Free Republic

In 2000, I was asked by the Israel Defense Forces to join a group of philosophers, lawyers, and generals for the purpose of drafting the army's ethics code. Since then, I have been deeply involved in the analysis of the moral issues that Israel faces in its war on terrorism. I have spent many hours in discussions with soldiers and officers in order to better grasp the dilemmas that they tackle in the field, and in an attempt to help facilitate the internalization of the code of ethics in war. It was no wonder that, when the Goldstone Report on...

The Muslim, dhimmi president with the satellite dish ears cannot seem to hear them cry out for freedom. It might have to do with the fact that he is trying stifle freedom in America, or it could be that he just doesn’t care. You see, the state run media in America does not cover the poor patriots in Iran who are crying out to be free, on this, the anniversary of their takeover of the US embassy under the other liberal wimp, Jimmy Carter.

I'm amazed by the soothsayers: Ayn Rand, for instance, who warned us fifty years ago of the risk of dictatorship or civil war if collectivism persisted. Or economist Friedrich Hayek, who wrote in the 1940s that we'll become serfs if we move toward big government. However, what feels most prophetic lately is an obscure movie from the l970s called Little Murders. The writer, Pulitzer-Prize-winning cartoonist Jules Feiffer, predicted that the '60s would unleash a feral, primitive society. The movie has a checkered history. It started out as a play on Broadway in the mid-'60s that was such a bomb, it...

Five soldiers have been shot dead by a "rogue" Afghan policeman in an attack at a police checkpoint. Three Grenadier Guards and two Royal Military Police were attacked as they rested inside a compound. The soldiers, who had removed their body armour and helmets, were shot by an Afghan national policeman who then fled. It is not known whether he was a member of the Taliban or being coerced by the insurgents.

The Afghan election is over and fortunately the Taliban did not wreak a bloodbath on voters as they had promised. However, they still caused quite a bit of carnage with suicide bombings in Kabul. As you probably know by now, the runoff election was cancelled when the contender, Abdullah Abdullah, dropped out of the race in protest, calling the election fixed. This can't be helpful to anyone except the Taliban! The Karzai regime was already discredited due to charges of widespread corruption, but Abdullah calling the election a farce has really got to drop his popularity. In truth, Afghani's...

It seems the planned protest of Lance Cpl. David Raymond Baker's funeral by Westboro Baptist Church, a Topeka, Kan.-based church known for picketing at the funerals of American troops who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan, never materialized. "If they were there, they didn't make themselves known," said Painesville Police Capt. Rick Kline. Painesville police received word from another department that protesters may have been on Walnut Avenue, though none were found upon investigation. There were also two buses that passed by the church before the funeral, but again, no protesters were involved. "(The buses) slowly drove by because of...

BEIJING: China’s Air Force will begin to develop “offensive operations” in space, a high-ranking military official has said in a seeming departure from Beijing’s recent opposition to space militarisation.

Kosovo unveils a statue of Bill Clinton The statue portrays the former president with his left arm raised while holding documents bearing the date when NATO started its air campaign against Yugoslavia – 24 March 1999. Why this is a farce: 1. It was illegal 2. It was poorly executed 3. It helped the wrong side 4. It produced the wrong outcome

VIENNA — Iranian officials sent mixed signals on a plan that would have Tehran ship out most of the material it would need to make a nuclear weapon, with the foreign minister saying Monday that option still exists and a senior diplomat suggesting the opposite. The contrasting messages appear designed to keep the international community off balance on how far Iran is ready to go in accepting the original proposal — having Tehran export 70 percent of its enriched uranium and having it returned as fuel for its research reactor. They also appeared geared toward pushing the plan's main backers...

Ex-Egyptian Chief of Staff: Arabs will definitely defeat the Jews .

Another soldier from Nevada has been killed in Afghanistan, the second Silver State-related casualty in a week, according to the Department of Defense. Sgt. Josue E. Hernandez Chavez, 23, of Reno was one of seven soldiers killed Monday when a helicopter crashed in Darreh-ye Bum, Afghanistan, Pentagon officials said in a news release Thursday. Chavez was on a MH-47 heavy lift helicopter with four other soldiers from the 3rd Battalion, 160th Special Operations Regiment from Hunter Army Airfield, Ga., and two from the 3rd Battalion, 7th Special Forces Group out of Fort Bragg, N.C.

