check Behind You” to avoid a sneak attack from the rear. For a more detailed explanation, click here.
Almost forgot, thanks for visiting 4GWAR Blog and our weekly FRIDAY FOTO featuring the wonderful, informative and sometimes quirky photographs taken by members of the U.S. Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, Coast Guard, National Guard and Space Force. Have a HAPPY NEW YEAR. See you in 2023!
FRIDAY FOTO (December 2, 2022)
TASK FORCE RED CLOUD.
(U.S. Marine Corps photo by Corporal Jackson Kirkiewicz) Click on the photo to enlarge the image.
U.S. Marines with Combat Logistics Battalion 6 (CLB-6), a unit of Combat Logistics Regiment 2 in the 2nd Marine Logistics Group, drive a Finnish G-Class landing craft while operating the Amy, an unmanned surface vehicle on the Baltic Sea, off the coast of Finland November 25, 2022.
CLB-6 trains organizes and deploys to provide logistical combat support to Regimental Combat Teams (RCT) in the field with supplies beyond their organic capabilities, so there’s no interruption to operations.
CLB-6 also supplies headquarters elements for Task Force Red Cloud, which is deployed to Finland in support of exercises like Freezing Winds 2022, which ran from November 22 to December 2. The exercise, in the Gulf of Finland and the constricted maritime terrain of the Finnish archipelago involved a total of 23 combat vessels, service and support vessels, transport vessels, as well as coastal and land troops, totaling about 5,000 personnel. The annual maritime defense exercise provided a unique opportunity to rehearse demanding combat tasks in the harsh November weather conditions of the Baltic Sea, according to Finland’s Chief of Staff of the Navy Command, Commodore Jukka Anteroinen.
The United States and NATO have stepped up military, air and naval exercises in the Baltic region with Sweden and Finland — which have both applied to join NATO — since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, leading to much destruction and loss of life.
FRIDAY FOTO (September 16, 2022)
HOLY SWITCHEROO, BATMAN!
(U.S. Army National Guard photo by Staff Sergean. Samantha Hircock) Click on photo to enlarge image.
Iowa National Guard Sergeant Brady Verbrugge — a horizontal construction engineer with Company A, of the 224th Brigade Engineer Battalion — rappels from a 34-foot tower at Camp Dodge in Johnston, Iowa, on September 6, 2022. Over 200 soldiers and airmen participated in a 12-day U.S. Army Air Assault course held at Camp Dodge, which trains service members in sling-load operations (2 minute 46 second video) and rappelling (one minute video). According to the Army, it’s also a test of grit.
For some context, look at the photo below. We think that’s what they mean by grit.
U.S. Soldiers and Airmen rappel from a 34-foot tower at Camp Dodge, Iowa, on September 6, 2022. Over 200 Soldiers and Airmen participated in a 12-day U.S. Army Air Assault course held at Camp Dodge. (U.S. Army National Guard photo by Staff Sergeant Samantha Hircock) Click on photo to enlarge image.
FRIDAY FOTO (July 22, 2022)
STEADY MEN.
(U.S. Marine Corps photo by Corporal. Sydney Smith) CLICK on photo to enlarge.
U.S. Marines assigned to Battalion Landing Team 3rd Battalion of the Okinawa-based, 4th Marine Regiment, Marine Air-Ground Task Force 7 and a Marine assigned to the Mexican Naval Infantry practice small boat flipping techniques at Marine Corps Base Hawaii on July 6, 2022, during Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC), the world’s largest international maritime exercise.
U.S. and Mexican Marines conducted small boat training with marines from Sri Lanka, Indonesia, and Australian soldiers in just one of the training exercises at RIMPAC from June 29 to August 4 in and around the Hawaiian Islands and Southern California.
Twenty-six nations, 38 ships, four submarines, more than 170 aircraft and 25,000 personnel are participating in RIMPAC 2022, the 28th exercise in the series first begun in 1971.
The photo below illustrates where these three soggy Marines started. So, you can see turning over an upside down rubber raft while both you and it are in the ocean isn’t easy — but a handy thing to know how to do.
The 4th Marine Regiment is slated to be transformed into one of the new Marine Littoral Regiments as part of the Marine Corps’ larger force design (Force Design 2030), intended to redesign the Corps for naval expeditionary warfare and to better align itself with the National Defense Strategy, in particular, its focus on strategically competing with China and Russia.
(U.S. Marine Corps photo by Corporal Sydney Smith) CLICK on photo to enlarge the image.
