Pacific Ocean (April 11, 2006) - Boatswain's Mate Seaman Charles Holmes mans the helm aboard the Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer USS John S. McCain (DDG 56) as the ship gets underway for a Friends and Family Day cruise. McCain is homeported at Commander, Fleet Activities Yokosuka, Japan. U.S. Navy photo by Photographer’s mate 2nd Class John L. Beeman

Sara's son was deployed to Iraq with the 82nd ABN last year and has since returned safely home. She knows how important support from home is, and how celebrating holidays can help break the monotony of a deployment.

For example, here's her son Dan (right) and buddy Jimmy celebrating Easter in Iraq last year with a "Peep Roast". For those of you not familiar with "Peeps", they are those little marshmallow bunnies, chicks, etc. available around Easter. Sara recommends this site for more Peeps fun.


Read the rest over at Soldiers' Angels Germany

PATROL — U.S. Army soldiers assigned to the 1st Brigade, 1st Armored Division, conduct a combat patrol in Tall Afar, Iraq, April 8, 2006. U.S. Air Force photo By Staff Sgt. Aaron Allmon

News of Note
Operation Iraqi Freedom
Iraq Police Ambush
Six dead, dozens missing
Spending Lags for Iraq Police Training
Qaeda member killed in Iraq: military
Bomb wounds 4 British soldiers in Iraq - Video

Homeland Security / War on Terror
Moussaoui: 'No Regret'
Knife-Wielding Attackers Kill1 Worshipper in Egypt
Grenades Kill 5 in Kashmir

Troops on Trial
Ninth Sailor Named in Illegal Marriage Scheme
Sailor who Escaped Brig Could be in the Region

Welcome Home!!
Photos: Security Squadron Airmen Return to Fargo

Other Military News
Three Colonels at Fort Bragg Nominated for General

Worldwide Wackos
Iran to clarify atomic plans: UN - Video
Rice says U.N. must adopt tough Iran resolution
Iran Rebuffs Request to Suspend Enrichment

Politics
Libby's Lawyers Say Prosecutors Withholding Info

Oddities
Man Kills Girlfriend With Microwave Over Sandwiches
Every 10-year-old kid knows that...
Police return $42,000 thrown out with trash
Fla. Island Residents Besieged by Iguanas

Other News of Note
Tornadoes Strike Iowa
350 Dead in Chad Assault
Paralyzed Girl, 5, Confronts Shooter

Fox News
6-Year-Old Girl Dies in Tennessee Bear Attack
Russia to Host Iran Talks
Officer: Alleged Duke Rape Victim 'Passed-Out Drunk'
Man: I Killed My Family
Stocks to Watch, April 17
NEW! Small Business Page
Bad News Barry
FULL SPORTS COVERAGE

Reuters: Top News
UN calls for calm in Chad
Berlusconi's power fades
San Francisco said unprepared for the 'Big One'
Greenpeace Arctic mission to spotlight polar bears
Sprint unveils mobile child locator service
Disney brand DVD players recalled
San Francisco marks quake centenary confused on scale
Closed borders squeeze Eritrea's coffee culture
Triple treatment cuts malaria in HIV patients
Study shows how painkillers raise heart risk
Asian shares higher
China frees up overseas investment by banks, funds
Fed officials hint rate hikes finally nearing end
Russia asks US court to stop YUKOS asset sale
Bausch & Lomb sued over contact lens solution
Sprint unveils mobile child locator service
Earnings fall at three major newspaper publishers
Samsung profit squeezed by phone, chip prices
TiVo says wins EchoStar patent suit
Strong profits may mute inflation angst
Alkermes rises after FDA approval
AMD shares fall, market fears Intel price cuts
Bulls working harder
On the Radar: Medical Action Industries
U.S. benchmark yield may see 5.5 pct.

AP World News
Taxpayers Get More Time to Procrastinate
A Tourism Mecca, Hawaii Braces for Flu
Cosby Urges Parents to Take Active Role
DHS Report Says Katrina Criticism Deserved
Bald Eagle Hatches on Santa Cruz Island

Military.com
Rumsfeld Criticism Mounts
Lawmaker Wants DD(X) 'Magnet Motor'
Moussaoui Mocks Testimony of Victims
Afghan Offensive Continues
Fighting Over TRICARE
Bin Laden Aide Reported Killed
Metal Shortages Hinder Army Aircraft in Iraq
Family, Friends Mourn Soldier Killed in Iraq Blast
U.S. Soldiers 'Unlawfully' Shot Reuters Cameraman

