Free Republic

BUREIJ, Gaza Strip — On Friday, the annual congress of FIFA, the governing body of world soccer, is scheduled to vote on a proposal to suspend Israel from the organization. The Palestine Football Association called for this measure because Israel prevents our national team from participating in normal training, travel and competition. If the corruption scandal now enveloping FIFA derails the vote, we will continue to press the issue. The Palestine national team has belonged to FIFA since 1998, but we do not trust the current president, Sepp Blatter, to represent our interests. Past assurances to act have not been...

For a time, reset, concessions and appeasement work to delay wars. But finally, nations wake up, grasp their blunders, rearm and face down enemies. That gets dangerous. The shocked aggressors cannot quite believe that their targets are suddenly serious and willing to punch back. Usually, the bullies foolishly press aggression, and war breaks out. It was insane of Nazi Germany and its Axis partners to even imagine that they could defeat the Allied trio of Imperial Britain, the Soviet Union and the United States. But why not try? Hitler figured that for a decade America had been unarmed and isolationist....

A Chinese state owned newspaper warns of a conflict with the US, unless Washington stops demanding that China halts land reclamation and construction projects in the South China Sea. The Global Times says ‘War is inevitable’ unless the US backs down on Chinese land reclamation and the consequent rights to territorial boundaries of such man made islands. The islands that are man-made are in disputed waters of several regional nations. Some of these nations have close ties with the United States. The US maintains that it is also maintaining the free passage of the waters of the South China Sea for all...

After Chinese state media warned that war with the United States may be “inevitable,” Beijing has published a policy paper detailing how the military will shift its focus from land and coastlines to the open seas. China’s State Council released a white paper today that criticizes “external countries…busy meddling in South China Sea affairs” and sets out an “active defense” military strategy for the country. The paper comes a day after an editorial (link in Chinese) in the state-run Chinese tabloid Global Times said conflict between China and the US will be unavoidable if the Washington doesn’t lay off Beijing...

Now, with Beijing set to enforce what is effectively a no-fly zone over its new sovereign ‘territory’ we bring you the following graphic from WSJ which shows that when it comes to sheer size, China’s air force and Navy are beyond compare. China’s promise to beef up its naval capabilities to prevent further “meddling” and “provocative actions” by rivals in the South China Sea is a daunting prospect for most of its neighbors, which already view Beijing’s fast-improving armed forces with trepidation... As a recent Pentagon review of China’s military modernization drive noted, “China is investing in capabilities designed to...

The detail hindsight forgets, and the fiction murky memories create We’ve been coming back to the Iraq War lately for two reasons. One is that the media keep bringing it up in the form of a knowing-what-we-know-now gotcha question aimed at Republican presidential candidates (although they offer no such question to Hillary Clinton concerning the 2011 withdrawl of all U.S. troops . . . not that she would answer). The other, more pertinent reason, is that ISIS is overrunning Iraq at the moment, taking advantage of the absence of a residual U.S. force and Barack Obama’s refusal to wage a...

Our friends from Prager University have released another great video. The subject (for Memorial Day): is America the world’s policeman? And if so, is that a good thing, or a bad thing? Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist and foreign affairs expert Bret Stephens weighs in: [VIDEO] Let me share my Dutch perspective on this matter: I thank God every day that the United States is the world’s only superpower and that it behaves like an international policeman. Think about it: what’s the alternative? If the United States withdraws, Russia and China will immediately expand their sphere of influence. These countries are ruled...

That'll show 'em. MSNBC has a new show! It’s hosted by former Pennsylvania Representative Patrick Murphy (D-of course). It’s called “Taking the Hill” and this weekend it featured an appearance by everyone’s favorite former Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi. Murphy asked Pelosi about Obama’s failing battle against ISIS, but Pelosi wasn’t interested in admitting that things aren’t going so well. Instead, she decided to highlight one of the areas where we are, apparently, making some truly “impressive advances” against our barbaric opponents. Are we bombing them back into the stone age? Not really. Are we killing them at a...

