Tag: perpetual war

Trump and Rubio Are Reviving the Old Cold War Racket Against Cuba

President Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio are making me feel like I’m smack dab back in the middle of the old Cold War racket — the racket that succeeded in making the U.S. national-security state and its ever-growing army of “defense” contractors a permanent feature of American life.

The State Department just issued a report that is straight out of the old Cold War playbook. It states that Cuba’s communist regime is behind the democratic socialist movements and radical leftist groups here in America . Reinforcing the report, Rubio delivered a talk last week at a big event hosted by the State Department in which he stated that Cuba’s “sprawling intelligence and ideological network helped to build the far left in our country and in our hemisphere.”

In other words, the Reds are coming to get us … again! Everyone needs to start looking under his bed for a Red … again! And Cuba, which is located only 90 miles away from American shores, is clearly the spearhead of the international communist conspiracy that is determined to take over America … again! Too bad Senator Joseph McCarthy is no longer here when we need him.

First question for Rubio: Is the international communist conspiracy still centered in Moscow or has it moved to Beijing?

Second question for Rubio: Is socialist-communist Cuba also responsible for Rubio’s fervent belief in Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, public (i.e., government) schooling, and other socialist programs here in the United States?

The Cold War racket was the best thing that ever happened to the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA, the three principal components of the U.S. national-security state. By striking deep fear of the Reds within the American people after World War II, warfare statists succeeded in converting the federal government from our founding system of a limited-government republic to a national-security state, which is a totalitarian-like governmental structure — and they did it without even the semblance of a constitutional amendment.

That’s how Americans ended up living under omnipotent government — that is, government that wields the power to assassinate, torture, and incarcerate them for life without due process of law and trial by jury.

It’s also how Americans have come to live under forever war and never-ending crises.

It’s also how Americans live like little serfs under a massive, all-powerful, and very expensive military-intelligence establishment and its ever-growing army of voracious “defense” contractors.

Keep reading

Humanoid War Robot Gets Advanced AMD-Powered AI Brain

At the start of February, we began tracking startup Foundation Robotics after publicly available news reports and X posts suggested it could become one of the first US companies to deploy humanoid robots on the modern battlefield.

TIME later reported that the company’s robots had been sent to Ukraine for testing and evaluation, raising the prospect that these war bots could soon reach the front lines in Eastern Europe.

Our February 2 report, “Watch: Russian Soldiers Surrender To Gun-Wielding Robot; Humanoid Warfare Nears,” and our February 3 report, “AI’s Next Frontier Is Physical As Humanoid Robots Begin March On Assembly Lines And Beyond,” both preceded TIME’s coverage of Foundation by a full month and showed how these robots were being positioned for testing in Ukraine.

In another signal that Foundation is preparing its war bots for battlefield deployment, Reuters reported that the startup partnered with Advanced Micro Devices to supply high-end AI processors for its second-generation Phantom MK-2 robot.

Foundation plans to open a factory in October capable of producing 5,000 robots per year, followed by a second facility with capacity for 50,000 units. Industrial robots will be leased for about $100,000 annually, while defense models designed for logistics and reconnaissance will be sold for $300,000 per unit.

Keep reading

Getting Away with Murder: Under Trump, the Buck Stops Nowhere

Having burned through billions of dollars and depleted critical munitions stockpiles, the Pentagon is running out of money.

Our money.

According to the Washington Post, the Pentagon is facing an urgent budget shortfall caused largely by the Iran war, with some critical funding accounts expected to run dry within weeks. Training, maintenance and other military priorities are reportedly being squeezed as the government struggles to sustain Trump’s escalating conflict.

Once again, the government is looking to the American people for a taxpayer-funded bailout—this time to the tune of $67 billion.

Nor is the $67 billion emergency infusion the end of it.

Trump’s fiscal year 2027 budget calls for an unprecedented $1.5 trillion in national-defense spending—a staggering increase that would pour still more money into a military apparatus that cannot account honestly for the costs of its current war, maintain its existing priorities, or keep from returning to taxpayers for another bailout.

The problem is not simply how much the war machine consumes. It is how little accountability accompanies that spending.

The government can launch a war, exhaust military resources, conceal its full costs, and return to Congress for billions more without anyone responsible being required to admit error, change course, or answer for the lives lost.

That is becoming a familiar pattern under Donald Trump.

