'The White House lunch that Trump hosted for Munir last year came just after Munir returned from a visit to Iran, at a moment when Israel and Iran were at war.' 'Trump said after that lunch that the Pakistanis know Iran very well. He likely views Munir as a useful interlocutor that can give helpful insights on Iran.'
The purge in Washington does not pause the war. Strikes continue, Hormuz remains closed, and Brent crude is still dancing around $109 a barrel. For India, the command chaos in the Pentagon is another layer of uncertainty piled on five weeks of conflict that was already straining every buffer Delhi has.
'The next two to three weeks will not be decided in Washington.' 'They will be decided in Tehran, in whatever calculation Iran makes about the costs of continued resistance against the costs of appearing to have yielded.'
Trump may strike. He may announce productive talks and extend again. He may do both at the same time. Iran will not open the Strait on someone else's terms, so no matter what happens, that problem will remain unsolved. And the IRGC will still be collecting its $2 million toll from every ship bold enough to ask permission to pass.
The question is no longer whether the war will expand. It has. The next few days will tell us whether the war stabilises around Hormuz or whether the Strait itself becomes the trigger for a far larger rupture. What to watch for over the next 48 hours is simple: Any move by the US toward direct naval control of the Strait; any credible Iranian attempt to disrupt or mine shipping lanes and, critically, whether energy infrastructure in the Gulf continues to be targeted.If those lines are crossed in tandem, the war will no longer be containable within the region.
Iran is fighting a different war: Older, slower, and in some ways more dangerous. Iran doesn't need to shoot down an F/A-18. It only needs to make the Strait of Hormuz feel dangerous long enough for insurance markets, shipping companies, and oil futures traders to do the rest. Prem Panicker continues his must-read daily blog on the war in the Middle East.
'I suspect that Bangladesh being given permission stuck in India's official craw, and this story was an attempt to balance the scales by giving the impression that a similar waiver had been given to India as well.'
Putin said that the Greenland issues doesn't concern him.
As Delcy Rodriguez took charge late on Sunday as Venezuela's acting president, United States President Donald Trump issued a sharp warning, saying she must give the US 'total access' or face consequences 'probably worse than Maduro'.
Names and names and names and names... 329 in all. Some Indian. Some Canadian. Some British. Berry. Gupta. Jain. James. Bhatt. Beauchesne. Chatlani. Enayati. Lougheed.... Vaihayasi Pande Daniel visits Ahakista, Ireland, home to the memorial for the worst terrorist atrocity in India's history.
'No respite from economic pain is worth the loss of dignity and self-respect,' asserts former foreign secretary Shyam Saran.
However, Musk silenced all the comments on Wednesday by replying to an X post that questioned if he and Meloni "would date".
Security experts have warned that using Signal for discussions of this nature violates every established protocol for handling classified information.
As the fight reaches its crescendo with the big election day just a few hours away, many political observers billed the unpredictable race for the 47th President of the US as the most consequential one in decades while appearing to project a grim picture for the country's future under a Trump presidency.
Confronted by outrage in Greenland, the US has scaled down a proposed visit to the island.
What did Narendra Modi tell former Utah governor Jon M Huntsman when he met him? Aziz Haniffa/Rediff.com reports from Washington, DC.
Trump's sweeping tariffs and penalties on China-built ships have turned global shipping into the front line of economic war, observes Shyam G Menon.
The United States has put on hold all its military-to-military engagements with Russia, attributing the move to Russia's intrusion into Ukraine.
A cross-border business plan competition will be launched to connect entrepreneurs from India, Pakistan and facilitate investment and collaboration.
India has voiced fears that Islamic radicals might drive back to power in Afghanistan after the withdrawal of US-led international forces and has called for greater coordination with Washington over the developments in the war-torn country.
Pakistan's Ambassador to the United States Sherry Rehman believes trade and people-to-people interactions between India and Pakistan can contain the fall-out of "flare-ups" like the recent killing and beheading of two Indian soldiers near the Line of Control in Kashmir.
Retired Indian diplomat Neelam Deo believes that India, in terms of bureaucratic capacity, 'does not match the capacity of the United States'.