CENTCOM: News Releases
WEAPONS CACHE DISCOVERED IN MOSUL

INSURGENT KILLED; FOUR SUSPECTS CAPTURED

THREE SUSPECTS DETAINED, ONE MAN KILLED IN BAGHDAD

AFGHAN, COALITION FORCES DISRUPT INSURGENT CELL

IRAQI FORCES TAKE LEAD IN OPERATION COBRA STRIKE

US AND COALITION VESSELS CONDUCT MSO IN ARABIAN SEA

DUTCH NAVY SHIP ANSWERS DISTRESS CALL AT SEA

IED EMPLACERS CAPTURED NEAR BAYJI

BIN LADEN ASSOCIATE KILLED IN IRAQ

IRAQI ARMY SOLDIERS DISCOVER MUTIPLE WEAPON CACHES

COALITION FORCES CONDUCT RAID NORTHWEST OF BALAD

Department of Defense
Recent Raid Killed bin Laden Associate - Story
Coalition Forces Capture, Kill Terrorists
Official: Insurgents Still Target Baghdad Video
Early OIF Planner Sees 'Phenomenal' Progress - Story
Coalition Task Force Provides Gulf Security - Story

IRAQIS TAKE THE LEAD
City Leaders, Residents Gather, Voice Hopes - Story
Iraqi Soldier Patrols Hometown 'Mean Streets' - Story

REBUILDING IRAQ
Khalilzad: Youth Center Symbolizes Values - Story
Iraqi Police Receive Forensic Equipment - Story

ON THE GROUND
Renovated Hospital Delivers Improved Care - Story

IN IRAQ
Company C Aid Station Soldiers On Call 24/7
Iraqis Take Lead in Tactical Ops With Vehicles
Iraqi Soldiers Learn Humvee Maintenance
Forts Part of Iraqi Path to Self-Governance

IN AFGHANISTAN
Riggers Prepare Supplies for Afghans in Need
Afghan, Coalition Forces Train Together
Governor, Khost Residents Celebrate Project

FACE OF DEFENSE
Drill Instructor, Recruit Meet Again in Afghanistan - Story

AMERICA SUPPORTS YOU


Singer Chronicles Spouses' Lives- Story
PGA Honored for Troop Support - Story



TOP NEWS
IRAQ
U.S. Soldier, Marine Killed
Pace: 'Tough Fight' Continues
Rice Welcomes Ambassador to U.S.
Synthetic Clothes Off Limits
IEDs Kill Three U.S. Soldiers
Iraq on 'Cusp of Greatness'
Troops Find Weapons Caches
Fact Sheet: Progress and Work Ahead
Report: Strategy for Victory in Iraq
Iraq Daily Update
This Week in Iraq (PDF)
Multinational Force Iraq
State Dept. Weekly Iraq Report (PDF)
'Boots on the Ground' Audio Archive
Iraq Reconstruction
Maps

AFGHANISTAN
Coalition Launches 'Mountain Lion'
Troops Find Weapons Caches
Officials Revise School Attack Toll
Army Graduates Radio Operators
Afghanistan Update
Maps

WAR ON TERRORISM
Rice Urges U.N. Action
Rumsfeld, Bush Support Diplomacy
Fact Sheet: Budget Request
Fact Sheet: War on Terror
Fact Sheet: Terror Plots Disrupted
Waging and Winning the War on Terror
Terrorism Timeline
Terrorism Knowledge Base

MILITARY NEWS
No-Fly Zone Duty Prepared Pilots
DoD to Set Up Joint Intel Centers
Dental Specialists Train to Deploy
Nassau Group Transits Suez Canal
National Guard, Reserve Update

CASUALTIES
Defense Officials Identify Casualties - Story

Weather
Iraq
Al Azamiyah Al Basrah Al Hillah Al Karkh Al KazimiyahAn Nasiriyah Baghdad Baqubah Mosul Najaf Nineveh Tall Kayf