He makes the decisions—others absorb the consequences.

He launches the war—the troops make the sacrifices, and taxpayers inherit the bill.

The Iran war is not merely another example of government waste, although the cost is already staggering. The war has already cost an estimated $80 to $100 billion, not counting its long-term economic impact, future veteran expenses, or the cost of repairing damaged military bases. Analysts estimate that the broader toll on American households could eventually reach as much as $1,000 per household.

Yet the true cost cannot be measured in dollars alone.

American service members are dying in a war Trump started without meaningful congressional authorization, without a credible plan for ending it, and without an honest accounting of what it will cost.

The Pentagon is draining resources from training, maintenance and weapons programs to keep the conflict going. Congress is being asked to supply billions more. And the American people—already struggling under the weight of debt, inflation and economic uncertainty—are expected to pay without question.

This is government without accountability.

When Trump’s decisions cost American lives, deplete military stockpiles and burn through billions of taxpayer dollars, the bill never finds its way to him. It finds its way to us, while Trump remains conspicuously insulated from the human and financial consequences of his own decisions.

That insulation from consequence is matched by a swaggering display of bluster and bravado that passes for leadership within the Trump administration.

Keep reading

Prosecutor Investigating U.S. Boat Strikes and Claims of Torture Was Murdered in Ecuador

Alexandra Bravo, the prosecutor assigned to investigate U.S. strikes on three Ecuadorian boats and the 36 survivors’ subsequent accounts of torture and kidnapping, was shot dead in the coastal city of Manta last month. According to police, on June 14 a hitman aboard a black motorcycle opened fire on Bravo as she and her sister were leaving a café at about 11 a.m. Bravo’s sister, who jumped to protect her, was also killed in the attack.

Upon arriving at the crime scene, officers say they found five 9mm shell casings and Bravo’s injured driver, but no sign of the police detail that had been assigned to protect her. The Police Directorate, which operates entirely under the executive branch, has launched a probe to determine if there’d been an internal security breach.

Bravo is the 26th member of Ecuador’s justice system to be assassinated since 2020 and the second individual investigating state crimes murdered that week. Besides her usual caseload of homicide and organized crime, Bravo had been working the Fiorella, Negra Francisca, and Don Maca cases—a series of drone attacks on civilian fishing ships exposed by Drop Site in April. Two of the boat’s crews returned home and reported being abducted, blindfolded, and starved for eight days by American gunmen in U.S. military uniforms aboard a U.S.-flagged patrol ship, before being abandoned in El Salvador. The UN Committee on Enforced Disappearances endorsed the calls for an investigation, demanding that the U.S. provide information on the whereabouts of the eight still-missing men and any involvement in the matter by April 27. To date, the United States has not responded.

Under Ecuador’s right-wing president Daniel Noboa—a Miami-born billionaire often characterized as a “U.S.-backed dictator”—the country has become a central testing ground for Operation Southern Spear, Washington’s extrajudicial bombing campaign purporting to target “narco-terrorists,” which has killed 221 people to date. There is no evidence that many of the victims, including those in Bravo’s investigation, had engaged in drug trafficking.

“I can’t make any assertion regarding it being a political assassination, but evidently, when a prosecutor is killed it’s because of the investigation they’re conducting,” Fernando Bastias, a renowned human rights attorney with Ecuador’s CDH and member of the Geneva-based World Organization Against Torture, told Drop Site, “That’s something we’ve learned from our experience in Ecuador.”

Keep reading

Iran unleashes wave of attacks on US bases

The Iranian military has attacked US bases in multiple Gulf states, and warned locals to keep their distance from “US terrorist army forces” in anticipation of more strikes. The attacks came immediately after US forces bombed the Iranian cities of Ahvaz, Khorramabad, and Jask.

Sirens sounded twice in Bahrain on Friday morning, as two waves of attacks targeted Sheikh Isa Air Base and Naval Support Activity Bahrain, the headquarters of the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet. 

“This morning, the fuel tanks, large equipment warehouses and silos, and the barracks of the US terrorist army forces at the Isa Air Base in Bahrain were targeted by Arash kamikaze drones,” the Iranian Army said in a statement broadcast on Iranian state media. In a separate statement, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said that it had damaged an observation tower at Naval Support Activity Bahrain.

