In the chaos of an early morning assault on a remote U.S. outpost in eastern Afghanistan, Staff Sgt. Erich Phillips' M4 carbine quit firing as militant forces surrounded the base. The machine gun he grabbed after tossing the rifle aside didn't work either.
When the battle in the small village of Wanat ended, nine U.S. soldiers lay dead and 27 more were wounded. A detailed study of the attack by a military historian found that weapons failed repeatedly at a "critical moment" during the firefight on July 13, 2008, putting the outnumbered American troops at risk of being overrun by nearly 200 insurgents.
Francisco Galicia paced his cell at Fort Hunter Liggett, a vast army base 160 miles south...
The U.S. Coast Guard launched an internal investigation after a swastika was found on a bathroom...
The US military launched a strike on an alleged drug smuggling boat in the eastern Pacific...
