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Middle East

Iranians Commemorate The Death Of Imam Reza

Inside Iran’s New Wartime Leadership

Tehran’s new power brokersA wave of assassinations rebuilt Iran’s leadership from the top down, leaving a severely wounded supreme leader and a [...] More

The Latest

Propaganda paintings with american flag an "Down with the USA text" in Tehran, Iran - stock photo

What Iran Wants and How It Can Still Fight

U.S. Vice President JD Vance is touting success out of the latest round of talks in Switzerland focused on seeking a permanent end to the war in [...] More

U.S. Continues Maritime Blockade In Strait Of Hormuz

Middle East at the Brink: Norm Roule on Iran, Israel, and the High-Stakes Struggle Taking Shape

As tensions between Israel and Iran continue to evolve following a weekend Iranian ballistic missile attack against Israel, policymakers and markets [...] More

Cybersecurity Photo Illustrations

Iran's Digital War Machine Targeting U.S. Infrastructure

The first missile strikes hadn’t even cooled before Iranian-linked hackers were moving. When the U.S. and Israel launched military operations against [...] More

CHINA-RUSSIA-IRAN-DIPLOMACY

How Russia and China are keeping Iran lethal

The ceasefire between the United States and Iran is barely holding. Pakistani mediators are still shuttling between capitals, fighting has flared in [...] More

Houthi's are Positioned to Close the Bab el-Mandeb Strait

Despite suffering heavy losses to combined U.S.-Israeli military strikes, the Iranian regime remains defiant. It’s recent reluctance to send a [...] More

Trump, Iran, and the Stress Test of Western Alliances

The war with Iran has grown beyond just a regional war; it is also a preliminary test of the cohesion of Western alliances under President Donald [...] More

Iranian president meets with Putin, discusses ways to boost cooperation in all sectors

What Iran Is Learning from Russia’s War and Why the U.S. Should Be Concerned

KREMLIN FILES/COLUMN: The war in Ukraine is often framed by optimistic academics, and some policymakers as a cautionary tale—an example of how [...] More

U.S. And Israel Wage War Against Iran

U.S. Intel’s Sobering Assessment of Iran’s War Resilience

Six weeks into Operation Epic Fury, with airstrikes having killed a sitting supreme leader, wiped out scores of top military and intelligence [...] More

A Declining Demand for Strategic Intelligence? U.S. and Israeli cases

Strategic intelligence, usually perceived as intelligence supporting the formulation of strategy, has always had limited influence over national [...] More

Iran War Scorecard Looks Bad for America’s Strategic Interests

While the war has yet to conclude, we have enough information to create a preliminary net assessment of its effects on U.S. security and prosperity. [...] More

While the U.S. Focuses on Iran, Russia and China See Strategic Gain

Russia and China are certainly concerned about the desperate state of Iran’s regime, an invaluable transactional partner to both countries. Yet they [...] More

Why the ‘Day After’ Is The Most Important Day in the Iranian Conflict

The countries that get held up as models for this kind of US led attack are worth looking at closely, because they’re instructive in the wrong [...] More