Free Republic

On Friday Nigel Farage sought to minimise his personal relationship with Trump. “I happen to know him, but that’s by the by,” said the Reform UK leader. Farage told the FT the bilateral partnership was “our most important relationship in the world . . . whether it’s [Joe] Biden in the White House or Trump.” Last year he said he hoped to become prime minister “quickly while Donald Trump is still in office.” Lord David Frost, the UK’s former Brexit negotiator, made an even more dramatic shift this week. The Conservative peer, who once welcomed Trump’s re-election as the “first...

Tuesday on CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) said the evidence that Iran was an imminent threat to the United States was not there.Co-host Joe Kernen said, “You have such a tough job. I asked Senator Scott, and he said, I love Senator Paul because you never waver, but everybody wavers. I was going to ask you about war powers, and the Constitution is messy, and to stick with it as you do in the real world, it’s hard. I don’t know why you even have this job. It must be so difficult at this point for you, right?...

President Donald Trump issued a fresh military threat against Iran on Sunday, saying U.S. forces are prepared to “finish up the little that is left of Iran” after marathon peace talks failed to clinch a deal to end more than six weeks of war. U.S. officials left drawn-out negotiations in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, in the early hours of Sunday without a breakthrough or answers on what could come next after a temporary, two-week ceasefire expires. Trump announced the pause in attacks on April 7. Rounding off a lengthy message on Truth Social, Trump added: "We are fully “LOCKED AND...

Video at link. About 50 minutes. A very good source of news that often includes cell phone video from inside Iran. Navy aircraft are being prepared for night time operations over Iran.

President Donald Trump announced a U.S. blockade on the Strait of Hormuz on Sunday. Trump made the announcement in a post on his Truth Social account, blaming the failure to reach a deal with Iran during talks in Pakistan this weekend. "So, there you have it, the meeting went well, most points were agreed to, but the only point that really mattered, NUCLEAR, was not. Effective immediately, the United States Navy, the Finest in the World, will begin the process of BLOCKADING any and all Ships trying to enter, or leave, the Strait of Hormuz," Trump wrote. "At some point,...

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Vice President JD Vance said the US and Iran failed to strike a peace deal to end the six-week war rocking the Middle East, blaming Tehran’s refusal to give up its nuclear ambitions — leaving uncertainty over whether fighting will resume. Vance delivered the quick-hit update after 21 hours of grueling negotiations in Pakistan, noting meaningful discussions were held with Iran but none that brokered a deal on terms laid out by the US. “The bad news is that we have not reached an agreement,” Vance told reporters in Islamabad. “And I think that’s bad news for...

An Iranian negotiating delegation led by Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqher Ghalibaf arrived in Islamabad Friday ahead of Saturday’s peace talks with the United States, which Ghalibaf demanded accept Iran’s “preconditions” before talks could begin. Speaking from Islamabad, Ghalibaf claimed Iran had goodwill toward negotiations but no trust in the United States, adding that the Islamic Republic was ready to reach a deal if Washington offered what he described as a genuine agreement and granted Iran its rights, Iranian state media reported. Ghalibaf stated earlier that Tehran’s demands include a ceasefire in Lebanon, which Iran and mediating Pakistan have stated was...

The Iranian regime is once again proving why it cannot be trusted. Despite a delicate ceasefire agreement, Iran is already backsliding, attempting to choke off the world’s oil supply and reportedly shaking down tankers for “tolls” in the Strait of Hormuz. The Gateway Pundit reported on Wednesday that Fars News Agency, the official propaganda arm directly linked to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), reported that tanker traffic is now “suspended” after Israel continued hammering Hezbollah. PBS journalist Elizabeth Landers confirmed that President Trump told her directly: Israel’s war against Hezbollah in Lebanon is NOT part of the ceasefire deal.

Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump All U.S. Ships, Aircraft, and Military Personnel, with additional Ammunition, Weaponry, and anything else that is appropriate and necessary for the lethal prosecution and destruction of an already substantially degraded Enemy, will remain in place in, and around, Iran, until such time as the REAL AGREEMENT reached is fully complied with. If for any reason it is not, which is highly unlikely, then the “Shootin’ Starts,” bigger, and better, and stronger than anyone has ever seen before. It was agreed, a long time ago, and despite all of the fake rhetoric to the contrary - NO...

Megyn Kelly on "Piers Morgan Uncensored" discussed the damage sustained by the Trump political coalition, the global economy, and U.S. allies, after 40 days at war with Iran. “The question is now not, who has Trump lost. The question is who remains," she said about the MAGA coalition. "He’s underwater with men, including young men and young people. The young person coalition that Charlie Kirk delivered to the president is gone. They’ve abandoned Donald Trump." "These battles in the Middle East have been fought now for 20-plus years, and we continue to learn the same lesson over and over. It’s...

