Obama to nominate first openly gay service secretary to lead the Army - Washington Post | Senior US, Russian defense officials talk to defuse tensions over Syria

Obama to nominate first openly gay service secretary to lead the Army - Washington Post | Senior US, Russian defense officials talk to defuse tensions over Syria - Washington Post

September 18, 2015

Obama to nominate first openly gay service secretary to lead the Army
Friday September 18th, 2015 at 4:30 PM

Eric Fanning greets Col. Dan Dant, 460th Space Wing commander at Buckley Air Force Base, Colo., in 2013. (Senior Airman Marcy Glass/U.S. Air Force)

President Obama, in a historic first for the Pentagon, has chosen to nominate Eric Fanning to lead the Army, a move that would make him the first openly gay civilian secretary of one of the military services.

Fanning’s nomination is the latest in a series of actions taken by the administration to advance the rights of gays and lesbians throughout the federal government. The Obama administration has overhauled internal policies to provide benefits to same-sex partners, appointed gay men and lesbians to the executive branch and the federal bench and ended the 18-year ban on gays serving openly in the military.

Fanning, who must still be confirmed by the Senate, has been a specialist on defense and national security issues for more than 25 years in Congress and the Pentagon. As Army secretary, he would be partnered with Gen. Mark Milley, who took over as the Army’s top general in August. Together the two men would assume responsibility for the Pentagon’s largest and most troubled service.

“Eric brings many years of proven experience and exceptional leadership to this new role,” Obama said in a statement. “I look forward to working with Eric to keep our Army the very best in the world.”

The Army, which swelled to about 570,000 active duty troops, has shed about 80,0000 soldiers from its ranks in recent years and plans to cut 40,000 more over the next few years. Those planned cuts would shrink the service to its smallest size of the post-World War II era.

Eric Fanning tours Air Force bases

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Eric Fanning visited several Air Force bases in 2013. At the time, Fanning was the acting secretary of the Air Force. (DVIDS)

Battered by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army has had to deal with a spike in suicides as the wars drew to an end and has struggled at times to provide the war wounded with the care they need to heal.

Recently, the Army’s outgoing top officer, Gen. Ray Odierno, said that tight budgets and the ongoing strain of 14 years of war had badly degraded the Army’s readiness to fight and that only one-third of its brigades were prepared to deploy to a war zone, the lowest readiness rate in decades.

Fanning’s role as Army secretary would give him influence over the generals the Army selects to rebuild the service after a long stretch of counterinsurgency wars in which soldiers dismounted from their tanks and armored vehicles and found themselves leading foot patrols through remote villages.

Much of Fanning’s time in the Pentagon has been overseeing massive ship and aircraft programs. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter tapped Fanning last year to oversee his transition team as he moved into the Pentagon’s top job.

Fanning served briefly as acting Air Force secretary and has been acting undersecretary of the Army since June 2015.

“He understands how the Pentagon works and how to get things done in the Pentagon,” said Rudy de Leon, who was deputy defense secretary in the Clinton administration. “He knows what works and what doesn’t work” inside the federal government’s largest bureaucracy.

Fanning would play a key role in helping the Army, which has struggled to field new combat systems amid the strain of fighting two wars, to upgrade aging tanks, armored personnel carriers and helicopters. Since 2000, the Army has been forced to cancel virtually all of its major new weapons programs because they ran over budget or didn’t perform as expected.

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21 of the most influential openly gay and lesbian Washingtonians

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LGBT issues are advancing by the day in the United States, and with it, there’s a growing class of Washington power players. Here is 21 of the most influential openly gay, lesbian and bisexual people working in the capital, part of a list as compiled by the National Journal.

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Hilary Rosen The managing director of SKDKnickerbocker strategic communications came out in the 1970s while studying at George Washington University. Being out “allows you to focus on doing what you want to do, as opposed to worrying about it,” the frequent CNN commentator told National Journal. Paul Morigi/Getty Images for Fortune

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New equipment for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, like special armored vehicles designed to resist blasts from roadside bombs, had to be developed outside of the traditional procurement channels.

