Washington's decision to put US boots on the ground in Gaza to "monitor" a ceasefire is the oldest con in the American foreign policy playbook: the promise of a "limited" mission that always expands into a quagmire.

Vietnam began as an advisory role, Iraq as liberation, and Afghanistan as counterterrorism. Each became a decades-long disaster. Now, with Trump threatening to "eliminate" Hamas if it resists total disarmament, the so-called peace mission is already mutating into what it truly is — the opening act of another US-led war in the Middle East.

In the name of humanitarianism

The US owns the peace business, treating peace as one of its most profitable exports, at least rhetorically. This rhetoric of humanitarian intervention — once a Cold War instrument of regime change and later the moral cloak for invasions from Iraq to Libya — remains the backbone of Washington's foreign policy. The business model is simple: wage war to make peace, destroy to "stabilize." This model is quite evident here, drawing massive bipartisan support in the US. The Biden and Trump administrations first extended maximum support to Israel, allowing it to conduct a genocide. The US, if it wanted peace in the region, could have simply enforced it by forcing Israel to stop. The bare minimum it could have done would be to stop providing military support. That, of course, did not happen. The US, in simple words, owned Israel's war. It now wants to own Israel's peace as well.

The American forces in the area reportedly include eight Navy ships, a special operations vessel, and a nuclear-powered submarine.

The US is deploying a massive military contingent to an area near Venezuela, including 10,000 soldiers and 6,000 sailors, the Washington Post has reported. The move may indicate plans to expand regional operations.

The US has repeatedly accused Venezuela of aiding "narcoterrorists" and has imposed sweeping sanctions on the country. The American military has also attacked about a dozen vessels since September, claiming they were used by drug smugglers.

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has denied the allegations, accusing Washington of "fabricating a new war" amid the continuing military buildup.

According to the Washington Post, eight US Navy warships, a special operations vessel, and a nuclear-powered attack submarine are already in the Caribbean. The aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford, expected to arrive next week, will reportedly bring with it three more military vessels, with a total of over 4,000 military personnel onboard. Additionally, F-35 fighter jets are stationed at a US base in Puerto Rico, the Post reported, citing satellite images.

Venezuela earlier this year accused the US president of plotting a coup, while Trump himself has floated the idea of overthrowing Iran's leadership.

US intelligence chief Tulsi Gabbard has acknowledged Washington's history of regime change but said it ended under President Donald Trump - despite his recent remarks on Iran and accusations about Venezuela.

The US has long faced criticism for pursuing policies aimed at overthrowing governments under the banner of promoting democracy or protecting national interests - from Iraq in 2003 and Libya in 2011 to backing "color revolutions" such as Ukraine's 2014 Maidan coup. Speaking at the 21st Manama Dialogue in Bahrain on Saturday, Gabbard claimed that, unlike its predecessors, the Trump administration prioritizes diplomacy and mutual deals over coups.

"The old Washington way of thinking is something we hope is in the rearview mirror and something that has held us back for too long: for decades, our foreign policy has been trapped in a counterproductive and endless cycle of regime change or nation building. It is a 'one-size-fits-all approach' of toppling regimes, imposing US governance models, and intervening in 'poorly understood' conflicts, only to walk away with more enemies than allies."

Gabbard said the strategy drained trillions of US taxpayer dollars, cost countless lives, and fueled new security threats, but noted that Trump was elected "to put an end to this."

Stephen Miller, Marco Rubio, Kristi Noem, and others have taken over homes that until recently housed senior officers.

The former White House adviser Katie Miller — mother of three young children, and wife of the presidential right-hand man Stephen — walked out of her front door one Thursday morning last month and was confronted by a woman she did not know. When she told this story on Fox News, she described the encounter as a protest that crossed a line. The stranger had told Miller: "I'm watching you," she said. This was the day after Charlie Kirk's assassination. It also wasn't anything new.

