Latest news with #IraqWar
Yahoo
a day ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Army Veteran Torches ‘Rattled' Hegseth's ‘Dangerous' Military Move
An Army veteran blasted Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth for politicizing the military and accused him of attacking the press more aggressively than he attacks America's enemies. Hegseth lashed out at reporters repeatedly during a Thursday news conference amid the fallout over a leaked preliminary intelligence assessment that found last weekend's strikes on Iran had only set the country's nuclear program back by a few months. The defense secretary ranted at the press and called out news organizations and reporters by name, accusing them of 'a great deal of irresponsible reporting based on leaks, preliminary information in low confidence.' He and Trump have also claimed the reporting disrespects the troops. Paul Rieckhoff, an Iraq War veteran and founder of Independent Veterans of America, called Hegseth's performance 'conduct unbecoming' and said the administration was setting a dangerous precedent. 'He looks rattled. He obviously looks thin-skinned,' Rieckhoff told CNN's Abby Phillip during Thursday's episode of NewsNight. 'He's extremely aggressive and volatile.' Rieckoff went on to say that asking the administration hard questions has nothing to do with the troops, and that Hegseth has continued to 'conflate the war with the warriors.' 'It's entirely separate, and they're using it [the military] consistently as a very dangerous shield, which continues to politicize our military, which is their playbook now, which is very, very dangerous,' he said. After the Vietnam War, the country worked hard to separate partisan politics from the people in uniform, he added. Rieckoff also ripped into Hegseth and other administration officials for repeatedly berating journalists questioning the administration's claims that Iran's nuclear program was 'obliterated' in Saturday's strikes on the Fordow, Natanz, and Esfahan sites. 'He's attacking the press. We need him to attack our enemies,' Rieckoff said. 'I wish he attacked Vladimir Putin as aggressively as he attacked CNN and others.' As for Iran's nuclear program, 'I don't know if it was obliterated or not,' he added. 'But I do know what is being obliterated: the Constitution,' he said. 'Congress has abdicated their responsibility to rein in a president when he's engaging in combat.'
The Herald Scotland
a day ago
- Politics
- The Herald Scotland
Starmer is a charlatan – Labour should dump him for Rayner
Tony Blair was obsessed with his place in the history books; Gordon Brown with duty. Even David Cameron represented something: class privilege and entitlement. John Major was the 1950s made flesh. But what does Keir Starmer stand for? Britain is in the unfortunate position of having a leader with seemingly no beliefs whatsoever. He doesn't appear to be in politics for sheer venal greed and narcissism, but nor is he in politics for any higher purpose. He clearly has no principles, as he abandons every position he's ever held. Starmer has just committed Britain to spending 5% of GDP on defence in the face of Russian threats. But what values is he protecting? To protect a nation, you must invest it with some purpose, some beliefs, to justify the cost in blood and gold. I know what I – and most folk – would deem the values we seek to protect: fairness, freedom, decency, the right to dissent, standing up for the underdog. Aren't these the so-called 'British values' we were taught once underpinned this country? Read more from Neil Mackay: Does Starmer defend fairness? No. He was about to degrade Britain's disabled people until his own rebel MPs pulled him back from the brink. He proposed cruelty, not decency. Does Starmer protect freedom? No. He has decided to proscribe a protest group as a terrorist organisation. Palestine Action sprayed red paint on military aircraft after breaking into an RAF base. Should the activists be prosecuted? Yes. They may have been standing up for their beliefs, but they broke in and committed criminal damage. So yes, prosecute them. But to label them terrorists is dangerously authoritarian. You may not like what Palestine Action did, but what happens if the next protest group to go too far is fighting for something you believe in? Should your views be bracketed with terrorism? Indeed, proscribing Palestine Action forces us to look back into Starmer's past as we ask: 'what – if anything – does this man hold dear?' As a human rights lawyer, Starmer defended a protester arrested after cutting an RAF base fence while carrying a flammable substance. He argued the behaviour was legal as the protester was acting to prevent a wider crime: the Iraq War. Starmer also represented Lindis Percy, arrested over 500 times for breaking into and protesting outside air force bases. Lawyers defend clients whose actions they don't support – we know