China's forces will no longer be limited to defence of the nation's territory but will project its military power further beyond its borders at sea and more assertively in the air in order to safeguard its maritime possessions, the white paper states. While the air force will shift focus from "territorial air defence" to both offence and defence, the Chinese army will increase its global mobility and its artillery will improve its "medium and long-range precision strikes", it said

In Harm’s Way: The Forgotten Service of Military Chaplains George J. Galloway In Otto Preminger’s 1965 classic movie In Harm’s Way, starring John Wayne as “Rock Torrey” and Kirk Douglas as “Commander Paul Eddington,” there’s an interesting dialogue that ensues after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the subsequent return of the cruiser Swayback to the lagoon-shaped sanctuary, now burial ground for thousands of American sailors, in Oahu. It’s a direct reference to a famous quote from John Paul Jones: “I wish to have no connection with any ship that does not sail fast, for I intend to go in harm’s...

Statement from Washington Post Executive Editor Martin Baron ahead of Jason Rezaian’s trial in Iran: The shameful acts of injustice continue without end in the treatment of Washington Post correspondent Jason Rezaian. Now we learn his trial will be closed to the world. And so it will be closed to the scrutiny it fully deserves. It’s worth recalling what kind of system we’re dealing with. Jason was arrested without charges. He was imprisoned in Iran’s worst prison. He was placed in isolation for many months and denied medical care he needed. His case was assigned to a judge internationally notorious...

This Memorial Day is special to those of us who served in the 173rd Airborne Brigade (Sep.) in Vietnam because this month marks the 50th anniversary of the Sky Soldiers deployment to Vietnam. The deployment marked the beginning of the American takeover of the Vietnam ground war.

Do Americans really want to remember their war heroes? If by saying “remember,” we mean it in the same sense in which we remember things like the 2004 World Series, the television show Cheers, or the Ford administration, then sure, we can take some time to think of those who have given their lives in war. But in reality, Memorial Day ought to involve something more substantive than merely remembering. What the day really calls for is commemorating, but very little in our contemporary culture is particularly attuned to having the orientation toward history that would make this truly...

Ronald Reagan tells it like it is, America is the last stand on earth. If the US is taken over then the planet is lost. A Time for Choosing speech Oct 27, 1964 excerpt

A Chinese state-owned newspaper said on Monday that "war is inevitable" between China and the United States over the South China Sea unless Washington stops demanding Beijing halt the building of artificial islands in the disputed waterway. The Global Times, an influential nationalist tabloid owned by the ruling Communist Party's official newspaper the People's Daily, said in an editorial that China was determined to finish its construction work, calling it the country's "most important bottom line".

Congress should act immediately on President Obama's request for new use of force powers in the fight against Islamic militants, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Thursday. “The ball is definitely in our court to take up this issue,” Pelosi said during a press briefing in the Capitol. “There should be an authorization for the use of military force as we go forward. It's long overdue.” The remarks were a rebuke of Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), who earlier this week called Obama's war powers request “irresponsible” and urged the president to “start over” with a fresh proposal. “The president's...

According to first unconfirmed reports, central Tehran was hit Sunday night with massive blasts leaving many hundreds of people dead. Witnesses report heavy Revolutionary Guards and Basij forces speeding to the area. Thee are also reports of explosions in the southern Iranian town of Isfahan - also unconfirmed.

Seventy years ago, we celebrated the end of World War II in Europe. That celebration is not the first memory of my childhood but it is one of the clearest. I was a 5-year-old boy in Cape Town, South Africa, proudly displaying a paper Union Jack, the familiar British flag, and watching the victory parade. I often wonder where the flags came from — before offset printing and photocopying — in time for the parade. Someone knew victory was at hand. There was a palpable, universal happiness — though more subdued, I am told, than the outbursts that greeted the...

Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei stated this week that Iran "will not allow any inspections of military sites by foreigners." He also vowed to resist "coercion and excessive demands" on the part of a "brazen enemy," meaning the U.S. U.S. President Barack Obama was not overly concerned by those statements. A nuclear agreement with Iran is essentially a done deal as far as Obama is concerned, so Iranian rhetoric no longer carries any weight. So goes the thinking at the White House. In fact, Obama is much more perturbed by what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on election day some...

JASON REZAIAN, a journalist who was born and raised in California, moved to Iran in 2008 with the hope of promoting a better understanding of his father’s homeland. After joining The Post in 2012, he wrote about political and economic issues but also took on such subjects as Iranian baseball. He earned the respect of senior officials: Mohammad Javad Zarif, Iran’s foreign minister, has called him “a friend” and “a good reporter.” Mr. Rezaian nevertheless is scheduled to go on trial Tuesday, along with his wife, Yeganeh Salehi, and a photographer, in Tehran’s Revolutionary Court. Arrested at home July 22,...