Tuesday, March 31, 2015

Deadline Extended, U.S. Threatens To 'Walk Away', Iran Militia Chief: Destroying Israel Is 'Nonnegotiable'





Deadline Extended In Marathon Nuclear Talks With Iran




The US abandoned late Tuesday a midnight deadline to agree the outlines of a nuclear deal with Iran but insisted that “enough progress” merited extending marathon talks into Wednesday.

“We’ve made enough progress in the last days to merit staying until Wednesday. There are several difficult issues still remaining,” State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said.

The announcement came late on a sixth day of talks in Switzerland aimed at laying the groundwork for a deal that world powers hope will prevent Iran developing nuclear weapons under the guise of its civilian program.

The stakes are high, with fears that failure to reach a deal may set the United States and Israel on a road to military action to thwart Iran’s nuclear drive, which Tehran says is purely peaceful.

A German diplomatic source also said the talks were “difficult” with a “changeable atmosphere” and “frequent breaks to negotiate in smaller groups.”

A Western diplomat said the army of technical and sanctions experts would continue plugging away “for (the) next hours. All parties (are) working hard and (are) committed to finding a solution.”

Senior Iranian negotiator Hamid Baidinejad said: “The negotiations will end when solutions have been found… We are ready to continue. We are not watching the clock.”







Top P5+1 diplomats worked past a midnight deadline into the early hours of Wednesday seeking to agree on the outlines of a nuclear deal with Iran, while the US threatened to “walk away” from negotiations if an accord could not be reached.

As the world powers were negotiating on a sixth day of talks in Switzerland aimed at laying the groundwork for a deal that they hope will prevent Iran developing nuclear weapons under the guise of its civilian program, the White House indicated that should a deal for a political framework not be reached, the US would leave the talks ahead of the final deadline in late June.

“If we’re not able to reach a political agreement, then we’re not going to wait … until June 30 to walk away,” said White House spokesman Josh Earnest on Tuesday.

Meanwhile the US has denied that Iran was given an ultimatum late Tuesday to decide whether to accept the deal offered by the P5+1 lest its representatives leave Switzerland by dawn.

According to Reuters, two European diplomats said that the major powers “did not want to continue negotiating beyond the early morning on Wednesday.”

A US official told the news agency that the report was “false.”
Earlier, the US said “enough progress” was made so as to merit extending marathon talks into Wednesday.





The commander of the Basij militia of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said that “erasing Israel off the map” is “nonnegotiable,” according to an Israel Radio report Tuesday.

Militia chief Mohammad Reza Naqdi also threatened Saudi Arabia, saying that the offensive it is leading in Yemen “will have a fate like the fate of Saddam Hussein.”

Naqdi’s comments were made public as Iran and six world powers prepared Tuesday to issue a general statement agreeing to continue nuclear negotiations in a new phase aimed at reaching a comprehensive accord by the end of June.

In 2014, Naqdi said Iran was stepping up efforts to arm West Bank Palestinians for battle against Israel, adding the move would lead to Israel’s annihilation, Iran’s Fars news agency reported.
“Arming the West Bank has started and weapons will be supplied to the people of this region,” Naqdi said.
“The Zionists should know that the next war won’t be confined to the present borders and the Mujahedeen will push them back,” he added. Naqdi claimed that much of Hamas’s arsenal, training and technical knowhow in the summer conflict with Israel was supplied by Iran.
The Basij is a religious volunteer force established in 1979 by the country’s revolutionary leaders, and has served as a moral police and to suppress dissent.

More Rumors Of War








A Russian geopolitical analyst says the best way to attack the United States is to detonate nuclear weapons to trigger a supervolcano at Yellowstone National Park or along the San Andreas fault line on California's coast.
The president of the Academy of Geopolitical Problems based in Moscow, Konstantin Sivkov said in an article for a Russian trade newspaper on Wednesday, VPK News, that Russia needed to increase its military weapons and strategies against the "West" which was "moving to the borders or Russia". 
He has a conspiracy theory that NATO - a political and military alliance which counts the US, UK, Canada and many countries in western Europe as members - was amassing strength against Russia and the only way to combat that problem was to attack America's vulnerabilities to ensure a "complete destruction of the enemy".
"Geologists believe that the Yellowstone supervolcano could explode at any moment. There are signs of growing activity there. Therefore it suffices to push the relatively small, for example the impact of the munition megaton class to initiate an eruption. The consequences will be catastrophic for the United States - a country just disappears," he said. 

