Human performance optimization, or HPO, is intended to improve health and readiness force-wide. Operator Syndrome, meanwhile, is a clinical construct that describes the cumulative health effects experienced by special operations personnel.

Comprehensive assessments of the two will require Pentagon leadership and the advisory council to establish a standardized, evidence-informed framework to assess special operations and other combat-focused jobs susceptible to cumulative operational injuries within the military health system.

The advisory council’s success will depend on both the recommendations it produces and its ability to develop a coherent, scalable framework for service members with suspected Operator Syndrome across the MHS.

Along the way, the council has a unique chance to shift the MHS from a fragmented, symptom-based approach to one that addresses cumulative effects of operational service through holistic, multidisciplinary care.

The value of this approach has been demonstrated by existing human performance and operator health programs such as the U.S. Special Operations Command’s Preservation of the Force and Family (POTFF) and the Army’s Holistic Health and Fitness (H2F) program.

Right now, the advisory council has an opportunity to leverage decades’ worth of lessons learned from these programs to establish evidence-based clinical standards for continuous evaluation and refinement.

As the science of Operator Syndrome evolves, this framework should function as a learning health system, with new evidence informing ongoing updates that improve health, function, and operational readiness.

Dr. Chris Frueh’s foundational work first introduced Operator Syndrome in 2020 as a multisystem effect resulting from allostatic load and cumulative operational exposure. This work has driven multidisciplinary research to develop standardized methods for its characterization and assessment.

One example of this ongoing work is the collaborative development and preliminary validation of a standardized self-report instrument to assess Operator Syndrome-related symptom patterns.

The Operator Syndrome Symptom Scale–Self Report, or OSSS-SR, is guided by existing scientific literature, multidisciplinary clinical expertise and principles of patient-reported outcomes. This multisystem screening tool is designed to identify common symptom patterns affecting the mind and body and to support occupational performance and overall health among operators.

Currently advancing to its next phase of development, the OSSS-SR includes items for the empirical evaluation of multiple symptom domains across physical, mental, physiological and other performance health systems.

As the advisory council establishes its agenda, it should actively encourage and leverage similar collaborations. The future of military medicine depends not only on government-led initiatives but also on strategic partnerships that unite operational experience and clinical expertise.

Ongoing research efforts, meanwhile, also reinforce an important implementation challenge.

A validated clinical framework should guide these new screening initiatives. Recognizing Operator Syndrome as a military health priority is an important first step, but sustainability will depend on the Pentagon’s ability to build the scientific infrastructure that supports evidence-based decision-making. The Pentagon should treat investment in measurement science as a foundational priority.

Implementing screening before establishing a validated clinical framework introduces avoidable risks. Without standardized assessment methods and evidence-based referral criteria, identification of Operator Syndrome will likely vary across providers and military treatment facilities, leading to inconsistent clinical decision-making, unnecessary referrals and missed opportunities to identify service members who would benefit from comprehensive multidisciplinary care.

These challenges are not unique to Operator Syndrome. Similar concerns have been raised by certain organizations — such as the Endocrine Society — about broad population-based testosterone screening.

The Endocrine Society supports targeted testing for individuals with specific symptoms and risk factors, emphasizing that no single symptom or biomarker should serve as the basis for identifying cumulative operational injury, and that laboratory findings should be interpreted in an appropriate clinical context to avoid unnecessary intervention.

While expanded screening may facilitate earlier identification of health concerns, testosterone testing should serve as the starting point — not the endpoint — of clinical evaluation.

Combining testosterone results with a comprehensive medical history, a validated assessment tool such as the OSSS-SR and additional laboratory testing provides a more complete picture of physiological dysfunction and supports more targeted, multidisciplinary care.

A holistic screening framework supports treatment of the impacts of occupational performance. This is essential for military readiness and retention and can improve screening and continuity of care during and after service.

Addressing Operator Syndrome through a single symptom or isolated laboratory value, such as relying on testosterone testing alone, or by evaluating the broader physiological systems increases the likelihood that the underlying condition will remain inadequately addressed.

Council members must understand military healthcare, its operational systems and clinical outcomes, and how to optimize health and wellness to enhance lethality.

Extensive research on Operator Syndrome and the development of a self-report instrument have emphasized the need for multidisciplinary expertise to enhance holistic assessments of special operations personnel.

It is imperative, therefore, that physical and psychological assessments and treatments be evidence-based and include continuous, cumulative diagnostics throughout a military member’s entire career.

The Pentagon must prioritize selecting a multidisciplinary group of health and policy specialists when evaluating the proposed advisory council’s nominated members. Relying on a single viewpoint for an entire advisory panel is as ineffective as isolating a single symptom in a comprehensive diagnosis.

Ultimately, ensuring warfighters can respond to conflict at a moment’s notice requires a fully functioning mind-body connection that supports both health and readiness.

Mackenzie Witt, Pepper Phillips, MPH, and KayleighBealer, MS, are with A-G Associates, which partners with federal agencies, public health systems, and mission-driven organizations to turn strategies into results across behavioral health, military and veteran wellbeing, and systems transformation.

Jennifer Byrne, OTD, and Kelli Cabrera, OTD, are with 5by5 Performance Therapy, an organization committed to contributing to blast-injury and operator-centric research and academia to improve knowledge and understanding of the Special Operator family’s strengths and challenges.

The deals cover avionics and ejector assemblies Boeing supplies to prime contractor Raytheon, an RTX business, for both the SM-3 Block IB and the newer Block IIA. Both variants operate with the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense System to destroy incoming missiles outside the atmosphere.

“These agreements ensure our Warfighters get the munitions they need to win,” Michael P. Duffey, under secretary of war for acquisition and sustainment, said in the Pentagon release. “We are stabilizing our supply chains, expanding munitions production and putting our entire defense industrial base on a wartime footing.”

The frameworks run for seven years and allow Boeing to start building components before a contract is in place, while the three sides negotiate a multiyear deal. The long-term commitment is intended to give suppliers enough certainty to invest in added capacity. Neither the Pentagon nor Boeing released dollar figures or quantities.

“This gives us a clear demand signal to build and deliver SM-3 interceptors at the levels needed to counter threats,” Bob Ciesla, vice president of Boeing Precision Engagement Systems, said in a company statement. “The SM-3 is an essential part of the layered air and missile defense architecture that protects the U.S. and its allies worldwide.”

The approach mirrors a seven-year deal Boeing struck in April to triple production of PAC-3 Missile Segment Enhancement seekers, part of a broader Pentagon effort to lock in supply from key subcontractors alongside the prime contractors.

Earlier this month, the Missile Defense Agency awarded Raytheon a $745 million contract to produce fully assembled SM-3 Block IIA interceptors for the United States and Japan.

Demand for the interceptor traces back to April 2024, when Navy destroyers first fired SM-3s in combat, helping to thwart an Iranian ballistic missile attack on Israel. Far more interceptors have been launched since, including those fired in Operation Epic Fury.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies estimated the SM-3 inventory at 414 as of December 2025. A May analysis from the center put wartime expenditures between 130 and 250 missiles and warned that replenishment will take years.

Congress has stepped in to keep the Block IB line open, the cheaper of the two variants covered by Friday’s agreements, after the Missile Defense Agency proposed ending new purchases in the fiscal 2025 budget request.

National security officials in Washington widely view Baker, who also served as a national security adviser to Vice President JD Vance, as a low-key but influential figure inside the White House.

A former State Department official, academic and Vance adviser when the vice president was in the Senate, Baker had historically advocated for a more restrained American foreign policy that questioned the wisdom of long-term foreign conflicts.

He was also among the figures who helped craft Vance’s speech to the Munich Security Conference last year, during which the vice president warned European leaders that alleged censorship and democratic backsliding posed risks as severe to the continent as external threats, like those posed by China and Russia.

“I’m proud of everything we’ve achieved and, of course, am incredibly grateful to the President, Vice President and Secretary Rubio,” Baker wrote in a statement provided to Reuters. “I’ll never be far away.”

In separate statements, Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio praised the outgoing deputy national security adviser, whose departure was first reported by Axios.

