US Army gets in troll fight over female "Rangers"...

via Daily Caller..story here.

Not surprising.

The US military is so misunderstanding the trauma they're about to create for themselves when it comes to recruiting and retention with this move that I almost feel sorry for them.  Almost.  They're so disconnected from middle America that it boggles the senses.  They recruit from the fly-over states yet express the views of the Northeast corridor and the West Coast.

This is a social experiment and I can't wait for them to have it blow up in their faces.  I for one will NEVER RECOMMEND MILITARY SERVICE to a young man ever again.  The kick in the pants for leadership?  I won't be the only one.  They just told one of their biggest recruiting sources "FUCK YOU".  Well fuck them too.

More from Large Scale Exercise-15...pics by Pfc. Levi Schultz & Cpl. Charles Santamaria

Pics via The Combat Center FaceBook Page....

Fucking really Navy! An honor grad ribbon?

via Navy Times...

Boot camp's top graduates are about to get a new ribbon.
Every sailor graduating from Navy Recruit Training receives the National Defense Service Ribbon. As many as three percent of each weekly graduating class will now earn an additional uniform ribbon: the new Navy Basic Military Training Honor Graduate ribbon.
"RTC recognizes multiple top performing recruits at graduation, but now the recognition is outwardly visible on an honoree's uniform," said Rear Adm. Stephen C. Evans in a statement. Evans commands Navy Service Training Command, which oversees all Navy officer and enlisted accession training except for the Naval Academy. "Wearing of the Honor Grad Ribbon will be a visible sign to peers and superiors at the recipient's future duty stations that the member demonstrated extraordinary excellence and leadership potential during Basic Military Training and is capable of accelerated and increased leadership positions within the Fleet."
The award is effective immediately. The first 15 honor grads will be awarded their ribbons Aug. 20 and can wear them when they graduate on Aug 21.
If you were a past honor graduate, don’t go out and buy one — there are no retroactive awards.
Navy Secretary Ray Mabus approved the award Aug. 18, details of which were released in ALNAV message 063/15.

Wow.

Participation awards have arrived in the military.

Modest proposal.  Marines should wear only their 4 highest awards.  The Navy can keep being the Navy.  But its time to for the Marine dress uniforms to stop looking like a bad caricature of a 3rd world dictator.

Germany's future Panzer via AutoBild.de

Thanks to Dwi for the link!

Many more pics here.

Interesting.  I guess the Russians are scaring the Germans a bit more than I imagined.  As far as this "new" tank is concerned the only part that strikes me as being unique is the RWS.  Its compact, streamlined and appears to have a bit of armor protection.  The rest of it we've seen before in bits and pieces.  Diwi pointed out that its remarkably similar to the MBT Revolution Leopard that was produced years ago and I agree.

I guess the long barrel 120mm cannon is noteworthy but again, that appears to be out of fear that their current rounds can't penetrate the Armata.  I'd still bet on our Depleted Uranium being able to punch thru.

All in all good for German morale but I don't see much to get excited about.

China just moved into Djibouti...

Thanks to Defense Talk for the heads up!

via Counterpunch.org

Djibouti, home to the only US permanent military presence in Africa, has recently notified the American military that they have to vacate Obock, a small secondary base which will see the installation of some 10,000 Chinese troops in their place.
The announcement, made the day after US Secretary of State John Kerry visited Djibouti last May is deeply worrying for Pax Americana for it comes on top of a major package of economic investments by China that has Djiboutian President Guelleh openly talking about the importance of his new friends from Asia.
China is about to complete a $3 billion railroad from the capital of Ethiopia, Addis Ababa, Africa’s second largest country to Djibouti, Ethiopia’s only outlet to the sea. China is also investing $400 million in modernizing Djibouti’s notoriously undersized port, where for the past 17 years (since the Ethiopians tried and failed to take Eritrea’s port of Assab during Ethiopia’s war against Eritrea from 1998-2000) Ethiopia has been forced to import 90% of its fuel and food from.
The US military pays Djibouti $63 million a year for the use of Camp Lemonnier, home to 4,000 US troops and one of the worlds largest drone bases used to terrorize the populations of Yemen and Somalia. This is a pittance really, when compared to the hundred$ of million$ a year that the Chinese investments will bring into Djiboutian government coffers.

The author of this article concludes with the thought that China is going to be left "holding the short end of the stick" with this move.

I disagree.

From the Pacific to Africa we're involved in either territorial disputes that are a threat to our credibility or more nuanced competition to gain influence in places like Africa.  Lets not forget the inroads that the Chinese are making in Central and South America while we're at it.

