WASHINGTON - On July 4, 1776, the signers of the Declaration of Independenceboldly proclaimed the birth of a new nation. In the fight for independence, American soldiers, sailors and Marines fought in bloody battles and endured countless hardships to earn the blessings of liberty that became the birthrights of all Americans.

WASHINGTON - The man in charge of America's nuclear arsenal is satisfied with Russia's nuclear security program.

FORT CAMPBELL, Ky. - "Do I have to take this shot?" is the question service members most often ask about the new DoD anthrax mass-vaccination program. It comes up, too, during discussions of Gulf War illnesses. The first inoculations were given to American troops during the Gulf War.

WASHINGTON - Some mission-critical DoD systems will not be Year 2000 compliant by an internal department deadline of December 1998 or the Office of Management and Budget's March 1999 target.

WASHINGTON - Even with summer in full swing, it's a good time to prepare for the next school year. Many elementary school students will be moving on to junior high -- also known as middle or intermediate school -- levels in the fall. Some won't be ready, simply because they lack time management and organizational skills.

WASHINGTON - The Year 2000 problem is not something that just concerns "technogeeks." It affects every member of the Department of Defense, and so everyone must be aware of the problem and help solve it.

WASHINGTON - Jan. 1, 2000, is a deadline staring all of DoD in the face.

WASHINGTON - Thousands of pages of outdated information that compute mileage to pay for cargo and household-goods delivery and temporary duty travel are en route to the trash bin.

WASHINGTON - A continuing agreement between DoD and the National Cancer Institute allows TRICARE-eligible patients access to the latest cancer therapies at more than 2,000 sites around the country.

VIENNA, Austria - Time is running out for Serb President Slobodan Milosevic. It's time to stop the violence in Kosovo, Secretary General Javier Solana said here June 21.

FORT CAMPBELL, Ky. - From the director down, members of the DoD team investigating Gulf War illnesses are concerned that active duty veterans aren't seeking help for their sicknesses.

VIENNA, Austria - Lacking resources to confront allied forces on the battlefield, future foes are likely to resort to more devious means, John Hamre warned NATO allies and Partnership for Peace members here.

WASHINGTON - The awarding of DoD's first contract for re-engineered travel services kicks off DoD's effort to re-engineer its temporary duty travel practices.

WASHINGTON - Shrinking defense dollars. Aging warfighting equipment. Increasing maintenance costs. Miles of bureaucratic paperwork. These and a host of other problems are the propellers driving Defense Reform Initiative efforts, said William P. "Bill" Houley.

WASHINGTON - It's summer, a time when service members frequently pack up their family households and head for new assignments.

WASHINGTON - "I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death."

WASHINGTON - How did the 13 Colonies vote on the Declaration of Independence?

VIENNA, Austria - NATO's top commander in Europe says the 16-nation security alliance faces three challenges. The alliance must stabilize the Balkans, support Europe's evolving security structure and retain allied forces' warfighting skills.

VIENNA, Austria - Three years ago, Army Gen. Wesley K. Clark helped negotiate a settlement to the Balkan nightmare called Bosnia. Today, the former Rhodes scholar is experiencing deja vu.

WASHINGTON - Health care for family members and retirees isjust as important as field hospitals to deployed soldiers' ability toperform their mission, said a senior Joint Staff medical planner.

FORT DIX, N.J. - Symbols are important, especially when they come crashing down like they did during a ceremony here June 20. The red Reserve identity card literally went into the dustbin when seven service members -- representing each of DoD's reserve components -- exchanged their red cards for total force green ones.

WASHINGTON - Two hundred and twenty-two years ago a small band of colonists shook the world with the most powerful of assertions. They called themselves Americans and their Declaration of Independence boldly proclaimed that freedom is not a privilege but a right. Turning that rhetoric into reality required sacrifice on battlefields from Concord to Yorktown.

BRUSSELS, Belgium - NATO has the diplomatic, economic and military means to swiftly react "to any unfolding crisis and to suffocate it before it turns into a bushfire," said NATO Secretary General Javier Solana.Speaking at a Rome conference on crisis management and NATO reform June 15, Solana highlighted the alliance's expanded role in European security affairs. Earlier in the day, NATO forces demonstrated exactly that by sending a 120-mile-long aerial convoy of 80 fighter jets, helicopters, and support aircraft over Albania and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. The airpower exercise involving 14 nations was conducted to show NATO's concern over the growing crisis in Kosovo and to demonstrate the alliance's ability to swiftly deploy air power.

WASHINGTON - DoD civilian employees supporting peacekeeping operations in the former Yugoslavia are the first to qualify for the new Armed Forces Civilian Service Medal.

WASHINGTON - High in the rugged mountains of Honduras near its border with Nicaragua, members of the U.S. Army's special operations forces are putting national policy into practice.

FORT CAMPBELL, Ky. - Bernard Rostker has taken many a rabbit punch for his efforts to meet with sick Gulf War veterans.

BRUSSELS, Belgium - NATO stabilization forces detained a former prison camp commander June 15.

WASHINGTON - The Department of Defense Education Activity recently increased its high school graduation requirements and will apply them starting with the 1998-99 school year.

