http://www.liveleak.com/browse?q=Marines Sat, 25 May 2013 22:15:08 -0400 Liveleak http://edge.liveleak.com/80281E/u/u/ll2/logo.gif http://www.liveleak.com/browse?q=Marines Sat, 25 May 2013 10:44:57 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=f30_1369492953 smokey75 US Marines return fire after a near miss with an incoming rocket. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=f30_1369492953 smokey75 Afghanistan Combat US <span class="highlight">Marines</span> Rocket Close Call. Close,Call. Sat, 25 May 2013 16:03:50 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=d6e_1369510263 marinemom As time goes by I keep my eyes open for a nice video to upload to LL on Memorial Day. If I see one I download it and hold onto it until then. I didn't find one this year, so as Memorial Day drew closer I decided to just make one myself. I chose the Marines my son fought with on two deployments to represent all who have given their lives for our country down through time. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=d6e_1369510263 marinemom Never Forgotten Memorial Day, 2013, OEF, OIF, 2/7, U.S. Marines Sat, 25 May 2013 18:57:44 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=1c7_1369522478 Detroit Iron BY RUSTY DENNEN / THE FREE LANCE-STAR Most people are lucky enough to handle maybe a few ounces of gold over the course of a lifetime. But what would it be like to be in the presence of 30 tons of the precious metal? Just ask Adam C. Glover. As a 17-year-old deckhand serving on a Navy destroyer escort during World War II, he helped move a small mountain of Polish gold from Africa to New York in a top-secret mission to keep it out of the hands of the Nazis. Glover, now 86, recalled the unlikely March 1944 adventure in a recent interview. "We pulled into Dakar," a port in French West Africa, "and there was a whole convoy of trucks coming in," said Glover, who lives in Grafton Village in southern Stafford County. There were so many men on the gangplank that, "They looked like ants, all of them carrying one box on their shoulder," he said. Glover, and the rest of the crew aboard the USS Breeman, knew they were on an urgent mission, but not what the cargo was. "The first indication we got was when they started bringing depth charges and putting them in the sleeping compartments," to make room for gold in the ammunition storage area, he said. "We found out from the first guy who came aboard. He said it was gold. It was a big surprise just how much it was." Glover's reaction: "Do my job." Any thought beyond that never entered his mind, he says. Besides, he said, smiling, "Everybody was standing around with guns. Where are you going to take it?" Glover helped move the boxes onto the ship-one of two destroyer escorts dispatched to pick up the cargo. The other was the USS Bronstein. MILLIONS IN GOLD Navy Lt. Cmdr. Sheldon Kinney, commander of the Bronstein, described the scene in "Tin Can Gold Rush," his postwar account to the U.S. Naval Institute: "Aboard the ships, ammunition was being shifted to make space for the heavy load. Each box was about 12 inches deep, 24 inches long, and 10 inches wide. Within each, four gold bars were packed in sawdust." The boxes were secured with iron bands and sealed "with the 'BP' of the Bank of ," Kinney wrote. The value of the gold was estimated at the time to be about $65 million. Glover says it took hours to stow the crates, then the ship slipped out of port that night for the three-day voyage to New York. They steered clear of the Cape Verde Islands, off Africa's West Coast, to avoid detection by German agents known to report on Allied ship movements there. On the third day, the flotilla detected an enemy submarine, but the Breeman and Bronstein-both sub-hunters-didn't pursue it. Their orders were to proceed directly to New York City. Glover managed to get a copy of the ship's orders, marked "Top Secret," from Vice Adm. William A. Glassford, head of the American Mission in Dakar, to Breeman's captain, Lt. Cmdr Edward N.W. Hunter. It read, in part: "Receive from, with receipt to, Mr. Stephan Michalski, Director of the Bank of Poland, an agent of the Polish Government, a shipment declared to contain gold." And, "Upon arrival at destination deliver the shipment to the Federal Reserve Bank " in New York. On April 3, 1944 when the Breeman arrived in New York Harbor, Glover says, there was a big welcoming party, so to speak. "There was a battalion of Marines, Army, New York police, and probably Secret Service, there on a Saturday night." Since the Federal Reserve Bank was not open, "We had to sit there with all that money" overnight, he recalled. The next day, it was unloaded and the Breeman left for Tunisia to resume its sub-hunting duties. A LONG JOURNEY According to Kinney's report, and other historical accounts, the saga of the gold began in September 1939, with the Nazis' unprovoked attack on Poland, located on the Baltic Sea between Germany and Russia. One prime objective: secure gold reserves to fund its war machine. As the Germans advanced, the directors of the Bank of Poland had gold loaded onto trucks bound for Romania, a neighboring country to the south. Over the coming months, the gold went through Lebanon, where it was loaded on French ships, then sent by rail to Paris. As the Nazis closed in on the French capital in the spring of 1940, the gold was moved again, to Casablanca in North Africa, then to the jungle outside Dakar, where it was stored until the American ships picked it up. The gold was returned to the Polish government after World War II. But by then, parts of Poland were annexed by the Soviets, so the efforts by the Allies to save the treasury for the Polish people were largely in vain, according to postwar records. Glover said he doesn't want the true story of the Polish gold to be mistaken for the fictional story of a gold heist depicted in the 1970 film "Kelly's Heroes," in which some World War II GIs conspire to steal a cache of gold stolen by the Germans in France. "The gold was never captured," Glover said. While the gold shipment was the most unusual mission for the the USS Breeman, Glover said, the ship spent more than two years hunting down subs in the Atlantic Ocean from Africa to northern Russia. On one wartime voyage, Glover was injured after the ship encountered a German submarine. "We had sunk the sub and some prisoners came off a life raft," onto the Breeman, he recalled. During the commotion, he walked under the ship's 3-inch gun, which the captain had ordered to fire and scuttle the raft. The concussion from the muzzle blast damaged Glover's eardrums, and he was nearly knocked overboard. "They got infected," Glover said of his ears, and he was hospitalized three times. He still has difficulty hearing. The Breeman rescued 32 German sailors during that engagement in mid-1945. HARROWING MOMENT Glover's ship was part of a battle group formed around the carrier USS Block Island, initially, then the five destroyer escorts of the group transferred to another air-carrier group led by the USS Card. Another harrowing moment came when the Breeman was hit by a huge wave during a storm in the North Atlantic. The 306-foot-long vessel rolled 76 degrees, so far that water got into the smokestack. "After the ship came back up and everybody realized they were alive, it took care of all the atheists on board," he said with a chuckle. "Most of the time, everybody was seasick. You were on duty four hours, off eight. If you had battle stations when you were asleep, you'd get your