F&F Per the 20,000 Pages, Impeach Lisa Monaco for Starters

Posted on April 17, 2016April 17, 2016 by Denise Simon

Fast and Furious, from the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee

F L A S H M E M O R A N D U M

April 14, 2016

To: Republican Members

Committee on Oversight and Government Reform

From: Chairman Jason Chaffetz

Re: Preliminary Update—The Fast and Furious Papers

Executive Summary

On January 19, 2016, U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson ordered the Justice Department to produce documents to the Committee related to Operation Fast and Furious. The documents—previously withheld pursuant to the President’s executive privilege claim—detail the Department’s internal deliberations with respect to denying, and eventually admitting, that firearms were trafficked into the hands of Mexican cartel associates during Fast and Furious.

On April 8, 2016, the Department produced 20,500 pages of documents in response to Judge Jackson’s Order.

More than previously understood, the documents show the lengths to which senior Department officials went to keep information from Congress. Further, the documents reveal how senior Justice Department officials—including Attorney General Eric Holder—intensely followed and managed an effort to carefully limit and obstruct the information produced to Congress. Justice Department officials in Washington impeded the congressional investigation in several ways, including:

 Presuming that allegations about gunwalking in Arizona were false and refusing to adjust when documents and evidence showed otherwise.

 Politicizing decisions about how and whether to comply with the congressional investigation.

 Devising strategies to redact or otherwise withhold relevant information from Congress and the public.

 Isolating the fallout from the Fast and Furious scandal to ATF leadership and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Arizona.

 Creating a culture of animosity towards congressional oversight.

Factual Background

On December 14, 2010, Customs and Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, a United States Marine veteran, was killed while on patrol near Nogales, Arizona, just miles from the Mexican border. The only two firearms found at the scene were semi-automatic rifles that were allowed to walk as part of a firearms trafficking case named Operation Fast and Furious. The deadly Fast and Furious operation ultimately was responsible for allowing approximately 2,000 firearms to illegally flow into the hands of Mexican cartel associates.

The case was started by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) Phoenix Field Division in 2009. In January 2010, ATF and the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Arizona secured funding through the Justice Department’s Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF) program. The OCDETF designation and the use of numerous wiretaps opened the door for significant oversight and supervision by Washington, D.C.-based Justice Department officials.

Congressional Republicans have investigated Fast and Furious since January 2011. Over the course of the investigation, the Justice Department has provided false information, stonewalled document requests, produced scores of blacked-out pages and duplicate documents in order to bolster its page count for public relations purposes, and refused to comply with two congressional subpoenas.

Litigation Background

On February 4, 2011, the Justice Department wrote to Congress and denied that law enforcement officers allowed straw purchasers to buy firearms illegally in the United States with the intent to traffic them without apprehension. On December 2, 2011—nearly ten months later—the Justice Department retracted that letter and confirmed federal investigators let weapons walk away in the hands of straw purchasers, many of whom entered Mexico during Operation Fast and Furious.

On October 12, 2011, the Committee issued a subpoena to then Attorney General Eric Holder to obtain documents and communications related to the Fast and Furious operation. As the investigation proceeded, understanding why, how, and when Justice Department officials determined the February 4 letter was false, and why it took so long for them to correct the record, became a primary focus. The Attorney General refused to produce the documents covered by the subpoena, and the President asserted executive privilege over the documents on June 20, 2012.

On June 28, 2012, the House of Representatives voted to hold the Attorney General in contempt because the President’s assertion of executive privilege was inappropriate and legally deficient. Concurrently, the House passed a civil contempt resolution authorizing a lawsuit 3

against the Justice Department to obtain the documents. The House of Representatives Office of General Counsel filed the lawsuit against the Justice Department on August 13, 2012.

Judge Amy Berman Jackson issued her opinion on January 19, 2016.

January 19, 2016 Order and Opinion

The Committee’s motion to compel the Justice Department to produce all the documents and communications it withheld pursuant to the President’s executive privilege claim asserted that: (1) those records are not deliberative, and therefore not eligible to be withheld under an executive privilege claim; and (2) even if they were, the privilege is outweighed in this instance by the Committee’s compelling need for the material.

Judge Jackson ruled executive branch communications regarding how to respond to congressional inquiries and other public relations communications are indeed eligible for executive privilege protection. However, Judge Jackson determined the privilege is outweighed in cases where Congress has a compelling need for the documents.

In this case, Judge Jackson decided the Committee’s need for the documents outweighed the Department’s need to protect itself from the limited harm that could come from releasing them.

Judge Jackson ordered the Justice Department to produce all documents and communications previously withheld as deliberative, among other things. Judge Jackson’s Order stated:

For the reasons stated above, it is ORDERED that plaintiff’s motion to compel [Dkt. # 103] is GRANTED insofar as it calls for the production of documents responsive to the October 11, 2011 subpoena that concern the Department of Justice’s response to congressional and media inquiries into Operation Fast and Furious which were withheld on deliberative process privilege grounds . . . . In all other respects, it is DENIED. Records subject to this order shall be produced to plaintiff by February 2, 2016.

It is further ORDERED that by February 2, 2016, defendant shall produce to plaintiff all segregable portions of any records withheld in full or in part on the grounds that they contain attorney-client privileged material, attorney work product, private information, law enforcement sensitive material, or foreign policy sensitive material. Whether any additional records or portions of records are to be produced is a matter to be resolved between the parties themselves.1

1 Order and Opinion of Judge Amy Berman Jackson, Comm. on Oversight and Gov’t Reform v. Loretta E. Lynch, Atty. Gen. of the U.S., Civil Action No. 12-1332 (ABJ) (Jan. 19, 2016). 4

The Committee’s Appeal

The House General Counsel filed a notice of appeal of Judge Jackson’s decision on behalf of the Committee on April 8, 2016. The Committee is seeking the remaining documents responsive to the lawsuit and subpoena that are still being inappropriately withheld by the Justice Department for other reasons.

The Justice Department’s Production

Within hours of the notice of appeal being filed, the Justice Department released thousands of documents to the Committee. Assistant Attorney General Peter Kadzik wrote an accompanying letter to the Committee. It stated:

[I]n light of the passage of time and other considerations, such as the department’s interests in moving past this litigation and building upon our cooperative working relationship with the committee and other congressional committees, the department has decided that it is not in the executive branch’s interest to continue litigating this issue at this time. The Department believes that the information provided to the Committee in the referenced production . . . obviates any need for further litigation on this matter.2

2 Letter from Peter Kadzik, Ass’t Atty. Gen., to Hon. Jason E. Chaffetz, Chairman, H. Comm. on Oversight and Gov’t Reform (Apr. 8, 2016).

