Free Republic

Commanders and advisors from Iran’s elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps are on the ground in Yemen and playing a direct role in Houthi rebel attacks on commercial traffic in the Red Sea. The IRGC has stationed missile and drone trainers and operators in Yemen, as well as personnel providing tactical intelligence support to the Houthis, U.S. and Middle East officials told Semafor. The IRGC, through its overseas Qods Force, has also overseen the transfer to the Houthis of the attack drones, cruise missiles, and medium-range ballistic missiles used in a string of strikes on Red Sea and Israeli targets in...

Two oil tankers, the M/T KAIROS and M/T VIRAT, alleged to be part of the “Russian Shadow Fleet” exploded and caught fire earlier today in the Southern Black Sea, shortly after crossing north through the Bosphorus Strait in Turkey. The tankers, which were enroute to the Russian Port of Novorossiysk from Egypt, are suspected to have been targeted by several uncrewed surface vessels and/or naval mines set by the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The crews aboard both vessels were able to be successfully evacuated, with it expected that the tankers will soon sink in the Black Sea, according to Turkish...

Putin is amassing nuclear weapons and attack submarines in the Arctic Circle as his country prepares for war with NATO, Norway has said. Norway's Defence Minister Tore Sandvik claimed his country had found Russia had been increasing its military presence in the Arctic, particularly in the Kola peninsula. The politician also said Vladimir Putin had been attempting to take over the Arctic region where its fleet is based to block shipping routes to Nato allies if war broke out. 'Russia is building up on the Kola peninsula... where one of the largest arsenals of nuclear warheads in the world is...

More than 60 containers toppled off a cargo ship Tuesday morning in the Port of Long Beach, tumbling overboard and floating in the water. The shipping containers fell off a vessel named the Mississippi shortly before 9 a.m., and no injuries have been reported, according to Port of Long Beach spokesperson Art Marroquin. About 67 containers were in the water, the US Coast Guard said on the social platform X. Long Beach, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) south of Los Angeles, is one of the busiest seaports in the country, with 40% of all shipping containers in the United States...

The SS Edmund Fitzgerald Was Just Scanned by An AI — And It Revealed Something No One Expected Beneath the icy depths of Lake Superior lies the SS Edmund Fitzgerald, a ship that vanished without warning nearly fifty years ago. No distress call. No survivors. Just silence. Now, for the first time, advanced AI has scanned the wreck with breathtaking precision. What it revealed was not just decay or twisted steel, but details that no one expected to see. How could one of the most respected ships on the Great Lakes disappear so suddenly? The answers hidden in this scan...

Several postal services around the world have paused package deliveries to the United States this week, and it's not because they're overwhelmed with shipping demand. The suspensions, which affect shipments of goods valued under $800, follow a recent executive order that President Trump signed that effectively ends the de minimis exemption on August 29. The fallout has been swift and global. We're talking about major disruptions from Europe to Asia that might impact many American small businesses, limit where you can shop, and make it more complicated and expensive to receive the items you order. What countries have limited deliveries,...

The crackdown on small-dollar imports has left businesses and consumers scrambling. Postal services in Japan and Switzerland are the latest to pause shipments to the United States this week, days before an exemption for certain import taxes is about to expire. The loophole, known as “de minimis,” has allowed goods worth less than $800 to enter the United States duty-free since 2016. President Donald Trump signed an executive order last month to abolish the practice. It is set to end Friday. The change has rocked small businesses and consumers, leaving many concerned about shipping backlogs and higher costs. Some business...

The loophole China exploited is Trump’s next tariff target.President Donald Trump’s executive order of July 31st, effective August 7th, has upended global trade dynamics in a single stroke. Slapping a 40% tariff on all “transshipped goods”—products rerouted through third countries to dodge US duties—this is merely the natural development of his evolving protectionist agenda.Just a week after the order, the move is a clear shot at China’s sprawling manufacturing empire, which has long exploited methods like transshipment and “nearshoring” to skirt American tariffs in general, and Trump’s tariff policies in particular.While applied globally, China stands to take the biggest hit...

On Monday night, a major explosion and fire occurred aboard a bulker in the Port of Baltimore's inner harbor, three miles from the site of the former Francis Scott Key Bridge. At 1830 hours local time, the vessel W Sapphire (IMO 9605645) was departing the CSX Curtis Bay coal pier in laden condition. Just off the dock, the vessel sustained a massive explosion in the forward hold, followed by a fire. A web cam operated by StreamTime captured video of the event, with some of the elements of the Key Bridge visible in the background. Multiple firefighting vessels responded immediately...

India will keep purchasing oil from Russia despite U.S. President Donald Trump's threats of penalties, two Indian government sources told Reuters on Saturday, not wishing to be identified due to the sensitivity of the matter. On top of a new 25% tariff on India's exports to the U.S., Trump indicated in a Truth Social post last month that India would face additional penalties for purchases of Russian arms and oil. On Friday, Trump told reporters he had heard that India would no longer be buying oil from Russia. But the sources said there would be no immediate changes. "These are...

