Pentagon

Iraqi forces have "liberated" 352 square kilometers of territory south of Mosul since a wide-ranging military operation began earlier this week to recapture the city from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), an Iraqi police commander said Oct. 19. 

U.S. Secretary of Defense Ash Carter is due to visit Turkey on Oct. 21, after Ankara and Washington agreed on Turkey's participation in coalition forces' aerial campaign in the Mosul offensive against the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL).  

Carter will travel to Ankara as part of a weeklong Middle East and Europe trip, according to the Pentagon.   

The United States has applauded Turkey and Ankara-backed Syrian rebels after they took control of Syria's symbolically important town of Dabiq from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). 

The U.S. military deployed to the east of Iraq's Mosul has started shelling Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) targets as part of an operation to retake the city, a Peshmerga commander said on Oct. 15, state-run Anadolu Agency has reported.

The U.S. military launched cruise missile strikes on Oct. 13 to knock out three coastal radar sites in areas of Yemen controlled by Iran-aligned Houthi forces, retaliating after failed missile attacks this week on a U.S. Navy destroyer, U.S. officials said. 

Washington has reiterated its support for Iraq's territorial sovereignty amid a spat between Turkey and Iraq before an operation on Mosul to liberate it from jihadists. "As we have repeatedly made clear, the United States supports Iraqi unity and sovereignty," the U.S. State Department said Oct. 11.

Hurricane Matthew, the fiercest Caribbean storm in almost a decade, hit Cuba and Haiti with winds of well over 100 miles-per-hour on Tuesday, pummelling towns, farmland and resorts and forcing hundreds of thousands of people to take cover.

The National Intelligence Agency (MİT), the Defense Ministry, the Turkish General Staff and other security commands will be moved to the Etimesgut district of Ankara, as a part of measures taken after the failed July 15 coup attempt, daily Habertürk reported on Oct. 4. 

BELGRADE - A controversial foreign PR firm known for representing unsavory characters was paid millions by the Pentagon to create fake terrorist videos, TheDailyBeast.com reports.

The Pentagon gave a controversial UK PR firm over half a billion dollars to run a top secret propaganda program in Iraq, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism can reveal.

U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said Sept. 29 that the U.S. will "sharpen our military edge" in Asia and the Pacific in order to remain a dominant power in a region feeling the effects of China's rising military might.

Carter made the pledge in a speech aboard the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson in port in San Diego.