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| The Pentagon announced Wednesday a new $700 million weapons package for Ukraine that includes advanced rocket systems with a range of up to 50 miles, marking a significant escalation in US military aid to Kyiv. The US will be shipping Ukraine High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, known as HIMARS. With strike capabilities of up to 50 miles, it means Russian territory could potentially be in range, but US officials insisted in comments to the media that the rockets won't be used to hit targets inside Russia. A senior administration official told The New York Times that the US had received "assurances" from Ukrainian leaders that the HIMARS won't be used against Russian territory. Russian officials have previously warned that providing Ukraine with long-range weapons that can hit Russia would be a step toward "unacceptable escalation." Responding to Wednesday's announcement, the Kremlin said the US was "adding fuel to the fire" by sending the rockets. "The United States pursues the course towards fighting Russia to the last Ukrainian," said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov. |
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| America has been involved in a crisis of conscience for some time. Most of our recent political controversies have ended in denunciations and upheavals that seem off the charts by the standard of all previous American experience outside war. Consider the right-wing birther movement, which questioned the authenticity of President Obama's citizenship, and the left-liberal Russiagate scandal, which accused President Trump of being a Russian agent. The loudest voices leveling these charges came from people with no interest in evidence. Rather, the accusations served their purpose within the factions that constitute the "base" of the major parties. Barack Obama, a few years into his presidency, got into the habit of saying (in a tight spot when Americans seemed to support a bad cause): "It's not who we are as a people." But do we know who we are as a people? On March 3, the Metropolitan Opera severed its relations with the singer Anna Netrebko because, in speaking out against the Ukraine war, she failed to denounce Russian President Vladimir Putin and said a word in defense of artistic freedom: I am opposed to this war. I am Russian and I love my country but I have many friends in Ukraine and the pain and suffering right now breaks my heart. I want this war to end and for people to be able to live in peace. I want to add, however: forcing artists, or any public figure, to voice their political opinions in public and to denounce their homeland is not right. |
| The White House has issued a new statement detailing the meeting of the US-Israel Strategic Consultative Group, which includes both nations, national security advisers and other representatives. The body is meant for coordination of the nations on "mutual interest" and common goals.
Naturally, the entire statement is about Iran, detailing plans to coordinate in preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons and just generally opposing Iran's regional activities. |
| | European officials told The Wall Street Journal Tuesday that divisions between NATO members on how much support to provide Ukraine have been growing in recent weeks. On one side, Western European nations led by France and Germany are reluctant to send Ukraine heavy weapons, have maintained dialogue with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and are calling for a negotiated solution to end the war. On the more hawkish side are the US, Britain, and nations in northern and central Europe, including the Baltic states, Poland, and the Czech Republic. These nations want to put more advanced weaponry in Ukraine's hands and are against talks with Russia, and some have discouraged Kyiv from negotiating a peace deal with Moscow. |
| Some US allies and Russia hawks in Washington are now agitating for the US and other members of NATO to use their naval forces break the Russian blockade of Ukraine. Retired Adm. James Stavridis is one of the latest advocates of this reckless idea, and he tries to sell it as an updated version of the US role in the Tanker War during the war between Iran and Iraq. The comparison is not a promising one. Russia's Black Sea Fleet is a more capable force than Iran's navy was, Russia has repeatedly warned against outside interference in the war, and the Tanker War did not involve the possibility of setting off a war between NATO and a nuclear-armed major power. |
| Four months ago, two days before the civilized world celebrated one year since the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons came into force on January 22, officials here at the Kansas City National Security Campus hosted a virtual celebration of a different milestone with partners from across the National Nuclear Security Administration and U.S. Air Force. "With great pride and excitement," they recognized the completion of the B61-12 bomb's Life Extension Program's first production unit. This plant is responsible for producing 39 major non-nuclear component assemblies of the B61-12. The trillion-dollar program of extending the lives of nuclear weapons is at odds with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, ratified into law by the United States, flouting Article VI of the treaty, which requires "all Parties undertake to pursue good-faith negotiations on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race, to nuclear disarmament, and to general and complete disarmament." |
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