"Another vulnerable area of ​​the United States from the geophysical point of view, is the San Andreas fault - 1300 kilometers between the Pacific and North American plates ... a detonation of a nuclear weapon there can trigger catastrophic events like a coast-scale tsunami which can completely destroy the infrastructure of the United States."

He said the Russian geography on the other hand would protect it from a tsunami or a volcano attack. Few people live on the coast in Russia and Siberia which rests on basalt would withstand similar attacks.

Mr Sivkov, who spoke at the 2013 Moscow Economic Forum, said by 2020 to 2025 Russia would have amassed "asymmetric weapons" in its arsenal for the attack.
"The situation for us today is comparably worse than half a century ago," he said.
"The weakened economic potential in Russia, the loss of the 'spiritual core of what was the communist idea', and the lack of large-scale community allies in Europe such as the Warsaw Pact, Russia simply cannot compete against the NATO and its allies." 

In December last year, the vocal military strategist told Russian newspaper, Pravda.ru that there is a "developing standoff between Russia and the West" and the US's ultimate goal was to "destroy Russia". 


Mr Sivkov accused American politicians of committing several crimes including causing the deaths of 1,200,000 people in Iraq. He believed the only way for the "American elite" to be held accountable was for its military forces to be destroyed.
"American politicians have committed a variety of crimes. Will anyone be held accountable for those crimes? What about the international law, the UN and other organisations? Are they doing anything?" he asked.
Mr Sivkov told Pravda that the idea of the US preparing for a serious war against Russia using cruise missiles was plausible given that it had already launched a thousand missiles in Yugoslavia and Iraq.







The Russian Defense Minister's press service reported on Monday that large-scale air defense exercises have got under way in Russia's Eastern Military District.

"The drills are taking place at special firing ranges in the Primorye Territory and Buryatia, where the servicemen will be tasked with destroying about 50 various targets," the press service said.

"To implement the task, the troops will use a spate of the short-range surface-to-air missile systems, such as the Osa, the Tor and the Strela-10. Additionally, the drills will see the Tunguska self-propelled anti-aircraft missile system, the man-portable air defense systems Igla and Verba, as well as the new generation long-range air defense missile systems Triumf and Favorit," the press service said.

It added that during the war games, the troops will, in particular, drill the units in repelling a massive missile and air strike by a simulated enemy.
The press service declined to elaborate on the exact number of servicemen involved in the exercises, but said that they will see the participation of air defense, aviation, radio-radar,  electronic warfare, reconnaissance and motor rifle units stationed in Buryatia and the Primorye Territory, as well as the Trans-Baikal, Khabarovsk, Kamchatka, Amur and Sakhalin regions.




The Rise Of Russia And The 'End Of The World'




[If you want to know what is really going on between the U.S. and Russia, read below]



You've probably read all sorts of theories that seek to explain the causes of the 'new cold war' in which we find ourselves. From the embarrassingly simplistic "Putin's a Hitler" offered by the Western press to the more nuanced idea of an 'energy war' between US-Europe-Russia. The truth about why we are where we are right now, as a species, however, is actually fairly simple. But to understand it you'll have to ditch the idea of a 'new cold war' and replace it with 'the 120-year-old war that never ended'


Since coming to power Putin has made moves to do to Russia precisely that which the Western banking elite spent over 100 years trying to prevent: make it a strong independent country, free (to the greatest extent possible) of the Western bankers' toxic influence. 

