Broadening the perspectives that surround military operations in Afghanistan, this project will chronicle the deployment of a battalion of U.S. Marines by using an online journal and the social web to report on America's longest war. The troops and their families have the potential to be interactive audiences for the journal -- challenging and augmenting coverage, and distributing content through their own social media channels. The approach will directly serve the stakeholders and inform the wider public by bringing in on-the-ground views on military issues and the execution of U.S. foreign policy. U.S. Marines were recently authorized to use social media on military networks, and this project will also examine the impact of that policy shift.