Pete Nealen

As our warfighting capability continues to erode, it is arguably in our best interests for the Syrian Civil War to go on.

On Friday, Nov 22, seven of the largest rebel groups in Syria announced their merger into the Islamic Front, or Jabhat al-Islamiyya.  The signatories of the new alliance are Harakat Ahrar al-Sham, Suqur as-Sham, Liwa at-Tawhid, Jaysh al-Islam, Jabhat al-Kurdiyya, Liwa al-Haqq, and Ansar as-Sham. Jaysh al-Islam is a newcomer to the Syrian civil war, […]

On Nov 21, three female Marines graduated the basic infantry course at the School of Infantry – East at Camp Geiger, Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune.  A fourth completed the course but was unable to graduate due to injury, keeping her from taking the final Combat Fitness Test.  She will be held over until she […]

Earlier this month (the exact date is unclear) the leader of the Tawhid Brigade, Abdelqader Saleh, was killed in an airstrike in Aleppo.  Saleh had been with the uprising from the beginning.  He was involved with the initial demonstrations against the Assad government, then took up arms when matters became violent.  Even in recent years, […]

On Nov 1, 2013 Hakimullah Mehsud, the emir of the ‘Movement of the Taliban’ in Pakistan, was killed in North Waziristan in a US drone strike.  This was the second or third time he was rumored to have been killed by drone strikes, but this time the Pakistani Taliban confirmed that he is dead.  Mehsud […]

Modern warfare, as waged by the US, seems to be mostly about timelines.  In some respects this is necessary, especially in a combined-arms environment.  When you’ve got a lot of moving parts to the operation, to include ground, air, artillery, multiple units moving in the AO at the same time, having time hacks built into […]

Following the “Rachel” and “Racket” operations, Detachment One was set to hunt for an HVT known only as “X” (the actual identity of “X” still hasn’t been unclassified).  “X” was believed to be a high-level insurgent facilitator; one of his associates had been captured in May, putting him on the operational radar.  He showed signs […]

On the morning of June 28th, 2005, in Kunar Province, Afghanistan, a small, four-man team of Naval Special Warfare operators under the command of Lieutenant Michael Murphy was compromised. There are two types of compromise, soft and hard. A soft compromise is essentially that a unit’s mission was exposed but there is no enemy fire […]

This book hits close to home for me. I remember finishing up a SEAL sniper course (at the time I was the Course Manager) in the spring of 2005. One of the graduates, a friend of mine, was Marcus Luttrell, author of Lone Survivor. Part of the Navy SEALs new 21st Century sniper training methodology […]

It was about 1140Z. Two MH-47s, callsigns Turbine 32 and Turbine 33, were closing on the LZ (Landing Zone) near the base of Sawtalo Sar, the compromised team’s last known position. Two Blackhawks and two AH-64 Apaches were flying cover, and Grip 21, a flight of two A-10 Warthogs, were circling above. Lt Cmdr Kristensen, […]

Rangers, Special Forces, and PJs were already moving up the mountain toward the crash site. It would take them until nearly midnight to reach it, after the first attempt had been turned back by the weather, but the weather had eased up. There had also been the issue of theater command denying any further flights […]

At just after midnight, an elderly Afghan by the name of Shina arrived at the gate of Camp Blessing. When the interpreter reached the gate, he said he needed to speak to the Marines’ senior officer, that there was a wounded American in his village. The interpreter ran to the Marine COC, and found the […]