Late last week, in the dead of night. President Obama made an unannounced trip to Dover, Delaware, where he was photographed saluting some flag-covered coffins that were coming in from Afghanistan. There were 18 coffins on this day. And afterwards, Obama said that this experience “would influence his decision” on troop levels and future policies in the war in that Afghanistan. Well, first I fault the press. I’ve been saying for years that reporting on war casualties, in Iraq, Afghanistan, or wherever, is defective. The national importance of casualties should be gauged by relative casualties in other, American wars. It’s...

Obama and his staff tried to have Fox News banned from the White House Press Corps, but that plan fell through. What's he to do now? NOTE: The author of this comic requests that you visit his web site and please refrain from copying the cartoon within this thread. Thanks!

We need to make some big numbers on this thing. Fox may not be perfect, but its the best we have in terms of Television.

In a flashback to Viet Nam, we get a foreshadowing of the Obama strategy in Afghanistan. Apparently disappointed by his handpicked General, Stanley McChrystal’s request for 40,000 more troops, General-in-Chief Obama has decide to run the Afghan war from Washington. To do that, according to the Washington Post, he has asked for a detailed report on that country, province by province. In a short while, McChrystal will be relegated to a powerless background position, just close enough to the action to act as a sacrificial lamb when the whole thing goes bust. ... That’s how we lost Viet Nam. Remember...

CAIRO – The Middle East's most powerful Islamic political movement is undergoing a leadership struggle as young, more moderate activists try to push the Muslim Brotherhood to soften its fundamentalist ideology and become a more democratic force. The direction the Brotherhood takes could have wider implications. The group is the strongest opposition movement in Egypt, though officially banned. Moreover, it is highly influential beyond Egypt's borders as the father of Islamic movements across the Arab and Muslim world — including the Palestinian militant group Hamas. Egypt's autocratic government has cracked down fiercely on the group, arresting many of its members...

ith Turkey’s prospects for joining the European Union growing more elusive and the country reaching out to predominantly Muslim countries with a vigor not seen in years, a longstanding question is vexing the United States and Europe: Is this large, secular Muslim country turning East instead of West?

It was late February 2003, a few weeks before the U.S. invasion of Iraq, and President George W. Bush's administration still lacked a real strategy for the would-be regional hegemon next door. As the Iran desk officer in the office of the secretary of defense, I felt desperate. We were about to invade Iraq without a definitive policy toward its most bitter foe. I feared a repeat of Vietnam and saw in Iran a new Ho Chi Minh Trail -- the enemy lifeline that snaked through Laos and Cambodia and helped dash U.S. hopes for Southeast Asia. I knew that...

The United States is cutting back on luxuries and distractions such as salsa and karaoke nights to free up space for troops fighting an increasingly violent eight-year war in Afghanistan. Kandahar airfield is the main air transport hub for the U.S.-led NATO mission in Afghanistan and is so cramped its sewage pool is almost overflowing. But the plan to cut recreational facilities is causing a bigger stink.

Here is a video report on President Obama making a surprise visit to Dover Air Force Base in Dover, Delaware overnight to greet the caskets of U.S. Soldiers and DEA Agents killed in Afghanistan. Obama made the trip in the middle of the night, and returned to the White House around 5:00 this morning. Obama lifted the ban on media coverage of military dead returning to the U.S. . . . (VIDEO)

The problem is that the President, by his indecision, is endangering our troops who are already massively imperiled. He is signaling to our enemies that America is irresolute and weak. The loss of American lives in Afghanistan in October alone tells us that the Taliban is getting stronger, emboldened by our lack of leadership.

Perhaps more than any other open-source outfit, the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments has put serious intellectual muscle into examining the implications of waging war in an environment where potential enemies don’t just threaten to use nuclear weapons, they actually detonate a nuclear device. While nuclear disarmament remains a noble aspiration, the world is going in the other direction, that is, more states with more nukes, says CSBA President Andrew Krepinevich in a new report, US Nuclear Forces: Meeting the Challenge of a Proliferated World. From four nuclear states in the 1960s, there are now double that number (adding...

