THE PENTAGON — Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told a number of reporters that he “absolutely” wasn’t leaving his post at the Pentagon “any time soon” as he made his way out to his car with a large cardboard box, sources confirmed today.

“I wouldn’t take these stories seriously at all,” Mattis said of recent news stories speculating on his imminent departure from the Trump administration. “This stuff is all cooked up by the media just looking for a good story,” the former general added, before opening up his car’s trunk, which was filled with papers, photos, plaques, and other mementos that he removed from his office.

“I’m just, uh, bringing these back home so I can swap them out with other photos and trinkets that I want instead,” Mattis sheepishly told reporters, when questioned about all the suits hanging in his back seat as well as the various ‘good luck in retirement!’ greeting cards found strewn across his passenger side.

Rumors have swirled that President Donald Trump has soured on Mattis in recent months, apparently due to a number of private clashes over defense policy. The speculation has reached a fever pitch in recent days, especially after the publication of Bob Woodward’s book on the Trump administration, which reported the defense secretary compared Trump’s understanding of national security to a “fifth or six grader.”

“I really love fiction, which is absolutely what that book is,” Mattis said of the book, titled ‘Fear.’ “I never said those things of the President. Woodward got it 100% wrong. I said Trump had the understanding of a third or fourth grader.”

At press time, Mattis again denied that he was leaving his post after being confronted with updates he made earlier this week to his LinkedIn profile.

Lieutenant Dan contributed reporting.

KABUL, Afghanistan — The Cleveland Browns relieved the 1st Security Force Assistance Brigade of its mission of training Afghan security forces under Operation Resolute Support, a spokesperson for U.S. Forces – Afghanistan announced today.

The Browns, who until Thursday had not won a football game since Dec. 24, 2016, arrived in Afghanistan on Saturday for a seven-month tour.

“These boys certainly know a thing or two about winning,” said Lt. Gen. Austin Miller, the senior U.S. commander in Afghanistan. “I can’t wait for them to show these Afghans how it’s done after 17 years [of not winning].”

The Browns take over a mission to train, advise, and assist Afghan military and police units, which will now fall under the purview of Cleveland Browns head coach Hue Jackson.

“Oh, thank God,” said Brig. Gen. Scott Jackson, the outgoing commander of 1st SFAB.

The effects of an all-volunteer, professional football-playing force were immediately felt, according to defense officials, with particular praise given to the Browns’ rejuvenated offense and downfield aerial attack with quarterback Baker Mayfield under center.

“He’s certainly better than Tyrod Taylor,” said Cpl. Steve Higgins, a native of Twinsburg, Ohio.

Still, Mayfield, selected first-overall in the 2018 NFL Draft, was later sacked for a complete loss after a Taliban sympathizer slipped past his offensive line on Sunday.

“It’s critical for us to protect the quarterback, and there’s really no excuse for what happened out there today,” said Jackson.

The Browns suffered additional casualties after a reconnaissance team was struck by an improvised explosive device. Two players have been placed into the NFL’s concussion protocol and will not be expected to patrol next week, while the other three have been placed on Injured Reserve for the remainder of their lives.

“We can always improve on special teams,” admitted Jackson.

Moreover, the Browns’ leading wideout, Jarvis Landry, has been suspended for violating the NFL’s substance abuse policy after indulging in a Hemland Steamer.

“What’s a Hemland Steamer, you ask?” said Jackson. “It’s basically where you pack a fat lip, snort a line of pre-workout, and then insert a Rip-It-soaked tampon in your rectal cavity.”

“I hear it’s very popular with the Marines,” he added.

Despite the initial challenges and hurdles the Browns have faced since taking over security and supporting a self-sufficient Afghan populace, leadership is cautiously optimistic.

“We’re very hopeful that we can get at least a first-round and a second-round draft pick out of our losses,” said Jimmy Haslam, the Browns owner. “Even if it means sacrificing everything.”

LONDON — Nearly 50 years after the release of his counterculture number one hit “War (What is it good for),” unearthed notes from singer Edwin Starr’s estate reveal that he actually believed war was “quite good” for boosting the economy and creating jobs, sources confirmed today.

Although the song, written by Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong in 1969, was one of the most popular anti-Vietnam War songs of the era, Starr admitted in his private notes that there were some technical inaccuracies in the lyrics.