3 Julian Hattem, Feds hand over ‘Fast and Furious’ docs as House appeals for more, THE HILL, Apr. 8, 2016.

4 DOJ-FF-04906.

In a story about the document production, The Hill wrote: “The decision to hand over documents amounts to an admission of failure for the administration, which had long insisted that many of the records were not eligible for Congress’s oversight.”3 This is true. It is also true, however, that the Justice Department continues to withhold thousands of documents covered by the Committee’s subpoena.

Preliminary Findings

Top Justice Department officials did not take questions from Congress about Fast and Furious seriously. In fact, in response to questions from Congress in January 2011, they presumed gunwalking did not occur and proceeded from there. That pattern persisted throughout the congressional investigation.

 On January 31, 2011, U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke wrote to Justice Department officials in Washington to share his concerns about a letter from Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Charles Grassley to ATF Director Kenneth Melson raising questions about whether guns were allowed to traffic into Mexico. Burke wrote: “Grassley’s assertions regarding the Arizona investigation and the weapons recovered at the BP agent Terry murder scene are based on categorical falsehoods. I worry that ATF will take 8 months to answer this when they should be refuting its underlying accusations right now.“4

Deputy Assistant Attorney General Jason Weinstein agreed: “This is a really important briefing for ATF – they need to nail it. . . . I’d be happy to work with ATF on the prep for this if it would be helpful.”5

5 DOJ-FF-04906.

6 DOJ-FF-04906.

7 DOJ-FF-04905.

8 DOJ-FF-44015—44018.

9 DOJ-FF-44015—44018.

10 DOJ-FF-44015—44018.

11 DOJ-FF-44015—44018.

12 DOJ-FF-11134.

Weinstein then suggested to Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division Lanny Breuer that he email Melson “offering any assistance they need for the Grassley briefing.”6 Weinstein further advised that “ATF can and should strongly refute” that a Fast and Furious weapon was involved in the Brian Terry attack.7

 On Friday, June 17, 2011, in response to news reports that firearms used in a high-profile kidnapping and murder were linked to Fast and Furious, Associate Deputy Attorney General Matt Axelrod emailed ATF, asking: “Were two F&F guns actually traced to the scene of this kidnapping? Can you run that down for us?”8 ATF dismissed the connection by responding that day: “[T]o suggest the guns are linked is like saying there was a murder in southeast three weeks ago. Tonight a car load of guys g[o]t caught with guns in southeast. Ergo the guns are linked to the murder.”9

Only after Chairman Issa and Ranking Member Grassley wrote to the Ambassador of Mexico on June 21, 2011 to ask for further details did Axelrod ask more probing questions of ATF.10 Subsequently, on June 22, 2011, Associate Deputy Attorney General Matt Axelrod emailed senior officials, including Deputy Attorney General Jim Cole: “I just heard from ATF. Their initial reporting on this was incorrect. Evidently, when MX law enforcement arrested the kidnappers at their hideout, they seized a number of firearms, two of which tie back to Fast and Furious. I’ll double check Issa’s letter in the morning, but it appears that the allegations in it (and in the Fox News report) are accurate.”11

Top Justice Department officials viewed the congressional investigation through a highly political lens. They constantly made decisions about whether and when to turn over documents based on political and public relations considerations.

 On March 9, 2011, Assistant Attorney General for Legislative Affairs Ron Weich forwarded a letter from the National Rifle Association to a group of senior Justice Department officials. The letter urged the House Judiciary Committee to hold hearings on ATF firearms trafficking enforcement tactics. Weich stated: “Chutzpah. The NRA’s now-public involvement in this may be useful in convincing reporters that this is part of the overall effort to discredit ATF.”12

 On May 4, 2011, Attorney General Holder weighed in on the topic of how to respond to a Wall Street Journal article about Lanny Breuer’s role in Fast and Furious. He asked a group of top Justice Department officials: “If we go out with something do we make it worse?”13 In response to a subsequent email from a Criminal Division lawyer providing additional details about how wiretap applications are reviewed, Holder responded: “Ok- but everyone get ready- this isn’t about facts.”14

13 DOJ-FF-00657.

14 DOJ-FF-00656.

15 DOJ-FF-43037.

16 DOJ-FF-43037.

17 DOJ-FF-43037.

18 DOJ-FF-60096.

19 DOJ-FF-60096.

 On June 15, 2011, Stephen Kelly, the top legislative affairs official for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, emailed top Justice Department officials about whether to provide certain material responsive to the Committee’s subpoena:

[T]his is a very bad idea. This will become precedent for Sen. Grassley’s office to seek actual documents from DoJ and the FBI in pending criminal investigations, and there’s a better than 50/50 chance that Sen. Grassley will become Chairman of the Judiciary Committee in the next cycle. If the documents are provided here, we can expect to see specific requests to DoJ and the FBI for documents in pending criminal investigations as a routine matter from Committee chairs, potentially including Sen. Grassley.15

The FBI’s General Counsel, Valerie Caproni, weighed in on Kelly’s assessment with “I agree.”16 Lisa Monaco responded to the group, “I have spoken with folks here on this and think for now we will not be providing this[.]”17

 In determining how the Department would describe in a letter to Chairman Issa the information being withheld, on September 19, 2011, DOJ lawyer Paul Colborn suggested “deleting the sentence giving a page count on our memos on memos withholding.”18 He went on to reason, “I think giving a page count is an inappropriate accommodation at this point. They have no legitimate oversight interest in that information.”19

 On October 5, 2011, DOJ Office of Public Affairs Director Matthew Miller emailed Attorney General Eric Holder:

If I were you, I would want answers from the entire team ([Deputy Attorney General Jim] Cole, [Associate Deputy Attorney General Steven] Reich, on down), on why the Department let Issa decide what to do with these memos. The whole point of the review is to find things like this and come up with plans for dealing with them. It should have been obvious that these memos were going to be a huge target, and instead of 7

just handing them over, the Department should have put them out to reporters on its own terms, instead of letting Issa do it. Give them to Issa at the same time you give them to the press with an explanation that takes the air out of the balloon. And if the answer is we owe it to Issa to give him this stuff first – well, that’s obviously ridiculous.20

20 DOJ-FF-61875.

21 DOJ-FF-61875.

22 DOJ-FF-12213—12214.

23 DOJ-FF-21337.

24 DOJ-FF-21335.

Holder forwarded the email to his chief of staff, Gary Grindler, with the comment, “I agree.”21

Top Justice Department officials in Washington wanted Congress and the public to have as little information as possible. They carefully chose language to minimize Congress’s and the public’s understanding of the role of the Department’s political staff in Fast and Furious.