Even worse, Putin's plan does not seem to be limited merely to freeing Russia, but includes the idea of using Russia's influence to establish a new 'new world order', based not on the hegemony of the few, but on multipolarity, real national sovereignty, mutual respect, and genuinely fair trade among nations

In their 15 short years at the helm in Russia, Putin and his friends have gone a long way towards achieving their goals. The response from the Western elite has been interesting to watch. From NATO's attempts to encircle Russia in Eastern Europe, to economic sanctions imposed on the basis of trumped-up charges, to sabotaging Russia-EU economic relations, to staging a coup in Ukraine in 2014, to manipulating the price of oil and assassinating 'opposition figures' inside and outside Russia; the anglo-American elite are resorting to increasingly desperate and hysterical measures to maintain the global imbalance they worked so hard to achieve. But nothing they do seems to phase Russia or divert it from the path it has chosen. 


So what can we expect next from the Western elites? Short of all-out nuclear war with Russia (which is not and never was an option, contrary to Cold War propaganda) what scurrilously duplicitous maneuvers are left to be made? Not many, to be sure. Perhaps the only weapon left in their arsenal is the one that, more than any other, has allowed them to dominate the globe for so long: the almighty US dollar, its position as the world's reserve currency, and the 'petrodollar'. 

For decades, these two financial 'instruments' have forced all other countries to hold large reserves of the American currency, thereby providing the US economy with a 'free ride' and securing its position as the world's largest economy. If the US dollar were, for some reason, to collapse, it would create massive panic in the world economic system, and result, quite possibly, in the collapse of governments around the world. 

This is likely the reason that both Russia and China are wasting no time in establishing the basis for a new economic order that is not dollar-based. If that initiative progresses far enough, there may come a time in the near future when the dollar can be safely 'ditched' and replaced with another reserve currency, or basket of currencies, thereby avoiding or mitigating the systemic threat to the global economy (if not the US economy) of a dollar collapse, and forcing the Western elite, with their base of operations in the USA, to accept a more humble and justified position among the nations. 

Anyone who has investigated and understood the nature of these "elites" of which I speak, knows that they are not the type of people who simply accept defeat, even when it is staring them in the face. They're like a highly narcissistic chess player who, seeing that 'check mate' is almost upon him, opts to knock all the pieces off the board (and maybe burn it... and the room) rather than suffer the ignominy of defeat. It can then be claimed, 'see, you didn't win, we'll have to start again'. The chess analogy is appropriate given that one of the main exponents of Mackinder's theories of Eurasian strategy is Zbigniew Brzezinski, author of The Grand Chessboard, where he wrote "it is imperative that no Eurasian challenger emerges, capable of dominating Eurasia and thus of also challenging America." 


With the US debt currently running at over 104% to GDP (and rising), and the US unable or unwilling to reduce that debt or to increase GDP, the USA is effectively insolvent, a 'failed state' in all but name. 

The only thing preventing its economic collapse is the dependency, for now, of so many other nations on the US not collapsing. Is it possible that, facing the almost certain end to their reign as rulers of the world, the Western psycho-elite will chose the 'financial nuclear option' of 'doing an Enron' and collapsing the American dollar in a last, insane and futile effort to avert defeat by bringing the whole house of cards down... so they can 'rebuild' from scratch? 

As my opening quote asserts: "what the darkness cannot possess, it seeks to destroy." 









The Russian military is in the midst of a sweeping modernization program, and it is currently developing some incredibly impressive offensive and defensive next-generation weapons that are designed to be used in a future war with the United States.  The key to winning World War III will be to strike hard and to strike fast, and the Russians understand this.  Meanwhile, the U.S. military has totally shifted gears from a “Cold War mindset” and is now completely focused on fighting smaller regional wars in the Middle East and elsewhere.  As a result, U.S. strategic forces have suffered.  There has been very little effort to modernize, and many of our nuclear missile silos are using technology that is ridiculously outdated.  For example, CBS News has documented that eight inch floppy disks are still being used in many of our missile silos.  And don’t expect things to change any time soon.  At this point, the U.S. military plans to keep Minuteman intercontinental ballistic missiles that were originally deployed in the 1960s and 1970s in service until 2030.

