Global Politics

Delta Force with DEVGRU support removed Nicolás Maduro as the U.S. moves toward prosecution and a short stabilization plan, Iran threatened U.S. forces after Trump warned Tehran over killing protesters, and Russia claimed Huliaipole while Ukraine and independent mappers describe a heavily contested gray zone in Zaporizhzhia.

Caracas did not wake up so much as it got yanked out of bed by a fistful of explosions, and by sunrise Maduro and Flores were gone, hauled out on a Delta Force rumor trail that the White House has not bothered to pin down while the rest of the country stares into the smoke and waits to see what comes next.

Explosions hit Caracas amid claims of a major U.S. operation and possible SOF involvement, DPAA identified 231 missing Americans in FY25, the FBI seized a $40 million motorcycle hoard tied to a wanted trafficker, and Iraq says it no longer needs Coalition forces as Ain al-Asad is handed over.

Iran escalated its rhetoric to “total war,” Russian forces drew outrage by using horses in frontline assaults, the Department of War flagged hazardous operating zones north of Venezuela amid rising regional pressure, and a gunman attacked a sheriff’s office in Wallace, Idaho, wounding three before police killed him.

In Washington, confidence often looks like a man walking off a cliff with a plan in his hand, convinced that history will blink first when gravity shows up.

Russia battered Kyiv with a winter missile-and-drone strike as Canada announced new Ukraine aid ahead of Florida talks, Thailand and Cambodia moved to lock in a ceasefire, Israel’s recognition of Somaliland sparked a regional flare-up, and Yemen’s south shifted as the STC expanded while the Houthis held the north.

Between Myanmar’s bloodletting, the 2016 interference debacle, and Cambridge Analytica, Facebook stopped looking like a neutral town square and started looking like an accelerant that only reached for the fire extinguisher once the building was already burning.

America’s widening inequality and pay-to-play politics have left millions feeling trapped in a grinding rat race, and in that anger they handed power to a leader they suspected was corrupt, with consequences that will reward the New Nobility while everyone else gets squeezed.

In Washington, the NATO argument is no longer about deterrence or doctrine, it is about the bar tab, and the guy holding the bottle is starting to ask why he is the only one paying.

From an ambush that wounded three Rochester police officers, to the killing of UN peacekeepers overseas, to US forces seizing sanctioned oil tankers off Venezuela, a series of escalating incidents highlights growing risks for security forces operating in unstable and increasingly contested environments.

After a deadly ambush near Palmyra, US forces hit more than 70 ISIS targets across central Syria in a heavy retaliation strike meant to keep ISIS cells from regrouping. Russia is pounding Odesa while massing forces near Pokrovsk, and back home a Bellevue officer-involved shooting is under review by King County’s independent investigators as both the officer and suspect recover.

Federal regulators are moving to let massive AI data centers connect closer to power plants, a fast-track grid shift that could bring reliability. Norway is also stocking the shelves with consequences, funding F-16 munitions and air-defense weapons for Ukraine while tightening security rules on Jan Mayen as the Arctic heats up.