In public he was the lean and ruthless face of American military outsourcing in Iraq. Erik Prince, as founder of the Blackwater security company, packed a mobile phone on one hip and a handgun on the other as he flew in and out of the world’s troublespots co-ordinating protection teams for American VIPs — and handling the backlash when his employees were accused of shooting dead 17 Iraqi civilians at a Baghdad crossroads in 2007.

ARLINGTON, Va. - He didn't introduce himself. He didn't have to.

President Obama simply stuck out his hand and asked for my name as he stepped toward me amid a bone-chilling drizzle in the Gardens of Stone.

This was Section 60 of Arlington National Cemetery. I wasn't there as a reporter, but to visit some friends and family buried there when Obama made an unscheduled stop - a rare presidential walk among what Lincoln called America's "honored dead" - after laying a Veterans Day wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns.

A mass shooting Thursday at Fort Hood, the largest U.S. Army base in the world, has resulted in 12 deaths, including one shooter, and 31 wounded.

Lt. Gen. Robert Cone confirmed that one of the three suspected shooters, a soldier, is dead, and the other two suspects, also soldiers, are in custody.

The suspect that was confirmed dead has been identified at Major Malik Nadal Hasan. Hasan was reportedly shot by authorities.

Washington D.C. – Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), a leading Congressional voice calling for an immediate withdrawal from Afghanistan and Iraq, yesterday released the following statement after media reports that a U.S. airstrike on two stolen fuel transport vehicles left as many as 90 dead, including 40 civilians and a ten-year old child:

About two in five Iraq or Afghanistan veterans have post-traumatic stress disorder or depression, abuse alcohol or have other serious problems, such as homelessness, researchers reported Thursday.

A new study showed a striking jump in mental illness from findings reported two years ago and indicates that veterans' problems continue to emerge years after they return home.

In a new interview, Obama said he has “no intention” of sending US troops into Pakistan. But US troops are already in the country and US drones attack Pakistan regularly.

By Jeremy Scahill

KABUL — Four U.S. contractors for the company formerly known as Blackwater were not authorized to carry weapons when they were involved in a deadly shooting in Afghanistan this month, the U.S. military said Tuesday.

The men — accused of opening fire on a vehicle in the capital on May 5 — have charged that their employer, now called Xe, issued them guns in breech of the company’s contract with the military. One Afghan was killed in the shooting, and two others wounded.

There are actual reasons that nations go to war, and then there are the excuses. The excuses are used because, except when war is resorted to for self-defense, the true reasons for war are rarely such that a nation would be proud to announce them. Those reasons of course include land grabs and a host of related imperialist motivations, such as access to markets, natural resources, military bases, or the labor of a nation’s people. To admit to such reasons would make the aggressor nation look bad – both to the world and, more important, to its own people.