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German Chancellor visits eastern city, home to AI firm DeepSeek and e-commerce giant Alibaba, with business leaders.

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has arrived in the tech hub of Hangzhou on the second day of his first official trip to China, flanked by a delegation of business leaders seeking contracts in the eastern city.

Merz travelled from Beijing to the city of some 12 million people on Thursday, where he was due to tour some leading companies, including Germany’s Siemens Energy and Unitree, a Chinese firm producing humanoid robots.

Hangzhou is a major hub in China’s tech sector, home to giants, including artificial intelligence company DeepSeek and e-commerce platform Alibaba.

Before leaving Beijing, Merz, who is being accompanied by a delegation, including executives of German car giants Volkswagen, BMW and Mercedes, visited a Mercedes plant in the Chinese capital where he tested a self-driving vehicle.

‘Improved’ trade relationship sought

Merz’s trip to China, which became Germany’s largest trading partner last year, seeks to deepen decades-old economic ties with the world’s second-largest economy in the wake of tariffs imposed by the United States last year.

But he has also sought to address “challenges” in the relationship, most notably tackling the massive imbalance which saw Germany’s trade deficit with China hit a record 89 billion euros ($105bn) last year, fuelling complaints from German businesses that Chinese competitors are flooding the market with cheaper goods.

In a meeting with Chinese Premier Li Qiang in Beijing on Wednesday, before he met Chinese President Xi Jinping, Merz said he wanted “to improve and make fair” the cooperation between the countries.

Following the talks with Xi and top Chinese leaders, Merz said China had agreed to buy up to 120 Airbus aircraft, and said other contracts were in the pipeline.

The two leaders stressed their commitment to developing closer strategic relations, with Xi telling Merz he was willing to take relations to “new levels”.

Ukraine, Taiwan discussed

The talks between Xi and Merz also touched on geopolitical issues, with the German leader saying any “reunification” with Taiwan, the self-ruled island China claims as its territory, must be done peacefully.

Merz also told reporters that he asked the Chinese government to use its influence with Russia to help end the war in Ukraine, amid frustrations among European leaders that Beijing was not doing enough to bring the war to an end.

“We know that signals from Beijing are taken very seriously in Moscow,” Merz said.

Following the meeting, the two countries released a joint statement saying they supported efforts to achieve a ceasefire and lasting peace in Ukraine, emphasising the importance of fair competition and mutual market access, and committing to resolving any concerns through dialogue, Chinese state media reported.

Merz is the latest in a string of Western leaders to visit Beijing in recent months, including the United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron and Canadian PM Mark Carney, amid the fallout from the Trump administration’s tariffs on long-established trade partners.

Kyiv hopes progress in talks in Geneva will pave the way for a direct meeting between Russian and Ukrainian leaders.

Russia pounded Ukraine with a barrage of missile and drone attacks across the country overnight, wounding at least eight people, in advance of the latest high-level meeting between Kyiv and Washington aimed at ending the war, now in its fifth year.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said the latest attacks on the capital in the early hours of Wednesday caused damage to a nine-storey residential building in the Darnytskyi district, and resulted in fires in a home and garages elsewhere in the city.

The strikes on the capital prompted the activation of air defence systems to counter the attack, Tymur Tkachenko, head of the city’s military administration, said, advising residents to remain in shelters until the assault was over. No casualties were reported in the capital.

Ukraine has faced regular overnight barrages as Russia targets cities with missiles and drones in harsh winter conditions in recent months, also targeting civilian energy infrastructure, even amid an ongoing push by Washington to try to negotiate an end to Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War II.

Attacks also took place in the regions of Kharkiv, Zaporizhia and Dnipropetrovsk, with officials reporting seven wounded in Kharkiv and another in Kryvyi Rih in Dnipropetrovsk, the AFP news agency reported.

US, Ukrainian delegations to meet

The strikes came before a scheduled meeting in the Swiss city of Geneva between Ukraine’s lead negotiator Rustem Umerov and US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, being held in advance of a full session of talks involving Moscow, Kyiv and Washington expected in early March.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Wednesday he had spoken with US President Donald Trump before the talks, with Witkoff and Kushner part of the 30-minute call, to discuss the issues that their representatives would cover in Geneva, “as well as preparations for the next meeting of the full negotiating teams in a trilateral format at the very beginning of March”.

Zelenskyy, who has repeatedly sought face-to-face meetings with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, to resolve the most challenging issues, said he expected the meeting in Geneva would “create an opportunity to move talks to the leaders’ level”.

“President Trump supports this sequence of steps,” he said. “This is the only way to resolve all the complex and sensitive issues and finally end the war.”

Putin has dismissed such a meeting repeatedly in the past, calling into question Zelenskyy’s legitimacy as Ukraine’s leader.

Meanwhile, Russian state news agency TASS reported the Kremlin’s economic affairs envoy, Kirill Dmitriev, was also due to be in Geneva on Thursday, where he would “pursue negotiations with the Americans on economic issues”.

Negotiations stalled

Despite Trump’s desire to bring an end to the conflict, one he claimed he could end in 24 hours after he retook office, the talks so far have failed to bear fruit.

Negotiations, based on a US plan unveiled late last year, have hit a roadblock over the thorniest territorial issues, such as control of the eastern Donbas, an industrial region in eastern Ukraine that has been at the heart of the fiercest fighting.

Russia is pushing for full control of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, in the Donbas, and has threatened to take it by force if Kyiv does not cave in at the negotiating table.

But Ukraine has rejected the demand and signalled it would not sign a deal without security guarantees that deter Russia from invading again. The Ukrainian constitution also forbids the ceding of territory.

Hundreds of thousands of people on both sides are believed to have been killed in Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Whether or not the U.S. Air Force’s new Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) will carry multiple warheads remains to be seen now that a key arms control treaty has expired. The service is otherwise hopeful that the Sentinel program is now on the right track after years of major delays and ballooning costs, driven heavily by costs and complexities associated with building new infrastructure. A particularly key issue has been the matter of silos, with the original plan to repurpose the ones that currently house Minuteman III ICBMs having been abandoned in favor of all-new construction.

Air Force and other U.S. military officials, as well as a representative from the Sentinel’s prime contractor, Northrop Grumman, shared new updates about the program with TWZ and other outlets at the Air & Space Forces Association’s (AFA) annual Warfare Symposium today. Sentinel has been undergoing a complete restructuring since delays and cost overruns triggered a legal requirement for a full review back in 2024. The original plan had called for the new Sentinel ICBMs, also designated LGM-35As, to begin entering operational service in 2029. Minuteman III, of which there are 400 currently sitting in silos across five states, was to be phased out by 2036.

The setbacks also mean that ongoing work on Sentinel is now occurring free from the limits on America’s nuclear arsenal that were imposed by the New START treaty with Russia. That agreement sunset, as scheduled, earlier this month without a follow-on deal in place.

A Sentinel Program official declined to say how many warheads could be loaded onto a single Sentinel missile when asked at a press briefing earlier today. The publicly stated plan previously has been to load each missile with a single W87-1 warhead.

Each of the Minuteman III ICBMs in service today, which are also designated LGM-30Gs, is topped with either a single W78 or W87 warhead, the result of a succession of arms control agreements culminating in New START. The LGM-30G, which entered service in 1970, was originally designed to carry up to three warheads, and retains this so-called multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle (MIRV) capability.

“We have the ability to do that. That’s obviously a national-level decision that would go up to the President,” Navy Adm. Rich Correll, head of U.S. Strategic Command (STRATCOM), told TWZ and others at a separate roundtable today, speaking generally about the prospect of the U.S. fielding ICBMs in a MIRV configuration again. “Those policy levers, if needed, provide additional resiliency within the capabilities that we have.”

“Nothing’s changed since [the] expiration of the New START treaty. The threat environment that existed before [the] expiration of the New START Treaty exists today,” Correll added. “So that decision space is open, and discussions will occur at a senior policy-making level to make decisions with respect to that. I would reserve any recommendations I have for that discussion within the Department.”

Earlier this month, Air Force Global Strike Command (AFGSC), under which the currently Minuteman III force falls, also told TWZ that it “maintains the capability and training to MIRV the Minuteman III ICBM force” and that it would be prepared to do so “if directed by the President.”

We do know that the Sentinel missile is a new design with a three-stage solid fuel rocket booster that has been described as slightly larger than the Minuteman III. Under the shroud on top is a payload bus with a liquid fuel propulsion system.

Enabling Peace Through Deterrence

“Our liquid propulsion system, this is what gives us the fine point that allows us to place the re-entry vehicle precisely on target, that greater accuracy that comes with the Sentinel system,” the Northrop Grumman official explained at today’s press briefing.

Beyond improved accuracy, the Air Force and Northrop Grumman have said that Sentinel will also offer greater range, as well as reliability and sustainability benefits, compared to the Cold War-era Minuteman III. Though more specific details about Sentinel’s capabilities are classified, developing a new ICBM does provide the opportunity to incorporate various new features and functionality, including when it comes to survivability.

“At this point, we have completed testing on all of the major elements of the missile system. … We met all of our primary objectives and are [on] a good course to first flight, which is why we have confidence that we’re going to hit that pad launch in 2027,” the Northrop Grumman official added. “What we’re working on now are additional tests just to give us confidence” when it comes to “reliability and integrating that system.”

The Air Force first announced it was targeting a Sentinel first flight in 2027, from a launch pad above ground, last week. The service has yet to share when it expects to conduct the first test launch from a silo. Northrop Grumman is now building a full-scale prototype silo facility in Promontory, Utah, but it is unclear whether that will be constructed in a way that would allow it to be used for test launches in the future. As an aside, the New START treaty had also imposed limits on deployed and non-deployed “launchers,” which included silos for ICBMs.

As mentioned, the topic of silos has been absolutely central to the Sentinel program and its troubles over the years. Originally, the Air Force expected to be able to reuse Minuteman III silos, but subsequently determined that this was not the optimal course of action. The plan now is to construct 450 entirely new silos. The Air Force hopes this will actually save time and money now, in part because of the ability to leverage modern modular construction methods from the start rather than trying to repurpose decades-old structures.

“The original acquisition strategy for Sentinel was to use and reuse the Minuteman III silos for the housing of the Sentinel missile, with some upgraded communication rooms and things next to it. Over the past year, we’ve gone through multiple assessments to figure out what the right strategy is as we look forward, and we’ve changed our acquisition strategy to go after building and constructing new silos for Sentinel,” the Sentinel Program official explained today. “That came out of really kind of two primary things. The first reason we looked at this is just the variability of refurbishing Minuteman III silos. The Minuteman III silos are amazing, and they are incredibly efficient at executing the mission today. But as we were going down the path of trying to plan, just like trying to renovate a house built in the [19]60s, there was variability in understanding how you would attack refurbishment, how you would understand the conditions, and the timing, and the cost associated with that.”

The Air Force also sees new silos as helping ease the transition process from Minuteman III to Sentinel. Both missiles will be in service simultaneously for a time to ensure the land-based leg of America’s nuclear deterrent triad remains credible throughout the process.

“As we were looking at opportunity space, we found a squadron at Malmstrom [Air Force Base in Montana], which was the first one, that was still owned Air Force land, but allowed us what I would call swing space,” the Sentinel Program official noted. “If we constructed there, how we sequence and how we choreograph, taking down Minuteman and bringing Sentinel up on alert, it allowed us the opportunity to do that without impacting operations today. And going after that swing space, it actually drove us to designing and constructing new silos, as there were not Minuteman III silos available to be reused on those sites.”

