Outside the Beltway

United States helped Saddam Hussein launch some of the worst chemical attacks in history against Iran.

The VA created an incentive system that rewarded fast, half-assed claim processing that denied complicated requests.

Virginia Tech English prof Steven Salaita implores us to “Stop saying ‘support the troops.'”

As President Obama’s red line has been crossed more brazenly, he continues to sound reluctant to intervene in Syria while positioning forces to do just that.

Convicted felon Bradley Manning has announced that she’d like to spend her confinement as Chelsea Manning.

The Army and Navy are finally doing something about brass bloat.

West Point graduates account for nearly one in fifty deaths in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Bradley Manning will be spending a long time at Leavenworth.

Does interest in Egypt make the same sense it did 30 years ago?

It may be Rick Santorum’s “turn” but he’s too harsh and extreme to win the nomination.

The Air Force will now allow pregnant women and single parents to join.

Al Qaeda may be up to something, so take no chances.

Megan Welter served as a Signal Corps officer in the Iraq War. Now, she’s an Arizona Cardinals cheerleader.

Bradley Manning was acquitted of the most serious charge against him, but is still likely to spend most of his life in prison.

Army Staff Sergeant Ty Carter will be the fifth living recipient of the Medal of Honor from the Afghanistan-Iraq era.

Chris Christie waded into the debate going on in the GOP over foreign policy. His comments were less than helpful to say the least.

Last month, a retired Navy SEAL came out as transgender. Those still in uniform, however, must serve in silence.

As many as 500 convicted al Qaeda terrorists were released Sunday night as part of a surge of violence that has killed thousands since April.

The Oval Office Address, once a common tool of the Presidency, has been in declining use of late.

The Defense Department will freeze promotions, cut workers, and suspend training in the face of across-the-board funding cuts.

North Korea’s nuclear weapons aren’t going anywhere.

Ostensible allies in the fight against the Assad regime, al Qaeda and the Free Syrian Army are killing each other.

A state of perpetual war is incompatible with good mental health and stable family relationships.

The military’s finance and accounting system has been dysfunctional for decades and is getting worse.

Frustrations with the mercurial leader of Afghanistan may increase the pace of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.

A decade ago. a certain New York Times columnist was more right than your humble host.

The blowback from yesterday’s revelations about U.S. surveillance on European allies continues.

The conviction of Marine Sergeant Lawrence Hutchins III for war crimes in 2006 has been overturned.

Rather than asking whether it was “worth it,” the important historical question regarding the Civil War is whether it could have been avoided.

About $7 billion in military equipment now in Afghanistan will be scrapped rather than returned to the U.S.

Radical Islamists now dominate the Syrian opposition. And you’re arming them.

Two polls indicate that most Americans oppose the President’s latest moves on Syria. This makes sense considering actual policy there seems to be entirely incoherent.

President Obama’s poll numbers seem to be suffering under the weight of nearly two months of scandals and/ media attention.

The U.S. is now confirming that the Syrian government has used chemical weapons. What’s next?

Outrage over leaks like those that Edward Snowden makes doesn’t exist when its politicians doing the leaking.