Staff Changes

Baker, who has a young family, stayed on at the White House months longer than originally planned to help with some key staff transitions, according to a person close to him.

Mike Needham, a high-ranking State Department official close to Rubio, joined the White House in late May as another deputy national security adviser alongside Baker, the person noted. Cliff Sims, a White House and intelligence official during Trump’s first term, succeeded Baker as national security adviser to Vance at around the same time.

There have been additional staff departures at lower levels of the White House’s national security team in recent months. The top officials on the National Security Council overseeing Europe and Latin America both departed in June.

The broader significance of the turnover is unclear. While Baker was present at some high-level talks and was considered far more influential than some of his peers, the Trump administration has often dealt with its biggest foreign policy challenges at the principal level, delegating relatively little responsibility even to its highest-level staff.

Outside the national security space, the White House has in recent days announced the impending departure of White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt and White House counsel David Warrington.

Melissa Farris was charged with depredation against property of the United States and destruction of veterans’ memorials, Pirro said on social media, adding that the charges carry penalties of up to 10 years in prison.

The World War II Memorial on the National Mall was vandalized with bubbly soap and graffiti on Thursday, prompting vows from the U.S. government to find the perpetrator. The fountain bubbled over with suds and the words “Clean hands Dirty $” were painted on one surface, splattering the area with red and green paint.

Along with her statement on X, Pirro posted photos of a woman who appears to be holding a can close to the red paint on the memorial.

Pirro did not provide more details of the woman in custody or provide the source of the images, which Reuters was not immediately able to verify.

Pirro has recently drawn President Donald Trump’s anger for dropping charges against four people for allegedly vandalizing the Reflecting Pool after Trump oversaw renovations of the pool.

The pool’s condition soon deteriorated, with a peeling liner and algae blooms. Pirro blamed that deterioration on faulty installation in dropping the vandalism charges.

Trump said in response that Pirro had “folded like an umbrella.”

Trump appeared to link the Reflecting Pool damage to the World War Two memorial in a post on social media on Friday, calling it an insult to Americans who had died in the conflict.

“First the Reflecting Pool, now this,” he wrote. “We are on their trail! Where do these animals come from???”

Pirro’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Farris could not be immediately reached for comment.

Task Force Falcon Strike will utilize one-way attack drones composed of unmanned systems from above, on and below the sea, managed by U.S. military support staff and regional partners, according to a Thursday release.

The move to launch this unit follows CENTCOM’s establishment of Task Force Scorpion Strike in December 2025, a Middle East-based task force equipped with one-way attack drones as the military strived to integrate drone technology across the services.

“Task Force Falcon Strike will expand on Scorpion Strike’s success given the tremendous innovation happening among our regional allies and partners,” Adm. Brad Cooper, CENTCOM commander, said in the release. “Integrating and deploying our new capabilities together will help us rapidly realize the new possibilities that are on the horizon.”

Scorpion Strike was the first to launch an aerial attack drone from a U.S. Navy warship last December, the month of its announcement. The unit also deployed one-way unmanned aerial systems during Operation Epic Fury and during strikes on Iranian port facilities in July with unmanned attack vessels at sea, the statement highlights.

CENTCOM began consulting with and officially inviting regional partners to join Falcon Strike, aiming to expand attack-drone capabilities across the Middle East into a “unified multi-domain, multinational deterrent.”

“The United States military has a lot of strong partnerships and friends in the region,” Cooper said. “We are collectively stronger when we integrate and deploy new capabilities together.”

The release did not specify which regional partners CENTCOM is working with on the unit.

Personnel from the U.S. Special Operations Command Central, located at MacDill Air Force Base, Florida, will lead Falcon Strike’s staff of U.S. and regional representatives after it launched Scorpion Strike, the release states.

The announcement comes as the U.S. continues its war with Iran, which has depleted the U.S. munitions stockpile and caused military leaders to weigh the possibility of developing cheaper anti-drone technology at a faster pace.

In an announcement, Sheehy said the Special Operations Forces Concealed Carry Act would align the status of special operators with active and retired law enforcement officers, who are permitted under federal law to carry concealed weapons across state lines.

“Our elite warfighters never stop serving, and this bill ensures the law reflects the trust they’ve earned through a lifetime of sacrifice,” Sheehy said, adding that “Special Operations Forces spend their careers protecting the American people with unmatched discipline, judgment, and professionalism.”

According to Sheehy’s office, when Congress passed the Law Enforcement Officers Safety Act, or LEOSA, in 2004, lawmakers recognized that active and retired officers may need to respond to violent crime or terrorists while off duty. They also recognized that officers face ongoing threats from individuals they previously encountered while on duty.

Sheehy’s office explained that his bill would build on the framework created by LEOSA because individuals in special operations “have completed rigorous selection and possess firearms training that meets or exceeds professional law enforcement standards.”

Congressman Pat Harrigan, a Republican from North Carolina, filed a companion bill in April. In a statement, he said that “it makes no sense that an active or retired SEAL or Green Beret, someone who spent a career mastering firearms under the most demanding conditions in the world, has no equivalent recognition under federal law.”

While the bill would extend concealed carry privileges, it would also require participants to complete annual active-duty-level firearms qualification tests, as well as a Justice Department concealed carry class.

During Sheehy’s bid for a Senate seat in 2024, The Washington Post published an article about an incident in which Sheehy was cited at Glacier National Park for illegally discharging a firearm. According to the report, the park ranger investigating the incident interviewed Sheehy at an emergency room in Kalispell shortly after the shooting in October 2015.

“(Sheehy) stated he was arranging gear in the back of his vehicle, and that the gun (Colt Revolver, .45 long) had slipped down the pile of gear, hit the ground and fired. The round hit him in the right forearm and did not pass through,” the ranger wrote in a narrative with the citation.

The ranger also told The Washington Post that the revolver that Sheehy said had accidentally discharged was loaded except for a single missing bullet.

When confronted with the details, Sheehy told reporters that he lied about accidentally discharging his firearm and that the shooting injury actually occurred during a deployment in Afghanistan. He said he didn’t report it because a teammate’s negligent discharge caused the injury, and he didn’t want to get his teammate in trouble.

“I guess the only thing I’m guilty of is admitting to doing something I never did,” Sheehy told the newspaper. He added: “It was a small price to pay to make sure that a whole team of really great Americans didn’t get dragged through the mud over this.”

I have never deployed for the United States Navy.

As an active-duty sailor, saying that feels disingenuous. My time in the Navy has only been on shore duty. My understanding of deployment comes mostly from hearing other sailors’ stories: months away from family, long watches, missed holidays, repetitive days, port calls and the odd feeling of watching life go on from afar.

But those of us who have not deployed are paying attention.

We see ships like the USS Gerald R. Ford come back after 326 days at sea. We remember the USS Nimitz and its strike group finishing a 321-day deployment during the pandemic.

We hear about deployments getting longer, and sailors having to adjust to timelines that go far beyond what was expected when they left.

Nearly a year at sea is difficult to comprehend for anyone. Eventually, many of us will be the next ones walking across the brow. This means extended deployments are not just a concern for those going through them now. The whole Navy needs to get its people ready for them.

The Navy exists to go to sea. Deployments are not an aberration from naval service; they are fundamental to it. Ships must be where the country needs them, and sometimes circumstances will require sailors to remain there longer than anyone originally planned.

Knowing this, we should take preparation even more seriously.

Preparation should start before a sailor ever deploys. Commands can be honest about what months at sea are really like. Not only about the Navy’s mission, but also about the daily routines and pressures. Experienced sailors know things you can’t learn from a PowerPoint. We should draw more on their experience when getting sailors ready.

We should also recognize that the quality of life aboard ship is part of readiness.

On a short trip at sea, small problems might be easy to ignore. But over eight, nine, 10, or 11 months, those problems become part of daily life.

Things like working water, clean bathrooms, soap, other basic hygiene supplies, chances to sleep and clean living spaces are not extras. They are the foundation. They are the basics that help sailors keep doing tough jobs.