 On March 16, 2011, an ATF official weighed in on the Justice Department’s response to a letter from House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith. Chairman Smith’s letter asked several questions about Operation Fast and Furious, including “How many weapons have been allowed to pass to Mexico under the program known as ‘Fast and Furious’”? The ATF official advised senior Justice Department officials to exclude key information from their response. He wrote: “We would suggest that you pull the sentence that notes how many weapons we’ve recovered. It squares poorly with how many we haven’t.”22

 On March 31, 2011, senior Justice Department officials in Washington were discussing an imminent subpoena from Chairman Issa. Assistant Attorney General for National Security Lisa Monaco asked the group: “[W]hat’s the status of the response to [I]ssa that had been discussed to try to buy time?”23 DOJ Office of Public Affairs Director Matthew Miller subsequently drafted a letter to Chairman Issa. Regarding that draft, DOJ lawyer Paul Colborn wrote to Ron Weich: “Ron, Matt’s draft is not a good letter. Much too weak on the open investigation point and suggesting we’ll provide a ‘substantial’ number of documents while withholding only ‘some’ relating to the investigation into the death of the agent. Much more likely, it’s the reverse: we’ll provide only some and withhold a substantial number, and they concern not just the murder investigation but also the longstanding Fast and Furious investigation.”24

 On May 3, 2011, top Justice Department officials were discussing whether to give a statement to the Wall Street Journal for an impending story on the Fast and Furious investigation. The Wall Street Journal was preparing to report that Lanny Breuer’s office approved wiretaps which described questionable investigative techniques in March 2010. DOJ Office of Public Affairs Director Matthew Miller recommended against issuing a statement. In an email to Breuer and other top DOJ officials, he wrote: “I think people will accuse us of playing with semantics when we say that you did not authorize Fast and

Furious, but they find out that CRM [DOJ’s Criminal Division] did authorize wiretaps.”25

25 DOJ-FF-28895.

26 DOJ-FF-28985.

27 Evan Perez, Lawmakers Step Up Probe of Gun Trafficking Operation, WALL ST. J., May 4, 2011.

28 DOJ-FF-48038.

29 DOJ-FF-00002.

30 DOJ-FF-00002.

 Later on May 3, 2011, top officials from DOJ’s Office of Public Affairs and other top DOJ officials were discussing how to respond to press inquiries about Lanny Breuer’s role in authorizing Fast and Furious. Officials from the Criminal Division wanted to issue a definitive denial that Breuer authorized the ATF operation. Office of Public Affairs Director Tracy Schmaler warned her colleagues: “. . . we run the risk of seeming disingenuous to some who will not take our explanation that aspects of the operation are not the same as authorizing the operation.”26 DOJ’s statement to the Wall Street Journal wound up being misleading and minimized Breuer’s role in Fast and Furious: “[The wiretap approvals are] a narrow assessment of whether a legal basis exists to support a surveillance request that ultimately goes before a judge for decision. These reviews are not approval of the underlying investigations or operations.”27

 On July 6, 2011, a draft letter to Chairman Issa and Ranking Member Cummings was circulated to senior Justice Department officials. In response, Department official Faith Burton wrote, “I’d stay away from the representation that we’ll fully cooperate in the future . . .” and removed language from the draft letter.28

 On August 17, 2011, Associate Deputy Attorney General Matt Axelrod wrote an email to ATF Assistant Deputy Director of the Office of Public and Governmental Affairs Chris Shaefer. In the email, Axelrod provided feedback in response to a draft external communication related to Fast and Furious. Axelrod advised Shaefer the draft “wades further than the last version into details and conclusions about Fast and Furious, which strikes us as unwise given the evolving nature of what we’re still learning about the underlying facts and the risk that what you say will be twisted and taken out of context by agency critics.”29

Axelrod further instructed Shaefer to keep his communications about Fast and Furious “high level.”30

The Justice Department’s political staff in Washington took steps to isolate the fallout from Fast and Furious to ATF and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Arizona.

 On August 28, 2011, Attorney General Holder was strategizing with top officials in Washington about how to announce ATF Director Ken Melson and U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke would resign due to their roles in Fast and Furious. Holder was concerned the news would leak early because Melson had already cleaned out his office. He instructed his staff

to have someone at ATF “close the door to his office.”31 Deputy Attorney General Jim Cole worried announcing Melson’s resignation would create the appearance Melson was the only official being removed. He wrote to Holder: “The problem with going earlier than Tuesday is that we won’t have Dennis in the package.“32

31 DOJ-FF-01272.

32 DOJ-FF-01310.

33 DOJ-FF-01310.

34 DOJ-FF-01310.

35 DOJ-FF-01268-69.

36 DOJ-FF-01268.

37 DOJ-FF-01267.

38 DOJ-FF-57853.

39 DOJ-FF-57852.

Holder responded: “Let’s hold all until Tuesday as planned.”33 He replied to his own email: “We have to make known the breadth of the changes- at the top in USAO and ATF. At worker level at USAO and ATF. No one is a fall guy here.”34

Further proof of the coordination by main Justice of the Melson and Burke staff changes occurred when Melson emailed a proposed “draft press release” he “would like to issue from ATF.”35 David O’Neil responded to the chain (with Holder cc’ed):

Ken’s message below reads like he may think he’s giving us a heads-up on the message he plans to send on Monday as opposed to asking for clearance. If we haven’t made clear to him that we want to approve/coordinate any messaging about this, we probably should say that OPA is going to revise the first draft he shared and we’ll get back to him with a new one.36

Stuart Goldberg alerted the email chain: “the DAG [Jim Cole] did tell him the change would be announced on Tuesday,” to which Holder questioned “Did Jim say it in Spanish?” Cole responded, “Further proof of the need for a change.”37

Talking points drafted by Ron Weich to communicate to congressional staff made clear both Melson and Burke were intended to be the scapegoats, noting: “These changes will help us move past the controversy that has surrounded Fast and Furious. Ken Melson and Dennis Burke have both acknowledged mistakes in that area, and it will be useful to turn the page from those mistakes.”38

According to Weich, Holder expected to “have these conversations personally,” but Weich believed “there may be a value in keeping the AG a step removed.”39 10

Top Justice Department officials disingenuously relied on the ongoing investigation by the Inspector General to ward off outside investigations.

