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To Iranian President Rouhani: NEVER, EVER THREATEN THE UNITED STATES AGAIN OR YOU WILL SUFFER CONSEQUENCES THE LIKES OF WHICH FEW THROUGHOUT HISTORY HAVE EVER SUFFERED BEFORE. WE ARE NO LONGER A COUNTRY THAT WILL STAND FOR YOUR DEMENTED WORDS OF VIOLENCE & DEATH. BE CAUTIOUS!

North Dakota has filed a claim against the federal government for $38 million the state spent dealing with the months-long Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) protests. The state claims the often violent protests were the result of negligence by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The Corps failed to enforce the law and keep protesters from setting up illegal campsites on federal land, the state argues.

In the view of many contemporary Russian leaders, the United States occupies a space on the world stage that rightly belongs to Russia—based on its possession of nuclear weapons, its history and culture, having the largest national territory, and other factors. Yet Russia’s apparent inability to compete with the United States on the world stage has resulted, for some leaders in Moscow, in mixed feelings of resentment, envy, and admiration. Speaking earlier this month at the Munich Security Conference, Russia’s Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev warned that his country and the West are headed towards a “new Cold War.” He criticized...

I am a member of the New/Paleo Right, as are many here on Free Republic. And I know many of us wonder: Where are the neocons? Where are those who will force us to engage logically as we, jointly, refine our perspectives of the day? What is YOUR opinion of the events of the last week and what do you think the rest of us are missing? With all sincerity, Mariner

President Trump offended the entire political spectrum with a tweet this morning blaming the U.S. for poor relations with Russia. “Our relationship with Russia has NEVER been worse thanks to many years of U.S. foolishness and stupidity,” the president said, and he is entirely correct. By this I do not mean to say that Russia is a beneficent actor in world affairs or that President Putin is an admirable world leader. Nonetheless, the president displayed both perspicacity and political courage when he pointed the finger at the United States for mismanaging the relationship with Russia. Full disclosure: I was a...

Israel is ramping up attacks against Iranian supply lines in Syria to block the flow of weapons to Hezbollah and other Tehran-backed militias, as it seeks to drive its foe away from its borders. In June Israel targeted a far-flung compound near the Syria-Iraq border, according to a security official, after carrying out multiple strikes closer to home against suspected Iranian military assets in Syria, where Iran is a key backer of President Bashar al-Assad. Israel, in accordance with its usual practice, didn’t confirm or deny it carried out the June airstrike. The U.S. denied responsibility, and a U.S. official...

The prime minister of the Netherlands, Mark Rutte (of the supposedly classically liberal VVD party), says in an interview with Dutch website Nu.nl that he realizes that signing the EU treaty with Ukraine could cost him votes. Still, he implies, he intends on doing so. The hypocritical prime minister who, for months, pretended he'd take the referendum results seriously (more than 60 percent of the Dutch voted against the treaty in a referendum earlier this year), has no actual intent of doing so. Yes, he says, he realizes that it may cost him some votes, but hey, he's the Prime...

Russian officials are reportedly destroying the records of gulag prisoners under a secret order passed in 2014, Russian media have reported. An estimated 3-12 million victims of Soviet repression were imprisoned in the gulag network of prisons and forced labor camps in the former Soviet Union. Registration records kept by the Museum of the History of the Gulag, now threatened with destruction, include the permanent records of those killed, as well as archival files detailing those who survived the gulag and when they were released. A 2014 inter-agency order labeled “for internal use” instructs files to be destroyed once the...

Violent Russian thugs who attacked Liverpool fans in Ukraine have issued a stark warning to England supporters planning to attend the World Cup. Trouble Company, a notorious hooligan group, said fans traveling abroad will face 'hell' during the 2018 competition. The group's followers have released a string of messages on social media claiming responsibility for the violence in Kiev, which saw Brits hospitalised.

A Dutch-led international criminal investigation has concluded that the Buk missile that shot down Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over Ukraine in 2014 came from Russia's 53rd Antiaircraft Missile Brigade. The Joint Investigative Team (JIT), comprising authorities from Australia, Belgium, Malaysia, the Netherlands, and Ukraine, made the announcement at a press conference on May 24 in Utrecht, the Netherlands. MH17 was shot down over the conflict zone in Ukraine's Donetsk region on July 17, 2014, killing all 298 people on board. The JIT "has come to the conclusion that the Buk-TELAR that shot down MH17 came from the 53rd Antiaircraft Missile...