butt up and go. When you're 17 years old, you do what you are told and get your a- up. It was very exciting." The Breeman, he said, was credited with sinking two enemy subs. Glover's Navy career ended in March 1946. The Breeman's last voyage was to Green Cove Springs, Fla., on the St. Johns River, where that ship and many other destroyer escorts were decommissioned. The Breeman was sold to China, and ultimately, sunk to create a dock in Taiwan, Glover said. Only one of hundreds of destroyer escorts built during the war remains. The USS Slater is a floating exhibit at the Destroyer Escort Historical Museum in Albany, N.Y. Two of Glover's brothers, James and Gene Glover, served in the Army during World War II. Glover still sees a few of his buddies from the ship during annual reunions. But he said, sadly, only seven of the crew of more than 300 are left. Glover says most people have no idea about the Navy's role in safekeeping the gold of Poland, "but it's still a hot topic when we get together." Rusty Dennen: 540/374-5431 rdennen@freelancestar.com http://news.fredericksburg.com/newsdesk/2013/05/24/stafford-veteran-recalls-golden-wwii-mission/ http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=1c7_1369522478 Detroit Iron U.S. NAVY KEPT POLISH GOLD FROM THE NAZIS veterans, WWII Sat, 25 May 2013 16:57:41 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=668_1369515309 AvataraS The DriverAn exclusive look inside the mysterious death and life of the world's most dangerous terrorist not named Osama bin Laden. BY MARK PERRY MAY/JUNE 2013 On the night of Feb. 12, 2008, an overweight middle-aged man with a light beard walked from his apartment in the Kfar Sousa district of Damascus to his silver Mitsubishi Pajero, parked in front of his building. It was already 10:15, and he was late for a meeting with Iran's new ambassador to Syria, who had arrived in the country the night before. COMMENTS (33)SHARE: Share on twitter Twitter Share on reddit Reddit inShare. More... There was good reason for the man's tardiness: He had just come from a meeting with Ramadan Shallah, the leader of the militant group Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and before that had spent several hours talking with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. The man was Imad Mughniyeh, the world's most wanted terrorist not named Osama bin Laden. His true identity as the violent mastermind of Hezbollah would have come as a shock to his Damascus neighbors, who thought he was a chauffeur in the employ of the Iranian embassy. A number of them had even called on him, on several occasions, to help tote their bags to waiting taxis. He had happily complied. On this night, he was in a hurry. He exited his apartment building and walked quickly to his SUV, crossing behind the tailgate to the driver's side door. He never made it. Instead, a remotely detonated explosive, containing hundreds of deadly, cube-shaped metal shards, ripped his body to shreds, lifting it into the air and depositing his burning torso 15 feet away on the apartment building's lawn. Just like that, the most dangerous man you never heard of was dead, his whole career proof that one person really can reshape politics in the Middle East -- and far beyond it. &quot;Both bin Laden and Mughniyeh were pathological killers,&quot; 30-year veteran CIA officer Milton Bearden told me. &quot;But there was always a nagging amateurishness about bin Laden -- his wildly hyped background, his bogus claims.... Bin Laden cowered and hid. Mughniyeh spent his life giving us the finger.&quot; UNTIL HIS DEATH, Hezbollah stubbornly refused to admit any knowledge of a commander named Imad Mughniyeh. Hezbollah's penchant for secrecy meant that, unlike bin Laden, who never tired of seeing himself on television, a nearly impenetrable fog settled on Mughniyeh while he was still alive. Only upon his assassination did Hezbollah hail &quot;Hajj Radwan,&quot; as he was known, as one of its indispensable military commanders, the head of its Jihad Council, and the architect of its war strategy during the 2006 conflict with Israel. Chanting pro-Hezbollah slogans and holding posters extolling his martyrdom, tens of thousands of Hezbollah partisans attended Mughniyeh's funeral in Beirut two days after his death. His 22-year-old son spoke to the crowd, pledging that his father's murder would be avenged. Mughniyeh's youngest son, 17, stood nearby alongside his sister, according to senior Hezbollah officials in attendance. They had only been informed that day that their father was something other than a midlevel Hezbollah official -- the &quot;driver&quot; -- who shuttled Iranian diplomats and Hezbollah leaders to and from Beirut and Damascus. After long denying his existence, Syrian officials quickly described the assassination as a &quot;cowardly terrorist act.&quot; Iran called it &quot;organized state terrorism by the Zionist regime,&quot; while Hezbollah leaders said Mughniyeh &quot;died a martyr at the hands of the Israeli Zionists.&quot; It was a violent end for a man who had devoted his life to violence on behalf of the Lebanese militant group and its patron, Iran. Although few had heard of him, he was responsible for virtually all the most notorious terrorist attacks of the pre-9/11 era: the October 1983 bombings of the U.S. Marine and French barracks in Beirut, the 1985 hijacking of a TWA airliner, and the kidnapping and murder of Western hostages in Lebanon in the 1980s. Mughniyeh also plotted the March 1992 attack on Israel's embassy in Argentina and the 1994 synagogue bombing in Buenos Aires. Until his death, however, no intelligence agency had ever successfully tracked him -- and only one American, former hostage Terry Anderson, admits to ever having met him. For many CIA officers -- those who had long tried and failed to find him -- Mughniyeh's death represented an incredible victory over an elusive foe; in the shadowy world of intelligence, it was almost as big a score as the bin Laden raid a few years later. There's just one trick: The United States didn't kill Mughniyeh. And even now, five years later, it's not entirely clear who did. For More -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 10 notorious attacks attributed to Hezbollah's shadowy mastermind I first heard of Mughniyeh in 1989, while reporting on the kidnapping of the CIA's Beirut station chief. Only the barest of facts about Mughniyeh were known at the time, and he remained, for me and other reporters, an obsessive journalistic pastime, a story we were sure would help us understand the region's murderously dysfunctional politics, if only we could decode it. &quot;For years, people claimed Mughniyeh was behind anything that went 'boom,'&quot; reporter Nicholas Blanford, a Hezbollah expert, says. &quot;Just sit in a Beirut cafe and listen to what people say. Most of it is pure fantasy, but no one really knows for sure.&quot; Blanford has stories of his own. &quot;I hear that he rarely traveled with bodyguards,&quot; he told me, &quot;and on some days he'd hop on his Vespa and run down the coast highway to train Hezbollah fighters in the south. Just imagine: One of the world's most wanted men on a scooter. In plain sight.