Washington in 5 minutes

INAUGURATION

Concert honors military children

Thousands of military families from across the mid-Atlantic region will be honored during a special concert for children on the eve of President-elect Barack Obama’s inauguration, organizers announced Wednesday.

Miley Cyrus and the Jonas Brothers are slated to perform at the Monday night event, along with Demi Lovato and Bow Wow. Usher, Billy Ray Cyrus and Keke Palmer also are scheduled to appear at the Verizon Center. The concert will be televised on the Disney Channel.

Michelle Obama and Jill Biden will host the event with their families. The audience will include active duty, reserve and Guard forces, as well as wounded warriors and families of fallen soldiers.

Tickets have been distributed to families through the Department of Defense and the Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Washington.

WHITE HOUSE

Judge orders e-mails preserved

The Bush administration has been hit with a last-minute court order to preserve electronic messages, the result of long problems with the White House’s e-mail system.

The preservation order comes amid fears by two private groups that the White House has failed to take the necessary steps to deal with millions of e-mails that apparently are missing.

The issue surfaced three years ago during the investigation into the leak of a CIA operative’s identity.

Wednesday’s order by U.S. District Judge Henry Kennedy directs the Executive Office of the President to issue a notice to employees to surrender any e-mails from March 2003 to October 2005.

TERRORISM

Top British diplomat blasts ’war on terror’

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband wants a rethink of the strategy against terrorism, calling the notion of a war on terrorism “misleading and mistaken.”

Mr. Miliband’s comments, days before President Bush hands the keys to the White House to Barack Obama, implicitly criticized Mr. Bush’s war against terrorism following the Sept. 11, 2001, al Qaeda terrorist attacks.

“Since 9/11, the notion of a ’war on terror’ has defined the terrain,” Mr. Miliband wrote in an opinion piece for Thursday’s editions of the left-leaning Guardian newspaper. “But ultimately, the notion is misleading and mistaken.”

“War on terror” implied that the correct response was primarily military, Britain’s top diplomat wrote, “but as General (David) Petraeus said to me and others in Iraq, the coalition there could not kill its way out of the problems of insurgency and civil strife.”

MILITARY

Spokesman: Obama will lift ban on gays

The incoming White House press secretary reiterated Wednesday in unusually blunt terms his boss’ vow to allow openly homosexual persons to serve in the U.S. military.

Robert Gibbs made the statement in a video during which he answered members of the public who sent him questions via YouTube.com.

“Thadeus of Lansing, Mich., asks, ’Is the new administration going to get rid of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy?’” Mr. Gibbs said. “Thadeus, you don’t hear a politician give a one-word answer much. But it’s ’Yes.’”

President-elect Barack Obama has long opposed the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, which President Bill Clinton established as a compromise after a public furor in the opening days of his administration led him to back off his campaign promise to repeal outright the military’s ban on gays.

The Washington Times reported in November that the Obama team did not expect to move against “don’t ask don’t tell” for months and, perhaps not until 2010.

From wire dispatches and staff reports