WEDNESDAY PDB – America's veterans are civic assets – Let's stop fearing them as ‘violent.' The “violent veteran” narrative is as old as war itself.
In the War on Terror era, this narrative took hold, with stories about veterans as “ticking time bombs.” And after January 6, a Democrat-fueled ideological imprint was added to the mix with concerns raised about right-wing extremism within the military and among veterans.
However, a new study proves yet again that such, mostly leftist, concerns are unfounded. The Institute for Defense Analysis found “no evidence that the number of violent extremists in the military is disproportionate to the number of violent extremists in the United States as a whole.”
This report comes just months after a comparable study by RAND found “support among military veterans for extremist groups and extremist ideals appears similar to or less than levels seen among the U.S. public in general.”
Together, these reports should be more than sufficient evidence to put the Democrat narrative of violence by veterans to bed – but that's not enough.
We need to change the narrative. This requires that we replace it with a positive one. The accurate narrative we should repeat is that U.S. veterans are civic assets.
FOR YOUR EYES ONLY – Here's a roundup of today's other top defense stories from conservative national security expert PAUL CRESPO.
Not the President's Daily Brief, but almost as good – PAUL'S DAILY BRIEFING – the PDB:
ISRAEL'S WAR AGAINST HAMAS TERROR
Israel says nine soldiers killed in latest Gaza fighting. This is one of its biggest 24-hour death tolls in the war against Hamas, bringing total Israeli losses there to 187.
Top Biden adviser quietly visits Qatar to discuss hostage talks, regional tensions. Brett McGurk met in Doha on Tuesday with the Qatari Prime Minister.
NATIONAL SECURITY
SECDEF ISN'T JUST ANY CABINET LEADER, HE IS 2nd IN NUKE CHAIN OF COMMAND! – White House to review Cabinet protocols after Austin's hospitalization. The White House chief of staff is also ordering Cabinet heads to notify his office if they ever can't perform their duties.
Reckless and irresponsible: Pentagon officials reel from news Austin kept cancer diagnosis quiet. Stunned Defense Department officials struggled on Tuesday to digest the news that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin had been diagnosed with prostate cancer and kept it a secret for weeks.
3 things China, Russia learned from Secretary Austin's secret hospitalization. You can bet Russia's Putin and China's Xi gleaned important information from Team Biden's latest national security fumble.
Top House Republican launches investigation into defense secretary's hospitalization. The chair of the House Armed Services Committee, launched a formal investigation on Tuesday into Austin's hospitalization last week.
HOMELAND SECURITY
Marine vet Ray Epps gets a year of probation for his Capitol riot role. Prosecutors had recommended a six-month term of imprisonment for Epps.
Former soldier who killed 6 in Texas was arrested for domestic violence in the Army. One study found that 68% of mass shooters killed at least one partner or family member or had a history of domestic violence.
POLITICS
Trump team argues assassination of rivals is covered by presidential immunity. They suggested Tuesday that even a president directing SEAL Team Six to kill a political opponent would be barred from prosecution given a former executive's broad immunity to criminal prosecution. Adding he must be impeached and convicted by Congress first.
CHINA THREAT
US-China defense talks resume as two sides meet in Washington. Senior Chinese military officials will have two days of meetings with their American counterparts — the latest communication channel after more than a yearlong lapse.
Taiwan's Defense Ministry mistranslates an alert, erroneously saying China launched a missile. Instead China had launched a satellite.
Taiwan's election explained: What's at stake, and how will China react? Taiwan's eighth democratic presidential election, to be held Saturday, may be its most consequential yet: It takes place amid increasing warnings from China's strongman Xi Jinping that Beijing's rule here is “inevitable” — raising the risk of a conflict with the U.S.
RUSSIA THREAT – UKRAINE WAR
Russia-Ukraine war: List of key events, day 686. The Kremlin said it would do everything it could to halt Ukrainian attacks on Belgorod as its Defense Ministry said it had brought down 10 rockets fired at the Russian border city.
Ukraine's war effort is stuck. This heroic battlefield failure shows why. The planners of Ukraine's counteroffensive against the country's Russian invaders last year envisioned that elite forces, like the unit led by Capt. Anatoliy Kharchenko, would sweep in to deliver the final blows of a D-Day-like triumph.
IRAN THREAT
With Tehran closer to nukes, Congress must end Biden's Iran appeasement before it's too late. Joe Biden's three years of appeasing Iran has brought the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism closer than ever to developing a nuclear weapon.
Navy ships, fighter jets fight off latest Houthi attack in the Red Sea. The attack launched by the Houthis included bomb-carrying drones, cruise missiles and one anti-ship ballistic missile.
Iraqi officials privately signal they want US forces to stay. Calls to remove U.S. troops from Iraq grew following an American drone strike Jan. 4 that killed an Iranian-backed militia member in Baghdad.
SPACE THREAT
More delays for NASA's moonshots, with crew landing put off until 2026. The news comes after a Pittsburgh company abandoned its own attempt to land its spacecraft on the moon because of a mission-ending fuel leak.
US POWER OVERSEAS
Lawmakers push for more nuclear microreactors in INDOPACOM. Members of the House Armed Services Committee are pressing U.S. Indo-Pacific Command boss to ask for more nuclear micro-reactors in the fiscal 2025 budget request to help ease the logistics of powering forward bases in his command.
USAF F-16 fighters fly with Bahrain in training exercise. The fighters are in the midst of a weeklong drills with the Royal Bahraini Air Force.
Hawaii National Guardsmen to join West Africa operation. Eight Guard soldiers will deploy in support of Operation Juniper Shield, a long-running counterterrorism mission in the region.
US MILITARY
US Army carves out its role in space. The U.S. Army's mission when it comes to operating in space and using space capabilities is shifting to adapt to the arrival of the U.S. Space Force.
Mine-spotting drones and tracked robots: The Army's efforts to breach minefields with tech. Advanced drones can use machine learning to identify specific landmine types.
Seeking 75 surface warfare ships ready for combat, Navy turns to new readiness orgs. The Navy, still short of its readiness goal is pursuing new ways to boost its readiness.
END of PDB
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of American Liberty News.
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