Now, the Army is saying goodbye to one of the cavalry units whose lineage draws a straight line to the original Buffalo Soldiers.

On July 28th, soldiers assigned to the 4th Squadron, 10th Cavalry Regiment, 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division gathered to honor the squadron’s 160-year legacy during Project Convergence-Capstone 6 at Fort Irwin, California, according to a recent release.

Conducting a final formation before its deactivation on July 29, soldiers of the 4th Squadron, 10th Cavalry Regiment assembled to mark and honor the renowned Army unit.

While African Americans have fought in every major U.S. war since the nation’s inception, Black U.S. Regular Army units were not created until 1866 when, as part of a Army reorganization following the Civil War, Congress created six segregated Regular Army regiments of African American soldiers: the 9th and 10th cavalry regiments; and the 38th, 39th, 40th and 41st infantry regiments.

Three years later, the infantry regiments were condensed into four and redesignated as the 9th and 10th Cavalry and the 24th and 25th Infantry.

The newly established units were tasked with protecting frontier settlers, escorting wagon trains and securing transportation routes across the frontier, according to the release.

The nickname “Buffalo Soldiers” originated during the 10th Cavalry’s initial service in the Frontier Army during campaigns against Native American tribes.

While there are differing theories regarding the origin of the nickname, according to the National Museum of African American History and Culture, “One is that the Plains Indians who fought the Buffalo Soldiers thought that their dark, curly hair resembled the fur of the buffalo. Another is that their bravery and ferocity in battle reminded the Indians of the way buffalo fought.”

Regardless, the soldiers considered the name high praise, with an image of a buffalo becoming part of the 10th Cavalry’s regimental crest, according to the museum. Eventually, the name was extended to denote all troops in the four Black cavalry and infantry regiments.

Throughout the 19th century, American aspirations of “Manifest Destiny” were largely aided by the practical, on-the-ground support of Buffalo Soldiers who protected communities, escorted mail routes, built roads and safeguarded critical infrastructure, according to the release. Eighteen Buffalo Soldiers received the Medal of Honor during the Indian Wars from roughly the 1860s to 1890.

From its creation in 1866, Buffalo Soldiers fought in the Spanish-American War, Philippine-American War, Mexican Punitive Expedition, World War II and the Korean War.

Notable U.S. Army officers who led Buffalo Soldiers include Benjamin H. Grierson; Ranald S. Mackenzie; John J. Pershing; Henry O. Flipper, the first Black graduate of West Point; and Charles Young, the third Black graduate of West Point and the first African American promoted to the rank of colonel.

The oldest Buffalo Soldier, Mark Matthews, died on Sept. 6, 2005, at the age of 111. He is interred at Arlington National Cemetery.

Now, according to the release, the deactivation of 4-10 Cav “reflects the Army’s broader transformation of its force structure to meet the demands of future large-scale combat operations.”

As emerging capabilities, including unmanned systems and electronic warfare, enhance battlefield effectiveness, the Army is sunsetting the 4-10 to modernize its force structure.

“Today we honor 160 years of service, sacrifice, and excellence that began with the very first Buffalo Soldiers and continued through every Trooper that followed in their footsteps,” said Lt. Col. Shawn Scott, commander of 4th Squadron, 10th Cavalry Regiment.

“As the squadron colors are cased, we remember the courage, professionalism and selfless service of all those BLACK JACK Troopers who came before us.While this chapter comes to a close, the values and traditions of the Buffalo Soldiers will continue to live on in every Trooper who served in this extraordinary unit. READY AND FORWARD!” Scott concluded.

In its updated accounting method, the Defense Casualty Analysis System’s category labeled “Overseas Operations (OO) Casualty Summary” lists U.S. casualties suffered in the conflict since July 7 — effectively removing the totals from those associated with Operation Epic Fury.

The new page comes in the wake of criticism that the Pentagon had dropped the number of U.S. troops killed and wounded in the war with Iran.

On July 17 three U.S. service members were killed when an Iranian missile hit their sleeping barracks at Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in Jordan. The fourth death occurred two days later in a separate incident in Erbil, Iraq, during a controlled detonation of an attack drone.

