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House Republicans Demand Answers From Biden Over Decision to Send U.S. Tanks to Ukraine

Texas Rep. Troy Nehls and a group of House Republicans sent a letter Friday to President Joe Biden and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin demanding answers over their decision to send 31 Abrams tanks to Ukraine.

The letter, first obtained by the Daily Caller, was signed by three other House Republicans — Reps. Paul Gosar and Eli Crane of Arizona and Lauren Boebert of Colorado. In it, the lawmakers express concerns about the recently announced deployment of 31 M1A2 Abrams tanks to Ukraine. The lawmakers say the decision creates several logistical challenges, specifically that it will take several months to train Ukrainian forces to operate the tanks and that it will take another take several months to get the tanks onto the battlefield.

The Republicans also mention comments from Austin and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley, nothing that both “recommended against sending M1 tanks to Ukraine.”

They also cite Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Dr. Colin Kahl’s concerns about the policy. “The Abrams tank is a very complicated piece of equipment. It’s expensive. It’s hard to train on. It has a jet engine. I think it’s about three gallons to the mile of jet fuel. It is not the easiest system to maintain,” the letter quotes him as saying on Jan. 18.

“Each M1 Abrams tank costs approximately $9 million to build, and to date, Ukrainian aid and security packages have totaled over $97 billion,” the Republican lawmakers wrote in the letter. (Read more from “House Republicans Demand Answers From Biden Over Decision to Send U.S. Tanks to Ukraine” HERE)

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The War in Ukraine Is Finally Starting to Pay Off for Big Defense Contractors

The two largest U.S. defense contractors saw a boost in sales as the Pentagon accelerated weapons orders to fill the gap left by billions in weapons and equipment sent to Ukraine, the companies said Tuesday.

Lockheed Martin and Raytheon Technologies posted fourth quarter 2022 earnings Tuesday that came in still slightly below earnings from the same period in 2021, attributing the downturn to labor shortages and supply chain issues that suppressed earnings throughout 2022, statements show. However, the two largest beneficiaries of $6.6 billion in Department of Defense (DOD) contracts awarded to industry as part of the Ukraine war response are picking up the pace compared to the previous quarter, according to The Wall Street Journal.

“We’ve got the orders, we’ve got the capacity,” Raytheon CEO Greg Hayes said on an investor call Tuesday to break down the company’s quarterly earnings report. “We just need to bring the materials in.”

Lockheed reported quarterly sales of $19 billion, 3% above internal forecasts, netting $1.9 million in profit compared to $2.05 billion the prior year. Raytheon earned $1.4 billion in the fourth quarter of 2022 compared to $685 million in the same period in 2021, with sales skyrocketing nearly 6% to $18.1 billion, results that beat Wall Street expectations, The Associated Press reported. (Read more from “The War in Ukraine Is Finally Starting to Pay Off for Big Defense Contractors” HERE)

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68 Percent of Active Duty Military Believe Pentagon Is Politicized

The vast majority of U.S. active duty military members believe the Pentagon has become politicized, according to data obtained exclusively by Breitbart News.

Sixty-eight percent of active duty members say they have “witnessed a growing politicization,” while 53 percent say the military has become “too politicized.” Sixty-eight percent also say such politicization would impact their decision to encourage their children to join the military.

The data, gathered by the National Independent Panel on Military Service and Readiness (NIPMSR), show specific policy areas of concern for active duty military at a time when President Joe Biden’s Pentagon has been criticized by many for conducting social experiments in the ranks of the military, as opposed to focusing on national defense. The NIPMSR was empaneled by Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts.

“The Pentagon should be focused on winning America’s future wars rather than prioritizing divisive programs and issues,” Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL), who chaired the panel, said. “The Pentagon should be focused on how best to counter our global adversaries like China and recruiting the best and brightest to our ranks.” (Read more from “68 Percent of Active Duty Military Believe Pentagon Is Politicized” HERE)

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Pentagon’s UFO Office Has Received Hundreds of New Reports

A new Pentagon office set up to track reports of unidentified flying objects has received “several hundreds” of new reports, but no evidence so far of alien life, the agency’s leadership told reporters Friday.

The All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) was set up in July and is responsible for not only tracking unidentified objects in the sky, but also underwater or in space — or potentially an object that has the ability to move from one domain to the next.

The office was established following more than a year of attention on unidentified flying objects that military pilots have observed but have sometimes been reluctant to report due to fear of stigma. (Read more from “Pentagon’s UFO Office Has Received Hundreds of New Reports” HERE)

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Russia’s Ammo ‘Rapidly Dwindling,’ May Begin To Run Out in Early 2023: Pentagon

The Russian military is quickly running out of artillery and rocket ammunition, Pentagon officials said Monday, and the Russian army can only sustain its current rate of attack in Ukraine until early next year.

A senior U.S. defense official told reporters on a conference call that Moscow is increasingly turning to Iran and North Korea to replenish its “rapidly dwindling” stockpiles of rocket and artillery rounds, which have been crucial to Russia‘s months-long assault on Ukraine‘s energy infrastructure.

The Russian military has relentlessly attacked Ukrainian civilian targets across the country in recent months ahead of the looming winter season, but the current pace may only be sustainable for another few weeks or months at best. (Read more from “Russia’s Ammo ‘Rapidly Dwindling,’ May Begin To Run Out in Early 2023: Pentagon” HERE)

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Woke Pentagon to Pay Travel Costs for Service Members to Get Abortions

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin issued a memo calling for the Pentagon to create travel allowances for service members to travel for so-called “reproductive health care” that is unavailable in their areas, which means that soldiers’ abortion-related travel would be funded by hard-working American taxpayers.

