WASHINGTON D.C. — Both the Senate Foreign Relations and House Foreign Affairs committees convened Wednesday to discuss the many strategic challenges posed by Iran — two meetings only amplified in significance following the news that Iran had test-launched nine missiles earlier in the day. Opening the House committee’s hearing, Chairman Howard L. Berman spoke about Iran’s missile test most directly: To illustrate the immediacy of [the Iranian threat], we need look no further than today’s news of an Iranian long-range missile test – a missile capable of carrying a nuclear payload to Israel. This, coupled with the belligerent talk from [...]
Iran’s missile test is getting a lot of attention, which is to be expected given the amount of posturing going on on both sides right now. (As an idea of how out of control the media “psy ops” have gotten, there’s this article in Press TV citing Iraqi press reports of Israeli war planes secretly based in Iraq in preparation for an attack on Iran.) To my mind, the missile test launch seems like the kind of signal you’d expect the Iranians to send following the much publicized “training operation” over the Mediterranean and Greece a few weeks back. What’s [...]
When Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Eric S. Edelman visited with top officials in Lebanon May 31, he brought more than just words of encouragement. Timed with his visit, a shipment of body armor, helmets and more than 1.3 million rounds of ammunition was delivered to the Lebanese Armed Forces — the latest installment in an ongoing program of military and economic aid that has made Lebanon, on a per capita basis, the second-highest recipient of U.S. assistance. On the heels of sectarian clashes in May, in which Hezbollah-allied forces largely routed pro-government Sunni fighters, the move is an [...]