that. You cannot equate a lawyer's defence work with their own beliefs. However, it isn't quite so simple with Starmer. In 2020, when running for Labour's leadership, he featured Percy in a campaign video. She said: 'Keir defended me, and many others, to bring public scrutiny and awareness of the presence of US visiting forces so that we can live in a more peaceful and less secretive society.' So as a human rights lawyer, did he actually believe in the right to protest, or was he just doing whatever the job required? Was he merely, as now, holding office for the banal sake of holding office? Did he believe in the right to protest when he became leader, and then dump this belief – as he has dumped so many beliefs – when it was convenient? Would human rights lawyer Starmer believe in Palestine Action's right to protest? (Image: Palestine Action) Indeed, the word 'belief' seems inappropriate. Nobody simply abandons beliefs. You can, though, abandon a 'pose'. Indeed, the word 'belief' seems inappropriate. Nobody simply abandons beliefs. You can, though, abandon a 'pose'. Is Starmer simply governing as he imagines the right-wing press wishes him to govern? Is he a creature of the Daily Mail, forever trying to run ahead of headlines he fears? He's an arrogant man. That's clear. Labour rebels were simply 'noises off', he said. Until they weren't, of course, when he realised he faced defeat over his brutish disability cuts. It all fits with his abandonment of every principle Labour stands for: he hurts the poor and cossets the wealthy; he sucks up to power and tramples the weak. Until the rebels got him in a stranglehold, Starmer's welfare bill would have pushed 250,000 disabled people into poverty, along with 50,000 children. Even with the u-turn, he's created a two-tier system where those who become disabled in the future will be worse off than those disabled today. He plays a monstrous game with the lives of others. Sign up to Unspun and read Neil Mackay every Friday. In one month, Starmer u-turned three times: on the winter fuel payment, on holding an inquiry into grooming gangs, and now on disability benefits. Between taking over as Labour leader and becoming Prime Minister, Starmer u-turned 27 times, including on the combustible issue of trans rights. In 2022, he claimed to believe that 'transwomen are women'. Come April this year, that was no longer his belief. Starmer is a charlatan, a man without character, a cipher. He's either so weak or so amoral that he is unfit to hold office. There's still a long way to go before the next UK election. Labour has the time to dump this empty vessel, this dangerous shape-shifter, and choose a better leader who just might save them from ruin at the ballot box. Perhaps, Angela Rayner?
Boston Globe
a day ago
- Politics
- Boston Globe
Trump was wrong to bomb Iran. Democrats must be the antiwar party.
At a moment when our country is looking for strong antiwar leadership, Democrats must be the party of peace — peace abroad and good-paying jobs at home. Being the party of peace does not mean that we are the party of pacifism or a party of isolationism. It means that we oppose wars of choice. It means that we reject the Beltway establishment that is pushing for war. War is a terrible thing: It is economically costly, it tears apart families, and innocent people die. Wars should only be fought in the face of an actual attack or imminent threat of attack, and then only when diplomacy has been exhausted and there is no way to repel the attack except through force. They should not be fought for territorial expansion, glory, or regime change. Advertisement Vietnam was a war of choice, which the United States should not have fought. The Iraq War was a war of choice that Advertisement How do Democrats become the antiwar party? We can start by standing firmly for diplomacy, the Constitution, and for our priorities at home — good-paying jobs, affordable health care, education — instead of endless conflict. Trump should not have ordered strikes on Iran. It is in America's national security interest to stop Iran from having a bomb, but the US attack reportedly only What comes next is most important. We need to ensure that the cease-fire holds and that we have diplomacy that prevents Iran from developing a nuclear weapon. We know that diplomacy works. Former president Barack Obama's Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action limited enrichment to Advertisement We also need to prevent any further escalation with Iran without the authorization of Congress. That is why Republican Representative Thomas Massie of Kentucky and I introduced a bipartisan It is easier to start a war than to end one. Democrats have to be the voice of restraint and principled diplomacy. As the party of peace, we can offer a vision — one where we invest in improving the lives of working-class people. That is how we build a stronger democracy where everyone can thrive.
