NEW: Weeks ago, I set out to answer the question, “What’s going on at Fort Hood?”
That question evolved again and again, and has resulted in what I hope gives another window into who Vanessa Guillén was, what happened to her & what it means for the Army. taskandpurpose.com/news/inside-th…
A little about Vanessa: She had a contagious smile, everyone loved her. She was planning to go to college, maybe Texas A&M, get married, and someday become a mom.
Her sister Lupe told me: “You know how they say no one’s perfect? Vanessa, she was...the definition of perfection."
Near the end of last year, though, her family could tell something was wrong.
She had bags under her eyes, her hair looked thin, she'd lost weight. She wasn't smiling anymore. Her mom kept pushing her to tell her what was wrong, and she eventually did.
She told her mom she was being sexually harassed, Lupe said.
“She told my mom, ‘I can’t report it, I’ve seen other girls pass through the same situation and they ignore them. They say that they’re lying. They don’t listen to them.’”
While her mom urged her to “rip up her [Army] contract in front of them and come back home," Lupe said, Vanessa assured her that she would take care of it herself.
Months later, on the weekend of April 19, it seemed like maybe she'd turned a corner. Lupe said that Vanessa seemed to be her normal happy self again when she left to go back to Fort Hood.
That was the last time she saw her sister. Three days later, Vanessa was gone.
The Army's investigation command has since been criticized for appearing to not move fast enough in their search.
They don't agree; a CID spokesman said they conducted over 300 interviews, tracked down 250 tips, and put in "over 14,600 investigative man-hours."
And Fort Hood's leadership has been criticized for failing to communicate.
Vanessa's family and her family's attorney have said repeatedly that they felt they weren't getting the full story, that leaders were "evasive."
A soldier currently at Fort Hood told me that while authorities searched for Vanessa, the “big push from command channels” was to make sure the “reward posters were…posted everywhere, so we looked good.”
“But besides that, honestly, it was like it wasn’t even happening.”
Since Vanessa's death, several investigations have been announced into Fort Hood, its leadership, the Army's sexual harassment prevention program, and more.
This story is far from over.
Vanessa's family only hopes that at the end of the day, they'll see change.
Lupe said that when Vanessa joined the Army, she told her family she wasn't afraid of going into combat because if she died there, "she died for a reason."
“The reason was ... to serve the country that gave my parents opportunities, that gave Vanessa opportunities," Lupe said.
But "she was murdered on base, and there hasn’t been change," Lupe said, adding that Vanessa's death "could have been prevented if the change" they're now seeking had only come earlier.
MORE: A defense official explains that the 102nd Intelligence Wing is responsible for pulling highly classified intel and packaging for combatant commanders — some of the most senior military officers around the globe.
Teixeira worked on the network where that intel lived...
Requiring him to have a TS/SCI clearance.
“It’s not like your regular IT guy where you call a help desk and they come fix your computer,” the official said. “They’re working on a very highly classified system, so they require that clearance.”
“This airman, even as a young man, his job was to work on this network that carried highly classified information,” the official said. “Because of this, the information carried on the network, people who work on it have to have that kind of clearance.”
Pentagon briefing with a senior defense official just started.
Updates:
- "Nearly 100%" of pre-positioned combat power committed in Ukraine
- 625+ missiles launched since start of invasion
- Air space remains contested
- ~500 US troops ordered to deploy to Europe over weekend
At this point, roughly 100,000 US troops are on rotational or permanent orders in Europe, official says.
Official says they believe reports that Russia is attempting to recruit Syrians to fight in Ukraine are true.
"We find that noteworthy that he believes he needs to rely on foreign fighters to supplement what is a very significant commitment of combat power as is."
Over the last several months I've been reporting out this profile of SMA Michael Grinston — speaking to him, senior leaders who knew him, & soldiers who deployed with him.
NEW: Inside the Army's top public affairs office & what some sources described as abusive treatment from its 1-star commander.
“I’ve been to fucking war, okay?” one officer said. “I have been through way worse ... but this woman constantly beat me down." taskandpurpose.com/news/army-amy-…
A memo I obtained confirmed that while 97% of people in the office reported a hostile environment, 100% of uniformed service members said it was hostile.
Every single soldier in OCPA reported it as a hostile work environment. That's...not very typical.
This week I spoke to Ryan Schalles, a Marine Corps vet who has been working tirelessly to get his former Afghan interpreter, his wife, and his two children, out of the country.
Omar worked with the Marine Corps from 2011-2012. Recommendation letters from Marines he served with call him “instrumental,” “exemplary,” and “extremely valuable.”
Here's one from a LTC (redacted for his safety):
A Marine Corps sergeant who worked with Omar said he was "staunchly and unambiguously advocating for [Omar] and his family’s immediate relocation to the United States — a country he has never even laid eyes on but has already fearlessly served."
In at least 3 recent documented instances, the Army has been reluctant to speak w/ media, allegedly withheld facts, or provided false information.
I talked to some current Army public affairs officers, who say it's indicative of a much larger problem: taskandpurpose.com/news/army-publ…
The most recent instance: The AP's report on Monday said the Army "sought to suppress information" and that officials "resisted releasing details" of missing or stolen weapons after the AP started asking 10 years ago. apnews.com/article/govern…
In January, the Washington Post reported that the Army "falsely denied for days" that Lt. Gen. Charles Flynn was involved in a meeting in the wake of the Jan. 6 Capitol riots. (His presence made sense given his job at the Pentagon.) washingtonpost.com/national-secur…