 On March 15, 2011, Justice Department officials in Washington and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Arizona discussed “noises that they [the Mexican government] are opening a criminal investigation of ATF for Fast and Furious . . . .”40 DOJ Criminal Division Office of International Affairs Director Molly Warlow advised that the Inspector General’s review “shouldn’t have any interplay at all [with the Mexican government’s investigation], unless we wanted to (or needed to) invoke that as reason (even if disingenuously) to shelve the Mexican inquiry. I can see nothing but mischief (and headaches for us) in the mexicans pursuing this, so I would like to see if there is a way we can turn it off, and the sooner the better.”41

40 DOJ-FF-12160.

41 DOJ-FF-12160.

Going Forward

On April 8, 2016, the Committee filed a notice of appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. House General Counsel will file the appeal on behalf of the Committee, pursuant to the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure. The purpose of the appeal is to obtain the full range of documents for which the Committee issued a subpoena in 2011 and brought this lawsuit in 2012. We expect those documents—which are still being withheld for inappropriate reasons by the Justice Department—will answer some of the outstanding questions about Operation Fast and Furious.

The emails and other internal Justice Department communications described in this memorandum represent a small subset of the 20,500 pages that the Committee received on April 8, 2016. Committee staff are working vigorously to review the entire set of documents that the Justice Department turned over to piece together how and why senior political officials in Washington obstructed the congressional investigation of Fast and Furious. The Committee will supplement the preliminary findings contained in this memorandum with a more complete report as soon as practicable. 11

APPENDIX: TIMELINE OF KEY DATES

December 14, 2010: Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was fatally shot.

January 27, 2011: Sen. Charles Grassley wrote a letter to ATF Acting Director Kenneth E. Melson requesting information about the ATF-sanctioned sale of hundreds of firearms to straw purchasers. The letter mentioned a number of allegations that walked guns were found at the scene of the fire fight that killed Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.

February 4, 2011: The Justice Department responded to Sen. Grassley and denied that law enforcement officers allowed straw purchasers to buy firearms illegally in the United States and take them into Mexico without being apprehended.

March 16, 2011: Chairman Issa wrote to then-Acting ATF Director Kenneth E. Melson requesting documents and information regarding Fast and Furious.

March 22, 2011: President Obama appeared on Univision and spoke about the “gunwalking” controversy. The President said neither he nor Attorney General Holder authorized Fast and Furious. He also stated, “There may be a situation here in which a serious mistake was made, and if that’s the case then we’ll find out and we’ll hold somebody accountable.”

March 31, 2011: The Committee issued a subpoena to Melson. The Department produced zero pages of non-public documents pursuant to that subpoena until June 10, 2011, on the eve of the Committee’s first Fast and Furious hearing.

October 12, 2011: Chairman Issa issued a subpoena for documents to the Justice Department. That subpoena, and its successors, is the subject of the ongoing litigation between the Committee and the Justice Department.

November 8, 2011: Holder stated for the first time in testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee that “gunwalking” occurred in Fast and Furious.

December 2, 2011: The Justice Department retracted the February 4 letter and confirmed that federal investigators did in fact permit weapons to enter Mexico during Operation Fast and Furious.

June 20, 2012: The President asserted executive privilege over some of the documents being withheld by the Attorney General.

June 28, 2012: The House of Representatives voted (255-67) to hold the Attorney General in contempt because the President’s assertion of executive privilege was invalid, among other reasons. The House also passed (258-95) a civil contempt resolution that authorized a lawsuit against the Justice Department to obtain the documents. 12

August 13, 2012: The House of Representatives Office of General Counsel filed the lawsuit against the Justice Department.

January 19, 2016: Judge Amy Berman Jackson issued her order and opinion.

April 8, 2016: The House General Counsel filed a notice of appeal of Judge Jackson’s order so the Committee can secure the full range of documents for which it brought the lawsuit.

The Justice Department provided 20,500 pages of documents in response to Judge Jackson’s order.

There Goes 9 More Gitmo Detainees

Posted on April 16, 2016April 16, 2016 by Denise Simon

Oh, late Friday night, cloak and daggar? No White House announcement from the podium?

Since most of the remaining detainees are from Yemen, 9 were released to Saudi Arabia. Think about that for a moment. Saudi has been at war in recent months in Yemen and the United States had to literally flee during the first days of the war, terminating our CIA staff and our major drone operation against al Qaeda Arabian Peninsula, AQAP.

This is a headscratcher….unless….well nevermind.

ABC: Authorities say the U.S. has released nine prisoners from Guantanamo Bay and sent them to Saudi Arabia for resettlement.

All nine are Yemeni but have family ties to Saudi Arabia. None of the men had been charged and all but one had been cleared for release from the U.S. base in Cuba since at least 2010. One was approved for release by a review board last year.

They could not be sent to their homeland because of instability there.

The prisoners include a frequent hunger striker whose weight had dropped to as low as 74 pounds (34 kilograms) at one point.

The release announced Saturday in a Pentagon statement brings the Guantanamo prisoner population to 80, including 26 cleared men expected to leave by the end of the summer.

****

Stripes: The nine Yemenis include Tariq Ba Odah, a frequent hunger striker whose weight dropped to a dangerously low 74 pounds (34 kilograms) at one point as the military fed him with liquid nutrients to prevent him from starving to death. His lawyers at the Center for Constitutional Rights had urged the U.S. to free him earlier due to his health.

Eight of the prisoners, including Ba Odah, had been cleared for released from Guantanamo since at least January 2009, when an Obama administration task force evaluated all of the prisoners held at that time. The ninth, Mashur Abdullah Muqbil Ahmed Al-Sabri, was cleared by a review board last year.

The other prisoners in this release were identified as: Ahmed Umar Abdullah Al-Hikimi; Abdul Rahman Mohammed Saleh Nasir; Ali Yahya Mahdi Al-Raimi; Muhammed Abdullah Muhammed Al-Hamiri; Ahmed Yaslam Said Kuman; Abd al Rahman Al-Qyati; and Mansour Muhammed Ali Al-Qatta.

