Secretary of State Rex Tillerson held private talks with head of the United Nations atomic watchdog agency Thursday in the first direct meeting between the outfit monitoring the Iranian nuclear accord and a senior official from the Trump administration, which has been sharply critical of the 2015 deal. – Washington Times
Iran is developing a submarine that could launch an anti-ship cruise missile designed to quickly sink an American warship operating in the Strait of Hormuz, according to a new assessment of Iranian naval capabilities published Wednesday by the U.S. Office of Naval Intelligence. – USNI News
Yousef al Otaiba writes: With Washington now alert to the growing threat, we are making plans too. Among them is a renewed security partnership with the U.S., which would provide the basis for a collective and firm response to the Islamic Republic’s provocations. It is an urgent and necessary effort to defend our shared interests and make us all safer and more secure. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
Jonathan Ruhe and Blake Fleisher write: The new administration is making clear its intent to stop tolerating Iranian aggression. Translating this into action means the United States can no longer turn a blind eye to Iran’s nuclear cruise missile program. – Breaking Defense
Iran is developing a submarine that could launch an anti-ship cruise missile designed to quickly sink an American warship operating in the Strait of Hormuz, according to a new assessment of Iranian naval capabilities published Wednesday by the U.S. Office of Naval Intelligence. – USNI News
Yousef al Otaiba writes: With Washington now alert to the growing threat, we are making plans too. Among them is a renewed security partnership with the U.S., which would provide the basis for a collective and firm response to the Islamic Republic’s provocations. It is an urgent and necessary effort to defend our shared interests and make us all safer and more secure. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
Jonathan Ruhe and Blake Fleisher write: The new administration is making clear its intent to stop tolerating Iranian aggression. Translating this into action means the United States can no longer turn a blind eye to Iran’s nuclear cruise missile program. – Breaking Defense
Robert Malley writes: Trump considers the measures taken to contain Iran over the past few years to have been feeble, feels that Tehran has acquired disproportionate regional influence, has evinced scant regard for diplomacy or multilateralism and has made his distaste for the nuclear deal abundantly clear, so one might expect a different calculus. What is fanciful is an outcome that wishes away basic political and military constraints. In the business world, this rule went by the expression “Fast, Good or Cheap — Pick two.” There is no all-of-the-above option. Something will have to give. – Washington Post
An aide to President Trump disputed reports that national security adviser Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster told aides not to say "radical Islamic terrorism" during his first meeting with his new staff last week. – Washington Examiner
A former Obama administration official dismissed President Trump's reference to "radical Islamic terrorism" in his speech to Congress last night as a talking point that doesn't matter much in the war against the Islamic State. – Washington Examiner
Despite his promises of a no-holds-barred administration, President Donald Trump is tiptoeing around U.S. military engagements in Afghanistan and Iraq, and dialing back the threats of abandoning allies. It seems Trump is opting for an increasingly risk-averse approach to the world. – Associated Press
Dov Zakheim writes: [S]hould the president’s innermost circle hold sway over national-security policy, the result will lead only to greater insecurity—not only for America’s nervous partners, but for the United States itself—and the president’s vision for America’s next great anniversary will prove to have been nothing more than the wishful thinking that has powered all too many of his late-night tweets. – The National Interest
Mark Lagon and Brian McKeon write: We have low expectations that the president will change course; attacks on our norms and institutions were regular fare for candidate Trump (who, among other things, threatened to prosecute his political opponent). It will likely fall to others — members of Congress, leaders of U.S. business and civil society, and the hundreds of thousands of U.S. citizens who regularly travel overseas — to protect the American brand that President Trump has so carelessly tarnished. America’s identity and influence depend on it. – Foreign Policy’s Elephants in the Room
Max Boot writes: To substantially and permanently improve his performance as president, Trump will have to fire the loonies on his staff, accede entirely to his more sober and rational appointees, and submit his most cherished beliefs to factual examination and correction. It will take a lot more, in other words, than smoothly reading a ghostwritten speech off a teleprompter. – Foreign Policy
A former Obama administration official dismissed President Trump's reference to "radical Islamic terrorism" in his speech to Congress last night as a talking point that doesn't matter much in the war against the Islamic State. – Washington Examiner
Despite his promises of a no-holds-barred administration, President Donald Trump is tiptoeing around U.S. military engagements in Afghanistan and Iraq, and dialing back the threats of abandoning allies. It seems Trump is opting for an increasingly risk-averse approach to the world. – Associated Press
Dov Zakheim writes: [S]hould the president’s innermost circle hold sway over national-security policy, the result will lead only to greater insecurity—not only for America’s nervous partners, but for the United States itself—and the president’s vision for America’s next great anniversary will prove to have been nothing more than the wishful thinking that has powered all too many of his late-night tweets. – The National Interest
Mark Lagon and Brian McKeon write: We have low expectations that the president will change course; attacks on our norms and institutions were regular fare for candidate Trump (who, among other things, threatened to prosecute his political opponent). It will likely fall to others — members of Congress, leaders of U.S. business and civil society, and the hundreds of thousands of U.S. citizens who regularly travel overseas — to protect the American brand that President Trump has so carelessly tarnished. America’s identity and influence depend on it. – Foreign Policy’s Elephants in the Room
Max Boot writes: To substantially and permanently improve his performance as president, Trump will have to fire the loonies on his staff, accede entirely to his more sober and rational appointees, and submit his most cherished beliefs to factual examination and correction. It will take a lot more, in other words, than smoothly reading a ghostwritten speech off a teleprompter. – Foreign Policy
RSS Feed