&quot; Only now, five years after his death, is a clearer narrative of his life coming into focus, one that finally separates the myth from the man. Indeed, though this account relies on dozens of conversations with Lebanese, Palestinian, Syrian, Israeli, and American observers and officials over a period of more than two decades, it's just in the last two years that those who knew Mughniyeh have begun to provide the details of his life, and only early this year, during a trip to the Middle East, was I told of his final hours. What I have found is an untold tale about the murderous three-decade shadow war between Iran and the United States, one filled with not only a gruesome body count but also the complicated politics of a region where even Hezbollah's closest friends could be suspect -- and where a shadowy terrorist could wield enough power to shape global events. Mohammed Zaatari/Associated Press IMAD MUGHNIYEH WAS BORN the eldest son of a poor farming family in Tayr Dibba, a Shiite village in southern Lebanon, in 1962. The Mughniyeh family was devout and traditional, but there wasn't anything unusual about them -- and certainly not anything that hinted at the path that the son would follow. Roughly a decade after Imad's birth, his father, Fayez, a fruit seller, moved his family to Beirut's southern suburbs. According to a number of people who knew him at that time, Imad attended a Shiite school and was an excellent student. But when the Lebanese civil war broke out in 1975, Mughniyeh turned up at a Palestinian refugee camp in southern Beirut and asked for military training. Anis Naccache, a Shiite militant Lebanese nationalist and later a successful businessman, remembers him as a politically aware boy. The Palestinians provided Mughniyeh with rudimentary small-arms training. He was 13. By 1979, he was enrolled in the American University of Beirut's engineering school and was increasingly politicized amid the tumult of Islamic revolution in nearby Iran and a deepening sectarian divide at home in Lebanon. Mughniyeh and his cousin Mustafa Badr al-Din joined the Palestinian resistance movement Fatah, which had been expelled from Jordan. The appearance of Fatah roiled the fragile Lebanese political environment, and the group had become a participant in the then four-year-old Lebanese civil war. A Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) veteran remembers that Mughniyeh and his cousin brought with them &quot;about 100 fighters from the southern suburbs -- a kind of roving Shiite fight club.&quot; Mughniyeh stood out. &quot;He was a superb soldier,&quot; this veteran says. &quot;He was courageous and a natural leader.&quot; Soon after, this same veteran notes, Shiite political operative Ali Hassan Deeb recommended him to the senior commander of Fatah's elite Force 17 commando unit. In late 1981, according to a senior Hezbollah official, Naccache introduced Mughniyeh to Iranian diplomat Ahmad Motevaselian in Beirut. The 1979 Iranian revolution had brought Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to power, and the new Islamist government was eager to fund a militant vanguard that could export its revolution to Lebanon -- and strike a blow against Israel. At Motevaselian's behest, Mughniyeh paid his first visit to Tehran and built ties that would prove crucial, particularly after the Israelis invaded Lebanon in June 1982 to destroy the PLO stronghold in Beirut, according to a Hezbollah official who was a lifelong friend. One month after the invasion, Tehran pressed Syria, which had sent troops into Lebanon, to approve the deployment of 1,000 Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps soldiers to an abandoned Lebanese military base in the Bekaa Valley. Once they had secured their foothold in Lebanon, the Iranian vanguard provided military training to the most important of Lebanon's Shiite movements, including Mughniyeh's Shiite militia, now called Islamic Jihad. The turning point in Mughniyeh's career came that same month, when Motevaselian, two Iranian diplomats, and an Iranian photographer were kidnapped by the right-wing Christian Lebanese Forces. The four would never be heard from again. In response, the Iranians loosed Islamic Jihad on the Americans, who had deployed Marines to Lebanon as part of an international peacekeeping force. Iran saw them as supporting Israel's Christian allies, and Mughniyeh's fighters traded sniper fire with U.S. forces, who occupied a base near southern Beirut's Shiite suburbs, throughout the end of 1982 -- stepping up their attacks in September after a Christian militia slaughtered at least 1,700 Palestinians in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps while Israeli soldiers looked on. In April 1983, a van carrying 400 pounds of explosives destroyed the U.S. Embassy in Beirut, killing 63 people, including Robert Ames, the head of the CIA's Near East division. The attack was followed that October by the simultaneous truck bombings of the U.S. Marine and French paratroop barracks in southern Beirut, killing 241 American and 58 French soldiers. The CIA investigation that followed showed that Islamic Jihad operatives planned the attack in a series of meetings inside the Iranian Embassy in Damascus, according to a CIA officer who served in the region at the time. Mughniyeh provided intelligence on the American deployment, this officer says, and recruited the bombers. &quot;This was Mughniyeh's operation. He was the mastermind.&quot; Bill Pierce/Time &amp;amp; Life Pictures IT WAS NOW CLEAR that the constellation of organizations that flocked to Iran's Bekaa camp in 1982 had been transformed from a &quot;fight club&quot; into a kind of family-run Murder Inc., subcontracted by Iran to exact a price for Israel's invasion of Lebanon, America's intervention there, and U.S. support for Iraq during the Iran-Iraq War. But the United States wasn't taking these punches sitting down. In March 1985, using Saudi assets, CIA-hired operatives detonated a car bomb outside the residence of Sheikh Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah, a prominent Shiite cleric. The explosion killed 80 people, including Mughniyeh's brother Jihad, while only slightly injuring Fadlallah. It was a blunder: Fadlallah was an important Shiite figure, if hardly the &quot;spiritual head&quot; of Hezbollah, which had emerged by this time as the leader of Lebanon's Shiite political groups. But the attempted assassination escalated America's conflict with Hezbollah and Iran. As the blood feud grew, Mughniyeh played a central role in the emerging shadow war between America and Iran. In June 1985, he and three others hijacked TWA Flight 847 and demanded the release of 700 Shiite prisoners held by Israel -- as well as his cousin Badr al-Din, who had been jailed in Kuwait since masterminding the 1983 U.S. Embassy bombing there, which killed six. The flight's odyssey was finally resolved when Israel agreed to release some 700 Shiite militants it had imprisoned, but only after the beaten body of murdered U.S. Navy serviceman Robert Stethem was thrown from the plane. A season of hostage takings, then just beginning, accelerated: Presbyterian missionary Benjamin Weir, reporters Terry Anderson and Charles Glass, educator Thomas Sutherland, and dozens more were abducted from Beirut's streets and held in clandestine locations. Veteran Middle East reporter Robert Fisk, seeking Anderson's release, remembers meeting Mughniyeh in Tehran during this period. &quot;Mughniyeh's handshake was like a vise grip, and he wouldn't let go,&quot; Fisk told a Western journalist. &quot;His defining trait was that he was a very, very angry man. He also had this absolute confidence in his own view of the world.