Kurds

Profile: Medal of Honor Recipient Sgt. Maj. Thomas Patrick Payne

"Every man on the mission that night was engaged in their own unique problem set. My teammates were also looking for some way to liberate those hostages," said Payne.

US Builds Several New Bases In Iraq Near Iran

Israeli experts say the U.S realized withdrawing from Iraq would leave policymakers and the military with greatly reduced influence in a region that has seen rapid and extensive Russian penetration into the region.

US Keeps Flying Drones Over Kurdish Syria; Turk’s Ceasefire Shaky

Defense Secretary Mark Esper spoke to reporters amidst a flurry of conflicting signals from the administration.

DoD May Fund Rare Earth & Small Drone Development: Lord

While the US is standing fast on its removal of Turkey from the F-35 program, DoD Acquisition czar Ellen Lord says there no decision has been made yet about FMS sales.

Esper To Lobby NATO For Tough Turkey Punishment

The SecDef will tell allies in Brussels next week they must take a hard line on Turkey as the body count in Syria continues to rise. The question is, does this emperil Turkey's NATO membership?

US Scrambles As Both Parties Oppose Trump On Kurds

The Pentagon and State Department spent much of Monday scrambling to respond to the White House’s Sunday night announcement. Three days earlier Defense Secretary Mark Esper told reporters he and the Turkish Defense Minister had reached an agreement on joint US/Turkish patrols in northern Syria.

US-Turkey Relations At Precipice; Turks Start S-400 Training

The Pentagon appears to be ready to take further action in the long-running saga over Turkey and the F-35.

Trump’s Pick For Joint Chiefs Praises Allies, Kurds & Mattis Strategy

“The Army has aligned itself with Secretary Mattis’s National Defense Strategy, which we will not walk away from,” Gen. Milley told an Association of the US Army breakfast. “It’s a solid strategy, it’s written in history, it’s written in the blood of generations past, and we subscribe to it.” And allies are key to the strategy.

White House, Pentagon Remain In Dark Over Syria Withdrawal

Republican Senators erupted in outrage, and there are some indications that Turkey pushed Trump to withdraw support from its traditional foes, the Kurds. The British government issued an equivocal statement, while the Kremlin applauded the move.

Israel Edges To NATO As Turkey Pivots To Russia

For a while, Turkey and Israel were the unexpected couple, the increasingly Muslim state buying the Jewish state's weapons and Israel offering Turkey a potentially strategic gas and oil pipeline. Today, Israel is reaching out to NATO and Turkish-Israeli relations are increasingly tense.

Has Turkey Gone Rogue?

When Secretary of State Rex Tillerson arrives in Ankara on Thursday, he will find Turkey unrecognizable as the ostensibly Muslim democracy and close ally that U.S. officials once held up as a model for the Islamic world. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is poised to complete his long transformation of Turkey from a raucous -- if imperfect democracy -- to an autocracy, one ruled by caprice and fear.

Stop The Malignant Misuse Of America’s Military

Last month, Secretary of Defense James Mattis warned that if Congress doesn’t “remove the defense caps,” he said, “then we’re questioning whether or not America has the ability to survive.” This claim that insufficient increases in Pentagon spending threatens American security is flatly wrong. The real and present danger to our national security is the […]

Will Daesh 3.0 Rise From Mosul’s Ashes?

They’re surrounded, targeted by constant bombardments and slowly strangled of supplies and reinforcements for months so fighters for Daesh (aka ISIS) might reasonably have abandoned Mosul and tried to slink off into the night. That’s what happened last June in the battle to recapture Fallujah, when Daesh fighters were relatively quickly routed, and hundreds were killed by U.S. […]

Beyond Paris: Still No Clear Strategy For Dealing with ISIL, Syria

  Anthony Cordesman at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) is simply one of the sharpest minds dealing with American national security. When he says the Obama administration hasn’t done enough to counter ISIL, or Daesh as we prefer to call them now, it’s worth noting. Read on to see what the White House and Pentagon should be […]