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4 April 2023

Military Times | Senate votes to repeal Iraq war authorizations

The Senate’s vote to repeal of the 2002 bill — alongside a 1991 Gulf war authorization to defend Kuwait against Saddam Hussein — marks a significant milestone in congressional efforts to claw back lawmakers’ warmaking authorities from the White House, ensuring that future presidents can’t invoke them as a justification for military intervention in the Middle East.

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The Hill | Finland to join NATO on Tuesday. What will it take for Sweden to follow

Finland on Tuesday is set to become the 31st member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the largest military alliance in the world. The historic moment comes after Turkey last week decided to allow Finland to move ahead on joining NATO without its neighbor Sweden.

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Task & Purpose | Iran has attacked US troops 83 times since Biden became president

Iran and its proxy forces have launched 83 attacks against U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria since President Joe Biden took office, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told lawmakers on Tuesday.

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Military Times | Army identifies nine soldiers killed in Fort Campbell crash

Army officials on Friday identified the nine soldiers lost this week when two HH-60 Black Hawk helicopters flying out of Kentucky’s Fort Campbell crashed, killing everyone on board.

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New York Times | 6 U.S. service members suffered traumatic brain injuries in Syria attacks

Six American service members suffered traumatic brain injuries in separate attacks by Iranian-backed militants in Syria last week, the Pentagon said on Thursday.

The Hill | Stop Veterans Affairs from setting itself up to fail

The Department of Veterans Affairs is abandoning a six-year-old law meant to make it easier to discipline or fire employees for misconduct or nonperformance. What’s going on? The headline in Government Executive, a daily publication for government employees, explains simply: “VA will no longer use its marquee civil service reform law to punish employees,” and the article notes, “The Biden administration unwinds a key Trump legislative victory, citing a series of setbacks the law has endured.”

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Washington Post | Veterans deserve support. But one benefit program deserves scrutiny

If we owe our veterans every support, we also owe them a measure of fiscal responsibility. Today, we offer suggestions about how to carefully prune the department’s kudzu-like spending growth.

The Overwatch | #VAFail: What is the VA hiding that it won’t release under the Freedom of Information Act?

The Department of Veterans Affairs continues to drag its feet on producing records requested under the Freedom of Information Act and now the subject of an ongoing lawsuit.

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The Overwatch | Senate passes AUMF repeal bill in historic vote

The Iraq Authorizations for Use of Military Force have been on the books for decades, leaving an opening for military action not recently voted on by Congress. But those outdated and obsolete AUMFs are on their way out the door thanks to a Senate vote this week.

We Are The Mighty | Veteran shares his journey to healing with new novel, Suicide in Slow Motion

Coast Guard veteran Reagan Pettigrew may have penned a fiction novel about loss and the weight of suicide ideations but its his own journey the character embarks on, page after page. And he’s just getting started.

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