"This trade generated as much as $70 billion for Iran, propping up the regime and its nuclear weapons program." China is reportedly using a “dark fleet” to conduct secret ship-to-ship transfers of Iranian oil in an effort to evade U.S. sanctions on Tehran’s tankers. CBS News sent a crew to scout an area roughly 80 nautical miles from Singapore and found four ship-to-ship transfers occurring; all the “dark fleet” tankers had their transponders switched off, and “clearly do not want to be identified,” the outlet reported. “Both ships have a net or something, a tarp, deployed over the stern, covering...

Matson, a major U.S.-based cargo shipping company, has announced an immediate and indefinite halt to all shipments of electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrids (PHEVs) across its entire maritime network, citing rising concerns over fire hazards linked to lithium-ion batteries. The decision affects routes between the U.S. mainland, Hawaii, Guam, and Alaska, creating massive logistical headaches for both automakers and private owners trying to move EVs across the Pacific. This unprecedented move follows a string of high-profile shipping fires—including the June 2025 loss of the Morning Midas, which sank after a suspected battery-related blaze aboard its vehicle deck. Matson confirmed...

The strangeness began when a research boat known as the Blue Heron started experiencing mechanical difficulties during a trip to Lake Erie and was dry-docked for repairs. While investigating the issue, Captain Rual Lee discovered a strange thick, black tar-like substance that seemed to be oozing out of the rudder. Unable to determine what it was, he sent a sample to the University of Minnesota Duluth. When researchers analyzed the substance, they discovered that it contained 20 DNA sequences and while many could be identified, several were completely novel and unknown to science. They concluded that the substance - now...

Tehran says it can destabilize global energy security — and that it’s a direct consequence of the Zionist regime’s actions.

Source: Unleashed.news If China secures the CopiaPort-E project, it would turbocharge Beijing’s trade in South America—not only enabling CHINAMAX megaships, but allowing all shipping to completely bypass U.S.-controlled chokepoints and dominate hemispheric commerce virtually overnight. A geopolitical storm is brewing on the western edge of South America—and the United States cannot afford to look away. At the heart of it all lies a deep-water mega-port project in Chile’s Atacama Desert: CopiaPort-E, a port so naturally engineered by geography itself that it could become either America’s greatest commercial and strategic opportunity, or China’s most dangerous economic beachhead south of our border....

A cargo ship carrying 3,000 cars, including 800 electric vehicles, caught fire off the coast of Alaska and continues to burn. The Coast Guard says that all 22 crew members escaped the ship and were picked up by two nearby freighters. The ship, a Liberian-registered car-carrier named "Morning Midas," was on its way to Lázaro Cárdenas, Mexico, from Yantai, China.. ... the Coast Guard is going to let the ship burn, since trying to put out a lithium-ion fire is nearly futile. ... In 2022, the Felicity Ace, a car carrier slightly larger than Morning Midas, sank in the Atlantic...

Grok: Expressed in billions of dollars list the five countries and five corporations that will benefit most from the U.S. military activity to eliminate shipping disruptions caused by the Houthi near the Red Sea. China is 1st. 🇺🇸 isn’t in the top 5... ...

United States officials are set to meet with their Ukrainian counterparts again after a round of talks with Russian negotiators on a partial ceasefire in Ukraine. A senior Ukrainian official told the AFP news agency that the meeting would be held later on Monday after US and Russian delegations wrap up their day’s talks in Saudi Arabia’s capital Riyadh. Monday’s US-Russia talks were primarily focused on ending attacks on Black Sea shipping, with a view to ushering in a broader ceasefire agreement that would bring an end to the three-year Russia-Ukraine war. US officials had already met the Ukrainian team...

Amid tensions with the US, Iran on Saturday flexed its military muscle by installing its missile systems on the three disputed islands near the Strait of Hormuz. As per reports, the weapons were deployed on Greater Tunb, Lesser Tunb, and Abu Musa near the Strait of Hormuz, a globally vital shipping lane. Iran's claim that fortifying the islands can help "target enemy bases and vessels" is seen as an answer to the US and its allies in the region. But, through the move, Tehran also seeks to reassert its ownership over the three islands. The islands located along a globally...

BEHIND THE LINES: The US administration appears to fail to notice the broader alliance taking shape behind these forces, and the interconnectedness of the current assault on the West. The statement by US President Donald Trump that Iran would be held responsible for continued attacks by the Yemeni Houthi movement on shipping in the Red Sea sharply raises the temperature in the ongoing escalation between US forces and the Yemeni Shi’ite Islamist movement in that area. “Every shot fired by the Houthis will be looked upon, from this point forward, as being a shot fired from the weapons and leadership...