Is this legal...and if so why?!?!

I was watching Meet the Press this morning and a curious thought crossed my mind.

Colonel Graham is also Senator Graham. 

Senator Graham sits on the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Senator Graham confirms all General Officer appointments.

Senator Graham just did his Reserve Duty obligation in Afghanistan (something he was quick to point out) so he was working for the same person that he voted to confirm only a few months ago.

This is obviously legal or much smarter people than me would have jumped all over it but I wonder if its RIGHT.

Its great for re-election campaigns in the South where military service is still valued, but is it good for the service?

Have you seen this?

I saw this first on Gawker of all places.  It shows US soldiers playing a prank by planting a grenade in an unsuspecting Iraqi's car.

Bad joke.

Hmm, makes me wonder where the leadership was and why this was allowed.  Anyway, judge for yourself.  What I do know for a fact is this.  Unless the guy that was playing the prank was an extremely fast talker this Iraqi could have ended up real dead, or at the very least beat to a few inches of his life.

Again.  Bad joke.

F-35 critics weep softly this time. France and UK won't share aircraft carriers.

I first read the story of France and the UK sharing aircraft carriers over at Aviation Week and to be honest it seemed overblown.

Yes, the story was sourced from a reputable British newspaper.

Yes, the story was confirmed by a noted aviation expert/writer.

Yes, it seemed like something to make critics of the F-35 jump for joy.

And yes, it seemed like something from a think tank.

All of the above made the story suspect and this latest piece of information confirms it.

France and Britain announced Friday they are talking about sharing the cost of military aircraft programmes, but rejected reports that they plan to merge their aircraft carrier fleets."In terms of actually being able to share an aircraft carrier, I would have thought that that was utterly unrealistic," Defence Minister Liam Fox told reporters after talks with his French counterpart Herve Morin.
"But when it comes to pooling assets in other areas such as strategic or tactical lift I would have thought that that was a different case altogether," he added, referring to military transport planes and helicopters.

Read the whole thing here and get in a corner F-35 haters.  I'm tired of the whining.

New F-35 video.

F-35 update

Lt. plays pattycake. 21 US troops die in 48 hours in Afghanistan.

 

Thanks for the heads up Resident Author on this story.

A few have stated that I'm too tough on the Lt. in the previous post for playing pattycake.

I'm not at all sorry for my characterization.

Follow this link and feel the pain.

Marines are involved in combat.  The special trust and relationship requires that she prepare her Marines to survive the horrors of war.  Playing pattycake isn't getting that done.

Wow Lt. isn't that special! How about leading Marines instead of playing patty cake?

Will someone in Headquarters Marine Corps spare us the sight of an of Officer of Marines playing patty cake?

If she can't find something better to do with her time then its time for a serious reduction in force.  Guys in Afghanistan are fighting and dying and this officer is playing.

Amazing!

Army Operating Concept.

Well I definitely haven't been paying enough attention to the Army Guys lately. 

The decision about the GCV was telegraphed for months...the Army Chief of Staff himself was expressing doubt about the weight of the vehicle and I still don't believe that they'll get it across the finish line, but perhaps more interesting is this new Army Operating Concept.

Security Stabilization Operations?

Give me a break.  Its a new name for a Three Block War.  But the ball busting part of this whole thing is how they've settled on the 2016-2028 timeline.

Didn't I once see something like an Army 2020???? 

Regardless its here for you to read ...

tp525-3-1

You guys rock!

You guys are the best.  Once again, readers here have clued us in to information before the rest of the web has picked up on it.

I could point to more than a couple of issues but the latest is the ongoing saga with the Kel-Tec PMR-30.

We've been looking at the slow delivery of this firearm to the market place for a while but now it seems that the dedicated firearms blogs are noticing...the "Firearm Blog"...is one of the best and they have finally keyed in on this.  Read it here.

Again, you guys rock.  Thanks.

Singapore's answer to the LPD as mini-LHD.

I posted yesterday that the idea of using LPD's as mini-LHD's has merit.  Well my friends Leesa and Marcase were a bit skeptical.

Fair enough.

But the main area of disagreement dealt with the limited space for aviation and in particular the limited areas for aviation maintenance.

My rebuttal comes in the form of what Singapore is doing with their LPD.  Below you'll see a sales brochure (yeah I know a Sales Brochure) but the point is this...there is plenty of space...on the San Antonio class the space is evident and on the older LSD's and LPD's the space has been made available with the use of removable hangars.

If we're going to do distributed operations.  If we're going to have mini-ARGs then this is something that must be done.

572N81fXA1DTA3OViRd

SAAB Networked Enabled Capability.

Leopard 2A7+

KMW has been pretty busy lately.  Not to the level of BAE (which really might be from the fact that BAE is a collection of companies and not one single entity) but they've been busy none-the-less.

Still this latest offering is curious.

Over the years we've seen the super long barreled Leopard 2A6, and the Peace Support Operations Leopard.  With the 2A7+ we see them returning to the PSO variant, dropping the long barrel, adding machineguns and bolt on armor and the now common dozer blade.

I'm not sure if this is really qualifies for a new model designation or not.  It seems to be more inline with what the US Army did a couple of years ago with its TUSK upgrade. 

Leopard 2A7+ Specifications (From the KMW Website)
Weight	67.5 t
Length (gun at 12 o'clock)	10.97 m
Width	4.00 m
Height (turret roof)	2.64 m
Engine power	1,100 kW (1,500 hp)
Maximum speed	72 km/h
Cruising range	450 km
Armament	120 mm / L55 smoothbore  cannon and 12.7 mm MG  oder 40 mm granade launcher  7.62 mm coaxial MG