Iran will continue provoking us

The Iranians clearly see the JCPOA as a first step in their effort to recalibrate its relationship with the West, that is to force the United States to recede and enable it to dominate the region. With President Obama, Iran is pushing on an open door. He plainly wants to disengage from the region, to the chagrin […]

Russian Envoy to NATO Warns US over Baltic Sea Incident Involving Destroyer

Russia’s ambassador to NATO accused the U.S. Wednesday of trying to intimidate Moscow by sailing a Navy destroyer in the Baltic Sea, and vowed Russia would respond to future incidents with “all necessary measures.” Alexander Grushko spoke following a meeting of the NATO-Russia council in Brussels, the first in nearly two years. The meeting, which […]

Obama’s Former Middle East Adviser: We Should Have Bombed Assad

A couple of weeks ago, I was talking with Philip Gordon, who held the Middle East portfolio at the National Security Council from 2013 to 2015 (and before that, served as assistant secretary of state for European affairs) about my Atlantic article, “The Obama Doctrine.” The piece tried to explain how the president understands the […]

The Candidates Ignore Rising Military Dangers

In this powerful nation with founding principles and latent capacities second to none, politics have become fit for the fall of Rome, the culture is sick with self-destruction, and the rule of law is routinely perverted. Though politics, culture and law are the arch of the nation, the keystone without which they cannot hold is […]

Obama to visit CIA as US weighs next steps on Islamic State

President Barack Obama will pay a rare visit to CIA headquarters Wednesday as the United States weighs sending more forces to Iraq to fight the Islamic State group. In a meeting with top national security advisers, Obama planned to get an update on the U.S.-led campaign in Syria and Iraq as well as rocky diplomatic […]

ISIS magazine takes credit for Obama shift in hostage negotiations

ISIS claimed victory Wednesday for the Obama administration’s summer shift in allowing hostage negotiations with terrorists, posting an article in the radical Islamist group’s online magazine declaring, “it’s clear that violence is the only message they will respond to.” The article, in the new issue of the Islamic State’s “Dabiq” magazine released Wednesday, is attributed […]

Obama at the CIA: ‘Depraved’ ISIS now on the defensive

ISIS is on the defensive after a “bad few months,” President Barack Obama claimed Wednesday during a rare trip to CIA headquarters outside Washington.  He said the “depraved” nature of the organization, also known as ISIL, only brings the world together and strengthens opposition to the group. “Their barbarism only stiffens our unity and our […]

China expresses anger at G7 statement on East, South China Seas

China’s expressed anger on Tuesday after foreign ministers from the Group of Seven (G7) advanced economies said they strongly opposed provocation in the East and South China Seas, where China is locked in territorial disputes. “We urge the G7 member states to honor their commitment of not taking sides on issues involving territorial disputes,” China’s […]

The Assad Files: Possible evidence for war crimes

The investigator in Syria had made the drive perhaps a hundred times, always in the same battered truck, never with any cargo. It was forty miles to the border, through eleven rebel checkpoints, where the soldiers had come to think of him as a local, a lawyer whose wartime misfortunes included a commute on their […]

CIA Chief: I Would Refuse Trump’s Orders to Torture

Republican White House hopefuls are clashing with the government’s intelligence community over their support for using so-called enhanced interrogation practices against terror suspects. GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump on Monday slammed CIA Director John Brennan after Brennan said over the weekend that his agency will not use waterboarding or other harsh techniques, even if the […]

Iran to US: Missile program ‘not open to negotiation’

Iran’s foreign minister said Sunday the Islamic Republic’s ballistic missile program is “not open to negotiation” with the United States, seemingly spurning an overture from Secretary of State John Kerry. Kerry said Thursday during a visit to Bahrain that the U.S. and its regional allies were “prepared to work on a new arrangement to find […]