The memo calls for the DOD to “Establish travel and transportation allowances for Service members and their dependents, as appropriate and consistent with applicable federal law and operational requirements, and as necessary amend any applicable travel regulations, to facilitate official travel to access noncovered reproductive health care that is unavailable within the local area of a Service member’s permanent duty station.” . . .

The move is a response to a U.S. Supreme Court decision earlier this year that returned to the states the authority to determine how to handle the issue of abortion and whether to ban the practice. Some states have banned most abortions. (Read more from “Woke Pentagon to Pay Travel Costs for Service Members to Get Abortions” HERE)

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Senate NDAA to Pentagon: ‘Immediately’ Halt Fight Against Extremism

The Senate Armed Services Committee has called on the Defense Department to halt its programs to prevent and root out extremism in the ranks.

The report accompanying the Senate’s National Defense Authorization Act, which was made public late Monday, states the committee’s view that “spending additional time and resources to combat exceptionally rare instances of extremism in the military is an inappropriate use of taxpayer funds, and should be discontinued by the Department of Defense immediately.”

The language has not previously been reported in the press. While not legally binding on the Pentagon, it appears to send a signal of congressional opposition to efforts to counter extremist narratives in the military. The Defense Department initiative was fueled largely by the fact that dozens of people charged with ransacking the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, were former or current service personnel — about 17 percent of those charged.

While the Senate report language suggests the committee as a whole supports halting counter-extremism training and analysis, the same document reveals that the committee approved including that section of the report by only the narrowest of margins: 14-12.

Every Republican on the committee voted for the motion, and every Democrat voted against it. Maine Independent Sen. Angus King’s vote in favor of the language tipped the balance in the GOP’s favor. (Read more from “Senate NDAA to Pentagon: ‘Immediately’ Halt Fight Against Extremism” HERE)

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Rebellious Department of Defense Gives Middle Finger Again to Reversal of Roe v. Wade

The Pentagon has quietly lifted a longstanding ban that prevented troops and civilians from searching for abortion-related terms on the department’s computer networks, a move that follows the Supreme Court’s landmark decision to overturn Roe v. Wade last month.

The department had banned abortion-related content, as well as other topics, under a policy dating to 2010, “to maximize available bandwidth for mission purposes,” Pentagon spokesman Navy Lt. Cmdr. Tim Gorman said in an email Tuesday to Military Times.

Such a sea change to what the department’s more than 3 million users can access on their computers came after POLITICO reported on May 3 that the court was slated to overturn Roe, but before the opinion was released on June 24.

“We determined in early June that we should absolutely allow content categorized as abortion (to be accessible on DOD networks) based on the healthcare aspects related to the category,” Gorman said. He added that the department continually evaluates content categories that are blocked on department networks.

Military Times began asking about the policy last month after a military officer said he had tried to access the non-profit Planned Parenthood and NARAL Pro-Choice America sites on his government computer to get information for his troops and received a blocked notification. (Read more from “Rebellious Department of Defense Gives Middle Finger Again to Reversal of Roe v. Wade” HERE)

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Biden Admin Super-Charged Military Recruitment Crisis With ‘Woke Policies’

The U.S. military under a Biden Pentagon has sacrificed meritocracy for wokeness in recent years, sending a message that discourages new applicants and worsens the recruiting crisis, an expert told The Daily Caller News Foundation.

Military recruitment in 2022 has plummeted, NBC News reported, leaving the pentagon scrambling for ways to fill the ranks of U.S. forces. Alienation of traditional families, who constitute the military’s core recruiting market, through things like diversity quotas, refusing religious exemptions and teaching critical race theory at military institutions have all contributed to a growing unwillingness to enlist, according to Center for Military Readiness President Elaine Donnelly.

The result, she said, is a loss of prestige and meritocracy in the armed forces.

“The culture of the military has been eroded by several years of social engineering and woke policies. It’s been accelerated by the current administration,” Donnelly, who has been studying social issues in the military for over 30 years, told TheDCNF.

The Biden administration’s emphasis on “woke” ideas “sends a poor message” that discourages parents and other influencers from supporting careers the all-volunteer force, according to Donnelly. (Read more from “Biden Admin Super-Charged Military Recruitment Crisis With ‘Woke Policies'” HERE)

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Memo Confirms Trump Pentagon Offered Guard Troops Before Jan. 6

Government memos validate the long-held claim of Trump administration officials that Capitol Police rejected an offer made by the Pentagon four days before the Jan. 6 riot to provide National Guard troops.

An official Capitol Police timeline obtained by Just the News records a Jan. 2, 2021, text from Defense Department official Carol Corbin to Capitol Police deputy chief Sean Gallagher.

Corbin, according to the timeline, reached out “to determine whether USCP is considering a request for National Guard soldiers for January 6, 2021 event.”

The following morning, “Gallagher replies to DOD via text that a request for National Guard support not forthcoming at this time after consultation with COP Sund,” referring to Steven Sund, the chief of the Capitol Police.

Just the News noted the rejection came as the Capitol Police was beginning to change its assessment of Jan. 6, 2021, to take into account a massive Trump rally to protest the November 2020 election results. (Read more from “Memo Confirms Trump Pentagon Offered Guard Troops Before Jan. 6” HERE)

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