New silos “also captured a few things that we were working through on risk, primarily around human factors and some other things that were existing in the reuse of Minuteman, it allowed us to get those and reduce those as we went forward,” they added.

“We knew and had some assumptions at the beginning. We had to test out those assumptions,” they also said when asked about why these issues were not recognized earlier on. “As we’ve tested out those assumptions, some of them proved false, which is why we’ve been going down the path of laying in, prototyping, experimentation, and showing progress on how do we say, ‘Hey, this is a different way of approaching it.’”

“To suggest they weren’t thought about, I think that would be probably short-sighted. They were very much thought about. I think that we often forget that these are very challenging programs. This is something we have not done in over six decades,” Air Force Gen. Dale White, Director of Critical Major Weapon Systems and direct reporting portfolio manager to the Deputy Secretary of War, also said at the roundtable. “Some of the assumptions that did come to fruition have actually provided more operational advantages. We’ve made changes along the way.”

“With the decision to recapitalize the intersite communications and build new launch silos, it’s opened up a lot of additional possibilities,” AFGSC commander Air Force Gen. Stephen Davis also said at the roundtable. “And I would tell you, I don’t think we have the answer exactly how we’re doing that yet, but we have more flexibility.”

The aforementioned prototype silo in Utah is being built to help further burn down risk.

“There are many things that we’re looking to prove out through this risk reduction activity, excavation techniques, how we integrate the modular elements of the silo, too. How we protect from weather conditions and how we do transportation to and from the site – critically important,” the Northrop Grumman official said. “And we will ultimately use this as we start to integrate and perform operations around missile emplacement, those kinds of things.”

Despite the “swing space” found to exist on Air Force-owned land, the Sentinel program is still expected to require the use of other U.S. government-owned land and the acquisition of additional land from private entities. The full extent of those additional land requirements is still being assessed. What will happen to the decommissioned Minuteman III silos is still to be determined, as well.

Though they are the most important aspect, silos are only one part of the massive infrastructure development plans baked into the Sentinel program. A total of 24 new launch centers and three new missile wing command centers are also set to be built. The new ICBM force will be spread across 32,000 square miles in five states and linked together by more than 5,000 miles of new fiber optic lines.

“The wing command center is actually a new capability being provided by Sentinel that doesn’t exist today for Minuteman,” the Sentinel Program official said. “Today at Minuteman, the information is more siloed. The structure of Minuteman is built around the [missile] squadron, and there isn’t a sole place where the information is pulled together, to give you the battlespace awareness of the entire wing at one time.”

“So the wing command center is where that fiber backbone is incredibly important,” they continued. “The quantity of data that can be pushed on fiber, from my physical security monitoring for health and status of the missiles and of the launch facilities, all can be integrated here into a common picture that allows the operational commander the ability to see what is going on in the missile field and take the appropriate action and prioritize where they are using their resources, their Airmen, to tackle the problems and the solutions.”

The first of these facilities is now being built at F.E. Warren Air Force Base in Wyoming. That base is also set to host initial prototyping efforts related to the fiber optic cable laying, which is set to be a huge undertaking led by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

The Air Force is now aiming to start fielding Sentinel sometime in the early 2030s. How long it will take to complete the transition from Minuteman III to the ICBMs is unclear. The service has said it is at least “feasible” to keep some number of Minuteman IIIs on alert until 2050, according to a past report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO), a congressional watchdog.

The U.S. military continues to stress that the new Sentinel ICBMs and modernized infrastructure that will come with them are top national security priorities. Despite debates in the past about the utility of the land-based leg of the triad, it does remain the fastest nuclear response option in the Pentagon’s strategic portfolio. It also has a continued purpose to act as a ‘warhead sponge’ that would force any opponent to expend substantial resources on trying to neutralize it in a future nuclear exchange.

US Air Force launches Minuteman III ICBM from Vandenberg in unarmed test

The global geostrategic environment has also evolved in ways that further bolster the case for Sentinel, particularly when it comes to China drastically expanding its nuclear arsenal. Other global crises, including Russia’s ongoing war with Ukraine, together with other proliferation and strategic weapons development concerns, are factors, as well.

“The fact of the matter is that both the offense and defensive threats … have evolved significantly” since Minuteman III was fielded, Gen. Davis said today. “We’ve gotten all the capability that we can out of the Minuteman, but Sentinel will bring Air Force Global Strike Command and USSTRATCOM important new capabilities that we need to keep up with the threat and to stay ahead of it.”

There are many questions the Sentinel program clearly still has to answer, including how many warheads each missile should carry, as it moves toward finally reaching an operational capability in the next decade.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

Robinson is notorious in the UK where he has been accused of promoting hatred against Muslims and organising mass anti-migrant protests.

British far-right activist Tommy Robinson says he visited the United States Department of State as part of a recent trip to Washington, DC, where he was welcomed by government officials and supporters of the Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement.

“In America making alliances & friendships, today I had the privilege of an invite to the @StateDept,” Robinson posted on X on Wednesday, alongside a photo of himself next to a US flag.

Robinson is a household name in the UK, notorious for his anti-Muslim rhetoric and multiple prison terms. He was also a cofounder of the now-defunct far-right English Defence League – a street protest movement.

US State Department official Joe Rittenhouse, who is a senior adviser for the department’s Consular Affairs bureau, said he met with Robinson, calling him a “free speech warrior”.

“Honored to have free speech warrior @TRobinsonNewEra at Department of State today. The World and the West is a better place when we fight for freedom of speech and no one has been on the front lines more than Tommy. Good to see you my friend!” Rittenhouse said in an X post.

Rittenhouse posted photos of what appeared to be Robinson touring the State Department.

The State Department did not answer questions from the Reuters news agency on who else Robinson met, what was discussed and what the objective of his visit was.

A representative for the United Kingdom’s embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Reuters.

Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, has become an icon for British nationalists and one of the UK’s most high-profile anti-migration campaigners, organising a large rally last September in London attended by about 150,000 people.

Social media posts show that during his trip to Washington, Robinson also met far-right US influencer Jack Posobiec and filmed a video with Congressman Randy Fine, a Republican from Florida, who has a history of anti-Muslim rhetoric. Robinson said on X that he will next travel to Florida.

Robinson’s visit to the US State Department follows a surge in support from the administration of President Donald Trump for far-right activists in the UK and Europe under the pretext of protecting “free speech”.

In December, the Trump administration accused Europe of engaging in “civilisational erasure” due to demographic and cultural changes from what Washington has described as weak immigration policies.

US Vice President JD Vance took aim at European countries during his first international trip last year, accusing the region’s leaders of stifling free speech – particularly voices from the far right – and being lax on migration to the detriment of their societies.

“No voter on this continent went to the ballot box to open the floodgates to millions of unvetted immigrants,” Vance said in remarks that shocked European leaders.

The UK and European countries have stronger rules on hate speech than the US, and the European Union has taken a proactive stance on regulating social media and internet content – positions that have angered the White House.

Robinson was banned from Twitter in 2018, but his account was restored in 2022 following its acquisition by Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX.

As the Muslim holy month of Ramadan began last week, the Iraqi city of Mosul regained its spiritual and cultural vibrancy, with religious rituals blending with cultural activities that reflect the city’s heritage, identity and collective memory after years of war and devastation.

On the first night of Ramadan, immediately after the Maghrib call to prayer, the chant “Majina ya Majina”, a traditional Ramadan song, echoes through the old neighbourhoods. Children in traditional clothing roam the streets singing Ramadan songs, in a scene that revives longstanding customs.

“This gathering of children revives Mosuli and Iraqi heritage and teaches them the values of sharing and celebrating the holy month,” said Yasser Goyani, 31, a member of the Bytna Foundation for Culture, Arts and Heritage

Tarawih prayers, performed at night during Ramadan, have also returned to the Grand al-Nuri Mosque and its iconic leaning minaret, al-Hadba, for the first time in nearly nine years, just before the bombing of the mosque in 2017 by ISIL (ISIS) fighters at the peak of an Iraqi government campaign against the group that had taken control of the city.

“I feel great joy performing prayers again in the mosque after its restoration and reopening, which reflects its spiritual and historical importance,” adds Goyani.

The traditional storyteller, or hakawati, has also re-emerged during Ramadan evenings, recounting stories from Mosul’s past.

“The hakawati represents a link between the past and the present. We narrate stories about how life in Mosul used to be, especially during the holy month of Ramadan. Despite technological development, people still love returning to their old memories,” explained Abeer al-Ghanem, 52, who plays the storyteller.

Meanwhile, the musaharati – the traditional predawn caller who wakes people up for a small meal to help them cope with the daylong fast – still walks through neighbourhoods in the Old City of Mosul before dawn.

Ghufran Thamer, 34, who performs the role, says, “The musaharati reminds people of authentic Ramadan rituals and keeps the nights of Ramadan alive, despite the changes in modern life.”

Traditional games remain a key part of the Ramadan atmosphere.

“We have been playing the siniya game since the 1980s. It is closely associated with Ramadan and creates a warm and joyful atmosphere among participants during the nights,” said Fahad Mohammed Kashmoula, 55.

Mosul’s markets, particularly the historic Bab al-Saray, come alive during Ramadan as residents flock to buy seasonal staples. Dates are especially in demand, providing a quick source of energy for those fasting. Khalil Mahmoud, 65, who has been selling dates in Bab al-Saray for nearly 40 years, says date sales increase significantly during Ramadan, especially in this market.

“Dates are highly sought after by those fasting, because they help compensate for the sugar lost during the day,” he said

Raisin juice, another Ramadan drink, is also popular across the city.

“The juice is prepared from high-quality raisins and fresh mint from the mountains of Kurdistan. The raisins are soaked, strained, crushed and strained again before being poured into bags for sale. Shops become crowded as people seek to replenish their energy after fasting,” said Hussein Muwaffaq, a raisin juice maker.

Alongside religious and cultural activities, the city also sees growing humanitarian initiatives during Ramadan, including paying off the debts of people in need, distributing food baskets, setting up free iftar meals, and promoting the values of social solidarity.

Surprise ruling comes weeks after the media mogul was convicted and jailed for 20 years on national security charges.

A Hong Kong appellate court has overturned a fraud conviction against pro-democracy media tycoon Jimmy Lai in a surprise ruling weeks after his jailing for 20 years on a separate national security charge.

The ruling by the Court of First Instance on Thursday said that it allowed the appeal from Lai and ⁠another defendant in the case to proceed as a lower court judge had “erred”.

“[We] allow the appeals, quash the convictions and set aside the sentences,” the judges wrote.

The conviction that was overturned was from an earlier fraud case in which prosecutors alleged that a consultancy firm operated by Lai, 78, for his personal use had taken up office space that his now defunct media business – Apple Daily – rented for publication and printing purposes.

This was in breach of the terms of the lease Apple Daily signed with a government company and amounted to fraud, prosecutors said.

Lai had been sentenced to five years and nine months in prison in 2022 on the two fraud charges.

Former Apple Daily executive Wong Wai-keung was also charged in the same case and jailed for 21 months.

Judges at the Court of Appeal wrote in their judgement that while Apple Daily Printing had breached the lease terms by allowing the firm to use part of the space, it didn’t owe a duty to disclose its breach. They said even if it had owed and breached that duty, the same could not be attributed to Lai and Wong as a matter of law.

