Outside the Beltway

John Nagl, who became famous as a leading counterinsurgency theorist and practitioner, is taking on a new challenge: grooming young boys for life.

General Martin Dempsey, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, sent a message to Israel last week.

A new IAEA report may make an Israeli strike on Iran in the near future more likely than it has ever been.

My latest for The Atlantic, “Stop Feeling Sorry for American Veterans, has posted.

The GOP claims to be a party that favors limited government, but its foreign policy positions reveal this to be little more than a lie.

Left with a choice between their hawkish foreign policy and their supposed commitment to fiscal conservatives, Republicans will, without fail, spend the nation into debt.

Today’s convention activities will include the opening salvos of an attack on the President’s foreign policy. This strikes me as a mistake.

An Atlantic story on veterans returning to college is both poignant and miscast.

A new book by one of the Navy SEALs involved in the raid that killed Osama bin Laden differs significantly from the official version put forward by the government.

Security at the Republican Convention in Tampa looks more like a war zone than a political convention in a democratic republic.

The Republican Party has apparently solved all of the nation’s real problems and decided it can waste time on nonsense.

Four idiot privates from Fort Stewart planned to take over the base, kill the president, and take over the government.

Justin Strine spent part of the summer in jail for violent mayhem but doesn’t understand why he’s unfit to be an Army officer.

To much fanfare, President Obama announced a shift in Afghan War policy in December 2009. There’s little evidence it’s worked.

A former Obama official says government should learn from business, but is private industry really more efficient?

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs has a message for those who wear and have worn our country’s uniform: “We are not elected to serve; rather, we elect to serve.”

The candidates aren’t talking about the war in Afghanistan very much, but that’s mostly because the American people don’t want them to.

President Obama issued a warning to Syria today over its chemical weapons stockpiles.

Since most pedophiles are men, Virgin airlines naturally treats all men as potential pedophiles.

Charges that the Obama administration leaked classified information about the Osama bin Laden raid for political gain are bunk.

Two groups of former special operations soldiers are opposing Obama. Their military bonafides are not their most interesting credentials.

Entirely unsurprisingly, the shooting at the Family Research Center’s office in Washington, D.C. is already being politicized.

Another step in the ongoing diplomatic showdown over the founder of Wikileaks.

A group of former special operations and intelligence officers are criticizing President Obama for “Dishonorable Disclosures.”

Some troubling, sad, and downright puzzling stories

For the first time in 80 years, there are no veterans on the major party Presidential tickets.

Tammy Smith has been promoted to brigadier general, thus becoming the first American general officer who also happens to be openly gay.

Once again, Chris Christie makes one wish there were more Republicans like him.

In calling for the sequestration cuts to be delayed, Republicans are demonstrating their lack of seriousness on the issue of fiscal responsibility.

The war in Afghanistan has not been a topic of discussion in the Presidential campaign, but that’s largely because there’s not much left to talk about.

The Obama campaign is challenging an Ohio law that gives members of the military three extra days to vote. They have a very persuasive argument.

The White House and the Pentagon are buildings, not unitary actors.

According to a new report, the CIA considers Israel to be an espionage threat.