In yet another attempt by the Obama Administration, with the silent help of congress (cowards), our freedom of speech has never been more at risk at being lost than it is right now. Why? Because while Americans were sipping back on a cold tall one, watching baseball and eating popcorn, the enemies were hard at work within our nation; diligently striving to remove the very freedoms we Americas have neglected for far too long . . .

Its 3am in the morning the red phone is ringing in the White House. The President of the United States (The Commander-in-Chief) has convened a group of advisors to advise him how to best answer the call. One wouldn’t what to pick up the call to suddenly as one might be expected to come to a decision so Mr. Soetoro is going to take some time maybe weeks or months to think about how best to answer the phone while he plays a few rounds of golf in the interim. For those of you who warned us that president Barry...

If world powers are not successful in efforts to contain the Iranian nuclear threat, an Israeli strike on Iran could become a reality, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said during a visit to Beirut, the Daily Telegraph reported Monday. The French foreign minister suggested that time was indeed short for a solution to the Iranian threat. "There is the time that Israel will offer us before reacting, because Israel will react as soon as they know clearly that there is a threat." "Israel will not tolerate an Iranian bomb. We know that, all of us," said Kouchner, adding that for...

Wiretap evidence of Radovan Karadzic allegedly discussing the mass slaughter of 300,000 Muslims was unveiled today at the genocide trial of the former Bosnian Serb leader. "The time has come," Alan Tieger, the prosecutor, quoted Mr Karadzic as telling the Bosnian Serb Parliament, as he signed the order to recapture Zepa and Srebrenica, the United Nations safe haven where Bosnian Serb forces killed more than 7,000 Muslim men and boys.

A fierce war of words has erupted in recent weeks between the two major camps in monetary circles. The first camp - the gold bulls/dollar bears - have been loudly voicing their twin belief that the gold price is poised to skyrocket while the dollar price is perched for a collapse. The other side - the gold bears/dollar bulls - are making the counter claim the gold price is setting up for a crash. There is another train of thought espoused by some that a slow, steady decline of the dollar's exchange value, rather than being a catastrophic event, is...

The U.S. military needs better dialogue with China to avoid "mistakes and miscalculations" given an unprecedented military expansion stoking uncertainty in the region, top U.S. defe nse officials said Wednesday.

An increasingly popular movement in this country is that of “libertarianism.” Ron Paul most recently brought it into the national spotlight with his token run for the White House. However instead of this movement being focused on liberty another concept jumps to the forefront, non-interventionism.This is a foreign policy which holds that political rulers should avoid alliances with other nations and avoid all wars not related to direct territorial self-defense. However, the belief that there are barriers or certain limits on how liberty must be pursued seems to be the mantra of many “libertarians.” The whole idea of non-interventionism as...

US army bases will appear on the Black Sea Coast – in Bulgaria and Romania. About $50 million will be assigned to build the base in Romania, and the Pentagon plans to spend $60 million more for the same purpose in Bulgaria. The Romanian base is expected to be put in operation in 2010, whereas the second one will most likely be launched in 2011 or 2012. Over 4,000 US military men are expected to serve at the two bases: 1,600 in Romania and 2,500 in Bulgaria. The authorities of the two nations expect that the US military men will...

The image of young women in a hot , dusty combat zone toting automatic weapons is still startling to some. But right now there are 10,000 women serving in Iraq, more than 4,000 in Aghanistan. They have been fighting and dying next to their male comrades since the wars began. "I can't help but think most Americans think women aren't in combat," says Specialist Ashley Pullen who was awarded a Bronze Star for valor in 2005 for her heroic action in Iraq where she served with a military police unit. "We're here and we're right up with the guys." Technically...

MAISONCELLE, France — The heavy clay-laced mud behind the cattle pen on Antoine Renault’s farm looks as treacherous as it must have been nearly 600 years ago, when King Henry V rode from a spot near here to lead a sodden and exhausted English Army against a French force that was said to outnumber his by as much as five to one. snip...They devastated a force of heavily armored French nobles who had gotten bogged down in the region’s sucking mud, riddled by thousands of arrows from English longbowmen and outmaneuvered by common soldiers with much lighter gear. It would...