It belongs partly to leadership, but it also belongs to the sailors themselves. Caring for the ship should always be part of our culture. Cleaning up after ourselves, keeping spaces in good shape, reporting problems instead of ignoring them, respecting shared sleeping and work areas and treating equipment properly are all small ways to be professional. Over many days at sea, these small actions add up. So does neglect, unfortunately.

Taking care of sailors and taking care of ships are closely linked. When a crew lives on a ship for most of a year, these things can’t be separated. The ship is their workplace, their way to travel, their defense, their dining hall and their home for a while.

If we expect the ship to endure, we have to maintain it. If we expect the crew to endure, we have to sustain them.

I can’t tell a sailor who’s done a 10-month deployment what it’s like. I haven’t had that experience. But I can listen to those who have and think about what their stories mean for sailors like me who might go to sea in the future.

The lesson I take from them is not that the Navy should stop deploying. It is that endurance cannot be the only plan. If the mission sometimes entails long deployments, the Navy should prepare sailors for that, both mentally and professionally. This means ensuring basic living standards are met, maintaining the ship, and fostering a culture where sailors know that caring for their ship and for each other go hand in hand. That ensures sailors will have some enthusiasm for the next deployment.

A 300-day deployment will never be easy. We should not pretend that it is. But when sailors are asked to stay at sea that long, we can make sure they leave the pier prepared for more than just their job. We can make sure they are ready to endure, and that the ship is ready to endure with them.

Editor’s Note: The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Department of the Navy, Department of Defense, or U.S. government.

The Connecticut Democrat, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, sent a letter on Wednesday to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao seeking information about the carrier’s long deployment and reports of problems involving basic supplies, water, plumbing, mental health, deck safety and mail.

The letter comes one day after a Military Times report that detailed concerns of family members who said multiple sailors aboard the Lincoln had attempted to go overboard during the deployment, which has been indefinitely extended as the carrier supports U.S. military operations in the Middle East against Iran.

The report also outlined various concerns raised by sailors and their families about conditions aboard the ship and the strain of the prolonged deployment.

The Lincoln departed Naval Base San Diego on Nov. 21, 2025, for a deployment expected to last seven months, according to Blumenthal’s letter. The carrier is now sailing towards its ninth month of deployment and, according to the senator, has gone more than 200 days without a port call.

Blumenthal asked the Navy to provide the dates of each extension to the Lincoln’s deployment, identify who authorized the extensions and explain the operational requirements behind each decision.

He also asked for a list of significant quality-of-life problems identified aboard the carrier, including mold, broken toilets or laundry facilities, inadequate water supplies and shortages of hygiene products.

Blumenthal requested information on when those problems were first identified and what corrective actions were taken.

The senator also asked what measures the Navy is taking to assess fatigue, morale, mental health and crew readiness aboard the Lincoln. Additionally, the letter asks whether commanders have identified increases in safety incidents, medical issues, disciplinary incidents or other readiness indicators associated with the extended deployment or the number of consecutive days at sea.

The Navy, meanwhile, has not provided a precise number of sailors who have attempted to go overboard or engaged in self-harm during the current deployment.

The service did not respond to inquiries by Military Times, but in a statement provided to Task & Purpose, denied the report.

“Based on information available to the command, we have not identified an increase in reported suicidal ideation or suicide attempts aboard the ship,” officials told Task & Purpose.

The Navy also told T&P it recognizes that extended deployments place significant strain on service members and their families, and that the Lincoln has medical professionals, counselors, chaplains, fleet and family support services available to sailors.

Navy officials also said current reports from the ship confirm continuous access to clean water and functional air conditioning. The service also acknowledged disruptions to mail and changes to resupply and replenishment during the deployment.

In his letter, Blumenthal asked the Navy to explain how it plans to maintain a carrier presence in the Middle East over the next 12 to 24 months if current operational requirements continue, including how anticipated carrier rotations could affect planned deployments, maintenance periods and carrier presence in the Indo-Pacific and other theaters.

The senator inquired as to whether the Navy believes current demand for carrier presence exceeds what can be sustainably generated under its existing force structure and deployment model.

Concerns surrounding the Lincoln come on the heels of the USS Gerald R. Ford returning to Norfolk, Virginia, on May 16 after a 326-day deployment, a record for the longest post-Vietnam deployment.

In a notice expected in the Federal Register on Thursday, the Defense Department will launch a three-year pilot in September that will reimburse eligible troops to preserve their gametes before deployment.

The benefit, required under the fiscal 2025 National Defense Authorization Act, will pay service members up to $500 per year for sperm retrieval and cryopreservation and $10,000 per year for egg preservation services.

Those eligible include active-duty DoD personnel who receive orders qualifying for hazardous duty pay, those who expect to get such orders within 120 days and those geographically separated from a “spouse, domestic partner or dating partner” for 180 days or more.

Military families and family planning advocates have lobbied for more than a decade to increase access to fertility services, to include cryopreservation of sperm and egg cells before combat deployments, in vitro fertilization and other advanced reproduction treatments.

In 2014, the Bob Woodruff Foundation sponsored a one-of-a-kind, two-day conference on intimacy and family issues among the combat injured that highlighted the need among wounded personnel to have broader access to family planning counseling, gamete banking and fertility treatments.

Nearly 2,000 troops received debilitating injuries to their groins or genital regions between 2000 and 2013, and 307,000 service members experienced some type of head injury during the same time frame — injuries that sometimes can affect fertility and sex drive.

Wounded troops battle obstacles to sex and intimacy

In 2016, then Defense Secretary Ash Carter announced that the Pentagon would begin covering sperm and egg freezing for service members, but the planned pilot never came to fruition following the election later that year of President Donald Trump.

Military families have often spent their own money on cryopreservation as a safeguard, and in extreme cases, have paid to extract sperm from dying loved ones to ensure the possibility of advanced reproductive services.

In 2019, the parents of West Point Cadet Peter Zhu extracted their son’s sperm after he was fatally injured in a skiing accident. They argued in court that Zhu had expressed wanting to have a family someday, and they wanted to preserve his sperm to provide future options.

In Israel, since the start of the Gaza conflict, the military has started offering the option to retrieve the sperm of deceased service members when delivering casualty notifications, according to The New York Times.

Since at least 2022, organizations such as the Military Family Building Coalition, Resolve: The National Infertility Association and others have provided free cryopreservation services to some service members, but until now, no government assistance has been available for deploying troops.

How the program works

Under the pilot, service members can elect to obtain preservation services at a military treatment facility that offers reproductive programs or through a civilian clinic of their choice.

Commanders must validate eligibility, as the Defense Health Agency does not have access to orders. To receive reimbursement, eligible troops must have written affirmation from their commands.

Reimbursement must be requested within 120 days after covered services began — usually the date of retrieval, prescription or lab procedure. Troops must submit itemized invoices and DHA Form 459.

Service members could be eligible for the program more than once within the three-year pilot. Any decisions regarding continued storage, disposition or later use following participation “are solely the responsibility of the covered member and outside the scope of the program,” according to the announcement.

Throughout the pilot, the DoD plans to study the program’s popularity, its cost, continued feasibility and impact on readiness, according to the announcement.

More information on the benefit will be available in the Aug. 13 edition of the Federal Register.

The grant, which covers four years, was awarded to Rosalind Franklin University in Illinois and Old Dominion University in Virginia. According to a release from Rosalind Franklin, bone-stress injuries affect up to 8% of military recruits across the services and cost the Department of Defense about $100 million per year in medical expenses alone.

“Because suspected stress fractures often require serial clinical visits, radiographs, MRI and bone scans, there is a strong operational and economic incentive to improve early diagnosis and risk stratification,” school staff said in the release.

The objective of the grant is to develop a “clinically actionable” test that flags biomarkers in urine, creating a non-invasive way to detect bone-stress injuries in the legs before they lead to fractures and other more severe, sidelining conditions.

“[Bone stress injuries] are a major challenge to military readiness,” Shawn Flanagan, director of the Human Performance Laboratory at Rosalind Franklin’s Center for Lower Extremity Ambulatory Research (CLEAR), said in a statement. “By combining cutting-edge proteomic methods with access to large, well-characterized military cohorts, we aim to create a biomarker panel that safeguards recruits and enhances operational performance.”

