Free Republic

Four American startups have brought their first small nuclear reactors to life, each reaching the point where the reactor can sustain a controlled chain reaction. The companies are chasing a specific goal: generating power on-site for the electricity-hungry data centers behind the artificial intelligence boom. Reaching criticality is a significant technical milestone, though it remains a long way from a fully operational commercial power plant.

It’s easy to see why Abdul El-Sayed wants to separate himself from left-wing streamer Hasan Piker. In an interview with Axios, Piker said that he believes the Middle East would be more stable if Iran had a nuclear weapon. .@AlexThomp: "Do you think the Middle East would be more stable if Iran had a nuclear weapon?"Hasan Piker: "I believe yes."(the world's largest state sponsor of terrorism) pic.twitter.com/S8uaLJEBMC— Sarah Gallagher (@sgallz_) September 17, 2026Piker said that America conducts more terror than Al-Qaeda. "You once said that America is the top dog in terrorism," Axios' Alex Thompson said. "Do you think America...

In early March, U.S. President Donald Trump said that the United States had already “won” the war against Iran but still had to “finish the job.” Months later, as fighting escalates across the region and diplomacy is stalled, the “job” remains unfinished with no end in sight. Trump on Wednesday said that “hopefully we are toward the end of the war” and suggested that Iran wants to make a deal. But that optimism is belied by what’s happening on the ground—and there’s little evidence that Tehran is eager for an agreement. The United States has had military successes in the...

Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said on Wednesday that the war with the United States could come to an end if Washington stops threatening Iran and meets a series of conditions set by Tehran, including demands concerning its nuclear program. IRGC spokesman Hossein Mohibi, quoted by Iran's Fars News Agency, said that if the United States seeks to end the current situation, it must completely halt the war and refrain from making further threats against Iran. He added that Iran's conditions include the withdrawal of the Israeli military from Lebanon, an end to the blockade imposed on Yemen, the...

President Trump confirmed Wednesday he plans to meet with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un later this year, the third sitdown between the two across the commander in chief’s two terms.*** “I get along with him, and you know what? The fact that I get along with him-that’s a good thing, not a bad thing,” Trump told reporters at the White House, adding that Kim has “57 very powerful nuclear weapons.”Should have never allowed it to happen,” the president added. “They should have never allowed it. If I were president, I wouldn’t have allowed it. But he’s got them.” Past...

The Pentagon first outlined the goal of putting the United States industrial base on a “wartime footing”— the condition of being prepared to deter and, if necessary, prevail in a protracted conflict—in November 2025. What steps have government and industry taken since then to make this ambition a reality?.... Yet industrial plans are not the same as results, and isolated bursts of investment are not the same as institutionalized industrial power. The time scales needed to deliver several critical munitions, for example, depleted after the war in Iran, continue to stretch more than three years. Though investment announcements have risen...

The Los Angeles Times recently published a "News Analysis" headlined: "Trump, long a critic of 'forever wars,' may be stumbling into one with Iran." The analysis offers legitimate grounds for criticizing President Donald Trump. He has described the objectives of the war against Iran in different ways. He has made changing predictions about its duration. He has repeatedly suggested that an agreement was near, only for negotiations to collapse. He promised no more endless Middle East wars, yet the conflict has continued for months, American servicemembers have died, and the administration has not clearly defined what victory looks like. All...

New satellite images show activity at 'Pickaxe Mountain,' an underground site in the Zagros Mountains where IAEA inspectors have not been allowed to visit, even as Natanz, Isfahan and Fordow show little movement after last year’s US strikes “The Islamic Republic of Iran reaffirms that it will not seek or develop nuclear weapons. The Islamic Republic of Iran will maintain the current status quo of its nuclear program.” These are two clauses in the memorandum of understanding signed by Iran and the United States, but new satellite images of a secret site are raising questions over whether Tehran truly intends...

The one thing we can always trust about Iran is that we can't trust Iran. Any agreement they make, they won't keep. Any promise they make, they will break. Any time they claim they are telling the truth, they are lying. These are constants.So, when satellite photos reveal some new and suspicious construction deep in the rugged Zagros Mountains, it raises some questions.One of the leading American institutes devoted to research on the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program sounded the alarm this week over the regime's uninspected underground site in the Zagros Mountains. Inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)...