If the White House wants to discredit Dick Cheney on his statements about their handling of Afghanistan, then why not make the report Cheney referred to public? Could it be that the report is true, that the former Vice President is speaking the truth? The Administration doesn't want to release any document that would disrupt or dispel their campaign to blame everything on the Bush Administration. The latest being that the past administration ignored Afghanistan for seven years and President Obama needs time to develop a new strategy. Now with a run off election scheduled for Afghanistan it allows him...

The left may be pressuring President Obama to exit Afghanistan. But their heroes—from FDR to JFK—promoted U.S. involvement in more wars than all modern GOP presidents combined. Should President Barack Obama continue his escalation of the wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan, it will be the liberal thing to do. What too few Americans realize—especially the president’s anti-war supporters, who accuse him of betraying liberal or "progressive" values—is that if he accedes to General Stanley McChrystal's request for more troops in Afghanistan and intensifies the drone attacks in Pakistan, he will follow squarely in the footsteps of the great liberal statesmen...

Former Vice President Dick Cheney says that the Obama administration should stop blaming the Bush administration for failures in Afghanistan and that its indecision over a war strategy is endangering U.S. troops. "Half-measures keep you half-exposed," Mr. Cheney said during a speech Wednesday night at the Center for Security Policy in Washington. "It's time for President Obama to do what it takes to win a war that he has repeatedly and rightly called a war of necessity. . . . It's easier to blame the Bush administration than support our troops."

WASHINGTON, DC--(Marketwire - October 21, 2009) - Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, announced today that since the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Iran and China lead the world in stealing sensitive U.S. military equipment and technology according to documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) from the Justice Department's National Security Division. The documents include a report entitled, "Significant Export Control Cases Since September 2001," which was prepared by the Counter Espionage Section (CES), and includes the charges, investigative agency, defendants and disposition of each case.

While our Narcissus-in-Chief is frozen gazing at his perfect image in his private pool, choices have to be made in Afghanistan. Consider the following: (a) We have a Democratically controlled Congress that by and large has supported, since 2004, the Kerry-Obama-Hillary Clinton narrative of a "good" war in Afghanistan, supposedly shamefully neglected by George Bush's neo-con adventure in Iraq, but absolutely vital to the security of the United States, and one entirely winnable — if only we allot sufficient resources. (b) We have a proven command in Generals McChrystal and Petraeus and their circle of subordinates, who crafted a winning...

The recent defection of the daughter of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s film advisor to Germany is the latest clue to a non-military "cold war” against a nuclear Iran. Iranian filmmaker Narges Kalhor, whose father is Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s cultural affairs advisor and a media spokesman, has applied for political asylum in Germany.

Ask the Norwegians who pick the Nobel Peace Prize recipient this question: “Which part of Europe are you from? The part whose butt we saved or the part whose butt we kicked?” They’d have to answer the former but only reluctantly because their answer would open a discussion about the ideology behind their bizarre choice of President Barack Obama as the 2009 prize winner. The Nobel committee has been widely and rightly ridiculed for that choice since the American president has yet to do anything to make the world a more peaceful place. They gave Obama the prize for making...

A Great Chinese Thriller…Pass!Posted By Michael Mandaville On October 18, 2009 @ 5:48 pm In Politics | 11 Comments I thought about writing a script about China – thriller, action, intrigue.  The last film that dealt with China would be “Red Corner” which a Wikipedia review said, “…more the movie’s subtext swallows its story, until all that is left is Gere’s superior virtue, intermixed with his superior virility — both of which are greatly appreciated by the evidently under-serviced Chinese female population…”  The film was banned in China.  But it’s fertile ground for material.  Imagine the conversation with a Studio...

Reporting from Kabul, Afghanistan, and Washington - Before President Obama commits additional troops to Afghanistan, the U.S. needs assurances that Afghan leaders preside over a stable government that is legitimate in the eyes of its citizens, top Democratic officials said in TV appearances Sunday. White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, on CNN's "State of the Union," said the overriding question facing the Obama administration is whether it has "a credible Afghan partner for this process that can provide the security and the type of services that the Afghan people need." The White House is in the midst of a...