What all of this means is that the Russians are feverishly preparing to fight World War III and we are not.  The following are just a few of the next-generation weapons that Russia will use against the United States during the next great global war…

Most Americans have heard of the infamous SS-18 “Satan” intercontinental ballistic missiles.  But these are now being replaced by the Sarmat intercontinental ballistic missile

The Sarmat (also known as Sarmatian) is a Russian liquid-fueled, MIRV-equipped, super-heavy thermonuclear intercontinental ballistic missile in development as of early 2015, intended to replace the previous SS-18 Satan and carry extensive counter-missile defense measures. Its large payload would allow for up to 10 heavy warheads or 15 lighter ones, and/or a combination of warheads and massive amounts of countermeasures designed to defeat the anti-missile systems. The Sarmat is expected to be ready for deployment around 2020, but other sources state that the program is being fast-tracked and it could comprise up to 80 percent of Russia’s land-based nuclear arsenal by 2021.


The Borey Class Nuclear Submarine

Of even greater concern than the Sarmat are the new Borey class nuclear submarines that Russia is building.  The following is from an article about the launch of one of these new submarines, the Vladimir Monomakh, in 2013

Russia recently launched its near silent nuclear submarine following several years of development.
The Borey Class submarine, dubbed Vladimir Monomakh, has a next generation nuclear reactor, can dive deeper than 1,200 feet, and carries up to 20 nuclear intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM).
Each of these “Bulava” ICBM’s can carry ten detachable MIRV warheads, what they call “re-entry vehicles,” capable of delivering 150 kiloton yields per warhead (luckily, tests of the warheads only yielded 11 “successes” out of almost 20 attempts). Which doesn’t mean they aren’t a concern, MIRV’s are what shook the Cold War to its foundation when they first appeared in the 1970s.
One of the primary things that has U.S. military planners worried is how quiet these subs are.  In fact, according to an RT article these subs are supposed to be “almost silent”…

It belongs to a class of missile strategic submarine cruisers with a new generation of nuclear reactor, which allows the submarine to dive to a depth of 480 meters. It can spend up to three months in autonomous navigation and, thanks to the latest achievements in the reduction of noise, it is almost silent compared to previous generations of submarines.
So why is that a problem?
Well, imagine a scenario where Russian nuclear subs approach our coastlines completely undetected and launch a barrage of missiles toward our cities and military bases.  We could be wiped out before we even knew what hit us.
If we can’t detect them, how are we going to defend against them?  Here is a look at one of them in the water…

Borey Class Russian Submarine

The Borey class submarines are going to be carrying Bulava submarine-launched nuclear missiles. 

The Bulava is specifically designed to avoid interception, and each warhead is independently maneuverable to help ensure that they reach their targets intact.  




Sadly, most Americans do not believe that there is even a remote possibility that we will ever fight a war with Russia.
As a result, most Americans will never see the point of articles like this one.
But over in Russia, anti-American sentiment is at an all-time high and many of their talking heads and intellectuals are now convinced that a shooting war with the United States is inevitable.







Also see:






























Monday, March 30, 2015

Down To The Wire With Iran





U.S. Sees 50/50 Chance Of Iran Deal By Tuesday Deadline



The US State Department said it believes there is a 50 percent chance of reaching a framework accord with Iran by Tuesday, as negotiators raced to finalize a deal with Tehran over its nuclear program before a March 31 midnight deadline.


Spokeswoman Marie Harf was quoted by Reuters Monday as saying that the chances of an agreement with Iran stood at 50-50.

It is unclear what move the six world powers, known as P5+1, will take in the event of a negotiations breakdown, but Harf indicated that all options remain on the table.

“We’re focused on these next 24 hours, they’re very crucial. We know that diplomacy is the best way to handle this, but we have other options if we can’t get this done diplomatically,” Harf told MSNBC news Monday from the Swiss resort town of Lausanne, where diplomats had gathered to hammer out an accord.

“The president and Secretary [of State John] Kerry have been very clear that the end of March is a real deadline and the decision the Iranians have to make isn’t going to get any easier the longer they wait,” Harf said. “We have been very clear: We’re not going to take a bad deal.”