The trial judges’ “reasoning in concluding that the applicants were liable for the concealment as the prosecution contended is unsupportable”, they said.

Neither defendant appeared in court.

The ruling would slightly reduce Lai’s total prison time. The judges handling Lai’s national security case allowed the two sentences to be served concurrently for only two years, with the other 18 years to be added after the fraud sentence.

The lengthy sentence – over ‌two counts of conspiracy to collude with foreign forces and one for publishing seditious materials – has raised concerns that he could spend the rest of his life in prison.

Lai’s children have expressed hopes that a visit by United States President Donald Trump to Beijing could help secure the release of their father, a British citizen. The White House has confirmed that Trump will travel to China on March 31 through April 2 to meet Chinese leader Xi Jinping.

United Kingdom Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper has said Lai was sentenced for exercising his right to freedom of expression and called on the Hong Kong authorities to release him on humanitarian grounds.

Chinese and Hong Kong authorities have defended Lai’s sentencing in the national security case, saying it reflected the spirit of the rule of law. They also insisted the security law is necessary for the city’s stability.

In a separate ruling on Thursday, a Hong Kong court sentenced the father of a wanted pro-democracy activist to eight months in prison under the city’s national security law for attempting to withdraw funds belonging to an “absconder”.

Kwok Yin-sang, 69, was found guilty on February 11 for “attempting to deal with, directly or indirectly, any funds or other financial assets or economic resources” after he tried to terminate his daughter Anna Kwok’s insurance policy and withdraw the funds.

He is the first person in the city to be charged and convicted of the offence.

He had pleaded not guilty and did not testify at the trial.

Caracas, February 25, 2026 (venezuelanalysis.com) – Venezuelan rice producers have staged demonstrations in recent days, demanding responses from authorities to secure fair prices for their harvests.

Campesino organizations from Barinas, Cojedes, Guárico, and Portuguesa states have held meetings with their respective governors and local representatives of the Agriculture Ministry to denounce pressure from agribusiness conglomerates imposing lower prices for their crops.

Victor Martínez, a rice producer and representative from a rural association in Portuguesa state, told Venezuelanalysis that there is an urgent need to establish appropriate crop prices with harvesting set to begin in the coming days.

“We are calling on the Venezuelan government, from Acting President Delcy Rodríguez to Agriculture Minister Julio León Heredia, to intervene and help set fair prices for rice that take into account our production costs,” he explained. “We cannot have the agroindustrial conglomerates imposing prices unilaterally.”

According to Martínez, rural producers sold rice crops at $0.50-0.55 per kilogram last year, and presently the Iancarina group, the biggest agribusiness firm in Portuguesa state, is offering $0.32-0.38 per kilo. Iancarina holds significant market shares nationwide in corn flour and rice distribution with its “Mary” brand and has ties to the US-based transnational commodities marketer GSI Food.

“These prices would mean the extinction of rice production, jeopardizing thousands of jobs in the countryside,” Martínez continued. “We urge authorities to establish dialogue mechanisms that take our production costs into account.”

The rice growers additionally denounced that corporations have recently imported rice to drive down crop prices and that Venezuelan producers cannot compete with international prices due to “exorbitant production costs.” AgroPatria, a state-owned company that supplied agricultural inputs to campesinos, was turned over to private group AgroLlano in 2020.

Martínez stated that $0.70 per kilo of rice is the price Portuguesa producers have set as a target in negotiations.

“There are too many hurdles to produce right now, from very expensive inputs to a lack of access to credit,” he went on to add. “The same agroindustry corporations offer financing but with draconian conditions and our profit margins vanish.”

According to Martínez, current financing agreements see companies supply inputs and then collect as much as 60 percent of the crop as payment. 

“Agribusiness oligopolies say that they are better off just importing rice, which carries no risk for them. But no country can survive without agriculture.” He concluded with a call for halting imports and extending state support to campesino producers.

In recent days, rural collectives in different states have shared their production costs and come up with different proposals for Venezuelan authorities. They are likewise weighing the possibility of staging a rally in Caracas to demand the intervention of the Agriculture Ministry. Venezuelan government officials have yet to comment on the controversy.

In recent years, with the economy heavily constrained by US sanctions, the Nicolás Maduro government moved to liberalize agricultural policies, transferring former state competencies to the private sector, including provisioning of seed and fertilizer inputs and access to tractors. Fuel subsidies have likewise been phased out, with small-scale producers denouncing it as a major factor driving up production costs.

Campesino collectives have repeatedly drawn attention to a growing agribusiness influence both in the supply of inputs and the commercialization of harvests. Food conglomerates have used their control of silos and retail channels as well as imports during harvest season, to drive up profit margins by imposing lower prices on producers.

Apart from rice, farmers have condemned similar coercive practices with sugar and coffee. Standoffs have traditionally led to mediation from state authorities and a temporary agreement on prices. However, campesinos have repeatedly alerted that agribusiness firms stop honoring established prices or delay payments to take advantage of the Venezuelan currency devaluation.

Edited by Lucas Koerner in Fusagasugá, Colombia.

US eases oil embargo on Cuba as Caribbean neighbours warn worsening humanitarian crisis could destabilise region.

The United States has said it will allow the resale of some Venezuelan oil to Cuba in a move that could ease the island’s acute fuel shortages, as neighbouring countries raised the alarm over a rapidly deteriorating humanitarian situation caused by Washington’s oil blockade.

In a statement on Wednesday, the US Department of the Treasury said it would authorise companies seeking licences to resell Venezuelan oil for “commercial and humanitarian use in Cuba”.

It said the new “favorable licensing policy” would not cover “persons or entities associated with the Cuban military, intelligence services, or other government institutions”.

Venezuela had been the main supplier of crude and fuel ⁠to Cuba for the past 25 years through a bilateral pact mostly based on the barter of products and services. But since the US abducted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro last month and took control of the country’s oil exports, Caracas’s supply to Cuba has ceased.

Mexico, which had emerged as an alternate supplier, also halted shipments to the Caribbean island after the US threatened tariffs on countries that send oil to Cuba. The US blockade has worsened an energy crisis in Cuba that is hitting power generation and fuel for vehicles, houses and aviation.

The shift in US policy came as Caribbean leaders gathering in Saint Kitts and Nevis expressed alarm at the impacts of the blockade on the island nation of some 10.9 million people. Speaking to Caribbean leaders during a meeting of the regional political group CARICOM on Tuesday, Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness affirmed solidarity with Cuba.

“Humanitarian suffering serves no one,” Holness said at the meeting. “A prolonged crisis in Cuba will not remain confined to Cuba.”

The Caribbean summit’s host, Saint Kitts and Nevis Prime Minister Terrance Drew, who studied in Cuba to be a doctor, said friends have told him of food scarcity and rubbish strewn in the streets.

“A destabilised Cuba will destabilise all of us,” Drew said.

But addressing the meeting in Saint Kitts and Nevis on Wednesday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio claimed that the humanitarian crisis had been caused by the Cuban government’s policies, not Washington’s blockade.

Rubio, whose parents migrated to the US from Cuba in 1956, warned that the sanctions would be snapped back if the oil winds up going to the government or military.

“Cuba needs to change. It needs to change dramatically because it is the only chance that it has to improve the quality of life for its people,” Rubio told reporters.

It is “a system that’s in collapse, and they need to make dramatic reforms”, he said.

Rubio went on to blame economic mismanagement and the lack of a vibrant private sector for the dire situation in Cuba, which has been under communist rule since Fidel Castro’s 1959 revolution.

“This is the worst economic climate Cuba has faced. And it is the authorities there, and that government, who are responsible for that,” Rubio said.

The US pressure on Venezuela and Cuba ⁠has left several fuel cargoes undelivered since December, according to the Reuters news agency, contributing to the island’s inability to keep the lights on and cars circulating. A Cuba-related vessel that loaded Venezuelan gasoline in early February at a port operated by state-run company PDVSA remained this week anchored in Venezuelan waters waiting for authorisation to set sail.

Mexico and Canada have meanwhile announced they would be sending aid to Cuba, and Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak also said his government was discussing the possibility of providing fuel to the island.

Separately on Wednesday, Cuba’s Ministry of the Interior announced killing four people and wounding six others on board a Florida-registered speedboat that it said entered Cuban waters.

Rubio told reporters it was not a US operation and that no US government personnel were involved.

“Suffice it to say, it is highly unusual to see shootouts in open sea like that,” he said. “ It’s not something that happens every day. It’s something frankly that hasn’t happened with Cuba in a very long time.”

US Justice Department accuses former Air Force officer Gerald Brown of training Chinese military pilots.

A former United States Air Force officer and “elite fighter pilot” has been arrested and accused of betraying his country for illegally providing training to Chinese military pilots.

The US Department of Justice said ex-Air Force Major Gerald Brown, once known by his pilot’s call sign “Runner”, was arrested on Wednesday in Indiana and charged with a criminal complaint for providing and conspiring to provide defence services to Chinese pilots without authorisation.

Brown, 65, a former F-35 Lightning II instructor pilot with decades of experience in the Air Force, “allegedly betrayed his country by training Chinese pilots to fight against those he swore to protect”, Roman Rozhavsky, assistant director at the FBI’s Counterintelligence and Espionage Division, said in a statement.

“The Chinese government continues to exploit the expertise of current and former members of the US armed forces to modernise China’s military capabilities. This arrest serves as a warning,” Rozhavsky said.

US Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro for the District of Columbia said Brown “and anyone conspiring against our Nation” will be held accountable for their actions.

According to the Justice Department, Brown served in the US Air Force for 24 years, had led combat missions and was responsible for commanding “sensitive units”, including those involved in nuclear weapons delivery systems.

After leaving the US military in 1996, Brown worked as a commercial cargo pilot before working as a defence contractor training US pilots to fly F-35 and A-10 warplanes.

Brown is alleged to have travelled to China in December 2023 to begin his work training Chinese pilots, and he remained in the country until returning to the US in early February 2026.

His contract to train Chinese pilots was negotiated by Stephen Su Bin, a Chinese national who in 2016 pleaded guilty and was sentenced to four years in prison for conspiring to hack a defence contractor in the US to steal military secrets for China, according to the Justice Department.

The department said Brown faces charges similar to those levelled against former US Marine Corps pilot Daniel Duggan, who was arrested in Australia in 2022 and is currently fighting his extradition back to the US, where he faces prosecution for violating the US Arms Export Control Act for providing pilot training to the Chinese armed forces.

Duggan appeared in an Australian court in October 2025 to appeal against his extradition, which was approved in December 2024 by Australia’s then Attorney General Mark Dreyfus.

Duggan, 57, a naturalised Australian citizen, was arrested by Australian police in 2022 shortly after returning from China, where he had lived since 2014.

According to the Reuters news agency. Duggan’s lawyer, Christopher Parkin, told the court that his client’s extradition to the US was “uncharted territory” for Australia.

He argued that his client’s conduct was not an offence in Australia at the time or when the US requested extradition, and so did not meet the requirement for dual criminality in Australia’s extradition treaty with the US.

The governments of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the US published a notice in 2024 warning current and former members of their armed forces that China was seeking to recruit them and other NATO military personnel in order to harness Western military expertise and bolster its own capabilities.

