US Army

November 13, 2009 -- WASHINGTON – Rohullah Farooqi Lodin and Hashmatullah Farooqi were each sentenced today in Alexandria, Va., to four years in prison for their roles in a scheme to offer $1 million in bribes to a U.S. Army contracting official in Afghanistan, announced Assistant Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer of the Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney Neil H. MacBride of the Eastern District of Virginia.

U.S. District Court Judge Liam O’Grady also sentenced Lodin, 48, from Irvine, Calif., and Farooqi, 38, from New York City, to each serve three years of supervised release following their prison term and ordered each to pay a $30,000 fine. Lodin and Farooqi, both dual Afghan/U.S. citizens, each pleaded guilty on Aug. 7, 2009, to one count of offering to bribe a public official.    » read more »

Army’s Decision to Pursue More Litigation Sends Hostile Message to Farmers and Ranchers in Southern Colorado

November 10, 2009 -- Today, in a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and Army Secretary John McHugh, Michael Bennet urged the Army to acknowledge the flawed nature of its 2007 environmental impact analysis on the proposed expansion at Pinon Canyon and asked that the Army immediately withdraw its plans to appeal the U.S. District Court's recent decision on the matter.

"The Army's decision to move forward with more litigation sends a hostile message to the farmers and ranchers in southern Colorado: the Army is more concerned about winning than about repairing this relationship over the long-term," wrote Bennet.    » read more »

November 10, 2009 -- JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. - Missouri Governor Jay Nixon has ordered that the U.S. and Missouri flags on all state buildings in St. Louis County be flown at half-staff from Nov. 12 to Nov. 18 to honor the bravery and sacrifice of Specialist Christopher M. Cooper, age 28, of St. Louis. Specialist Cooper was a soldier in the United States Army who died on Oct. 30 while serving his country in Babil Province, Iraq.

In addition, Gov. Nixon has ordered that the U.S. and Missouri flags at state buildings in all 114 counties and the city of St. Louis be flown at half-staff for one full day on Thursday, Nov. 12.    » read more »

November 9, 2009 -- OLYMPIA – Washington Governor Chris Gregoire has directed that flags at all Washington state agency buildings be lowered to half-staff Thursday, Nov. 12, in memory of U.S. Army Specialist Aaron S. Aamot of Custer. Aamot was killed last week in Afghanistan when an improvised explosive device detonated near his military vehicle.

Flags should remain at half-staff until close of business Thursday, or first thing Friday morning, Nov. 13.

Congress amended the U.S. Flag Code to give governors the authority to lower flags when a state resident in the military is killed in the line of duty. Other government entities, citizens and businesses are encouraged to join in this recognition.

Source: Washington Governor

November 9, 2009 -- New York Governor David A. Paterson has directed that flags on New York State government buildings be flown at half-staff on Thursday, November 12, in honor of an Albany-area soldier who died in Iraq on November 4.

Staff Sergeant Amy C. Tirador, a member of the 209th Military Intelligence Co., 1st Squadron, 14th Cavalry Regiment of the 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team of the 2nd Infantry Division, died of injuries sustained in a non-combat related incident in Kirkush. The unit is based at Fort Lewis, Washington.    » read more »

Scheme Involved U.S. Military Contracts Awarded in Kuwait

November 5, 2009 -- A civil lawsuit was filed today against a former U.S. Army officer and three contracting firms related to an alleged bribery scheme in connection with the awarding of contracts for services in Kuwait. Former Army officer John Cockerham Jr., who is named as a defendant in the lawsuit, previously pleaded guilty to criminal charges along with another former officer, James Momon Jr.    » read more »

November 03, 2009 -- CONTRACTS

UNITED STATES TRANSPORTATION COMMAND

American Auto Logistics, LP, of Park Ridge, N.J., is being awarded a $207,382,618 firm, fixed-price modification for an earned award term under a previously awarded contract (DAMTOI-03-D-0184) to provide continuing services for the transportation and storage of privately owned vehicles. Work will be performed at worldwide locations and is expected to be completed Oct. 31, 2010. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. United States Transportation Command (USTRANSCOM), Directorate of Acquisition, Scott Air Force Base, Ill., is the contracting activity.