FRIDAY FOTO (June 17, 2022)
LET IT SNOW — INDOORS.
(U.S. Air Force photo by William Higdon)
The U.S. Air Force can make it snow, indoors, in May — in Florida!
Team members at the McKinley Climatic Laboratory (MCL) at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida, use machines to create snow in the MCL Main Chamber on May 26, 2022 to prepare for environmental testing. The MCL recently celebrated its 75th anniversary.
The first tests at the MCL occurred in May 1947. In the 75 years since, the unique capabilities available at the MCL have allowed a variety of climatic testing for the Defense Department, other government agencies and private industry. From arctic freeze to blazing heat and desert sand to jungle humidity, any climatic environment in the world can be simulated in the facility.
When it first began operations, the MCL was part of the U.S. Army Air Forces. This component was soon separated from the Army and became its own military branch when the Air Force was founded on September 18, 1947.
Before the MCL was created, there was the Cold Weather Test Detachment stationed at Ladd Field in Fairbanks, Alaska. The Army Air Force designated that site as a cold-weather testing facility in 1940.
The MCL is operated by the 717th Test Squadron, 804th Test Group, Arnold Engineering Development Complex.
SHAKO: D-Day Remembered and Other Greatest Generation Notes
D-DAY, PLUS 78 YEARS.
One of the monuments to U.S. D-Day Landings in Normandy, France. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Staff Sergeant Akeel Austin)
D-Day, the Invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944, is the day when more than 160,000 Allied forces landed in Nazi-occupied France as part of the biggest air, land and sea invasion ever executed. It ended with heavy casualties — more than 9,000 Allied soldiers were killed or wounded in those first 24 hours.
Still, D-Day is largely considered the successful beginning of the end of Hitler’s tyrannical regime and the war in Europe.
A bird’s-eye view of landing craft, barrage balloons and Allied troops landing in Normandy, France, on D-Day, June 6, 1944. (Photo By: U.S. Maritime Commission)
In the past we’ve mostly written about the airborne landings the night before D-Day, largely because 37 years ago your 4GWAR editor once interviewed a Catholic priest who jumped into the dark as a chaplain with the 101st Airborne Division. But this year, we thought we’d try something different.
Here’s a D-Day quiz that Defense Department had on their website for the 78th anniversary of the Invasion of Normandy. See how you do.
And here’s a 2016 article the Defense Department rolled out again this year: Five Things You May Not Know About D-Day.
And let’s not forget the Boys of ’44.
(U.S. Army photo by Specialist Vincent Levelev)
These are some of the World War II Veterans, and representatives of those who could not be in attendance, receiving a challenge coin at the Eternal Heroes Monument in Normandy, France, on June 2, 2022. World War II Veterans and representatives of the 82nd Airborne Division and 101st Airborne Division’s (Air Assault) came to honor fallen Paratroopers who liberated Ravenoville in June of 1944.
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BATTLE OF MIDWAY REMEMBERED.
Another decisive battle in World War II also took place in June — on the other side of the world against a different enemy.
June 4, marked the 80th anniversary of the Battle of Midway, considered by most military historians to be the turning point in the Pacific during the Second World War.
Torpedo bombers on the flight deck of the US Enterprise CV-6 just before the Battle of Midway (Navy archival photo)
In 1942, a large Japanese fleet, led by four heavy aircraft carriers, planned to destroy the three U.S. carriers they missed during the Pearl Harbor attack six months earlier. But by early June, Naval Intelligence had cracked the Imperial Japanese Navy code and Admiral Chester Nimitz, the head of the Navy’s Pacific forces, knew where the enemy was and what their plans were.
After three days of battle, where the opposing surface ships never saw each other, Japan lost all four of its heavy carriers as well as hundreds of planes and thousands of sailors and pilots. U.S. losses were limited to one carrier – the USS Yorktown (CV-5) – a destroyer, the USS Hammann (DD-412), less than 150 planes and 305 men. After Midway, Japan was never able to launch a large naval offensive again.
To commemorate that historic victory, two EA-18G Growlers — electronic warfare aircraft — conducted a fly-by during a ceremony being held aboard the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Spruance (DDG 111). In the photo below one can see the Growlers approaching as the ship’s crew salute the ensign (flag) during the playing of the National Anthem.
