Defense

  • U.S. Navy gunners aboard a refueling ship opened fire on a small boat racing toward them in broad daylight Monday near the Gulf city of Dubai, killing one person and injuring three. The Associated Press reports, "the rare shooting not far from approaches to the Strait of Hormuz comes at a period of heightened tensions between the United States and nearby Iran."

    July 17, 2012
  • The Defense and Transportation Departments announced Route 1 will expand to six lanes as the result of $180 million disbursement from the Office of Economic Adjustment to pay for the upgrades.

    July 16, 2012
  • Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz has taken his last flight as an active-duty officer. Gen. Schwartz flew aboard a MC-130E Combat Talon I out of Hurlburt Field on Thursday for his "fini flight." He joined an MC-130E crew on a local training sortie.

    July 16, 2012
  • The federal government has issued more than 4.8 million security clearances to federal civilians, military service members and contractors. But the process for determining what positions require clearances amounts to little more than a "hodge-podge" across agencies, an official with the Government Accountability Office told Federal News Radio.

    July 16, 2012
  • A federal judge sentenced an Uzbek man living illegally in the United States to nearly 16 years in prison on Friday on terrorism and weapons charges stemming from his plot to kill President Barack Obama. Reuters reports, Ulugbek Kodirov, who arrived in the United States in 2009 to attend medical school but never enrolled, had plotted to shoot Obama while the President campaigned for re-election this year, according to federal authorities in Alabama.

    July 16, 2012
  • Using a DARPA grant and its own money, the FBI has enlisted researchers at George Mason University to try out so-called fuzzing attacks.

    July 16, 2012
  • An outside review panel has two disturbing conclusions about the Defense Department's handling of post-traumatic stress disorder.

    July 16, 2012
  • About 700 airmen just received iPads to use as electronic flight bags.

    July 16, 2012
  • The Army is unveiling eight new sizes of body armor for women.

    July 16, 2012
  • Mary Santiago, director of VA's Veteran Employment Services Office, was nominated for her work with the VA for Vets program.

    July 16, 2012
  • Phoenix-based TriWest Healthcare Alliance will end its challenge to the Defense Department's award of the TRICARE West Region contract to UnitedHealth. The decision comes weeks after the GAO dismissed TwiWest's protest.

    July 13, 2012
  • Rep. Scott Rigell's (R-Va.) asked the Navy to postpone its layoff dates for a year. The Navy is laying off 3,000 sailors to help balance its force profile.

    July 13, 2012
  • The Defense Department removed the 10-page limit after Rep. Buck McKeon (R-Calif.) called the department's latest report on China "skimpy."

    July 13, 2012
  • Lawyers for an ex-Marine from Virginia facing 25 years in prison for firing shots at the Pentagon, the Marine Corps museum in Quantico and other targets in 2010 now say their client is mentally ill. According to the Associated Press, the Associated Press is reporting Yonathan Melaku (meh-LAH-koo) of Alexandria pleaded guilty earlier this year to a series of overnight shootings at various military buildings in northern Virginia. No one was injured. In the plea deal, he agreed to a 25-year sentence. In court papers filed Wednesday in federal court in Alexandria, Melaku's new lawyers ask for a court-ordered mental examination.

    July 12, 2012