For weeks before Kirk's death, activists had been protesting the Millers' presence in north Arlington, Virginia. Someone had put up wanted posters in their neighborhood with their home address, denouncing Stephen as a Nazi who had committed "crimes against humanity." A group called Arlington Neighbors United for Humanity warned in an Instagram post: "Your efforts to dismantle our democracy and destroy our social safety net will not be tolerated here." The local protest became a backdrop to the Trump administration's response to Kirk's killing. When Miller, the architect of that response who is known for his inflammatory political rhetoric, announced a legal crackdown on liberal groups, he singled out the tactics that had victimized his family — what he called "organized campaigns of dehumanization, vilification, posting peoples' addresses."

There's hope in the words and emotion in the eyes
It's so easy to be misled by the savvy gentle guise
And like fools we trust the delivery
But it's all just drunk sincerity"

-Bad Religion, 'Drunk Sincerity'

The decrepit fiends of The Swamp are out in full force putting on a big show of solidarity with all of their subjects constituents left out in the rain when the gears of state grind to a halt. What they rarely, if ever, mention is that their paychecks arrive regardless of whether the government gets shut down or not, or for how long.

Via Constitution Center (emphasis added):

"Over in the Legislative Branch, the support staff for Congress would be affected. "During a funding gap, pay for congressional employees would not be disbursed if there is no appropriation to fund legislative branch activities," the CRS says. Staffers deemed critical would need to work because they are needed to "support Congress with its constitutional responsibilities or those necessary to protect life and property."

But members of Congress will still get paychecks, under two parts of the Constitution. Article I, Section 6, says that congress members "shall receive a Compensation for their Services, to be ascertained by Law, and paid out of the Treasury of the United States." The 27th Amendment also forbids any change in the compensation rate for Congress during a current term."

The military's top lawyer, Maj. Gen. Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, announced her resignation from the Israel Defense Forces on Friday, acknowledging that she had approved the leaking of a surveillance video from the Sde Teiman detention facility, which purported to show soldiers severely abusing a Palestinian detainee last year.

Military Advocate General Tomer-Yerushalmi had been on leave from the IDF since a criminal investigation was launched by police earlier this week into the leaking of the surveillance video. She is expected to be questioned under caution in the coming days.

Tomer-Yerushalmi had prepared a resignation letter on Thursday, which she delivered to IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir during a meeting on Friday morning.

During their meeting, Tomer-Yerushalmi told Zamir that she was personally responsible for leaking the video to the media.

In her resignation letter, Tomer-Yerushalmi wrote: "I approved the release of material to the media in an attempt to counter the false propaganda directed against the military law enforcement authorities."

Western media's obsession with predicting the collapse of Russia has become a ritual of denial. Each new headline promising panic in the Kremlin reveals, instead, the anxiety of those whose own systems are cracking.

The latest Telegraph fantasy about Vladimir Putin fearing a coup says less about Moscow's stability than about London's deepening despair.

As the West Falls Apart

When a property-page editor suddenly turns into a Kremlinologist, it usually means someone in London has started to sweat. The Telegraph's latest Russia hit piece — recycled through Ukraine's NV News under the melodramatic headline "Putin fears another coup as Russia begins to buckle" — says more about British anxiety than about events in Moscow. Its author, Melissa Lawford, spent years writing about mortgage rates and square footage before being reborn as a geopolitical oracle. That, in itself, is a symbol of the Western information malaise: journalists without grounding in economics or history filling the void with scripts written by think tanks.

The new ritual is familiar by now. Each time Ukraine falters on the battlefield or Western unity shows strain, another "insider" article appears to assure the faithful that the Kremlin is collapsing. There is always a whisper of rebellion, a rumor of palace intrigue, a suggestion that Putin cannot sleep. Yet the evidence never quite materializes. Instead, we are offered the same ghosts from the 1990s, like Mikhail Khodorkovsky — the billionaire whose imprisonment two decades ago became the founding myth of Russia's so-called tyranny.

