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Blake Farmer

National Security
4:42 am
Thu January 24, 2013

Women In Combat Ban To Be Lifted

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Originally published on Thu January 24, 2013 11:19 am

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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

On a momentous Thursday, it's MORNING EDITION from NPR News. I'm Steve Inskeep.

RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

And I'm Renee Montagne.

We're expecting Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to make an announcement today. From now on, women will formally be allowed to serve in ground combat.

INSKEEP: To sense just how dramatic this change is, consider how many other milestones the military passed before reaching this one. The move for women comes 65 years after the Armed Forces ended racial segregation.

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U.S.
4:26 pm
Mon September 10, 2012

Army Aims To Use Words, Not Weapons, With Afghans

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Credit Blake Farmer for NPR
U.S. Army soldiers learn to play khosai, Afghanistan's full-contact national pastime, at Fort Campbell.
Credit Blake Farmer for NPR
Afghan instructors demonstrate how to play a game called "egg jousting" for U.S. soldiers at Fort Campbell, Ky.
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Originally published on Mon September 10, 2012 4:53 pm

The U.S. Army has been ramping up instruction in the languages of Afghanistan, even as troop levels in the country decrease in preparation for the U.S. troop withdrawal in 2014.

This year, key installations have added several hundred speakers of Pashto and Dari to their ranks, more than doubling the number of soldiers trained in the Afghan languages.

But it's not just the country's languages that are foreign to U.S. soldiers — it's the culture, as well.

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