Guest Authors

Media Release about the Comfort Women Statue

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Details: Published: Thursday, 04 August 2016 15:37; Written by Australia - Japan Community

04 August 2016

press release about comfort woman statue 1

For the complete article in PDF please click below:

Michael Yon's War

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Details: Published: Tuesday, 12 April 2016 15:23; Written by David W. Brown

This year I will say and write some things that may sound outlandish. Before dismissing my words, please remember that I am very careful with information that is delivered to your table. Your time is valuable and is respected. Those who pay attention to what I write will be ahead of the game in some areas. Please remember my history:

Authored by: David W. Brown (First published on June 1, 2010 in The Atlantic)

It began with a bridge. On the morning of March 1, a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device detonated on Tarnak River Bridge near Kandahar, Afghanistan, killing multiple civilians and one American soldier. While the destruction of a single bridge might ordinarily pose a mere inconvenience to the U.S. war machine, in the oppressive terrain of Afghanistan it became a logistical chokepoint, halting ground-based operations for days.

War correspondent Michael Yon sought the answer to an uncomfortable question: who was responsible for the security of that bridge?

Yon is no ordinary reporter. A former Green Beret with U.S. Army Special Forces, he has spent more time embedded in Iraq and Afghanistan than any other journalist. His dispatches have produced some of the most memorable combat narratives of the war, and a large share of its most iconic images. Make no mistake; Michael Yon is not a dispassionate observer of the Columbia J-School variety. When writing about U.S. forces, he says "we." When writing about insurgents, he calls them terrorists or Taliban. And when reporting failures in the war effort, he names names. This has earned him both the respect and ire of senior military staff. In the case of the Tarnak River Bridge, the name most repeatedly mentioned as responsible for its security was Daniel Menard, the Canadian brigadier general in charge of Task Force Kandahar. Yon went public with this information.

DEATH OF A GENERAL, A MOTHER’S LOSS, AND HOPE

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Details: Published: Tuesday, 02 February 2016 16:30; Written by Free Burma Rangers

2 February 2016
Nineveh, Kurdistan

Written by: Free Burma Rangers

Kurdish forces at Nineveh front.

Several days ago we came from the front line across from Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS)-held Nineveh to attend the memorial of a General killed as he led his troops in repelling an ISIS suicide attack. Our team, consisting of Karen, Kachin and Karenni Free Burma Rangers (FBR) team members from Burma, our family, and foreign staff, drove under snow-covered peaks and through a beautiful gorge arriving in mid-afternoon in the snowy mountain vastness of Soran.

The memorial service lasted two and a half hours with speeches, poems, as well as Kurdish music from Kurdistan’s greatest singer, Shivon Prewar. Kurdish Generals, Members of Parliament and people from all walks of life crowded in to pay their respects to General Shawkat and the others who died with him.