“Eric is taking over at a critical time for the Army,” de Leon said “The Army is still living off equipment from the Reagan years.”

Greg Jaffe covers the White House for The Washington Post, where he has been since March 2009.

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Obama to nominate first openly gay service secretary to lead the Army - Washington Post
Friday September 18th, 2015 at 4:28 PM

Senior US, Russian defense officials talk to defuse tensions over Syria - Washington Post
Friday September 18th, 2015 at 4:26 PM

Croatia Closes Its Border Crossings With Serbia as Thousands of Refugees Enter the Country by hcregan
Friday September 18th, 2015 at 4:25 PM

TIME

Croatia closed seven out of eight border crossings with Serbia Thursday after 10,000 refugees entered in two days.

Croatia’s Interior Minister Ranko Ostojic told reporters that the country was “absolutely full” and could no longer take any more refugees, reports the BBC.

“Don’t come here anymore,” he said. “Stay in refugee centers in Serbia and Macedonia and Greece. This is not the road to Europe. Buses can’t take you there. It’s a lie.”

According to the BBC, Croatia has been overwhelmed by the new arrivals. On Thursday, crowds of people tried to break through police lines at two towns on the border with Serbia, in the hope of getting to the Croatian
capital, Zagreb. Scuffles broke out at Tovarnik and Batina, two of the crossings that are now closed.

Buses arrived to take the refugees to a registration
center, but there was not enough transport to take
everyone, and thousands of people reportedly spent Thursday night sleeping on the roadside or in fields.

Hungary sealed off its southern border with Serbia on Wednesday, forcing thousands of desperate people to turn to neighboring Croatia in order to attempt to make their way to northern Europe and their preferred destination: Germany.

In chaotic scenes at the Serbian border town of Horgos, riot police on the Hungarian side of the border used tear gas and water cannons to repel crowds of refugees back into Serbia. Hungary has defended its actions and has vowed to continue to forcefully defend its border, reports the Guardian.

The border closures in Croatia and Hungary mean the main land route from Greece to northern Europe has effectively been cut off, reports the BBC.

Meanwhile, Slovenia said it stopped a group of refugees on a train at the border and would return them to Zagreb. Slovenia, which lies to the north of Croatia and shares a border with Austria, is part of the E.U. border-free Schengen
area. On Thursday, Slovenian officials told the European Commission that its border with Hungary would be closed for at least 10 days.

[BBC]

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A Mexican Gang Member Has Been Arrested in Connection With the Missing Students Case by joannaplucinska
Friday September 18th, 2015 at 4:25 PM

TIME

A leading suspect in the case of 43 missing Mexican students was arrested Wednesday in the city of Taxco, authorities say.

Gildardo “El Gil” López Astudillo, a senior member of the Guerreros Unidos gang in the Iguala region, was detained in connection with the Sept. 26, 2014, disappearance of students from the Ayotzinapa
teacher-training college, who were en route to a protest when the school buses they had commissioned came under attack from local police.

Authorities say the students were likely then handed over to the Guerreros Unidos and killed. Astudillo allegedly told the gang’s leader, arrested in October of last year, that the students were members of a rival gang called Los Rojos, or
the Reds, reports Mexico News Daily, a Mexican English-language news site.

The case has become the subject of
a high-profile mass-murder investigation and sparked nationwide protests over the past year. Authorities are now investigating whether the students’ deaths were caused by mistaken identity in the fight of territory between the two gangs, the Dailyreports.

The arrest comes as Mexican authorities say they have identified the remains of one missing student, Jhosivani Guerrero de la Cruz, in the garbage dump where the remains of another student was found in December

However, there has been disagreement about the
garbage-dump connection. Earlier this month, an interdisciplinary group called the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights published a reportstating that it was “scientifically impossible” for the students to have been burned at the Cocula trash dump.

The report also said that one of the school buses may have had a stash of heroin
on board that was headed for the U.S.

