Military

The U.S. and South Korea conducted joint bombing drills using a type of precision munition for the first time in about seven years, in a show of force after Seoul scrapped a 2018 deal with North Korea to reduce tensions at the border.

For many, it will be the last big commemoration. The last reunion. Eighty years after Allied armies invaded the beaches of Normandy, marking a definitive turning point in World War II, those veterans who are still alive and sound enough are expected to return to France this week from the United States, Britain and Canada to commemorate the moment -- gingerly, slowly, happily.

Hundreds of flags dotted the headstones at Fairmount Memorial Park, coming alive in unison across the cemetery with each gust of wind.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – In less than two years since Congress passed a landmark bill to expand benefits to veterans who were exposed to toxins in the military, the Department of Veterans Affairs said last week that it passed a milestone of 1 million claims approved under the new law, including more than 22,500 in Washington state and nearly 6,500 in Idaho.

The inscription on the granite cover for Michael Flansaas’ cremated remains reads: “Once met, never forgotten. We’ll meet again.”

Spokane Valley’s Balfour Park consisted of little more than a grassy field, volleyball courts and a playground next to an adjacent vacant lot for years.

The top U.S. general in Afghanistan during the American military’s 2021 withdrawal repeatedly warned Washington that security would get “very bad, very fast” after troops departed, but the Biden administration still failed to grasp the danger in keeping its embassy open with only nominal protection, he told lawmakers investigating the war’s deadly endgame.

More than 74,000 people on Whidbey Island could face long-term health impacts from the U.S. Navy jet noise that's blasted over residents several days a week for over a decade, new research shows.

Thirty sailors and Marines assigned to Norfolk-based Navy ships were injured Wednesday in a hovercraft training incident, the Navy said. The service members were injured in an “incident” involving two hovercraft vessels, also known as air-cushioned landing craft, according to a Thursday news release from the U.S. 2nd Fleet.  

Not since the dark day at Pearl Harbor that drew America into World War II has there been so much trouble in paradise, as the U.S. naval base on the Hawaiian island of Oahu is sometimes described. 

In her second visit to Spokane in sixth months of office, Deputy Veterans Affairs Secretary Tanya Bradsher said the federal government remains committed to the VA’s controversial electronic health records system unveiled at Mann-Grandstaff Medical Center.

Frank Fogarty knew nothing about nuclear physics on ships when he got pulled from his Korean War submarine duty to interview for a fledgling U.S. Navy program, for the world’s first atomic-powered submarines. Fogarty, who just turned 100 in Spokane, recalls initially supporting the USS Seawolf before soon getting transferred to the USS Nautilus, the first one launched in 1955, while later being Nautilus Commanding Officer in 1963-67.

The world’s costliest weapons program, Lockheed Martin Corp.’s F-35 fighter jet, is getting even more expensive, according to a government watchdog.

In the wake of a "troubling trend" in aviation accidents — including the March 25 crash of an Apache AH-64E helicopter on Joint Base Lewis-McChord property in Thurston County that injured two pilots — the Army implemented an aviation safety stand-up Wednesday to increase training for both pilots and maintenance personnel.

In accepting the first Thomas S. Foley Award for Distinguished Public Service, former Secretary of Defense and retired Gen. James Mattis on Tuesday called on those in the audience to reject political division and cynicism for this country.

The Spokesman-Review

Lou Conter, the last known survivor of the battleship Arizona, which sank with the loss of 1,177 sailors and Marines in Japan's sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, plunging the United States into World War II, died Monday at his home in Grass Valley, California. He was 102.