Free Republic

U.S. drivers can look forward to $2 gas later this year, thanks in part to the Iran nuclear deal announced Tuesday. Gas may only dip a few cents when the Iranian oil first starts to flow again, but by September drivers could see big savings. "Once we get past Labor Day, we should see gas falling by 10 to 15 cents a month," said Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst with the Oil Price Information Service. "By December a lot of places are going to see gasoline at $2 or less." Iran hasn't been able to sell oil to the United...

American Decline: Chinese forces head to Syria to join with Russia in filling Obama's power vacuum and purportedly fight the Islamic State. A false move involving NATO member Turkey could mean world war. Russian and Chinese military sources now confirm that Chinese warships are en route to the Middle East to get in on some of the action of humiliating the U.S. In just a week and a half, Moscow has upended the dynamics of power in the Mideast by taking on the role that President Obama relinquished: acting like a superpower in a regional conflict that has implications extending...

Watching the events cascading in Syria makes it eerily easy to see how the political elites of 1914 stumbled into World War I while believing they were pursuing a sensible set of national interests. The parallels are far from precise. The alliances bonding the players in today’s Middle East aren’t as interlocking as those in early 20th-century Europe. The war-mobilizing machinery isn’t as rigid. And, of course, today’s leaders have the precautionary example of World War I to rivet their attention: They know the pitfalls of escalation and the tragic consequences of unbounded warfare—though people don’t always heed the lessons...

<p>NATO said it was prepared to send troops to Turkey to defend its ally after violations of Turkish airspace by Russian jets bombing Syria and Britain scolded Moscow for escalating a civil war that has already killed 250,000 people.</p> <p>Officials at the U.S.-led alliance are still smarting from Russia's weekend incursions into Turkey's airspace near northern Syria and NATO defense ministers are meeting in Brussels with the agenda likely to be dominated by the Syria crisis.</p>

Russian fighter jets shadowed U.S. predator drones on at least three separate occasions high above Syria since the start of Russia's air campaign last week, according to two U.S. officials briefed on this latest intelligence from the region. Meanwhile, U.S. Navy Captain Jeff Davis told reporters a U.S. aircraft flying over Syria had to be rerouted to avoid a Russian fighter jet at least once. "We have taken action to maintain safe separation," Davis said, adding that the U.S. aircraft "changed path a little bit." He did not disclose which type of U.S. aircraft was involved. U.S. officials tell Fox...

Europe must live up to the challenge of an upheaval that has forced hundreds of thousands of refugees to flee Syria, where everyone including Iran, Russia and the West must seek a political solution, French President Francois Hollande said on Wednesday. Speaking alongside German Chancellor Angela Merkel to the European Parliament in Strasbourg, eastern France, Hollande said the risk of failure was "total war" and that Europe, if slow to grasp the scale of the refugee exodus, had now made a start. As for Syria, Hollande reiterated the Paris line that any solution for Syria had to be based on...

Should Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina win the Oval Office, she wouldn’t be making any calls to her counterpart in Russia. “I wouldn’t speak to Vladmir Putin,” Fiorina said. She would, however, rebuild a missile defense program in Poland and conduct military exercises in the Baltic States. “I would guarantee you that after four or five or six months of that kind of behavior, Vladmir Putin will speak differently with the United States of America,” she said. “It’s how people behave. He’s a bully.” Fiorina, the only woman seeking the GOP nomination, is the former CEO of Hewlett-Packard. She ran...

US foreign policy expert Zbigniew Brzezinski says the United States should retaliate if Russia does not stop bombing its assets in Syria. Brzezinski, the national security advisor for former President Jimmy Carter, advised President Barack Obama to attempt to disarm the Russians if they keep attacking the CIA-trained militants in Syria. "The Russian naval and air presences in Syria are vulnerable, isolated geographically from their homeland," Brzezinski wrote in an article published by the Financial Times on Sunday. "They could be 'disarmed' if they persist in provoking the US."

The United States and its NATO allies denounced Russia on Monday for violating Turkish air space along the frontier with Syria, and Ankara threatened to respond if provoked again, raising the prospect of direct confrontation between the Cold War enemies. NATO held an emergency meeting of ambassadors of its 28 member states to respond to what Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg called "unacceptable violations of Turkish air space" after Turkey said a Russian jet had crossed its frontier. NATO members "strongly protest" and "condemn" incursions into Turkish and NATO territory, the alliance said. "Allies also note the extreme danger of such irresponsible...

Dozens of Islamist Saudi Arabian clerics have called on Arab and Muslim countries to "give all moral, material, political and military" support to what they term a jihad, or holy war, against Syria's government and its Iranian and Russian backers. Although the clerics who signed the online statement are not affiliated with the government, their strong sectarian and anti-Christian language reflects mounting anger among many Saudis over Russian and Iranian involvement in Syria's civil war. Russia last week started airstrikes against Syrian opposition targets that it describes as aimed at weakening the jihadist Islamic State group, a move Riyadh has...