WASHINGTON - As the story goes, Civil War Gen. William Sherman became one of the first military commanders to encounter enemy land mines, as his Union troops advanced through Virginia during his Georgia campaign.

WASHINGTON - How many U.S-Canadian professional teams (NHL, NBA, NFL and MLB) have wild cats as team names?

WASHINGTON - Defense Contract Management Command Long Island received the 1998 Presidential Award for Quality, the federal government's top quality award, here June 17.

DALLAS - Army Brig. Gen. Barry D. Bates assumed command of the Army and Air Force Exchange Service here in May. He was vice commander from 1995 to 1996.

WASHINGTON - The Defense Department is taking a hard look at the civilian personnel system and hopes to usher in the year 2000 with new, more flexible rules that reward performance and improve productivity.

WASHINGTON - The Navy broke tradition June 5 by announcing that nine fifth-graders from Cranston, R.I., had won the national competition to name the Navy's newest oceanographic survey ship.

WASHINGTON - Nancy Carter thought she was entitled to some benefits after her Army husband died while on leave in 1968. But nobody seemed able to help her.

WASHINGTON - TRICARE, DoD's managed health care plan, now operates in every state and overseas location where service members and their families live.

BELLEAU, France - For military historians and battlefield buffs, the wheat fields and farm villages here are rich in the details of heroic attacks, untold sacrifices and ultimate victory. For others, especially the U.S. Marine Corps, this is hallowed ground, a sacred place of pilgrimage.

BELLEAU, France - Today's Marines are drawn to Belleau Wood as to a holy shrine. Lessons they learn in training are reinforced by the real-life deeds of their late brethren. The 250 Marines present walked the wheat fields and woods May 30 during a battlefield study tour dubbed Operation Devil Dogs.

WASHINGTON - "The successful man will profit from his mistakes and try again in a different way."

WASHINGTON - Where does the word "chevron" come from?

BRUSSELS, Belgium - Women in NATO's armed forces are united in a common quest for gender equality. They're working together to find ways to deal with issues affecting military women throughout the alliance.

WASHINGTON - Military strength decreased by 5,224 in the month ending April 30 and by 32,790 from April a year ago.

WASHINGTON - "In the great defining words of our democracy -- liberty, justice, equality and opportunity."

WASHINGTON - Defense scientists have "a good DNA sample" from the bones disinterred from the Tomb of the Unknowns, DoD spokesman Ken Bacon said June 11.

WASHINGTON - Eighty-four allied aircraft from 14 NATO nations conducted air exercises over Albania and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia June 15 to demonstrate NATO's ability to project power rapidly to the region.

WASHINGTON - What collegiate varsity program captured the first NCAA women's cross country championship in 1981?

WASHINGTON - Weekly rates at military child care centers will increase 2.8 percent between Aug. 1 and Oct. 1 as the services adopt a new DoD fee schedule.

WASHINGTON - The Defense Department has awarded a $3 million contract to Price Waterhouse to study the military exchange systems for possible consolidation.

WASHINGTON - A team of 19 DoD civilians received the prestigious Hammer Award at the Pentagon June 4 for their work in creating and implementing DoD's Welfare to Work Program.

WASHINGTON - Civilian DoD employees enrolled in the Civil Service Retirement System may transfer to the Federal Employees Retirement System during a six-month "open season" that begins July 1.

WASHINGTON - Electrical extension cords are simple and so reliable we rarely give them a second thought. That mistake can cost you your home.

WASHINGTON - The monthly premium for the TRICARE active duty family member dental plan will increase slightly Aug. 1.

WASHINGTON - Vietnam veterans Tom Holloway and Chris Shepard have never met. Yet, together, they created and now maintain a home page on the World Wide Web that helps people learn about Americans killed in action in Vietnam.

WASHINGTON - Military teens have a new hangout on the World Wide Web, thanks to DoD's Office of Family Policy.

WASHINGTON - Former Defense Secretary William Perry and retired Air Force Maj. Gen. Jeanne Holm received the first Sen. Margaret Chase Smith Leadership Awards June 11 at the Women's Memorial at Arlington (Va.) National Cemetery.

WASHINGTON - It's a bird. It's a plane. It's a new comic book starring Superman and Wonder Woman designed to teach children in Central America about land mines.

WASHINGTON - Fido could turn out to be a deminer's best friend.

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary William Cohen announced June 10 the military services should continue training as usual -- whether gender integrated or segregated.

WASHINGTON - "If courage is the first characteristic of the soldier, perseverance is the second."

WASHINGTON - It stands to reason DoD web sites would be included in "best of" lists: The Internet is a Defense Department creation.

WASHINGTON - A former Army airborne infantryman and Vietnam veteran is the new deputy assistant secretary of defense for prisoners of war/missing personnel affairs.

WASHINGTON - Service members most vulnerable to an anthrax attack will be the first inoculated against the biological weapon, the Army's top doctor said here recently.

WASHINGTON - Navy Secretary John H. Dalton announced June 8 his intention to leave office in December after more than five years as leader of the Navy Department.