New York Post
2 days ago
- Politics
- New York Post
With Iran strike, Trump broke the spell of Iraq — and reset US foreign policy
President Donald Trump has finally moved the United States past the traumas of the Iraq War. With the bombing of Iranian nuclear facilities in Fordow, Isfahan and Natanz, the United States made the world a safer place in the long run. But the attack and subsequent cease-fire between Israel and Iran also represents a reset of American foreign policy. Advertisement The president rejected both the naivety of neoconservatism and the shortsightedness of isolationism. For one thing, Trump, to the dismay of 'non-interventionists,' came to terms with the serious limitations of diplomacy with Islamists. Advertisement Iran was given decades to strike an agreement. It was more interested in a nuclear weapon. Even after Israel had severely degraded its military capabilities and nuclear facilities, seizing supremacy of the air, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei wouldn't surrender his program. Stay up to date on the latest developments in the US airstrike on Iran The idea that diplomats were on the cusp of forging a deal with Iran is dubious. Advertisement Trump also realized that diplomacy is useless without enforced red lines. For decades, the Iranian leadership, hard-liners and 'moderates' alike, ignored its commitments without any repercussions. Simply because we were misled about the extent of Iraq's WMD program doesn't mean that no other country is pursuing them. Iran didn't make much of a secret about its intent, after all. Advertisement Also, let's not forget that the Islamic Republic has been assailing Americans for 45 years. Some of us are old enough to remember hostages being paraded by revolutionaries, the bloody Beirut bombing and servicemen being killed and maimed by Iranian IEDs. All of this should have been unacceptable. But every president since Bill Clinton has been made a fool of by the Iranians on the nuclear issue. Trump, though, accepted that Iran was not Iraq. Few argue that our experiment of imposing a democratic government on Islamic nations failed. Neither Afghanistan nor Iraq evolved into anything resembling a free nation. US drops $500M bombs on Iran Tam Nguyen / NYPost Design The US military dropped 14 'bunker buster' bombs on Iran's Fordow nuclear enrichment plant Saturday night and on two other key sites. Prior to the airstrikes, Israel initiated extensive attacks on Iran's nuclear infrastructure and military. Satellite images show how part of the mountain protecting the facility was completely obliterated. This marks the first time that the US used the 15-ton GBU-57 bunker buster bombs in anger. 'Each and every member of the UN must be alarmed over this extremely dangerous, lawless and criminal behavior,' Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said following the attack. Iran, though, was never going to be another social engineering project. The Trump administration's goal was to deny the regime nuclear weapons. There could not have been a clearer objective. Advertisement Our long-standing ally did the heavy lifting, severely degrading Iran's military capabilities. We, hopefully, finished the job without a single American casualty. Yet the failures of a foreign technocratic nation-building project have turned many Americans into cynics and panic-mongers. There was hysteria after Trump posted that though it wasn't 'politically correct' to use the term regime change, 'if the current Iranian Regime is unable to MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN, why wouldn't there be a regime change??? MIGA!!!' Advertisement Attempting to divine the president's heavily punctuated thinking is a precarious undertaking. Still, it's extraordinarily unlikely Trump ever meant the United States was mulling a way to install a new Iranian government by force. The president was likely attempting to frighten the mullahs into a cease-fire. An invasion of that nation would have taken a major buildup of troops and movement of military assets. There was never any sign that such a plan was in motion. Nor has anyone suggested such an undertaking. Nor is there any popular will to do it. Advertisement Yes, the Israelis also talked up 'regime change.' Stirring up paranoia and anxiety in an opponent is a psychological component of warfare. Israel, moreover, is fighting an enemy that's incessantly threatening its existence. It, quite rationally, wants to destroy its foe. It's also quite rational for the United States to desire a less fundamentalist and bellicose government in Iran. Advertisement Simply because Iraqis rejected our ideas doesn't mean those ideas aren't worthwhile — or that we shouldn't help those who organically embrace them. Our primary concern is American interests. But engaging in a foreign policy wholly stripped of any idealism also leads to ugly places. There have been five uprisings in Iran over the past decade. If the Iranian people have the means and ability to overthrow an autocratic regime and cobble together a less destabilizing government, however unlikely, we certainly shouldn't stand in their way. Perhaps most importantly, Trump understands that a superpower doesn't act terrified when threatened. Others should be terrified of us. The United States seems to have forgotten its own strength after the failures of the Iraq War, which convinced an entire generation that even limited conflicts would spiral us into World War III. This week's Iranian 'attack' on a US base in Qatar had all the earmarks of a face-saving, symbolic maneuver designed for a domestic audience. The truth is that we humiliated our enemy and denied them a chance at a nuke. We have no clue how all this ends. What we do know is this: The United States is no longer paralyzed by the past. David Harsanyi is a senior writer at the Washington Examiner.
Wall Street Journal
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Wall Street Journal
For War on Terror Veterans, U.S. Strikes in Iran Leave Sinking Sense of Déjà Vu
Zachary Hubbard was watching a friend's band perform at a brewery in Kernersville, N.C., on Saturday night when his phone lighted up with a text message: 'Did you see we bombed Iran?' His first thought was, 'Here we go again.' The 48-year-old Army veteran ordered another beer, and spent the next two hours buried in group chats with soldiers he served with on his deployment to Iraq in 2005.