Negotiations with Tehran over its controversial nuclear project have been underway since late 2013. Iran insists that its program will only be used for peaceful purposes, but other nations, notably Israel, fear that if economic sanctions on the Islamic Republic are relaxed as part of the agreement, Iran will clandestinely break out to the bomb.
Harf denied reports on Sunday that a deal with Tehran had been agreed and that the Iranians had backed out at the last moment.
“The notion that we had some agreement in the last 24 hours is factually inaccurate,” Harf said.
Asked by reporters what plans will be made in the event of a no-deal, Harf intoned that the US will have to take a “hard look” at its options, the outcome of which “I don’t want to predict.”


With Tuesday’s target date for a framework accord just hours away, the top diplomats from the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany were meeting with Iran to try to bridge remaining gaps and hammer out an understanding that would serve as the basis for a final accord to be reached by the end of June.
“We are working late into the night and obviously into tomorrow,” said Kerry, who has been meeting with his Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif in Lausanne since Thursday in an intense effort to reach a political understanding on terms that would curb Iran’s nuclear activities in exchange for sanctions relief.
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said Iran’s expectations from the talks are “very ambitious” and not yet acceptable to his country or the other five negotiating: the US, Britain, China, France and Russia.

“We will not allow a bad deal,” he said. “We will only arrive at a document that is ready to sign if it … excludes Iran getting access to nuclear weapons. We have not yet cleared this up.”
In a sign that the talks would go down to the wire on Tuesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov left, just a day after arriving, to return to Moscow. His spokeswoman said he would will return to Lausanne on Tuesday only if there was a realistic chance for a deal.







Foreign ministers from major powers raced against the clock in the Swiss town of Lausanne Monday on the eve of a deadline to nail down the final pieces of a framework deal they hope will put any Iranian nuclear bomb out of reach.

Meanwhile in Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Western powers that any agreement with Tehran would be seen as a reward for the country’s alleged “aggression” in Yemen.

“The agreement being formulated… sends a message that there is no price for aggression and, on the contrary, that Iran’s aggression is to be rewarded,” Netanyahu said, referring to Iranian support for Shiite Houthi rebels in Yemen.

“The moderate and responsible countries in the region, especially Israel and also many other countries, will be the first to be hurt by this agreement,” said the prime minister, who has waged a campaign against the emerging nuclear deal with Tehran, arguing that it will pave the way “to an Iranian nuclear arsenal.

“One cannot understand that when forces supported by Iran continue to conquer more ground in Yemen, in Lausanne they are closing their eyes to this aggression,” Netanyahu said. “But we are not closing our eyes and we will continue to act against every threat in every generation, certainly in this generation.”







There are more than half a dozen shifting elements at play in the Iran nuclear deal currently being cobbled together in Lausanne, Switzerland – everything from the number of uranium-enriching centrifuges to the fate of the underground facility in Fordow to the possible military dimensions of the program. But the future, assuming a deal is reached, will hinge on monitoring and verification, and that, to borrow a phrase from an Obama insider, is a problem from hell.

The first challenge will be the detection of violations. US National Security Advisor Susan Rice told AIPAC earlier this month that “we’re not taking anything on trust.” Instead, she made the case that “we’ve insisted upon — and achieved — unprecedented access to Iran’s nuclear program,” including “daily access” to the nuclear sites at Natanz and Fordow.

Tellingly, though, the unparalleled access has failed to impress the International Atomic Energy Agency – a UN body that seems to have staked out territory to the right of the Obama administration.

In February, the agency said it “remains concerned” about the possible existence of military components of Iran’s nuclear program, “including activities related to the development of a nuclear payload for a missile.”
Yukiya Amano, director general of the IAEA, told the Washington Post last week that “we would like to have access” – to the military installation at Parchin, where Iran allegedly conducted weaponization tests – “and we would like to clarify.”
In order to achieve any reasonable degree of transparency, the international community must have the ability to conduct  inspections “anytime, anyplace,” said Emily Landau, the head of the arms control and regional security program at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv.
That means open access not only to Natanz and Fordow, and even Parchin, which has been denied to the IAEA since for years, but to any military installation or Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps base in the country.



Preparing For The Wars To Come






This trend in the news may be somewhat redundant, but it is impossible to ignore:








Advanced weaponry, much of it supplied by Iran, is flowing into Syria and Lebanon, a senior Israel Navy source warned on Sunday.