Founded in 2004, CLEAR is a leading center for research to make “measurable improvements in the health and function of the lower extremities,” according to its website, with specialties in diabetic complications and biomechanics.

The team of researchers, which, according to releases, will include military professionals and experts in proteins, musculoskeletal physiology, bone imaging and military health, will study cohorts of military recruits over time to validate testing panels, and include gender-specific analyses to evaluate any differences between male and female recruits.

The release does not say where the research will be conducted or what services will be involved.

The new research grant comes on the heels of military research that expands what’s known about military stress fractures and who’s most at risk. A Uniformed Services University study published in the Journal of Military Medicine in June assessed 446 patients at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center who sustained a total of 537 stress fractures over three years.

It found that recruits were more likely than longer-serving service members to sustain leg and pelvis fractures, but less likely to sustain foot fractures. New recruits were also significantly more likely than other groups to sustain multiple stress fractures.

“Providers may consider having a lower threshold for imaging new recruits with hip pain as this could identify a stress reaction before it becomes a stress fracture,” the study concluded.

The prospect of a non-invasive test that flags biomarkers for stress fractures is all the more appealing because they can be difficult to confirm with conventional approaches.

“[Bone stress injuries], particularly hips, can be tricky to diagnose as the pain level doesn’t always equal the severity level, and X-ray imaging doesn’t always show early BSI,” Army Maj. Gary Helton, assistant chief of the Fort Jackson Department of Sports Medicine, said in a 2025 release. “Tibial BSIs, and hip BSIs, particularly the femoral neck, can lead to a complete fracture needing surgery if not addressed in a timely manner.”

An ongoing Army study aims to identify trends and risk factors for BSIs, giving providers more opportunities to prevent severe injuries through better evaluation techniques.

Communication has been difficult to come by, and he is now on medical hold.

Loma, who lives in San Diego, said her husband had been repeatedly overextended before he tried to jump from the carrier.

“He’s scared,” Loma said. “He thinks he’ll get a dishonorable discharge, and just because he was burnt out, his 13-year career is ruined, just like that. That’s not fair, that’s not right. That’s not what he should be worrying about right now.”

Loma said she initially received a call from the ship’s ombudsman after the incident but has not heard from anyone with the Navy in recent weeks.

Lincoln’s roughly 5,000 sailors and Marines remain on a deployment that began Nov. 21. The carrier has been deployed for more than eight months while supporting U.S. military operations in the Middle East against Iran.

The deployment, which was anticipated to end in May, has been extended with no publicly announced return date.

In a separate incident aboard Lincoln, a sailor on watch saw a shipmate preparing to go overboard, and he intervened, according to the sailor’s wife, Maria Rodriguez.

Rodriguez said her husband called out to the sailor before reaching the individual and grabbing their arms, pulling them onto the deck. Her husband told her the sailor had not yet gone over the side when he got there. Three other sailors heard the commotion and came running to help.

Rodriguez’s husband told her about the incident several days after it happened.

“He said he hadn’t felt adrenaline like that in his life, and he was just so thankful he was able to get to [the sailor] in time, to stop them from going overboard,” Rodriguez said.

She did not know what happened to the sailor afterward.

Separately, Stars and Stripes reported Tuesday that sailors described an incident in which watchstanders stopped a crew member from jumping overboard. Stripes reported that the crew was informed about the incident through a shipwide announcement.

More than 200 family members attended a meeting in San Diego last week with acting Secretary of the Navy Hung Cao. During a separate virtual meeting later that evening, families raised concerns about sailors’ mental health, exhaustion and safety, according to recordings of the meeting reviewed by MS NOW.

Vice Adm. Joseph Cahill, commander of Naval Surface Forces, acknowledged the strain on sailors and their families during the virtual meeting.

“We hear you loud and clear [regarding] the impact this has on families, on service members and the long-term ability of us to stand, sustain our forces’ health,” Cahill said, according to MS NOW.

Cahill described deployment-resilience counselors and chaplains aboard warships, along with Human Factors Councils designed to review factors affecting sailors’ well-being and identify related risks.

The Navy has said Lincoln’s leadership is continuously assessing sailors’ psychological readiness and that the carrier has access to counselors, chaplains, medical professionals and other support services.

The Navy did not provide a precise number of sailors who have attempted to go overboard or engaged in self-harm aboard Lincoln during the current deployment.

Shelby Sanders, whose mother is serving aboard Lincoln, said connecting has been difficult over the past eight months. When her mother does manage to send a note, Sanders said, she can tell she’s struggling.

“When she can email me, she’s definitely down,” Sanders said. “I think they’ve had five weeks of non-stop combat operations or something like that, so that makes it really tough to communicate consistently or even know if we’ll be able to. It sucks.”

Sanders is preparing to begin her senior year of high school without knowing whether her mother will be home for the milestones that normally mark the year.

“I don’t know how to enjoy starting my senior year when my mom isn’t here, you know?” Sanders said. “Will she be back before homecoming? My birthday? Christmas? I have no idea, and that’s all that I think about.”

Manuel Guevara, whose son is serving aboard Lincoln, said he sounded exhausted, down and worried the last time they spoke.

“Us being out there keeps wars out of our country, but it sucks having your family away. It makes the homecoming that much sweeter, but the uncertainty of when that day will come starts to eat away at you,” Guevara said.

The Navy father said it is difficult to stay focused when he hears about problems aboard the ship and knows his son is worried about day-to-day circumstances, such as eating, doing laundry and having adequate living conditions.

“I don’t want to worry that the circumstances of this deployment will get the best of my son, and he doesn’t make it back home,” Guevara said. “That’s an unbearable burden on my heart.”

The Navy is preparing the USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier strike group to relieve Lincoln, Cao told families at the San Diego meeting. Officials have not provided a timeline, however, citing operational security.

Meanwhile, Loma is caring for the couple’s three children, and her husband remains in medical hold.

“I’m trying to keep a happy face for our three kids,” she said. “They’re little, they miss their daddy, they just want to know mommy and daddy are okay. So I can’t just worry and break down, even though I want to — every single day.”

At Camp Courtney and Kadena and Yokota Air Bases in Japan, investigators with the Defense Department Office of Inspector General found “visible corrosion, visible mold, visible fire damage, visible cracks on the building exterior and interior, visible concrete spalling and exposed rebar, water intrusion, lead‑based paint, asbestos‑containing material and inoperable communication connections.”

The findings came during an audit of Pacific Command infrastructure, during which IG investigators visited 11 PACOM bases in May 2025. They examined operations and communications infrastructure, as well as base housing.

Though the report is heavily redacted, the descriptions — and the photographs — show some structures on the verge of collapse, including two photos of homes at Kadena with crumbling ceilings and living room furniture strewn with debris.

“DoD officials told us that in some areas, falling debris — ranging from small fragments to large slabs — poses an ongoing risk to personnel safety,” the report states.

The audit was originally aimed at assessing the state of “mission-critical systems,” such as operations and communications infrastructure. Investigators determined that housing and water infrastructure are “critical to support the Service members in the USPACOM AOR as they complete their mission.” Their examination of those facilities revealed numerous problems.

Photos of a 50-year-old pier at Camp Courtney show corroded steel fenders and damaged concrete beams.

One Kadena building had eight inches of standing water on the roof, asbestos and cracked pillars and walls.

A Kadena aircraft hangar had holes in the walls.

A 50-year-old water pipe at Kadena had a 12-foot crack. Broken pipes at Kadena and Yokota have caused flooding and collapsed sidewalks.

At Kinser Tower base housing at Kadena, concrete damage has affected 544 homes, according to the IG.

Sebille Manor Housing at Kadena received 100 reports of mold, and dozens of Kadena residents were forced to move due to mold and concrete concerns.

DoD officials told IG investigators that “aging infrastructure, construction choices, or environmental conditions caused accelerated degradation.” In addition, facilities in Japan experience the effects of typhoons, earthquakes and tsunamis.

DoD officials also blamed the problems on a lack of funds and the high cost of services in places like Japan.