“The insight the PLA [People’s Liberation Army] gains from Western military talent threatens the safety of the targeted recruits, their fellow service members, and US and allied security,” the notice stated.

“Those providing unauthorized training or expertise services to a foreign military can face civil and criminal penalties,” it added.

So, here we are, once again. The United States has flooded the Middle East with combat capabilities. A massive investment has already been made in airframe hours, manpower, and naval resources in preparation for what could be the biggest initial military action America has taken in more than 20 years. Such an operation is not without absolutely massive risks. Iran has prepared for this day for many decades, and so many questions remain outstanding. Glaring ones. Ones that impact the globe and especially those tasked with fighting what could very well be a bloody war that has, at least at this time, highly opaque goals.

Let’s talk about those questions.

What is the goal?

This is the biggest unknown. What are we getting into here? Aside from the possibility that this is a giant feint — a hammer and anvil tactic to force a diplomatic outcome — there have to be clear military goals. Would an air campaign be focused on destroying Iran’s nuclear program alone? There are limitations to achieving that goal with airpower. Israel, too, is well aware of this. Is this goal to be paired with absolutely neutering Iran’s military-industrial base, along with its existing combat capabilities? That would seem more likely, but doing so would require a much larger, sustained operation.

There have also been reports that the White House is eyeing a limited operation in order to force Iran to make a deal. This seems wildly reckless both on a military and diplomatic level, and I doubt these reports are true. The Pentagon would never recommend this. It would ruin any element of surprise and the cumulative impact of using everything at its disposal to shock, blind, and deafen Iran’s command and control. It would also likely result in Iran counter-attacking, which sets off a chain of events that will be hard to pull back from.

Then there is regime change. That term comes with immense baggage for obvious and totally relevant reasons. Even if this goal is achieved — the collapse of the current regime — mainly through strikes, what comes next? Is there a plan in place for who will succeed Khamenei, and what would that group’s own goals be? How would they seize power when the power vacuum appears? Or will decapitating the regime throw Iran into civil war or even worse, a country controlled by the fanatical IRGC, which, on paper, would seem to be a prime candidate with the might and infrastructure to assume control.

In other words, could lopping off the head of the snake just see another, even more gruesome serpent take its place?

We don’t know the intelligence or what is going on clandestinely to see that such a risky operation has any chance of long-term success. Without a solid plan, such a move would seem to only invite more risk.

And once again, obtaining this level of transformation largely via airpower is a highly questionable proposition, at best. There is absolutely no appetite domestically to engage in another ground war in the Middle East, so that option is a non-starter, which is a good thing, as America’s track record in this regard is terrible.

Finally, as we have mentioned before, the U.S. military has a lot of combat capability now in the region, and more that can strike from afar, but there doesn’t appear to be enough to sustain a long campaign with a wider set of objectives. So this may limit what can be achieved.

That brings us to the next question.

What will Israel’s role be?

I think it’s safe to assume that Israel will be involved deeply in any major military operation the United States executes against Iran. Frankly, for any sustained campaign, based on the airpower capabilities in the region, America will need Israel’s help, and for that to be en masse.

Israel brings hundreds of fighter aircraft, unique munitions, and more to the fight. Supported fully by America’s tanker force, Israel’s tactical airpower will be far more effective than it was during the 12 Day War less than a year ago. Combining forces fully to achieve a common outcome is more powerful than the sum of its parts in this case.

Beyond traditional airpower, leveraging Israel’s intelligence would be critical. Traditional intelligence products from Israel will be key in achieving any outcome faster in an air war. The same can be said for the flow of U.S. information in Israel’s direction. Still, operating seamlessly is very tough in such a complex, long-range combat scenario. While Israel and the United States have repeatedly trained on smaller scales for this type of operation, doing it on a massive scale is a different story. How the tasking orders would be assigned and deconflicted would be very interesting to watch.

But even above the traditional combat power and intelligence Israel can offer such a mission, Israel’s deep presence on the ground in Iran will be arguably of the greatest value. Nobody is anywhere as deeply embedded inside Iran as Israel. And this will impact the full gamut of potential operational scenarios.

Case in point is the Mossad’s novel operation to take out Iran’s air defenses in key areas using operatives on the ground equipped with one-way attack drones and loitering anti-tank guided missiles. While suppression and destruction of enemy air defenses is largely thought to be relegated to the role of airpower, it is anything but limited to just this domain. And Israel proved this on an unprecedented level in the opening stages of the air war in June. Those near-field attacks on Iranian air defense sites allowed standoff munitions, drones, and eventually manned aircraft to make it to their targets, firmly setting the momentum in Israel’s favor during the opening parts of the campaign. It wouldn’t be that surprising if this is repeated, at least in some altered fashion, during whatever could happen in the coming days.

Mossad operatives on the ground also worked to assassinate the cream of Iran’s nuclear scientist corps during the operation, mainly using drones launched from near their targets. We would likely see a similar operation take place against military and regime leadership in the opening stages of the looming conflict, if it comes to pass. There are no indications that the United States has anywhere near this capability working inside Iran.

As we have discussed for years, Israel would likely be willing to put special operations units on the ground to seize and destroy absolutely critical hardened targets, such as nuclear sites or possibly individuals hidden within regime bunkers, that are not capable of being destroyed from the air. The United States could as well, but the political risks would be far higher if such an operation went awry.

Finally, it is worth noting that going to war alongside Israel against Iran brings additional diplomatic risks in the region, although these have waned in recent years as Arab countries have become far less hostile to the Jewish State. These Arab states also could see a massive benefit from a successful campaign that rejiggers the status quo in the region and ends Iran’s troublesome influence throughout it. Still, the economic disruption alone could be large, especially if the war carries and if Iran actively works to deny access to the Persian Gulf.

Real dangers

We have not seen modern Iran fight for its very life against the United States or even Israel. On paper, Iran can do immense damage to the region. Yes, it can close and mine the Strait of Hormuz, causing massive repercussions that could last long after the war ends, a possibility which you can read about here. This is a well-understood danger. But above even that, Iran has an absolutely huge inventory of standoff weapons — specifically cruise missiles, long-range one-way attack drones, and most importantly, ballistic missiles. On the latter, there is a broad misconception that Israel wiped out Iran’s ballistic missile capabilities. This couldn’t be further from the truth.

During the 12 Day War, Israel was concerned with Iran’s long-range ballistic missiles — MRBMs and IRBMs. These are also the easiest to find, fix, and destroy. They are large and their launchers are vulnerable because of it, especially during the pre-launch fueling stage. The location of the storage areas for these missiles is well known, including the missile cave complexes, some of which have the ability to launch the missiles through apertures in launch room ceilings. By hitting the entry and exit points of these facilities, these weapons are not destroyed but they are trapped inside.

In addition, Israel focused their interdiction ‘missile hunting’ efforts on these long-range weapons that threaten its homeland. They were also the weapons that had to be exposed as they were employed in retaliatory strikes during the war. The shorter-range stuff didn’t need to be as it was largely not used.

To make this clear, Iran’s far more plentiful short-range ballistic missiles that threaten American bases in Gulf Arab allied states were not heavily targeted. The same can be said for the shorter-range drones and cruise missiles.

So no, these capabilities were not knocked out by any means, and they are also by far the easiest for Iran to disperse and hide. This makes hunting for them from the air extremely problematic. This is especially true when Iran enters into a combat state, where it distributes these missiles, which are largely loaded onto common truck platforms, into population centers and hidden under pretty much anything. They can also shoot and scoot much faster than their long-range counterparts.

The IRGC-N took a massive delivery of anti ship missiles for coastal defense

Note the dual tube launcher in the pics, which we’ve never seen before. Seems to be a new anti ship new cruise missile. Sadly no information was given besides pics

My guess is possible supersonic AShM pic.twitter.com/i7i0z8uFc0

— Iran Defense commentary (unofficial) (@IranDefense) August 9, 2024

With all of America’s intelligence capabilities, finding and destroying these weapons from the air will be extremely challenging. Even the relatively meager arsenal belonging to Yemen’s Houthis proved vexing for the U.S. military after many months of sustained ‘hunting.’ The Houthis continued to get off successful coastal launches throughout these operations. The scale of the Iranian threat is exponentially larger, and the country has more complex terrain to hide these weapons.

Iran’s shorter-range standoff weapons number in the thousands. They have the ability to saturate the best defenses on earth and lay waste to prized targets across the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Sea, and deeper into allied Arab nations. This not only makes nearby basing of U.S. aircraft and personnel problematic, but it greatly increases the cost of any war the United States could execute against Iran.

We have seen what it took to defend against just one volley of Iranian short-range ballistic missiles. It resulted in the largest volley of Patriot interceptors in history. Even that defensive action wasn’t entirely successful at rebuffing the attack, let alone repeated ones that would include layers of drones, as well as cruise and ballistic missiles.

Footage of a US/Qatari PATRIOT surface to air missile system conducting a large ballistic missile engagement over Al-Udeid this evening, salvoing out dozens of PAC-3 interceptors at incoming Iranian ballistic missiles. pic.twitter.com/a7OHrs9svr

— OSINTtechnical (@Osinttechnical) June 23, 2025

There is also a risk to American warships, even those that are operating far out to sea. Iran has shown it has the ability to launch long-range anti-ship weaponry not just from its coasts and warships, but from unassuming seaborne platforms, including using containerized missiles and drones. The farther U.S. Navy vessels have to operate from Iranian territory also means their missiles won’t be able to penetrate as far into the country. A carrier’s air wing will need additional tanking support to get to its targets, and sortie rates will be lowered.

These capabilities, along with the possibility of closing the Strait of Hormuz, drastically increase the chances of expanding the conflict by pulling Arab countries into it, as well, which would complicate, not help the cause, at least in many respects.

Iran knows full well where American aircraft are currently based, and they will throw everything they have at these sites. This includes America’s sprawling airbase in Jordan that is packed with tactical airpower. They know what defenses are there and have an understanding of what it will take to overwhelm them if they get the chance to do so. So the idea that we could not see mass losses of aircraft and other materiel, and even lives, on the ground, even when striking from afar, is not reality.

The same can be said about an air war. The U.S. has the most advanced air combat capabilities on earth, but ‘shit happens,’ especially during war. Even the Houthis nearly downed U.S. fighter aircraft optimized to destroy enemy air defenses. But regardless of defenses and the state of Iran’s air defense overlay, putting Americans over Iran, and repeatedly over days and weeks, is a risk. Aircraft can malfunction and mistakes can be made. When that happens, it will require even more risk to push combat search and rescue assets into the area to try and recover the crew. In other words, regardless of America’s outstanding air warfare capabilities, there is still a real risk involved in any operation over Iran.

Finally, if Iran is really backed into a corner, and especially if its most extremist elements remain in play, it could resort to weapons of mass destruction. Specifically, chemical weapons and rudimentary radiological ones (dirty bombs) could be used in a dying gasp of the regime. If they did this, it would mean a certain end for the sitting power structure in the country, but if that is going to happen anyway, they could lash out in horrible ways. There is debate as to whether Iran would, or even could, actually do this, but historically, the regime in Tehran is no stranger to the use of chemical weapons.