Afghanistan
Bost/Laskar Ghurian Herat Kabul Qandahar

Gitmo

Today in History
0193 - Lucius Septimus Severus crowned emperor of Rome
0754 - Pact of Quierzy between Pope Stephen II, [III] & Pippin the Korte
0979 - Challenge to throne of King Aethelred II of England
1028 - German emperor Conrad II the Sailor crowns his son Henry III, king
1191 - 85-year old Giacinto Bobo becomes Pope Coelestinus III
1471 - Battle of Barnet-King Edward IV vs Earl of Warwick
1536 - English King Henry VIII expropriates minor monasteries
1544 - Battle at Carignano French troops under Earl d'Enghien beat Swiss
1574 - Battle of Mookerhei-D'Avila beats Louis of Nassau
1611 - Word "telescope" is 1st used (Prince Federico Cesi)
1614 - Pocahontas, daughter of chief Powhatan, marries planter John Rolfe
1629 - England & France sign Peace of Susa
1671 - Cosaks capture Russian boer leader Stenka Razin
1756 - Governor Glen of South Carolina protests against 900 Acadia Indians
1775 - 1st abolitionist society in US organizes in Philadelphia, PA
1777 - New York adopts new constitution as an independent state
1792 - France declares war on Austria, starting French Revolutionary Wars
1799 - Napoleon called for establishing Jerusalem for Jews
1809 - Napoleon defeated Austria in the Battle of Abensberg, Bavaria
1814 - Napoleon abdicates & was banished to Elba
1818 - US Medical Corp forms
1828 - 18-gun sloop Acorn sinks off Halifax with 115 men aboard
1836 - Congress forms Territory of Wisconsin
1847 - Persia & Osmaanse sign 2nd Treaty of Erzurum
1853 - Harriet Tubman begins her Underground Railroad, helping slaves escape
1859 - Charles Dickens' "A Tale Of Two Cities" published
1860 - 1st Pony Express rider arrives in San Francisco, CA from St. Joseph, MO
1861 - Formal Union surrender of Fort Sumter; Robert E. Lee resigns from Union Army
1862 - Battle of Fort Pillow, TN
1863 - William Bullock patents continuous-roll printing press
1865 - Mobile, AL is captured; President Abraham Lincoln shot in Ford's Theatre by John Wilkes Booth
1868 - South Carolina voters approve constitution, 70,758 to 27,228
1871 - Canada sets denominations of currency as dollars, cents, & mills
1872 - Dominion Lands Act passed-Canada's Homestead Act
1900 - Veteran's Hospital at Fort Miley is established
1902 - Marie & Pierre Curie isolate the radioactive element radium
1903 - Dr. Harry Plotz discovers vaccine against typhoid (New York NY)
1906 - President Theodore Roosevelt denounces "muckrakers" in US press
1910 - President William Howard Taft begins tradition of throwing out ball on opening day
1912 - The Titanic, launched on 31 May 1911, on route from Southampton to New York with 2200 passengers, strikes iceberg off the coast of Halifax, Nova Scotia at approximately 11:30pm, and sinks early the next morning (1500+ death toll)
1913 - Belgium begins general strike for voting rights
1914 - Stacy G. Carkhuff patents non-skid tire pattern
1915 - Dutch merchant navy ship Katwijk sunk by Germany torpedo
1918 - Douglas Campbell is 1st US ace pilot (shooting down 5th German plane)
1920 - Tornadoes killed 219 people in Alabama & Mississippi
1921 - Prince Henry opens Rotterdam-Amsterdam-Bremen-Hamburg air route
1922 - Republic rebels occupies 4 government courts in Dublin
1923 - Etienne Oehmichen sets helicopter distance record of 358 meters
1931 - Spain becomes a republic with overthrow of King Alfonso XIII
1935 - Sandstorm ravages US midwest (Dust Bowl)
1939 - John Steinbeck novel "The Grapes of Wrath" published
1940 - Allied troops land in Norway; RCA demonstrates its new electron microscope in Philadelphia
1941 - 1st massive German raid in Paris France, 3,600 Jews rounded up; King Peter leaves Yugoslavia
1942 - Destroyer Roper sinks German U-85 of US east coast
1943 - Generals Alexander/Eisenhower/Anderson/Bradley discuss assault on Tunis
1944 - Freighter "Fort Stikine" explodes in Bombay India, killing 960+; 1st Jews transported from Athens arrive at Auschwitz; General Eisenhower becomes head commander of Allied air fleet; Greek Colonel Venizelos forms government
1945 - American B-29 incendiary raids on Tokyo & damage the Imperial Palace; Arnhem/Zwolle freed from Nazis; US forces conquer Motobu peninsula on Okinawa; US marines attack Yae Take on Okinawa
1948 - A flash of light is observed in the crater Plato on the Moon
1949 - International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg's last judgment
1953 - Viet-Minh offensive in Laos
1954 - Soviet diplomat Vladimir Petrov asks for political asylum in Canberra
1958 - Sputnik 2 (with dog Laika) burns up in atmosphere
1959 - (Robert) Taft Memorial Bell Tower dedicated in Washington DC
1960 - 1st underwater launching of Polaris missile
1961 - 1st live television broadcast from the Soviet Union; Cuban-American invasion army departs Nicaragua; US element 103 (Lawrencium) discovered
1962 - Demonstration for sovereign status of New-Guinea in Amsterdam; Georges Pompidou becomes President of France
1967 - General Gnassingbe Eyadema becomes President of Togo; In the Vietnam War, US planes bomb Haiphong for 1st time
1969 - 1st major league baseball game outside US played in Montréal, Québec, Canada; Student Afro-American Society seized at Columbia College; Tornado strikes Dacca, East Pakistan killing 540
1971 - Fort Point, San Francisco dedicated as a national historic site; President Richard Nixon ends blockade against People's Republic of China; Supreme Court upholds busing as means of achieving racial desegregation
1973 - Acting FBI director L. Patrick Gray resigns after admitting he destroyed evidence in the Watergate scandal
1977 - Supreme Court says people may refuse to display state motto on license
1978 - Korean Air Lines Boeing 707, fired on by Soviets, crashes in Russia
1980 - 1st Cubans of the Mariel boatlift sail to Florida
1981 - 1st Space Shuttle-Columbia 1-returns to Earth
1983 - President Ronald Reagan signs $165 billion Social Security rescue
1985 - Alan Garcia wins elections in Peru
1986 - US aircraft attack 5 terrorist locations in Libya
1986 - Double-decker ferry sinks in stormy weather in Bangladesh, killing 200
1987 - Turkey asks to join European market
1988 - USSR, US, Pakistan & Afghanistan sign Afghanistan treaty
1989 - 1,100,000,000th Chinese born; In the Iran-Contra trial, Oliver North's case goes to the jury
1992 - UN-imposed embargo against Libya takes effect; Court throws out Apple's lawsuit against Microsoft
1993 - Branch Davidian cult leader David Koresh promises to surrender after completion of his Seven Seals manuscript
1994 - US F-15 accidentally shoots 2 US helicopters down over Iraq, 26 die

