Analysis

As the commander in chief, former President George W. Bush oversaw the return of thousands of troops in flag-draped transfer cases. Many more came home forever changed, some missing limbs, others with their minds racked with post-traumatic stress and blast injuries.

Google's parent company Alphabet has dispatched its stratospheric Project Loon balloons to deliver Internet service to remote areas of Puerto Rico where cellphone towers were knocked out by Hurricane Maria.

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All five living former U.S. presidents attended a concert Saturday night in a Texas college town, raising money for relief efforts from Hurricane Harvey, Irma and Maria's devastation in Texas, Florida, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

President Donald Trump says he doesn't plan to block the scheduled release of thousands of never publicly seen government documents related to President John F. Kennedy's assassination.

One was in prison for shooting a state trooper in the face. Another had repeatedly stabbed an Army sergeant's wife with a kitchen knife. A third was incarcerated for shooting a co-worker to death behind a west Charlotte gas station.

Prosecutors say that George Murillo was not your average bank robber. Murillo was fired from his job as a U.S. Postal Service worker after he committed a dramatic bank robbery on his day off from work earlier this year. The Palm Beach County man said it was “the most foolish thing” he had ever done.

The orchard is one of the few remaining remnants of the five or six original homesteads of the former Bangor townsite along the Hood Canal waterfront before the Navy came to the area in the 1940s.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott announced Friday that flags would be lowered to half staff on Saturday to honor Army Sgt. La David T. Johnson, the 25-year-old father of two, lost his life on Oct. 4, along with three other American soldiers, when they were attacked in an ambush in Niger in West Africa.

The house where Rosa Parks lived after sparking the Montgomery bus boycott was on a demolition list in Detroit until it was saved by Parks' niece and a Berlin-based artist, who moved it to Germany and reassembled it in his yard, piece by piece.

The 3rd Special Forces Group's annual Harvest Festival had a little bit of everything, designed for both young families and adults. From trunk or treating to a hay ride to games and a flowing beer tap, the event was meant to be one big family reunion of sorts for the soldiers and their families.

Lyla Kohistany spent seven years as a Navy officer, but when she looks at today's U.S. military, she doesn't see herself. That's because, as the nation and the military as a whole grows more diverse, she said the upper levels of the U.S. military are lagging behind.

In what is expected to be one of the hottest political races next year, Republican Congresswoman Martha McSally continues her unbroken streak of raking in more cash than her would-be Democratic rivals.

On Friday, a public viewing was held at Christ The Rock Church in Cooper City, where a funeral with military honors will be held for the slain soldier at 11 a.m. Saturday.

Starting next month, veterans can register for identification cards that prove their military history – but not everyone who has served will get one.

Fox News ran a story on Oct. 8 about a decorated Vietnam War Navy SEAL who created an enormous presidential glass seal he hoped to give to President Donald Trump. On Thursday, 11 days later, the network retracted the story after being told the man never served in Vietnam at all, much less earned commendations for his service.

For nearly three decades, retired Army Capt. Gary Michael Rose told no one about his harrowing four-day secret mission to Laos during the Vietnam War.

The IRS is asking a wounded veteran to pay $62,000 in income taxes on the federal government's cancellation of his student loans. Will Milzarski said he was surprised by the notice. "One part of government says, 'We recognize your service, we recognize your inability to work," Milzarski said. "The other branch says, 'Give us your blood.' Well, the U.S. Army already took a lot of my blood."

As an 82nd Airborne Division veteran, Richard Clapp had trained for this moment. But a disaster stole it from him and ended his Army career. On March 23, 1994, Clapp was among more than 170 soldiers who were injured in the so-called Green Ramp Disaster at Fort Bragg. Twenty-four other soldiers died that day.

Texas is overseeing a 7-year revamp of the shrine where 189 Texas independence fighters were killed by Mexican Gen. Santa Anna's troops in 1836. The project has raised the ire of some conservatives, who worry that the Battle of the Alamo will be sanitized by "political correctness."

