The US's top military officer has said a military solution to the North Korean missile threat would be "horrific" but allowing Pyongyang to develop the capability to launch a nuclear attack on the United States is "unimaginable".

America's top military officer has told his counterparts in South Korea that the United States is ready to use the "full range" of its military capabilities to defend itself and its allies from any North Korean provocation.

A Navy corpsman and 15 Marines were killed when a military plane crashed in rural Mississippi as it was headed from North Carolina to California, a Marine spokesman said.

A US military plane has crashed into a field in rural Mississippi, killing at least 16 people aboard and spreading debris for miles, officials said.

A homeless man in Florida has been given another chance at his life after a video of him playing piano on the street has gone viral.

The first of the victims of the Philadelphia railway crash has been laid to rest as investigators continue to probe why the train was travelling faster than 100mph.

Hundreds of Nepali troops yesterday searched for a missing US Marine helicopter with eight people on board, a day after a second powerful earthquake in less than three weeks killed more than 60 people.

A second powerful earthquake in less than three weeks spread panic in Nepal yesterday, bringing down buildings weakened by the first disaster and killing at least 66 people, including 17 in neighbouring India and one in Tibet.

Hey, it passes the time.

Christmas Eve court date for ‘Santa Claus’

Pupils cowered in fear and pleaded for their lives as a 12-year-old boy went on a rampage with a handgun in the US, waving the weapon at classmates and shooting dead a maths teacher.

US soldier Bradley Manning has been jailed for 35 years for giving hundreds of thousands of military and diplomatic secrets to the WikiLeaks website.

Environmentalists have expressed anger after it emerged that two US fighter jets dropped four unarmed bombs into Australia's Great Barrier Reef Marine Park when a training exercise went wrong.

Two American fighter jets dropped four unarmed bombs into Australia’s Great Barrier Reef Marine Park last week when a training exercise went wrong, the US Navy said, angering environmentalists.

Two US fighter jets dropped four unarmed bombs in Australia’s Great Barrier Reef Marine Park when a training exercise went wrong, it has emerged.

A soldier charged in the biggest leak of classified material in US history has offered guilty pleas to 10 of 22 charges against him.

A former US Marine who spent three months in Ireland on an outdoor adventure course faces charges of kidnap and murder.

The trial of the soldier charged with leaking thousands of classified documents to the WikiLeaks website has been postponed to June.

A US Marine staff sergeant who urinated on dead Taliban insurgents and posed for photographs with the bodies has pleaded guilty to two charges in a military court, the Marine Corps said.

Surviving abandonment in the south side of Chicago to beat the odds and forge a stellar military career, Tee Hanible helps other kids in trouble, reports Gail Sheehy

A US soldier charged with leaking classified material to WikiLeaks says he tied a bedsheet into a noose while considering suicide in detention as he awaited trial.

Demonstrators yesterday attacked the US embassies in Yemen and Egypt in protest at a film they consider blasphemous to Islam, and US warships headed towards Libya after the US ambassador there was killed in related violence this week.

“So, who’s stoked about being in Dublin?” The response said it all. “Wooo-hooo!”

You’d be forgiven for thinking you were in Dublin, Ohio; Dublin, Georgia; or Dublin, California — as long as you ignored the weather.

A US military investigation has determined that US troops burned up to 100 Qurans and other religious materials in Afghanistan during a February incident that led to deadly riots and strained relations between the two countries.

The US Navy is initiating dismissal proceedings against two Marines from a squad that killed 24 unarmed Iraqi civilians in 2005.

Seven US marines have been killed in a collision between two helicopters north of Yuma, Arizona, during night training.

The US Marine Corps once again did damage control after a photograph surfaced of a sniper team in Afghanistan posing in front of a flag with a logo resembling that of the Nazi SS - the special unit that murdered millions of Jews, gypsies and others.

THE US Marines have identified the unit whose forces are suspected of being behind a video appearing to show them urinating on the bodies of dead Taliban in Afghanistan, according to a Marine officer.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has condemned a video depicting what appears to be four US Marines urinating on the corpses of Taliban fighters.

The US Marine Corps said it is investigating a video depicting what appears to be four Marines urinating on the corpses of Taliban fighters.

President Barack Obama insisted today that the United States will maintain what he calls the best-equipped military in US history despite deep and looming defence budget cuts.

Nearly 80 American soldiers were wounded and two Afghan civilians were killed when a Taliban truck bomb struck an American base in eastern Afghanistan on the eve of the 10th anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks against the United States, Nato said today.

THE summer holidays bring memories of céilís at teen romances and Irish colleges in the Gaeltacht for thousands of adults.

THANKS to the power of the internet, a US marine’s YouTube request to go on a date with Mila Kunis got through to the actress, who said yes.

THE US Marine Corps last night honoured screen legend Maureen O’Hara for one of her great war-time movie roles, which it says helped boost recruitment during the Second World War.

SOUTH Korea’s President Lee Myung-Bak yesterday dismissed North Korea’s offers of dialogue as insincere and said the communist state must apologise for two deadly border incidents last year.

State Department spokesman PJ Crowley has resigned after causing a stir by describing the Army’s treatment of the suspected WikiLeaks leaker as “ridiculous” and “stupid.”

The lawyer for a jailed US Army private suspected of leaking classified documents to the WikiLeaks website says his client was stripped of all his clothing at night because he had made sarcastic comments about using underwear to commit suicide.

The lawyer for a jailed Army private suspected of leaking classified US documents to the WikiLeaks website says his client was stripped of all his clothing at night because he had made sarcastic comments about using underwear to commit suicide.

The man behind the posting of 400,000 leaked classified US military reports on the internet said that he wanted to reveal the truth behind the Iraq war.

A SENATE bill to repeal the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy was headed for defeat last night, a major setback for gay groups which saw the vote as their last chance this year to overturn the 17-year-old ban.

President Barack Obama’s choice to lead the US Marine Corps told the Senate today Congress should not repeal the law barring gays from serving openly in the military, dealing a blow to gay rights advocates just hours before a crucial vote.

US TROOPS en route to Iraq said they were overwhelmed by the welcome at Cork Airport after an unexpected weekend landing.