Artillery

Iran's state TV is reporting the country has produced laser-guided artillery shells, capable of hitting moving targets with high accuracy. The Monday report quoting Defense Minister Gen. Ahmad Vahidi also says that the shell was an "intelligent" munition with the capability to identify its own targets. The report was accompanied by footage showing an artillery piece firing a shell, followed by an explosion in the desert. The report does not give details on specifications of the shell.

Iran's state TV is reporting the country has produced laser-guided artillery shells, capable of hitting moving targets with high accuracy. The Monday report quoting Defense Minister Gen. Ahmad Vahidi also says that the shell was an "intelligent" munition with the capability to identify its own targets. The report was accompanied by footage showing an artillery piece firing a shell, followed by an explosion in the desert. The report does not give details on specifications of the shell.

The Battle of the Somme was World War I's most tragically futile military encounter. Hoping to destroy the German Army and thus end the war in 1916, the British and French armies launched their attacks, but neither side could legitimately claim victory. The five-month siege in France resulted in a total of some 1.2 million casualties. The Somme stalemate and its massive death toll would come to haunt the postwar generation. Oral historian Peter Hart offers an insightful and viscerally detailed account of the horrific battle in "The Somme" by interweaving his historical narrative with...

The Army has offered a northern New Jersey family over $7,300 to compensate for damages from wayward artillery shell shrapnel that crashed through their roof in 2008, causing the death of their cat. The 2-pound fragment traveled more than a mile from Picatinny Arsenal and punched a hole in the roof of Frederick Angle's Jefferson Township home. The hot piece of metal landed on the bed of Angle's then-10-year-old stepdaughter, who wasn't home. But the family's cat was on the bed and had to be euthanized.

BANGKOK — Thailand and Cambodia exchanged artillery and gunfire for several hours yesterday in a flare-up of a long-running border dispute, and their militaries said six soldiers were killed. The fighting near the ancient temples of Ta Krabey and Ta Moan forced thousands of civilians on both sides to flee. Cambodia said artillery fell on villages and other areas as far as 13 miles inside its territory. It was the first skirmish reported since four days of fighting in February, when eight soldiers and civilians were killed near the Preah Vihear temple, about 100 miles to the east of...

INCHON, South Korea — As they left behind gutted homes, scorched trees, and rubble-strewn streets, residents of the tiny South Korean island shelled by North Korea told harrowing tales yesterday of fiery destruction and narrow escapes. Ann Ahe-ja, one of hundreds of exhausted evacuees from Yeonpyeong Island arriving in the port of Inchon on a rescue ship, said Tuesday’s artillery barrage that killed four people — two of them civilians — had caught her by surprise. “Over my head, a pine tree was broken and burning,’’ Ann told AP Television...

The Army has offered a northern New Jersey family over $7,300 to compensate for damages from wayward artillery shell shrapnel that crashed through their roof in 2008, causing the death of their cat. The 2-pound fragment traveled more than a mile from Picatinny Arsenal and punched a hole in the roof of Frederick Angle's Jefferson Township home. The hot piece of metal landed on the bed of Angle's then-10-year-old stepdaughter, who wasn't home. But the family's cat was on the bed and had to be euthanized.

LONDON - A British World War II hero who fought valiantly in North Africa despite severe wounds has died 68 years after he was "posthumously" awarded the nation's highest combat honor by officials who thought he had been killed. Eric Wilson, the oldest living holder of the Victoria Cross, died at age 96, according to obituaries published yesterday in The Times and The Daily Telegraph. Jenny Hunt, a warden of St. Mary Magdelene church in Stowell, where Mr. Wilson lived, said he died Dec. 23. Mr. Wilson had been reported killed in North Africa in 1940, but was later...

With the Iraq war ending and an Afghanistan exit in sight, the Marine Corps is beginning a historic shift, returning to its roots as a seafaring force that will get smaller, lighter and, it hopes, less bogged down in land wars. This moment of change happens to coincide with a reorienting of American security priorities to the Asia-Pacific region, where China has been building military muscle during a decade of U.S. preoccupation in the greater Middle East. That suits the Marines, who see the Pacific as a home away from home.

The promos for Lifetime's "Army Wives" remind us, enthusiastically, that this new series has the ultimate chick-tube credential: It comes from a producer of "Grey's Anatomy. " Indeed, many "Grey's" elements turn up here: t he sassy but conflicted women, the sensitive men who say the right things most of the time, the soft-pop soundtrack featuring female vocalists. It's a tried-and-true formula, and, as with "Grey's," it generally works in ways that are both attractive and infuriating; it's strange how much we love getting our heartstrings tugged by predictable means, but nice...

