Free Republic

Seldom, if ever, in the history of war did the opening event eliminate the senior leadership of the opponent.Victor Davis Hanson has just published a rather thorough description of the current structure of Iran’s government. Suffice it to say we are “negotiating” with ambiguity. Should one want to find who’s most in charge, he’d need look no farther than the Islamic Revolutionary Gard Corps (IRGC) simply because they have the most guns.Further inhibiting the progress of negotiations is the Persian cultural predisposition to deal with strangers in bad faith. Fortunately, this is fairly common knowledge, although unhinged critics of President...

President Donald Trump on Thursday said he would be “honored” to meet Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei. The U.S. president said he would meet the Iranian leader if a deal is reached to end the U.S.-Iran war, which has dragged on into its fourth month. Trump was taking questions from reporters in the Oval Office after making an announcement about coal. “If we make a deal, it’s possible that I would meet,” he said. “I’d be okay with that.” Khamenei was named the supreme leader in Iran after his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was killed on the first day...

Have you wondered what happened to Project Freedom? That was the operation President Donald Trump announced about helping ships get out of the Persian Gulf and transit through the Strait of Hormuz, in the face of potential threats from Iran. Then it was stopped, and we didn't hear much about it. Turns out it appears to have been going on, in some measure, right under the nose of the Iranian regime, without letting it be known. American forces in recent weeks have helped coordinate the passage of dozens of commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz, according to U.S. officials,...

A senior Hamas official told Asharq Al-Awsat that Hamas had sent messages to the mediating countries complaining about Israel’s alleged violations of the ceasefire agreement, while reaffirming its commitment to negotiations and efforts to reach a breakthrough in talks on Gaza. The official claimed that the assassination of Hamas military wing commander Izz ad-Din Haddad disrupted the negotiations, and called on the mediators to pressure Israel to halt what Hamas described as daily ceasefire violations. Hamas expressed hope that consultations with the mediators would help formulate a path forward in the talks, which have been postponed until after Eid al-Adha....

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump will meet with his Cabinet on Wednesday at a precarious moment for talks aimed at ending the war with Iran, just days after insisting that his administration and Tehran had “largely negotiated” a settlement but with the negotiations still in a state of flux. As he prepares to huddle with his top aides, Trump is projecting confidence that he's closing in on a deal that will reopen the Strait of Hormuz and provide him a credible argument that Iran’s nuclear capability has been diminished enough to declare victory, winding down a conflict that's been...

Political commentator Scott Jennings gave the Iran debate a much-needed dose of plain English after he received a briefing from a senior Trump administration official. Jennings' central point was simple: President Donald Trump used force when force became necessary, then paused further strikes when diplomacy had a chance to save lives. Trump's critics have spent years calling him reckless, impulsive, and incapable of restraint. Now he's showing patience, and many of those same voices still can't bring themselves to admit what sits in front of them. Trump has said talks with Iran remain active, but he has also warned his...

Washington’s war hawks are molting down over President Trump’s outreach to Iran. Senator Ted Cruz says that he is “concerned.” Senator Roger Wicker fears a “disaster.” Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo deemed a preliminary agreement with Iran “not remotely America First.” Trump and his advisors are having none of it. Responding to Pompeo, White House communications director Steve Cheung observed that “he should shut his stupid mouth and leave the real work to the professionals.” Trump, who angered Senate Republicans earlier this week by proposing a $1.8 billion slush fund for January 6 victims and by endorsing Ken Paxton...

President Donald Trump on Saturday abruptly canceled a planned trip by special envoy Steve Witkoff and the president’s son-in-law Jared Kushner to Pakistan, pulling back from what had been billed just a day earlier as a potential jump-start to fragile Iran talks. “I just cancelled the trip of my representatives going is [to] Islamabad, Pakistan, to meet with the Iranians,” the president wrote on Truth Social. “Too much time wasted on traveling, too much work! Besides which, there is tremendous infighting and confusion within their ‘leadership.’ Nobody knows who on earth is in charge, including them. Also, we have all...

Iran's 'moderate' mask falls completely off as the IRGC takes the wheel. Risk trades are diving on a report from N12 about Ghalibaf leaving the negotiating team. N12 is the digital news brand of Keshet 12, an Israeli free-to-air television channelIf anyone in the market was still holding out hope for a diplomatic off-ramp in the Middle East, it might be time to worry.We just got a pair of headlines out of Iran that paint a very stark picture of where things are heading, and it’s not toward de-escalation.First, Iranian President Pezeshkian took to X to completely torpedo the idea...