Shikha Bhatnagar's recent appointment as Associate Director of the South Asia Center of the Atlantic Council, is yet another manifestation of a growing trend of second generation Indian Americans' advent into leading Washington, DC think tanks as senior policy analysts and associates.
Pakistan's Ambassador to the US, Husain Haqqani has taken strong exception to the contention that President Barack Obama's recent visit to India clearly indicates that while the United States seeks a long-term strategic partnership with Delhi, Pakistan to is nothing but a short-term strategic convenience to Washington.
Former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has alleged that it is not Pakistan that is carrying out a proxy war against India in Afghanistan, but the other way around, with the Indian consulates in Kandahar and Jalalabad, veritable offices of the Indian intelligence, the Research and Analysis Wing, to foment terrorism in Pakistan.
Former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has expressed his bitter resentment toward United States President Barack Obama and his administration for developing a strategic partnership with India while using Pakistan only for its strategic convenience. While speaking at the Atlantic Council, a Washington, DC-based think tank, Musharraf lashed out against Obama's decision not to visit Pakistan during his recent visit to Asia.
Former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has expressed his bitter resentment toward United States President Barack Obama and his administration for developing a strategic partnership with India while using Pakistan only for its strategic convenience. While speaking at the Atlantic Council, a Washington, DC-based think tank, Musharraf lashed out against Obama's decision not to visit Pakistan during his recent visit to Asia.
Srinagar-born Farah Pandith, President Barack Obama's special representative to Muslim communities worldwide, recently made her first trip to India after her high-level appointment. She had 'a great trip,' she told rediff.com, and 'was very humbled to be able to go back.'
Pakistan continues to be a safe haven for terrorists and its influence in Afghanistan needs to be tackled, US military chief Gen Martin Dempsey has said, while acknowledging that his country's ties with Islamabad are in a state of mess.
Shuja Nawaz, arguably the most authoritative expert on the Pakistani military, assesses the US-Pakistan strategic dialogue.
On the eve of the second anniversary of the horrific 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks, Pakistan's Ambassador to the US, Husain Haqqani has said the alleged perpetrators and conspirators of this attack on trial in Pakistan can only be convicted if India provides evidence to the Pakistani authorities.
Rao asserted that India has been transparent on this issue with international partners given its enormous energy security needs.
Former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf believes that he os the panacea for Pakistan if it were to be saved from being a failed state, thanks to the 'inept and pathetic performance' by President Asif Ali Zardari led civilian government in Islamabad.Musharraf said that at the time he left office, the poverty rate in Pakistan, according to World Bank figures, had been halved, from 34 percent to 17 percent. "Which government has done this?" he asked.
'This is in its own interest.' 'Only the State must have the monopoly of power in the country.'
'Militias have no place in democracies,' says Shuja Nawaz, Distinguished Fellow at the Atlantic Council, the Washington, DC-based think-tank.
It was imperative if the war against extremism and terrorism that threatens to tear apart both countries and could have dire consequences to the region is to be combated, Afghanistan's Ambassador to the United States Said Jawad said, adding that while Afghanistan does not question Pak civilian government's commitment to combat terrorism, the military still seemed to be obsessed with India instead of the existential threat that threatens the very fabric of Pak and Afghanistan.
Chairman of Senate Foreign Relations Committee John Kerry said on Wednesday that Pakistan has become the "ground zero of terrorism" and "security threat" to the United States.
Indian Ambassador to the United States Meera Shankar has said it is not India but the US that has to respond to the recent revelations by former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf that American military aid provided to Pakistan for its war against terror during his tenure, had been diverted to strengthen its defenses against India.
Chairman of Senate Foreign Relations Committee John Kerry has said that he would soon be introducing a legislation in the US Congress to triple the non-military aid to Pakistan to avert an economic meltdown.
He, however, said that India and Pakistan are proceeding with the composite dialogue process, which has led to reduction of tensions and resulted in several Confidence Building Measures.
The National Security Strategy document should flag all major issues concerning security strategy and provide guidelines to concerned departments to work out suitable action plans. Since the global and regional geopolitical canvas is dynamic, the NSS document should be deliberated at length before formulation and should be reviewed periodically, recommends Commodore Venugopal Menon (retd).
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