This graphic, via Visual Capitalist’s Pallavia Rao, locates the known overseas bases of the American military, categorized by who controls the base.
In red are the ones controlled by the U.S., and blue are ones controlled by the host country.
This map does not include several hundred temporary sites for military exercises or contingency operations.
Data is sourced from a Congressional report published in 2024. Troop data is from the Defense Manpower Data Center, current to March 2024.
In his seminal speech at the recently concluded Munich Security Conference, US Vice President JD Vance said the following:
“[T]he threat that I worry the most about vis-a-vis Europe is not Russia, it’s not China, it’s not any other external actor. What I worry about is the threat from within. The retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values: values shared with the United States of America.”
Vance’s words convey a paradigm-changing truth that few have yet grasped.
The truth is this: As far as Europe is concerned, the real enemy of the American people is not Russia. The real enemy is the EU, specifically its ruling elite in Brussels.M.D. Rob
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum is seeking to alter the country’s constitution to protect drug cartels from the U.S. military.
Under the terms of the proposals filed by Sheinbaum, Articles 19 and 40 of country’s constitution would be changed to block any investigation or military action by foreign entities without permission from the Mexican government.
The first amendment would prohibit any “act from abroad that is harmful to the integrity, independence and sovereignty of the Nation.”
The Second amendment mandates automatic pretrial detention and the highest possible penalties for any citizen or foreigner engaged in illegal arms trafficking, as well as any foreigner violating Mexico’s s sovereignty.
“What we want to make clear in the face of this designation is that we do not negotiate sovereignty,” Sheinbaum said.
“This cannot be an opportunity on the part of the United States to invade our sovereignty.”
”So, they can name it whatever they want, but with Mexico, it is collaboration and coordination, never subordination, not interference, and much less invasion.”
The decision comes after the U.S. State Department on Thursday upgraded the designation of cartels, including Mexico’s Sinaloa and Jalisco Nueva Generación.
Together, those two cartels control the majority of Mexico’s fentanyl production and are responsible for importing thousands of kilograms of fentanyl across the southern border.
The designation enables the State Department to impose targeted sanctions, enhances the U.S. government’s authority to prosecute individuals aiding these groups, and strengthens intelligence-gathering for military operations.
Donald Trump appears to have won his trade standoff with Volodymyr Zelensky, as the Ukrainian president is set to give in and sign a deal giving the U.S. access to deposits of critical minerals.
The deal was seen as crucial for satisfying Washington’s demands for a peace settlement between Ukraine and Russia to end their three-year long war.
It’s a staggering surrender from Zelensky, who had said just days earlier: ‘I defend Ukraine, I can’t sell our country.’
Zelensky said on Friday that officials from his country and the U.S. were working on concluding an economic deal to ensure that the accord worked and was fair to Kyiv.
‘We’re signing an agreement, hopefully in the next fairly short period of time,’ Trump told reporters in the Oval Office when asked about a deal for Ukraine’s minerals.
The Wall Street Journal later cited several people familiar with the matter that the deal is close and will be signed within hours.
It comes following word that Zelensky angered Trump so much during negotiations that Trump threatened to completely pull US funding from Ukraine, Axios reported.
Zelensky had apparently worn out his welcome with the entire American negotiating team – which included the president, JD Vance, Marco Rubio, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and National Security Advisor Michael Waltz – in the span of a week.
The Israeli military acknowledged on Friday it knew the Bibas family was dead in captivity in Gaza despite previously insisting they might be alive.
Hamas said in November 2023 that Shiri Bibas, 32, and her two children, Ariel, aged four, and nine-month-old Kfir, were killed in an Israeli air strike.
However, the Israeli military continued to demand their release alive.
Military spokesperson Daniel Hagari on Friday confirmed the death of the two babies “no later than November 2023” following the return of their bodies by Hamas as part of the ceasefire agreement.
During a news conference, Hagari said the Israeli military had intelligence that they were already dead but could not announce it to the public.
Earlier this month, President Donald Trump said that the US will “take over the Gaza Strip” and “own” it for the “long-term” (AP, 2/5/25), and that its Palestinian inhabitants will be “permanently” exiled (AP, 2/4/25). Subsequently, when reporters asked Trump whether Palestinians would have the right to return to Gaza under his plan, he said “no” (BBC, 2/10/25).
After Trump’s remarks, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres (Reuters, 2/5/25) said “it is essential to avoid any form of ethnic cleansing.”
Navi Pillay (Politico, 2/9/25), chair of the UN Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, said that
Trump is woefully ignorant of international law and the law of occupation. Forcible displacement of an occupied group is an international crime, and amounts to ethnic cleansing.