They said that while the Japanese government provides host-nation funding, often it can’t be used to fix infrastructure. Instead, these funds tend to be allocated to new construction, or to “broader strategic objectives, such as reducing the impact of U.S. forces on the people of Okinawa.”

The IG recommended that various base commanders in mainland Japan and Okinawa submit a list of priority repairs. But this raises some interservice issues. For example, Army officials said that while Fort Buckner is used only by Army units, the Marine Corps is the real property owner.

The IG also recommended that the secretaries of the Army, Navy and Air Force — as well as the commanders of PACOM and U.S. Forces Japan — conduct a root-cause analysis of infrastructure problems and find funding to fix them. The Deputy Assistant Secretary of War for Infrastructure Modernization and Resilience concurred with the IG’s recommendations.

Dilapidated military facilities are not confined to the Pacific. A 2022 Government Accountability Office report estimated an infrastructure maintenance backlog of $137 million as of 2020. Housing on military bases in the United States has long been afflicted by issues like toxic mold.

Roughly 80% of mental health appointments made in the Veterans Affairs’ Community Care Program are scheduled within the department’s 30-day wait-time standard, but VA schedulers still struggle to meet the seven-day requirement for making these appointments, the VA Office of Inspector General has found.

The VA’s watchdog evaluated mental health referrals for community care at 133 VA medical systems and found that just five met the seven-day metric for scheduling the appointments.

But the inspectors also found that despite those delays, 80% of the referrals received appointments within 30 days.

Of those that didn’t meet the requirement, the average wait time for an appointment was 56 days.

In the report released Monday, OIG inspectors said the scheduling issues contributed to the delays in care, with staff often relying on telephone calls and postal mail to communicate with veterans.

Other roadblocks to timely referrals included providers not being available for the types of appointments veterans wanted and issues reaching providers, according to the report.

Delays in mental health consults are a problem because veterans who need the care may pose a risk to themselves and others without treatment, said Larry Reinkemeyer, assistant inspector general for audits and evaluation.

“Process improvements are needed to enable VA to meet its scheduling and appointment timeliness standards for mental health consults. Veterans who receive community care services for mental health consults represent a vulnerable group,” Reinkemeyer wrote in the report.

For the analysis, the OIG reviewed community care consults for mental health services from Oct. 1, 2024, through Sept. 30, 2025. More than 825,000 veterans received mental health treatment during that period, either directly from the VA — with more than 1 million consults to VA facilities — or 198,000 referrals for community care.

The analysts found that when an appointment did not meet the 30-day metric, scheduling delays consumed much of that window.

Community care is the VA’s program for veterans to receive medical services in the private sector with the cost covered by the VA.

By law, the VA must refer veterans to community care if the wait time for a primary or mental health care appointment at a VA facility is more than 20 days or the drive time is longer than 30 minutes.

Also by law, appointments must occur within 30 days to ensure patients have access to care.

The VA is in the process of reorganizing the management and structure of its medical arm, the Veterans Health Administration, to include reducing the number of regional offices and streamlining the leadership framework.

The reforms also will create a “Community Care Hub” designed to improve services to veterans by improving access to care, tracking payments and standardizing the referral/consult process.

The VA OIG made recommendations to improve the scheduling process, including: adjusting contracts for the companies that manage community care to ensure they can deliver timely care; evaluate its referral system to ensure that it follows best practices; improve its system for identifying available providers to ensure they can provide the care veterans want; and determine whether community care contractors can meet demand for in-person and tele health appointments.

In their response, VA officials said they have addressed several of the recommendations already and expect its new Community Care Network contracts to improve performance.

VA officials also said they were engaging with providers, its contractors and others to identify gaps and address them. They also noted that they are reviewing best practices for reaching patients and working with facilities to ensure that their schedulers are able to communicate with veterans and providers.

“The [Veterans Health Administration] greatly values the OIG’s assistance in ensuring that all stakeholders are unified in supporting VHA’s vision of providing all Veterans with access to the highest quality care,” wrote John Bartrum, the department’s former Under Secretary for Health.

The VA wants to remind veterans that same-day emergency mental health services are available at VA medical facilities as well as private emergency rooms at not cost to veterans — even if they aren’t enrolled in VA healthcare.

The number of veterans who have received care under the Emergent Suicide Crisis Benefit, provided under the Compact Act, has grew from 10,023 in fiscal 2023 to 15,218 in fiscal 2025, VA Press Secretary Quinn Slaven told Military Times on Wednesday.

It also helped 9,434 veterans in the first half of fiscal 2026.

“In FY25, VA covered a record-high $109,934,325 in acute suicide crisis care,” Slaven said. “VA employs several efforts to educate Veterans and non-VA emergency department staff about the availability of [Emergent Suicide Crisis Benefit]. Importantly, once crisis stabilization care has been provided, VA will work with all relevant parties to ensure eligible Veterans don’t get stuck with a bill.”

Operation Morale, Welfare and Recreation is bringing music acts to military facilities through April 2027. The event kicked off on Aug. 8 at Naval Air Station Whidbey Island with Fitz and The Tantrums and Alana Springsteen.

“Quality of service is about ensuring our sailors and their families have the support, connections and opportunities they need to thrive,” said Vice Adm. Scott Gray, commander of Navy Installations Command. “Programs like Operation MWR help reduce stress, strengthen unit and family support networks, and sustain the personal resilience sailors need to meet demanding operational requirements.”

The concert series follows several MWR events, including an Oct. 16, 2025, performance by Jelly Roll and Gwen Stefani at Naval Station Norfolk.

While the Navy is still hammering out the details for upcoming shows, the list of upcoming concerts is as follows:

• Aug. 29, 2026 — Naval Station Norfolk: Teddy Swims with special guest Miranda Lambert and opening act DJ Vito

• Sept. 11, 2026 – Naval Weapons Station Crane: Preston James and Band

• Oct. 2, 2026 — Naval Support Activity Saratoga Springs: Michael Kent

• Oct. 10, 2026 — Naval Base San Diego: Artist announcement forthcoming

• Oct. 17, 2026 — Naval Station Great Lakes: DJ Diesel, also known as Shaquille O’Neal

• April 30, 2027 — Naval Air Station Panama City: Artist announcement forthcoming

Service members and their families are not required to register for concerts in advance, but admission may be first-come, first-served at some venues with limited space.

Anonymous allegations of misconduct that occur in the Navy or Marine Corps will not be processed as a complaint under the Military Equal Opportunity program, which seeks to address unlawful discrimination and sexual harassment, the service announced. Instead, service members are encouraged to use the confidential reporting system, though the anonymous system remains available.

“This does not prevent a commander from taking appropriate action in response to an anonymous report,” a Navy administrative message said.

The reform follows a September 2025 Pentagon memo that called for the anonymous reporting system to be replaced with a confidential complaint system in order to “foster a more effective support and resolution-based program.”

Through the confidential complaint system, sailors are asked to identify themselves and provide information regarding the harassment or discrimination complaint to Navy or Marine Corps personnel tasked with receiving those complaints.

The military branches will document the report and send the service members to support services without requiring them to upgrade it to an informal or formal complaint, though they have that option, the administrative message said.

Personally identifying information contained in the confidential report can be forfeited for revelation if aspects of the complaint involve serious bodily harm, death, or admission of intent to commit a crime.

The Navy said that it will still process anonymous allegations regarding harassment, hazing and bullying, pending further guidance.

Making false official statements during complaints may violate the Uniform Code of Military Justice, according to the Navy.

If a service member makes an informal complaint, the Navy and Marine Corps will offer conflict resolution methods in an attempt to resolve the situation. But the service member can still begin the MEO complaint process if they want to decline that remediation strategy or if the conflict resolution process doesn’t work.

Formal MEO complaints can be dismissed if the complaint is made more than 60 calendar days after the most recent incident occurred for an active-duty service member or 120 calendar days for a reserve service member; if the complaint doesn’t fall within the jurisdiction of the MEO office; if the complaint doesn’t yield enough information to investigate; if the incident was resolved; if a false statement was made; or if the individual who filed the complaint doesn’t comply with Navy requests for information.

The U.S. Navy first introduced a confidential option for reporting sexual harassment in February 2024, adding another way to document allegations of misconduct besides the formal, informal and anonymous ones offered.