Both facilities have come under Iranian attack on multiple occasions since the US-Israeli war on Iran began in February. Footage shared on social media showed plumes of smoke rising from the area of the naval base after the second round of sirens sounded.

Keep reading

US-Israel Defense Integration on Horizon as House Keeps Section 219 in NDAA

The House is preparing to vote on the Fiscal Year 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) with Section 219 (formerly section 224) still embedded in the roughly $1.1 trillion bill.

The House approved the rule governing debate on H.R. 8800 by a 214-211 vote Tuesday, July 21. The vote allowed the chamber to proceed with the NDAA but excluded the amendment from Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) that would have removed Section 219.

Lawmakers will not receive a separate vote on the bipartisan amendment that sought to remove the section, a proposal to expand U.S.-Israel defense technology cooperation that has garnered strong rebukes in certain political and defense circles.

The House expects to hold a recorded vote on the complete NDAA on Wednesday.

What Section 219 Would Do

Section 219 would direct the defense secretary to designate a Pentagon “executive agent” to oversee the United States-Israel Defense Technology Cooperation Initiative. That official would coordinate bilateral defense research, development, testing, evaluation and industrial cooperation.

The proposal originated as the bipartisan, bicameral United States-Israel FUTURES Act, introduced in the House by Reps. Ronny Jackson (R-Texas) and Don Davis (D-N.C.) with companion legislation from Sens. Ted Budd (R-N.C.) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.).

Jackson framed the proposal as a way to preserve America’s technological advantage and deliver new battlefield capabilities to service members. Davis emphasized its potential to prepare troops for evolving threats, particularly unmanned systems and electronic warfare.

Sens. Budd and Gillibrand have similarly presented the initiative as an expansion of existing work on missile defense, drones, and underground threats as a means to strengthen American military and technological capabilities.

Keep reading

Trump “Close” To Ordering “Massive Attack Greater Than Anything Before” On Iran

New Iraq PM Tries Hand at Mediation

After being at the White House just last week, Iraq’s new “Washington approved” prime minister is apparently now the new shuttle diplomacy guy, after Qatari and Pakistani peace efforts on Iran have come to naught. 

The NY Times is reporting Thursday afternoon that “Iraq’s prime minister, Ali al-Zaidi, is in Tehran carrying a proposal for a cease-fire between Iran and the United States, according to Iranian and Iraqi officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about matters of national security.”

But the messaging apparently went the other way to, from Tehran to Washington, per more from the Times:

Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, told local news media that the Iraqi leader had shared with Iranian officials his “insights and impressions” from his recent meeting with Trump. Araghchi added that Tehran and Washington don’t have a problem when it comes to finding mediators, “the problem is America’s attitude.”

At the moment, Trump is threatening new, massive attacks on Iran, which could come tonight or at any time, with the whole region on edge and the State Department telling Americans to urgently find flights out of the Middle East.

Trump “Close” To Bigger Strikes Than Ever Before: Interview

President Trump has newly been cited in Axios as saying he’s seriously considering restarting major combat operations in Iran. He’s previewing strikes that would be bigger than anything before, including in the opening days of Operation Epic Fury, when dozens of Iranian government and military leaders were killed, including the Ayatollah. There’s also chatter that Israel could rejoin the attacks this time, after Israeli jets have been absent in the past twelve days of renewed bombing raids.

However, Axios stipulated that Trump has yet to make a final decision. Mideast regional Al Hadath and Israel’s Channel 12 are separately reporting that US officials have told regional allies to “be prepared” for such a new major assault on Iran.

Axios writes, “In a brief interview, Trump acknowledged that such a decision would have consequences and stressed he hasn’t made a determination yet.” This as Brent Crude has climbed past $100 per barrel on Thursday, and as the prospect of all-out war remains unpopular among American voters, especially with months to go ahead of the midterms.

“I am considering a massive attack. Bigger than ever before. I am close to making a decision. We are all set for it,” the president said. And more via the Axios interview:

  • Trump said Israel “would join in two minutes if I ask them to,” but added that “we don’t need anybody” to launch a new operation against Iran.
  • He also said there would be “consequences” for Israel joining the strikes, hinting at Iranian retaliation against Israel.
  • Trump said the Iranians “want to negotiate” but are not ready to make a deal at the moment.
  • “They haven’t received enough pain yet,” he said.
  • Two regional sources with knowledge of mediation efforts said Iranian leadership hasn’t accepted the latest proposal put forward.
  • “We are trying, but the Iranians are not being helpful,” one of them said.