&quot; From the U.S. standpoint, the most important hostages were William Buckley, the CIA's Beirut station chief, and Marine Col. Rich Higgins, taken at gunpoint while serving as part of the U.N. peacekeeping mission. The CIA quickly concluded that the two kidnappings had all the hallmarks of a Mughniyeh operation: meticulously planned, elegantly conducted -- and virtually unpredictable. Buckley's kidnapping sparked recriminations among CIA professionals, who proved powerless to find him. Chip Beck, a U.S. State Department official, Navy officer, professional artist -- and Buckley's close friend -- was tasked with providing a sketch of Mughniyeh. &quot;There wasn't much to work with,&quot; he told me recently, &quot;since so few people had ever seen him.&quot; The Higgins kidnapping, for which CIA professionals continue to hold Mughniyeh responsible, proved an even greater insult, particularly after U.S. officials received a videotape of his torture. The video, delivered to the Americans, reflected a graphic exercise in animalistic vengeance. &quot;Unforgettable,&quot; as one former intelligence officer who saw it says. But the message was also ruthlessly clinical: Top this. Higgins's tortured remains were found in a garbage bag near a southern Beirut mosque in December 1991. A few days later, Buckley's body was found dumped on Beirut's airport road. IN JANUARY 1995, according to a senior Hezbollah official, Mughniyeh fled to Iran. He was being hounded by the United States and Israelis; his brother Jihad had been assassinated; and his best friend, cousin Badr al-Din, had spent seven years in a Kuwaiti prison, gaining release only after Saddam Hussein's military occupied Kuwait in August 1990. Despite all this and a $5 million U.S. bounty on his head, Mughniyeh remained unscathed. This was primarily due to the care he took to protect his identity. He never talked of his operations, never agreed to an interview, never allowed his picture to be taken. He never spoke of his past, his family, or his life. According to a senior Islamist official who first met him in 1990 and got to know him as &quot;Hajj Radwan,&quot; Mughniyeh rarely returned to his village to see his father and mother. On a number of occasions, according to published reports, because he was fluent in Arabic and Farsi, he served as an interpreter at meetings between Iranians and foreign leaders, but without telling Iran's visitors who he was. From 1995 to 2006, Mughniyeh shuttled between Tehran, Damascus, and Beirut, eluding capture. There were some close scrapes. He boarded a flight to Saudi Arabia in late 1995, but the Saudis refused an American request to apprehend him, instead denying the airliner landing rights. U.S. intelligence officers concluded that the Saudis feared that cooperating in Mughniyeh's capture would lead to violent retribution. In 1996, he was spotted aboard a ship in Doha, Qatar, but the CIA moved too slowly to catch him. His legend grew with each escape: Stories spread that he met bin Laden, commanded Iran's operations in Basra, Iraq, in 2006 during the U.S. war in that country, had two plastic surgeries, and somehow owned a bakery in Beirut, where he could be seen, every morning, at a nearby coffee shop. The most believable Mughniyeh story comes from the senior Islamist official who filled me in on Mughniyeh's past. Over a quiet dinner in Beirut in late 2011, the official told me that Mughniyeh had been married with two boys and a girl and been living in Lebanon, with a second wife in Damascus. &quot;I first met Hajj Radwan in 1990,&quot; he told me, &quot;and I met him quite by accident several times thereafter. I had no idea he was Imad Mughniyeh.&quot; He said he spotted Mughniyeh in 1992 at a southern Beirut store that sold decorative bathroom tiles and plumbing fixtures. What my source didn't know at the time was that the shop was owned by Mughniyeh's brother Fuad, who served as a midlevel Hezbollah security official. The shop was across the street from a prominent mosque frequented by Hezbollah's senior leadership. One day, he was picking up supplies and found Mughniyeh standing behind the counter. Mughniyeh greeted my source with a grin and said he was &quot;filling in&quot; for Fuad -- &quot;a close friend of mine,&quot; my source recalled, shaking his head in disbelief. &quot;He waited on me.&quot; But while my source didn't know then that the shop's owner was Mughniyeh's brother, the Israelis did. On Dec. 21, 1994, Ahmad Hallaq, a former Palestinian militiaman recruited by the Israelis, planted 120 pounds of explosives in a gray Volkswagen van outside Fuad's store, walked inside to confirm that his target, Fuad, was there, and then, after walking a safe distance away, triggered the bomb. The blast, Nicholas Blanford wrote, &quot;ripped apart the front of the shop, instantly killing Mughniyah and three passersby.&quot; Israel had good reason to target anyone close to Imad Mughniyeh: He had become indispensable to Hassan Nasrallah, Hezbollah's chief, who was then shaping a strategy to pry Israel out of southern Lebanon, where Israel had set up a security zone. Later, after Israel's June 2000 withdrawal from the south, Nasrallah called on Mughniyeh to design a plan to deploy Hezbollah's Iranian-supplied, Russian-made Kornet and RPG-29 anti-tank rockets against Israeli armor. A senior Hezbollah official confirmed to me that Mughniyeh actually came up with Hezbollah's anti-tank training regimen, which paid off six years later. During the 2006 Israeli invasion of Lebanon, the Israel Defense Forces were badly bloodied, losing more than 40 armored vehicles to Hezbollah's anti-tank squads. But while Mughniyeh was a hero for Hezbollah, his welcome was wearing thin in Syria. The Syrians always had a loveless marriage with Iran -- and Hezbollah. Syrian President Hafez al-Assad had only reluctantly agreed to the deployment of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps training units to the Bekaa Valley in 1982, and then insisted that the deployment be scaled back. His son and successor, Bashar, followed suit: He maintained strong ties to Tehran, while registering discomfort with Iran's anti-Baath strategy in the wake of the 2003 U.S. invasion of neighboring Iraq. Relations soured further after the 2006 Lebanon war. Facing domestic economic pressures as a result of U.S.-imposed sanctions, the Syrian president pursued deeper ties with the West -- over Iranian objections. &quot;I want to make this clear: Syria views itself as a Mediterranean country,&quot; Imad Moustapha, then Syria's ambassador to the United States, pointedly told me in 2007. &quot;We look west -- not east. We look to America for leadership.&quot; The statement, shocking at the time, reflected Syria's desire to normalize relations with Washington -- a fact that discomfited Tehran. Hezbollah had its own problems with Damascus. Movement leaders were bitter about Syria's February 2007 decision to open a communications channel with Israel through Turkey, and with Assad's decision to send the Sunni Islamist militants of Fatah al-Islam into the Lebanese city of Tripoli, where they sparked a bitter conflict in a Palestinian refugee camp in May 2007 that claimed hundreds of lives. Syria's move in Tripoli roiled Hezbollah leaders, who accused Assad of purposely attempting to destabilize the Lebanese government -- at their expense. &quot;We know who's responsible for Tripoli, even if you and your journalist friends don't,&quot; a Hezbollah official told me at the time. Ties between Damascus and Hezbollah reached a low point that September when Israeli jets bombed Syria's clandestine nuclear reactor under construction in the country's north and Assad's regime refused to respond militarily. In private, a senior Hezbollah leader with whom I spoke accused Syria of &quot;flirting with the Zionists.