Turkey opposes Russia's military intervention in Syria. Turkey scrambles fighter jets to intercept Russian warplanes that Ankara says violated its airspace. The Russians were allegedly making their way to Syria to carry out bombings to support Syria's Assad regime. Turkey opposes Russia's intervention in wartorn Syria and officials have warned that any further violations may be responded to more harshly.

A growing number of Democrats are joining GOP voices in calling for a no-fly zone or a safe zone in Syria where civilians and opposition fighters can go without fear of attack — a step the Obama administration does not back. The calls come after the spectacle of millions of desperate Syrian refugees fleeing to Europe, and an increasing sense that the Pentagon's program to train moderate rebels is failing. They continued even after Russian aircraft entered Syrian airspace this week to go after groups fighting Syrian President Bashar Assad, including rebels backed by the U.S. Former Secretary of State...

Clueless Carly Fiorina Would Create A NO-FLY Zone To Protect Non-ISIS Terrorist Groups Who Are Slaughtering Christians In Syria. Carly Fiorina says she would consider shooting down Russian fighter jets if necessary…the same Russian fighter jets that are trying to protect Assad, the Syrian leader who has kept his Christian population safe from Muslim terrorists all these years…until ISIS and the Obama-backed Free Syrian Rebels started trying to take him down. These non-ISIS “rebels” whom Carly Fiorina calls “allies” are actually al-Qaeda linked groups like al-Nusra, or the now virtually defunct Free Syrian Army, down to 5 or 6 fighters,...

Russian fighter jets launched from a new airbase in Syria have persuaded western critics to mute their demands for the removal of President Bashar al-Assad, but another group of his opponents sees Moscow’s intervention as more provocative than decisive. Regional powers have quietly, but effectively, channelled funds, weapons and other support to rebel groups making the biggest inroads against the forces from Damascus. In doing so, they are investing heavily in a conflict which they see as part of a wider regional struggle for influence with bitter rival Iran. In a week when Russia made dozens of bombing raids, those...

I'm FOX challenged but today I had live feeds all over the place because of the Senate vote. Tonight, I'm now listening to a report that Putin has bombed the middle east and no one seems to know what is going on

For years, Republicans have criticised Barack Obama for not doing more to stop the brutalities carried out by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime and to fight Isis. But what they think Obama should do and what the long-term solution might be remained hazy. -snip- Republican rising star Carly Fiorina had already called on the US to enforce a no-fly zone in Syria to protect US-backed rebel fighters, as had Jeb Bush in unequivocal terms. On Friday, another Republican presidential contender joined their camp: “You enter that no-fly zone, you enter at your own peril,” said Governor John Kasich. “No more...

Saying the U.S. needs to provide “moral leadership,” Ohio Gov. John Kasich called on Friday for the establishment of no-fly zones in Syria and again recommended a coalition of ground troops in that nation. At a news conference in New Hampshire, Kasich said he is worried that Russia’s decision to drop bombs in Syria will exacerbate that nation’s troubles. No-fly zones, he said, are needed to prevent casualties and more refugees. “You enter that no-fly zone, you enter at your own peril," Kasich said. “No more red lines, no more looking the other way. If any hostile aircraft should enter...

Both the Democratic front-runner and the Republican rising star think the US should declare and enforce a no-fly zone in Syria. Military experts say it could set up a showdown with Russia that would be best to avoid. Here’s a surprise – Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton and Republican rising star Carly Fiorina agree on something big. Both think the US should declare and enforce a no-fly zone in Syria to protect civilians and US-backed rebel fighters. Former Secretary of State Clinton’s pronouncement on this emphasized its humanitarian aspects. “I personally would be advocating now for a no-fly zone and humanitarian...

MOSCOW (Reuters) - International monitors say they have spotted a new kind of Russian weapons system in rebel-held Ukraine this week, possible evidence of Moscow's continued interest in Ukraine even as it focuses on Syria. The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, which is monitoring a ceasefire in eastern Ukraine, reported that its monitors had seen a mobile TOS-1 'Buratino' weapons system for the first time. The Buratino is equipped with thermobaric warheads which spread a flammable liquid around a target and then ignite it. It can destroy several city blocks in one strike and cause indiscriminate damage. Only...

BEIRUT/MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia bombed Syria for a third day on Friday, mainly hitting areas held by rival insurgent groups rather than the Islamic State fighters it said it was targeting and drawing an increasingly angry response from the West. The U.S.-led coalition that is waging its own air war against Islamic State called on the Russians to halt strikes on targets other than Islamic State. "We call on the Russian Federation to immediately cease its attacks on the Syrian opposition and civilians and to focus its efforts on fighting ISIL," said the coalition, which includes the United States, major...