The last time Barack Obama was to be with the Saudis was at a Camp David Gulf Nation Summit, where he was snubbed. Furthermore in recent days there has been other hostilities over the 28 missing pages of the 9/11 report where there is text that at least one Saudi diplomatic had met with two of the hijackers in California providing them with material and monetary support. Anyway, Obama starts this coming week with his trip to Saudi Arabia mostly to meet on the fight against Islamic State.

ABC: resident Barack Obama will strategize with his Middle Eastern and European counterparts on a broad range of issues during a weeklong trip to Saudi Arabia, England and Germany with efforts to rein in the Islamic State group being the common denominator in all three stops.

Obama, who begins traveling next week, recently said defeating IS his No. 1 priority. He paid a rare visit to CIA headquarters this week for a national security team meeting focused on countering the group.

The president is scheduled to arrive in the Saudi capital of Riyadh on Wednesday, where he will hold talks with King Salman. Obama will also attend a summit hosted by leaders of six Persian Gulf countries that are members of the Gulf Cooperation Council: Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman.

The summit follows a similar gathering that Obama hosted with the Gulf leaders last year at the Camp David presidential retreat. The White House arranged last year’s meeting largely to reassure Gulf leaders who were unnerved by a deal the U.S. and other world powers negotiated with Iran to ease economic sanctions in exchange for limits on its nuclear program.

The Iran deal is now in force, and the meeting next week will focus on defeating the Islamic State militants and al-Qaida, as well as regional security issues that include Iran.

Obama will spend most of his time in England. He is scheduled to meet again with Queen Elizabeth II over lunch at Windsor Castle on April 22, a visit that coincides with her 90th birthday a day earlier.

Obama will also meet with British Prime Minister David Cameron, who is campaigning for his country to continue its membership in the European Union. Britons are scheduled to vote on its EU membership in a June 23 referendum, the first vote ever by a nation on whether to leave the 28-member, post-World War II bloc.

Obama is not expected announce a position on the referendum, although aides have voiced support for a strong United Kingdom as a member of the E.U.

“He’ll make clear that this is a matter the British people themselves will decide when they head to the polls in June,” Ben Rhodes, Obama’s deputy national security adviser, said Thursday as he outlined the trip for reporters.

Cameron has also been stung by criticism over his investment in an offshore trust run by his late father. The revelation was part of the recent dump of more than 11 million documents from a Panama law firm that is one of the leaders in setting up offshore bank accounts for the rich and powerful.

Obama also plans a town hall-style, question-and-answer session with young adults, which has become a staple of his foreign trips. Additional stops were being planned for London.

In Germany, the final stop on Obama’s three-country trip, the president will hold talks and a news conference Sunday with Chancellor Angela Merkel. Merkel’s popularity has suffered after she angered Germans by allowing a massive resettlement of refugees from Syria and other war-torn countries. She recently helped broker a deal between the EU and Turkey to stem the refugee flow to Europe.

Obama also plans to join Merkel to open the Hannover Messe, the world’s largest trade show for industrial technology.

Before departing for Washington, Obama has scheduled a speech reviewing U.S.-European collaboration during his tenure and looking ahead to future joint efforts.

(General) Susan Rice, Declares War Policy on ISIS

Posted on April 15, 2016April 15, 2016 by Denise Simon

Cant make this up……

Consider again this interview with the three previous Secretaries of Defense under Barack Obama…..

Rice Details U.S. Whole-of-Government Approach to Defeating ISIL

By Jim Garamone DoD News, Defense Media Activity

President Barack Obama talks with National Security Advisor Susan E. Rice in the Oval Office prior to a phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Feb. 10, 2015. White House photo by Pete Souza

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DOWNLOAD HI-RES / PHOTO DETAILS President Barack Obama talks with National Security Advisor Susan E. Rice in the Oval Office prior to a phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Feb. 10, 2015. White House photo by Pete Souza

Susan E. Rice told the cadets and faculty that defeating ISIL is “at the very top of President Obama’s agenda.”

While the terror group is not an existential threat to the United States, she said, it is a danger to Americans and U.S. allies around the globe. Rice pointed to the ISIL attacks in Brussels, Paris, Istanbul, San Bernardino, Jakarta, Nigeria and others. She also highlighted ISIL in Syria and Iraq and the danger it poses to millions of people under its rule.

Dangerous Hybrid

What makes the group dangerous is that “it is essentially a hybrid,” the national security advisor said. ISIL is a terror organization that exploited the chaos of civil war in Syria to attack and occupy large swaths of Syria and Iraq. “At the same time, they have harnessed the power of social media to recruit fighters and inspire lone-wolf attacks,” Rice said.

ISIL is an enormous danger to civilians in the region and is an incredibly destabilizing force in the Middle East, she said, but members of the group are not 10 feet tall.

“This is not World War III or the much-hyped clash of civilizations,” Rice said. “On the contrary, we alienate our Muslim friends and allies — and dishonor the countless Muslim victims of ISIL’s brutality — when people recklessly and wrongly cast ISIL as somehow representative of one of the world’s largest religions.”

ISIL is simply “a twisted network of murderers and maniacs, and they must be rooted out, hunted down and destroyed,” she said, and all aspects of the U.S. government are part of the process to stop them.

Comprehensive Strategy

“For the past year and a half, the president has been leading a comprehensive strategy to destroy ISIL and its ideology of hate,” Rice said. “And, I do mean comprehensive. When we’re sitting around the situation room table, we’re using all aspects of our power — military, diplomacy, intelligence, counterterrorism, economic, development, homeland security, law enforcement. Ours is truly a whole-of-government campaign.”

During remarks at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo., Ambassador Susan E. Rice, national security advisor, explains the comprehensive effort the United States is using to destroy the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, April 14, 2016.

And it is a global effort, the national security advisor emphasized. “We’ve assembled a broad coalition of 66 partners — from Nigeria and the Arab League to Australia and Singapore,” Rice said.

The anti-ISIL campaign represents an evolution in America’s broader strategy of confronting and defeating terrorism, she said, noting that since 9/11, the United States has learned that not every conflict requires large numbers of ground troops. “Our fight against ISIL is not like Afghanistan or the Iraq War,” she said.

