David Greenberg

A very sobering assessment from the great Professor Sir Lawrence Freedman on the situation in Iran. Here's an extract to whet your appetite: "It is hard to convey the gloom that has overtaken Washington. All the structures that are vital to crisis management have either been attenuated or disbanded. There is hardly anyone left on the National Security Council staff. A friend described an empty State Department where you could hear your own foot steps. Marco Rubio is involved in the decision-making but he has neglected to acquire the professional staff assessments that should inform such decisions... The military part of the Pentagon still functions, but the civilian part has been purged. At its head is Pete Hegseth who puts effort into looking charismatic and brings the perspective of a disgruntled junior officer to everything he does, waging his own war on ‘woke’ which in its latest version involves striking out the names of two black men and two women for promotion to general. Some satisfaction is taken that figures such as Elbridge Colby, who were supposed to be providing the intellectual heft to security policy, are now stuck defending exactly the interventions they were pledged to avoid."

Hasan isn’t driving a wedge into the party, the failed, repeatedly discredited yet unfortunately still entrenched corporate wing of the party is. They fear the left’s growing power and see Hasan as a way to make us argue amongst ourselves. We shouldn’t fall for it.

Today I've seen CNN, BBC, dozens of pundits, think tanks, commentators, podcasters, journalists all saying that the regime will not fall. But it will. And soon.

IDF spokesperson in a statement: "Tonight, we attacked a property of Khatam al-Anbiya's Intelligence Division, Iran's Emergency Command HQ. This body is responsible for aggregating intelligence collected by various Iranian intelligence agencies to present it to the regime’s senior leadership. The strike took place while several senior officials from the Intelligence Directorate were present. At this stage, we are assessing the results of the strike."

Huh.