IAVA Daily Brief 10.29.09

IAVA Daily Brief 10.29.09
Posted by Terrell Frazier [1] on October 29 [2] 2009

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 Here are some of today's top stories and happenings at IAVA.  Prefer to receive real-time updates about major stories and legislation that IAVA is tracking?  Follow us on Twitter @IAVAPressRoom [4].

MUST READS

1) President Obama Pays Respects to Returning Fallen Heroes [5]

President Obama traveled to Dover Air Force Base early Thursday morning, where he met with family members and paid his respects as the bodies of 18 Americans killed this week in Afghanistan were returned to the United States. It was the president’s first trip to the Delaware air base, the main point of entry for the nation’s war dead to return home.

2) President Obama Signs Defense Authorization Bill [6]

President Obama signed a $680 billion defense authorization bill Wednesday that he said begins the difficult process of eliminating "some of the waste and inefficiency" from the defense budget. As Vice President Biden, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and members of Congress looked on in the White House East Room, Obama acknowledged that while the bill eliminated some weapons systems he called unnecessary, others survived. IAVA applauded the signing, as it included many of IAVA’s top legislative priorities, including: mandatory, face to face, confidential mental health screenings for every returning servicemember; increases the number of mental health providers in the military; a pay increase of 3.4%; a reduction in servicemembers’ exposure to hazardous waste by severely limiting the use of open air burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan; extending stop loss payments to the Reserve/National Guard; and granting meaningful voting protections for overseas servicemembers. Click here [7] for comments from IAVA Executive Director Paul Rieckhoff on this important bill.

3) VA Seeking to Enlist Contractors to Help with GI Bill Claims [8]

The Veterans Affairs Department is ready to admit it cannot process GI Bill benefits claims without help, announcing Wednesday that it is seeking an outside contractor to do some preliminary data collection and enrollment certification. VA’s undersecretary for benefits, Patrick Dunne, said in a statement that a contractor “will assist VA in delivering education benefits to our veterans as quickly as possible.” The formal solicitation for temporary contract support was issued Oct. 21 but not announced until Oct. 28. A VA statement said the contractor will be involved in “claims-processing tasks,” but that VA personnel will make final claims decisions and generate payments.

4) Rieckhoff Takes Veterans’ Fight From ‘Sandbox’ to White House [9]

The work of IAVA Executive Director Paul Rieckhoff on behalf of veterans was featured on CNN’s new web site. The story and accompanying video spotlighted IAVA’s efforts to address the needs of veterans, including IAVA seeing its top legislative priority achieved, when President Obama signed advance VA funding into law. Paul shares his experience as a returning veteran from Iraq and the other motivations behind the founding of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. Click here [10] to watch the CNN profile of Paul Rieckhoff.

5) Watch New Music Video ‘War Song’ from O.A.R. and IAVA [11]

A few weeks ago, acclaimed band O.A.R. teamed up with IAVA to create OpenUpYourArms.org, a place for people to pledge their support to our nation's newest generation of veterans. On Wednesday, as part of the campaign, a new video was launched for “War Song,” which was inspired by O.A.R.’s experience visiting Iraq and Kuwait with the USO. IAVA started OpenUpYourArms.org with a goal of 11,111 pledges. After shattering that goal, IAVA and O.A.R. are now aiming for 111,111 pledges by Veterans Day on 11/11. In IAVA Executive Director Paul Rieckhoff’s latest blog [12], he shares his thoughts on O.A.R.’s commitment to this cause and the importance of the campaign. Click here [11] to see the video and sign the pledge. If you have already taken the pledge, make sure to share this link to the video so others can join the campaign.

AFGHANISTAN

The New York Times recounts [13] the long siege at a guesthouse in Kabul that ended with at least five United Nations employees dead and 11 dead total [14]. Numerous people survived the siege because of United Nations security guards, one of them an American, who held off the attackers for about an hour. The Taliban ultimately claimed responsibility for the commando-style raid.  

President Barack Obama is considering sending large numbers of additional U.S. forces [15] to Afghanistan next year - but not as many as his war commander wants. Some are calling the option for a narrowed military mission "McChrystal Lite" after the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal. The option would preserve the general's goals of protecting Afghan cities and key infrastructure but use fewer troops to do it.

Omar Bin Laden—Osama Bin Laden's fourth-eldest known child—remembers his father's dedication to Islam, his military campaign against the Soviet army, and his whiz-bang math skills. In an upcoming memoir by him and his mother, excerpted online at Vanity Fair [16], Omar recalls alternating episodes of neglect and abuse by the man who became the world's most-wanted terrorist.