WASHINGTON - With TRICARE now up and running worldwide, every eligible DoD health care beneficiary has to answer one question: Which care option is right for me?

FORT BELVOIR, Va. - When Defense Secretary William S. Cohen officially opened the Joint Electronic Program Commerce Office here June 5, he said the office is where miles of paperwork are going to stop.

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary William S. Cohen June 9 ordered the acting secretaries of the Army and Air Force to investigate a news report that the services used sarin nerve agent in Laos in 1970.

WASHINGTON - The Department of Defense joined the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the world's largest business federation, in signing a pledge June 8 for companies not to penalize employees who take time off for voluntary service in the reserve components.

WASHINGTON - In 1986, the book "Softwar" detailed how the Warsaw Pact countries would cripple the West by launching attacks against U.S. and NATO military and financial computer systems.

WASHINGTON - Name the nine U.S. stadiums originally selected to host soccer's World Cup 1994 games.

WASHINGTON - The "terrorist attack" on the Pentagon May 30 was just exercise Cloudy Office, but the threat is real, said Chief John Jester of the Defense Protective Service.

WASHINGTON - NATO will look at military options in Kosovo, but the U.S. and British governments prefer a diplomatic solution to the unrest.

WASHINGTON - The remains of a Marine Corps pilot shot down over Vietnam in 1967 have been identified and will be buried July 16 in Arlington (Va.) National Cemetery.

WASHINGTON - If you've decided to enroll in TRICARE Prime, DoD's managed health care option for service families, you may be wondering how to go about it.

WASHINGTON - Reservists and National Guardsmen representing the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Coast Guard will be the first to receive new green military identification cards at a June 20 ceremony at Fort Dix, N.J.

BRASILIA - Defense Secretary William Cohen wound up his five-day visit to South America May 27 in Brazil, where he praised leaders for their stance against nuclear weapons proliferation, terrorism and drug trafficking.

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary William S. Cohen told newly commissioned officers at the U.S. Military Academy the world has changed since they took the oath of enlistment in 1994, and they can expect change to be constant.

WASHINGTON - What planet has the greatest number of known satellites?

SPRINGFIELD, Va. - Twenty-one children of military and DoD civilian-employee families have been named winners in the Armed Services YMCA Young Readers 1998 essay contest.

BRUSSELS, Belgium - NATO's 44-member Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council established the Euro-Atlantic Disaster Response Coordination Center and a Euro-Atlantic Disaster Response Unit during meetings in Luxembourg May 29. The center will coordinate disaster relief efforts by NATO and Partnership for Peace nations.

LUXEMBOURG - Concerned over escalating violence in Kosovo, NATO ministers have asked military authorities to explore options, including sending up to 23,000 troops to monitor Kosovo's borders with Albania and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.

WASHINGTON - The Defense Department wants more firsthand accounts from Gulf War veterans to help investigators determine potential causes of Gulf War illnesses.

BRUSSELS, Belgium - Skeptics on both sides say the new relationship between NATO and Russia is a marriage that can't last, but the new U.S. Ambassador to NATO says they're wrong.

WASHINGTON - An Army National Guard recruit was buried with military honors May 26, five days after he was killed in a student's shooting rampage at Thurston High School in Springfield, Ore.

LUXEMBOURG - As the North Atlantic Treaty Organization heads toward its 50th anniversary summit, U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright called on alliance leaders May 28 to set the course for the future.

WASHINGTON - "Do not accustom yourself to consider debt only as an inconvenience, you will find it a calamity."

SAN ANTONIO, Texas - The patient awaiting surgery at the Air Force's Wilford Hall Medical Center had been shot through the head with an AK-47 assault rifle. The bullet had entered through his right ear and exited through his right eye socket, blowing the eyeball out.

WASHINGTON - Military exchanges want your business, and they're lowering prices to get it.

WASHINGTON - DoD officials hope India and Pakistan will step back and avoid an arms race, Pentagon spokesman Ken Bacon said during a May 28 news conference.

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary William Cohen re-enlists Air Force Staff Sgt. Lonnie Allen aboard an E-4B aircraft en route from Brasilia, Brazil, to Andrews Air Force Base, Md. Allen, a radar and secure voice operator, took the oath May 27.

INCIRLIK AIR BASE, Turkey - Northern Iraq's snow-capped peaks and fertile green plains seem tranquil, but everyone here knows the scenic countryside conceals real danger.

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina - Defense Secretary William Cohen said the United States will work with Argentina to help battle international terrorism.

WASHINGTON - DoD has selected 10 states to receive the first regional Rapid Assessment Element teams.

WASHINGTON - President Clinton announced his intent May 22 to nominate Louis Caldera as secretary of the Army.

WASHINGTON - Reservists who are still owed money under the Ready Reserve Mobilization Insurance Program will finally be paid in full.

SAN ANTONIO - Every week, land mines kill 500 people worldwide. And according to global statistics gathered by the Institute of Surgical Research here, 10 million land mines are still planted around the world waiting for more victims.

WASHINGTON - What is the name of the trophy awarded to the Stanley Cup Playoffs' Most Valuable Player?