The Navy is spending a large chunk of its operational time dealing with advanced weapon smuggling, according to the source, who added, “Such weapons pose a challenge to all Western navies in the area.”

He said the northern front has become unified, and that Lebanon and Syria can not be viewed as separate entities anymore.

“What happens in Syria, happens in Lebanon [in terms of weapons availability], and vice versa. I’ll go a step further and say that everything that happens in Iran can end up in Syria, which can then end up in Lebanon,” the source stated. “In the event of war with Hezbollah in Lebanon, I’m not sure Syria will remain on the sidelines. Hezbollah assists the Assad regime, and the help is mutual.”

Describing the quantity and quality of surface-to-sea missiles in Hezbollah’s possession as “unprecedented,” the source said there are dozens of such weapons in its keeping, covering around 10 different kinds of such missiles.

“The types of warheads and their ranges are many,” said the source. “We are in a completely different situation. The sector has changed.”

The source said he assumed Hezbollah is in possession of the Yakhont guided antiship missile, adding that the navy is capable of defending itself from it.

“They can fire it at military headquarters in Tel Aviv,” he said.

The Yakhont has a 300 kilometer range, according to the source.

“It is very fast. It has unusual capabilities. It can fly at a very high altitude, or a low one, depending on the variation,” he said.

Iran continues to develop its own weapons, copying the arms of other states, and it smuggles them to its allies and proxies in Syria and Lebanon, said the source.

Meanwhile, semi-state organizations are growing in Syria, and jihadist groups are likelier than previously to try to mount a sea-based terrorist attack, such as a bomb-laden vessel.

In Hezbollah’s view, the naval arena is becoming central, the source continued, and the organization’s chief, Hassan Nasrallah is planning offensive moves against Israel in the next clash, rather than just waging a lengthy war of attrition.

Meanwhile, the Israel Navy is preparing to receive four new missile ships, to secure four gas drilling platforms in Israel’s Exclusive Economic Zone in the Mediterranean, an area twoand- a-half times larger than Israel.

The gas rigs, which will form most of Israel’s electricity supply, are attractive targets for Hezbollah, the source said.

The navy is setting up layers of defense around them, including antimissile defenses on ships and underwater defenses.

“Additional ships for this task are a must,” the source said.










The Russian Defense Minister's press service reported on Monday that large-scale air defense exercises have got under way in Russia's Eastern Military District.
"The drills are taking place at special firing ranges in the Primorye Territory and Buryatia, where the servicemen will be tasked with destroying about 50 various targets," the press service said.
"To implement the task, the troops will use a spate of the short-range surface-to-air missile systems, such as the Osa, the Tor and the Strela-10. Additionally, the drills will see the Tunguska self-propelled anti-aircraft missile system, the man-portable air defense systems Igla and Verba, as well as the new generation long-range air defense missile systems Triumf and Favorit," the press service said.
It added that during the war games, the troops will, in particular, drill the units in repelling a massive missile and air strike by a simulated enemy.
The press service declined to elaborate on the exact number of servicemen involved in the exercises, but said that they will see the participation of air defense, aviation, radio-radar,  electronic warfare, reconnaissance and motor rifle units stationed in Buryatia and the Primorye Territory, as well as the Trans-Baikal, Khabarovsk, Kamchatka, Amur and Sakhalin regions.






Operation Rising Panther, the first of six proposed air defence operations due to take place every year, will “show Vladimir Putin in no uncertain terms” that Britain is ready, willing and able counter increasing Russian aggression should the need arise, say military sources.
More than 30 aircraft, including 20 Typhoons and Tornado fighter jets as well as a range of ED-3, AWACS, Sentinal and Shadow surveillance aircraft took part in the mock attack-and-defence wargames over the North east of England, as well as ground-based command teams. 
In February the Sunday Express revealed how one of the two Russian T-95 “Bear” long-range bombers intercepted by RAF Typhoons over the English Channel was carrying a nuclear missile designed to destroy a Trident submarine.
President Putin, who has recently increased Russian defence spending by a record 33 per cent, authorises around eight Russian incursions into  UK air space or Britain's "sphere of influence" every year. More than 100 were known to have encroached European airspace in 2013 alone.









