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Soldier-perpetrated sex crimes are under-reported, but the Defense Department estimates about 19,000 assaults occurred last year. Veterans who are victims of sexual assault recently convened for the first-ever summit on military sexual violence.

Of the 1.6 million veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, nearly half are applying for disability benefits. New numbers show that 45 percent of vets are claiming service-related psychological and physical injuries. That's far more than ever before. So why now? Greg Jacob is a combat veteran and the policy director for Service Women's Action Network.

The Metropolitan Museum, the Guggenheim and the New Museum are among the roughly 40 museums in New York City that will offer free admission to active-duty military service members and their families — including those active in the Reserves and the National Guard — this summer. See a list of some of the participating Tri-State area museums.

Owen West, a third-generation U.S. Marine, tells the inside story of the American and Iraqi troops who fought the insurgency street by street and house by house in Khalidiya, Iraq. The Snake Eaters gives an account of the mission, one of the success stories of the war in Iraq.

Journalist and documentary-maker Ben Anderson discusses the war in Afghanistan, and his experience reporting on front lines in Helmand province. His book No Worse Enemy: The Inside Story of the Chaotic Struggle for Afghanistan is based on five years of unrivalled access to the US Marines and UK Forces, often for months at a time and amidst the worst violence the conflict has seen. It details the daily struggles facing U.S. troops in Afghanistan, and raises urgent questions about our strategies in there.

Recent vets are confronting life back home, as combat missions in Iraq have wrapped up. Some of them are choosing to use their war-time experiences to help other vets who're having a harder time making the transition back to civilian life.

The Intrepid Air and Sea Museum moves three aircraft off the flight deck to make room for the shuttle Enterprise.

The war in Afghanistan is now 11 years old, and it doesn’t seem to be getting any easier for America to achieve a graceful departure from the region. Yesterday the LA Times posted 18 photos online of soldiers posing with the body parts of Afghan insurgents, another entry to a long series of errors that may undermine American plans for full troop withdrawal by 2014. Daoud Sultanzoy is an Afghan Parliament member, Sean Easter is an Afghan War Veteran.

The Los Angeles Times has published graphic photos showing U.S. military personnel posing with the dead bodies of Afghan insurgents. The U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan wasted little time condemning the actions in the pictures, saying in a statement that "the incident depicted in the LA Times' photographs represents a serious error in judgment by several soldiers who have acted out of ignorance and unfamiliarity with U.S. Army values." Joining us is Peter Galbraith, former UN Deputy Special Representative for Afghanistan.

Rachel Maddow, host the Emmy Award–winning "Rachel Maddow Show" on MSNBC, talks about the rise of executive authority and the gradual outsourcing of war to private contractors, and argues that this distances the American people from the human and financial costs of war. In Drift: The Unmooring of American Military Power, she makes the case that the priorities of the national security state have been allowed to overpower our political discourse. She'll also talk about the upcoming election, politics, and her show.

Stanley Tucci’s blue hair, Elizabeth Banks’ pink eyelashes, and the brutal slaughter of young children could easily have distracted you from a quieter question at the center of dystopian future in The Hunger Games: who fights in wars and why do they volunteer to do it?

Schools are enrolling hundreds of thousands of recent veterans and servicemembers due to the drawdown in Iraq and Post 9/11 GI Bill. But the education benefit is not helping all of them make the transition from military life to getting a college degree. Learn more and watch video of veterans featured in this story here.

Pakistan was once the U.S.’s principal ally in the Afghanistan war. But tensions between the two countries have grown since the U.S. raid that killed Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad last May. Pakistan’s Parliament is currently debating the future of its relationship with the United States and President Obama is set to meet with Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani in Seoul tomorrow. How will the U.S. move forward on Pakistan and how will strained relations between the two countries affect our current efforts in Afghanistan? Joining us is Christine Fair, professor at the Center for Peace and Security Studies at Georgetown University.

When we talk about the Vietnam War, we often talk about the draft, protestors, a no-win situation, and veterans’ rights. But something we don’t always give attention to is this question: Who or what is a Vietnam vet? It’s a question that’s haunted thousands of Hmong-Americans, who were trained, armed and paid by the CIA to fight for the U.S. in Vietnam. These soldiers, who hail primarily from Laos, consider themselves vets. But the law prevents them from being buried in national or state veterans’ cemeteries.

In Afghanistan protesters have taken to the streets for a fourth consecutive day over the accidental burning of Korans at a U.S. air base. The Korans were taken from prisoners and thought to be subversive materials. The U.S. military command and President Obama have both apologized for the incident. Joining the show is Orla Guerin, correspondent for our partner the BBC.

People go to great lengths to fabricate military service. For every real Navy SEAL the FBI estimates there are hundreds of impostors. Xavier Alvarez, for example is an impostor. Alvarez, once a member of a California water-district board, lied at a public meeting about being a war hero specifically that he was awarded the Medal of Honor. But his lies did more than make him an outcast. They made him a criminal.  

Historian Robert Kagan holds the distinction of influencing both Mitt Romney and President Obama's political discourse. A foreign policy adviser to the Romney campaign, Kagan's ideas were also evident in President Obama’s state of the union address, which disputes the claim that America is in decline.  

The Pentagon announced new rules this week that would allow women to serve closer to the front lines and will be implemented later this summer. The changes would allow women to serve in non-infantry battalion jobs, such as radio operators, intelligence analysts, medics, radar operators and tank mechanics. This could open up 14,000 new jobs to female troops, largely in the army and marine corps.  

Consisting of one-third of all military aircrafts, drones have played a major role in U.S. military operations in Pakistan, Yemen, and Afghanistan. Relying on a remote pilot to carry out airstrikes, drones are cheaper to build and operate than other types of aircrafts. However a new experimental drone, the X-47-B, will be entirely computer-controlled, and therefore more akin to cruise missiles.

On Tuesday night, the Navy's SEAL Team Six rescued a Dutch and an American aid worker who had been held by Somali pirates since October. The pirates had held the aid workers hostage in a desert hide-out since October. SEAL Team Six first came into the general public's awareness last May after leading the mission to kill Osama Bin Laden. Along with an increasing reliance on unmanned drone strikes in combat zones, the future of the U.S. military might be a smaller, more covert venture.