The Pentagon initially updated its system to 18 killed before lowering that number to 14 once again.

On July 23, Sean Parnell, the chief Pentagon spokesman, refuted a New York Times article on the lowering of the KIA number, writing on X that “Our Pentagon Press Office gave the New York Times a courtesy off-the-record phone call explaining in detail that the site errors on the Defense Casualty Analysis System (DCAS) were due to a temporary data disruption. Our team explained we are working on it being resolved in coordination with the Military Services.”

Under the “overseas operations” system, the Pentagon reports that 207 U.S. service members have been wounded in action. It lists 417 wounded during Operation Epic Fury. Combined, the two categories account for 624 wounded service members. The total number listed as killed is 18.

The post-July 7 tally comes one day prior to the collapse of the tenuous June ceasefire agreement between the U.S. and Iran, resulting in U.S. Central Command delivering 13 continuous nightly strikes against the Middle East nation.

The collapse of the ceasefire, the Trump administration argued, restarted the 60-day clock that allows the president to use military force without congressional approval.

The new accounting system is in line with President Donald Trump’s assertion that the latest escalation between the U.S. and Iran is part of a new conflict with the Islamic Republic, not a continuation of the one that began in February.

On July 10, the president formally notified Congress that hostilities with Iran had resumed, a position that administration officials contend allows them to bypass the War Powers Resolution and restart the clock again on the war.

In April, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth controversially claimed that the ceasefire with Iran meant that Trump did not yet have to seek congressional consent to extend the war.

Hegseth argued that the pause in hostilities froze the ticking clock that would otherwise require the president either to get agreement from lawmakers or to end military operations after 60 days.

“We are in a ceasefire right now, which [in] our understanding means the 60-day clock pauses, or stops,” Hegseth told Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing.

“I do not believe the statute would support that,” Kaine said, adding that he has “serious constitutional concerns and we don’t want to layer those with additional statutory concerns.”

Congress has not technically declared war since World War II, and yet more than 100,000 service members have died in conflicts spanning the globe since 1945.

Admiral, who currently serves as the commander of III Corps and Fort Hood, Texas, could take over the top job from Gen. Christopher Donahue, who unexpectedly relinquished command earlier this month after only 18 months in the role. Since Donahue’s exit, Maj. Gen. Christopher Norrie has been serving as acting commander.

If confirmed, Admiral would also serve as commander of NATO’s Allied Land Command, coordinating with 104 countries in USAREUR-AF’s area of responsibility. He would remain a three-star, despite the role previously being a four-star position.

Prior to leading III Corps and Fort Hood, Admiral served as the commanding general for the 1st Cavalry Division out of Fort Hood, Texas, and in Poland, and director of force management in the Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff, G-3/5/7, according to his official Army bio.

Donahue’s early July departure came amid the Pentagon’s broad senior leadership changes under Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who in April asked U.S. Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George to step down and retire ahead of the typical four-year term.

Since taking office, Hegseth has removed more than a dozen senior military leaders, including former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. C.Q. Brown and former Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Lisa Franchetti.

Eve Sampson contributed to this report.

The Defense Department on Tuesday identified Sgt. Angel S. Rampersad, 28, of Ozone Park, New York, as the third soldier killed during an enemy attack at Muwaffaq Salti Air Base, Jordan.

In the wake of the assault, U.S. Central Command confirmed the deaths of U.S. Army Pvt. Isabella Gonzales, 19, of Carrollton, Texas, and 1st Lt. Tyler James Feehan, 25, from Ewa Beach, Hawaii, who died July 17 and July 18, respectively, according to a DoD release.

CENTCOM originally noted that a third U.S. service member was missing, however, the command announced on July 19 that, “After a thorough search, U.S. military personnel found unidentified remains at the location earlier today. An examination process to verify the remains is ongoing.”

The missing third service member appears to be Rampersad.

The Pentagon noted that the incident is under investigation, with the soldier status updated from “missing” to “believed to be deceased.”

According to the release, Rampersad enlisted in the Army in 2019 and was assigned to 1st Battalion, 57th Air Defense Artillery Regiment, 52nd Air Defense Artillery Brigade, 10th Army Air & Missile Defense Command, Ansbach, Germany.