Defending Israel again

Iran did not run out of long-range ballistic missiles during the 12 Day War, either. They ran out of ones available for launch, and they likely saw real degradation in their ability to launch those accessible due to Israel’s interdiction efforts and disarray in Iranian command and control after nearly two weeks of being bombarded. Since that war, Iran has been pumping out more of these missiles at a high rate, despite Israel’s attacks on missile production-related targets. Some of these weapons are quite advanced, proving their ability to penetrate the IDF’s multi-tier integrated air defense system, the most advanced one on Earth, an air defense capability you can read all about here.

At the same time, the 12 Day War saw the United States and Israel burn through stocks of advanced interceptors, especially the mid-course or near mid-course intercept-capable ones. These weapons take years to produce and cost many millions of dollars each. Israel’s coveted Arrow system was reported to be running low on interceptors towards the end of the war, although how accurate those reports were is in question. The U.S. military burned through a large portion of its THAAD interceptors and many of the U.S. Navy’s prized SM-3 interceptors. This is on top of Israel ripping through countless Stunners fired by David’s Sling. The U.S. also fired a considerable number of PAC-3 Patriots and air-to-air missiles during the conflict while defending in areas outside of Israel from missile and drone attacks. But it’s the stockpile of the upper tier of missile defense interceptors that is most concerning.

If Iran was truly fighting for its life and knowing the end could be near, how many missiles will it send at Israel, and how many interceptors are available to defend against those barrages? Iran also has become increasingly savvy on what tactics to employ and where in order to overwhelm Israel’s defenses. While targeting has focused, at least to a degree, on military and governmental targets, if this was an all-out conflict, it’s likely Iran would just concentrate on population centers with whatever it has to throw at the cause.

The U.S. stockpile of advanced munitions is already a real concern after multiple campaigns to defend Israel, the long and violent standoff in the Red Sea, and the war in Ukraine. This is especially true for its more advanced interceptors, which are also in extreme demand among allies globally. This is all happening as the threat from China is growing more concerning by the day. A war in the Pacific will consume stocks of these weapons at a vastly higher rate than anything we have seen before. If those magazines run dry, it could mean the difference between winning and losing in that critical theater. And remember, these weapons take years to produce and cost many millions of dollars each. So it’s not like you can just say, ‘we’ll buy more.’ Of course, we will, but we won’t get those weapons for years, even as expansion of production is now underway across the DoW’s munitions portfolio.

So the cost of taking on Iran is not just in money and assets, and especially blood, it’s the opportunity cost of expending precious weapons in a war of choice that would be essential in a war of necessity that could erupt at any time.

Wild cards

There are capabilities and war plans we know nothing about. It may be possible that the United States thinks it can break Iran’s command and control capabilities so quickly that it can preempt many of its most dangerous weapons from being used in large quantities. This could come in the form of cyber attacks, other forms of espionage, electronic warfare, and exotic weaponry — and more likely a combination of the above. It could also be the orchestration of an insider coup-like scenario.

There is also the possibility that the United States thinks Iran’s military apparatus would simply collapse under a full combined aerial assault by the U.S. and Israel. A possible decapitation of the regime is another factor here.

If this is the case, and Iran’s warfighting capabilities can be left largely unused, then the risk equation changes. But this is a massive bet to make, and just how certain whatever measures are used will have the exact crippling effects intended could mean the difference between go and no-go for a major campaign.

In other words, we really don’t know what the United States and Israel still have up their sleeves. And maybe they have nothing that would cause such a dramatic effect at all. Instead, hitting them traditionally fast and hard, along with cyber, espionage, electronic warfare, and everything else, will be needed to erode Iran’s ability to fight back over time.

Regardless, the United States and Israel have prepared for exactly this eventuality for decades, so there certainly are bound to be some surprises. Of what magnitude is the question.

What if a deal is made, but Israel doesn’t think it’s good enough?

It’s possible that the game tree could expand in such a way that the United States makes a nuclear deal with Iran, but it does not address the long-range missile threat, or even the nuclear program, to a sufficient degree in Israel’s eyes. If this occurs, there is still the chance that Israel goes it alone and tries to do as much damage as possible to both of these elements. In some ways, this could be played to America’s advantage as it could deny being involved in the conflict and work to see if the deal sticks even after Israel’s kinetic action. In this case, American resources would be used to defend Israel, but not participate in the attack.

This may sound far-fetched, but it really isn’t an impossibility. Especially if Trump realizes how much of a commitment achieving something meaningful via an air campaign could become, as well as the risks of what comes after on the ground in Iran.

Whether a nuclear deal would even survive such a situation is unclear, but it’s possible.

Why now?

In the end, these are the fundamental questions Trump has to be asking himself and his aides: Is going to war with Iran really worth the risks, both the known ones and unknown ones, and what is the goal in doing so? Is that goal readily attainable and at what cost?

These questions also bleed directly into the political arena. Trump claimed to be the President that would get America out of wars, not start them, and especially ones that seem like they could spiral out of control relatively easily, resulting in much longer-term commitments. While he has had some stunningly successful military victories as of late, and there is a danger for politicians to think it will always turn out a similar way, that can change very quickly. If America wakes up to seeing a U.S. pilot being dragged through the streets of Tehran, any support for this conflict could quickly evaporate.

Above all else, the question has to be asked, why now? What has prompted the idea of declaring war on Iran at this moment? Yes, the protests and the brutal deaths of thousands at the hands of the regime seemed to have moved Trump, but that was subsequently used as a pretext for nuclear negotiations, not to correct human rights abuses.

In addition, Trump has declared repeatedly that he destroyed Iran’s nuclear program after the B-2 strikes in June. So why, just eight months after that action took place, is the United States about to go all-in against Iran over its nuclear program? We have heard anecdotes about possible threats of Iran starting the nuclear program back up, the threat posed by the enriched uranium they already have, and the possibility that they could develop new, longer-range missiles that could hit the U.S. one day, maybe. Yet nothing has been presented in a concrete manner as to why doing this right now is essential. It doesn’t match Trump’s long-standing political rhetoric at all.

There is obviously much the public doesn’t know, but the risk-reward equation seems like a uniquely puzzling one with this crisis, at least at this time.

If Iran doesn’t make a deal, it seems clear that Trump has put himself in a position where he will either have his bluff called or he will need to commit to an air war against Iran.

What happens from that historic split in the road is really anyone’s guess.

Including the Pentagon’s.

Contact the author: Tyler@twz.com

China officially announced in late January 2026 its refusal to join the Board of Peace at the “International Peace Council for the Administration of the Gaza Strip.” This council, proposed by the United States under the leadership of Donald Trump, is a new international entity launched by the US president as an alternative to traditional UN mechanisms. China confirmed in January 2026 that it had received a formal invitation from the United States to join the “International Peace Council” for Gaza, launched by President “Trump” as a global initiative to resolve the conflict. China’s stance toward this council is characterized by caution and a demand for further details while adhering to its established principles.

The reasons for China’s rejection of the US-sponsored peace council for the Gaza Strip are based on several strategic and legal justifications, the most important of which is the marginalization of the UN’s role by the International Peace Council, sponsored by Washington. Beijing believes that the council seeks to replace the role of the United Nations and the Security Council, and it affirms its commitment to an international system centered on the United Nations and based on international law. Regarding China’s criticism of the lack of Palestinian representation within the International Peace Council, China criticized the Council’s charter for failing to mention the Palestinians or respect their will, asserting that any arrangements for the future of Gaza must be based on the principle of “Palestinians governing Palestine.” Furthermore, (China’s concerns about “American dominance” over the International Peace Council): Beijing warned that the Council could be a tool for Washington to impose “control” or establish military bases in the Gaza envelope area under the guise of reconstruction. Also, (China’s rejection of the financial membership criteria within the International Peace Council): The Council requires substantial financial contributions (up to one billion dollars for permanent membership), which China views as transforming peace into a “deal” driven by financial power rather than the legal rights of the Palestinians.

At the same time, China is demanding structural clarity regarding the resolution establishing the International Peace Council and its actual feasibility. China, through its Permanent Representative to the United Nations, “Fu Cong,” expressed concern that the resolution establishing the council lacks essential details, particularly concerning its structure, composition, and terms of reference, as well as the nature of the proposed “international stabilization force” in Gaza. Therefore, Beijing insisted on the UN’s authority in this matter, maintaining that any future arrangements for Gaza must be made under the auspices of UN Security Council resolutions and with broad participation including Palestinian parties and Arab states. China rejected any “closed” or “unilateral” mechanisms that could marginalize the UN’s role. Furthermore, China categorically emphasized the principle of “Palestinian governance of Gaza,” considering the Gaza Strip an integral part of Palestinian territory. China rejects any plans aimed at imposing external trusteeship or control over its administration, affirming that the principle of “Palestinians governing Palestine” is the foundation for any post-conflict governance. China has supported Arab initiatives on post-war management of the Gaza Strip, explicitly endorsing reconstruction and peace plans proposed by Egypt and other Arab states, deeming them consistent with the aspirations of the Palestinian people. China firmly adheres to the two-state solution, maintaining that any peace efforts must ultimately lead to a two-state solution and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state within the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as its capital.

Therefore, the motives behind China’s rejection of the American request to join the International Peace Council on Gaza can be summarized as follows: China’s insistence on upholding the international legitimacy of the United Nations and its deep suspicions regarding the security and political objectives behind the council’s formation and Washington’s enthusiasm for it. The main reasons for China’s rejection of the International Peace Council on Gaza are China’s desire to protect the UN system. Beijing believes the proposed council seeks to replace or marginalize the role of the United Nations. The Chinese Foreign Ministry affirmed its commitment to an international system centered on the United Nations and based on its Charter and international law, rejecting any “alternative frameworks” outside of this scope. (Ambiguity in structure and tasks): The Chinese representative to the United Nations, “Fu Cong,” criticized the draft resolution concerning the council (Resolution 2803) for its lack of clear details regarding its structure, composition, and criteria for participation, describing it as “worrying.” In addition to China’s security concerns regarding the Gaza issue: Chinese intelligence reports indicate that one of the hidden objectives of the Washington-sponsored International Peace Council in Gaza is to destroy Hamas tunnels under the guise of “reconstruction,” which Beijing considers a “provocative and extremely dangerous” foreign military intervention. Furthermore, (China rejects American unilateralism in dealing with regional and global issues): China views the American International Peace Council initiative in Gaza as part of Washington’s attempts to impose “unilateralism” and exacerbate confrontation between blocs, which contradicts the “Global Governance Initiative” championed by Chinese President “Xi Jinping. ”.

Herein lies China’s alternative vision to the American initiative to form the International Peace Council: China, in its alternative to joining the Council, calls for the activation of the two-state solution as the only way to guarantee lasting peace in the Middle East and the implementation of the Beijing Declaration to support Palestinian national unity and strengthen the legitimacy of the Palestinian state. (UN Reform): Instead of creating parallel initiatives, Beijing calls for making the Security Council more responsive to the expectations of the world’s people on its 80th anniversary.

China proposes a different vision for managing the Gaza and Middle East issues, based on the following pillars: (Security Council Authority): This involves full adherence to UN Security Council resolutions as the sole basis for international legitimacy in Gaza. The Chinese call for (the principle of self-governance in the Gaza Strip): This involves China’s insistence that post-war administration of Gaza must be in the hands of the Palestinians themselves, rejecting any plans for forced displacement or external trusteeship. The Chinese call for a broad international peace conference on Gaza: Beijing calls for a more inclusive and credible international peace conference under UN auspices, with the aim of concretely implementing the two-state solution within a defined timeframe. With China prioritizing land routes over sea routes or temporary docks, as proposed by the US, China rejects maritime alternatives or “temporary docks” as substitutes for land corridors, viewing them as attempts to circumvent international obligations regarding humanitarian relief in the Gaza Strip.