(U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Taylor Crenshaw)
The Spruance is named for Admiral Raymond A. Spruance, considered the victor at Midway. He commanded Task Force 16, which included the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise (CV 6). Once within range of the advancing Japanese fleet, he capitalized on the element of surprise to launch the decisive attack near Midway.
Spruance is part of the Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group is on a scheduled deployment in the U.S. 7th Fleet area of operations in the Western Pacific. The June 4 ceremony was held less than 1,000 miles from the 1942 battle zone.
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GOLD MEDAL FOR MERRILL’S MARAUDERS.
The Congressional Gold Medal was awarded May 25 in a virtual Capitol Hill ceremony to a famed World War II Army special operations outfit, the 5307th Composite Unit, better known as Merrill’s Marauders.
Merrill’s Marauders crossing a jungle river with pack animals.
(U.S. Army photo)
Created as a long range, light infantry unit trained in jungle warfare, the 5307th, code-named Galahad, was tasked with penetrating deep into Japanese-held territory to disrupt communications, cut supply lines and capture an airfield in Burma.
The volunteer unit was formed in 1943, with more than 900 jungle-trained officers and men from Caribbean Defense Command, 600 Army veterans of Guadalcanal and the Solomon Islands campaign, a few hundred more from Southwest Pacific Command, veterans of the New Guinea and Bougainville campaigns, and another 900 jungle-trained troops from Army Ground Forces stateside. Fourteen Japanese-American (Nisei) Military Intelligence Service translators were also assigned to the unit. In just five months in 1944, the Marauders fought often larger Japanese forces in 32 engagements including five major battles across some of the toughest conditions of the war: the disease-infested jungles of Burma and the rugged foothills of the Himalayas.
“Merrill’s Marauders stand among the great heroes of our history. Nearly 80 years later, Americans remain in awe of their courage, valor and patriotism – willing to go where no others would dare,” Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi said during the gold medal ceremony.
“On behalf of the United States Congress and all Americans, I’m honored to present this Congressional Gold Medal to Merrill’s Marauders in recognition of their bravery and outstanding service. May this medal serve as an expression of our nation’s deepest gratitude and respect. And may its place in the Smithsonian remind future generations of the Marauders’ fight for freedom and democracy,” Pelosi said.
She also cited lawmakers who worked for years to get the congressional recognition for the Marauders — the late Senator Johnny Isakson of Georgia, Congressman Sanford Bishop Jr. of Georgia and former Congressman Peter King of New York.
Dubbed Merrill’s Marauders after their commander, then-Brigadier General Frank Merrill, the men were tasked with a “dangerous and hazardous mission” behind Japanese lines in Burma, where the fall of the country’s capital of Rangoon had severely threatened the Allied supply line to China. In their final mission, the Marauders were ordered to push enemy forces out of the town of Myitkyina, the only city with an all-weather airstrip in Northern Burma, according to Military Times
Brigadier General Frank Merrill, commander of “Merrill’s Marauders,” poses between two of the 14 Japanese-American interpreters assigned to the unit, Tech Sergeants Herbert Miyasaki and Akiji Yoshimura in Burma on May 1, 1944. Courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration.
Weakened by disease, malnourishment and enemy attacks during their march through Burma, the Marauders, effective force dwindled from nearly 3,000 men to 1,500. Even with reduced numbers of the 5307th was still able to take the airfield on May 17, 1944. But the nearby town of Myitkyina proved to have a larger Japanese garrison than intelligence reports indicated. It was only with Chinese reinforcements that the town fell to Allied troops on August 3. After five months of combat, 95 percent of the Marauders were dead, wounded, or deemed no longer medically fit for combat.
Although operational for only a few months, Merrill’s Marauders gained a fierce reputation for hard fighting and tenacity as the first American infantry force to see ground action in Asia. Considered a forerunner of today’s Special Operations troops, the Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment’s distinctive unit insignia honors the legacy of the Marauders by replicating the design of their shoulder shoulder sleeve insignia.
The colors used to identify the Marauders can be found on every tan beret worn by a Ranger, said Colonel J.D. “Jim” Keirsey, commander of the 75th Ranger Regiment. The Rangers’ crest displays a star, sun and lightning bolt to symbolize the “behind enemy lines, deep-strike character” of their predecessors, he said, according to the Stars and Stripes website.
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SHAKO is an occasional 4GWAR posting on military history, traditions and culture. For the uninitiated, a shako is the tall, billed headgear worn by many armies from the Napoleonic era to about the time of the American Civil War. It remains a part of the dress or parade uniform of several military organizations like the corps of cadets at the U.S. Military Academy, West Point, New York.
