Free Republic

Vladimir Solovyov, media personality and ally to Russian President Vladimir Putin, recently suggested that Moscow launch a missile strike at the torch of the Statue of Liberty in New York City. Amid Moscow's ongoing full-scale invasion of Ukraine that Putin launched in February 2022, Solovyov has been a source of Russian propaganda. He has talked about Russia expanding its war, claiming that the country owns Ukraine and even parts of Europe like Poland and Finland.

A Russian victory is an Iranian victory. Moscow and Tehran have formed a military bloc with the aim of defeating the United States and its allies in the Middle East, Europe, and around the world. Russian and Iranian military forces have been fighting alongside one another in Syria for nearly a decade.

A class disparity has emerged within the Russian military, contrasting the fates of ordinary soldiers and the privileged elite. This divide has ignited widespread anger and criticism, even among top-level troops who feel betrayed by their leadership during the ongoing battle over Ukraine.

The incoming president of Panama has vowed to make big changes to help alleviate the U.S. border crisis. President-elect Jose Raul Mulino vowed to shut down a crucial migration gap through Panama that has been used by more than 500,000 migrants over the last year, signaling a shift in the country's policy as the U.S. continues to battle a crisis at its southern border, according to a report from Voice of America.

Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey faces his second, distinct bribery and corruption trial in seven years starting Monday. This new case is a complicated affair involving multiple gold bars, envelopes of cash, a Mercedes and a lot more that, prosecutors say, the powerful former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and his new wife (they got married during the alleged bribery scheme) obtained in exchange for helping a halal meat monopoly, granting favors for people from Egypt and Qatar and trying to influence a New Jersey prosecution.

"It's of course impossible to know the real reasons for his arrest but this could be related to the revelations made by Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation that showed Ivanov and his wife in a pretty bad light," Kallioniemi said. FBK alleged leaked emails from Ivanov's wife, Svetlana Maniovich, showed the extent of her family's lavish lifestyle, beyond what his official salary could cover, with some transactions routed through third parties, including Defense Ministry contractors.

Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas.) expressed a similar sentiment to CNN earlier in the day, arguing those behind the motion to vacate are siding with Russia. “I guess their reasoning is that they want Russia to win so badly that they want to oust the Speaker over it,” Crenshaw said Thursday. “I mean, it’s a strange position to take.”

Q2: Why is Russia doing this? A2: Russia’s actions reflect deeper strategic cooperation with Pyongyang that has emerged as a result of North Korean support for Putin’s war in Ukraine. CSIS reports show that North Korea has supplied more than 10,000 containers of military equipment and munitions to fill three major storage depots near the front lines of the war, which could amount to more than 3 million rounds of ammunition (according to the U.S. State Department and South Korean Ministry of Defense). North Korea is preparing for a likely reciprocal visit by Putin after Kim Jong-un’s visit last year....

So what changed the policy in Tehran? Mikhail Podolyak, the head of the Ukraine Presidential Office, blamed Iran for agreeing to be "directly complicit in the mass murder of Ukrainians." Why?, he asked: "Russia offered something important to Iran in exchange for killer drones and a ballistic missile contract. It is one of these options: uranium and other materials; nuclear technology; regional guarantees from the Russian Federation."

Apair of U.S. Navy Arleigh Burke class destroyers in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea were reportedly among the assets employed to shoot down Iranian missiles and drones headed toward Israel last night. There are strong signs these ships may have fired Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) anti-missile interceptors in the course of those operations, which would mark the first use of those weapons against real incoming threats.

Iran has launched an attack on Israel. Get he latest on the Iran attack on Israel in our LIVE breaking news coverage. In this interactive live stream host Steve Lookner brings you the latest updates on the Iranian attack on Israel and he’ll also read your comments and questions on the air!

In a 273 to 147 vote, lawmakers renewed Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which is set to expire on April 19, through 2026. It now heads to the Senate. Section 702 allows the U.S. government to collect electronic communications of non-Americans located outside the country without a warrant. It came under scrutiny among some lawmakers on both sides of the aisle and civil liberties groups because it sometimes results in the collection of data on Americans who are in contact with those surveilled individuals.

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev launched a scathing verbal attack against the North Atlantic Treaty Organization on Thursday, calling for a bounty on any Western troops that enter Ukraine. "There can only be one rule for these overseas lice, who, unlike the unfortunate Ukrainians, were not forced to go to war: no prisoners taken!" Medvedev, who's now the deputy chair of Russia's Security Council, wrote in a post on X. "And for each NATO fighter killed, blown-up, or burned, there must be a maximum reward," he added." >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> This Medvedev comment sounds like a comment from a demented, drugged, serial...

Iran paid the first real price Monday for its proxy warfare in the Middle East after Israel killed the leading Iranians sowing chaos in the region. “The most significant assassination since Soleimani” is how the missile strike in Damascus is being reported in Israel. That’s a reference to the January 2020 U.S. strike on Qassem Soleimani, the longtime mastermind of Iran’s foreign terrorism and proxy-war strategy.

The liquid assets in Russia's national wealth fund fell 44% from January 2022 to December 2023. Total holdings in the fund tumbled 12% over the same period amid the war in Ukraine, per Bloomberg. Liquid assets in the fund could last just another year or two if Russia's oil export price falls below $50 a barrel, per Bloomberg Economics.

Putin later called the embassy’s alerts “provocative” and “outright blackmail,” intended to damage Russian society. “I would also like to recall the recent provocative statements by a number of official Western structures regarding potential terrorist attacks in Russia,” Putin said during a March 19 meeting of the Federal Security Board, per a Kremlin transcript. “All these actions resemble outright blackmail and the intention to intimidate and destabilize our society. You are well aware of them, so I will not go into details at this point.”

The Islamic State (ISIS) terrorist organization claimed responsibility for Friday's attack at a concert hall in Moscow in which at least 40 people were killed and 100 injured.

The Assemblée Nationale voted in favor of the government's Ukraine strategy, including a bilateral security agreement between France and Ukraine.

(Stockholm, 11 March 2024) States in Europe almost doubled their imports of major arms (+94 per cent) between 2014–18 and 2019–23. Far larger volumes of arms flowed to Asia and Oceania and the Middle East in 2019–23, where nine of the 10 largest arms importers are. The United States increased its arms exports by 17 per cent between 2014–18 and 2019–23, while Russia’s arms exports halved. Russia was for the first time the third largest arms exporter, falling just behind France. The global volume of international arms transfers fell slightly by 3.3 per cent between 2014–18 and 2019–23, according to...

The Dörtyol terminal, based in the province of Hatay, had previously been a relatively slow-paced terminal for business and mostly exported Iraqi crude. After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, however, seaborne deliveries of Russian oil to Dörtyol soared as European restrictions came into play and Moscow looked to reroute trade. In 2023, the terminal saw record amounts of Russian crude and refined oil move through Türkiye to Europe in a contravention of EU sanctions. Shipping data shows that Dörtyol – which imports, exports and stores fuel and crude – received a record 11.74 million barrels of Russian crude...