Category: US Military

It looks like for a number of servicemembers it will be back to wearing masks indoors regardless of vaccination status:

The Pentagon on Wednesday announced it would once again require all individuals to wear face coverings when indoors at Defense Department facilities in locations deemed high risk by federal health officials for the spread of coronavirus.

The directive from Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks on Wednesday walks back guidance issued in May that allowed service members and others who had been fully vaccinated against the virus to forgo mask-wearing at Defense Department facilities worldwide. It comes one day after the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued new guidance encouraging vaccinated Americans to don masks indoors in certain locations where the coronavirus is spreading rapidly.

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link, but no word in the article on how this new policy will be implemented for troops stationed overseas.

Every time I see some one go down in flames for mishandling classified information I can’t help, but think of the whole Hillary Clinton situation:

 A 31-year-old civilian employee of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command pleaded guilty this week in Hawaii to mishandling classified information while she was on temporary duty in Manila.

Asia Janay Lavarello, in a plea agreement on Tuesday, admitted one count of “knowingly removing classified information concerning the national defense or foreign relations of the United States and retaining it at an unauthorized location” in U.S. District Court in Hawaii, the Department of Justice said in a news release Tuesday.

She is free on an unsecured bail bond, with sentencing scheduled for Nov. 4.

The count carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison, three years of supervised release and a fine of up to $250,000, the release said.

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link.

It looks like soon the remaining 30% of US military personnel not vaccinated will have to get the shot:

The Army is directing commands to prepare to administer mandatory COVID-19 vaccines as soon as Sept. 1, Army Times is reporting.

The Department of the Army Headquarters has sent an executive order to commands that the vaccines will become mandatory “on or around 01 September 2021 pending full Food and Drug Administration licensure.”

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link.

It sounds like this guy should be doing something else other than working for the Pentagon:

The headline hardly stood out on the website of the hyper-nationalistic Chinese newspaper.

“Why US will lose a war with China over Taiwan island,” announced the April 27 op-ed in the Global Times, which also referred to Taiwan’s democratically elected leaders as “renegade secessionists” and called U.S. Congress interest “corrupt.”

What was unusual about the article was its author.

Franz Gayl isn’t just an American. He is a celebrated whistleblower — whose conduct was praised by then-Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del. — and a retired Marine major working at the Pentagon.

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link.

The anti-religion group MRFF has found another cause to attack the military with:

A religious freedom and diversity group is demanding that a naval air station in Japan remove a Bible from a POW-MIA table on base. 

The Military Religious Freedom Foundation sent a letter Friday to Naval Air Facility Atsugi’s commander, Capt. John Montagnet, after receiving 15 complaints about the table from personnel at the installation, group founder Michael Weinstein told Stars and Stripes in a phone call Monday. (…..)

Over the past five years, the MRFF’s petitions resulted in the removal of Bibles from POW-MIA tables at Wright Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio; four Veterans’ Administration offices in Pennsylvania, Texas and Ohio; and an allergy clinic at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla.

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link, but if someone wants their religion represented on the table I am sure no one would have a problem with another book added to the table. I wonder if this group’s ultimate goal is to go after military chaplains and try to get them removed?

Anyway if any is wondering why the MRFF’s founder Michael Weinstein is so adamant about attacking the military all you have to do is follow the money.

Don’t expect to see any gay pride flags flying on U.S. military installations this month:

The Defense Department will not make an exception to its unauthorized-flag policy to allow military bases to fly rainbow flags for Pride month, chief Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said Friday.

June is gay pride month, which supporters often mark with displays of rainbow flags. However, a July 16 Pentagon policy that banned the display of unofficial flags on military installations means the unauthorized Pride flag will not fly on bases this month, Kirby said.

“The department will maintain the existing policy from July of 2020 regarding the display or depiction of unofficial flags, so there won’t be an exception made this month for the Pride flag,” Kirby told reporters at the Pentagon.

Stars & Stripes via a reader tip

You can read more at the link, but I can understand why the Pentagon upheld this ban because who knows what other exceptions people may want in the future for other events. The article did say that the State Department is going to allow gay pride flags to fly this month though.

It looks like Santa brought the coronavirus vaccine for some U.S. troops in South Korea and Japan:

U.S. Forces Korea will start administering the Moderna vaccine against the coronavirus to frontline health care workers and first responders “over the next few days,” the USFK commander, Gen. Robert Abrams, announced Tuesday.

In a message on the USFK website, Abrams said the command would receive “additional shipments of the vaccine to inoculate all USFK-affiliated community members as production and distribution increases.”

He did not specify a timeline for wider distribution of the vaccine. “I ask that our community remains patient and flexible as the additional shipments arrive,” Abrams wrote. (…….)

In Japan, the same vaccine is expected to arrive, destined for six U.S. bases with medical treatment facilities, “within the next 24-48 hours,” Chief Master Sgt. Rick Winegardner Jr., senior enlisted leader of U.S. Forces Japan, said on American Forces Network Radio on Wednesday.

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link.

This announcement will probably set off a whole new round of jokes about the Space Force:

Troops serving in Space Force are now referred to as Guardians, Vice President Mike Pence announced Friday.

“It is my honor on behalf of the president to announce henceforth the men and women of the United States Space Force will be known as Guardians,” Pence said during a ceremony to celebrate Space Force’s first birthday, which is Dec. 20. “Soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines and Guardians will be defending our nation for generations to come.”

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link, but does anyone have any alternative ideas on what Space Force personnel should be called?