“Today, we mourn the loss of Sgt. Angel Rampersad,” Brig. Gen. Glenn Henke, commanding general of the 10th Army Air and Missile Defense Command, said in a statement. “We extend our deepest, most heartfelt condolences to her family and all those who are navigating this unimaginable loss. The 10th Army Air and Missile Defense Command is grieving, and we will continue to support one another as we process this tragedy.”

Rampersad’s awards include the Army Commendation Medal, the Army Achievement Medal with two Oak Leaf Clusters, the Army Good Conduct Medal, the National Defense Service Medal and the Army Service Ribbon.

The latest casualties bring the toll of American troops killed in the war with Iran to 18. More than 400 U.S. troops have been wounded in the campaign, which began Feb. 28.

J.D. Simkins and Christina Stassis contributed to this report.

Born in Breslau, Germany (present day Wrocław, Poland), the Jewish-born Cohn and his family found refuge in the United States in 1938. Cohn was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1943, just one month after his 18th birthday.

Sworn in as an American citizen during basic training, Cohn was originally assigned to the 87th Infantry Division before receiving orders as an infantry replacement and was sent to England, France and then all the way to the front line in Belgium.

While stationed near Bastogne, despite trying to distance himself from his native tongue, Army officials learned German was Cohn’s first language. He was subsequently plucked from the infantry ranks and sent to Le Vesinet near Paris. Unlike the Ritchie Boys — U.S. Army recruits who possessed German, Italian and Japanese language skills and immigrants who had fled Europe and Asia for the U.S. — who received a minimum of eight weeks of training, Cohn was slated for a two-week course which was then cut down even further.

“I had one week of training, and I became a full-fledged intelligence agent, well-trained,” quipped Cohn.

“The first night was the scariest night of my life,” Cohn recalled in a conversation with the Friends of the National WWII Memorial. “Not because we were bombarded or anything. Or shot at. It was all the rumors that were coming in.”

Speaking to an audience during a Nov. 13, 2024, conversation with historian and author Alex Kershaw, Cohn recalled, “I was given a rifle and a flashlight and told to go to a small dirt access road and make sure to not let any Germans come in. So, I get in the middle of road, and I stand there and a vehicle comes and I halt, and the driver asks, ‘What the heck you doing there?’ I say, ‘I’m making sure you’re not a German.’ He said, ‘if I was a German, you’d be dead.’

“I thought that was a good point. I go into a ditch in the road. The next vehicle comes. They don’t hear me. They go right by. I’m not doing my job. Now, what am I supposed to do? I’m up. I’m down. I don’t know what to do. Thank goodness around midnight they called me back in.”

For Cohn, the Bulge would hardly be his last time in combat. He saw action during the Rhineland campaign and was among the U.S. soldiers who met the Soviets at the river Elbe in Magdeburg, Germany.

Post-war, Cohn joined the Army Reserve and commissioned as a second lieutenant, deploying to Korea and Vietnam before retiring as a colonel in 1978.

Cohn’s celebration of life will take place on July 15 at the Adas Israel Congregation in Washington, D.C.

The USS Constitution, named by George Washington and built with copper bolts forged by Paul Revere, was launched in 1797. The three-masted heavy frigate earned is famous nickname — “Old Ironsides” — during the War of 1812 after an astonished American sailor reportedly watched British cannonballs bounce harmlessly off the ship’s exceptionally thick oak hull and shouted, “Huzzah, her sides are made of iron!” according to the National Park Service.

While the wooden ship remains a symbol of durability and strength, its longevity would not be possible without a special 40 acres of land set aside for the care and maintenance of the ship from Naval Support Activity Crane.

According to National Geographic, NSA Crane dates back to the Franklin D. Roosevelt New Deal-era, when the U.S. government, in the depths of the Great Depression, purchased unfarmable land across the U.S. and reforested them for the purpose of creating jobs. NSA Crane was among the plots of land purchased by the FDR administration, and its 40,000 acres of hills was soon swarming with workers planting a wide variety of oak, hickory, poplar, maple and ash trees across the acres of Crane.

