Category: National Security
Lethal Alliance
by The Washington Spectator | Dec 14, 2015 | National Security, PoliticsPhoto Credit: Sgt Brian Gamble In response to a lone gunman killing 10 students at Umpqua Community College on October 2, Democratic senators have introduced a package of gun-control measures that includes the expansion of criminal background checks for gun buyers. Passage in the Senate is unlikely; in the House, where Republicans hold greater sway than […]
Hell in a Small Place: The Saudi-U.S. War in Yemen
by Belén Fernández | Dec 1, 2015 | Foreign Policy, National Security, PoliticsPhoto Credit: Hugh Macleod / IRIN The travel warning for Yemen the U.S. State Department issued in April 2015 describes a “high security threat level . . . due to terrorist activities and civil unrest.” Citing continuing activity by organizations like Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), the warning specifies that the “U.S. government […]
Profiles in Political Cowardice (or Expedience)
by Lou Dubose | Nov 20, 2015 | National Security, Politics, The IntervalPhoto Credit: Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division; Harris and Ewing Collection Forty-seven Democrats turning their backs on principle—and on their president—in Thursday’s House vote on an “Arab Exclusion Act” reminded me of a conversation I had with the late Maury Maverick Jr. Maverick was a San Antonio civil rights lawyer, son of New […]
The Lies Still Killing Gulf War Vets
by Barbara Koeppel | Apr 13, 2015 | Legal Affairs, National Security, PoliticsSome cover-ups are scandalous. Others, like those surrounding the First Gulf War, suggest an official callousness that shocks and awes. During and immediately after the war, 200,000 of 700,000 U.S. troops were exposed to nerve gas and other chemical agents. The Department of Defense (DOD), fully aware of the chemical hazards and the troop […]
To Save Syria, Save Assad
by Peter W. Galbraith | Nov 1, 2014 | Foreign Policy, National SecurityIn Syria, the United States has adopted a none-of-the-above strategy. President Barack Obama has launched airstrikes against ISIS targets in the Euphrates Valley and against an unrelated radical group near Aleppo. But the administration does not want airstrikes to benefit Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. So it proposes to spend $500 million to create a […]