In Syria and Iraq, coalition forces are helping to train indigenous forces, she said. “And, this increasingly dynamic campaign is ideally suited for airpower and the Air Force, utilized smartly in support of our partners on the ground,” Rice added.

The counter-ISIL strategy has four facets, she said. First, it calls for attacking ISIL’s core in Syria and Iraq. Second, the coalition is targeting ISIL’s branches. Third, the coalition is working to disrupt ISIL’s global network. Fourth, the United States is working around the clock to protect the homeland.

Substantial Progress

“It is a complex effort,” the national security advisor said. “It will not be accomplished fully in just a few weeks or months, or even a few years. But day by day, mile by mile, strike by strike, we are making substantial progress. And … we’re going to keep up the momentum.”

Rice detailed the coalition’s plans to continue the pressure on ISIL, beginning with continuing to hammer at the terrorist organization in Iraq and Syria — the so-called core ISIL. Coalition forces have conducted more than 11,500 strikes against core ISIL since starting operations in 2014, she said.

“Due, in large part, to our unprecedented visibility of the battlefield, the coalition air campaign is having a real impact,” Rice said. “Every few days, we’re taking out another key ISIL leader, hampering ISIL’s ability to plan attacks or launch new offensives.”

The strikes also are squeezing ISIL’s finances, which flow from their control of vast oil resources, their extortion and taxation of local populations and their looting and illicit sale of our cultural heritage, she said.

On the Ground

On the ground, the coalition will continue to support local forces in Iraq as they roll back ISIL, the national security advisor said. “So far, they have retaken more than 40 percent of the populated territory that ISIL once held,” she said.

“This fight will continue to require the courage and perseverance of the Iraqi people,” Rice continued. “It will also require the sustained financial support of the international community. It is not enough to win this fight; we must also win the eventual peace.”

Ending the civil war in Syria will go a long way to destroying ISIL, she said. An interagency team of diplomats, military and intelligence officers, working alongside Russia and other international partners facilitated a cessation of hostilities in the country, Rice noted. “This cessation has largely held, but in recent days, we’ve seen a significant uptick in fighting,” she said. “We’re increasingly concerned that the regime’s persistent violations of the cessation — and al-Nusrah’s hostile actions — will undermine efforts to quiet the conflict.”

Assad Must Go

Syrian President Bashar Assad may continue trying to disrupt and delay the good-faith efforts of the international community and the Syrian people to broker a political transition, the national security advisor said. “But he cannot escape the reality that the only solution to this conflict — the only way this ends — is through a political process that brings all Syrians together under a transitional government, a new constitution and credible elections that result in a new government without Assad,” Rice said.

An Air Force F-15 Strike Eagle approaches a KC-135 Stratotanker for refueling over Iraq in support of Operation Inherent Resolve, the effort to counter the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant in Iraq and Syria. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Corey Hook

But core ISIL is only part of the problem, she noted. ISIL will flourish in fragile states and lawless regions, Rice said, citing ISIL ally Boko Haram in Nigeria and ISIL’s branches in Libya, on the Arabian Peninsula, in West Africa, in Afghanistan and Pakistan. ISIL has sent envoys “to provide their affiliates with money, fighters — even media training,” Rice said.

In Libya, ISIL threatens not only North African stability, but also sub-Saharan Africa and Europe as well, the national security advisor said.

In Afghanistan and Pakistan, ISIL has established a branch calling itself ISIL in the Khorasan — largely composed of former Afghan and Pakistani Taliban members. “They’ve gained territory in the east and launched attacks in major cities like Jalalabad, though a combination of U.S., Afghan, and Taliban pressure has limited ISIL’s gains,” she said. “As part of the U.S. counterterrorism mission in Afghanistan, President Obama has authorized the Department of Defense to target ISIL in the Khorasan.”

ISIL Affiliates in Yemen

In Yemen, ISIL affiliates have taken advantage of ongoing instability to attack mosques and nursing homes. In Saudi Arabia, ISIL has targeted security forces and civilians. “To address these offshoots, we are deepening our security cooperation with countries in the region,” Rice said. “When President Obama attends the U.S.-Gulf Cooperation Council Summit in Riyadh [Saudi Arabia] next week, ISIL will be at the top of our agenda.”

Peshmerga soldiers rehearse urban tactical movement at a training base near Irbil, Iraq, Jan. 26, 2016. Peshmerga soldiers attend a six-week infantry basic course that will help improve their tactical knowledge to aid in the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. There are six Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve training locations: four building partner capacity sites and two building specialized training sites. Army photo by Spc. Jessica Hurst

The United States is working with countries such as Mali, Somalia, Bangladesh, Indonesia and the Philippines, which are countries targeted by the terror group, Rice said. “With smart, sustained investments,” she added, “we have a chance to prevent ISIL from taking root in these disparate corners by assisting our partners in ways as varied as improving local law enforcement, promoting development and countering ISIL’s nefarious narrative.”

ISIL’s narrative is at the heart of dismantling ISIL’s global network, Rice said. The attacks in Paris highlighted the threat of ISIL fighters returning home, she noted. The United States sent “foreign-fighter surge teams” to work with allies as they implement long-term structural reforms to improve intelligence sharing and prevent future attacks, she said.

Homeland Defense

U.S. officials in the homeland are also working to strengthen aviation security and screening, and working with Interpol to share thousands of profiles of suspected fighters, Rice said. “Roughly 45 countries have established mechanisms to identify and flag terrorist travel to Iraq and Syria, and dozens of countries have arrested fighters or aspiring fighters,” she added. “Together with our partners, we’re slowing the flow of foreign terrorist fighters into and out of Iraq and Syria — including sealing almost all the border with Turkey.”

It remains a problem. Since 2011, nearly 40,000 foreign fighters have traveled to Syria from more than 120 countries. “We will continue to do everything in our power to prevent them from returning and launching attacks in our countries,” Rice said.

The United Nations has passed a resolution targeting ISIL’s abuse of the international financial system. The raid last year against Abu Sayyaf, ISIL’s finance chief, yielded a wealth of information on ISIL’s financial vulnerabilities: 7 terabytes of flash drives, CDs, papers and other data, she said. “That’s more than we got out of the bin Laden raid. And, we’re going to continue using that information and other tools to turn off the ISIL funding tap,” Rice said.

Hearts and Minds

The battle against ISIL is a battle for hearts and minds, Rice said. She quoted the president saying, “Ideologies are not defeated with guns; they’re defeated by better ideas.”