[Mexico News Daily]

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AP Top News at 12:58 p.m. EDT
Friday September 18th, 2015 at 4:25 PM

TheUnion Local.Com | TheUnion.Com

AP Top News at 12:58 p.m. EDT

European nations shut borders, block bridges, halt trainsTOVARNIK, Croatia (AP) - Across southeast Europe, nations closed borders, blocked bridges, shut down trains and built new razor-wire fences Friday in a rush to block tens of thousands seeking safety in Western Europe from crossing their territories. The rapid-fire, often contradictory border decisions came as each nation tried to shift the burden of handling the huge influx onto their neighbors, leaving asylum-seekers even more angry, confused and desperate.

Latest: Slovenia extends railway suspension with CroatiaLJUBLJANA, Slovenia (AP) - The latest developments as European governments rush to cope with the huge number of people moving across Europe. All times local (CET): ---

Syrian refugee family meets rude welcome in new German homeCHEMNITZ, Germany (AP) - It was pitch-dark by the time the Syrian refugee family arrived in the eastern German town that was to be their new home. As they prepared to get off the train, a drunken skinhead stumbled past them, giving a glare that made 11-year-old Raghad huddle closer to her mom. The five members of the Habashieh family took a taxi to the asylum center assigned to them by a computer in Berlin. It was a former army barracks used by the Soviets and by the Nazis before them, surrounded by towering fences topped with barbed wire.

Alleged church shooter's friend pleads not guilty to lyingCOLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) - Dylann Roof's friend knew about his plans to shoot black church members during Bible study in Charleston and lied to investigators when they interviewed him a day after the massacre, according to an indictment unsealed Friday. Joey Meek, 21, hung out with Roof off and on in the weeks before the June 17 shooting at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal and failed to let authorities know that Roof was planning a racially motivated attack, the indictment said.

House OKs GOP bill blocking Planned Parenthood fundsWASHINGTON (AP) - A divided House voted Friday to block Planned Parenthood's federal funds for a year, as Republican leaders labored to keep GOP outrage over abortion from spiraling into an impasse with President Barack Obama that could shut down the government. The House used a nearly party-line 241-187 vote to clear the legislation, which stands little chance of enactment. Senate Democrats have enough votes to block it, and for good measure the White House has promised a veto.

APNewsBreak: Waco police bullets hit bikers in May meleeFORT WORTH, Texas (AP) - Evidence reviewed by The Associated Press confirms that police bullets hit bikers in the deadly shootout involving two rival motorcycle clubs that clashed last spring outside a Waco restaurant, though it isn't clear whether those rifle shots caused any of the nine fatalities. The AP reviewed more than 8,800 pages of evidence, including police reports, dash-cam video, photos and audio interviews related to the May 17 confrontation. The evidence offers the best insight yet into how the shootout unfolded. Four months later, authorities have released little information about what sparked the fight or how the gunfire played out, and no one has been charged with any of the deaths.

Officer says he expressed worry about Bergdahl, was hushedSAN ANTONIO (AP) - Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl's former squad leader testified Friday that before Bergdahl walked away from his post in Afghanistan six years ago, he expressed concern that Bergdahl didn't seem to be adjusting well to their deployment but was told to be quiet. Former Sgt. Greg Leatherman said that when he told his first sergeant that he thought Bergdahl should speak to someone such as a chaplain, the officer told him to drop the matter.

Taliban attack on Pakistan base kills 29; 16 die in mosquePESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) - A brazen Taliban attack on a Pakistani military base on the outskirts of the northwestern city of Peshawar killed 29 people on Friday, including 16 worshippers who were gunned down when the militants stormed a mosque inside the compound during prayers. The army said the militants came from neighboring Afghanistan, without providing details.

An anxious, but hopeful return to Cuba for pope's visitHAVANA (AP) - When Fidel Castro staged a first, failed attempt to overthrow the Cuban government, Roman Catholic Archbishop Enrique Perez Serantes pleaded for the rebel leader's life to be saved. After Castro took power, Serantes' support turned to opposition and the prelate's family fled. As they built a new life in Miami, Serantes' family vowed never to return while Castro was in power.

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