Congress told the Navy to develop concepts for less-expensive aircraft carriers than those being built at Newport News Shipbuilding after the USS Gerald R. Ford, the first of a new class of such warships commissioned in July, suffered repeated cost overruns and delays. The federally funded Rand Corp. came up with four alternatives.

Sen. Lindsey Graham said Friday that Americans need to be prepared for more combat around the world as the rules of engagement against terrorist groups evolve under President Donald Trump’s administration.

The White House is defending White House chief of staff John Kelly who on Thursday derided a Florida congresswoman as an "empty barrel," saying she had delivered a speech at an FBI field office dedication in which she "talked about how she was instrumental in getting the funding for that building.

Ardie Wright got the condolence call from President Donald Trump on Tuesday. “It went probably 20 minutes or more, and I did 17 or 18 minutes of the talking,” Wright said, adding that Trump was "very cordial and polite.” Meanwhile, Calvin Murphy said he has not received such a phone call — or even a letter — from the commander-in-chief since his son, Spc. Etienne Murphy, died in May.

ANALYSIS

During his years of service, John F. Kelly experienced two losses that were intensely personal: that of Lance Cpl. Chance Phelps, killed in action when his unit was ambushed in Iraq in 2004 while providing convoy escort to Kelly, who was the assistant division commander at the time; and that of his son, Second Lt. Robert Kelly, in 2010, who was killed when he stepped on hidden explosives in Afghanistan.

Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl will learn his fate inside a Fort Bragg courtroom next week when defense attorneys and prosecutors will spar over the circumstances surrounding the soldier’s decision to walk off his combat outpost in Afghanistan some eight years ago.

The immigrants have been allowed to live and work in the United States under a program called Temporary Protected Status (TPS) that shields some migrants from deportation if their nations are stricken by natural disasters, civil wars or other calamities.

Friday's joyride from Charlestown Navy Yard in Boston to Fort Independence on Castle Island will celebrate the U.S. Navy's 242nd birthday and the 220th anniversary of the iconic vessel's maiden voyage.

The Department of Veterans Affairs is soliciting donors such as nonprofits to provide funds to construct, expand or renovate VA health care facilities.

Electrical linemen descend from helicopters, balancing on steel girders 90 feet high on transmission towers in the mountains of central Puerto Rico, far from any road. At the same time, crews fan out across the battered island, erecting light poles and power lines in a block by block slog.

Two more U.S. government workers have been confirmed to be victims of invisible attacks in Cuba, the United States said Friday, raising the total to 24.

GALLERY

Noting that past winners have included everyone from Gen. Douglas MacArthur to his own father, former President George W. Bush said his selection "arouses a sense of pride and humility in me."

Tyler James Yeager was arrested after an undocumented Chinese citizen was found hidden inside the spare tire compartment the vehicle that Yeager was driving.

The federal budget deficit rose to $666 billion in the just-completed fiscal year, a spike that comes as Republicans are moving to draft a tax code rewrite that promises to add up to $1.5 trillion to the national debt over the coming decade.

The top winners, announced Friday, are Staff Sgt. Jonathon Roque and Sgt. Brandon Kelley. A team from the National Guard took second, with third going to the U.S. Coast Guard.

The Arizona man accused of killing his wife — an Army veteran who lived in San Diego — allegedly abused a woman from a previous marriage, according to court documents.

The slaying of five dozen people in Las Vegas did little to change Americans' opinions about gun laws.

A spacewalking astronaut successfully replaced a blurry camera outside the International Space Station on Friday, but had to contend with a balky jetpack and a frayed safety tether. Both jetpacks and safety ties are crucial for saving a flyaway astronaut.

Former presidents are shedding a traditional reluctance to criticize their successors, unleashing pointed attacks on the Trump White House and the commander in chief — but without mentioning him by name.

Islamic State militants are capable of orchestrating and carrying out an attack against the United States, possibly downing an airplane, even after being evicted from their self-declared Syrian capital of Raqqa, the CIA director said Thursday.

