Scammers have operated as Exchange Inc. to broker the sales of vehicles and vehicle parts, AAFES said in the announcement. It’s not a new scam, officials said, but it’s recently branched out to include the sale of boat engines.

Some ways to tell whether you’re dealing with an exchange impostor:

• AAFES isn’t allowed to sell vehicles in the continental U.S. If you’re buying a vehicle stateside, you’re not buying from the exchange.
• The scammers frequently request payment via untraceable, generally unrefundable methods, such as third-party gift cards like Google Play cards.
• The transaction comes via a classified ad or a resale website. AAFES only operates on installations and via the exchange web portal.

Shoppers should verify any suspicious payment requests by calling the AAFES customer service line at 800-527-2345, officials said. Those who believe they have been scammed can file a complaint through the Internet Crime Complaint Center at www.ic3.gov.

The “Guardians of America’s Freedom Medal,” created via legislation introduced by Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., is the first official Defense Department commendation for military working dogs, the New York Times reported.

Menendez announced the passage of the legislation on Tuesday at the U.S. War Dog memorial in Holmdel, New Jersey. The award, included in the latest defense authorization act, will be official when President Trump signs the NDAA, something he’s expected to do in the coming days.

The legislation will allow each service to establish its own criteria for the award, Menendez said, according to the New York Times. Each service also will design its own version of the award.

“These dogs endure multiple tours of duty. Some come back having lost limbs and others give their lives in service to their teams,” Menendez said, according to the New York Times. “Yet until now the U.S. military did not recognize the incredible service and sacrifice of working dogs and their handlers.”

The U.S. War Dog memorial, where Menendez made the announcement, features a bronze statue of a Vietnam War soldier kneeling next to his loyal canine companion. The memorial was built in 2006 next to the New Jersey Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

According to the New York Times, several hundred dogs are currently deployed to the Middle East.

Menendez, who cited the life-saving exploits of several working dogs and their handlers who attended Tuesday’s announcement, said there’s no reason why military dogs should be treated as just equipment or animals.

“If we as a nation can strap a Kevlar vest on Cairo and send him on a mission with SEAL Team 6, or we can deploy dogs like Kira or Khrusty or Rudy to dangerous regions around the world, then I think they deserve more than treats and a pat on the head,” he said.

The new measure is a significant change of pace from the way military dogs were considered at the time of the Vietnam War. According to the New York Times, dogs were often considered to be “equipment” and that many were euthanized or given away to the Vietnamese at the end of their service.

“Honoring [the dogs’] service — as well as their partner — I think is incredibly important. You know, we have lost a lot of dogs along the way who gave their lives … others have been maimed for life,” the senator said. “At the end of the day, I think it’s the least a grateful nation can do for them and for their handlers.”

The planned updates to the My Career Advancement Account online portal, including the move to a new website, were slated to run July 19-27. The site remains down after encountering what officials characterized as “unforeseen technical issues” in a Monday Facebook post.

The program is open to spouses of active-duty service members in paygrades E-1 to E-5, W-1 and W-2, and O-1 and O-2, including spouses of activated members of the Guard and Reserve (Title 10 orders) in those same paygrades. It allows spouses to pursue job-related licenses, credentials or academic degrees from MyCAA scholarship-approved accredited colleges, universities or technical schools.

Via social media and in a statement to Military.com, officials said they are working on a temporary plan that would allow eligible spouses to apply for and manage their MyCAA accounts over the phone. Updates on that plan, and on the website’s relaunch, will be posted at the Defense Department’s Spouse Education and Career Opportunities Facebook page, officials said.

A Defense Department spokeswoman told Military.com that spouses already registered with SECO via Military OneSource would receive updates via email, or via phone if requested.

The change was announced Thursday in a picture that outlined a three-step process, Stripes reported. The message was sent via a command messaging list to DoD personnel.

According to Stripes, the change was made in order to more closely follow Navy policies, and not in response to any specific alcohol-related incidents. While the Navy rules for drinking in foreign countries allow troops to follow local drinking laws, commanders can set the rules based on their discretion, Stripes reported.

In this case, the policy was changed after a recent review and research of Bahraini law determined that it does not establish a drinking age, Lt. Christina Gibson, a U.S. Naval Forces Central Command spokeswoman, told Stripes. As a result, the drinking age was set to be in accordance with the Navy’s policy.

The change will be made through a three-step process to ease the transition, Stripes reported. The first step, which went into effect Thursday, bans the off-base purchase of alcohol by anyone under 21.