In an interview today with Frank Gaffney, national security correspondent, Bill Gertz, discussed a recent interview with the Libyan ambassador to the U.A.E., in which the diplomat stated, "The situation is so dire in Libya that I expect an ISIS attack on Italy within weeks." ISIS has captured aircraft, has access to Libyan air force advisors, and could very well pack the planes with explosives.
Contrary to Obama's claims that the U.S. bombing campaign is destroying ISIS, Gertz claims the operations are a farce - blowing up pick-up trucks - and that ISIS is spreading.
As part of his two segments on Gaffney's radio show, Gertz discusses the non-binding, non-verifiable deal with Iran that the Obama administration is due to sign this weekend minus Pentagon input. He believes that Iran will be allowed to continue to enrich uranium, accelerating the already frantic nuclear arms race in the region. The unprecedented release of Israeli nuclear capabilities will further fuel the fire.
Gertz explores the issue of space warfare, which the Russians and Chinese have been busy perfecting. This could mean that every satellite in every orbit is vulnerable to attack. U.S. satellites perform military command and control, intelligence gathering, navigation and precision weapons targeting among other functions. 
Listen and learn about the new Russian cruise missiles, North Korea's ballistic missiles that overmatch our own, the lack of preparedness and weakening of our military and much more.
Start the MP3 at about 27:45.









Islamic State has recently found a following among Bedouin tribes in southern Jordan, tens of kilometers away from the border with Israel, sources from the IDF's Southern Command claim, according to Walla! News.
Sympathy for the terror organization, IDF sources fear, may spur terror cells to be established along the border, from where terrorists will infiltrate into Israel's Aravah region and carry out attacks. 
Concern is only amplified by the fact that there is no border fence between Jordan and Israel in that region, and the Aravah Division of the IDF, responsible for border security, suffers from low manpower. 
Just last month, Walla!  reported that seven people entered Israel illegally from Jordan, made their way to the Yotvata Kibbutz on the border, and stole vehicles before disappearing. None of the infiltrators have been caught. 
Jordan, meanwhile, is presently dealing with waves of refugees pouring in from Syria. In addition to food and shelter concerns, Jordanian security forces are also working to prevent terror cells belonging to both ISIS and Al Qaeda's Al-Nusra Front from springing up. 
Nonetheless, many ISIS supporters in Jordan are terrorists who returned from Syria, and there is a real concern that they will begin trying to accumulate followers thereby creating splinter groups. 
While IDF officials have confirmed there is a growing concentration of pro-ISIS supporters in Jordan's Ma'an province, kilometers away from the border with Israel, they argued it was too early to tell if active terror cells posed a genuine threat at this point. 










Saudi-led warplanes bombed Yemen's main international airport and struck a renegade troop base in the capital, as Arab leaders vowed Sunday to pummel Iranian-backed rebels until they surrender.
The raids on the country's main air gateway came just hours after UN workers were evacuated following deadly fighting that has sent tensions between Tehran and other Middle East powers soaring.

India and Pakistan also moved to airlift their citizens from the chaos-wracked country.

Yemen's President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi has urged his Arab allies to keep up the bombing until the Houthi Shiite rebels are defeated, branding them Iran's "puppet".
His Foreign Minister Riyadh Yassin said there could be "no negotiations and dialogue" with the rebels "until the legitimate government has control over all Yemeni lands".

Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi said at a regional summit in Egypt on Sunday the offensive would go on until the rebels "surrender" their weapons and withdraw from areas they seized.








Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a dire warning Sunday about a possible nuclear accord with Iran as talks in Switzerland towards the outline of a deal intensified days before a deadline.

"The dangerous accord which is being negotiated in Lausanne confirms our concerns and even worse," Netanyahu said in remarks broadcast on public radio.

He said the "Iran-Lausanne-Yemen axis" was "dangerous for all of humanity" and that combined with Tehran's regional influence, a nuclear deal could allow Iran to "conquer" the Middle East.





Also see: