WASHINGTON: There’s no “feuding” or “chaos” in the Trump White House, National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster insisted yesterday. Anyone who pushed their personal agenda at the expense of the president’s is now either gone or neutralized by Chief of Staff John Kelly, McMaster added. Both men are military officers, as is Defense Secretary Jim Mattis. McMaster… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: President Trump was pretty excited when he announced that the central Chinese bank ordered the cessation of all financial business with North Korea. Dean Cheng, the Heritage Foundation’s expert on China and its military, is much less excited. Cheng’s much more skeptical that this latest Chinese move will make any long-term difference in the… Keep reading →

On July 10, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, pulling on the same black uniform and jacket that Iraq’s elite counterterrorism forces wore throughout the battle for Mosul, declared the final liberation of the city from Daesh’s (aka ISIL) control. “I announce from here the end and the failure and the collapse of the terrorist state… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: After a UN tribunal ruled stingingly against Chinese territorial claims in the South China Sea, Beijing reacted with its characteristically prickly mix of grandiosity and insecurity. The official Chinese perspective inverts Washington’s worldview so thoroughly it can be hard for Americans to understand: International rules are rigged, US military presence is destabilizing, China rightfully… Keep reading →

UPDATED with Chinese Ambassador, Sen. Sullivan, & CSIS conference WASHINGTON: “To a surrounded enemy, you must leave a way of escape,” Sun Tzu wrote 2,500 years ago. It’s a stratagem – often called the “golden bridge” – that the US and its allies would do well to remember tomorrow morning, when a UN tribunal will almost… Keep reading →

Islamists are regrouping in Mali, but France wants to draw its forces down to 1,000 troops, so who will fill the gap? The UN, which already has 5,500 soldiers on the ground? A fragile truce holds in the Central Africa Republic, where more than one million people have been displaced by gruesome fighting between Muslims… Keep reading →

UNITED NATIONS: Iran’s charm offensive this week at the UN was spectacular. Iran went from being hardline and cantankerous to open and cooperative. The rogue state personified by former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad became the good world citizen under new President Hassan Rouhani. The change in tone since Rouhani took office in August has been so… Keep reading →

UNITED NATIONS: The march towards a peaceful settlement in the Iranian nuclear crisis took an amazing step today when Iran agreed to a Thursday meeting that will bring together the foreign ministers of both the United States and Iran, the highest formal contacts between Iran and the United States since the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Any potential… Keep reading →

Will Iran’s new president defuse the confrontation with the United States over the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program? Hassan Rowhani, elected with a narrow 50.7 percent of the votes in Friday’s presidential election, inherits a dangerous stalemate. Iran is stonewalling on answering UN inspectors’ questions about possible military dimensions of its nuclear program, while talks with… Keep reading →

The International Telecommunications Union sent shock waves across the Internet with an agreement approved last night which would give countries a right to access international telecommunications services including Internet traffic. While the U.S., Canada, Australia, Norway, Denmark, and other countries refused to go along with the measure, the motion carried in a decision that caught… Keep reading →