The Houthis have meanwhile been ratcheting their involvement, apparently having been called upon by Tehran to help it keep leverage over key oil transit chokepoints. All the while, there have been widespread reports of the Pentagon surging large aircraft, especially refueling tankers, from Europe to the CENTCOM area.

Houthis Threaten Saudi Aramco

After the Iranian-aligned Houthis confirmed they struck two Saudi oil tankers as part of a naval blockade on Saudi Arabia, as a second chokepoint on global oil supplies opens alongside the Strait of Hormuz, on Thursday the Shia militant group is now openly threatening Aramco facilities inside the kingdom… or at least some unnamed officials are telling regional media.

The Houthis have characterized their campaign as “a blockade for a blockade,” saying it is intended to pressure Saudi Arabia. The Saudis have already been blockading Houthis controlled-ports in Yemen for years, which hearkens back to a Gulf vs. Houthi chiefly aerial war that opened in 2015.

Keep reading

“A Bridge Too Far”: Middle East Set For A Massive Escalation

Unless things change dramatically, the Middle East seems set for massive escalation.

President Trump yesterday warned every missile, rocket, or drone Iran fires at ships in Hormuz will be met with the destruction of an Iranian bridge or power plant.

This morning, the IRGC says a tanker is on fire after an explosion in the strait and Kuwait is under drone attack. Moreover, the Houthis claimed attacks on two Saudi tankers in the Red Sea, raising the risks of a new global energy chokepoint besides Hormuz.

Reports say the US is surging military forces to the region, heavy bombers are being prepared, and Mossad is coordinating with the CIA. Equally, Iran’s Ghalibaf has stated there will be no safety if Iran’s security is not guaranteed, read as more or less a declaration of war against the entire region’s infrastructure and energy should its own be hit.

Worse, Iranian strikes on CIA Middle-East facilities are prompting US questions about Russian involvement, which would conflate the war more deeply with Russia-Ukraine, where epic damage to Russian energy, shipping, and logistics infrastructure continues to mount. On that note, after Kazakhstan was forced to stop piping oil via the Black Sea due Ukraine’s drone attacks, the EU is launching a mission to board Russian shadow fleet ships in the Indian Ocean; however, Russian LNG is to remain exempt from EU sanctions – realpolitik or real weakness?

In the Middle East, the UK is evacuating its remaining diplomatic personnel from Iran, just as it did the day before the Iran war started in February, but Bulgaria is aiding US military operations from its territory. That could potentially make it a target for Iranian reprisals – and it’s a NATO and EU member, each with collective defense clauses.

If we see military escalation, it’s likely to drive energy prices even higher than the $95.5 level Brent was at this morning with benchmark crack spreads at $68. However, it’s unlikely to last long. Neither the US nor Israel, nor Iran, nor the GCC can sustain a no-holds-barred war for long – and the world economy obviously can’t either. As such, we may be close to the beginning of the end of this crisis – it’s just unclear if it will prove a bridge too far for the US or Iran.

Keep reading

NATO’s Shadow Bank: Financing a New Era of Militarisation

As the war in Ukraine continues to reshape European security, tensions surrounding Iran and the Middle East intensify, and NATO members accelerate defence spending, the alliance is entering a more openly militarised phase. Behind the familiar language of deterrence, resilience and collective security lies a deeper question: how will this expanding confrontation be financed, and who stands to benefit from it?

In this special broadcast, Kevork Almassian, host of Syriana Analysis, speaks with Mats Nilsson, senior analyst at Sweden’s Dissident Club, about the NATO summit in Ankara and the emerging financial architecture behind long-term rearmament. Their discussion examines the proposed Defense, Security and Resilience Bank, a mechanism presented as supporting allied preparedness but viewed by critics as a means of locking Western states into permanent military expenditure.

Almassian and Nilsson place Turkey’s growing regional weight, Israel’s strategic position, and the conflicts involving Russia and Iran within a wider geopolitical contest extending toward China and Eurasia. As conventional diplomacy gives way to enlarged military budgets, arms transfers and financial instruments designed to sustain them, the stakes reach far beyond any single battlefield.

