Search results for ‘pentagon’
210 items found
-
300th soldier's death is tragic, but what about the Afghans?
Tragic though the 300th British dead soldier/marine is, it is the Afghan people for whom we are fighting we are told, and the Afghan people who remain resolutely ignored, writes Alex Thomson
-
PowerPointing the way to Afghan victory
Jonathan Rugman blogs on what has been described as the PowerPoint presentations of all presentations – on Iraq and Afghanistan.
-
What we've learned so far from the Iraq Inquiry
“There’s a wonderful phrase: ‘the Fog of War.’ What the fog of war means is: war is so complex it’s beyond the ability of the human mind to comprehend all the variables. Our judgment, our understanding, are not adequate. And we kill people unnecessarily.”
-
An everyday tale of Nato being bonkers
OK, let’s be clear, all we wanted to do was to go and collect our ISAF (NATO) accreditation.
-
The sting in the tail of the fight against the Taliban
Alex Thomson blogs about the fight against the Taliban as military commander Mullah Baradar is reportedly arrested in Karachi.
-
Behind Enemy Lines: more revealing than a thousand Afghan conferences
On a pinboard in the Pentagon in the summer of 2004, as insurgency in Iraq took a turn for the worse, they put up a flier advertising a special screening of Gillo Pontecorvo’s 1966 classic film The Battle of Algiers. It depicts the ruthless tactics employed by both French colonial paratroopers and nationalist guerrillas in…
-
Iraq inquiry: the transcript of the security blackout
Good morning from day 15 of the Iraq inquiry in a positively freezing London. Mercifully the press room is kept stocked with pretty decent coffee; otherwise we’d lose at least the first 15 minutes of live-Tweeting to finger-de-freezing. Continuing from yesterday’s evidence we hear this morning from Lt Gen Sir Robert Fry – his biog…
-
Iraq inquiry: the problem of witness pairing
Admiral Boyce and Sir Kevin Tebbit give evidence at the Iraq war inquiry.
-
Iraq inquiry: weapons of mass destruction take centre stage
Day two of the Iraq War Inquiry led by Sir John Chilcot will focus on weapons of mass destruction and how the US/UK coalition shifted from “containment” policies to regime change, writes the Channel 4 News Iraq Inquiry Blogger.
-
China's carefully choreographed anniversary Party
It can sometimes feel like quite a sinister experience, this celebration. I’m not sure if it was the teenage soldier grabbing my arm as I tried to enter the compound where our offices are based, or the armoured personnel carrier outside the Nike shop that did it, but Beijing’s not been feeling that relaxed of…
-
After Granai, why should Afghans believe the US?
Sometimes it happens this way at Channel 4 News – a cameraman or photographer calls us up and tells us he has been somewhere we have not, and asks if we want to see his footage. So it was that we had a chance to view new pictures from the village of Granai, in western…
-
North Korea: how scared should we be?
Okay, so how scared should we be by North Korea’s nuclear brinksmanship? On the face of it, it’s not looking good. First, there’s the (still unconfirmed) nuclear test detonation on Sunday, followed by five short-range missile launches on Monday and Tuesday. And today, reports that North Korea may have restarted its Yongbyon plant which makes weapons-grade…
-
Torture memos: questions for Donald Rumsfeld
WASHINGTON DC, USA – There are lots of questions that lots of people would like to ask former defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld. But right now the only “known known” is that he is not answering any. Unlike his old mate, the former vice president Dick Cheney, who is far more visible and far more vocal…
-
A looted museum and a satellite phone
I remember the horror when we entered the plundered Baghdad Museum two days after the Americans took the Iraqi capital in April 2003. We picked our way through broken shards of pottery and destroyed statues – the looters had smashed as well as grabbed. A lone archaeologist was wandering around in shock. “We would have…
-
Afghanistan: people’s war
A father prepared to sell his son, widespread kidnappings, corruption and lawlessness. In an RTS award-winning film, Channel 4 News captured the startling personal tales of ordinary Afghan people.