The onset of the war in 1939 prompted the U.S. Navy — whose weapons and munitions at the time were housed in Delaware — to seek a location that a potential enemy could not strike by sea.

Central Indiana was the ticket and so the government purchased another 30,000 acres surrounding NSA Crane.

The first administrative buildings on the base, according to Nat Geo, were dedicated in December 1941 — just a few days before the attack on Pearl Harbor.

But it wasn’t until the nation’s bicentennial in 1976 that NSA Crane reentered the Navy’s consciousness.

With attention returning to the storied, yet aging USS Constitution, NSA Crane’s concentration of high-quality white oak caught the Navy’s eye.

The oak forest is one of the few in the United States that contains centuries-old oak long and thick enough to provide the necessary lumber for the hull of the hulking Constitution.

Mature trees anywhere from 110 to 125 years old and 120 to 130 feet tall are needed for the ship that requires near constant maintenance. Its two most recent dry dock restorations — concluding in 2017 — required the felling of 114 white oaks.

Today, 40 acres of the park have been dedicated to keeping the warship afloat, where much of the timber is harvested, and it remains the only forest in the U.S. that is owned and managed by the Navy to support its fleet of old wooden ships.

According to the Memphis Police, as officers responded to a shots-fired call in the early hours of July 5 they observed an armed man carrying a handgun fleeing the scene. Tennessee National Guard soldiers on assignment as part of the Memphis Safe Task Force joined the foot pursuit.

Twenty-year-old Tyrin Johnson, a civilian, allegedly turned his weapon on the soldiers, prompting the guardsmen to open fire. Johnson was pronounced dead at the scene.

No officers or soldiers were injured in the incident. It is now being investigated by the TBI, which noted that the office “acts solely as fact-finders in its cases and does not determine whether the actions of an officer were justified in these types of matters. That decision rests with the District Attorney General requesting TBI’s involvement.”

Tennessee National Guardsmen have been deployed to Memphis since October 2025. Republican Gov. Bill Lee approved the deployment despite the fact that Democratic Mayor Paul Young never requested the Guard come to Memphis.

Young later said he wanted the task force to focus on targeting violent offenders rather than use their presence to scare, harass or intimidate the general public, according to Associated Press reporting.

Lee previously said troops would not make arrests and would not be armed unless requested by local law enforcement officials.

While overall crime numbers dipped in 2025 compared with the previous year, in 2023 the city set a record with more than 390 homicides.

The investigation is ongoing.

It had been several weeks since President Donald Trump had declared a “crime emergency” in the nation’s capital and deployed federal troops. On three separate occasions O’Hara had taken to playing “The Imperial March” as a Star Wars-inspired peaceful protest, recorded and uploaded to O’Hara’s social media accounts.

Passersby can be heard saying “May the force be with you” and several guardsmen smiled or laughed at O’Hara’s satirist opposition.

That is, until Sept. 11, 2025, when Sgt. Devon Beck, a guardsman from Ohio, took umbrage to O’Hara’s Darth Vader-esque comparison.

“Hey man, if you’re going to keep following us, we can contact Metro PD and they can come handle you if that’s what you want to do. Is that what you want to do?” the sergeant said, per the lawsuit.

While called up and activated on Title 32 status to participate in the Safe and Beautiful Task Force, troops deployed to D.C. can not make arrests but can briefly detain people until police are brought in.

Within 30 minutes of the interaction, O’Hara had been cuffed by the police. He was ultimately not charged and released but the incident set off a monthslong lawsuit between O’Hara, the district, several D.C. police officers and Beck, with the D.C. resident alleging that his First Amendment and Forth Amendment rights had been violated.

The ACLU announced on Friday that it had reached an undisclosed financial agreement with the D.C. government and four of its officers. Still pending, however, is the part of O’Hara’s lawsuit directed at Beck.

“On each of the three occasions, Mr. O’Hara did not touch Guard members or interfere in their operations,” the lawsuit reads. “Mr. O’Hara initiated his protests only when he saw Guard members engaged in operations consisting entirely of walking on patrol, as opposed to incidents where Guard members were actively involved in supporting law enforcement. And, on each occasion, Mr. O’Hara walked behind the Guard members for only a few minutes.”

