Free Republic

Donald Trump clashed with Pete Hegseth over a claim that a US munitions shortage could limit his options in the Iran war, according to reports. The US president confronted his defence secretary at Camp David, his country retreat in Maryland, demanding to know why he had been misled about the missile shortage. The clash occurred on the sidelines of Mr Trump’s cabinet meeting on Friday, at which he said that he thought the missile issue “had been fixed”, two people familiar with the matter told the Washington Post. The White House dismissed the claims as “fake news”, denying that the...

Anger over depleted US weapon inventories broke into the open at Camp David, where President Donald Trump pressed Secretary of War Pete Hegseth on why he had been kept in the dark regarding severe missile deficits that are now restricting military maneuvers against Iran, The Washington Post reported on Wednesday, citing two individuals familiar with the matter. According to the report, the tense interaction occurred on the sidelines of a Friday Cabinet meeting. Trump reportedly expressed sharp irritation, indicating he assumed the supply deficit “had been fixed", according to sources who spoke to The Post on the condition of anonymity....

President Trump has set aside, at least for now, plans to sharply escalate the American military assault against Iran, with particular concern that intensifying the war could dangerously drain the Pentagon’s already diminished stockpile of Patriot antimissile interceptors and other air defense munitions in the Middle East. The threat to interceptor stockpiles is one of many considerations that have made a return to major combat operations a hugely risky endeavor, administration officials say. Mr. Trump and his top aides are also uneasy about the prospect of a widening war in the Middle East, the alienation of key Gulf allies who...

he U.S. military's Central Command repeated an assertion on Tuesday evening that has been made by the Trump administration many times over the last two weeks, insisting that "despite Iranian aggression, the Strait of Hormuz remains open for commercial vessel traffic." Despite the U.S. president and military continuing to urge vessels to use a southern route through the strait, in defiance of Iran's threats, few shippers seem willing to risk it. The Joint Maritime Information Center in Bahrain, a military partnership that includes the U.S., said commercial traffic in the Strait of Hormuz fell to a three-week low on Tuesday...

President Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday shared a video of himself rallying troops at Kupyansk, a city Russia claimed to have taken control of. In the video, the city limit sign for Kupyansk is visible in the background, with intermittent explosions audible. The Kremlin claimed to have captured the city in late November and invited journalists to visit it alongside Russian troops. Zelensky rallied troops and said battlefield gains could influence ongoing peace talks.

Senator Forest-Niesing was double vaccinated for COVID but suffered from an autoimmune condition that affected her lungs, according to a statement from her office on Tuesday. Her staff also said they were unsure how she contracted the virus....

Let me be clear: Trump will be president for another four years. Biden will not be president. Yes, I know those are shocking words in these crazy days. Let me be clear: Trump will be president for another four years. Biden will not be president. Yes, I know those are shocking words in these crazy days. I have been approached by many saying, “It’s over…” and “Trump conceded the election…”. Nothing of the sort has taken place. Go back and listen to the videos all the way through. At no point does Trump even mention Biden’s name. At no point...

As the army takes control of Egypt, demonstrators in favour of the ousted president feel isolated and ignored. Cairo - The fireworks celebrating Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi’s removal by the military are visible a few kilometres away, where thousands of his supporters are holding a sit-in, a protest they plan to continue until Morsi is reinstated. Hours after his removal, the mood at the rally, outside a mosque in Cairo’s Nasr City neighbourhood, was sombre and confused. Supporters of Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood wondered how the man who last year became Egypt’s first democratically-elected president could be ousted so...

At least 73 people have been killed in fan clashes following a football match in the Egyptian city of Port Said, state television reports. The deaths occurred after supporters invaded the pitch following a match between top-tier clubs Masry and al-Ahly on Wednesday. It is feared the death toll could rise as scores have been injured. Some of the dead were security officers, the Associated Press quoted a morgue official as saying. The BBC's Jon Leyne in Cairo says it appears fans had taken knives into the stadium. Our correspondent says the lack of the usual level of security in...

Survey: Most Economists See Recession End in '09 By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS May 27, 2009 WASHINGTON (AP) -- More than 90 percent of economists predict the recession will end this year, although the recovery is likely to be bumpy. That assessment came from leading forecasters in a survey by the National Association for Business Economics to be released Wednesday. It is generally in line with the outlook from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and his colleagues. About 74 percent of the forecasters expect the recession -- which started in December 2007 and is the longest since World War II --...