4,000,000,029,057. Remember that number. It’s going to come up again later. But let’s begin with another number entirely. 145,000 — as in, 145,000 uniformed soldiers striding down Washington’s Pennsylvania Avenue. That’s the number of troops who marched down that very street in May 1865 after the United States defeated... Read more
A principios de junio de 2018, en un pequeño puesto militar cerca de la ciudad en ruinas de Jamaame, en Somalia, empezaron a escucharse disparos de armas portátiles mientras caían proyectiles de mortero. Cuando terminó el ataque, había un soldado somalí herido ─y si esa hubiera sido la única... Read more
Raids by U.S. commandos in Afghanistan. I could be talking about 2001 or 2018. A U.S. drone strike in Yemen. I could be talking about 2002 or 2018. Missions by Green Berets in Iraq. I could be talking about 2003 or 2018. While so much about the “war on... Read more
In early June 2018, at a tiny military post near the tumbledown town of Jamaame in Somalia, small arms fire began to ring out as mortar shells crashed down. When the attack was over, one Somali soldier had been wounded — and had that been the extent of the... Read more
For almost 20 years, U.S. drone warfare was largely one-sided. Unlike Afghans and Yemenis, Iraqis and Somalis, Americans never had to worry about lethal robots hovering overhead and raining down missiles. Until, that is, one appeared in the skies above Florida. But that’s a story for later. For now,... Read more
2017 was a year of investigations for U.S. Africa Command. There was the investigation of the two-star commander of U.S. Army Africa who allegedly sent racy texts to an enlisted man’s wife. There was the investigation into the alleged killing of an Army Special Forces soldier by Navy SEALs... Read more
At around 11:00 that night, four Lockheed MC-130 Combat Talons, turboprop special operations aircraft, were flying through a moonless sky from Pakistani into Afghan air space. On board were 199 U.S. Army Rangers with orders to seize an airstrip. One hundred miles to the northeast, Chinook and Black Hawk... Read more
“We don’t know exactly where we’re at in the world, militarily, and what we’re doing,” Sen. Lindsey Graham, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in October 2017. That was in the wake of the combat deaths of four members of the Special Operations forces in the West... Read more
“They are very concerned about their adversary next door,” Gen. Raymond Thomas, the head of U.S. Special Operations Command, said at a national security conference in Aspen, Colorado in July 2017.  “They make no bones about it.” The “they” in question were various Eastern European and Baltic nations.  “Their... Read more
We were already roaring down the road when the young man called to me over his shoulder. There was a woman seated between us on the motorbike and with the distance, his accent, the rushing air and the engine noise, it took a moment for me to decipher what... Read more

Nick Turse

Managing editor of TomDispatch and a fellow at the Nation Institute.