Birthdays
1578 - Philip III, King of Spain & Portugal (1598-1621)
1629 - Christiaan Huygens, astronomer (discovered Saturn's rings)
1721 - William August [Duke of Cumberland], English army leader
1738 - Duck of Portland, British PM (1783, 1807-09)
1770 - George Canning, British PM (1827)
1797 - Adolphe Thiers 1st President of 3rd French Republic (1871-77)
1809 - George W. Vreede, Dutch lawyer/politician
1820 - Harry Thompson Hays, Confederate Brigadier General
1831 - Gerhard Rohlfs, German explorer/ambassador in Abyssinia
1832 - James Hewett Ledlie, Union Brigadier General
1862 - Pyotr A. Stolypin, premier Russia (1906-11)
1866 - Anne Mansfield Sullivan, educated Helen Keller
1874 - Count Alexander of Athlone, Governor-General (South-Africa/Canada)
1902 - Menachem A Schneerson, head of Lubavitcher Jews
1906 - Faisal ibn Abd al-Aziz, King Saudi-Arabia (1964-75)
1907 - François "Doc" Duvalier, dictator of Haiti; Otto F. A. H. van Nispen, Dutch mayor (Pannerden)/MP (KVP)
1925 - Abel Muzorewa, bishop/premier (Rhodesia)
1928 - Robert Mugabe, President (Zimbabwe)
1929 - William Edgar Thornton, MD/astronaut (STS-8, 51-B, sk:49)
1930 - George W. Gekas (Representative-PA)
1941 - Anatoli Pavlocich Fyodorov, cosmonaut
1943 - Yvonne Vriens-Auerbach, Dutch MP (CDA)
1948 - Chester G. Atkins (Representative-MA)
1953 - Irina Rudolfovna Pronina, Russian cosmonaut
1958 - Albert Alexandre Louis Pierre, Prince of Monaco

Passings
0711 - Childebert III, King of French, dies at about 27
0911 - Sergius III, Italian Pope (904-11)
1240 - Llywelyn ap Iorwerth, Prince of Wales, dies
1471 - Richard Neville Warwick, 2nd Earl of Salisbury, dies at 42
1574 - Christoffel Palts, German General strategist, dies in battle; Hendrik, Count of Nassau-Dillenburg, dies in battle; Louis, Earl of Nassau-Dillenburg, dies in battle at 35
1692 - Carlos de Gurrea, Spanish viceroy (Spanish Netherlands)
1924 - Roland Napoleon Bonaparte, French officer/explorer (Surinam), dies at 65
1925 - Pieter D. van Essen, Dutch artillery officer, dies at 54
1948 - Walter P. Reuther, President (United Auto Workers), shot at his home
1949 - Joseph A. Cushman, US paleontologist, dies at 68
1965 - Perry E. Smith and Robert E. Hickok, US murderers (In Cold Blood), hanged
1985 - Enver Hoxha, Albanian leader (1944-85)
1993 - Sam Ntombani, ANC-Secretary in Soweto South-Africa, shot to death
1994 - Selometsi Baholo, vice-premier of Lesotho, murdered
1996 - Benjamin "Zik" Azikiwe, Nnamdi politician, dies at 91

Reported Missing in Action
1968
Quamo, George, US Army (NY); U17 crashed - remains recovered June, 1974

Rodriguez, Ferdinand A., US Army (NY); released by PRG February, 1973 - deceased

1972
Greenleaf, Joseph G., USN (MA); F4E shot down (w/McKinney)

McKinney, Clemie, USN (OH); F4E shot down (w/Greenleaf) - remains returned August, 1985 - ID'd February, 1988