From the preceding analysis, we understand that China considers itself a “positive stabilizing force” seeking to end the ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip through comprehensive dialogue, in contrast to what it describes as the “unilateral” US approach, which it believes could deepen regional divisions. In short, while China does not reject participation in international dialogue on Gaza, it stipulates that the international peace council, sponsored by Washington, should be an instrument for strengthening international legitimacy, not a replacement for it, while preserving full Palestinian sovereignty over Gaza.

The commander of Air Force Reserve Command (AFRC) has said that he would like to field F-15E Strike Eagle and F-15EX Eagle II combat aircraft to help the command meet its commitment to supporting the overall Air Force mission. AFRC commander Lt. Gen. John P. Healy was speaking at the Air & Space Forces Association’s annual Warfare Symposium, where TWZ is in attendance.

Headquartered at Robins Air Force Base, Georgia, the AFRC is responsible for three numbered air forces, 34 flying wings, 10 flying groups, a space wing, a cyber wing, and an intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance wing. It also has other subordinate units that help to accomplish its total-force missions.

Healy was addressing how AFRC is grappling with how best to contribute to the Air Force’s 10-year fighter jet plan, which calls for purchasing more F-15EXs, F-35s, and F-47s, as it aims to have nearly 1,400 combat-coded tactical aircraft in service by 2030. The commander noted that the plan is not only “pretty ambitious” but also that, while it has been submitted to Congress, it is still very much a work in progress.

Nevertheless, Healy said that, whatever happens, the Air Force’s future fighter plans will rely heavily on the AFRC. At the same time, this organization is facing upcoming combat aircraft retirements, including the A-10 attack jet, which the Air Force wants to withdraw entirely.

“As the commander of Air Force Reserve Command, I am keenly aware that some of my units are scheduled to divest without any plan of recapitalization,” Healy said. “Some could say I am loud and annoying when it comes to how we can ensure that we can maintain this fighting force,” he added, noting that in certain AFRC units, 100 percent of the airmen are combat veterans, and that he wants to ensure “that talent, that experience, doesn’t walk out the door during a normal, planned divestment.”

Healy is hopeful that the historic practice of aircraft divestment without recapitalization, something he said has existed over the last 14 years, is now on the way out.

“I think we’re finally at a point where we’re putting a stop to that,” Healy said. “We’re looking at maintaining our classic associations where we have them and recapping as the active duty can. For the remaining fighter units that we have that are divesting or scheduled for divestment, our full expectation is that we’re going to recap those with new weapons systems.”

There’s no doubt that many of the AFRC’s planned divestments are badly needed, with upward of 80 percent of the command’s fleet now being considered “legacy.” Healy continued: “You know, it’s code for old. Some of these airplanes need to be divested, but we also need to ensure that we are proportionately, concurrently fielded with new equipment.”

That’s where the F-15E and F-15EX could come into play.

“For every one of these A-10 units that are going away, I’m looking at if there’s a means by which we can get an F-15 unit behind it, whether it’s a Strike Eagle or an EX.”

Meanwhile, Healy said he’s also “pressing hard” to ensure that ARFC units divesting from the F-16 will be backfilled with F-35 stealth jets.

“We’ve got that combat capability,” Healy added. “We’ve got that combat experience. We need to leverage that.”

The AFRC boss also made the financial case for continuing to re-equip his command’s squadrons with new (or, failing that, newer) equipment.

According to the Air Force’s own factsheet, the AFRC provides around 14 percent of the total force within the service, while consuming only around four percent of the total manpower budget.

“My job is to constantly remind the programmers and remind the chief and the secretary of the value proposition, the advantage of the Reserve, because at the end of the day, we’re providing a little bit more money that we can reinvest into other things as well.”

Healy said that, when it comes to operating the F-16, an AFRC squadron does that “$12 million cheaper than the active duty can.”

The savings on F-15 units would be even more compelling, Healy argued, with an AFRC Strike Eagle squadron working out as $28 million cheaper than the active-duty equivalent, or $24 million in the case of the F-15EX.

There remains a question, however, around just how feasible it might be for the ARFC to get the F-15E or F-15EX. For all their undoubted capabilities, these types are both in short supply and high demand.

The Air Force’s planned F-15EX numbers have fluctuated repeatedly over the last few years. Under the Fiscal Year 2026 budget proposal, the Air Force’s program of record is now set to grow from 98 to 129 aircraft, with the addition of at least one more squadron, which will be converting from the A-10.

Originally, the Air Force had a minimum number of 144 F-15EX aircraft to replace the F-15C/D force. Some of the Eagle units have switched to other platforms since then, but units that fly A-10s, F-16s, and even F-15Es could end up getting F-15EX if the service chooses to go such a route. It seems quite possible that further growth of the program could occur, and that would seem to be a prerequisite if the ARFC is to get the Eagle II as well.

When it comes to the F-15E, the Air Force inventory numbers 218 aircraft, of which 119 are powered by the older F100-PW-220 turbofan engines that produce some 23,500 pounds of thrust each. The other 99 have the F100-PW-229s, each of which is rated at 29,000 pounds of thrust.

The Air Force previously aspired to retire the Dash-220-powered jets by the end of Fiscal Year 2028.

The Air Force has argued that it needs to retire its older F-15Es to help free up resources for its future modernization plans, but lawmakers have been concerned about dwindling numbers of available tactical aircraft if this were to happen.

The possibility of transferring F-15Es from active-duty units to Air National Guard (or AFRC) units is something that TWZ has discussed in depth in this previous feature.

As far as the AFRC is concerned, the best chance of getting its hands on F-15Es will almost certainly be provided by the return stateside of the two squadrons of Dash-229-powered Strike Eagles currently at RAF Lakenheath in England. These are due to be replaced by F-35s in the future. For the time being, they are the only permanently forward-deployed F-15Es, which remain the service’s first choice for a wide variety of critical missions around the globe.

Another option, and one we have explored in the past, would be to pass on the Dash-220-powered jets to the AFRC, and it is somewhat surprising the Air Force hasn’t floated this idea before when it has sought to offload the older, less-powerful Strike Eagles.

Asked by TWZ about the likelihood of F-15Es making their way to his command, the AFRC commander responded: “I am optimistic that we’ve at least got people listening to the value that we provide, the combat capability we provide, the experience that we provide. We’ve proven it over and over again. We’re efficient, we’re experienced, we’re 100 percent accessible as a reserve force, and we’re lethal in all these mission sets. I think our message is sounding in a positive way with senior leadership within the Air Force. I’m not going to cash the check yet, but I’m optimistic about our future in terms of recapitalizing some of our units.”

Many of the savings that the AFRC makes are a result of the efficiencies that are baked into its ‘business’ practices. Of the 67,000 airmen that make up the command, 14,000 are full-timers.

“Those full-timers are the ones that keep the lights on day-to-day,” Healy continued. Our business model is such that a typical unit will have 25 percent full-timers, and they run that unit for 28 days of the month. It’s only that one weekend a month that we’re at 100 percent — full strength. So those cost savings, right there, are what allow us to realize benefits. It adds up when we start putting it into big numbers like that.”

Whether examples of the F-15E Strike Eagle or F-15EX Eagle II end up on Air Force Reserve Command ramps remains to be seen, but in Lt. Gen. John P. Healy, that component has a strong advocate for making that happen.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

US judge says that rapid deportation of migrants to countries other than their own violates due process.

A United States federal judge has ruled that the administration of President Donald Trump had violated the law through the swift deportation of migrants to countries other than their own, without giving them an opportunity to appeal their removal.

US District Judge Brian Murphy declared the policy invalid on Wednesday, teeing up a possible appeal from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to the Supreme Court.

“It is not fine, nor is it legal,” Murphy wrote in his decision, adding that migrants could not be sent to an “unfamiliar and potentially dangerous country” without any legal recourse.

He added that due process – the right to receive fair legal proceedings – is an essential component of the US Constitution.

“These are our laws, and it is with profound gratitude for the unbelievable luck of being born in the United States of America that this Court affirms these and our nation’s bedrock principle: that no ‘person’ in this country may be ‘deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law’,” Murphy said.

The ruling is the latest legal setback in the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign.

Trump has long pledged to remove immigrants from the country who violate the law or are in the country without legal paperwork. But critics argue that his immigration crackdown has been marked by widespread neglect of due process rights.

They also point out that some of the deportees have been in the country legally, with their cases being processed through legal immigration pathways like asylum.

Murphy said in his ruling that the swift nature of the deportation obscures the details of each case, preventing courts from weighing whether each deportation is legal.

“The simple reality is that nobody knows the merits of any individual class member’s claim because [administration officials] are withholding the predicate fact: the country of removal,” wrote Murphy.

In the decision, Murphy also addressed some of the Trump administration’s arguments in favour of swift deportation.

He highlighted one argument, for instance, where the administration asserted it would be “fine” to deport migrants to third-party countries, so long as the Department of Homeland Security was not aware of anyone waiting to kill them upon arrival.

“It is not fine, nor is it legal,” Murphy responded in his decision.

Murphy has previously ruled against efforts to swiftly deport migrants to countries where they have no ties, and over the past year, he has seen some decisions overturned by the Supreme Court.

Noting that trend, Murphy said Wednesday’s decision would not take effect for 15 days, in order to give the administration the opportunity to appeal.

Last year, for instance, the conservative-majority Supreme Court lifted an injunction Murphy issued in April that sought to protect the due process rights of migrants being deported to third-party countries.

The injunction had come as part of a case where the Trump administration attempted to send eight men to South Sudan, despite concerns about human rights conditions there.

Wednesday’s decision, meanwhile, stemmed from a class-action lawsuit brought by immigrants similarly facing deportation to countries they had no relation to.

A lawyer for the plaintiffs, Trina Realmuto from the National Immigration Litigation Alliance, hailed Murphy’s latest ruling.

“Under the government’s policy, people have been forcibly returned to countries where US immigration judges have found they will be persecuted or tortured,” Realmuto said in a statement.

Realmuto added that the ruling was a “forceful statement” about the policy’s constitutionality.

Manila, Philippines – “Bongbong is our principal worry. He is too carefree and lazy,” then-President of the Philippines Ferdinand Marcos Sr wrote in 1972.

Marcos Sr was referring to his only son and namesake by the child’s moniker, Bongbong.

He was concerned about what the future would hold for the young Marcos.

“The boy must realise his weakness – the carefree wayward ways that may have been bred in him,” his father further warned in his diary.

Half a century later, his son – Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr – would be sworn in as the 17th president of the Philippines, following a landslide victory in the 2022 polls.

The rise of Marcos Jr to the presidency marked his family’s dramatic rehabilitation after the mass street protests that forced Marcos Sr from power and the family into exile in 1986.

In his inaugural speech, Marcos Jr invoked memories of his late father’s presidency – though he skipped the years of brutal dictatorship and reported plunder of state resources – to project hope for “a better future” for 110 million Filipinos.

“You will get no excuses from me,” Marcos Jr said as he took his oath of office.

“You will not be disappointed.”

But three years into his term in office, Marcos Jr’s popularity has withered.

His political alliance with Vice President Sara Duterte has shattered, and his administration is ensnared in a multibillion-dollar corruption scandal that has plunged the country into a period of uncertainty.

