S-400 anti-air missile systems will begin to arrive in Turkey in two months, says the head of Russian state defense corporation Rostec, despite Washington warning Ankara that the deal could threaten their partnership. [...]

Returning to the United States in an election year, I am struck by the silence. I have covered four presidential campaigns, starting with 1968; I was with Robert Kennedy when he was shot and I saw his assassin, preparing to kill him. It was a baptism in the American way, along with the salivating violence of the Chicago police at the Democratic Party’s rigged convention. The great counter revolu [...]

Iran is right. The way to save the international nuclear accord on Iran is for all parties to honor it and to implement normal trading relations. That would also permit de-escalation of dangerous war tensions in the Gulf. [...]

A lawyer's advice on how to assert your rights when it comes to drugs and the police. If you use pot you are a criminal. This is true [according to federal authorities] even in Colorado and Washington, where the feds continue to outlaw cannabis. This is also true in California and other states that provide medical protection. [...]

Malaysia can’t accept the conclusions of the Dutch-led probe into the downing of flight MH17, as the probe didn’t seem interested in establishing the truth about the tragedy, the country’s prime minister Mahathir Mohamad has said. [...]

Former PM Tony Blair will respond to the Chilcot report on the legality of the 2003 Iraq invasion by arguing the Middle East state was devastated by Iran, Al-Qaeda and a powder keg of tribal animosity unleashed by Saddam’s removal, reports suggest. He is expected to defend the war while trying to externalize the continuing bloodshed, but not before the Chilcot Inquiry reports on July 6. [...]

Almost three-quarters of a century ago on August 9, 1945, the United States dropped a 22-kiloton plutonium bomb called the “Fat Man” on Nagasaki. The total destruction of that city, and the instant incineration of 40,000 mostly civilian people, occurred just three days after the destruction of Hiroshima by a 15-kiloton uranium bomb, which instantly killed 70,000. This criminal one-two punch by [...]

As the U.S. and NATO mount provocative military maneuvers on Russia’s border, the West is oblivious to how these threatening gestures ratchet up prospects of thermonuclear war that could extinguish civilization, says Gilbert Doctorow. In his eulogy to Mohammed Ali at the Louisville memorial service, Rabbi Michael Lerner reminded us all of the distinguishing feature of “The Greatest,” that [...]

Lebanon has accused Israel of being behind a drone strike on the office of Hezbollah near Beirut on 25 August, followed by another on Palestinian militant positions in eastern Lebanon. [...]

Austria’s interior minister has rejected a proposal that would require EU member states to grant asylum seekers the right to work, calling the plan “unthinkable,” as the country’s job market could not absorb the flood of new workers. [...]

Multiple Patriot launchers, Aegis destroyers and radars are guarding Saudi skies, but they failed to stop a massive strike on an oilfield because their actual properties aren’t what the US advertises, a Russian Army source says. [...]

President Obama threw his full support behind Hillary Clinton at the 2016 Democratic National Convention and reflected on his eight-year presidency. Here are the highlights in four minutes. Barack Obama’s mission on behalf of Hillary Clinton on Wednesday night was personal and political. He testified to her virtues as a would-be president in a way only a current president could. [...]

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) - The US Department of State has approved a proposed sale of 150 Javelin anti-tank missiles to Ukraine in a deal valued at nearly $40 million, the Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) said in a press release on Thursday.  "The Government of Ukraine has requested to buy one hundred fifty (150) Javelin missiles and ten (10) Javelin Command Launch Units (CLUs)," the releas [...]

Neocons are jumping off the Republican ship for Hillary Clinton even though Donald Trump has shifted their way on Israel and military spending. The big reason seems to be his resistance to a new Cold War with Russia, writes JP Sottile. Bill Kristol is downright despondent after his failed search for an alternative to Donald Trump. Max Boot is indignant about his “stupid” party’s willingne [...]

The United States maintains nearly three dozen military bases in Germany, with troops stationed in the country since the end of the Second World War, and long after the end of the Cold War and the withdrawal of Soviet/Russian troops from the country in the early 1990s. [...]

Donald Trump has entered a political kill zone. And the American establishment is lining up to take him out. We are talking here in virtual terms - at least thus far. Nowadays, political assassination by US powers-that-be does not necessarily involve physical liquidation of the individual deemed to be an enemy of the state. [...]

The Australian taxpayer will foot the bill for a $85 million (AUS$125 mn) Growler fighter jet that burst into flames on the runway due to an engine fault. The US Navy will not reimburse Australia for the “dud” warplane. [...]

You haven’t heard much from the Democrats lately about foreign policy or global agendas – indeed virtually nothing at the Philadelphia convention and little worthy of mention along the campaign trail. Hillary Clinton’s many liberal (and sadly, progressive) supporters routinely steer away from anything related to foreign policy, talk, talk, talking instead about the candidate’s “experienc [...]

On Friday, US President Donald Trump signed the FY2020 National Defence Authorisation Act into law, with its provisions including sanctions against the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline project. A day later, the Treasury confirmed that the restrictions had snapped into place. [...]

Finland's health and social affairs ministry wants to try out a basic income scheme to test the impact of unconditional cash payments on work incentives. The experiment aims to show if the measure can simplify the welfare benefits system and lower unemployment in the country. [...]

As part of its strategic goal of building a nationwide high-speed rail network, Beijing plans to invest about 800 billion yuan (US$114.36 billion) on the expansion of the country's railways in 2020. According to China’s Ministry of Transport (MOT), 1.8 trillion yuan might be spent on roads and waterways, and about 90 billion yuan on civil aviation. The country will strive to cover 98 percent of [...]

A study by Afghan-based research group came to troubling conclusions regarding the US government’s handling of Guantanamo Bay, finding it used bad intelligence and rigged its own legal system to justify detentions, thus prolonging the Afghan war. [...]