Environmental pollution — from filthy air to contaminated water — is killing more people every year than all war and violence in the world. More than smoking, hunger or natural disasters. More than AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria combined.

Relatives of people who died in military service have recounted varied interactions with President Donald Trump in the difficult days and weeks after the deaths of their loved ones. Despite Trump's boast that he reaches out personally to all families of the fallen, interviews with families members did not support his claim. Some never heard from him at all, and a few who did came away more upset.

A Florida man has been sentenced to 29 years in prison for the wrong-way crash that killed Air Force Staff Sgt. Alexis Musumeci and her sister Brittany in 2015.

The U.S. military is searching for answers into the circumstances surrounding the deaths of four U.S. soldiers killed two weeks ago in an ambush in Niger as Defense Secretary Jim Mattis conceded Thursday that little about the attack is known, including how one soldier became separated from the rest of his unit.

An Ohio native who disappeared from Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota in 1977 has been found living in Florida under a fake name, reports say.

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White House chief of staff John Kelly delivered an extraordinary denunciation of a Democratic congresswoman Thursday, accusing her of politicizing what he called a "sacred" presidential effort to console the grieving loved ones of a slain soldier.

The Department of Veterans Affairs inspector general has launched a criminal investigation with the U.S. attorney's office and the FBI to identify how the system may have failed the Vietnam vet, the Boston Globe reported.

During a life cut short by war, Staff Sgt. Bryan Christopher Black lived as much as any man could. He was a Green Beret, medic, father, son, husband, chess master, cigar aficionado, coffee connoisseur, and master of many skills – including poker, carpentry, stock trading and martial arts. But most of all, Black, 35, was a man who never settled.

Companies have until Oct. 26 to finish the models but Border Patrol spokesman Theron Francisco said the last two came into profile, with crews installing a corrugated metal surface on the eighth model on a dirt lot just a few steps from homes in Tijuana, Mexico.

Last year, the Defense Department received 6,172 reports of sexual assault in the ranks - a new high and almost twice as many as were reported in 2010. Pentagon officials have called the increase an encouraging sign that more victims are willing to come forward and trust the military to help them.

A 36-year-old Kentucky man who authorities said tried to scale a White House fence on Tuesday while dressed as the Pokémon character Pikachu had planned to film his act in an attempt to attain fame, according to an arrest affidavit filed in court.

The wildfires that have devastated California this month caused at least $1 billion in damage to insured property, officials said Thursday, as authorities raised the number of homes and other buildings destroyed to nearly 7,000.

It's the first pennant for one of baseball's most storied franchises since Hall of Famer Tommy Lasorda managed Los Angeles to its last championship in 1988.

ANALYSIS

The summer of 2017 saw a rash of fatal military accidents — ships colliding at sea, planes crashing and vehicles catching fire — that were deadlier than attacks from America’s enemies. Still, major military accidents have been dropping, despite this year's spike.

The Federal Aviation Administration said in a paper filed recently with a U.N. agency that its tests show that when a laptop's rechargeable lithium-ion battery overheats in close proximity to an aerosol spray can, it can cause an explosion capable of disabling an airliner's fire suppression system.

The U.S. Military Academy's Association of Graduates will present the Thayer Award to the 43rd president on Thursday night. The award is given to citizens whose service in the national interest reflects the academy's motto of "Duty, Honor, Country."

Generations of professional and amateur sleuths have spent decades steeped in the details of the JFK assassination. In coming days, they’ll be able to pore through thousands more files kept classified for 54 years — unless President Donald Trump steps in.

A young Barack Obama questioned his place in the world and his racial identity, agonized over whether he'd make enough money as a community organizer, and lamented his incompatibility with his ex-girlfriend in 30 pages of letters he wrote to her that are now being archived by Emory University in Atlanta.

New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas is weighing in for the first time on the “tragedy” involving two Albuquerque-based nonprofits accused of siphoning millions of dollars from the accounts of veterans, elderly and special needs clients.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson called Wednesday for the U.S. and India to expand strategic ties. He also pointedly criticized China, which he accused of challenging international norms needed for global stability.

