West Michigan's Morning News
US Military in Europe
It is Ryan C. Chris here. People always say it's good to unwind, but that's easier said than done. The exception, Champa Casino. They actually make it easier done than said, or at least the same. Champa Casino is an online social casino with hundreds of casino-style games like Slots and Blackjack. Play for fun, play for free, for your chance to redeem some serious prizes. Sign up now and collect your free welcome bonus at ChampaCasino.com. Sponsored by Champa Casino. No purchase necessary. VGW Group. Void we're prohibited by law. 18+ terms and conditions apply. Welcome to West Michigan's Morning News. That's Brett Bequita. Steve Kelly Schmidy's back with us soon. Force protection, Charlie. That's the level alert. US bases have raised the status on the live line with us this morning on West Michigan's Morning News. Jonathan Savage with Fox News Radio in London. Good morning, Jonathan. Good morning. So what is force protection, Charlie, and how come? Yeah, this is the second highest force protection condition that applies to US military bases across Europe. There are many of them with over 100,000 servicemen and women stationed there, and the level has been raised because of what we're told is a credible intelligence of an attack targeting bases in Europe over the next week or so, that from a DOD official speaking to Fox News. So they're on this heightened state of terror alert. Now we're told it's not a specific threat from a particular terror group, but there is this fear that American military facilities in Europe will be targeted. So we're told US European Command taking steps to increase vigilance for service personnel, their families and facilities out of an abundance of caution. Jonathan, I'm wondering, do they have any indication of what has triggered this if this has been in the works for a while? The reason I say that is because, you know, we look at things like the presidential debate last week and the turmoil that it created and just the uncertainty. Maybe I'm just wondering if there's anything related to that. I don't know if it is related to that. They're being very, very broad in what they're saying, but if you look back to the FBI Director Christopher Ray just last month in written testimony to the Senate, he was sounding the alarm on the increased terror threat stemming from the October 7th Hamas attack and the war in Gaza. He said, "We've seen the threat from foreign terrorists rise to a whole other level after October 7th." And of course, Europe being no stranger to terrorist attacks, we're used to this threat here. There's probably no surprise that US military bases are concerned. I'm just to give you a little point of reference 100 years ago when I was learning how to drive on a US Air Force base. We had no idea. The perimeter road around the landing strip, the runway was the best place to learn how to drive because there weren't a lot of cars out there and I went out there with my mom during one of such alerts not knowing that it was going on and was pulled over by an armored personnel carrier, which is a little disconcerting to see in your rear view mirror when you're 15 and a half years old learning a stick shift. So if you know anyone that's in the armed forces learning to drive today, let them know not to drive around the base. Excellent advice, I'm sure, will be broadly received. Can we ask a quick question about the king? The reason why we ask is that it's a different sort of relationship with the monarch and the press as it is here with any elected person. You may remember that the secretary of defense had a little problem, tried to take care of it without the press finding out they didn't. It was almost removed from office. So the king we full disclosure learned had some cancer was getting treatments. Anything new on that front? Very little new. They are very, very private about medical issues in the royal family and of course we don't elect or remove them as such over here. They don't necessarily have that same sort of level of public accountability but of course they are right to a certain amount of privacy like anybody else and they try to maintain that. They are trying to give us information they say when they can but aside from the king's with occasional public appearances including at the D.D. commemorations in France last month, all we're hearing is that he is continuing his treatment and recovering. All right, that is Jonathan Savage with Fox News Radio in London this morning. Thank you for your time today. Thank you. My mom had to drive home by the way. Yeah, I would guess. I was so rattled. That's a little different than a siren in your rear room here. Yeah, well there was but yeah but I'm just saying it's a tank basically. All of drab thing and you know mom got a little nervous too so I know why I'm such a cautious driver.