After pummeling Iran for two weeks US President Donald Trump took to social media and called for Iran’s “unconditional surrender” late last week. While correct that the US and Israel are winning the war from a military damage point of view, Iran doesn’t show any signs of giving up and letting Trump march in as the dictator/victor. Then on Monday Trump claimed that “the war is nearly complete,” and “will end soon.” These two extreme comments highlight Trump’s habit of bluster and exaggerating every success. He did have to backtrack a bit this week, by saying he’s not finished yet in Iran. Not a few commentators think Trump is looking for an “out” because the US is running low on munitions and anti-missile interceptors.
There is only one purpose in demanding unconditional surrender. The conqueror wants to take over and run the defeated country. And Trump clearly harbors such egotistical notions, as he does with Venezuela and Cuba. He wants complete control but with puppet leaders that will let him control the defeated nation, including their rebuilding and economic output. Such a demand is an offense to other cultures, and is sure to prolong the war, as it did with both Germany and Japan in WWII. It also results in many more civilian deaths as Israel and the US turns to bombing more and more of the cities and infrastructure in order to force that unconditional surrender. To receive a free one-time sample of the Brief, along with options on how to subscribe, click on Request a sample on the left.
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“The FDA’s previous adverse event reporting systems were outdated and fragmented and made important data difficult to access. These clunky systems also wasted millions of taxpayer dollars and created blind spots in our postmarket surveillance of products ranging from drugs and vaccines to cosmetics,” Dr. Marty Makary, the FDA’s commissioner, said in a statement.
“We’re fixing the problem through a major modernization initiative
Sea mines are simple weapons that could give Iran outsize power to wreak havoc with the global economy.
U.S. officials said Wednesday that Iran had laid mines in the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway that carries 20% of the world’s oil exports from the Persian Gulf to the rest of the world. The U.S. Institute for the Study of War estimated that 10 mines had been laid...
The law will ban the sale, import, manufacture, purchase, and transfer of what it describes as “assault firearms,” and it will treat high-capacity magazines that can hold 15 rounds or more in the same way. It will make any violations of the law a “Class 1 misdemeanor,” which could mean up to a year in jail and a $2,500 for a first offense.
While SB 749 does not explicitly ban AR-15 rifles, since the popular long rifle falls under the bill’s definition of assault weapons, it will be effectively banned.
FBI Director Kash Patel says agents are at the scene of what appears to be a vehicle-ramming attack and an active shooter situation at Temple Israel Synagogue in West Bloomfield Township, Michigan.
The president’s comments came after reports first published by CBS News that Iranian small craft, capable of carrying two to three mines each, have been detected moving into the 100-mile waterway.
Saudi Arabia is set to buy a large order of Ukrainian air-defense equipment, as it and other Gulf countries face attacks from the same type of drones that Kyiv has been battling for years.
The Gulf state is negotiating to buy so-called interceptor drones and electronic warfare, according to two people familiar with the matter. The deal could be worth millions of dollars but has yet to be signed, they said.
Up until today, establishment poster boy Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) was a chief obstacle to killing the filibuster so that Republicans could pass the SAVE Act, which would require photo ID to be able to vote in US elections.
This morning, Bloomberg confirms that while mainstream Western shipping remains largely suspended through the Strait of Hormuz, recent 24-hour observations reveal a jump in Iran-linked traffic, specifically involving two sanctioned (read China-focused) VLCCs.
There were eight commercial transits on Tuesday and four more were identified early Wednesday, most of which have ties to Iran or have Chinese commercial links, according to vessel-tracking data compiled by Bloomberg.
CBS News sources confirmed that over the eleven-day course of Operation Epic Fury, the U.S. lost eleven General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper drones. At roughly $30 million apiece, the losses likely cost taxpayers more than $330 million.
We previously highlighted that Zelensky's biggest current worry is that the Iran war and ongoing major US operations there will starve Ukraine of critical arms, and especially long sought-after and expensive anti-air systems and munitions.
It's not just Ukraine expressing alarm, but now South Korea too, with President Lee Jae Myung on Tuesday loudly complaining about Washington's plans to redeploy Patriot air defense batteries from the Korean Peninsula to the Middle East in order to bolster regional defenses against Iran
The IEA’s decision comes a day after 32 member governments convened an extraordinary meeting to assess fallout from the Iranian conflict and its impact on global market conditions.