The second step will go into effect on Aug. 1 and will ban the under-21 purchase of alcohol on base as well. However, the consumption of alcohol that was purchased prior to the ban on base will still be allowed.

On Sept. 1, a full ban on the consumption of alcohol by anyone under 21 will go into effect.

Although brief, the flight telegraphed the future use of the Osprey, a workhorse of Marine aviation, as it shuttles sailors, supplies and spare parts to ships at sea.

The crew belonged to the Navy’s Airborne Command and Control and Logistics Wing’s Medium Tilt Rotor Squadron Detachment 204, according to USNI News.

Commanders like the Osprey because it can take off and land vertically but flies faster than a helicopter. In 2007, the Marines began swapping out their aging fleet of Boeing Vertol CH-46 Sea Knights with the Ospreys.

The Air Force began fielding its Ospreys two years later.

In June, the Navy renegotiated a $4.2 billion contract with Bell Boeing to buy 39 Ospreys to replace 27 Grumman C-2A Greyhounds. Carriers have relied on the twin-engine planes for five decades.

The Navy’s Osprey program is expected to begin operating in 2021 and will be integrated into the aircraft fleet by the mid-2020s.

The arrival of the Ospreys from Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, California, marks “the beginning of VMM−363′s permenant stationing” in Hawaii, according to a press release. While at Kaneohe Bay, VMM−363 will serve under Marine Aircraft Group 24, 1st Marine Aircraft Wing.

“There have been multiple cases recently where the Osprey was, or could have been, very effective responding to a local crisis, and we look forward to increasing that capability with the new squadron,” Capt. Eric Abrams said to Marine Corps Times.

The Pacific Ocean presents a major obstacle to Marine forces, with its “tyranny of distance.” And as threats grow in the Pacific, the Corps is amid a focus shift. Marine Corps Times previously reported that the Corps wants to turn its Ospreys into air refueling tankers, in order to extend the range of other aircraft. And crossing the Pacific quickly will be key.

“Combined with 1st MAW refueling assets, MAG 24’s MV−22Bs are able to reach across the Pacific to respond to a crisis in a matter of days,” the Corps said this week in a press release.

Seven of the planes arrived in Hawaii on July 7, the first of a group of 12 Ospreys that will be transferred from Miramar, according to Stripes. The five remaining aircraft are expected to be transferred sometime later this month. The seven Ospreys arrived aboard the amphibious assault ship Bonhomme Richard. The new infusion of the aircraft will double the number of Ospreys at Kaneohe Bay.

The original 12 arrived with VMM−268 in Hawaii two years ago, and some are used on a rotational deployment to Darwin, Australia.

“VMM−363′s capabilities will significantly enhance the Marine Corps’ ability to perform humanitarian assistance and disaster response, respond to crises and fulfill other alliance roles in the Indo-Pacific region,” according to the news release.

Plasma plays an important role in the human body, and it has clotting properties that can stop bleeding, especially in life or death circumstances on the battlefield.

Freeze-dried plasma is easier to transport than the liquid form of plasma, especially in an environment like the battlefield. Plasma needs to be kept cold, so freeze-drying the solution avoids the need to keep it at an optimal temperature while in a medical kit in combat. The product has a shelf life of about two years.

The freeze-dried version of plasma is a powder that only needs to be mixed with sterile water before it can be injected into the patient. The resulting product prevents soldiers from needing to carry actual plasma in coolers or other temperature-regulating storage containers that can be cumbersome and bulky,

The FDA’s approval of the product for use comes nearly a year after House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry (R-Texas) tried to allow DoD to approve the product for emergency use in combat. according to The Hill.

The 2018 National Defense Authorization Act would have given DoD that power, but the necessary language was removed from the NDAA after the FDA and its congressional supporters fought back on the change. A new bill was passed that instead authorizes DoD to request the quickening of the FDA’s review of medical products.

The FDA and DoD began working together at the beginning of the year in an effort to fast-track the use of the potentially life saving product, according to the Washington Examiner.

As of January, the US was using the French product until Teleflex Inc. can produce the product for the armed services. France has had approval from their equivalent of the FDA for 24 years.

While the FDA approval of the military use of freeze-dried blood plasma is new, the use of it is not. In March 2017, Lt. Col. Rebecca Carter, then chief of Air Force Special Operation Command’s medical modernization, said that the U.S. used freeze-dried plasma in WWII, but stopped when the use of the product was linked to hepatitis outbreaks because of the unreliable methods of donor screening at the time.

