By: John C. Wohlstetter, Senior Fellow
The divisive speech given by President Biden last Thursday — seeking to shift focus from his cowardly bug-out from Afghanistan to COVID, and to make Republicans — to Biden, a/k/a “the dark forces” — the issue rather than his horrendous first eight months in office, came on the anniversary date — 9/9/2001 — when Al-Qaeda assassinated the Northern Alliance’s greatest warrior-leader, Ahmed Shah Massoud; his son continues the resistance today.
By: Simone Ledeene, Senior Fellow and Victoria Coates
Last week, a laconic statement from the Department of Defense marked a tectonic shift in Middle East security cooperation, as the United States formally designated that Israel would now be part of the U.S Central Command (CENTCOM). President Donald Trump announced the proposed change on January 15, 2021, and while the escalation of violence in Gaza this spring seemed to put the designation in some jeopardy, it went into effect on September 1, 2021. The initiative to move Israel into CENTCOM is a direct result of the Trump administration-led Abraham Accords normalization agreements between the United States, Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, signed one year ago today on the South Lawn of the White House.
By: Simone Ledeen, Senior Fellow
The Biden administration and leftist congressional allies have perpetuated a tired charade of prioritizing human rights over other security-focused considerations with regard to relations with several key partners, including Egypt. One of the loudest Democratic voices in opposition to continued security assistance for Egypt is Sen. Christopher Murphy (Conn.), who questions a number of established partnerships supporting U.S. objectives across the Middle East.
By: Geoffrey Van Orden, Distinguished Fellow
Sir, Further to Nathalie Loiseau’s Thunderer (“Britain and the EU must forge strong foreign policy bond”, Sep 2), it is France that determines the EU’s foreign policy. There cannot now be a call for a new and strong EU-UK partnership on foreign, security and defence policy when we cannot trust France as a friend.
By: Neil W. McCabe
The Founder of the Blackwater private security firm and the author of a comprehensive plan to save Afghanistan by shifting the country’s security to private contractors and away from the American military told The Star News Network on Sunday he warned U.S. diplomats the government of President Ashraf Ghani would fall before Labor Day.
By: John C. Wohlstetter, Senior Fellow
My series on the 25th Amendment — Part I, historical antecedents; Part II, 25th Amendment genesis; Part III, 25th Amendment implementation today; and Part IV, possible first-ever use of the 25th Amendment’s involuntary presidential disability provision — focused almost exclusively on the Constitutional issues, dipping down into legislative enactment (in legal shorthand parlance, “statutory”) issues only when necessary.
As noted in my series, presidential succession, as enacted as part of the landmark 1947 National Security Act, created the potential for serious conflict at a time when stability is most needed; the updated presidential succession statute is set forth below.
By: John C. Wohlstetter, Senior Fellow
The earlier installments in my series on the 25th Amendment were: Part I, historical antecedents; Part II, 25th Amendment genesis; and Part III, 25th Amendment implementation since 1967. Part IV covers possible first-ever use of the 25th Amendment’s involuntary presidential disability provision.
By: John C Wohlstetter, Senior Fellow
In Part I, I covered the historical precedents (1789-1960) up to JFK’s tragically short presidency; Part II covered the years 1961-67, featuring the reaction to 1963’s assassination horror, which led to the 1967 ratification of the 25th Amendment. Part III carries the story through Trump. It begins with the serial vice-presidential and presidential vacancy crises of 1973-74. The years following saw several assassination attempts (two in 1975 and one in 1981) and multiple instances since of temporary presidential disability, with at first a reluctance to invoke the 25th Amendment formally, and later a better practice of using the 25th to cover temporary instances of disability.
