Editor’s note: This article first appeared on The War Horse, an award-winning nonprofit news organization educating the public on military service. Subscribe to their newsletter.If not for what happened on Sept. 11, 2001, Valeria Casillas probably would not have joined the military. But in the surge of patriotism following deadly terrorist attacks on New York City and outside Washington, D.C., she saw service as a chance to give back to the country where her father — a truck driver and naturalized citizen from Mexico — had carved his own path.“My dad loves this country so much. … He came to the U.S. and made his life what he wanted,” she said. “It feels almost like my contribution is in my father’s name.”In 2006, the then-18-year-old Casillas enlisted in the Air Force, where she became an intelligence analyst. But she began to question the value of her mission during a 2008 deployment, after spending 12-hour shifts watching airborne overwatch videos of Iraqi society’s slide into chaos.“I remember being at the smoke pit after we’d been there a couple months … with other junior enlisted, all of us 18, 19, 20 years old, asking ‘What are we doing here? What’s the point?’”…

Don’t believe all the hype you’ve heard about the strength of chimpanzees. It’s nonsense, according to MMA fighter Cole Johnson, who plans on proving it by fighting one and beating it.The 24-year-old, who goes by Wavy MMA on social media and fights out of City Kickboxing in New Zealand, has one professional fight under his belt. He won that fight and that was enough for him to believe he could take on a chimp. Johnson made the announcement in a video last week, where he confidently stated, “I 100% wholeheartedly believe that I could beat a chimpanzee in a fight.”THE CRAIG CARTON SHOW–UNFILTERED, UNAPOLOGETIC AND UNMISSABLE. DOWNLOAD HIS DAILY PODCAST NOW!He knew that it was going to rub people the wrong way. He wasn’t fazed by that at all. He called out those who believe that chimpanzees are six times stronger than humans and laid an argument for why he believes he’d win the fight.”A chimpanzee is two times the strength of the average human. You know who else is two times the strength of the average human?” Johnson said.”Me. I’ve been grappling and wrestling my whole life. A chimpanzee is four feet tall and 130 pounds.”He adds that any…

Editor’s note: This report contains discussion of suicide. Troops, veterans and family members experiencing suicidal thoughts can call the 24-hour Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988 and dial 1, text 838255 or visit VeteransCrisisLine.net.House lawmakers released key findings Tuesday from an investigation into the Navy’s response to aviators dealing with flight-related brain injuries.The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform said the Navy has not done enough to research and mitigate potential neurological damage for Navy pilots despite being aware of documented mental health concerns and suicides within the F/A-18 community.“The result is a system that is well-equipped to treat injuries once they are diagnosed, but poorly structured to understand or prevent risks developing over time,” the investigation said. “In effect, despite internal warnings and external reporting, the Navy has not taken the steps necessary to determine whether it is systematically exposing its aviators to long-term brain injury.”The investigation, which began Feb. 6, 2025, was sparked by a New York Times report about a confidential Navy program studying whether Navy pilots were experiencing debilitating brain injuries from flying.The program, called Project Odin’s Eye, studied pilots who flew the F/A-18 Super Hornet, according to the report.Several of those aviators died by…

There’s a second model slated to join Civivi’s new Elite series of upscale knife designs. It’s called the Tessera, and it’s a notable contrast in style to the first Elite model. The Elite series is a very new Civivi project, having commenced earlier in the summer. The idea is simple: it aims to fill a space in the Civivi lineup with heightened material choices compared to the main line. In short, the Civivi Elite pieces will land between the Civivi knives as we know them, and the entry-level offerings from its sibling label, We Knife Co. In conjunction with the budget-conscious pieces available from other sister label Sencut, the We Knife Co. offering line extends from price-conscious beginners all the way to dyed-in-the-wool collectors. The sculpted pocket clip is made from titanium Which brings us to the Tessera. The first Elite model, the Brova, played up the hard use/tactical angle; the Tessera, while not skimpy at 3.37 inches of blade length, is shorter than the Brova and generally a slimmer looking piece. It will slot quite nicely into an everyday carry role, and look good doing it. Its sweeping drop point is made from S35VN – steel of choice so…

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Sharon Stone is opening up about how she survived Hollywood’s dark side after starring in her hit movie “Basic Instinct.”The actress became an international star after she played Catherine Tramell, a seductive crime novelist and alleged serial killer, in the 1992 erotic thriller. However, Stone recently shared that portraying Tramell took a psychological toll on her and drew dangerous people into her orbit.During an appearance on the “Mayim Bialik’s Breakdown” podcast this week, Stone spoke about times when she’s gotten too close to dark characters she’s played and “scared the living s— out of myself.” Bialik asked her for an example, and she replied, “When I did ‘Basic Instinct,’ and I had to really look at darkness, and yet I was very still young and inexperienced.”‘TEACHER’S PET’ STAR MAMIE VAN DOREN SAYS SHE FELT ‘USED’ AS YOUNG ACTRESS NAVIGATING HOLLYWOOD’S DARK SIDE She continued, “I didn’t understand about holding the core, the core self, the golden self, and then wrapping the character around it with the power of the self driving it. But just bringing it all in there and looking at it all, I opened some dark doors, right?””And some of…