BALTIC-2-BLACK: Tensions Grow on Ukraine-Russia Border; Moscow Eyes Svalbard Presence in Hybrid-Strategy
UKRAINE:
Biden Reassures Ukrainian President.
President Joe Biden has reassured Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of U.S. support for Ukraine’s sovereignty, as the country steels itself for a potential Russian invasion on its eastern frontier.
According to a White House readout of the December 9 call, “President Biden voiced the deep concerns of the United States and our European Allies about Russia’s aggressive actions towards Ukraine and made clear that the U.S. and our Allies would respond with strong economic and other measures in the event of a further military intervention.”
Biden also told Zelenskyy that the United States and its allies were “committed to the principle of ‘no decisions or discussions about Ukraine without Ukraine,’” reiterating his calls for Russia to de-escalate tensions and choose diplomacy, POLITICO reported.
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(Black Sea region map Norman Einstein via wikipedia)
Seeking Help from Parners, Allies.
Biden also held a separate call December 9 with the “Bucharest Nine,” a group of NATO members on Europe’s eastern edge close to Russia — including the Baltics and Poland — that are particularly sensitive to aggressive moves by Moscow, the Washington Post reported.
“That is not on the table,” Biden told reporters December 8 at the White House. “The idea that the United States is going to unilaterally use force to confront Russia invading Ukraine is not on, in the cards right now,” Defense One repored.
Ukraine is not a member of NATO and does not enjoy the collective protection of Article 5, which calls every alliance member to arms when one is attacked. Ukraine seeks to join NATO but Russia opposes its entry into the alliance.
In an exclusive interview for Defense One’s Outlook 2022, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said Biden emphasized in his phone call with Putin that if Russia moves against Ukraine, the United States would levy economic consequences; provide more military gear to Kiev; and deploy an “increased U.S. troop presence and increased capabilities in countries like Poland, the Baltics, [and] Romania.”
But Sullivan reiterated that the U.S. does not intend to send more troops to Ukraine.
Meanwhile, the final elements of a $60 million security systems package to Ukraine — initially announced in August — will ship this week, a Pentagon spokesman said December 9.
U.S. Marines, assigned to 1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, 2d Marine Division, cut through barbed wire during the Exercise Sea Breeze 2021 in Oleshky Sands, Ukraine, July 2, 2021. The multinational maritime exercise cohosted by U.S. Sixth Fleet and the Ukrainian Navy in the Black Sea since 1997, is designed to enhance interoperability of participating nations and strengthen maritime security and peace in the region. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Trey Fowler)
Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby told reporters that the last portions of the existing security package, which includes small arms and ammunition, is shipping now. Other parts of that security assistance package, meant to help Ukrainians defend their sovereignty against Russian aggression, included the Javelin missile system, which is already in the hands of Ukrainian servicemembers.
The $60 million package previously included 30 Javelin Command Launch Units and 180 missiles. The Javelins were delivered to Ukraine on October 23. “The United States has committed more than $450 million in security assistance to Ukraine in 2021, and this is part of our ongoing commitment to supporting Ukraine’s ability to defend its sovereignty and territorial integrity,” Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel Anton Semelroth, a Defense Department spokesman said in an email to reporters.
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Putin’s No-Ukraine-in-NATO Demand.
On December 1, Vladimir Putin demanded ‘‘legal guarantees’’ that NATO would never expand eastward, ratcheting up the stakes as the West scrambled to respond to Russia’s military buildup near Ukraine, the New York Times reported.
Putin, who sees Ukraine’s deepening military partnership with the United States and other NATO countries as an existential threat, wants to start talks with the West to reach an agreement that would block the alliance’s expansion. He spoke in the midst of what Western officials describe as a growing threat of military action by tens of thousands of Russian troops massing close to the border with Ukraine — a former Soviet nation that seeks to join NATO.
‘‘The threat on our western borders is, indeed, rising, as we have said multiple times,’’ Putin said at a ceremony for ambassadors at the Kremlin December, according to the Times. ‘‘In our dialogue with the United States and its allies, we will insist on developing concrete agreements prohibiting any further eastward expansion of NATO and the placement there of weapons systems in the immediate vicinity of Russian territory.’’
Putin’s demand is a nonstarter for NATO. ‘‘It’s only Ukraine and 30 NATO allies that decide when Ukraine is ready to join NATO,’’ Jens Stoltenberg, NATO’s secretary general told reporters in Riga, Latvia. ‘‘Russia has no veto, Russia has no say, and Russia has no right to establish a sphere of influence trying to control their neighbors.’’
