During three years of ISIS occupation, the people of Mosul were forbidden from shaving, watching TV and having cell phones. The terrorist groups also carried out public executions. Boris Malagurski gives us more details. [...]

This week Donald Trump signed the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), allocating $717 billion to the armed forces. The bill will fund the US Department of Defense, authorize a 2.6% military pay raise and increase the number of US troops by 15,600. [...]

Four years ago, I toppled from my bicycle to the street, dead at age 42 from cardiac arrest.  A stranger was giving enough to administer CPR, and I was conscious again in two-days time. I had no prior knowledge of my heart condition, don’t know who saved me, and when I woke in the hospital, had no idea why. [...]

White House national security adviser John Bolton stated on Sunday that he is interested in a proposal by Erik Prince - founder of private military company Blackwater - to shift the prosecution of the 17-year US war in Afghanistan away from the Pentagon to private mercenaries. [...]

Lockheed Martin’s social media appeal to send them the best photos of its products went horribly awry, as unimpressed Twitterati responded with gruesome images of the horrors of war. The world’s largest defense contractor and one of the top defense manufacturers posted a tweet last week, asking Twitter users to send them an “amazing photo” of a Lockheed Martin item. [...]

Turkey is the latest target for US trade barriers, faces sanctions against top ministers and is even having its purchasing of advanced US weapons reconsidered. The Anatolian country’s leaders have indicated they are beginning to look elsewhere, feeling like the US is trying “to make Turkey surrender in all areas, from finance to politics.” On Friday, US President Donald Trump doubled tariffs [...]

The White Helmets, officially known as Syrian Civil Defense is a non-governmental organization, formed in 2014. Both Moscow and Damascus have accused the group of helping to stage a chemical attack in the Eastern Ghouta town of Douma on April 7. According to Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, participation of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in the evacu [...]

American politicians provoke a slew of emotions, from tears of rage to tears of laughter. But perhaps the uppermost emotion is one of pity. With a few honorable exceptions, it is such a pity that the American people are misled by such buffoons. It is such a pity that the American and Russian people — who have so much in common as human beings — are nevertheless being driven towards a state of [...]

RT’s special reports about the humanitarian crisis in the Iraqi city of Mosul has netted the network its sixth International Emmy Awards nomination, earning recognition for a story that went largely ignored in western media. The finalists for the Emmy in the News category, announced on Monday, included RT’s #MosulSOS, a series of reports and a social media campaign aimed at highlighting the pl [...]

The American military has fought in dozens of conflicts, but the US has only declared war five times in its history. A new bipartisan bill in Congress aims to curb this trend by making it illegal for the president to take the country into war without authorization by Congress, as mandated by the US Constitution. [...]

Lockheed Martin’s F-35, the most expensive aircraft in history, "is almost like an invisible fighter," in the words of US President Donald Trump; however, a new report indicates an Israeli version of the warplane showed up on a publicly accessible flight tracker on the web. The jet was detected by flight tracking site Flightradar24.com flying north along the Israeli coast after taking off from [...]

A far-reaching US Defense Department multi-project initiative to “train and equip” personnel around the world for the fight against terrorism (to the tune of billions) has failed to improve the capabilities of local fighters in more than half of its projects, according to a federal watchdog. [...]

Problems have been plaguing the new class of US destroyers, with the first ship in the series also having faced technical issues during early testing. The Zumwalt-class destroyer USS Michael Monsoor has been forced to return to the shipyard after one of its Rolls-Royce MT30 marine gas turbine engines suffered irreparable damage during acceptance trials, Rear Adm. William Galinis said in an [...]

The UK is to offer asylum to members of the White Helmets, a Syria-based volunteer rescue group which operates in areas controlled by jihadists. The move has prompted dire warnings about who exactly Britain might be admitting. [...]

The pullout of the White Helmets from Syria, carried out by Israel on the US' and Canada’s request, reveals “true colors and hypocrisy” of the controversial group, showing who actually controls it, Russia’s Foreign Ministry said. The rescue operation, which emerged Sunday, “speaks for itself” and clearly shows who exactly the group serves, the ministry said in a statement on Monday, ca [...]

US NATO ambassador Kay Bailey Hutchison has accused Moscow of trying to "flip Turkey" and other US allies and "destabilize" the alliance amid Ankara's plans to purchase the S-400 air defense system. Speaking to Sputnik, Turkish military and political observers said that although the US envoy's logic may be convoluted, it's not entirely incorrect. [...]

The bodies of more than 1,200 civilians, mostly women and children, were discovered in mass graves in Raqqa, Syria. The total number of corpses still rotting there is unknown, as relatives continue searching for their loved ones. The Raqqa Reconstruction Committee has been working for more than six months to deal with and dig up the human cost of the city’s ‘liberation.’ [...]

Until Tuesday, the two officials could have started a war without additional authorization. Israeli members of Parliament have revised earlier legislation that allowed the prime minister and minister of defense to make a decision together to start a war, according to the press service of the Knesset, Israel's parliamentary body. [...]

NATO has nothing to do with European defense, it is just a tool of intimidation and a money-making machine for the US' bloated and corrupt military-industrial complex, geopolitical analyst Jon Hellevig told Sputnik, arguing that the latest summit has not indicated any real rift among NATO members – they just don't want to fork out. [...]

The Western-made weapons surrendered by armed groups in Deraa are “material evidence of gross interference” in Syria, according to Russian Foreign ministry. The Syrian province was under militant control for years. "Enormous number of Western-produced modern weapons and equipment was handed over by reconciled militants to the Syrian army," spokesperson Maria Zakharova said, during her weekly n [...]

Donald Trump’s policy of pressuring European countries on issues like defense spending, Russia cooperation or trade will ultimately end NATO, Willy Wimmer, Germany’s former State Secretary for Defense, told RT. Commenting on the outcome of this week’s NATO summit in Brussels, during which the US president criticized European members of the alliance of spending too little on defense and berat [...]

"One who deceives will always find those who allow themselves to be deceived," Niccolo Machiavelli wrote. The famed Renaissance-era philosopher's sage words describe to a tee the allegation that Syrian forces attacked the city of Douma, 10km northeast of Damascus, with nerve gas on April 7, 2018. [...]