Several months later, the Department of Defense Inspector General chastised the service for providing inadequate training and documentation methods for military officials handling the sensitive cases.

The Navy has made other notable updates to guidance surrounding serious instances of reported wrongdoing.

The service recently announced a new policy for sailors being investigated for sexual assault after a high-profile murder was committed by a service member previously charged with sexual assault.

Military personnel who are being investigated for alleged sexual misconduct, sexual assault or stalking will now only be permitted for brief relocation to shore commands, whereas prior policy only stipulated that a service member be temporarily transferred from their parent command to another command.

The Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Thomas Hudner arrived at Naval Station Mayport along with almost 300 sailors after a nearly nine-month deployment to the U.S. 4th, 5th and 6th Fleet areas of operations.

“Over the past almost nine months, this crew has demonstrated exceptional resilience and tactical proficiency across three different fleets,” said Cmdr. David Cook, commanding officer of the Hudner. “Their dedication is unmatched, and we are absolutely thrilled to be back in Mayport to reunite with the families and loved ones whose unwavering support made our success possible.”

Hudner departed Mayport for a scheduled deployment on Dec. 1, 2025, and made its way to the Caribbean Sea, where it provided support to Operation Southern Spear, a campaign the U.S. launched in September 2025 on the premise of reducing the flow of illegal drugs into the country.

As part of the efforts, the U.S. has launched 66 military strikes against alleged drug-carrying vessels, killing at least 196 people. The campaign has been divisive, with senators and legal experts questioning the legality of the strikes.

Hudner then transited to the 6th Fleet area of operations to support the readiness of U.S. Naval Forces Europe-Africa.

Most recently, the ship participated in Operation Epic Fury, launching Tomahawk land attack missiles as the U.S. bombarded Iranian military targets, and helping establish maritime security in the region while the U.S. Navy enforced a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz.

The Pentagon announced late last month that the base, located in North Charleston, South Carolina, would be renamed after Republican Senator Lindsey Graham. The renaming took place Monday with a ceremony attended by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, as well as state and local officials.

A late July memo, signed by Secretary of the Air Force Troy Meink, directed staff to begin working with Air Mobility Command and Joint Base Charleston to rename the base, attributing the honor to Graham’s “decades of distinguished service to the United States Congress and the United States Air Force.”

Graham spent 33 years in the Air Force as an active-duty staff judge advocate, a South Carolina Air National Guard officer and a senior lawyer in the Air Force Reserve.

He died unexpectedly from an aortic dissection at the age of 71 in mid-July.

Graham was elected to the House of Representatives in 1994 and the Senate in 2002.

Graham was a member of the Senate Budget Committee, leading efforts to further military funding. Before his death, he secured $212 million for the Charleston base to go toward the Coast Guard for enhanced readiness.

“Beyond the uniform, Senator Graham has been a vital supporter to this base,” base Commander Col. Kenneth Shirley said during the unveiling ceremony. “His unwavering support to the installation’s mission was not just words. His support was cemented into the foundation that makes this base.”

In a speech Monday, Hegseth applauded Graham for “taking on a radical leftist ideology that had run rampant in the media, in academia and even among a few members of Congress,” which he said had curbed the military’s recruiting numbers under former President Joe Biden’s administration.

The defense secretary pointed to the historic $1.5 trillion fiscal 2027 defense budget currently under consideration by Congress, saying that Graham told Hegseth it was the “best military budget” he has seen since taking office.

“This department pays tribute to Lindsey Graham in the naming of this base, but there could be no greater tribute that Congress could give than to invest in our warriors for the full $1.5 trillion,” Hegseth said.

The base mainly houses the 628th Air Base Wing, 437th Airlift Wing and the reserve 315th Airlift Wing, with a total force of over 90,000 airmen, sailors, soldiers, Marines, Coast Guardsmen, civilians and retirees across four installations. The base manages the force’s largest fleet of C-17 Globemaster II cargo aircraft.

In May, acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao announced during a Senate Armed Services Committee Hearing that the MQ-25A was moving into the low-rate initial production and deployment phase.

The aircraft is intended to relieve the Navy’s F/A-18 Super Hornets of the aerial refueling role, freeing up F/A-18E/F aircraft to focus on strike missions.

The memo, dated April 21, 2026, was recently published by the Pentagon within a Modernized Selected Acquisition Report. It was first reported by The War Zone.

The report notes that in March 2026, the USS Theodore Roosevelt Unmanned Air Warfare Center “became the first fully operational/deployable MQ-25 capable aircraft carrier,” with another UAWC aboard the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan slated “to be operational/deployable at the end of [August] 2026.”

The Nimitz-class carrier USS George H.W. Bush was the first aircraft carrier on which the UAWC was installed and tested back in August 2024.

According to the Navy, the integrated Unmanned Carrier Aviation Mission Control System and the MD-5E Ground Control Station are the systems required for the MQ-25 air vehicle command and control — and are critical to the unmanned aircraft refueler’s operations.

In May, the Stingray reached milestone C, which in the defense acquisition process authorizes a program to transition from the engineering and manufacturing development, or EMD, phase into production and deployment, a process that in this instance has been nearly eight years in the making.

Inked in 2018, the $805 million Boeing-Navy contract covered the design, development, fabrication, test and delivery of four Stingray aircraft, a program that the service at the time estimated would cost about $13 billion for 72 aircraft, according to previous Military Times coverage.

Despite its first test flight running a year later than previously planned, on April 25 the Stingray inched closer to operability after completing an approximately two-hour flight around Mascoutah, Illinois.

With the USS Theodore Roosevelt in the fold and able to support MQ-25 operations, deploying the unmanned refueling drone is seemingly only a matter of time.

“This is the first pair of slacks being introduced to the fleet using our new modernized sizing,” said Dr. Brianna Plummer, Group Leader at the Navy Exchange Service Command’s Navy Clothing & Textile Research Facility. “We’ve already introduced two optional items — the Summer and Dress White female overblouses in both short-sleeve and long-sleeve in the new modernized fit sizing, which are annotated as fit types ‘Alpha,’ ‘Bravo’ and ‘Delta.’”

According to the release, the new fits are available to try on or purchase at NEX Norfolk, NEX Oceana and NEX Arlington, Virginia; NEX Great Lakes, Illinois; NEX Jacksonville and NEX Pensacola; Aviation Plaza, Florida; NEX San Diego; NEX Kitsap-Bangor, Washington; NEX Pearl Harbor, Hawaii; and NEX Bethesda, Maryland, as well as online at myNavyExchange.com.

“It is our charge to ensure Sailors are fit for the fight, that means they are equipped with uniforms that fit correctly, are of a quality that performs, and represent professionalism in all tasks,” said Rear Adm. Jennifer Couture, former Director, Military Personnel Plans and Policy (N13). “Modernizing the Service Khaki slacks is a direct result of listening to our sailors, it’s a tangible example of how we’re modernizing uniforms to fit the needs of sailors today and strengthen readiness across the fleet.”

Made of 75% polyester and 25% wool fabric, the Service Khaki slacks feature two “back welt pockets” that will surely make any sailor say, “Thanks, it has pockets!”

While the focus of the Navy Exchange Service Command is currently on the modernizing of female uniforms, the release notes that male uniform sizes will also be evaluated and updated in the coming months and years.

Citing the pro forma “loss of confidence in his ability to command,” Loe was relieved of his command by Rear Adm. Kevin Brown, commander of Naval Medical Forces Pacific, per the release.

Loe served as the NMRTC commanding officer beginning in July 2025 and has since been temporarily reassigned to NMFP. Capt. Robin Bennet will serve as the interim commanding officer.

The Navy noted that the “relief of the CO does not impact the command’s operational readiness.”

Based in California, Navy Medicine Readiness and Training Command Lemoore delivers healthcare to more than 32,000 active duty, retired military, and civilian beneficiaries from shore-based and operational commands, according to the Navy’s website.

According to his biography, the Texas-born Loe completed his Bachelor of Science in Nursing at The University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston, Texas, in 1995 and his Master of Science in Nursing at The University of Texas Health Science Center Houston, Texas, in 2001. In 2012, he completed his Doctor of Nursing Practice at the Texas Tech University Health Science Center.