The United States is working to expose ISIL’s twisted interpretation of Islam and underscore that ISIL not only is not defending Muslims, but also is killing many innocent Muslims, Rice said. But the United States cannot deliver this message, she said. It has to come from Muslims.

U.S. officials are supporting partners across the globe, including in Saudi Arabia and Malaysia, to get this message across, the national security advisor said. She praised the State Department’s new Global Engagement Center for amplifying anti-ISIL voices internationally, from religious leaders to ISIL defectors.

“Week by week, these voices are eroding ISIL’s appeal,” Rice said. “A new poll shows that nearly 80 percent of young Muslims — from Saudi Arabia to Egypt to Tunisia — are now strongly opposed to ISIL.”

Addressing Conditions

But the president doesn’t want to defeat ISIL only to have another group pop up and take its place, Rice said. “To defeat ISIL’s ideology for good, however, we must acknowledge the conditions that help draw people to ISIL’s destructive message in the first place,” she said. “Around the world, countries and communities — including the United States — must continue working to offer a better, more compelling vision. We must demonstrate, as President Obama has said, that the future belongs to those who build, not those who destroy. Where ISIL offers horror, countries around the world must offer hope.”

President Barack Obama talks with Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of State John Kerry, National Security Advisor to the Vice President Colin Kahl and National Security Advisor Susan E. Rice outside the West Wing of the White House, July 15, 2015. White House photo by Pete Souza

Finally, Rice said, it comes down to protecting the homeland. “We’ve hardened our defenses — strengthening borders, airports, ports and other critical infrastructure,” she said. “We’re better prepared against potential bioterrorism and cyberattacks.”

U.S. borders will remain strong, and counterterrorism experts will remain hyper-vigilant, the national security advisor said. “The enduring source of America’s strength, however, comes from upholding our core values — the same enduring values embodied in each one of you at this academy,” Rice said. “It is when people feel persecuted or disempowered that extremism can take hold, so our commitment to the dignity and equality of every human being must remain ironclad.

“In the face of ISIL’s barbarism,” she continued, “America must remain resilient and defiant in our freedom, our openness, and our incredible diversity.”

U.S. Deploys Commandos to the Philippines

Posted on April 15, 2016April 15, 2016 by Denise Simon

Why? Well as both Barack Obama and John Kerry tell us that Islamic State has lost territory, which may only be barely accurate in Iraq or Syria, they have gained a larger footprint globally and that includes the Philippines.

The Philippines-based jihadi group Abu Sayyaf Group released a new video with its Canadian, Filipino, and Norwegian hostages, giving a final deadline for their ransoms to be met and threatening to behead one of the four on April 25.

So we are deploying special forces to the region.

MANILA, Philippines— In a military buildup certain to inflame tensions with China, the United States said Thursday it will send troops and combat aircraft to the Philippines for regular, more frequent rotations, and will conduct more joint sea and air patrols with Philippine forces in the South China Sea.

In fact, Defense Secretary Ash Carter is in the region on has taken some time to board the carrier battle group the USS Stennis.

ABOARD THE USS JOHN C. STENNIS —U.S. Secretary of Defense Ash Carter on Friday made a second sail of the South China Sea, underscoring the U.S. commitment to its Asia-Pacific allies amid increasing tensions with China.

Carter said his presence on the aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis, which was sailing about 60 to 70 miles West of the Philippines’ main island, Luzon Island, was to send “a message to the region.”

“The United States intends to continue to play a role in keeping peace and stability in this region’” said Carter, who was accompanied by Philippines defense minister Voltaire Gazmin.

What is the problem there you ask? Islamic State….the terror operation that is spreading to other regions in the world.

From Time magazine:

ISIS Is Making Inroads in the Southern Philippines and the Implications for Asia Are Alarming

Anadolu Agency/Getty ImagesPhilippine army soldiers stage a counterterrorism operation against Maute terrorists, who are allegedly linked with ISIS, in Butig, the Philippine province of Lanao Del Sur, in Mindanao Island, on March 1, 2016

Islamist extremism is growing in Mindanao, with serious security implications for the region and beyond

Musa Muhammad stands at the site where 400 Islamist militants launched an invasion of the southern Philippine city of Zamboanga little over two years ago, sparking 20 days of heavy fighting with security forces. The ruins of his old house can be found there, amid several hundred other razed homes. Since then his family has lived in a sports stadium, refusing to move to a newly built house in another part of town.

“This has been our home for 50 years,” he says. “We’re afraid, but we’ll never leave.”

The Moros (“Moors”), as the Muslims of the southern Philippine region of Mindanao are called, are known for their intransigence. For centuries, they fought the Spanish, Americans and Japanese for their independence. Today, they are fighting Manila too. Some 120,000 people have died, and millions have been displaced, in the past 40 years of insurgency. (Muddying the picture, a separate communist insurgency is also sporadically waged in parts of Mindanao by the New People’s Army, which is thought to consist of some 3,200 fighters.)

Yet many Moros, like Musa, are not victims of a heavy-handed central government but the casualties of infighting among their own kin. The battle at Zamboanga, which led to the destruction of Musa’s home, started off when factions of one rebel group, the Moro National Liberation Front, wanted to signal their displeasure with the peace negotiations with Manila then being carried out by another rebel group, Moro Islamic Liberation Front. It took 3,000 troops to end the rebel occupation of several districts of the city, in an operation that saw 51 insurgents killed and drove 70,000 people from their homes.

Now those talks have stalled and, in the frustrated void that has followed their collapse, extremism has taken root. Several Moro outfits have pledged allegiance to terrorist group Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) and carried out attacks in its name.

One of those groups is the Abu Sayyaf militia, whose head Isnilon Hapilon — now styled Sheik Mujahid Abu Abdullah al-Filipini — has been appointed ISIS’s leader in the Philippines. Presently, the Philippine army is attempting to strike at the group’s jungle stronghold on the island of Basilan. In one of the bloodiest days for the armed forces in years, 18 soldiers were killed and over 50 wounded on April 9. ISIS claimed responsibility for the killings. Shortly after, Abu Sayyaf beheaded two Filipino hostages. (The group is also holding 10 Indonesians, two Canadians and a Norwegian captive.)

“It’s very likely that [Abu Sayyaf] will declare a satellite of the caliphate in the coming year,” says Rohan Gunaratna, an international terrorism expert at S. Rajaratnam School of Security Studies in Singapore. “Once that is done, it will be much more difficult to dismantle these groups.”