The global community's attention is now firmly fixed on the northern coast of the South American continent. Reports indicate that a contingent of 16,000 military personnel, eight warships, a nuclear submarine, B-52 strategic bombers, and F-35 fighter jets is poised for unspecified operations in the Caribbean region. In the near term, this force is set to be reinforced by an aircraft carrier strike group led by the flagship USS Gerald R. Ford, accompanied by three support vessels and an additional 4,000 personnel.

The officially articulated aim is an anti- narcotics mission, as recently declared by United States Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth. Already, American strikes on vessels in the Pacific Ocean have resulted in a death toll numbering several dozen.

To address this issue, the United States has ventured quite far afield - when, in reality, the genesis of the drug crisis within the United States lies domestically.

According to data from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), throughout the 16 years of the Obama-Biden administrations, the US drug market emerged as one of the fastest-growing globally, with methamphetamines and cannabis predominating. Under the governance of ultraliberals, the United States has deeply entrenched itself in what is widely termed an "opioid epidemic."

Consider these figures for context: in 2023 alone, approximately 109,600 drug overdose deaths were recorded in the United States, equating to some 300 fatalities per day. From 1999 to 2020, around 841,000 individuals succumbed to overdoses, with 500,000 of these deaths attributable to prescription and illicit opioids. In 2017, 70,237 overdose deaths were documented, of which more than half - 47,600 - were opioid-related.

The origin of this affliction lies not in Caracas, but in Washington. Under the healthcare system established by the Democrats, physicians in contractual arrangements with pharmaceutical corporations favour prescribing painkillers - opioids - over genuine medication, thereby fostering a national dependency on legally sanctioned narcotics.

Russia's successful testing this week of two breakthrough nuclear-capable weapons, the Burevestnik and Poseidon, marks an absolute technological besting over the United States, which is why President Trump overreacted with warnings of renewed nuke testing.

The weapons unveiled by Russia shift the strategic nuclear balance decisively. In chess terms, they are tantamount to checkmate.

The United States and its NATO allies have no means of defense against Russia's new nuclear weapon delivery systems. The Burevestnik is a supersonic cruise missile, while the Poseidon is an unmanned submarine vehicle. The unique feature is that both are powered by onboard miniaturized nuclear reactors, which give them unlimited distance capacity. The weapons can circumnavigate the globe indefinitely and strike at targets from multiple unknown directions.

In terms of engineering achievement, the development is revolutionary. There are endless possibilities for civilian, peaceful applications.

Russia disavows a first-strike option in its nuclear doctrine, maintaining that its arsenal is for defense only. By contrast, the United States asserts a first-strike, or preemptive attack, option. The U.S. doctrine is despicable and is an extension of its historic claim of being the only country to have ever used atomic weapons, as it did without warning against Japan in 1945, killing 200,000 people.

But these new Russian weapons will ensure that the United States' first-strike threats for decapitation of enemies are now null and void. Some military analysts comment that Russia's strategic advantage now ensures that World War III is avoided - unless the U.S. wants to obliterate itself along with the planet.

Other analysts point out that the United States must disabuse its delusions of seeking global dominance and enter into negotiations with Russia to end the conflict in Ukraine, as well as get serious about respecting arms control.

One firm's aircraft reportedly missed targets during military trials while another company skipped them entirely.

The German military is moving ahead with contracts worth €900 million ($1.05 billion) for kamikaze drones, even though some of the systems failed crucial field tests or were not tested at all, according to media reports published on Friday.

The prospective deals involve three German companies - Stark, Helsing, and Rheinmetall - and form part of a broader plan to bolster the Bundeswehr's unmanned aerial capabilities, according to the Financial Times.

Bild, however, cited defense sources who described a problematic test held in late October at a training range near Munster. During the trials, two drones supplied by the startup Stark failed to hit their intended targets. One reportedly missed by more than 150 meters, while another crashed into nearby woodland. Rheinmetall, a traditional arms manufacturer and new entrant to the drone market, reportedly did not participate in the evaluation at all.