The Department of Veterans Affairs will mark the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks by hosting volunteer events on Saturday, Sept. 12, at more than 144 locations, including national cemeteries, VA-funded facilities and private cemeteries, beautifying the grounds to honor the fallen. The VA has held events on Patriot Day, as the date was declared by Congress in December 2001, to honor the 47 veterans and family members killed in the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, as well as the more than 16,000 veterans who have died since and are interred at VA national cemeteries. “As our nation marks the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, VA national cemeteries offer a meaningful place to honor the courage and sacrifice of that day,” said VA Under Secretary for Memorial Affairs Sam Brown, a retired Army captain who was severely wounded in combat in Kandahar, Afghanistan, in 2008. Patriot Day honors not only those killed in the attacks, but the service members, law enforcement officers, firefighters and first responders who responded, as well as those who gave their lives for their country in subsequent wars. The efforts mark the eighth year the VA teamed with Carry the Load to host the volunteer events. The nonprofit…

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! We have seen plenty of scams borrow Amazon’s name, and some of them look convincing enough to make almost anyone hesitate.Earlier this summer, we showed you a fake Amazon email that claimed there was unusual activity on an account and pushed the recipient to “Sign In to Verify.” The message even suggested a document might need to be uploaded. We have also warned about fake Amazon recruiting texts promising hundreds of dollars a day for easy remote work.The stories change, but scammers keep coming back to Amazon because so many of us use it. A delivery warning or account alert can feel believable when you are already expecting a package.Now Amazon is giving customers a new way to answer the question we keep asking when these messages arrive: Did Amazon actually send this? The company says about 360,000 customers contact Amazon customer service every year asking whether a message is real. Its latest answer is built into Alexa for Shopping.AMAZON JOB SCAM TEXTS ARE SPREADING AGAIN WITH A NEW TWIST Here is how the new verification tool works, what it can tell you and why you should still keep your guard up…

Retired Army special operations master sergeant Pasha Palanker first met Marc Andersen during the COVID-19 pandemic, when the man who now manages Army finances was handing out diapers at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, as part of volunteer work to support military families. Palanker was impressed — both by Andersen’s tall stature and formidable presence and by how he seemed to be serving the military community without a spotlight or a political agenda. The two quickly developed a close relationship. On Sept. 5, Palanker posted a series of photos of himself with Andersen on his Instagram, along with a “wholehearted” endorsement for the role of Army secretary, a position left vacant after Dan Driscoll’s resignation on Aug. 31 amid reported friction with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. “He listens. He cares. He gets things done,” Palanker wrote. “He combines the heart of a servant leader with the experience of an execution-oriented business leader turning vision into resources, infrastructure, and measurable results while keeping Soldiers and families at the center.” Andersen, who was handpicked by Driscoll to become the assistant secretary of the Army for Financial Management and Comptroller last year, is now on a short list of candidates under consideration by the…

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Reps. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y. and Josh Gottheimer, D-N.J., are launching a congressional coalition to target antisemitism at institutions of higher education.The Combating Antisemitism on College Campuses Caucus will provide a bipartisan avenue for lawmakers to “coordinate oversight of how” schools of higher learning react to antisemitism, according to press releases issued by the lawmakers’ offices.The caucus will “press institutions to protect Jewish students, faculty, and staff, and to enforce their own anti-harassment and anti-discrimination policies,” “advance and track federal legislation targeting campus antisemitism and BDS-driven discrimination,” and “spotlight schools that are getting it right and share best practices across campuses nationwide,” the releases note.CAMPUS ANTISEMITISM EXTENDS BEYOND STUDENT PROTESTS AND INTO CLASSROOMS, ADL WARNS While Gottheimer is a Jewish Democrat and Stefanik is a Catholic Republican, both lawmakers are concerned about the problem of antisemitism.”Since October 7th, Jewish students on too many campuses have been harassed, intimidated, and made to feel like strangers in their own school,” Gottheimer said, referring to the 2023 attack by Hamas terrorists in Israel.TRUMP INDICATES SUPPORT FOR CHRISTIAN-BACKED PLAN TO HELP CANADIAN JEWS ESCAPE ANTISEMITISM “That’s why Elise and I are teaming up to launch this caucus…

The Pentagon has codified sweeping changes to military fitness requirements, some of which Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered last fall. The new regulations, published Aug. 31, spell out testing timelines, standards for troops in combat arms specialties, guidelines for pregnancy and postpartum fitness and establish tracking mechanisms for testing results across the services. The policy incorporates directives issued throughout 2025 into a set of standards for the services. Among them: commanders must allow time for physical fitness every duty day and troops in jobs designated as “combat arms” must be held to male fitness standards on regular fitness tests. Many changes are already underway across the services. In March 2025, Hegseth ordered the services to identify their combat-arms specialties and develop sex-neutral, mission-related physical standards. Hegseth has railed against “fat troops,” and “fat generals,” and pledged to return combat arms jobs to “the highest male standard only.” The changes have unfolded alongside a Pentagon review of women in front-line jobs. In December, the Pentagon’s personnel chief, Anthony Tata, announced a study on the effectiveness of integrating ground combat units, prompting concerns among some that it could be used to justify restricting women from combat roles. Critics have questioned the study’s…