“While there are certainly many aspects of war I don’t like, my initial assessment that it is good for ‘absolutely nothing’ was a bit misguided,” Starr, who died in 2003, wrote in his personal diary. “I now realize that, despite war’s shortcomings, it plays a vital role in the economics of our country.”

Starr’s diary went on to say that when he initially performed the song in 1970, statistical data about job creation in the defense industry was not yet available. Nowadays, he said, defense giants like Lockheed Martin and Raytheon provide stable, well-paying jobs to thousands of Americans across the country.

“I’m still totally against the whole ‘death and destruction’ part of war, but from a commercial point of view it kind of makes sense,” the diary went on. “I would never have had the success I had if it weren’t for war.”

His diary went on to reveal more verses to the song that expand upon the various fiscal benefits of war which did not make the final cut.

“It ain’t nothin’ but a heart breaker,” goes the second verse, “but it is quite effective at reducing the bottleneck in entry-level civilian employment, oh-oo-oh yeah.”

“Lord knows there’s got to be a better way, whoa-oo-whoa, ya’ll,” Starr sings at the end of the song. “But, for now, war seems to lead to technological innovation and a sense of national unity and community involvement unequalled during most other periods in our history, good Lord, yeah.”

Dirty contributed reporting.

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Not every soldier is as lucky as Pvt. Jesse Butler, who just signed his enlistment papers on his 17th birthday and will get the opportunity to fight in the same war that the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks inspired.

Although Butler came into the world on a terrible day in U.S. history, he’s thanking his lucky stars today that he has the privilege of avenging that attack just like thousands of others that came before and after him.

“I’m really thankful for people like Jesse who are stepping up to serve this country at a time of war,” said Sgt. 1st Class Elon Rodriguez, his recruiter. “And in his specific case, the war is the same one he’s known his whole life.”

Butler will soon ship off to Army basic training where he’ll get physically fit and learn all kinds of skills that will serve him well in Afghanistan, which the U.S. has been fighting in since before people knew what an Apple iPod was.

(Although the “classic” Apple iPod was discontinued in 2014, the obsolete War in Afghanistan continued its production run to the present day).

Sources say it’s possible that Butler may be sent to Kandahar, where his father once served, or to Bagram, where his older brother is currently deployed.

Butler has told reporters he can’t wait to pass on his knowledge of the country and how to fight the Taliban to his own sons.

WASHINGTON — The director of the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency announced today the agency would be ending its pro bono research and development relationship with Google and other Silicon Valley tech firms.

Founded in 1958, DARPA spent decades conducting cutting edge research for the most difficult problems faced by the military, while working on its lesser-known secondary mission of creating marketable technologies that could be adapted for civilian use, making billionaires out of smart and socially inept twenty-somethings.

“It was something that had to be done,” said Dr. Steven H. Walker, DARPA Director. “While we have enjoyed a long, fruitful relationship with Silicon Valley, we think it is time to make a change.”

“We enjoyed watching them turn ARPANET, the brilliant communication and data sharing system we invented, into the largest repository of cat videos and porn mankind has ever seen,” said Jonathan Winters, a program manager. “And, you can imagine the pride we all felt when the Global Positioning System we designed to guide warships and nuclear armed bombers during the Cold War was turned into an app that guides drunk college students to the nearest Quiznos. But these tech guys have gone too far.”

The policy change came after a number of DARPA scientists raised ethical concerns about large tech firms such as Google and Facebook. Many critics have argued that technology firms are mostly responsible for the rise of “fake news” conspiracy theories that have spread quickly on social media platforms.

“They control 90% of the web search market, so the internet is mostly whatever they say it is. We may build cutting edge death-dealing, murder-bots, but we aren’t reading your emails or convincing your uncle that the Illuminati rigged the local school board election.”

When reached for comment, Google CEO Larry Page denied the news would have a significant impact on the company’s business, but he declined to answer further questions as he stepped into a self-driving car whose technological advances were made possible by the 2004 DARPA Grand Challenge.

Still, a visibly-distraught Page immediately sent an encrypted email to the firm’s senior leadership using the Tor system developed by DARPA in 1997 to discuss their options, a company source said.

“Look, no one is happy about this,” said Walker. “But we just can’t do research and development for the military and the private sector. Google just needs to work on its own technological breakthroughs from now on.”

WASHINGTON — The Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Counternarcotics and Global Threats totally got on bloop and Bobby Brown when testifying about countering transnational organized crime before the House Committee on Armed Services last week, according to sources.