KABUL — President Hamid Karzai accused Pakistan yesterday of firing 470 rockets into two eastern Afghan provinces over the past three weeks, a deadly rain of artillery that Afghan officials said killed 36 people, including 12 children. The attacks came in areas of Kunar and Nangarhar provinces, where NATO forces have withdrawn and where Pakistani Taliban moved in behind fleeing civilians, Afghan border officials said. Karzai indicated Pakistani government forces are responsible for the bombardment, and “they should be stopped immediately.’’ In response to the...

BANGKOK — Thailand and Cambodia exchanged artillery and gunfire for several hours yesterday in a flare-up of a long-running border dispute, and their militaries said six soldiers were killed. The fighting near the ancient temples of Ta Krabey and Ta Moan forced thousands of civilians on both sides to flee. Cambodia said artillery fell on villages and other areas as far as 13 miles inside its territory. It was the first skirmish reported since four days of fighting in February, when eight soldiers and civilians were killed near the Preah Vihear temple,...

INCHON, South Korea — As they left behind gutted homes, scorched trees, and rubble-strewn streets, residents of the tiny South Korean island shelled by North Korea told harrowing tales yesterday of fiery destruction and narrow escapes. Ann Ahe-ja, one of hundreds of exhausted evacuees from Yeonpyeong Island arriving in the port of Inchon on a rescue ship, said Tuesday’s artillery barrage that killed four people — two of them civilians — had caught her by surprise. “Over my head, a pine tree was broken and burning,’’ Ann told AP Television...

SEOUL — South Korea denounced the firing of artillery from North Korea as a grave violation of their cease-fire and warned yesterday that it would deal “sternly’’ with any further provocations. North Korea fired about 110 rounds from its western shores late Monday afternoon, just minutes after the South Korean military concluded five days of large-scale naval drills staged in response to the deadly sinking of a warship. Most of the shells landed in North Korean waters, but about 10 reached South Korean waters not far from an...

SEOUL — North Korea fired about 110 rounds of artillery yesterday near its disputed sea border with South Korea, the South’s military said, amid high tension over the deadly sinking of a South Korean warship blamed on North Korea. The fusillade erupted after South Korea ended five days of naval drills off the west coast that the North called a rehearsal for an invasion, vowing to retaliate. All the artillery shells landed harmlessly in the North’s waters and caused no damage to the South, a South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff officer said on condition of...

SEOUL - North and South Korea exchanged artillery fire along their disputed western sea border today, two days after the North designated no-sail zones in the area, the military and news reports said. North Korea fired several rounds of land-based artillery off its coast, an officer at the Joint Chiefs of Staff in Seoul said. The officer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of department policy, said no casualties or damage were reported. South Korea, in response, immediately fired warning shots from a marine base on an island near the sea...

SEOUL - North and South Korea exchanged artillery fire along their disputed western sea border today, two days after the North designated no-sail zones in the area, the military and news reports said. North Korea fired several rounds of land-based artillery off its coast, an officer at the Joint Chiefs of Staff in Seoul said. The officer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of department policy, said no casualties or damage were reported. South Korea, in response, immediately fired warning shots from a marine base on an island near the sea border, according to Seoul’s...

BAGHDAD - The heavily fortified Green Zone was hit by a sustained barrage of rocket or mortar fire early this morning, one day after a roadside bomb killed three American soldiers north of the capital, pushing the US death toll in the five-year conflict to nearly 4,000. Also yesterday, Iraqi authorities reported that a US air strike north of the capital killed six members of a US-backed Sunni group - straining relations with America's new allies in the fight against Al Qaeda. Two Iraqi civilians also died in the roadside bombing, which occurred as the Americans were...

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka - Artillery shells tore through a hospital packed with wounded civilians in Sri Lanka's war zone for a second day yesterday, killing at least 50 people, setting an ambulance ablaze, and forcing the medical staff to huddle in bunkers for safety, doctors said. Health workers at the makeshift medical facility said they were so overwhelmed by the crush of the wounded and the unrelenting shelling of the area they could do little but give gauze and bandages to the roughly 1,000 patients waiting for treatment.

The Battle of the Somme was World War I's most tragically futile military encounter. Hoping to destroy the German Army and thus end the war in 1916, the British and French armies launched their attacks, but neither side could legitimately claim victory. The five-month siege in France resulted in a total of some 1.2 million casualties. The Somme stalemate and its massive death toll would come to haunt the postwar generation. Oral historian Peter Hart offers an insightful and viscerally detailed account of the horrific battle in "The Somme" by interweaving his...