Top aides have privately made the case to President Trump in recent days that Iran’s power-generating facilities and bridges are legitimate military targets because destroying them could cripple the country’s missile and nuclear programs, officials say. Trump embraced the rationale, sharply questioned by legal experts and human-rights groups, in a nationwide address Wednesday when he vowed to bomb Iran “back to the stone ages.” By Saturday, as an urgent rescue mission was under way to find a missing U.S. aviator whose aircraft was shot down in Iran, the president showed no signs of backing down on the new strategy. “Remember...

A Kuwaiti oil tanker off the coast of Dubai was set ablaze Tuesday after being struck by an Iranian drone, according to reports. The fully-loaded Al Salmi tanker suffered damage to its hull and firefighters battled to control the flames, the Kuwait News Agency reported. The 24 people on board the vessel were rescued and there were no oil spills, the Dubai government confirmed. Officials are now investigating the scale of the damage caused to the vessel, which has been in operation since 2011. The strike comes as oil prices continue to fluctuate while the Strait of Hormuz remains closed....

President Trump shared jaw-dropping video footage Monday of a massive explosion in Iran reportedly caused by a US airstrike on a large ammunition depot in Isfahan. A “high volume” of 2,000-pound bunker buster bombs was used in the strike posted by Trump on Truth Social, a US official told the Wall Street Journal. The footage that caught the president’s eye is one of several videos of fiery blasts that have taken place in Isfahan, the country’s third-most populous city and the location of the majority of Tehran’s 60% enriched uranium as well as a sprawling “missile city”.

It's hard to imagine greater courage than taking to the streets to protest against a heavily armed repressive regime that is willing to kill you in cold blood. For the more than 35,000 - and up to 80,000 Iranians who paid with their lives for showing this courage in January, the hope now is that they did not die in vain. Yet as the war the war enters its third week, the dreams of so many Iranians that their odious regime will collapse are hanging in the balance. The joint US-Israeli attacks have done much to weaken the regime militarily,...

President Donald Trump’s war with Iran is not going well. He began the conflict with a promise to use an air campaign to initiate regime change in as little as “two or three days.” But about three weeks in, Iran’s government, military and security forces remain highly functional. No popular uprising has emerged. And Iran’s government has seized control of the Strait of Hormuz, sending global oil prices surging and Trump into a panic. Robert Pape, a political scientist at the University of Chicago, is one of the analysts who saw this situation coming a long way off. An expert...

Iran says it is targeting Dimona, which houses Israel’s main nuclear research center, as a “response” to an earlier strike on the Natanz nuclear enrichment site. The Israel Defense Forces said it was not responsible for striking Natanz.

History offers a recurring pattern that conventional history tends not to recognize: governments overreach abroad, miscalculate badly, and the resulting strain — financial, political, and psychological — comes home to roost in the form of unrest, rebellion, or outright civil war. The public is usually fed lofty justifications at the outset, but in the aftermath, real consequences expose hidden, deeper structural weaknesses. France in the late 18th century. The monarchy’s heavy involvement in foreign wars—most notably the Seven Years’ War and then the expensive intervention in the American Revolution—left the country financially crippled. While the American venture is celebrated as...

Trump supporters who backed his promise to avoid new Middle East wars worry Iran’s attacks on shipping are pushing the U.S. toward escalation — and maybe even boots on the ground.When the U.S. started firing Tomahawk missiles at Iran late last month, many of President Donald Trump’s allies hoped it would be a quick, surgical operation, similar to last year’s strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities or the ouster of Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro in January. Though uneasy, they were reassured by the belief that Trump’s open-ended objectives gave him the flexibility to declare victory whenever he saw fit. Now, more...

Russia has delivered more than 13 tons of emergency medical supplies to Iran via Azerbaijan, as the ongoing conflict between Iran and the United States and Israel intensifies. The aid package, consisting primarily of medicines and essential hospital equipment, was dispatched on the direct orders of Russian President Vladimir Putin to address urgent healthcare shortages following weeks of heavy bombardment. The humanitarian shipment was transported by a specialised Il-76 aircraft from Russia’s Emergency Situations Ministry to Azerbaijan, from where it was transferred to the Iranian Red Crescent Society for final delivery. The Russian Foreign Ministry stated that the aid was...

Iran's leadership and its triad of threats: nuclear ambiguity, surging missiles, and drone swarms – the very real hegemonic danger that extended far beyond the Middle East.For years, the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA)—the Iran nuclear deal—was sold as a historic diplomatic achievement that blocked Iran's path to a nuclear weapon for a generation. Supporters praised it as pragmatic restraint. Critics, including myself, saw it for what it really was: a temporary pause that let Iran preserve its nuclear infrastructure, accelerate its military capabilities, and wait out the sunset clauses.The deal was never designed to be permanent. Many...