Human Rights Watch (2/5/25) said that, if Trump’s plan were implemented, it would “amount to an alarming escalation of forced displacement and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza.”
Media outlets continue to print headlines about antisemitism based on Anti-Defamation League statistics known to be faulty and politicized. In doing so, they grant undeserved credibility to the ADL as a source.
Producing statistics helps the ADL to claim objectivity when they assert that antisemitism is increasing dramatically, prevalent in all fields of society, and emanating from the left as well as the right. Those “facts” are then used to justify policy recommendations that fail to respond to actual antisemitism, but succeed in undermining the free speech rights of Palestinians and their supporters, including those of us who are Jews.
While it frames itself as a civil rights organization, the ADL has a long history of actively spying on critics of Israel and collaborating with the Israeli government (Nation, 1/31/24). (FAIR itself was targeted as a “Pinko” group in ADL’s sprawling spying operation in the ’90s.)
Though it professes to document and challenge antisemitism, it openly admits to counting pro-Palestinian activism as antisemitic: In 2023, the ADL changed its methodology for reporting antisemitic incidents to include rallies that feature “anti-Zionist chants and slogans,” even counting anti-war protests led by Jews—including Jewish organizations the ADL designated as “hate groups.”
Three buses exploded in central Israel on Thursday in what authorities are calling a “suspected terror attack.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu responded swiftly, ordering an “intense military operation” in the West Bank to root out terrorist networks responsible for the attack.
Israeli police confirmed that three explosive devices detonated, while two additional bombs failed to go off.
The buses, located in a parking lot in Bat Yam and Holon, south of Tel Aviv, were not in service at the time, miraculously preventing mass casualties, according to The Time.
However, intelligence suggests the terrorists had intended for the bombs to detonate on Friday when the buses would have been packed with passengers.
Each device was equipped with a timer, and one bore a message in both Hebrew and Arabic: “Revenge from Tulkarem,” a reference to a recent Israeli military operation in the West Bank city of Tulkarem, according to the Times of Israel.
Having the biggest and best military ever to ensure we don’t get into a War and at the same time cutting funding is not incompatible. It is actually very wise and do-able.
The reality is, we’re spending more on defense than we ever have (as a percentage of GDP Defense spending is slipping down from 3.5% of GDP). The reality is that we are getting less available aircraft, ships, missiles, and service members for that increase in spending.
That is wrong.
To rectify this mess, it first starts with re-setting or “plucking” military leadership. That means firing Uniformed Generals and Admirals and also career civilian senior executives.
As far as military leadership, Chairman of the Joint Staff, CQ Brown certainly has to go. It’s very likely he is on the list to be fired. Admiral Franchetti, the Chief of Naval Operations is also likely to be sacked.
P.S. one of the first things one does when they are promoted to General or Flag Officer is that they sign a letter of resignation, it’s kept on file and then dated when they are asked for their resignation.
The next thing is cutting costs. Research and Development is very important and we have lost the art of R&D. Around $146 Billion a year goes to R&D of which about $6-10 Billion goes to what are known as Federally Funded Research and Development Centers (FFRDCs) as part of Research and Development. The big three are the Mitre Corporation, Rand, and The Aerospace Corporation. I worked at one of those for six years after leaving Government.
That Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s political fortunes have been on a downward trajectory over the course of the past year is undeniable. The accelerated collapse of Zelensky as a legitimate governing authority in Ukraine that has transpired over the course of the past few days was unimaginable. That Zelensky would double down by carrying out a personal attack against Donald Trump is unthinkable.
Back in the summer of 2023, I tried to warn the American people, and the world, about the illegitimacy and inherent instability of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. I helped write and produce a two-part exposé of the one-time comedian titled “Agent Zelensky.”
Part One was well received when I published it on YouTube.
Too well received.
The Ukrainian intelligence services, which had flagged me as a Russian disinformation agent and marked me for death by putting me on an infamous liquidation list, reached out to their FBI contacts in the Legal Attache office of the US Embassy in Kiev, and demanded that action be taken.
The appropriate authorities at YouTube were approached by the FBI, and soon the Agent Zelensky video was removed from the platform.
Part Two of Agent Zelensky suffered the same fate within hours of being published.
Then the Department of Justice tasked the FBI with eliminating the source of Agent Zelensky—me.
They targeted me for allegedly being an unregistered agent of the Russian government, trampling my status as an independent journalist whose speech was protected by the First Amendment of the US Constitution.
The FBI raided my home and seized my computers, all to intimidate me while the Department of Justice scrambled to make a case against me as an unregistered Russian agent.
They failed.
Hellbound and Down 
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