Stevenson’s army, May 25

On this Memorial Day I want to honor Captain Levi Ely, head of an 88-man company from Springfield, Massachusetts, who died in combat in upstate New York in October, 1780. Captain Ely was a direct ancestor of my father’s mother. One of his ancestors, Nathaniel Ely, came to America in 1620 on the Mayflower, not as a pilgrim but as a member of the crew.
– NYT shows that the coronavirus has — so far — hit Democratic-voting [“blue”] counties harder than GOP-voting [“red”] counties, largely because of population densities.
– NYT also reports on a failed mercenary operation in troubled Libya.
– An Army War College professor lists some great books for colonels to read and engage with.

My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).