The president who ran on a platform of unity is now struggling to lead a divided nation that is deeply disappointed over his lacklustre performance.

On the 40th anniversary of the People Power Revolution that ousted his father, Marcos Jr seems unable to escape history as some political factions in the opposition are calling for his removal – an ending that befell his father on the fateful date of February 25, 1986.

‘No plan’

Political analyst and economist Andrew Masigan pulls no punches. Masigan said what is happening in the Philippines is a consequence of an electorate choosing the “entitled son of a dictator” over a more competent candidate.

“[Marcos Jr] campaigned under the slogan and promise of unity. Economists and political pundits all assumed that there was a plan behind it. We’ve been waiting, and it has been three years. No such thing exists,” he said.

“His plan was to be president. It was a self-serving plan. It’s a presidency about Bongbong Marcos for Bongbong Marcos,” he added.

“He just wanted the opportunity to whitewash the tainted Marcos name,” he added.

As president, Marcos Jr has “squandered” the demographic advantage of the Philippines, Masigan continued, pointing to the country’s youth, who make up almost half of the population. Given such a youthful and dynamic society, the country’s economy should have been growing 7 to 8 percent annually by now, Masigan said.

Instead, the economy posted a sluggish 4.4 percent growth in 2025, well below the government target of 5.5-6.5 percent, he added.

Susan Kurdli, an assistant professor at De La Salle University in Manila, said the first three years of Marcos Jr’s six-year term were “indeed a period of missed opportunities”.

Kurdli said the “vague direction” the Philippines is heading was only to be expected, “as Marcos Jr never ran on a clear policy ticket”.

“He won the election largely by relying on the tried and tested tactics of tribalism, name recognition and alliance building,” she said.

Foreign investment has also declined by half from $9.42bn in 2024 to $4.7bn in 2025, its sharpest fall in five years, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).

Unemployment rose at the same time from 3.8 percent in 2024 to 4.2 percent in 2025, PSA data showed. In 2025, only 172,000 jobs were added to the overall labour market, making it the fifth-worst year in job creation in 25 years, according to the think tank IBON Foundation.

A lack of economic opportunity and unemployment are the top risks for the Philippines in the next two years, the World Economic Forum (WEF) 2026 Global Risks Report notes.

If the weak economic figures have left Filipinos disgruntled, allegations of corruption have left them seething with anger.

“The scandal allegations surrounding him and his family have particularly hit a nerve with voters,” Kurdli of De La Salle University told Al Jazeera.

“They have definitely impacted the perceived legitimacy of Marcos Jr as a national leader.”

The latest corruption perceptions index conducted by Transparency International (TI) reflects that assessment.

According to the anticorruption body’s latest report, the Philippines has slipped six notches lower, ranking 120th out of 182 territories covered.

In response to the TI report, presidential spokesperson Claire Castro said Marcos Jr “has not lost interest” in fighting corruption, and is working to strengthen government institutions.

‘Ghost projects’

It was in the middle of last year when allegations first emerged that Marcos Jr had abused his authority by approving three consecutive national budgets riddled with questionable infrastructure projects amounting to billions of dollars.

Among those implicated in the alleged scheme was Ferdinand Martin Romualdez, the once-powerful speaker of the House of Representatives and a first cousin of Marcos Jr, who oversaw the drafting of the national budget.

He was accused by opposition congresspeople of manipulating the budget. An investigation by a Philippine news website also linked him to multimillion-dollar homes in the Philippines and the United States that are allegedly not listed in his government disclosure forms. He has since relinquished his post but has not been called to account despite massive protests and political pressure.

Also accused of cornering millions of dollars in public funds for pet projects were the president’s sister, Senator Maria Imelda Marcos, and his son, Ferdinand Alexander Marcos, a congressman.

Combined, the three Marcos relatives secured government projects worth at least $560m in the last three years, according to public works department data and the National Expenditure Program listed in the budget. They have all denied wrongdoing related to the awarding of the lucrative projects.

Private contractors and government bureaucrats were also linked to the scandal.

Some were reported by the news media to have spent their newfound wealth on Bentley and Rolls-Royce vehicles and gambling sprees. One mid-ranking official, whose monthly salary was the equivalent of $1,250, admitted during a congressional inquiry that he owned a GMC Denali SUV worth $200,000, a Lamborghini Urus worth between $500,000 and $700,000 and a Ferrari estimated at $1m.

Further investigations revealed several nonexistent government infrastructure initiatives, described as “ghost projects”, worth millions of dollars. Marcos Jr himself discovered an abandoned flood control project estimated to be about $1m in Baliwag, a city just north of Metro Manila.

In Quezon City in Metro Manila, the local government reported that 35 flood control projects were missing out of the 331 listed, with a total budget of almost $300m.

According to estimates by the Department of Finance, alleged corruption in flood control projects cost taxpayers approximately $2bn between 2023 and 2025.

The scale of the corruption allegations has reminded some Filipinos of the time when Marcos Sr and his wife, Imelda, ruled the country in what historians have described as a “conjugal dictatorship”.

During their two decades in power, the Marcos couple were accused of emptying the Philippine treasury of up to $10bn.

Masigan, the political analyst and economist, said despite all efforts to distance himself from the ongoing scandal, it is difficult for the current president to do so.

“The three budgets were authored, presided over and approved by the president himself. He signed it,” Masigan said.

“Everything leads to him.”

‘Give Marcos some credit’

Jan Credo, political science professor at Silliman University in Dumaguete City, Philippines, said despite the fierce criticism of the president, Marcos Jr should still get some credit for his role in highlighting the massive corruption scandal during his annual State of the Nation Address last year.

“President Marcos, in fact, started the expose when he chastised members of Congress and told them, ‘Shame on you’, for their involvement in the alleged massive bribery,” Credo told Al Jazeera.

“What this has generated is the consciousness among the public about the issue that led to the crystallisation of the social movement against corruption,” he said.

“If you ask me, Marcos Jr does not have anything to do” with the corruption, Credo said, blaming his close allies instead.

Credo also did not believe that the ongoing scandal would cost Marcos Jr the support of one of the country’s most powerful institutions, the military. Over the last four decades, two Philippine presidents, including Marcos Sr, were forced out of office in popular revolts backed by the military. Two other presidents faced coup attempts.

“Marcos Jr may be in survival mode now. But he is also fortunate to have a military that is highly professionalised and no longer politicised,” Credo said.

“The recent calls by retired military officers to withdraw support from Marcos Jr have not gained traction, because we have learned their lesson,” he explained.

Political analyst Masigan agreed, saying a move by the military was “out of the question”, noting that while there were some whispers for Marcos Jr’s removal, “nothing is being seriously considered”.

“As far as the military is concerned, they are loyal to the constitution; there is no movement to oust the president and have a caretaker government,” he added.

Securing a legacy

With just about two more years left in office, Marcos Jr still wields enough power to change the narrative of his administration, restore the Marcos name and implement policies that help Filipinos, political observers who spoke to Al Jazeera said.

But the president must act fast before the narrowing window of opportunity closes on him, and he becomes a “lame duck” leader, they added.

Major legislation that needs to be addressed includes government transparency, education, energy and investment reforms, as well as an overhaul of the transport and manufacturing industries, said Kurdli of De La Salle University.

But the most urgent policy reform that Marcos Jr has to address is the passage of a law banning political dynasties, which is the main culprit of corruption in the country, Masigan and Credo said.

“If he really wants to have an impact, he must get the antipolitical dynasty law passed,” Masigan said of the president.

In the Philippines, political dynasties have dominated about 80 percent of seats in the Senate and the House, according to a 2025 analysis by the Anti-Dynasty Network.

At the Philippine Senate, for instance, there are four sets of siblings occupying a third of the 24-seat chamber. At least eight other senators have close family members in the House.

President Marcos Jr comes from a dynasty himself. He has one sibling in the Senate, a son and two cousins in the House, and several relatives elected as town and provincial executives.

Vice President Duterte, who is the daughter of former President Rodrigo Duterte, is no different. Her brother, nephew and a cousin are serving in Congress. Another brother serves as the mayor of the Duterte stronghold, Davao City, while a nephew serves as the vice mayor.

While political dynasties are prohibited under the 1987 Philippine Constitution, Congress has failed to pass a supplementary law that spells out what a ban should look like.

For Credo, getting the antipolitical dynasty law passed is “a tall order” for Marcos Jr, given that a vast majority of legislators come from dynasties, guaranteeing fierce resistance.

“But if he can get it done, that would be a major achievement on his part. He will be able to secure his place in the history books,” Credo added.

Masigan said, given the Marcos family history, it is really up to the Filipino citizenry to keep the pressure on and demand real reforms from the government.

“I’ve seen how the Marcoses operate since the 1970s. They are fond of creating a semblance of reforms and giving people hope. But it will never come to fruition,” Masigan said.

“I hope this time it’s different. But I am not holding my breath.”

Monterrey, Mexico – Portraits of the missing cover Guadalajara’s “Roundabout of the Disappeared”, a landmark renamed by families to highlight the state’s disappearance crisis.

On February 22, the streets surrounding the memorial and throughout the city stood empty after the Mexican army killed Ruben Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, the longtime leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG).

In retaliation, cartel members set fire to buses and taxis, erecting a series of blockades that spread across 20 states.

The widespread unrest demonstrated the CJNG’s capacity for rapid coordination, fuelled by a ‘franchise’ model that allows smaller cells to operate under the cartel’s brand and vast financial network.

While the group’s economic reach extends into Europe and Asia, its power remains rooted in its paramilitary force. This structure relies on extortion, brutal violence and forced disappearances as its main tools to seize territory and control markets.

Oseguera Cervantes, known as “El Mencho”, consolidated one of Mexico’s most powerful criminal organisations in part due to a unique franchise-based structure.

According to the United States Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), the CJNG maintains a presence in every state of Mexico, with varying levels of influence, and operates in more than 40 countries across the Americas, Europe, Asia and Africa, and throughout the US. Its primary activity is the trafficking of cocaine, fentanyl and methamphetamine.

Raul Zepeda Gil, a teaching fellow in War Studies at King’s College London, notes that rather than following a “classic organisational pyramid”, the CJNG avoids a centralised financial network.

“Instead, profits can be distributed across many locations and groups simultaneously,” Zepeda told Al Jazeera.

Besides controlling key areas in western Mexico, the CJNG controls the Pacific Coast region, including the strategic ports of Manzanillo and Lazaro Cardenas, crucial for the import of synthetic precursor chemicals.

“Their most important activity is drug trafficking,” Zepeda said. “Chemical precursors that arrive from China reach Mexican ports and are then sent to the United States already in fentanyl form.”

The organisation also generates revenues through fuel theft, illegal mining, extortion, migrant smuggling and money laundering.

On February 19, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned a timeshare fraud network led by the CJNG that targeted elderly Americans.

“Timeshare fraud in Mexico has plagued American victims for decades, costing them hundreds of millions of dollars while enriching criminal organisations such as CJNG,” the Treasury Department stated in a press release.

The CJNG’s extensive reach and rapid growth are made possible by a vast, powerful network that protects drug trafficking operations and ensures impunity, says Carlos Flores, an investigator at the Centre for Research and Higher Education in Social Anthropology (CIESAS). Flores argues that these “hegemonic power networks”, shadow networks of business leaders, politicians, and criminals, have reconfigured state institutions to serve their own interests.