Poland signed the largest arms procurement deal in its history on Wednesday, agreeing with the United States to buy Raytheon Co’s (RTN.N) Patriot missile defense system for $4.75 billion in a major step to modernize its forces against a bolder Russia. “It is an extraordinary, historic moment; it is Poland’s introduction into a whole new world of state-of-the-art technology, modern weaponry, and defensive means,” President Andrzej Duda said during the signing ceremony. NATO member Poland has accelerated efforts to overhaul its ageing weaponry following Moscow’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea peninsula in 2014. Two-thirds of Poland’s weaponry dates from the Cold...

It seems that Russia, in its search for a suitable method of collective suicide, has decided to compensate for America's supposed superiority in anti-missile defense systems with an enormously expensive one-sided arms race. Russia decided to create missiles capable of almost 100% penetration of not just the existing, but also any future missile defense of the United States.  Of course, the Pentagon only shrugged – they know perfectly well about Russia's tiny military budget.  Well, if Russia wants to go bankrupt unilaterally, so be it.  Trump's administration will not interfere.  It will even help. The fact is that the nuclear missiles currently in service...

With perfect timing, and taking advantage of the vacuum left by Obama’s decision not to get involved in Syria, Putin had put Russia back on the geopolitical map. He made a surprise visit to Damascus in December to declare: Mission accomplished. He should have learned from former U.S. President George W. Bush never to say that – because now everything is starting to fall apart for the Russians.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says Saturday that he informed Putin of Israel's intention to continue defending itself against any aggression and to prevent Iran from establishing a presence "in Syria or anywhere else." Russia backs the Assad regime and maintains a large military presence in the country. Netanyahu has met several times with Putin to coordinate military activities in the region. Russia's foreign ministry appeared to criticize Israel's actions by saying it was "absolutely unacceptable to create threats to the lives and security of Russian servicemen." Netanyahu says he also spoke to U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.

An FBI informant told three congressional committees in a written statement that Moscow routed millions to America with the expectation it would benefit Bill Clinton’s charitable efforts as then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pushed through a “reset” in U.S.-Russia relations, the Hill reported. The informant, Douglas Campbell, said in the statement, which was obtained by the Hill, that Russian nuclear executives told him Moscow hired American lobbying firm APCO Worldwide because it would influence the Obama administration and specifically Hillary Clinton.

Maybe I’ll say something that someone might dislike, but that’s the way I see it,” Putin said in an interview for the documentary Valaam, an excerpt of which was broadcast on Russia 1. “First of all, faith has always accompanied us, becoming stronger every time our country, our people, have been through hard times. “There were those years of militant atheism when priests were eradicated, churches destroyed, but at the same time a new religion was being created. Communist ideology is very similar to Christianity, in fact: freedom, equality, brotherhood, justice – everything is laid out in the Holy Scripture,...

Russia blamed “external interference” for driving anti-regime protests in Iran, echoing claims by Iranian leaders. In a statement carried Tuesday by the official TASS news agency, the Russian foreign ministry said the protests were “Iran’s internal affair.” “External interference destabilizing the situation is inadmissible,” it said. The Russian foreign ministry also said: “We express the hope that the situation won’t develop under the scenario of bloodshed and violence.” Both Russia and Iran are backers of Syria’s President Bashar Assad and have provided substantial military support to his regime during the Syrian civil war. Earlier Tuesday, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali...

China and Singapore show what countries can achieve when they admit they are behind and have much to learn from others and play by the rules. But “Putin’s Russia conducts itself in a principally different way, pretending to be a counterweight to the West and in fact to the role of a world leader.” “Not having the resources for this and also lacking any chance to achieve what it wants in an honest way, Putin” first violates the rules of the game and then begins to threaten that he will do even more unless others change the rules so that...

Turkey and Russia are aggressively conspiring against U.S. interests in Syria. That's my takeaway from the joint press conference on Thursday, between Presidents Erdogan and Putin in Turkey. First off, on Syria, Putin stated that Turkey and Russia have agreed to a cease-fire in Syria's north-eastern Idlib province. That statement might sound positive, but with Idlib the last major holdout of the Sunni rebellion fighting the Assad-Putin-Iran axis, Putin's words suggest that Erdogan is about to cut-off the rebel supply lines from Turkey. As I warned last December, Russia's endgame has always been the annihilation of the rebels in Idlib....