March 17, 2026 - Americans consider themselves to be compassionate people, and the United States military has a long tradition of humanitarian relief operations both within and outside the continental United States. Never has this humanitarian impulse proven more dangerous to follow than in 1992 when the United States intervened to arrest famine in the midst of an ongoing civil war in the East African country of Somalia.

March 17, 2026 - 27 years ago, on March 24, 1999, NATO launched an air campaign called “Operation Allied Force” to halt the humanitarian devastation that was then unfolding in Kosovo. The decision to intervene followed more than a year of fighting within the province and the failure of international efforts to resolve the conflict by diplomatic means.

NATO announced the suspension of the air campaign on June 10, 1999, once it had concluded a military technical agreement with the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

February 18, 2026 - On January 16, 1991, President George H. W. Bush announced the start of what would be called Operation Desert Storm—a military operation of coalition forces from 34 nations to expel occupying Iraqi forces from Kuwait, which Iraq had invaded and annexed months earlier. When the war ended on February 28, 1991, 148 Americans had died in battle.

Private Denzil Gladys Harvey Taft
United States Army, World War II
Women’s Army Air Corps - WAAC

PFC Robert Owen Yearwood
United States Army, World War I
Company C, 142ND Machine Gun Battalion, 39th Division