Each country will release its emergency stockpiles into the market over a timeframe, and some nations will take additional actions on top of these injections.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)—which has trained for decades in small-craft operations in these waters and has artillery hidden in reinforced bunkers looming above—were to opt to do so, especially with mines.
Only Iran’s self-interest as a Persian Gulf oil exporter has shielded the strait from the heaviest of drone and missile attacks since Operation Epic Fury began on Feb. 28, but that could change immediately if the United States and Israel were to destroy Tehran’s energy infrastructure, said maritime industry analyst and historian Salvatore Mercogliano.
A pair of cargo ships tied to a sanctioned Iranian state shipping line have quietly departed a Chinese chemical hub and are now sailing toward Iran carrying what analysts suspect is missile fuel precursor, according to fresh Washington Post analysis of ship-tracking data and satellite imagery.
Trump's mixed messaging as war could end 'soon' while saying Iran's military is crippled, but also warns Tehran would be hit "20 times harder" if it disrupts oil traffic through the Strait of Hormuz. Signs of Washington officials looking for an offramp. A mere few days ago Trump stressed the US would stop at nothing short of Iran's "unconditional surrender" - but that continues to look dubious.
A pair of cargo ships tied to a sanctioned Iranian state shipping line have quietly departed a Chinese chemical hub and are now sailing toward Iran carrying what analysts suspect is missile fuel precursor, according to fresh Washington Post analysis of ship-tracking data and satellite imagery.
Iran is reportedly using smaller crafts that can carry 2 to 3 mines each. While Iran’s mine stock isn’t publicly known, estimates over the years have ranged from roughly 2,000 to 6,000 naval mines of Iranian, Chinese and Russian-made variants.
That sent oil prices dramatically higher...
“I think the war is very complete, pretty much,” Trump told Weijia Jiang, CBS’s senior White House correspondent. “They have no navy, no communications, they’ve got no Air Force,” he said, according to Jiang.
Trump’s ultimatum could add renewed pressure on Senate Republicans to consider procedural workarounds.
Some Republicans have called for changing the filibuster rules to give the voter ID bill a path to passage
Weeks after New Mexico officials launched an investigation into Jeffrey Epstein's Zorro Ranch in New Mexico - which has since been purchased to turn into a Christian retreat, the FBI and local law enforcement descended on the 7,500 acre property in search of dark secrets, including the possible graves of trafficked girls who may have been strangled to death
Ten days into the U.S.-Israeli Operation Epic Fury against Iran, which has forced shut-ins at major Gulf oil and gas facilities, disrupted production at key oil fields, sent stockpiles soaring, sparked a global energy crisis (Brent crude hit $119/bbl highs overnight) and severely disrupted commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, the world's most critical energy chokepoint, new satellite imagery data from TankerTrackers, first cited by Bloomberg, suggests Tehran has recently moved substantial volumes of crude through the waterway.
Iran claims it hoarded enough enriched uranium for 11 nukes
As the U.S.-Israel coalition pounds Iranian targets in the ongoing Operation Epic Fury, Tehran is reporetedly desperately scrambling to recover its enriched uranium from bombed-out facilities. President Trump is now weighing a high-stakes commando raid to neutralize the threat, ensuring Iran never crosses the nuclear threshold that could endanger America and its allies.
Hungarian authorities have launched an investigation into potential money laundering, but Ukraine insists those facilitating the transfer were state-owned bank employees carrying out their job
As was rumored and widely expected, the son of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Mojtaba, will become Iran’s next supreme leader, Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency announced, taking over after his father was killed in an attack by the US and Israel.
Mojtaba Khamenei, 56, is the third person to lead the Islamic Republic and the first example of hereditary succession since the overthrow of the Pahlavi monarchy in the 1979 revolution. In other words, it appears that Iran overthrew a monarchy 47 years ago to institute a... monarchy.
Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) said he will not seek reelection in his southern California district, which had been redrawn to favor Democrats in last year’s redistricting.
An 80-year-old nonprofit that advises conscientious objectors says its phone is "ringing off the hook" as American service members who object to the US-and-Israel-initiated war on Iran are seeking guidance on how to avoid being a part of it. Ominously, the group's executive director says the breadth of force mobilization is much like the run-up to the ground invasion of Iraq.
From data centers in the Gulf area to water desalination plants, the worst-case scenario is now unfolding in the Middle East conflict, with no boundaries regarding civilian infrastructure...Most GCC countries rely heavily on desalination: 90% of Kuwait's drinking water, 86% in Oman, 70% in Saudi Arabia, and 42% in the UAE.