“These same networks, which control and administer state institutions – including security institutions – focus their actions primarily against their competitors, while simultaneously allowing these other networks to consolidate their power,” he added.

The rise of a deadly paramilitary force

Forced disappearances and extortion are crucial for the CJNG’s control of the market, seeding fear that silences communities and facilitates forced recruitment. This ensures a steady supply of disposable labour while following the ‘no body, no crime’ logic that minimises the political and legal costs of their operations.

Homicides and forced disappearances have surged in Jalisco since the group emerged in 2010. The CJNG rose from the remnants of the Milenio Cartel, a subordinate partner of the Sinaloa Cartel based in Oseguera Cervantes’s home state of Michoacan. While across Mexico more than 130,000 people are missing, Jalisco currently ranks at the top with at least 16,000 reported cases, and collectives of families continue to uncover mass graves and what they describe as “extermination sites”.

Raul Servin, a member of the Guerreros Buscadores, a collective representing more than 400 families of the disappeared, told Al Jazeera that their searches frequently reveal human remains in varying states of decay and torture. They have found victims who were shot, hanged or killed with bladed weapons that were left inside the bodies, he said.

“It’s a sadness and helplessness we feel when we see each body these people leave behind,” said Servin, who has been searching for his son since 2018.

Beyond its financial power, the CJNG is notorious for its extensive arsenal of military-grade weaponry, including armed drones, rocket-propelled grenades, and firearms.

On February 22, more than 25 National Guard members were killed in Jalisco. In the past, the organisation has also carried out high-profile attacks against public officials.

Last year in February, US President Donald Trump designated the Jalisco New Generation Cartel as a foreign terrorist organisation. In July, US prosecutors in Virginia unsealed an indictment against Petar Dimitrov Mirchev, a Bulgarian national accused of conspiring with East African associates to equip the CJNG with military-grade weaponry. The indictment states that Mirchev brokered these deals “despite knowing that the CJNG inflicts catastrophic suffering” to protect its prolific drug trafficking operations.

The indictment also revealed that the CJNG was attempting to buy surface-to-air missiles and anti-aircraft systems (ZU-23). Overall, Mirchev allegedly created a list of weaponry worth approximately $58m.

The paramilitary profile has allowed the CJNG to expand rapidly into rival territories and monopolise the market. Flores describes this training, deployment, and weaponry as being similar to an army, making them “practically uncontestable”.

“They operate under a different kind of logic,” Flores said. “They provide a kind of licence to [local] groups that associate with them. They fight their enemies and collaborate on trafficking in exchange for using the Jalisco New Generation Cartel as a label.”

The CJNG adopted a level of brutality similar to Los Zetas, whose founders were elite Mexican special forces soldiers trained by the US and Israel. In its early days, the CJNG was known as the “Matazetas”, or Zetas Killers.

Servin and the Guerreros Buscadores have seen the results of this brutality firsthand. Locating the missing becomes more difficult as concealment tactics evolve, Servin said. Disappearances have become a powerful economic tool to control and exploit territory. Collectives often find bodies buried under layers of dirt and animal carcasses to throw off the scent, or even encased in concrete.

“They make us work harder than necessary. If they took his life, why not leave him where we can find him quickly?”

Zepeda says that the CJNG leveraged military-grade tactics to fill the void left by the government’s crackdown on other cartels carried out between 2008 and 2010. In 2009, the Beltran-Leyva Organisation – which had been at war with the Sinaloa Cartel since their 2008 split – was reeling from a series of high-profile arrests and killings.

The death of Ignacio “Nacho” Coronel, a key finance operator for the Sinaloa Cartel, at the hands of the military in 2010 further cleared the way for new criminal players. Oseguera Cervantes was working under Coronel before breaking away to form what would become the CJNG.

“If we could summarise the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, it’s a reinvention of Los Zetas, which took over all the territory that the other cartels defeated by the Mexican government had occupied,” Zepeda added.

This history serves as a warning of what may follow the death of Oseguera Cervantes. Zepeda pointed out that the drug trade is an incredibly dynamic market where “there will always be a group of people willing to take control”.

Flores warns that “decapitating the leadership” is insufficient if power networks, along with the CJNG’s criminal and operational structures, remain intact.

“Without dismantling the power networks, yesterday’s victory will become the cause of new violence tomorrow,” Flores said. “We’ve seen this approach many times before, and we know what it leads to: It solves neither the transnational drug problem nor creates conditions of greater stability for the Mexican population.”

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi defended Israel’s devastating war on Gaza, saying it stands by the country “with full conviction” – despite accusations of genocide against the Palestinian people.

Modi gave a speech to the Knesset, or parliament, on Wednesday, on the first day of his two-day visit and received a standing ovation as he stressed India’s enduring support for Israel.

It was the first time an Indian leader addressed the Knesset.

“India stands with Israel firmly, with full conviction, in this moment and beyond,” said Modi, condemning the October 7, 2023, attack by Hamas-led fighters as “barbaric”, adding “no cause can justify the murder of civilians”.

India’s leader was earlier greeted by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at Ben Gurion International Airport, where a welcoming ceremony was held.

In his own Knesset speech, Netanyahu thanked India for “standing by” Israel in the wake of October 7, and said the two nations shared “common interests”. He described Modi as “more than a friend, a brother”.

Modi said New Delhi expressed “strong support” for the Gaza peace initiative approved by the UN Security Council in November. It “offers a pathway”, he said, adding India believes “it holds the promise of a just and durable peace for all the people of the region”.

‘Trusted partners’

The Indian leader said the two countries are “trusted partners” and this “contributes to global stability and prosperity”.

He described their relations as “vital” for trade and security, and hailed “synergy” on artificial intelligence, quantum technology, and other topics.

“We are committed to further consolidating this relationship across many sectors,” he added.

Modi’s first trip to Israel was in 2017 after relations between the two countries warmed following his election in 2014. Netanyahu also visited India in 2018.

Haaretz newspaper journalist Gideon Levy told Al Jazeera that Modi’s visit cannot be underestimated.

“India is a highly important country and [Modi] showing himself … in these times when public opinion in India is very critical about Israel is a step that cannot be underestimated,” said Levy.

He pointed to similarities between Netanyahu and Modi, saying both are “nationalist, populist in a way, quite conservative, and hawkish. Both countries carry also some stains, Kashmir, Palestine, the West Bank”.

Israel’s largest arms buyer

In September 2025, India and Israel signed the Bilateral Investment Treaty to expand trade during far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s visit to India.

India is Israel’s largest arms buyer, spending $20.5bn on Israeli weapons between 2020 and 2024. In 2024, trade between the two, largely based on defence and security, stood at $3.9bn.

Modi has received criticism for his support for Israel during its genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, which has killed at least 72,073 people and wounded 171,756. At least 615 of those deaths occurred during the “ceasefire” agreed between Israel and Hamas last October.

Last week, India was one of the more than 100 countries condemning Israel’s recent moves to expand its control of the occupied West Bank and move towards annexation.

Imran Masood, a parliamentarian for India’s Congress party, urged Modi to address Gaza during his visit, saying, “if there is any morality then he should talk about death of children in Gaza”, ANI news agency reported.

“India’s stand is clear … that it supports Palestine,” said Masood.

Marian Alexander Baby, leader of the Communist Party of India, said Modi’s embrace of Israel is “a betrayal of India’s anti-colonial legacy and our long-standing position in support of the right to self determination of the Palestinian people, reaffirmed by UN resolutions that India has co-sponsored and voted for”.

Modi continues his visit to Israel on Thursday.

Release of documents show close relationship between high-profile economist and disgraced sex offender.

Former United States Treasury Secretary Larry Summers says he will resign as a professor at Harvard University at the end of the semester after revelations of his close relationship with disgraced sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Summers, a longtime influential figure in economic policymaking circles and a former president of Harvard, said on Wednesday that he would resign from teaching at the end of the academic year.

“In connection with the ongoing review by the University of documents related to Jeffrey Epstein that were recently released by the government, Harvard Kennedy School Dean Jeremy Weinstein has accepted Professor Lawrence H Summers’ resignation from his leadership position as co-director of the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government,” Harvard spokesperson Jason Newton said in a statement.

Documents released as part of an effort to bring greater transparency to Epstein’s relationships with powerbrokers in politics, business and culture shed light on Summers’s extensive correspondence with Epstein, whom he once emailed asking for advice on wooing women.

Summers, who has denied any wrongdoing and has not been charged with any crime, previously resigned from the board of the company OpenAI over his ties to Epstein, with whom he remained in contact as late as July 2019.

“I take full responsibility for my misguided decision to continue communicating with Mr Epstein,” Summers said in a statement to US media after releases of Epstein files in November, at which time Harvard announced a review of those named in the documents, which were compiled during criminal investigations of Epstein.

Documents released in December also showed that Summers had been designated as a successor executor in a 2014 draft of Epstein’s will, according to the student newspaper The Harvard Crimson. The paper reported that a spokesperson for Summers denied any knowledge of the matter.

A sinkhole suddenly opened at an intersection in Omaha, Nebraska, swallowing two cars stopped at a red light. Police said both drivers escaped before crews arrived and no injuries were reported. Authorities warn the street could remain closed for days amid fears the hole may expand.

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Cuba was plunged into crisis. Fuel, food and spare parts vanished almost overnight. This character-led documentary shows how common Cubans refused to give up – and instead built a new culture of radical repair. From Havana’s Malecon to small-town back yards, it follows mechanics, street vendors and a teacher-turned-inventor who live by one rule: “invent and resolve”.

A pristine US Plymouth Fury convertible of the 1950s hides a Soviet engine, Japanese gearbox and handmade parts; washing machines become coconut graters, solar dryers and tools for urban farms. Cuban historians and designer Ernesto Oroza reveal the philosophy behind this “technical disobedience”, treating every object as raw material to hack and extend. Far from nostalgia, the film offers a stark snapshot of a future in which resources are scarce and the power to repair may be our most important tool.

Daniel Dubois refused a fist bump from world champion Fabio Wardley as the pair came face-to-face at a lively news conference in London.

The world title fight between two of Britain’s biggest punchers takes place at Manchester’s Co-op Live Arena on 9 May.

After some long-winded bickering between the two camps, the fighters – relatively restrained until that point – finally sparked into life.

Wardley said he would “flatten” the challenger. “My power is proven. If there’s time left on the clock, I’m taking you out of the fight,” he added.

The 31-year-old – with 19 stoppages in 20 wins – will make the first defence of his WBO crown, having claimed the ‘interim’ title against Joseph Parker before being upgraded to full champion when Oleksandr Usyk vacated the belt.

Former IBF champion Dubois, 28, is coming off a devastating knockout loss to generational great Usyk last summer.

“If you look back, when it gets dicey, he’s not up for it,” Wardley said of Dubois, who has faced accusations of folding too easily in his three stoppage defeats.

Wednesday’s news conference took place at Dutch Hall, a converted 16th-century church tucked away in the heart of the city.

Dubois – never one for lengthy monologues – kept his answers short and matter of fact.

But the Londoner was clear in his intention. “Victory by knockout, by any means necessary,” he said.

When the fighters eventually stepped forward for the obligatory face-off, Dubois looked away first as Wardley smirked.

Moments later Wardley extended his fist in a gesture of respect, but Dubois shook his head and refused to engage.