From the Iranian negotiations, a strong pattern has emerged: anything the U.S. says that they’ve agreed to, they deny. This has happened repeatedly, to the point where we have to ask ourselves why they reject our statements? Are our government officials misunderstanding them? Do Trump and Vance purposely misstate what has been agreed to? Or does Iran think that their defiance and disagreement give a picture of strength and victory for their side? To demonstrate the frequency of these denials, let’s take them one at a time:Vance confirmed yesterday in a press statement that the United States had agreed to...

Former President Bill Clinton has expressed remorse over his role in negotiating a 1994 deal that resulted in Ukraine giving up its nuclear arsenal, suggesting that Russia never would have invaded its smaller neighbor if it still had nukes. “I feel a personal stake because I got them [Ukraine] to agree to give up their nuclear weapons. And none of them believe that Russia would have pulled this stunt if Ukraine still had their weapons,” Clinton told Irish broadcaster RTE in an interview that aired Tuesday. The 42nd president was referencing a landmark post-Cold War deal in which then-Ukrainian President...

Despite the suggestions that I am irrationally hard on Trump's "deal" with Iran, I really am trying to keep an open mind. My assessment of the situation is based on watching and interpreting Trump's moves during the so-called "ceasefire" with Iran that began on April 7th of this year. I thought the ceasefire was likely a mistake, based on Trump's assurances that Iran was on the ropes and ready to make a deal. I know that sounds odd. If I thought Trump was right about the conditions, why oppose the ceasefire? Simple: if true, we had them on the ropes....

President Donald Trump announced Saturday that the United States has reached a peace deal with Iran, and the contrast with what Barack Obama handed the world in 2015 could not be starker. "The Deal with the Islamic Republic of Iran is now complete," Trump posted on Truth Social Sunday. "Ships of the World, start your engines. Let the oil flow!" The naval blockade on Iranian ports has already lifted. The Strait of Hormuz is open. And for the first time in a long time, there's an actual framework that puts nuclear weapons permanently off the table. Results are happening. Oil...

Nuclear energy is about to play a huge role in powering America, but the new reactors that will do the heavy lifting are surprisingly small. Some are so small they are classified as microreactors—mobile powerhouses capable of being transported anywhere they’re needed to provide power, including the most remote sites on the planet. Spotlight on America traveled to the Idaho National Laboratory (INL), where these microreactors are about to be powered up and tested for the very first time inside a facility already famous for making history. Now, history is unfolding here once again. The newly renovated and reconfigured Dome...

Iran’s semi-official IRNA news agency says that Tehran will not give up its right to enrich uranium under any deal it makes with the United States. Negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program are expected to begin after the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding, which US President Donald Trump has claimed could be signed as early as this weekend. IRNA reports that Iran will “negotiate only the nuclear program solely within the framework of the Islamic Republic’s fundamental principles.” “Issues such as Iran’s right to enrich uranium and the retention of enriched material by the Islamic Republic of Iran will be...

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...

If a former CIA agent’s report is accurate, Iran may find itself making a decision the U.S. was faced with making in 1945. The agent, Larry Johnson, revealed that Pakistan’s Foreign Minister personally delivered a disturbing, secret message to Secretary of State Mark Rubio claiming that Iran does possess a nuclear weapon. He also reports Tehran intends to demonstrate soon this capability to the world community. The immediate question obviously is just how Iran intends to demonstrate it?In 1945, during World War II, the U.S. had to decide how to demonstrate to Japan it possessed an atomic weapon, developed under...

US President Donald Trump tells reporters that Washington does not need a deal with Iran to get enriched uranium from the country. “We could get it right now. I don’t think they could stop us if we wanted, but there’s no reason to. It’s entombed,” he says.Trump also says that he did not want to meet with Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, but adds that “I’d be honored to meet him.”He says if Washington and Tehran reached a deal, it was possible that the two would meet and adds, “If it happened… I’d be respectful.” “In some circles he has...

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,...

President Donald Trump made an important post late Monday afternoon about the highly enriched uranium that has been the focus of the deal he's been trying to achieve with Iran. Trump said that the stockpile would either have to be handed over to the U.S. or be destroyed under supervision as part of the agreement. “The Enriched Uranium (Nuclear Dust!) will either be immediately turned over to the United States to be brought home and destroyed or, preferably, in conjunction and coordination with the Islamic Republic of Iran, destroyed in place or, at another acceptable location, with the Atomic Energy...