According to Stripes, Tomko was sentenced at the Virginia Beach Circuit Court in Virginia. He had been charged with indecent liberties, aggravated sexual battery and child abuse and neglect involving three child relatives, which reportedly started in 2002. Tomko has been in custody in the Virginia Beach City Jail since he was arrested in November.

Prior to his arrest, Tomko was pastor of Parkview Church in Quincy, Illinois.

Before that, Tomko was the commander of the Wounded Warrior Regiment prior to being relieved of his post in February 2015.

In May 2016, Tomko was sentenced to 60 days confinement and a $10,000 fine after he pleaded guilty to having an inappropriate relationship with a corporal, where the two had exchanged various Facebook messages that contained clear sexual content.

At the time, Tomko also pleaded guilty to showing up drunk to an arraignment, using a subordinate to acquire testosterone and violating a military protective order and contacting his wife. He retired shortly after his time in the brig.

Maj. Geoff Shows, Tomko’s military attorney, had claimed that “Tomko needs help, not confinement” and that Tomko was “a Marine officer who is so broken that he can’t get out of his own way.”

While awaiting extradition in Illinois, Tomko will get credit for jail time, Stripes reported. Additionally half of his prison sentence, another 18 months, was suspended, and Tomko will not be allowed to contact the now-adult victims in the case or their parents.

The screenshot, which was posted on the popular website Reddit, showed a conversation on the Bumble dating app between a young man and woman.

In the photo, the woman, who used the name Kaitlin Robertson, appears to be actively recruiting the young man she matched with to join the Marine Corps.

Marine Corps Recruiting Command spokesman Gunnery Sgt. Justin Kronenberg quickly shot down the idea that the Marine Corps is using dating apps as a platform for recruitment.

“We don’t condone use of dating apps for business purposes and no, that Bumble post was not written by a recruiter,” Kronenberg wrote in an email to Stars and Stripes.

According to Kronenberg, the Marine Corps has searched its records and cannot find any trace of a Marine or Marine recruiter with the name Kaitlin Robertson, Stripes reported.

In the “green-on-blue” attack, Hockenberry was shot five times. Two bullets shattered her tibia, one hit her groin and the two remaining bullets hit her stomach.

The attack killed Army Maj. Gen. Harold Greene, the first American general officer to be killed by combat fire since Sept. 11, 2001. It also wounded 17 other coalition and Afghan forces.

Nearly four years later, now-Master Chief Petty Officer Hockenberry has returned to service and has taken up the post of personnel and administrative officer on board the USS Port Royal.

Although that is her official title, “the great thing about being on a ship is that you are anything and everything,” she said.

Hockenberry also recently won eight gold medals and set four records while competing in the 2018 Warrior Games in Colorado Springs, Colorado. She competed in rowing, powerlifting, cycling and swimming.

In four months, she will represent the U.S. at the Invictus Games in Sydney, Australia.

But Hockenberry’s recovery wasn’t easy.

In the attack, she lost almost seven inches of her tibia when it was shattered by bullets.

As part of her recovery process, she wore a Taylor Spatial Frame, a contraption that includes a metal rod that connected the two pieces of her tibia. The frame stretched the bone one millimeter a day to try and reconnect the broken tibia.

Had the treatment, known as “limb salvage,” not worked, doctors would have been forced to amputate.

Due to the severity of her wounds, a medical retirement looked imminent for Hockenberry.

But she refused to give up and continued to work to remain active duty, even doing work on a laptop while recovering at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland.

“I was severely injured to the point where a medical retirement made sense, but I can’t imagine not serving in the military,” Hockenberry said told reporters at the Pentagon during a recent media event. “It’s part of who we are, and my fellow brothers and sisters in the military, we all believe in what we do. And I could not imagine not standing with them.”

During her recovery, she was awarded a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart. She also got the chance to return to Afghanistan in 2016 as part of a program called Operation Proper Exit, which brings veterans wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan back to where they were hurt.

Seeing her old working area in Afghanistan was good her, Hockenberry said.

Now that she’s back on active duty, Hockenberry doesn’t plan on giving up that privilege anytime soon.

“It’s just what we do,” she said. “We serve as much as we can. I plan on serving for as long as I can be effective.”

Most importantly, Hockenberry wants to change how she believes the vast majority of people view veterans who were critically wounded in combat.

“One of the big messages I’m trying to bring across is that even though we’ve been injured and hurt, we can still give to the military,” she said. “Because we are people who are fighting to be there. It’s part of who we are.”