The World Opinion

Tag: defense department

  • Trump’s Protection Division Wiped Telephones With Jan. 6 Texts, Courtroom Submitting Claims

    The Division of Protection reportedly wiped the telephones of best officers on the finish of the Trump management, deleting any textual content messages that would doubtlessly supply perception in regards to the Jan. 6, 2021, assault at the U.S. Capitol.

    American Oversight unveiled this data in court docket filings as a part of an ongoing lawsuit towards the Division of Protection and in a letter to Legal professional Common Merrick Garland. The federal government watchdog workforce advised Garland to “workout your authority as our country’s leader regulation enforcement officer to suppose regulate of the felony investigation these days underway through the Division of Hometown Safety inspector common.”

    The Division of Hometown Safety (DHS) has been investigating the lack of textual content messages and different Jan. 6 communications on Secret Carrier brokers’ telephones.

    The Division of Protection (DOD) didn’t straight away reply to a request for remark at the subject.

    American Oversight claimed Tuesday it’s pursuing this felony motion after a Freedom of Knowledge Act request it filed with the Protection Division in a while after the Capitol assault reportedly resulted within the division announcing it “didn’t keep textual content messages and different communications saved on telephones from best DOD and Military officers.”

    Former performing Protection Secretary Chris Miller, his leader of team of workers Kash Patel and previous Military Secretary Ryan McCarthy are regarded as crucial witnesses in regards to the Trump management’s reaction to the Capitol rebellion. All 3 had been concerned within the Protection Division sending Nationwide Guard troops to the Capitol grounds on the time.

    The Protection Division and the Military answered to the guidelines request announcing the telephones had been wiped as a part of protocol. “[W]rooster an worker separates from DOD or Military she or he turns within the executive issued telephone, and the telephone is wiped,” the federal government informed American Oversight in March.

    Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Sick.) additionally requested Garland in July to take regulate of DHS’s investigation into the lacking texts.

    “The destruction of proof which may be related to the investigation of the fatal assault on our Capitol is a particularly critical subject. Inspector Common [Joseph] Cuffari’s failure to take speedy motion upon studying that those textual content messages have been deleted makes it transparent that he must now not be entrusted with this investigation,” Durbin mentioned. “That’s why I’m sending a letter nowadays to Legal professional Common Garland asking him to step in and unravel what came about to those textual content messages and grasp responsible those that are accountable.”

  • Lawmakers Urge Pentagon To Replace Local weather Plans In Upcoming Technique To Stay U.S. ‘Protected’

    A coalition of lawmakers steered the Pentagon this week to raised deal with weather alternate in its upcoming Nationwide Protection Technique, pronouncing a concrete plan to reply to a warming international may just save tens of millions of lives and billions of greenbacks.

    The letter, addressed to Protection Secretary Lloyd Austin, was once spearheaded via Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.). Along 16 different participants of Congress, the gang stated the Pentagon’s present nationwide safety funds — a mammoth $777 billion — fails “to give protection to American citizens from the worsening weather disaster” and does now not deal with the company’s position “as the arena’s greatest client of fossil fuels and emitter of greenhouse gases.”

    “Local weather alternate is a transparent and provide risk to each nationwide safety and American citizens,” the lawmakers wrote on Monday. “A technique that integrates weather alternate issues in any respect ranges, and shifts our nationwide safety funds to successfully deal with those threats is a important step to preserving the US and its electorate secure.”

    The lawmakers went on to induce the Pentagon to make sure the Nationwide Protection Technique prioritizes federal funding to take on weather dangers, and “now not settle for weather alternate and emerging temperatures as an inevitable.”

    “By way of treating the weather disaster because the existential and nationwide safety risk that it’s during the Nationwide Protection Technique, DoD can handle nationwide safety and armed forces readiness, keep away from billions of greenbacks in damages and save tens of millions of lives,” they wrote.

    Lee has lengthy steered the Protection Division to be extra clear about its efforts to battle weather alternate. In November, the lawmaker presented a solution calling at the company to unlock information about its annual greenhouse fuel emissions after the Pentagon failed to take action via a July 1 time limit mandated in a protection spending invoice.

    Warren has often known as at the company to extend its resilience in opposition to weather alternate, and has been a significant critic of the fossil gas trade.

    The Pentagon’s personal weather chance evaluation, launched ultimate October, was once simply one among a number of govt experiences to warn the army will want to spend a good portion of its annual funds to deal with climate-related threats within the close to long term. Bases are already underneath risk from flooding, wildfires and emerging seas, in addition to larger numbers of harmful storms.

    The lawmakers famous Monday that the Protection Division asked just about $9 billion in more investment in 2019 to fix injury to army bases after a number of hurricanes, stressing such threats will most effective develop if greenhouse fuel emissions don’t seem to be reined in.

    A separate document via the country’s intelligence businesses stated climate-related threats will exacerbate world tensions and result in an uptick in warfare between countries’ borders.