Author: Braxton Taylor

The Pentagon has confirmed reports it has pulled Navy Rear Adm. Michael Donnelly from promotion and a new job overseeing the Navy’s Pacific fleet after a conservative news outlet again highlighted his role in allowing sailors to hold drag shows aboard a ship he commanded nearly 10 years ago.A senior defense official confirmed that “Secretary Hegseth has chosen to withdraw Adm. Donnelly’s nomination to lead 7th Fleet” in a statement provided Friday, adding “the department will open up nominations for the 7th Fleet commander” — the fleet that operates in the Pacific and especially around Japan and China.On Thursday, conservative…

A former Marine who exploited roughly two dozen minors, including by posing as a teenage girl online, was sentenced to 40 years in prison on Thursday. He extorted multiple victims into creating child sexual abuse material and threatened to release it to their friends and family.Anthony Fritzinger, 25, committed the offenses while he was an active-duty lance corporal in the Marine Corps at Cherry Point, North Carolina, according to his indictment and service record. His criminal conduct was first discovered in 2020 when he used an anonymous account to threaten an 18-year-old woman with the release of nude pictures taken…

As a high school kid, I spent most of my Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays at my grandparents. I had almost zero responsibilities and ample hunting time. When I wasn’t in the woods, I would thumb through stacks of Outdoor Life or Field & Stream that my grandfather hoarded over the years and kept in a wicker basket beside his recliner.In the evenings, he would formulate the next day’s hunting plans for me and my cousins as we watched hunting shows. Most of these shows featured sprawling midwestern ag fields, big bucks, even bigger tower blinds, and, of course, the whispered…

If you’ve spent any time in western terrain, you already know about the brutal climbs, long hours in the cold, or the moment you finally arrow a bull, only to realize you’re many miles from the truck with a few hundred pounds of meat on the ground.That’s when fitness stops being a bonus and becomes a requirement. It’s not about six packs or max deadlifts. It’s about being more present, more capable, and more resilient when it counts. When you’re not winded from the hike, you’re more alert. When you’re not aching from the cold, you’re more patient. And when…

Treat small drones like ammunition, not airplanes, the defense secretary told the Pentagon in a Thursday memo that just might boost production where many other efforts have failed.“There’s a chance for this to go really fast,” said Allan Evans, CEO of Unusual Machines, a company that manufactures drone parts. The memo from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, which builds on a July 6 White House executive order, does a couple of key things. Most importantly, it directs the Defense Department to treat small drones under 55 pounds—the so-called Group 1 and 2 drones—as consumables rather than “durable property.” Small drones already don’t have…

I’m confident in saying that I have fairly well-trained bird dogs. They know the basics and can run multiple retrieves at the same time. My dogs are steady to the shot, and they listen really well. For me.My daughters and my wife, their dogs aren’t quite as good. This is a real bummer, because they are the same dogs.The thing about our modern bird dogs is that they are also house dogs, family dogs, and general pets all wrapped up in one package. This is great, but it can lead to some issues with their skills in the field. The…

The State Department is laying about 1,350 employees today, part of a reorganization that Trump administration officials said would address an overly “bloated bureaucracy.” The reduction in force will eliminate the jobs of about 1,100 civil service employees and nearly 250 foreign service officers on domestic assignments, bringing the total reduction to “nearly 3,000 members of the workforce” when voluntary and incentivized departures are included, State officials said on Friday. That’s somewhat fewer than the estimates of 2,000 layoffs and 3,400 total departures that officials gave lawmakers in March.“Headcount reductions have been carefully tailored to affect non-core functions, duplicative or redundant offices, and offices where considerable efficiencies may be found…

The one-time cash infusion of the One Big Beautiful Bill bestows about $2.5 billion on the Army for upgrades that include developing new weapons and hastening procurement of existing systems. Together with the proposed 2026 budget, which increases the Army’s buying power by 6.2 percent, the service is looking at a 14.2-percent bump in acquisitions funding, Army spokesman Steve Warren told reporters on Tuesday.“This includes critical investment in air and missile defense, such as $679.1 million for M-SHORAD and another $634.5 for LTAMDS, and $1.1 billion to continue modernizing our organic industrial base,” Warren said. “We’re also investing in munitions to…

When you are a non-swimming athlete and your time in the pool is basically limited to backyard games such as Marco Polo and Sharks and Minnows, you may need a swimming routine to get you better prepared for a fitness test.This system requires swimming five days a week, but each week includes the following staple workouts:TechniquePracticing the stroke technique you will use on military fitness tests is the first step. For strokes such as the sidestroke, breaststroke and the modified sidestroke — referred to collectively as the combat swimmer stroke (CSS) — you should receive technique training. This can occur…

The Pentagon needs a new plan to deter hackers from attacking American critical infrastructure, say senators who aim to write that into law.In its version of the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, the Senate Armed Services Committee would require the Pentagon to develop a strategy to “reestablish a credible deterrence against cyberattacks targeting American critical infrastructure using the full spectrum of military operations,” according to an executive summary of the bill that was marked up and passed in closed sessions this week. “As we’ve seen in the last two years—particularly with Volt and Salt Typhoon—there’s obviously a growing, more aggressive and…