An Aurora, Ill. teen’s arrest at O’Hare International Airport in 2013 while trying to fly to the Middle East to join an al-Qaida branch symbolized a growing fear among law enforcement that young, impressionable Americans were becoming increasingly radicalized by online Islamic extremist propaganda.

President Donald Trump's quiet tribute to John Kelly's son contrasts with his messy brawl this week with critics of his handling of condolences to Gold Star families who, like Kelly, have lost people to recent warfare.

Chris Allen's phone started buzzing as word broke that invisible attacks in Cuba had hit a U.S. government worker at Havana's Hotel Capri. Allen's friends and family had heard an eerily similar story from him before.

Sessions advised the Senate Judiciary Committee at the outset of his first oversight hearing as attorney general that he would not answer any questions about conversations with the president that he considered confidential.

A Massachusetts man was convicted Wednesday of plotting to behead conservative blogger Pamela Geller and kill other Americans on behalf of the Islamic State group.

Chances are, if you're a young airmen new to the Air Force and coming to Dover Air Force Base, you're going to need a few basic supplies and some information.

President Donald Trump sent more perplexing signals Wednesday about whether he backs a bipartisan Senate deal for steadying health insurance markets, saying he backs lawmakers' efforts to strike that compromise but "can never support" federal bailouts for insurers.

A gunman shot five of his co-workers at a Maryland office park Wednesday, killing three of them and setting off a manhunt along the I-95 Northeast corridor, authorities said.

The Army has postponed the looming retirement of chief war crimes prosecutor Army Brig. Gen. Mark Martins, who will stay in the job “for at least another two years,” a Pentagon spokesman said Wednesday.

When President Donald Trump added the African nation of Chad to his most recent installment of travel restrictions, everyone from the Pentagon to Chad's leaders to the French government was perplexed — especially since the U.S. has praised Chad's cooperation on counterterrorism.

A federal watchdog has found most military bases have caught up on reporting about concerns of water contamination, but plenty of work remains to have more bases come into compliance and end future fears of water pollution.

Chris Baldridge, the father of Army Cpl. Dillon Baldridge, said the White House had done nothing else other than send a condolence letter from Trump — despite being promised a personal donation from the president.

Air Force Col. Michael Shawn Garrett, 45, arranged to meet with an undercover police officer who he believed was a 14-year-old boy to engage in sexual activity. He faces at least 10 years in prison and a maximum of life imprisonment without parole.

Tania Rodriguiz Ramos was pregnant and due any day as Hurricane Maria barreled toward Ponce, Puerto Rico. Unable to receive care in Ponce, Ramos was evacuated to the hospital ship USNS Comfort. On Saturday, Sara Victoria Llull Rodriguiz was born, weighing 6 pounds, 8 ounces.

Four months after he enlisted in the Army at 18, John Morse IV was on the front lines in Iraq training the sights of laser range finders on combat targets to be shelled. For the next four years, the fire-support specialist watched dozens of people in his unit die, saw missile fire kill civilians and witnessed the aftermath of a mass beheading. Last year, the 27-year-old who had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder hanged himself in a Nevada prison.

Another contingent of National Guard members from New York is preparing to depart for Puerto Rico to help the U.S. territory recover from Hurricane Maria.

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A few Fridays ago, in D.C. neighborhood, Smithsonian curator Frank Blazich put on headlamp and descended into the subbasement of Oyster-Adams intermediate school in search of the past. He found an intact fallout shelter dating to 1962. A time capsule to a nation's panic, lined up in a long, concrete hall.

Nikki Haley urged the U.N. Security Council to consider a wide range of Iran's "destabilizing" actions in the Middle East in an early test of whether President Donald Trump's toughening position on the Islamic Republic is alienating allies and leaving the U.S. isolated internationally.

President Donald Trump took to Twitter on Wednesday to revive his long-standing complaint about the FBI's handling of the Hillary Clinton email server investigation, alleging that then-Director James Comey had protected the Democratic presidential nominee by prematurely "exonerating" her before the 2016 election.