After a civilian nursing career, Loe joined the Navy and deployed to Afghanistan in 2008, where he embedded as the training team leader responsible for all forward operating base departments that supported over 3,000 Afghan Army and 400 NATO personnel. Before serving as NMRTC’s CO, Loe worked as the officer-in-charge of the Branch Health Clinic Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort.

His awards include the Meritorious Service Medal, Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal, Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medal and the 2009 Association of the United States Navy Bea Ratner Nurse Corps Junior Officer of the Year.

The 4.2% jobless rate for all veterans was up a tick from the 4.1% recorded in June, while the rate for post-9/11 veterans dropped from 4.8% in June to 4.7% in July. The unemployment rate for women veterans, meanwhile, went up from 3.6% in June to 3.8% in July.

The BLS report also included revised figures on the number of jobs added in June and May, which showed major downward trends. The initial May numbers showed that 129,000 jobs had been added, but that number was revised downward to 63,000. June’s initial job growth number was 57,000, but that number was revised to 20,000.

In addition, the BLS report stated, “Among the unemployed, the number of people on temporary layoff increased by 153,000 to 921,000 in July,” and the “number of permanent job losers changed little at 1.7 million.”

Friday’s BLS report came out the day after President Donald Trump declared at a Las Vegas rally that the U.S. economy was “the greatest in the history of the world,” although archived BLS reports show that the U.S. economy has added a total of 542,000 jobs over the 19 months of Trump’s second term, while nearly 2.7 million jobs were added in the last 19 months of the Biden administration.

In response to Friday’s report, White House aides put out not-to-worry statements noting job growth in construction and manufacturing.

White House spokesman Kush Desai said in a released statement that the “Trump industrial resurgence is on schedule.”

“Manufacturing (which added 5,000 jobs in July) and factory construction jobs grew again in July even as government payrolls continued to significantly shrink,” Desai said. “Unemployment claims are at record lows.”

On Fox Business News, White House National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett said that the end of the FIFA World Cup was a factor in the number of jobs lost. He described it as a “sort of rebound from all the employment we got from the World Cup, because the World Cup was ending.”

Hassett’s comments contrasted with the analysis of other economists who have focused on the eventual long-term impact of artificial intelligence and the uncertainty over whether the chokehold on oil tankers passing through the Strait of Hormuz can be lifted.

“It’s a bleak (BLS) report,” Heather Long, chief economist for the Navy Federal Credit Union, said in a phone interview with Military Times. The report shows that “a lot of people are leaving the labor force,” and “there’s no doubt that the job market has flatlined in President Trump’s second term.”

“It’s just not a dynamic jobs market,” she added. “Tariffs and the war in Iran have caused companies to cut back” on hiring. To sidestep hiring slowdowns due to the impact of AI, “young people are looking again at trade schools.”

The BLS report also highlighted one of the great counter-intuitives of American economics: people losing their jobs can be good news for the stock markets, Long said.

By midday Friday, the Dow Industrial Average was up 50 points, possibly indicating that investors were betting on the gloomy jobs report making it unlikely that the Federal Reserve would raise interest rates in September.

SensorMAX, developed by Lockheed Martin, uses AI and machine learning to analyze acoustic sensor data, update the sensor model — and then immediately transmit the updates over the air to anti-submarine warfare, or ASW, platforms.

During RIMPAC maneuvers near Hawaii, Navy MH-60R helicopters dropped sonobuoys, which fed data to SensorMAX. It in turn assisted the crews with target identification.

“Ground operators retrained SensorMAX’s models on new sounds in minutes, then transmitted AI-enhanced undersea intelligence OTA [over the air] using an encrypted data link directly back to the helicopter and the fleet,” according to a Lockheed Martin news release.

Lockheed described the system as the “Navy’s AI portable sonar expert.”

“Taking in subsurface acoustic data from a network of sensors, SensorMAX provides a continuous data stream to the aircrew and sends information to the ground station,” the company continued. “When a new target is identified, system operators label the identified noise signature, retrain the model on the new data and push a small update packet back to the aircrew.”

The system allows aircrews to manage up to eight simultaneous sonobuoy surveillance feeds, “doubling the capacity of legacy capabilities,” Lockheed said.

The company estimated that each retraining cycle for the model takes under five minutes.

SensorMAX integrates data from a variety of sensors, which makes it useful for air and ground operations as well as naval, according to Lockheed Martin.

“Lockheed Martin’s collaboration with FUSE Inc. enables secure, resilient software delivery to deployed aircraft, allowing SensorMAX’s trained AI models and mission software to be updated rapidly without interrupting operations,” the company said.

“By demonstrating platform-agnostic AI intelligence and classification, the future fleet can leverage any acoustic sensor to expand the protective ring around high-value assets and accelerating the ASW kill chain,” Lockheed Martin continued.

China is also integrating AI into ASW. Chinese media claimed last year that researchers had developed AI which evaluates data from multiple sources, including sonobuoys as well as data on water temperature and salinity.

Although Congress authorized CMP to sell surplus weapons — and has sold 1911 handguns and M1 Garands in the past — this is the first time it will sell the historic M14.

Jerry O’Keefe, CMP’s chairman and chief executive officer, explained that the challenge was that the rifles were originally serialized as fully automatic firearms.

Although civilians can legally own machine guns, federal law requires both buyers and sellers to adhere to strict regulatory policies.

“We’ve spent an extraordinary amount of time and effort thinking through every step in this process, working with our partners to get everybody in agreement,” O’Keefe said.

He explained that they worked closely with their federal partners and walked them “through every step in the conversion process” to show how they will make the M14s “permanently and irreversibly semi-automatic.”

The federal government created CMP in 1903 to promote marksmanship training among civilians, and in 1996, Congress privatized the organization and gave it authority to sell surplus military firearms.

According to a 2019 Government Accountability Office report, the Army has transferred more than 700,000 rifles and handguns to CMP, which has generated about $196.8 million in revenue from their sale.

While CMP initially announced that the M14s could be available as early as this year, O’Keefe clarified that the first sales will most likely occur in early 2027.

“We expected the demand for this to be extraordinary and frankly, the feedback on all the different forums and websites and YouTubes has even exceeded what we expected,” he said. “So we now know that we’re going to have to spend a few months building up a pretty large inventory of converted guns before we go to first sale.”

The M14 has a complicated military history but remains popular among firearms enthusiasts. Chambered in 7.62mm, it was developed from the M1 Garand and replaced the World War II-era rifle as the standard U.S. service rifle around 1957.

The M14 was intended to serve as an all-purpose infantry weapon. Its select-fire option was part of an effort to consolidate several weapons used by American troops into a single platform.

Ian McCollum, a firearms historian and host of the YouTube channel Forgotten Weapons, explained that the military wanted to combine the capabilities of the M1 carbine, M1 Garand, M3 Grease Gun and M1918A2 BAR into a single weapon.

That effort produced the M14 Infantry Rifle, as well as the M15 Light Machine Gun, which was essentially an M14 equipped with a bipod and pistol grip.

The M14, however, had a short service life. Springfield Armory — the historic military arsenal, not the current manufacturer that produces modernized M14s — designed the rifle but was not equipped for the kind of mass production the military ultimately demanded.

Once other manufacturers got involved, though, they made parts of inconsistent quality, which led to inconsistencies in the rifle’s overall performance.

The military ultimately bought about 1.38 million M14s before ending the program in 1964. The rifle entered combat during the Vietnam War, but its size and materials made it ill-suited for the dense jungle environment compared to the M16, which began replacing it in 1967.

“Tromping through a jungle, you are better off with something a little bit shorter than an M14, so ultimately, the M14 would end up being the U.S. service rifle with the shortest active service life of anything that the U.S. has ever issued,” McCollum said.

Many of the remaining M14s were subsequently destroyed, sold overseas or transferred to foreign militaries, according to McCollum. They also briefly made an appearance during the Global War on Terror. M14 variants were used in Afghanistan and Iraq, primarily as designated marksman and sniper rifles.