China is drinking our milkshake.

JLTV decision soon. But what unit is it for?

via Military.com

Defense contractors competing for a contract to build the U.S. military’s replacement to the iconic Humvee are eagerly awaiting a decision from the Army.
Humvee-maker AM General, truck-maker Oshkosh Corp. and defense contracting giant Lockheed Martin Corp. are vying to begin production of the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle, or JLTV.
An announcement on which company will be chosen to build the first 17,000 production models of the vehicle is expected either this week or next, sources told Military​.com.
Overall, the Army and the Marine Corps plan to buy a total of 54,720 JLTVs to replace about a third of the Humvee fleet at an estimated cost of more than $30 billion, or about $559,000 per vehicle, according to Pentagon budget documents.

So let me get this straight.

The 82nd, USMC and SOCOM are all developing ultra-light combat vehicles or using off the shelf ATVs.  Additionally its becoming obvious that the Army needs either (A) develop a replacement for the Bradley, (B) seriously upgrade the Stryker (C) upgrade the Bradley along with the Stryker (D) do A, B, and C or (E) buy JLTVs.

The USMC needs to (A) get on with the selection of the ACV (B) scrap the survivability upgrades and do a soup to nuts upgrade of the AAV (C) do both A and B or (D) buy the JLTV.

Lets take a step back and ignore doctrine and just look at the JLTV buy in a vacuum.  To which units will it go?  What will happen to the Humvees that are still in service and will undoubtedly be fired on?  Does it make sense to have two separate supply lines for two separate utility vehicles performing presumably the same functions?

The JLTV buy just doesn't make sense.

Lets call this what it is.  This is a bone being tossed to the ground forces to get us to shut up about the TREMENDOUS cost of the F-35 and how ground combat units are being shredded to pay for it (along with the Soldiers and Marines that man those units).

This program should have been canned long ago.  A more sensible solution would be to get the Textron upgrade...it would be cheaper and just as effective...while simplifying the supply chain, not further complicating it.

All the US Navy combat jets in history via SPLOID...

NOTE:  They have a few jumbled images in this and that's to be expected...Sploid is an entertainment and not defense channel so this is more a flight of fancy rather than a serious documentation of Navy airplanes.

F-35 is minimally effective, extremely expensive via US News & World Report...

via USNews (here)...

Saying the current plan, “may not be affordable” is putting it mildly. The long-term sustainment costs of F-35 have been pegged by GAO at roughly $1 trillion. Think about that for a moment. It’s hard to wrap your mind around something costing a trillion dollars. And as good as the GAO is at costing these things out, I have no doubt this estimate will continue to creep upward. Can the Pentagon afford such a massive investment, for a plane designed to be in the inventory for at least 40 years, when the nature of warfare in 2025, much less 2055 is unknowable?
I certainly hope this initial operational capability designation doesn’t mean the Pentagon believes the F-35 is now eligible for Overseas Contingency Operations funding. The Marines asked to reprogramunspent contingency operations funds at the end of the last fiscal year to buy more F-35s. Thankfully, the U.S. House Appropriations Committee forcefully shut that down. But initial operational capability and Overseas Contingency Operations share one common root word: “operations.” People who care about fiscal sanity and sound budget practices should be watching for this.

Uh...yeah....this is going from a travesty to a tragedy.

The situation in Ukraine Infographic via Reuters Blog...

via Reuters Blog (here)...

Renewed fighting in Ukraine has claimed the lives of dozens of civilians and soldiers in the past two weeks alone. Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and Russian President Vladimir Putinhave both called emergency war councils since Aug. 4, as the ceasefire and diplomacy have further broken down. In its recent reports, the Ukrainian military has used the phrase “most shelling in six months” multiple times, and with increasing frequency.

I keep hearing how this is one of the most peaceful times in human history.  My eyes are telling me otherwise.

This does explain some of the moves by the Pentagon...sending a Marine Corps Special Purpose Armored Task Force (my name for it...fits the current "style") and having the Army's 2nd CAV running circles around Europe....something evil is definitely brewing.  I don't think we'll see intervention in case of a flair up, rather an effort to contain it.

T-90A MBT's in Ukraine? If true this is the smoking gun...

via Tank & AFV News.

Ukraine Today is reporting that T-90A tanks have been identified operating near Luhansk in east Ukraine. If true, this would be evidence of Russian involvement in the fighting in Donbas. According to the article, Ukrainian activists on August 14-15 published photos of the Russian armor on their facebook page.

Here.

Wow.

This (if true) is blatant.  Is an outright admission of Russian forces in Ukraine and will require a response.  Just wow.