US seizes thousands of Iranian weapons, including grenade launchers, in Arabian Sea

US seizes thousands of Iranian weapons, including grenade launchers, in Arabian Sea

The crew of a U.S. Navy ship stopped a massive Iranian arms shipment dead in its tracks, seizing thousands of weapons, AK-47 rifles and rocket-propelled grenade launchers in the Arabian Sea, the Pentagon announced Monday. The seizure, which unfolded on March 28, was the third of its kind in recent weeks, military officials say. Iran has been […]

Iran deploys Army Special Forces to Syria and Iraq

Iran deploys Army Special Forces to Syria and Iraq

A senior commander in Iran’s Army told reporters on Mar. 23 that Special Forces would be deployed as “advisors” to Syria and Iraq. This would mark the first time that Army forces – in this case, commandos and snipers of the Rapid Response Battalions – will have operated outside Iranian borders since the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s. The Islamic Revolutionary […]

Qatar Places Order For Rafale, Thanks To Japan

Qatar Places Order For Rafale, Thanks To Japan

Editor’s Note: Where there’s a will, there’s a way. Here’s an indication of a partner nation who’s grown weary of being put on hold and has taken matters into its own hands to procure the hardware it needs to secure itself in a part of the world which grows more and more hostile as days […]

Iran said planning statue of captured American sailors for a tourist attraction

Iran said planning statue of captured American sailors for a tourist attraction

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard is planning to build a statue of the US sailors who were captured in Iranian waters earlier this year, a senior officer said. The provocative proposal is likely to cause outrage in the US and be seized on by Republicans opposed to President Barack Obama’s nuclear agreement with Iran. Commander Ali Fadavi, the head […]

Iran Reverse-Engineers, Arms Stolen Sentinel

Iran Reverse-Engineers, Arms Stolen Sentinel

Editor’s Note: On 4 December 2011, a Lockheed-Martin RQ-170 Sentinel drone was brought down over northeastern Iran, presumably by the cyberwarfare unit of the Iranian government. In the last four years, the government has been meticulously dissecting and reverse-engineering the craft and now, according to their state media outlets, they have “improved” and armed the […]

Ballistic missiles tested by Iranian military

Ballistic missiles tested by Iranian military

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard launched several ballistic missiles in recent days as part of a military exercise showing off the rogue nation’s power, the official IRNA news agency reported on Tuesday. The missiles launched today appeared to have a short range of 180-250 miles, not viewed as the same threat as the November launch of medium-range ballistic […]

Weapons seized by Australia may have come from Iran, intended for Houthis

Weapons seized by Australia may have come from Iran, intended for Houthis

An Australian naval ship has seized a large arms cache that may have come from Iran and headed to Yemen by way of Somalia. The Australian Navy said that one of its ships patrolling the region, the HMAS Darwin, intercepted a small, stateless fishing vessel about 170 nautical miles off the coast of Oman when […]

Fairy tale policies in Iraq: Thoughts by a former U.S. advisor

Fairy tale policies in Iraq: Thoughts by a former U.S. advisor

By Noah Smith Best Defense Council of the Former Enlisted I deployed to Iraq in 2012. On the way over, I was 27 years old and eager to fight. I headed into the international zone in the center of Baghdad. My mission to advise the Iraqi Special Operators to help them adjust to an environment […]

A deeper look at the U.S. Navy, Iran debacle

A deeper look at the U.S. Navy, Iran debacle

The 10 American sailors were on an unfamiliar assignment and running behind schedule. Setting off from Kuwait en route to Bahrain, the U.S. sailors had never navigated across the Persian Gulf in small patrol boats, and they were unaccustomed to traveling such a long distance in vessels designed for shorter missions in coastal waters or […]

NY man accused of shipping missile-grade metal to Iran via Turkey

NY man accused of shipping missile-grade metal to Iran via Turkey

The feds arrested the CEO of a metal services company in New York Tuesday on charges of exporting a high-tech missile-grade metallic powder to Iran secretly through Turkey. Erdal Kuyumcu, 44, helped conspire to obtain more than 1,000 pounds of the cobalt-nickel material used in missile production, nuclear activity and the aerospace industry, federal investigators claim. They […]

Joining Hezbollah: An Insider’s Account

Joining Hezbollah: An Insider’s Account

In late December 2015, Lebanese journalist Carol Malouf held an in-depth interview with two Hezbollah captives of Jabhat al-Nusra. The interview appears to be the first of its kind: Hezbollah members speaking candidly about the group’s organization and methods. Naturally, the fact that their remarks were made in captivity means their testimony must be taken with a […]