ARMY    » read more »

WASHINGTON, (11/02/09) - As the Defense Department begins to compensate military members forced to serve beyond the expiration of their contracts, the number of those still serving under "Stop Loss" has been greatly reduced, a Pentagon official said.

The Army, the only service still using the program, still has 9,600 soldiers serving involuntarily beyond their resignation or retirement date, Sam Retherford, The Defense Department's director of officer and enlisted personnel management, said during an Oct. 29 "DoDLive" bloggers roundtable.

That compares to 16,000 servicemembers on Stop Loss in 2005, he said.    » read more »

October 30, 2009 -- U. S. ARMY NORTH – As the leaves turn and the country heads into winter U. S. Army North personnel are preparing to exercise and train the one of the Department of Defense’s consequence management response forces at Camp Atterbury, Ind. Nov 1 – 13.

Exercise Vibrant Response 10.1 will put about four thousand members of Chemical, Biological, Nuclear, High Yield Explosive Consequence Management Response Force, or CCMRF, 10.1 through a domestic incident response in support of a primary agency for the first time.    » read more »

CONTRACTS

NAVY

Bechtel Plant Machinery Inc., Monroeville, Pa., is being awarded a $523,530,301 cost-plus-fixed fee contract for naval nuclear propulsion components. Work will be performed in Monroeville, Pa., (67 percent); Schenectady, N.Y., (33 percent). Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. No completion date or additional information is provided on naval nuclear propulsion program contracts. The Naval Sea Systems Command is the contracting activity (N00024-10-C-2119).    » read more »

10/19/2009 -- WASHINGTON -- The Department of the Army announced today that it has established additional quality control measures to further ensure that body armor testing documentation and procurement processes are rigorous, consistent, and use available best practices. To this end, the Army has added several quality control positions to include a Senior Executive Service position as the quality assurance director of personal protective equipment. This new senior-level position will report directly to the Army Acquisition Executive.

These changes address issues raised in a GAO report released today entitled “WARFIGHTER SUPPORT, Independent Expert Assessment of Army Body Armor Test Results and Procedures Needed Before Fielding.”    » read more »

MARLBOROUGH, Mass., Oct. 19, 2009 -- Raytheon Company (NYSE: RTN) has been selected as the network systems integrator for the Army Expeditionary Warrior Experiment. This experiment will integrate more than 25 technologies from more than 20 different companies and government agencies to operate on a single integrated backbone network.

Raytheon will provide the integration capability to establish the network and join a variety of communication devices, command and control applications and sensor platforms. Raytheon's MAINGATE solution is the backbone of the network, which will link together unattended ground sensors, unmanned ground vehicles and unmanned aircraft systems.    » read more »

October 14, 2009 -- CONTRACTS

NAVY    » read more »

WASHINGTON, D.C. (October 8) — The Army today released suicide data for the month of September. Among active-duty Soldiers, there were seven potential suicides. One has been confirmed as a suicide, and six are pending determination of the manner of death. For August, the Army reported 11 potential suicides among active-duty Soldiers. Since the release of that report, four have been confirmed as suicides and seven remain under investigation.

There were 117 reported active-duty Army suicides from January 2009 through September 2009. Of those, 81 have been confirmed, and 36 are pending determination of manner of death. For the same period in 2008, there were 103 suicides among active-duty Soldiers.    » read more »

October 7, 2009 -- Although U.S. Army deployments have been linked positively to the likelihood of reenlisting for much of the past decade, a new RAND Corporation study shows that by 2006 the mounting burden of deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan reached the point where deployment had a negative effect on reenlistment.

However, the increased rate of deployment did not reduce reenlistment rates through 2007 for any of the three other branches of the U.S. military.    » read more »