War Secretary Pete Hegseth on Thursday said the U.S. military is "locked and loaded" and prepared to escalate against Iran if negotiations fail. "We are locked and loaded on your critical dual-use infrastructure, on your remaining power generation, and on your energy industry," Hegseth said during his weekly press conference at the Pentagon, *** "We'd rather not have to do it, but we're ready to go at the command of our president and at the push of a button," Hegseth told reporters*** Hegseth issued a direct warning to Iran's military leadership, saying the imbalance in capabilities is decisive. "Our capabilities...

Mediators moved closer Wednesday to extending the ceasefire between the United States and Iran and restarting negotiations to salvage the fragile truce before it expires next week. A senior Iranian military official threatened to halt trade in the region if the U.S. does not lift its naval blockade, underscoring tensions that are overshadowing the diplomacy. The U.S. blockade on Iranian ports and renewed Iranian threats have imperiled the week-old agreement, but regional officials said Wednesday they were making progress, telling The Associated Press that the United States and Iran had given an “in principle agreement” to extend it to allow...

Donald Trump claims that the "right people" in Iran have reached out to cut a deal for real after imposing a naval blockade and cutting off Iran's income stream. Who are we talking with in Tehran? Mahdi al-Hall? That's what Trump claimed in an ad-hoc press conference on the veranda of the Oval Office this afternoon. Trump didn't specify the identities of the "right people," but hinted that the blockade may have changed some minds over the last few hours: Trump: The right people called from Iran, they want to make a deal. pic.twitter.com/nbcXnyn19P— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) April 13,...

The Iranian delegation to the US-Iran high-stakes peace talks has adopted the name “Minab-168”. Iranian Speaker of the Parliament Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf explicitly identified the aircraft the mission as “Minab-168”. The front row of the aircraft was arranged with blood-soaked bags, the children's shoes, and their photograph with white roses. He posted a picture the caption, “My companions on this flight #Minab168.” The Iranian embassy in South Africa re-shared the picture with the caption, “We will never forget the children of Minab" It also posted an AI-generated video emphasising that association. Iranian officials and state media have used the name...

Quite a lot. Still listening. As always, Tousi is informative.

Did Masoud Pezeshkian just signal a capitulation by the Iranian regime? Or is he just trying to claim turf in a power struggle among what's left of the mullahcracy's leadership? Perhaps the answer is ... yes. Iran's president has been sidelined during the conflict as the IRGC seized power after the death of Ali Khamenei. Both the US and Israel left him alone while targeting other top-ranked regime officials, either to have a potential negotiating partner, a reflection of Pezeshkian's impotence in the war, or both. With Trump threatening to wipe out what's left of Iran's energy infrastructure and B-52s...

Remember how Iran denied that any discussions were going on with the United States after President Donald Trump revealed they were happening? Some in the liberal media and among the Democrats immediately lined up, saying they believed Iran, despite Iran's history of lying and terrorism. Oh, and you know, killing Americans. Former CIA Director John Brennan: "I tend to believe Iran more than Donald Trump." pic.twitter.com/W2fPiKmtOf— TheBlaze (@theblaze) March 24, 2026But even while the Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi denied talks, he confirmed them, as we reported. There are no talks with the U.S., which is sending messages through different...

IRGC: US, Israel, UAE, etc.: Nuts! All: Have it your way. 82nd AB and USMC steady as you go (2Kharg?). Iranian people: Keep hitting IRGC. We want them dead. "Compassion" junkies: STFU and go away.

But what it is, is entirely unclear. President Trump has announced a breakthrough in negotiations with Iran: President Trump said Iran has agreed to his biggest demand in order to stop the war: no nuclear weapons. “They’ve agreed,” he said. “They will never have a nuclear weapon. They’ve agreed to that.” Tehran has not stated that publicly — and denied even talking to the US. But Trump has made clear that the no-nukes demand is necessary for the US to stop its military campaign. *** “We’re actually talking to the right people and they want to make a deal so...

Stocks rallied Monday after President Donald Trump said the U.S. and Iran have held talks and that he was halting strikes on Iranian power plants and energy infrastructure, giving investors hope that the Middle East conflict that spiked oil prices and raised fears of a global recession was nearing an end. The Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 1,117 points, or 2.4%. The S&P 500 rose 2.2%, while the Nasdaq Composite gained 2.4%. Before Trump’s comments, which he posted on Truth Social on Monday morning, futures were pointing to more losses for equity markets under siege from skyrocketing oil prices and...

The NY Times is reporting this afternoon that President Trump is demanding Cuba's current president, Miguel Díaz-Canel, be removed from power in any deal with the country. This may be the first time people inside the administration have said so directly, but it has been obvious for weeks that this is what they had in mind.The other part of this, which also isn't really news, is that Trump is willing to leave some version of the regime in place so long as that regime is America friendly moving forward.As U.S. and Cuban officials negotiate over the future of the Communist-ruled...