There are already more than 100,000 [17] international troops in Afghanistan working with 200,000 Afghan security forces and police. It adds up to a 12-1 numerical advantage over Taliban rebels. The Taliban rebels are estimated to number no more than 25,000. Ljubomir Stojadinovic, a military analyst and guerrilla warfare expert from Serbia, said that although commander, Gen. Stanley McChrystal's request for 40,000 more troops would lift the ratio to 20-1 or more, they would prove counterproductive. "It's impossible to regain the initiative by introducing more foreign forces, which will only breed more resentment and more recruits for the enemy," he said.

IRAQ

CNN’s Michael Ware analyzes the bombings [18] that ripped through Baghdad on Sunday that brought more bloodshed to the country. He argues that the attacks are part of a long-running campaign to destabilize the U.S. mission, the Iraqi government and to reignite sectarian civil war. He argues that the sheer size of the bombings — 160 dead and more than 500 injured — do punctuate a seemingly never ending campaign.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Wednesday [19] he was sending a senior official from the world body to Iraq soon to discuss a series of recent deadly bombings in Baghdad. Earlier this week Iraq renewed a previous request for a U.N. inquiry into the support given by foreign countries to insurgents after twin suicide blasts against government buildings in Baghdad on Sunday killed more than 150 people.

Concern is rising in Iraq [20] that a greater security threat may come from within the system in the form of corruption, from the top leadership of ministries down to soldiers who man checkpoints. A recent internal report on corruption by the inspector general of the Interior Ministry specifically mentions the bribery of checkpoint guards: The blast on Sunday at the Justice Ministry, surrounded by checkpoints, killed nearly 160 people, while a similar attack in August [21] on the Foreign and Finance Ministries killed at least 122.

MILITARY AFFAIRS

American military officers are expressing concern [22] over the spreading use of makeshift bombs beyond the war zones of Iraq and Afghanistan to other countries in the region, as well as in East Asia and South America. Improvised explosive devices, as the military calls them, have been the largest killer of American forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, showing up with devastating effect in Pakistan and India, but also with less notice in Thailand, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, Colombia, Somalia and parts of North Africa.

The arrival of Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in Pakistan was overshadowed Wednesday [23] by a devastating car bomb that tore through a market in the northwest city of Peshawar, an attack aimed at civilians and marking a clear escalation in the Taliban campaign to undermine the government. The bomb tore through a congested area of narrow alleys and crowded stalls in Peshawar’s old city, killing as many as 101 people, most of them women, and wounding about 160. A Pakistani official, who did not want to be identified, described it as the most serious in the history of a city that has become a frontline of Taliban terrorist attacks.

INSIDE WASHINGTON

A key senator predicted Wednesday [24] that weapons modernization will suffer as a result of what is likely to be sustained combat and security operations in Afghanistan. Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., an Army veteran who chairs the Senate Armed Services subcommittee on seapower, said at a breakfast meeting with defense reporters, that he anticipates no rise in future defense budgets means be reduced spending on weapons programs. “It is going to be a difficult time,” he said.

CONGRESSIONAL SCHEDULE

THE SENATE

The Senate will convene at 9:30 a.m.

SENATE FLOOR ACTIVITY of INTEREST

Morning business for 2 hours with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each with the Republicans controlling the first hour and the Majority controlling the second hour.

FUTURE COMMITTEE HEARINGS of INTEREST

November 5, 2009  Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee Hearing on cooperation between the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Indian Health Service.  10:00 a.m.; 418 Russell

THE HOUSE of  REPRESENTATIVES


The House will convene at 10:00 a.m.

HOUSE FLOOR ACTIVITY of INTEREST

No issues today

HOUSE COMMITTEE HEARINGS of  INTEREST



No issues today

FUTURE  HOUSE COMMITTEE HEARINGS of  INTEREST



November 4, 2009   Veterans‚ Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations Hearing: Gulf War Illness: What Lies Ahead for Veterans?  10:00 a.m.; Cannon 334

November 5, 2009   Veterans‚ Affairs Subcommittee on Economic Opportunity Hearing:  Adaptive Housing Grants  1:00 p.m.;  334 Cannon HOB

November 19, 2009  Veterans‚ Affairs Subcommittee on Health Hearing:  Review of VA Contract Health Care: Project HERO  10:00 a.m.; 334 Cannon

December 3, 2009  Veterans‚ Affairs Subcommittee on Economic Opportunity Roundtable  1:00 p.m.; 334 Cannon HOB

A wide-range of views, positions, and publications are represented in these articles. These views, positions and publications are not endorsed by nor do they necessarily represent the views of IAVA.

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