Already, up to 1,200 Southeast Asians have joined ISIS in the Middle East. Experts now worry that an ISIS stronghold in the southern Philippines will act as a regional lure, providing extremists from across Asia with a place to gain combat experience, before they set act to attack Asian targets or even targets further afield. The Jakarta attack in January that killed four civilians is just a taste of what could come, says Greg Barton, chair in global Islamic politics at Deakin University in Melbourne.

“Next time they won’t mess around with pistols but bring assault rifles,” says Barton. “That’s all it takes to turn amateurs into a lethal bunch of killers.”

Some claim that the biggest threat currently is that competing, ISIS-inspired groups would seek to upstage each other with small-scale attacks. However, organized, international networks still exist, even if the influence of al-Qaeda, which once funded training camps in the southern Philippines, has waned, along with that of its affiliates.

Indonesian operatives are already trading Syria-hardened tutors for weapons and training grounds in Mindanao, reports the ISIS Study Group, an intelligence collective run by the Washington, D.C., think tank Center for a New American Security. The area is evidently attracting insurgents from further afield too. Mohammad Khattab, an alleged bombmaking instructor from Morocco, was reportedly among the five killed militants on Basilan earlier in April. There have been rumors of Muslim Uighurs from China in the area. And in January last year, Zulkifli bin Hir — a Malaysian described as a key facilitator between Indonesian and Filipino extremist groups — was cornered and killed in Mamasapano in central Mindanao, but at the cost of 44 deaths among the Philippine army’s Special Action Force. Five civilians also lost their lives in an operation that turned the tide of support against President Benigno Aquino III’s peace negotiations with the Moro separatists.

“Before the Mamasapano tragedy, it looked really promising,” says Richard Javad Heydarian, a security expert at De La Salle University in Manila. “There were even rumors that Aquino would be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. Unfortunately a lot of journalists sensationalized the story, fanning anti-Muslim sentiment. Politicians running for office have then been trying to score political points on this.”

Further talk of a new, autonomous province within the Philippines for the Moro — it would be called Bangsamoro — has now been suspended until the general elections in May. In the meantime, says terrorism expert Gunaratna, intolerance is putting down deeper roots. As an example, he points to the March 1 assassination attempt on a Saudi cleric, Aaidh al-Qarni. The preacher, who has been on ISIS hit lists, was shot while visiting Western Mindanao State University in Zamboanga for a two-day symposium.

“Recent arrests in Malaysia and Indonesia clearly show that a new terror attack from ISIS in the region is imminent,” Gunaratna warns. “And the next one will be bloodier.”

Marines Salvaging Aircraft Parts to Keep Flying

Posted on April 14, 2016April 14, 2016 by Denise Simon

Congressional failures just forced the Marines to raid a museum for aircraft parts

MilitaryTimes: Marine aviation squadrons are salvaging aircraft parts from museums in order to keep planes flying, according to anecdotes from a key congressional leader.

During a recent trip to several Southern U.S. military bases, Marines told House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, that they’ve been paying for their units’ supplies like pens and paper towels, and were forced to raid decommissioned aircraft for parts.

“I have heard firsthand from service members who have looked me in the eye and told of trying to cannibalize parts from a museum aircraft … getting aircraft that were sent to the boneyard in Arizona back and ready to fly missions, pilots flying well below the minimum number of hours required for minimal proficiency,” Thornberry said.

To see the short real time video go here.

Lawmakers are livid about the fiscal shortfalls, even if their budget infighting in Congress is partly to blame.

At issue are military readiness accounts stretched thin by more than a decade of war and four years of defense penny pinching. Earlier this month, chiefs from each of the four services told lawmakers that those two stressors have led to belt-tightening headaches for units across the military, in some cases deferring long-term needs in favor of short-term solutions.

PhotoCamel

Thornberry would not identify which Marine air station had the parts shortage, and Marine Corps officials at the locations he visited would not confirm the stories.

But Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Joseph Dunford did not dispute and seemed to confirm the incidents when confronted with the anecdotes at a March 22 hearing.

“What you saw in the Marine Corps I think reflects in some part what you’ll see in all the services, perhaps not to the same degree as Marine aviation,” he told the chairman. “But that same dynamic exists in each one of the services.”

The Marine Corps has about 180 F/A-18A-Ds, said Marine Corps spokesman Maj. Clark Carpenter. Typically, 43 F/A-18s from deployable squadrons and nine from training squadrons are in depot for maintenance at any given time. That leaves only about 60 percent of the deployable aircraft in flyable, “fight tonight” status.”

Lt. Gen. Glen Walters, the Corps’ deputy commandant for programs and resources, told lawmakers earlier this month that budget cuts have left the entire service “under-resourced” for spare parts.

The Marine Corps has requested $460 million from Congress in fiscal 2017, some of which would buy spare parts for aircraft, but aviation readiness is not expected to fully recover until at least 2020.

Thornberry said the museum salvage attempt he learned about didn’t work, and the Marines were forced to find another fix to get the aircraft ready for an overseas mission.

“The part they took off the museum aircraft did not fit the aircraft they were trying to keep flying,” he said. “But they’re looking for whatever they can do to keep these things up in the air. It’s just amazing.”

Earlier this month, Marine Commandant Gen. Robert Neller blamed some of the maintenance and repair woes on the continued high tempo of operations.

“The fight in ISIL continues to put stress on equipment, particularly aviation,” he told lawmakers, using an acronym for the Islamic State group. “We’re in the process of resetting our equipment and then you’re trying to maintain legacy gear, and at the same time modernize every model type series of aircraft.”

Other service officials have echoed similar problems. Dunford and Defense Secretary Ash Carter point to Congress’ defense spending caps, which have limited maintenance and investment accounts in recent years, and begged for relief in upcoming budgets.

But committee members have questioned the Pentagon leaders’ assessments that the White House’s fiscal 2017 budget request is truly enough to fix the deep-seated problems, criticizing their promises that next year’s spending caps will be enough to right the force.

Thornberry said that several service members have told him they’ve started buying “basic supplies” like pens and cleaning products “because otherwise it would take three to four months to get them if they could get them at all.”

“I’d say my concern level was very high when I hear [anecdotes] like that. You have folks out there doing their job and they can’t get a pen from the federal government procurement system.

“It just makes you think ‘my gosh, can’t we do better than this?’”