The White House is now signaling that no troop decision will be made until after the Afghanistan election is resolved. It would be irresponsible to send more troops to Afghanistan until a legitimate and credible government is in place, the White House and top Democrats said Sunday. White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel said the most critical issue facing U.S. strategy is whether the Afghans can be an effective partner in destroying Al Qaeda safe havens and bringing stability to the region. "It would be reckless to make a decision on U.S. troop levels if in fact you haven't...

YOUR OWN LANDMINES BOXES OF GRENADES FULLY AUTOMATIC ASSAULT RIFLES thelastcrusade.org How do you get Somali Muslims to participate in an educational contest? Do you lure them with a luxury cruise as top prize? Do you give them a chance to win a walk around the Kaaba free of charge? No, you offer them a chance to win one-way ticket to jihad, replete with a cache of AK-47 assault rifles, a box of grenades, and a few anti-tank landmines. Should they get killed in the struggle, the top prize winners are sure to enter seventh heaven where seventy houris...

A Palestinian Authority official has admitted that while the PA has been urging the International Criminal Court (ICC) to pursue war crimes charges against IDF troops, the only evidence the PA has been able to supply is the Goldstone panel's report, which was approved by the United Nations Human Rights Commission last week. PA Justice Minister Ali Al-Khashan said Saturday that anyone expecting quick action by the court on the alleged Israeli war crimes needed to "have patience," because "we do not have any documentation for the Israeli crimes." He said that the PA was hoping to join the ICC...

All nations eventually fail. Some go peacefully; others in paroxysms of violence and bloodshed. All that I have examined were guilty, at least in part, of nurturing the process. Even given that, one is hard pressed to imagine how a democratic or an autocratic government can be expected to survive. To wit: Democracies do not start wars (with the exception of the US under Lincoln). Further, citizens are not by nature war like and see no need to shed blood and treasure to acquire an empire. Empires acquired by any means eventually will cause their own demise. FDR had to...

Think last summer's $4 a gallon prices at the pump were painful? Imagine being the US Military, which pays around $400 a gallon in Afghanistan according to the Pentagon comptroller's office in a report to the House Appropriations Defense panel.

Rising Oil Prices May Be The Forerunner To War Ron Coby Oct 16, 2009 9:45 am Traders’ fears that an impending attack on Iran by either the US or Israel is related to the rise in oil prices. The headlines are widely publicizing the new highs being made in gold. Soon the news may be directed to gushing gold in the energy space … Black Gold. Many of the fundamental reports I read on oil say that there’s an “oil glut”, and that the world is “swimming in oil”. That may in fact be true, but our motto at Coby...

BEIRUT - After the second mysterious explosion since July levelled a Hizbollah member’s home, Israel has formally complained to the United Nations that the militia continues to maintain weapons stockpiles south of the Litani River, along the Israel-Lebanon border, in defiance of the ceasefire that ended the July 2006 war. In both cases, Israel immediately released footage from cameras on unmanned drones showing what are thought to be Hizbollah members emptying both buildings of what appear to be rockets before UN and Lebanese army forces were allowed into the villages to investigate. Monday’s blast was almost identical to an explosion...

Senators diverted $2.6 billion in funds in a defense spending bill to pet projects largely at the expense of accounts that pay for fuel, ammunition and training for U.S. troops, including those fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to an analysis.

(IsraelNN.com) The IDF Intelligence video released this week showing Hizbullah terrorists stockpiling long-range missiles is the proof that Israel needs to “take off its gloves” in the next round of warfare. So says long-time military analyst Yisrael Katzover, speaking with Arutz-7’s Hebrew newsmagazine. The video footage, released on Tuesday of this week, shows the terrorists taking missiles and other weaponry out of a southern Lebanon warehouse, where an explosion had occurred the day before, and loading them onto trucks. United Nations ceasefire resolution 1701 that ended the Second Lebanon War of 2006 clearly bans such activity...