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ARCTIC:
From the Barents Sea to the Baltic to the Black Sea
An expert on Polar geopolitics warns that Russia to enhance its presence in Svalbard, a Norwegian-controlled archipelago in the Arctic, the Independent Barents Observer reports.
In an interview with the Norwegian-based Arctic news site, Dr. Elizabeth Buchanan, says “a hybrid-strategy is underway in which Russia bolsters its legitimate presence in Svalbard on one hand while raising tensions in the maritime space on the other hand.” A lecturer in strategic studies at Australia’s Deakin University, says Moscow “isn’t about to annex Svalbard, Russia doesn’t want such a fight.”
Instead, she says Russia will try to assert its rights under a 1920 Treaty that gave Norway sovereignty over the islands, but Russia coal limited mining and other economic and scientific rights.
In recent years, the islands have risen in strategic importance as they reside just north of the intersection of the Barents, Greenland and Norwegian seas (see map above) . Whomever controls Svalbard is also likely to control the important gateway from the shallow Barents Sea to the deeper North Atlantic. For Russia’s Northern Fleet, the so-called Bear Island Gap between mainland Norway and the archipelago’s southernmost island is key to conducting sea denial operations in and over the maritime areas further south, potentially threatening NATO’s transatlantic sea lines of communication, according to the Observer.
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BALTIC-2-BLACK is an occasional 4GWAR posting on the rising tensions between Russia and the West in the regions of the Baltic Sea and the Black Sea, where former Russian satellite nations like Poland and Romania border against Russian territory. Both NATO, and the United States in particular, have stepped up their presence in the region since Russia began throwing its weight around after annexing Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in 2014. Since then, some Scandinavian countries have been boosting defense budgets even restoring a military draft as Russian aircraft and naval vessels have acted more aggressively in the region.
FRIDAY FOTO (November 26, 2021)
Native American Heritage Day.
(U.S. Army photo by Elizabeth Fraser / Arlington National Cemetery ) released)
November is National American Indian Heritage Month, honoring the hundreds of Native American tribes and peoples of the United States. And the day after Thanksgiving is Native American Heritage Day.
Mindful of that, we thought this would be a good FRIDAY FOTO as we near the end of November. It shows Vincent Goesahead Jr. of the Crow Nation during the opening ceremony commemorating the centennial of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, Virginia, on November 9, 2021.
The road to a national commemoration of that heritage has taken several twists over the 20th Century. Originally treated as members of sovereign “nations” for treaty-making purposes, Native Americans were not extended U.S. citizenship — and the civil rights that went with it — until 1924.
Nevertheless, a significant number of Native Americans have served in all of the nation’s wars beginning with the Revolutionary War, according to the Defense Department website.
Twenty-nine service members of Native American heritage have been awarded the Medal of Honor, the highest medal for valor: 25 soldiers, three sailors and one Marine. That Marine is the fabled Greg “Pappy” Boyington of the Cactus Air Force in World War II — who a member of the Brule Sioux tribe.
In 1976, as part of the nation’s bicentennial commemoration, President Gerald Ford proclaimed October 10-16, 1976, as “Native American Awareness Week.”
In 1986, President Ronald Reagan proclaimed November 23-30, American Indian Week.
It wasn’t until November 14, 1990, President George H. W. Bush declared the month of November as National American Indian Heritage Month to honor the hundreds of Native American tribes and people in the United States, including Alaska. Native Hawaiians and those in U.S. territories in the Pacific are honored in Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month each May.
Those who claim to be American Indians in the active duty force as of July 2021, number 14,246, or 1.1 percent of the total force, according to the Defense Manpower Data Center.
In the past, we here at 4GWAR Blog have celebrated the Native American code talkers: Navaho Marines and Comanche, Choctaw and Meswaki Soldiers who thwarted German and Japanese troops listening in on U.S. field telephone and radio communications in World War I and World War II.
On the Pentagon website there are feature stories on Comanche, Lakota and Lumbee Native Americans serving in today’s Army and Navy.
For those who see bitter irony in celebrating the Native Americans who wore the uniform of the national government that frequently warred on them, took their land and tried to obliterate their culture, we offer this photo, of the Apache leader Geronimo, and a caption dripping with irony, that grew out of the response to the 9/11 attacks on the Homeland.
4GWAR 