Thomas Alexander, who recently returned from California where he observed National Guardsmen performing counter-drug duties, floated into the District “hungry laughing” and with “potent vision,” according to a press release from the Pentagon’s Public Affairs Office.

Alexander is reportedly very concerned about the use of active-duty personnel and money in conducting counter-narcotics support activities, especially in the U.S. This comes during a review of Defense funding after 17 blazing years of constant war in the narcotics hotspots of the Middle East and South Asia.

Before testifying, Alexander allegedly started the day with a wake-and-bake at a bro’s house in Taneytown with some Jolly Green and Devil’s Lettuce, right before gnoshing an awesome breakfast of five bagels topped with powdered eggs, bacon, salsa, pancakes, melon, beetroot and whipped cream.

Then, while being driven very slowly to the Capitol by bouldered driver Army Spc. Jahmee I. Ree of the D.C. National Guard, Alexander stopped the car and bought a dro bud called 535 Funk from a kine at the intersection of 3rd and Constitution. 

Fearing a magic cancer call — also known as a urinalysis by dem stiff necks — Alexander then mixed up some black pepper, microwave popcorn and Doobie’s E-Liminate-It Magic Syrup, and passed it to himself on the left-hand side. That reportedly broke his personal security detail, who only had Greenout juice and No-Mo-Wreck pills to help walk back their gnarly fear of The Man.

A short time later, appearing before Congress at the unrighteous hour of 9 a.m. to describe Defense counterdrug requirements for the coming fiscal year, Alexander said he needed more “chess” and “sha-bang-a-bang-a” to get inside the minds of drug users. But he didn’t want any of that “snickle-fritz” from California.

When Congresswoman Jackie Speier of California’s 14th District objected, Alexander replied that “Reggie Miller” and an unidentified general he called “Sampson” never served in California. He also said that South Bay weed isn’t “loud” or “nay nay famous.”

Exhaling a massive power-cloud of Lanai Cabbage smoke, Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii’s like, only the second of two whole districts, breezily quizzed the Chief on the current posture of the National Guard’s counter-drug programs. Alexander, who was by then totally lit on widdle that enhanced the upper reaches of his holy state, said that Hawaii’s bogus decriminalization laws have had no influence on overall Guard readiness or his personal state of mellow with regard to “haters” and “the pigs.”

He also said for the record, he hates funding “these bogus DoD counter-drug task forces that are the children of Babylon.” He added that they are not what DoD’s main mission is about — defending the U.S. “They’re totally all in on supporting drug law enforcement,” he said. “No brethren and sistren can tolerate that since it harshes everyone’s mellow.”

At press time, Alexander was seen telling the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy to refer to him as haile nigušu t’īsi, the Ethiopian-language translation of “Mighty King Smoke.”

WASHINGTON — The Defense Department’s Public Affairs Office has unveiled a new aircraft to combat dumpster fires today, according to its own press release.

Dana White, the Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs, personally demonstrated the Canadair CL-215 “Scooper” by flying over a roll-off, open-topped Dixie dumpster in a Pentagon parking lot, and releasing one thousand gallons of water in a single pass that extinguished all potential public relations infernos at once.

The bin, which was filled to the brim with substantiated reports of financial misconduct, validated sex scandals, and a current Space Force investigation, was left a water-logged mess that no investigator or journalist would touch, according to sources.

“That was easy,” joked White while back on the ground, pushing an annoying red button that repeated, “That was easy.” She added, “No other part of the federal government has this kind of firefighting capability.”

A twin-engine, high-wing aircraft, the Scooper is designed to react at low speed and in dangerous dumpster environments, such as those found over wrecked Navy ships in the middle of the Pacific Ocean and on U.S. Space Force bases across the solar system.

Public Affairs reportedly acquired the aircraft from Turkey in a sweetheart deal that will send scores of F-35 fighter aircraft to America’s favorite NATO ally next week, so long as Turkey promises not to detain and execute all the U.S. Air Force officers currently stationed at Incirlik Air Base.

Sources say White will soon head to Syria and then back to Central Command headquarters in Tampa with the aircraft, before its diverted toward the website Task & Purpose, which recently reported a green-on-blue attack on a U.S. Marine in Syria.

“We are always ready to fight under our motto, facta es fictus,” White said, from behind the aircraft controls.

At press time, White was continuing to refuse pleas from the California Air National Guard to contribute the Scooper to help fight its wildfires. “Our information special forces don’t have time for that,” she said.