Pentagon

By Peter Van Buren | ( Tomdispatch.com ) | – – One of the most popular apps these days is Snapchat. It allows the sender to set a timer for any photo dispatched via the app, so that a few seconds after the recipient opens the message, the photo is automatically deleted. The evidence of […]

Drone Warfare

Surges, Mission Creeps & Drones in the Mideast: America’s Forever War

contributors

By Tom Engelhardt | ( Tomdispatch.com ) | – – There are the news stories that genuinely surprise you, and then there are the ones that you could write in your sleep before they happen. Let me concoct an example for you: “Top American and European military leaders are weighing options to step up the […]

National Security State

US spends as much as next 11 countries on War Industries; why do Cruz/Trump want to Spend More?

contributors

Bear F. Braumoeller | (The Conversation) | – – One of the prominent themes in this year’s presidential primaries is the state of the American military. In his April 27 foreign policy speech, Republican front-runner Donald Trump summed up the majority view of the GOP: [W]e have to rebuild our military and our economy. The […]

Islamic State of Iraq and Syria

ISIL Digging in Against new US Troops in Syria

contributors

By By James Miller| ( RFE/RL ) | – – On June 29, 2014, when Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi gave a speech from the Great Mosque of al-Nuri in Mosul, Iraq, announcing the formation of an Islamic caliphate, the newly proclaimed [so-called] "Islamic State" did indeed have many of the hallmarks of an actual state. It […]

Featured

ISIL Endgame: Obama to send 250 more US Troops into Syria

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – President Obama is announcing Monday morning in Hanover, Germany, that he will send another 250 US troops, likely mostly special operations, into Syria, bringing the total to 300. The 50 troops already there are embedded with the YPG or People’s Defense Units of the leftist Democratic […]

Barack Obama

The Iraq War Never Ended: An Interview with Anand Gopal

contributors

By Charles Davis | ( TeleSur | – – The U.S. is at war with the same extremist group it claimed to have defeated five years ago, and it’s relying on sectarian extremists to "win" again. The United States is winning the war on terror, just as it always has. The Islamic State group is […]

CIA

Murdering Civilians: US Drone Whistleblowers Step Out of the Shadows

contributors

By Pratap Chatterjee | (Tomdispatch.com) | – – In a trio of recent action-packed movies, good guys watch terrorists mingling with innocent women and children via real-time video feeds from halfway across the world. A clock ticks and we, the audience, are let in on the secret that mayhem is going to break loose. After […]

Militarization

The Euphemisms of War and Covering up American Military Failure

contributors

By William J. Astore | ( Tomdispatch.com) | – – Introduction | By Tom Engelhardt | – – At the moment, there are a maximum of 3,870 U.S. military personnel (or 7,740 actual boots on the ground) in Iraq supporting the war against the Islamic State. That’s the “official cap” imposed by the Obama administration, […]

Democratic Party

Is Hillary Clinton vulnerable to Trump over her 2002 vote for the Iraq War?

contributors

Tom F.A Watts | (The Conversation) | – – To the horror of almost everyone in mainstream US politics, it seems increasingly likely that by the close of the Republican National Convention in July, Donald Trump will have snatched the prize he has long coveted: the Republican presidential nomination. The party’s leadership is no longer […]