&quot; Peter Jordan/Time &amp;amp; Life Pictures MUGHNIYEH'S ASSASSINATION in Damascus marked the final indignity for Hezbollah. In public, the &quot;resistance axis&quot; presented a united front, putting out nearly identical statements bemoaning the killing. In private, however, Hezbollah leaders blamed Syria for Mughniyeh's death, citing lax security and the incompetence of Gen. Assef Shawkat, Assad's brother-in-law, who was personally responsible for Mughniyeh's safety. In the bombing's immediate aftermath, according to a senior Lebanese Islamist, Hezbollah officials in Damascus adamantly refused all Syrian requests for access to the body, physically barring security officers from the room at the hospital where he had been deposited. Iran dispatched its foreign minister within hours of the killing to calm tensions, but without success. According to my senior Islamist source, no high-level Syrian official attended Mughniyeh's memorial service, and Hezbollah was enraged when Assad appointed Shawkat as the incident's chief investigator. But if Hezbollah had seen dark omens coming from Damascus, Mughniyeh's death apparently caught Israel, as well as the United States, entirely by surprise. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's denial of responsibility was categorical: &quot;Israel rejects the attempt by terrorist elements to ascribe to it any involvement whatsoever in this incident,&quot; he said in a statement. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack simply commented that Mughniyeh was &quot;a coldblooded killer, a mass murderer, and a terrorist responsible for countless innocent lives lost,&quot; adding that &quot;the world is a better place&quot; without him. Certainly, Hezbollah officials have their suspicions about who was responsible for Mughniyeh's assassination, which includes the usual suspects -- and the Syrians. One such official spoke candidly about it while seated beneath a portrait of Mughniyeh in his office in Beirut in the summer of 2010. &quot;The Zionists killed Hajj Radwan,&quot; he said, and then shrugged. &quot;Or your CIA.&quot; I disagreed: &quot;We can't organize a two-car funeral.&quot; His eyes flashed, and he turned on me, raising his voice. &quot;I can't tell you who killed Imad Mughniyeh, because I don't know,&quot; he snapped. &quot;But I can tell you this: If we were in charge of his security, instead of the Syrians, he'd be alive today.&quot; In the end, persistent rumors about Syria's involvement in Mughniyeh's death drove me to visit an acquaintance in Israel in early 2009 -- a man who'd spent three decades at or near the top of the Israeli political establishment. I began the discussion off topic, asking about Olmert's views on the Palestinians. Slowly, however, the discussion turned to Israel-Syria relations and the Turkish-hosted indirect talks. I was forced to be explicit: Did the Israelis condition warming relations with Syria on an end to its nuclear program -- and the death of Mughniyeh? My friend eyed me from behind his desk as a slow smile crept across his face: &quot;Not only can't I talk about it, but I certainly can't talk about it with you,&quot; he said. Then, after a long pause, he added: &quot;You know, we had two pieces of baggage with Syria, and now we don't.&quot; Almost exactly three years after Mughniyeh's assassination, in March 2011, the Syrian uprising began in Daraa. A few months later, Nasrallah dispatched the first Hezbollah fighters to help Assad stay in power. The decision sparked dissent among Hezbollah's senior leadership, who remained bitter about Mughniyeh's death. But Nasrallah imposed his will. &quot;No one in Hezbollah mentions Syria; no one even talks about Syria,&quot; Timur Goksel, a veteran of the United Nations mission in Lebanon and Hezbollah expert, told me recently. &quot;Only Hassan Nasrallah.&quot; A year later, the rebels struck at the very heart of Assad's regime. On July 18, 2012, a massive explosion at the headquarters of Syria's national security council in Damascus killed the defense minister and three other top security and intelligence officials, including General Shawkat, once tasked with Imad Mughniyeh's safety. The Syrian government blamed &quot;terrorists&quot; for the attack. When Shawkat's funeral was held two days later, no Hezbollah official bothered to attend. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=668_1369515309 AvataraS The Driver Syria Sat, 25 May 2013 11:03:16 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=d3f_1369493795 smokey75 Raw combat video of U.S. Marine AH-1W Super Cobra attack helicopters and M1A1 Abrams tanks engaging enemy insurgents surrounding VSP Shurakay while supporting Marines with Combat Logistics Regiment 2 (CLR-2) during Operation Dynamic Partner, Helmand Province, Afghanistan on Feb. 15, 2013. CLR-2 provided tactical logistics support to Regimental Combat Team 7 (RCT-7) in order to extract equipment from VSP Shurkay to facilitate its demilitarization. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=d3f_1369493795 smokey75 Cobras, Abrams give insurgents a bad night in Op Dynamic Partner. Cobra,Helicopter. Wed, 22 May 2013 18:48:48 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=2f9_1369261794 USMC_SRT Under an overcast sky with the waves crashing in the distance, the Marines of force reconnaissance platoon, 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit, conducted close quarter tactics shooting at the Kaneohe Bay range training facility, May 13. The Marines from Okinawa, Japan, were thankful for the break from the sun as they performed training drills to maintain proficiency. They aimed at paper targets using two weapons, .45-caliber pistols and M4 carbine rifles. Capt. Brian VanHoose, the platoon commander and a native of Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, said their shooting drills are practice for direct action raids. "All of this shooting is designed to engage the enemy in a close proximity," VanHoose said. "We train in close quarters tactics with primary and secondary weapons, the rifle and pistol. We utilize similar tactics during visit, board, search and seizure." The Marines focused on their stance and movements during live-fire drills. The importance of focusing on their positioning enables muscle memory. The more they practice, the easier it becomes second nature for conducting actual missions. Staff Sgt. Daniel Sigala, a force recon platoon team leader and native of Anthony, N.M., said the training at K-Bay range is about keeping up their standards. "Our training is for missions capability," Sigala said. "Accurate shooting needs to be maintained for whatever mission arises." VanHoose said they have been training together for a year and a half, and this is their culminating training package. They have been in Hawaii for four weeks conducting exercises to sustain their skills. "Training in Hawaii is different from training in Okinawa," VanHoose said. "Because of the capabilities the facilities offer in Hawaii, the training here is excellent. We were able to conduct VBSS training with a retired Navy fleet, and parachute training in which we performed three military freefalls and two low level static line jumps, including a water jump. It's difficult to train in Okinawa because of the weather, and in Kaneohe Bay everything is close together, which makes