Keep reading

The Collapse of the Bipartisan Consensus Over US-Israel Ties

For decades, U.S. support for Israel rested on one of Washington’s strongest bipartisan assumptions: that military assistance was strategically necessary and politically untouchable. But Gaza has weakened that consensus.

Critics now see Israeli military aid as a misguided strategy and political target. The most visible shift has occurred inside the Democratic Party.

A collapsing bipartisan consensus on Israel

Driven by voter and demographic shifts, humanitarian concerns in Gaza, and the unwarranted conflict with Iran, more than 100 House Democrats recently supported an amendment seeking to block billions of dollars in Israel-related assistance, an extraordinary departure from previous voting patterns.

House Democratic leadership (including Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries) has officially called for a “major reset” in U.S.-Israel relations.

Senate efforts to restrict weapons transfers have also attracted substantial Democratic support, reflecting growing concern about civilian casualties, international law, and U.S. responsibility.

The Republican coalition is also less unified than before. While most Republican lawmakers remain strongly supportive of Israel, MAGA-aligned figures influenced by anti-interventionism, “America First” priorities, and skepticism toward foreign aid have increasingly questioned open-ended commitments.

Growing opposition within the MAGA movement to U.S. arms transfers centers on a deep ideological rift over foreign interventionism. Former Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene left office in January 2026 after a bitter falling out with President Trump.

While much of the base supports President Trump’s foreign policy, a growing, vocal faction – backed by prominent voices like Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens, and Representative Thomas Massie – challenges continued, unconditional weapons shipments.

The result is a new political landscape: traditional pro-Israel Democrats, evangelical conservatives, progressive Democrats, libertarian Republicans, and anti-interventionist conservatives now approach the issue from fundamentally different premises.

The debate is therefore no longer simply “pro-Israel versus anti-Israel.” It concerns whether U.S. strategic interests, domestic law, international obligations, and humanitarian concerns can continue to be reconciled under existing policy.

From political controversy to legal challenges

At the same time, legal initiatives accusing U.S. officials of complicity or failure to prevent alleged Israeli violations have moved the debate from politics into courts, international institutions, and questions of historical accountability.

The legal debate has developed along several tracks. The most significant U.S. case was Defense for Children International–Palestine v. Biden, brought by Palestinian organizations, Gaza residents, and Palestinian-Americans against President Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, for their alleged “failure to prevent and complicity in the unfolding genocide against Gaza.”

Along with the human rights organizations, the lawsuit was promoted by Josh Paul who had resigned from the U.S. State Department over arms shipments to Israel; Jewish Voice for Peace; and genocide and Holocaust scholars spearheaded by international lawyer William Schabas.

The plaintiffs proposed that a genocide, or serious risk of genocide, of Palestinians in Gaza was occurring. They also argued the U.S. is violating its duties under international law to prevent and not be complicit in the genocide. Those U.S. failures were seen to contribute to the erosion of “long and widely held norms of international law,” including the Genocide Convention and Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The Palestine et al. v. Biden et al. case was dismissed by the U.S. Court with a ruling that “while it is plausible that Israel’s conduct amounts to genocide,” U.S. foreign policy was a political question over which courts lacked jurisdiction. In a written decision, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White quoted approvingly from a prior preliminary ruling (by the ICJ in the case brought against Israel by South Africa). It found Israel’s conduct in Gaza may amount to genocide and ordered it to stop killing and wounding Palestinians.

Other initiatives include advocacy and legal campaigns by groups such as Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), which warned U.S. officials that continued assistance after awareness of alleged violations could raise questions of aiding and abetting.

DAWN wanted the ICC to investigate Biden, Blinken, and Austin for violating Articles 25(3)(c) and (d) of the Rome Statute. These crimes featured those identified in the ICC arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. Intriguingly, the DAWN submission widened the net of “accessorial liability” to include several other U.S. officials as well.

More recently, DAWN and allied organizations have also challenged Trump administration’s measures targeting ICC-related advocacy.

Genocide scholar William Schabas and other international-law experts have supported arguments that third-party states may face responsibility if they knowingly facilitate atrocities. In the mainstream corporate media, these remain contested (though increasingly popular) legal interpretations. Yet, the latter have expanded the debate beyond Israel itself to states providing weapons, diplomatic protection, or political cover.

Keep reading