The Pentagon is preventing the Biden administration from sharing American intelligence agencies' evidence about Russian atrocities in Ukraine with the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague. The evidence reportedly includes details of the abduction of thousands of Ukrainian children by Russian officials from occupied territory, as well as decisions...
Pentagon: Chinese Spy Balloon Spotted Over Western US
WASHINGTON — The U.S. is tracking a suspected Chinese surveillance balloon that has been spotted over U.S. airspace for a couple days, but the Pentagon decided not to shoot it down due to risks of harm for people on the ground, officials said Thursday. The discovery of the balloon puts...
US Report Makes No Definitive Finding About UFOs
WASHINGTON — Whatever or whoever they are, they’re still out there. U.S. intelligence is after them, but its upcoming report will not deliver the full and final truth about UFOs. The tantalizing prospect of top government intel finally weighing in — after decades of conspiracy theories, TV shows, movies and...
Austin Wins Senate Confirmation as 1st Black Pentagon Chief
WASHINGTON — Lloyd J. Austin, a West Point graduate who rose to the Army's elite ranks and marched through racial barriers in a 41-year career, won Senate confirmation Friday to become the nation's first Black secretary of defense. The 93-2 vote gave President Joe Biden his second Cabinet member; Avril Haines was...
Capitol Police Rejected Offers of Federal Help to Quell Mob
WASHINGTON — Three days before the pro-President Donald Trump riot at the Capitol, the Pentagon asked the U.S Capitol Police if it needed National Guard manpower. And as the mob descended on the building Wednesday, Justice Department leaders reached out to offer up FBI agents. The police turned them down both times, according to a defense...
Extraordinary Warning to Trump by 10 Former Pentagon Chiefs
WASHINGTON — In an extraordinary rebuke of President Donald Trump, all 10 living former secretaries of defense are cautioning against any move to involve the military in pursuing claims of election fraud, arguing that it would take the country into “dangerous, unlawful and unconstitutional territory.” The 10 men, both Democrats...
US Troop Pullouts in Mideast Raise Fears of Iranian Attacks
WASHINGTON — As the Pentagon pulls troops out of the Middle East in the coming weeks, under orders from President Donald Trump, U.S. military leaders are working to find other ways to deter potential attacks by Iran and its proxies, and to counter arguments that America is abandoning the region....
Military Wary That Shakeup Could Upend Its Apolitical Nature
WASHINGTON — The words spoken by America's top military officer carried a familiar ring, but in the midst of a chaotic week at the Pentagon, they were particularly poignant. “We are unique among militaries," said Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. “We do not take...
Pentagon-Trump Clash Breaks Open Over Military and Protests
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s Pentagon chief shot down his idea of using troops to quell protests across the United States, then reversed course on pulling part of the 82nd Airborne Division off standby in an extraordinary clash between the U.S. military and its commander in chief. Both Trump and...
Pentagon Reconsiders Microsoft Contract After Amazon Protest
WASHINGTON — The Pentagon is reconsidering its awarding of a major cloud computing contract to Microsoft after rival tech giant Amazon protested what it called a flawed bidding process. U.S. government lawyers said in a court filing this week that the Defense Department “wishes to reconsider its award decision” and...