War

President Trump had made defeating ISIS one of the key goals of his presidency, and if Reuters' sources are to be believed, the administration is weighing a deployment of up to 1,000 American soldiers to Kuwait to serve as a reserve force in the fight against Islamic State as U.S.-backed fighters accelerate the offensive in Syria and Iraq. The Pentagon has so far declined to comment on the leak.

In an "Onion-sounding" article in Russian tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda, titled "Trump-Pump-Pump And Our Big Bang", Russian military expert Viktor Baranetz, a retired colonel and former defense ministry spokesman asserted that Russia has asymmetrical responses to the increase in the U.S. military budget.

Japan are gearing up for a nuclear confrontation with North Korea in the wake of a ballistic missile test by Pyongyang.  Legislators in Japan are calling for a ‘first strike’ policy against the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), amid fears that North Korea could strike at any moment. “If bombers attacked us or warships bombarded us, we would fire back,” former defense minister Itsunori Onodera said during a Japanese committee meeting to discuss possible military action against North Korea.

Via Soeren Kern of The Gatestone Institute,