Olympic medalist McKayla Maroney says she was molested by former USA Gymnastics team doctor Larry Nassar from the time she was 13 to her retirement from the sport last year.

As firefighters gain on wildfires burning in Northern California's wine country, the many thousands who lost their houses, condos and apartments in those fires will have to find a new place to live in one of the toughest housing markets in the nation.

The mother of an Army sergeant killed in Niger said Wednesday that President Donald Trump, in a call offering condolences, showed "disrespect" to the soldier's loved ones as they drove to the airport to meet his body. Trump, engulfed in controversy over the appropriate way for presidents to show compassion for slain soldiers, strongly disputed that account.

Attorneys for Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl renewed efforts to have the soldier’s court-martial dismissed, filing an 11th-hour motion Tuesday arguing President Donald Trump’s reasserted past criticism of their client makes a fair sentence impossible.

Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin, who is under investigation for taking a 10-day trip to Europe that mixed business with sightseeing, is not being considered for the top job at Health and Human Services, the White House said Wednesday.

Secretary of the Navy Richard V. Spencer visited the Puget Sound area on Tuesday to visit Navy facilities and related industries in the Pacific Northwest.

Dubbed Vaquita CPR (Conservation, Protection and Recovery), the mission envisions not just capturing the rare porpoises, but breeding them in order to rebuild the population. And hopefully, once conditions allow, releasing them back into the wild.

Robert Christian Perdomo, a cybersecurity expert at Naval Undersea Warfare Center in Keyport, Wash., is charged with allegedly having sex with a 12-year-old girl he met on a telephone chat line.

A Georgia physician said her plan to honor a fallen soldier by singing the U.S. national anthem aboard a Delta Air Lines plane carrying the soldier's casket was stopped by a flight attendant who told her it would violate company policy.

About 500 people lined both sides of Ramsey Street on Monday as the bodies of of Staff Sgt. Bryan Black and Staff Sgt. Jeremiah W. Johnson arrived at Jernigan-Warren Funeral Home.

Caitlan Boyle, her husband, Joshua Boyle, and their three children were rescued Wednesday, five years after the couple was abducted in Afghanistan on a backpacking trip. The children were born in captivity.

Dalen Larry Ware was taken into custody at his home in Phoenix Friday in connection with the presumed slaying of Julia Jacobson, 37. Her remains have not been found, according to police in Ontario, Calif., where she was last spotted.

Petty Officer 1st Class Brian Jerrell and Petty Officer 2nd Class Ty Bell, both assigned to Kings Bay Naval Submarine Base, were found dead in the same off-base home four days apart.

After Republican Sen. John McCain questioned "half-baked, spurious nationalism" in America's foreign policy, President Donald Trump warned that "people have to be careful because at some point I fight back."

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said his committee needs the particulars in order to properly outfit the U.S. armed forces with training and equipment. "If we don't get the information we need, we can't do that."

While the holidays are a hard time to be away from home, the U.S. Postal Service makes it a priority that those serving their country will receive their presents, care packages and cards in time for the holidays no matter where they may be.

The 200 reserve soldiers of the 2nd Space Battalion in Colorado Springs will back up their active-duty comrades to make sure troops in the field have the signals they need from space.

The Jacksonville Jaguars have apologized to local military leaders for demonstrating during the national anthem in London last month.

A former official at a New Jersey university and another woman have admitted their roles in a scheme that stole more than $24 million from a federal education benefits program designed to help veterans.

The Department of Veterans Affairs said Tuesday it would proceed with a narrow waiver to an ethics law banning VA employees from receiving benefits from for-profit colleges.

A week after fleeing raging wildfires, tens of thousands of emotionally ravaged Californians have drifted back home to find their lives and their communities dramatically altered.

The agreement followed weeks of negotiations between Sen. Lamar Alexander R-Tenn., and Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., that sought to address health insurance markets that have been in limbo following GOP failures to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.