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Ben Wolfgang

Ben Wolfgang

bwolfgang@washingtontimes.com

Ben Wolfgang is a national security correspondent at The Washington Times, a senior member of its Threat Status team, and the host and producer of the award-winning Threat Status Podcast. Ben covers national security, foreign policy, military affairs, the defense industry and the rapidly evolving landscape of military technology.
A Pennsylvania native, he joined The Washington Times in 2011 after serving as a political reporter at The Republican-Herald in Pottsville, Pa. Over the course of his career, Ben has covered the White House, Congress, and four presidential campaigns.
His reporting has earned recognition from some of journalism's most respected organizations, including the Virginia Press Association and the Society of Professional Journalists' Washington, D.C. Chapter, among other honors.
Ben has interviewed heads of state, chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, senior military commanders, cabinet secretaries, senior government officials, and the CEOs of many of the nation's largest and most influential defense companies.
Ben is a frequent guest on broadcast media, with appearances on C-SPAN, the Sirius XM POTUS channel, and other outlets.
He can be reached at bwolfgang@washingtontimes.com.

Articles by Ben Wolfgang

Defense Secretary Mark Esper, left, listens as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Army Gen. Mark Milley, right, speaks during a briefing at the Pentagon in Washington, Monday, March 2, 2020. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

Active-duty troops on ‘short alert status’ outside Washington, Pentagon says

Active-duty U.S. troops are on "short alert status" at bases outside the District of Columbia, Pentagon officials said Tuesday, but so far forces have not mobilized in any other region of the country following President Trump's threat to use the full weight of the American military to quell riots and violent protests.

June 2, 2020
People take part in a Black Lives Matter protest in Trafalgar Square in London Sunday, May 31, 2020, to protest against the recent killing of George Floyd by police officers in Minneapolis, USA, that has led to protests in many countries and across the US. A US police officer has been charged with the death of George Floyd. (Dominic Lipinski/PA via AP)

Britain, Germany hit U.S. over George Floyd riots

The Trump administration's struggles to get control of violent nationwide protests has sparked comment and criticism from even some of America's staunchest allies, potentially driving a wedge between the U.S. and its partners as demonstrations spread around the globe and the U.S. seems paralyzed by an onset of crises.

June 1, 2020
This Dec. 22, 2018, file photo shows a pump jack over an oil well along Interstate 25 near Dacono, Colo. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski, File)

Oil price crash alters priorities, greases skids to new world order

The sustained plunge in global oil prices has brought deep, unexpected shifts on the geopolitical landscape, with impacts felt in the Arctic and the Middle East, and in the fortunes of the American heartland and the future of the Russian-Chinese strategic alliance.

May 28, 2020
In this photo made from the footage taken from Russian Defense Ministry official web site on Sunday, March 11, 2018, a MiG-31 fighter jet of the Russian air force carrying the new Kinzhal hypersonic missile takes off from an air base in southern Russia. The Russian military says it has run a successful test of the Kinzhal missile, that President Vladimir Putin sited among several other new nuclear weapons that would bolster the nation's military capability. (AP Photo/ Russian Defense Ministry Press Service, File)

Russia deploys fighter jets to Libya, U.S. military says

Moscow recently sent fighter aircraft to Libya to reinforce their paramilitary forces battling against the U.S.-backed government in Tripoli, the Pentagon said Tuesday in the latest sign that Russia is doubling down on its involvement in the Libyan civil war.

May 26, 2020
The sun rises over Tripoli, Libya, Friday, Feb. 28, 2020. (AP Photo/Felipe Dana)

Tide of battle in Libya shifting against rebel Gen. Khalifa Haftar

Libyan government forces and their Turkish allies appear on the verge of an unexpected victory after the strategic retreat of Russian fighters over the weekend, and U.S. officials on Monday offered strong support for the government in Tripoli in its stand against Gen. Khalifa Haftar's Libyan National Army.

May 25, 2020
A visitor sits at a gravesite at Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery in San Antonio, Tuesday, April 7, 2020. National cemeteries are open and will continue to provide interments for veterans and eligible individuals, but due to the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak committal services and the rendering of military funeral honors have been discontinued until further notice. (AP Photo/Eric Gay) ** FILE **

Top lawmakers tell VA to remove German POW headstones with swastikas

Top House Democrats and Republicans demanded Monday that the Department of Veterans Affairs remove three headstones over German prisoner-of-war graves that bear swastika insignias and words praising Adolf Hitler, calling it "callous" to leave them in place.

May 25, 2020
A health care specialist from C Company, 407th Brigade Support Battalion, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division, and a combat medical technician from the British 16 Air Assault Brigade, load a British Paratrooper with simulated injuries onto a litter during Combined Joint Operational Access Exercise 15-01 on Fort Bragg, N.C., April 18, 2015. Throughout CJOAX 15-01, medical teams from both forces trained on how to seamlessly integrate their respective life saving capabilities into a multinational force. CJOAX 15-01 is the largest bilateral exercise held on Fort Bragg in almost 20 years. (Photo by Sgt. Flor Gonzalez, 22nd Mobile Public Affairs Detachment)

Veterans military expertise ignored in civilian job hunt

Millions of U.S. military veterans who have risked their lives while serving their country and often bear the scars of battle confront a frustrating web of red tape as they begin their journey back into civilian life and try to use the job skills they've perfected in war zones.

May 24, 2020
A visitor sits at a gravesite at Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery in San Antonio, Tuesday, April 7, 2020. National cemeteries are open and will continue to provide interments for veterans and eligible individuals, but due to the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak committal services and the rendering of military funeral honors have been discontinued until further notice. (AP Photo/Eric Gay) ** FILE **

Debbie Wasserman-Schultz seeks swastikas removed from U.S. veterans cemeteries

Controversial inscriptions in Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery in Texas and Fort Douglas Post Cemetery in Utah attracted relatively little attention until recently, when the Southern Poverty Law Center and other advocacy groups launched a public campaign pressuring the federal government to remove them.

May 19, 2020
Smokes rises from a maternity hospital, after gunmen attacked in Kabul, Afghanistan, Tuesday, May 12, 2020. Gunmen stormed the hospital in the western part of Kabul on Tuesday, setting off a shootout with the police and killing several people. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul)

Afghanistan maternity ward attack undermines Taliban peace plan

The Trump administration's hope for a lasting cease-fire in Afghanistan has dipped to a low point this week after a vicious attack on a Kabul maternity ward that shocked the world and led Afghan government officials to publicly declare that they have all but given up trying to make peace with the Taliban.

May 13, 2020