Beck is being represented by lawyers at the D.C. U.S. attorney’s office who filed a motion to dismiss back in April.

O’Hara’s complaint, the attorneys wrote, sought to hold the National Guardsman liable “for simply requesting police assistance while performing a federal support mission as an on-duty guardsman.”

“When followed, distracted, and harassed by plaintiff,” they continued, he “did the very thing the mission contemplated: he called local law enforcement to conduct their own investigation and to address the matter as they saw fit.”

In its original submission, the ACLU-filed court documents dispute such claims, stating “The law might have tolerated government conduct of this sort a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. But in the here and now, the First Amendment bars government officials from shutting down peaceful protests, and the Fourth Amendment (along with the District’s prohibition on false arrest) bars groundless seizures.”

The military was controversially brought into the city last August to support law enforcement’s “efforts to restore law and order,” according to a memo signed by U.S. Army Secretary Dan Driscoll.

Despite the presence of more than 2,000 National Guard troops in Washington, D.C., since last August, it has had “no measurable effect on violent crime,” according to a recent Niskanen Center report.

“The National Guard was deployed primarily in high-visibility public spaces, exactly the locations where opportunistic property crime tends to occur and where visible deterrence is most likely to be effective,” the authors wrote. “A uniformed presence in tourist corridors and transit hubs is unlikely to interrupt a dispute between individuals with preexisting ties on their own turf. The Guard’s footprint was simply misaligned with the geography of violence.”

Robbery and other violent crimes in Washington, D.C., have also seen a downward trend that predates the deployment, the report reads, and the operation did not impact that trajectory.

National Guard troop levels have surged in recent weeks from slightly over 2,500 to 4,600 in anticipation of the Fourth of July and America 250 events in the ensuing days and weeks.

O’Hara, in an interview with the Washington Post, told the outlet that he has no plans to stop his protests.

So, amid the festivities, the low thrumming of “The Imperial March” from O’Hara’s phone just might be in the mix as well.

Tanya Noury contributed to this report.

According to U.S. Southern Command, the interim government of Venezuela formally requested U.S. support following the twin 7.2 and 7.5 magnitude earthquakes. American forces are providing “specialized mobility services and support to U.S. government personnel, search and rescue teams, and U.S. interagency partners as they assess damage, locate the injured, and deliver critical, life-saving assistance.”

On Wednesday, a 7.2 magnitude quake hit north-central Venezuela near Yumare. Just 39 seconds later, a larger 7.5 magnitude quake struck in nearly the same location, along the fault that marks the boundary between the Caribbean and South American plates. The earthquakes have left entire neighborhoods in ruins.

As of Friday morning, the death toll has risen to 589 and thousands more are injured, according to Acting President Delcy Rodríguez.

Rodríguez noted that she welcomed the arrival of rescue crews from all over the world, as the death toll is expected to continue to rise.

“We are going to rescue the people who are trapped,” she said during a state televised update. “We are working tirelessly on this task.”

In addition to the warships heading to the South American nation, C-17 Globemaster and C-130 Hercules transport aircraft as well as fixed and rotary wing aircraft are en route to assist search and rescue teams, according to U.S. SOUTHCOM.

Fort Lauderdale and Billings have been assigned to Operation Southern Spear as part of the Pentagon’s campaign to combat what it has labeled as narcoterrorist operations to push illicit drugs into the United States.

Late Thursday evening, Maj. Gen. Kevin J. Jarrard arrived on the ground in Caracas to coordinate SOUTHCOM’s response and direct humanitarian assistance to the affected areas.

Jarrard will serve as the senior U.S. Southern Command official in Venezuela, overseeing the aid and rescue efforts that have at times been reduced to shovels, hammers and basic tools to assist rescue efforts as the nation’s emergency resources became stretched thin.

In a press conference on Thursday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio stressed the importance of the next 48 hours and the critical aid the U.S. military can provide following the destabilizing earthquakes.

“The most immediate need, the one they need right now, is search and rescue,” said Rubio. “That’s the one they need immediately, because you’ve got to get people out of that rubble within 48 hours or they won’t survive. And so that’s the first thing we’re going to respond to.”