That makes CMP’s planned sale particularly notable for enthusiasts who have long viewed the M14 as an iconic American service rifle.

Brian C. Sheetz, the editor-in-chief of the American Rifleman, called it “one of the best general-purpose rifle choices for uncertain times” because it “offers a level of utility and capability — all in an understated package — not commonly encountered in many more modern firearms.”

When the surplus M14s finally go on sale, O’Keefe said they will cost around $2,000 apiece, and buyers should be able to purchase up to two rifles at a time.

The trial, known as the Psilocybin Intervention for Veterans Overcoming Treatment-Resistant Depression,” or PIVOT, study aims to include at least 240 veterans, all of whom have difficult-to-treat major depressive disorder and some who also have PTSD.

The study will take place at five VA medical centers through June 2031 and will assess patients’ levels of depression before and after treatment, side effects and overall response among participants.

“Far too many veterans are living with mental health conditions that don’t respond to available treatments,” VA Secretary Doug Collins said in a statement. “Under President [Donald] Trump, VA is pursuing all avenues to evaluate new treatments and offer meaningful relief for those who have worn the uniform. This clinical trial reflects another step toward this goal.”

Last month, researchers with Ohio State University’s Center for Psychedelic Drug Research and Education published the findings of a small, 12-person study on the safety of using psilocybin to treat severe PTSD in veterans.

After receiving eight hours of psychotherapy and two doses of synthetic psilocybin and integrative therapy, nine participants, or 75%, no longer met the clinical criteria for having PTSD.

According to the research, published July 30 in Communications Medicine, participants showed no serious adverse effects, including suicidal ideation or behavior. Non-serious side effects included headache, anxiety and dizziness.

“For a population with severe treatment-resistant PTSD, these results are striking,” said Stacey Armstrong, associate director and senior researcher at the center.

The PIVOT study will involve veterans with major depressive disorder who have not responded to current treatments, including those with or without a diagnosis of PTSD. In the double-blind, randomized trial, veterans will receive one dose of psilocybin or a placebo, along with therapeutic support. They will receive a second dose one month later, also with support, and will be evaluated two to four weeks following each session.

They also will receive follow-up six months after their participation.

VA officials said for the study, they will use pharmaceutical-grade drugs and treat veterans in a “safe, controlled, clinical setting.”

The five VA facilities that are slated to host the research include: the Birmingham VA Health Care System and Tuscaloosa VA Medical Center, Alabama; the VA Portland Health Care System, Oregon; Cpl. Michael Crescenz VA Medical Center, Philadelphia; and VA Puget Sound Health Care System, Seattle.

Trump signed an executive order in April directing the Food and Drug Administration to accelerate the review of some psychedelic therapies to treat mental health conditions. The order also required the FDA, the Department of Health and Human Services and the VA to collaborate on psychedelic research.

As a result of the order, HHS and the VA signed an agreement last month to increase coordination on research, including increasing clinical trial participation, training therapists, nurses and doctors to administer psychedelic medications if they are approved and collecting data and evidence to support patients, physicians and federal regulators.

According to the VA, its staff is involved in 20 current clinical trials focused on psychedelic treatments for mental health conditions, including MDMA and LSD.

Nearly 5 million veterans have used magic mushrooms, LSD or MDMA, study finds

Studies sponsored by the Multidisciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies have shown that 87% of veteran participants in a study on the use of MDMA — the chemical compound known recreationally as Ecstasy or Molly — had significant improvement in PTSD symptoms four months after receiving treatments, and 71% no longer met the diagnostic criteria for PTSD at the end of the studies.

The advancement of MDMA as a treatment met a setback in 2024, however, when the Food and Drug Administration rejected an application to approve it as a PTSD treatment, requesting more research on its safety and efficacy.

VA officials said in a release on the PIVOT study Wednesday that they strongly discourage self-medication, and veterans should not “replace other mental health treatment options with psychedelics or any other unprescribed substances.”

“Proven, evidence-based treatments are currently available at VA facilities to treat Veterans with mental health conditions,” they wrote.

The official in charge of tracking the Navy’s finances mocked the smell, weight and appearance of subordinates and made hiring decisions that appeared to show bias in favor of other African American women, a new report from the Pentagon’s top watchdog finds.

The 42-page probe concludes that Donjette Gilmore, auditor general of the Navy Audit Service, made a habit of harassing and belittling subordinates, creating a hostile work environment and reducing some employees to tears.

Of 27 witnesses interviewed by the Inspector General, 23 said they had personally witnessed, experienced or heard about this behavior.

Specific comments alleged by witnesses included, “Oh, your perfume stinks. She stinks. You stink;” “Oh, my God, you look like a witch;” “No. Let’s take the stairs because [you need] the exercise;” “Your clothes are too tight;” and “You need to stop eating cookies [because] [y]ou don’t need to eat cookies,” among others.

Employees reported being berated and told to “shut up” in staff meetings and mentioned instances in which two single parents were targeted with derogatory comments.

“Nobody told you all to have kids,” Gilmore allegedly said.

Additionally, according to the report, she created a culture of fear around reporting alleged misconduct.

“Witnesses told us that they and their colleagues were afraid to file complaints against Ms. Gilmore and that no safe or effective channel existed to address their harassment allegations,” investigators wrote. “They believed that previous complaints were ignored and mishandled and that Ms. Gilmore would find out they complained against her.”

Eight witnesses also said Gilmore tried to hide negative feedback from command climate surveys administered in 2023 and 2024, ordering that specific comments be redacted on briefing slides.

This week, the Navy published new guidance on transparency in the administration of command climate surveys. Officials did not confirm to Military Times whether the guidance was linked to the IG report on Gilmore.

“A strong and positive command climate is the bedrock of our warfighting advantage. Because our people are our most valuable asset, a command climate that fosters trust, respect, and psychological safety is not a ‘nice to have’; it is a combat multiplier,” the Navy administrative message states.

The report also finds that Gilmore’s behavior in 17 different hiring actions showed a preference for external candidates and non-competitive practices and thus “created an appearance” of favoritism. Eight African American women were hired to fill 13 of the 17 roles, with some of them being selected for more than one position, the probe found. Nine of the hires were made without a competitive selection process.

Witnesses, who the watchdog noted included seven current and former Audit Service employees who are Black women, also alleged Gilmore made racially specific comments about hiring and employees, including stating “that she needed to keep an employee by keeping him happy because ‘he is white.’”

In addition, the report concluded that Gilmore misused her role in various ways, most notably by pressuring a subordinate to submit sexual harassment allegations as part of an extended effort to discredit another official, Ronnie Booth, who’d previously been selected over her in 2018 to become the Navy’s auditor general.

“Ms. Gilmore took other extraordinary steps in her efforts to discredit Mr. Booth,” the IG found. “Specifically, Ms. Gilmore:

• sent anonymous letters to other potential victims;
• solicited congressional support for her selection as AG in conjunction with the adverse information about Mr. Booth; and 
• coordinated her actions and shared information about the harassment allegations with a Washington Post reporter."

The DoD IG did find in 2021 that Booth had sexually harassed a dozen female Naval Audit Service employees over the course of more than two decades, engaging in a “pervasive pattern of sexual harassment and quid pro quo sexual propositions.”

Booth retired under the shadow of harassment allegations in 2019.

Gilmore, who previously directed the Navy’s public-private partnership housing reviews, became auditor general in 2022. Between May 2023 and June 2024, the Navy received six complaints alleging favoritism, harassment and misuse of her position.

In responses provided to the IG, Gilmore denied wrongdoing, at times claiming she did not recall specific alleged interactions and comments. She also told the IG that she couldn’t remember the passcodes to government-issued cell phones that were seized by investigators and that she didn’t know where a missing SIM card was, according to the report.

In a message to Military Times, Gilmore said that, on the advice of her attorney, she was unable to comment.

As of Thursday, Gilmore appears to remain in her position as the Navy reviews findings.

“We have received and are currently reviewing the DOW IG report,” a Navy spokesperson told Military Times. “We take all allegations of misconduct very seriously and are committed to workforce accountability. We have no further comment on the matter at this time.”