things quicker and easier." In between drills, the Marines reloaded magazines and discussed how their overall training went in Hawaii. Cpl. Randall Stevenson, a recon scout with force recon platoon and native of Baton Rouge, La., said this was his second time coming to Hawaii. "It's great to come here to train because we do more diverse training here than in Okinawa," Stevenson said. Sgt. Micah Crowell, a radio operator with force recon platoon, said this was his first time in Hawaii and wasn't sure what to expect. "Hawaii is a beautiful place with great weather and I loved being able to train here," Crowell said. " Performing jumps was the best so far because the adrenaline rush is addicting. The scenery here is incredible." Sigala said training in Hawaii was especially beneficial for the Marines of force recon platoon to test what they've learned. "Training here gives them a sense of being able to train outside of what they are used to," Sigala said. "They understand that everywhere we go, there are restrictions, and things we have to overcome." * A Marine from force reconnaissance platoon loads rounds into a magazine during close quarter tactics shooting at the Kaneohe Bay range training facility, May 13. ** Sgt. Timothy Hippler, a point man with force reconnaissance platoon, shoots a .45-caliber pistol during close quarter tactics shooting at Kaneohe Bay range training facility *** Sgt. Timothy Hippler, a point man with force reconnaissance platoon, shoots a .45-caliber pistol during close quarter tactics shooting at Kaneohe Bay http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=2f9_1369261794 USMC_SRT Maintaining marksmanship: Force Recon <span class="highlight">Marines</span> fire away USMC, Marines, Force, Recon Wed, 22 May 2013 18:29:20 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=86f_1369261447 USMC_SRT Blue chemical lights illuminated the Pacific under a early morning sky as 41 dark figures approached the black waters off San Onofre beach at 4 a.m. and patiently waited in the brisk air for the countdown to honor their fallen comrades to begin May 17. The announcer counted "3... 2... 1!" The Marines plunged into the frigid ocean and stroked their way through a 2,000 meter swim, which was the first evolution of the 5th Annual Recon Challenge here. Twenty two-man teams and Sgt. Maj. Blake Smith ran the event alone. The event consisted of swimming, climbing, and navigating obstacle courses. "You have to factor in the rocks, waves and your buddy's abilities," said Staff Sgt. Mark Rawson, a recon team leader with 1st Force Reconnaissance Company here. "You also have to keep account of all of your gear." Each competitor carried a ruck sack weighing no less than 50 pounds when filled with the supplies necessary to complete the race. "It was designed to simulate a full mission profile," said Master Sgt. Mariota Pa'u Jr., the operations chief and challenge staff noncommissioned officer in charge. "These guys aren't here to compete for a trophy or a Super Bowl ring," said Pa'u. "They're here to compete because they are representing the recon Marines that have been killed overseas." According to Pa'u, like every other recon challenge, this year's was dedicated to the families of fallen reconnaissance Marines and many aspects of the challenges symbolize that. "You start with the Marine's dog tags and name stenciled on your ruck-sack," said Pa'u. "You start with them, you finish with them." Competitors performed a callisthenic test, climbed a 35 ft. tower and did a 25 meter swim without breaching the surface. "Every few miles we had to stop and take our pack off and that affected a lot of people," said Gunnery Sgt. Collin Barry, course chief for Basic Reconnaissance Course with Reconnaissance Training Company, Advance Infantry Training Battalion, School of Infantry-West. Barry said that the challenge was different this year from previous years because the exercise stations were added to the courses trails. "Whether it's 20 miles or 30 miles you can get in the right mind set, but not this year," said Barry. "Every two to three miles you're taking your ruck-sack off to do some type of event that smokes you." Although safety is paramount, injuries do occur. Event staff was sure to accommodate those who were impacted negatively during the trial. "My partner dislocated both of his shoulders yesterday," said Sgt. Maj. Blake Smith, director of the Staff Non-Commissioned Officer Academy here. "I was linked with a team in the beggining and told I could run on my own if I wanted to. That way I didn't affect any other team's performance." Although Smith's partner was unable to finish the race, he said he had to continue any way he could because the race was about those he'd lost long ago. "He was a good friend of mine from a long time ago," said Smith. "It was pretty emotional." Smith, coincidentally, had the honor of bearing the name of someone he knew this year. "(This event) is near and dear to a lot of our hearts because we go out and race with the names of our fallen brothers," said Smith, 43, the oldest participant this year. Smith's partner wasn't the only one to suffer minor injury. "I got a cramp on one of the obstacles and fell," said Cpl. Joshua Rios, reconnaissance Marine with 3rd Reconnaissance Battalion in Okinawa, Japan. "The corpsman wrapped my knee up and recommended I stop, but I kept pushing." According to Rios, the risk was worth the reward. "It's going get tough and it's going to suck," said Rios. "That doesn't matter. You don't give up because it's much more worth it to see it through to the end than it is to quit." Running this event gives these Marines time to catch up with old friends. "It's a great opportunity for us recon Marines to come together, reunite and shake the hands of brothers we haven't seen in a long time," said Master Sgt. David Jarvis, operations chief with 1st Reconnaissance Battalion's Alpha Company. "The most important thing is remembering our fallen brothers." Jarvis came in first place with his teammate Gunnery Sgt. Tyler Fedelchak at 8 hours and 36 minutes. They beat second place finishers by seven minutes. "This really brings a tear to your eye because we care so much about the guys we've lost," said Jarvis, who came in first placefor the second year in a row. "Recon marines were tied to the hip with each other so those guys are literally like family to us." * Sgt. Johnathan Bumpus performs a functions check on an M-240G machinegun that he and his teammate, Sgt. Alexander Hale, assembled under 15-feet of water during the 5th Annual Recon Challenge here May 17. The challenge consisted of a 2,000-meter swim, calisthenics tests and other skill based events. ** Cpl. Benjamin Walker leaped off of the 35-foot tower at the 53-Area pool during the 5th Annual Recon Challenge. *** Sgt. Maj. Blake Smith dives 15-feet to retrieve an M240G machinegun which he assembled at the bottom of the 53-Area pool during the 5th Annual Recon Challenge. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=86f_1369261447 USMC_SRT <span class="highlight">Marines</span> sacrifice at Recon Challenge for those who gave it all USMC, Marines, Recon, Challenge Tue, 21 May 2013 14:00:54 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=da5_1369158731 CptSpaulding YUMA PROVING GROUND, AZ -- U.S. Marines with the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit's Maritime Raid Force parachute at night from approximately 3,000 feet and land at Yuma Proving Ground, Az, during ground realistic urban training May 10, 2013. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=da5_1369158731 CptSpaulding <span class="highlight">Marines</span> Conduct Nighttime Parachute Jump Marines Conduct Nighttime Parachute Jump Sun, 19 May 2013 08:55:46 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=e1a_1368967036 Solomon_h Royal Marines http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=e1a_1368967036 Solomon_h Royal <span class="highlight">Marines</span> combat display Royal, marines, combat, Britain Fri, 24 May 2013 18:29:48 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=ae5_1369434445 USMC_SRT He was outnumbered. Most of his Marines were dead. But through courage and commitment, John Basilone and a section of surviving machine gunners killed over 3,000 Japanese enemy fighters in the battle of Guadacanal during WWII. For his actions, Basilone was awarded the Medal of Honor, the nation's highest award for combat valor. Upon his redeployment to the United States, Basilone toured the country selling war bonds. He was offered an officer's comission and the opportunity to remain stateside. He refused. Basilone was determined to fufill a promise he made to his Marines the day he left combat - that he would deploy to the Pacific and fight once again by their sides. He did. This time at Iwo Jima. He fought courageously until he was killed by an enemy mortar. But that wasn't the end of Basilone's legacy. For the first time in history, a Reserve Marine was awarded the Gunnery Sgt. John Basilone Award for Courage and Commitment in a ceremony here May 19, 2013. Staff Sgt. Alec Haralovich, a Silver Star and Purple Heart recipient, received the award from Lt. Col. Dion A. Anglin, the 4th Reconnaissance Battalion commander. "I'm truly honored to have received this award," said Haralovich. "It's even more humbling to end up being in the same roles as reconnaissance legends such as John Mosser Brian Blonder... not to mention John Basilone himself." According to his fellow Marines, Haralovich's name belongs aside those same Marine Corps legends. Haralovich's father could not be prouder. " The John Basilone award is a rare and honorable thing to have," said George Haralovich, who is a U.S. Navy and Vietnam veteran. "I raised and I know the kind of man that he's become.... He personifies the Marine values of personal sacrifice and commitment." George said his son first displayed courage when he deployed with the California-based 2nd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment to Iraq on active duty. "He rescued a Marine in Fallujah; that was done completely anonymously," George Haralovich said. "I could barely pull it out of him. But other Marines I met at the 2/7 barbecue filled me in on it. I'm not surprised that he would behave the way he did and take action the way he did. He chose the Marine career, so I think he's ready to go anywhere, anytime. It's the Marine Corps, you get your orders and you go, and that is where he's at." According to Maj. Benjamin Everett, the inspector-instructor for Company E, 4th Recon. Bn., the award honors the legacy of Basilone and emphazises the contribution of the noncommissioned officer to the current fight. The final stamp of approval for the award comes from the highest-ranking enlisted Marine serving, the Sergeant Major of the Marine Corps. The recipient of the award is someone who embodies the spirit and character of Basilone. His combat exploits contributed greatly to his selection as the recipient, said Everett, and Haralovich's likeness to Basilone could not be more evident. " comes back stateside to sell war bonds and through his own force of will finds his way back... in theater to serve with his Marines," he said. "And you see a Marine Reservist, who has done active duty, come into the Reserves, volunteer for a deployment in Afghanistan and volunteer yet again. So there's definitely some similarities there both in courage and commitment." After the ceremony, Haralovich took time to mingle with his fellow Marines and have a private conversation with his father before he left for a volunteer deployment, again. * The 4th Reconnaissance Battalion commander, Lt. Col. Dion A. Anglin, presents Staff Sgt. Alec Haralovich with the Gunnery Sgt. John Basilone Award for Courage and Commitment during a ceremony here, May 19, 2013. Anglin, who is from Warshaw, Ind., traveled from his San Antonio-based unit headquarters to bestow Haralovich with the honor. Harolovich,who is from Bloomington, Ind., is currently assigned to Company E, a section assign to Anglin. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=ae5_1369434445 USMC_SRT Indiana Marine awarded the 2013 Gunnery Sgt. John Basilone Award for Courage and Commitment USMC, Marines, Award, Courage Fri, 24 May 2013 18:22:06 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=993_1369433944 USMC_SRT Marines do many things to relieve stress during breaks at work. Some go out for a smoke break or gather around for some "water cooler" talk, while others go outside to catch a whiff of fresh air. Sgt. Emmanuel Dickson, however, does not do any of those things. Dickson, an administrative specialist with personnel sourcing, Marine Forces Reserve, takes "pull-up breaks" instead. "Everyday individuals sit in front of their computers, and by the end of the day, they are exhausted and tired and do not feel like doing anything," he said. "I go out to do pull-ups because it gets my blood pumping and keeps my mind going. It will get me feeling energized." His frequent trips to the pull-up bar have earned him the top spot on the MARFORRES Pull-Up Campaign leader board. The campaign, which kicked off April 1, aims to have Marines perform more pull-ups through friendly competition, according to Sgt. Maj. James T. Booker, the MARFORRES and Marine Forces North sergeant major. As a part of the campaign, installing new sets of pull-up bars and inspiring participants to do more sets will ultimately help Marines improve their future physical fitness test scores. For Dickson, this just meant writing down what he was already doing. "When came out, it gave me an opportunity to do... something I just like to do... go out there and knock out as many as I can whenever I can," said Dickson, a native of Kaduna, Nigeria. Pull-ups have always been a part of his workout regimen. Dickson, who can perform 38 pull-ups now, said to stay overall physically fit he takes part in everything from cross-fit to gymnastics. However, he prefers bodyweight exercises like pull-ups. He declared that fitness is a lifestyle and being inactive is not an option. "He's always out there and he's really good at ," said Sgt. Enrique Trevino, administrative specialist with MARFORRES Installation Personnel Administration Center, and also a teammate of Dickson's. "I'm glad he's on my team." Dickson said he never planned on doing so many pull-ups, but the campaign motivated him to beat or match the number he performed the day before. The campaign website has an individual leader board, lead by Dickson who has logged more than 2,500 pull ups since mid-April. There is also a team leader board, which shows the teams and sections with the most pull-ups. Team "Lat's for Days," Dickson's and Trevino's team, has lost most of its team members either to a different duty station or temporary additional duty. This means that Dickson and Trevino have to carry the team while other members are gone. So far they have been successful holding the team in the top spot, while Trevino is also holding the second spot on the individual leader board. Trevino said they like to go out as a team and face-off because it allows them to motivate each other and ultimately build camaraderie by competing between themselves. Marines around Marine Corps Support Facility New Orleans started to notice Dickson's name on top of the leader board. Some have been curious about what he is doing and what his routine is, but others approached him with something else. Dickson has been getting called out publically; one friendly competitor in the MARFORRES Pull-Up Campaign video vowed to take his spot on the pull-up throne. But Dickson sees it as a win-win situation. He loves it when other Marines are motivated and work hard on improving themselves, even if it means trying to beat him as the top dog. For MARFORRES Pull-Up Campaign Video, visit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01gB6LEDgtQ . * &amp; ** Sgt. Emmanuel Dickson, an administrative specialist with personnel sourcing, Marine Forces Reserve, takes a break after doing a set of pull-ups here, May 20. Dickson says he can currently perform 38 pull-ups in a row, and performs more than 100 pull-ups every day. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=993_1369433944 USMC_SRT The Pull-up Champ: Marine performs pull-ups all the way to the top USMC, Marines, Pull, Up, Thu, 23 May 2013 18:50:42 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=71e_1369349190 USMC_SRT U.S. Marines are taught to overcome obstacles with a minimum of help. But when some Marines prepared to charge a hill in a training exercise here a few months ago, they were forced to halt and radio the one man who could help them advance: Brian Henen, turtle expert.The troops were "running up the hill and firing at targets," Mr. Henen said. "Some of the tortoises like the hill also. The Marines don't want to hurt the tortoise, so they call us and we go in and move it." Mr. Henen, who has a doctorate in biology, is part of a little-known army of biologists and other scientists who manage the Mojave desert tortoise and about 420 other threatened and endangered species on about 28 million acres of federally managed military land. "There's a lot of people who don't recognize the amount of conservation the Marine Corps does," said Martin Husung, a natural-resource specialist on the base. "A lot of people think we're just running over things." Instead, Mr. Henen often hustles out to remote parts of the Mojave Desert to make sure the threatened desert tortoise, which can weigh 10 pounds and live to be more than 50 years old, isn't frightened by charging troops. "When they get scared, they pee themselves," Mr. Henen said, referring to the tortoises. Since tortoises can go two years between drinks of water, an unplanned micturition can cause dehydration and even death. So Mr. Henen sometimes demonstrates to troops how he soaks the reptiles in a pool until they drink enough water to plod on with their lives. CloseDesert tortoise The tortoise isn't the only animal benefiting from the limited hunting, high security and trained biologists on many bases. On the Navy's San Clemente Island, biologists protect vulnerable loggerhead shrikes from hungry rats by installing metal "rat flashings" at the base of trees the birds nest in. In Texas, the Army creates protective nesting environments for endangered golden-cheeked warblers to fend off incursions by brown-headed cowbirds. And at Arnold Air Force Base in Tennessee, the once-endangered Helianthus eggertii , or Eggert's sunflower, is doing so well it has been taken off the endangered list. Congress ordered the Defense Department to protect the flora and fauna on its lands under the 1960 Sikes Act. Today, the military works with agencies like the Fish and Wildlife Service, a bureau of the Interior Department, to search for and protect animals, plants and archaeological sites on its bases. At Fort Benning, an Army base near Columbus, Ga., gunfire and explosions regularly set off fires in the pine trees, said John Brent, the base environmental manager. Oddly enough, this is a boon for the red-cockaded woodpecker, a bird on the endangered species list that has made a comeback there. The finicky woodpecker typically lives in longleaf pines at least 60 years old. The tree thrives on forest fires. "It needs fire to germinate and grow," Mr. Brent said. USMCA conservation poster Outside the base, civilian agencies have long tried to prevent forest fires, and that ultimately hurts the pine population. Elsewhere, forest lands are disappearing amid rapid development. All of this has the birds flocking to the base, Mr. Brent said. To help welcome the new tenants, Mr. Brent and others have been building bird "condominiums," Mr. Brent said. For this they cut a hole about the size of a loaf of bread in an existing tree and slide in a cedar box to accommodate a nest. They can only do this once per tree because these picky birds prefer "condos, not townhouses," Mr. Brent said. "It's a well-kept secret" that biologists are drawn to work on military bases, Mr. Brent said. "There's a chance to do terrific work." Last year, the Department of Defense spent nearly $70 million on threatened and endangered species management and conservation, including $16.5 million on the red-cockaded woodpecker and just under $6 million on the desert tortoise. A sign at the Marine base at Twentynine Palms warns about tortoises. The outlays let biologists survey habitats, tag and track animals, build hatcheries and provide ecological training to thousands of troops. At Fort Irwin, an Army base near Barstow, Calif., Clarence Everly bumped along a dirt trail in a Dodge Ram pickup. The former Airborne Ranger is now the natural and cultural resources manager on base. "Having been in the Army, it gives you some street cred" dealing with soldiers and the chain of command, he said. "You're not just the environmentalist guy trying to prevent them from doing training." He drove out to meet a team of biologists from the U.S. Geological Survey on a 10-acre restricted area where lonely Joshua trees shook in 50 mile per hour winds. This "is a great resource," said Christina Aiello, a USGS scientist and Ph.D. student from Penn State University, trying to yell over the gusts of wind. "Blocking off areas, restricting access, it's safe and secure and there's no public access."She is part of a team doing research on how tortoises interact socially. She said their research is "like Facebook" as they track friend circles in the tortoise group. Back at Twentynine Palms, Ken Nagy, a professor emeritus in biology from UCLA studying the reproductive habits of the reptiles, held a baby tortoise in one hand, its shell still soft. They are like "walking ravioli" to predators, he said. A fenced-off section of the base covered by netting helps overcome the high mortality rate for young tortoises in the wild. Mr. Nagy's program helps protect juveniles from birds and allows for research in a natural habitat. Other parts of the military's domain aren't exactly natural but still offer the animals military-style protection. On Fort Irwin, Mr. Everly peered through the window of his pickup at some targets in the distance-home to a surprisingly large tortoise population. "In essence, the live-fire ranges are protection for the tortoises," he said, looking at a patch of ground where bullets often rain down but rarely hit the burrowing reptile. "Nobody goes out there." http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=71e_1369349190 USMC_SRT The Few, the Proud, the Tortoises USMC, Marines, Tortoise