Is the Senate Trying to force Obama to go to war?

Is the Senate trying to force Obama to go to war?

In pushing for war with Iran, some senators are putting Netanyahu's priorities ahead of the United States.

Washington, DC - No one knows if President Obama intends to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities, give Israel the go-ahead to do it, continue to rely on sanctions or turn to comprehensive negotiations to resolve the escalating conflict.

The decision to go to war is the most difficult one a president can make because it is impossible to foresee the outcome of a war. Even if it is Israel that attacks rather than the United States, the consequences for us are likely to be the same. That is because the entire world knows that the United States and Israel are linked by means of strategic cooperation agreements which prevent Israel from acting without, at least, tacit US approval. If Israel is "in", so are we.

It is safe to assume that Obama wants to avoid war. Having just come out of the disastrous Iraq experience, which cost 4,500 American lives and severely damaged our interests and credibility in the Middle East (and beyond), the president wants to keep his options open. If he can prevent war (i.e., Americans dying and other vital US interests being attacked), he will.

But while the president needs his options open, the United States Congress, under intense pressure from pro-war lobbyists, is determined to shut down all but one of them. Read More

Kim Jong-un Joins War of Words Against S.Korea-U.S. Drills

New North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has personally joined Pyongyang's rhetorical war against joint South Korea-U.S. military exercises that kick off Monday.

According to the North's official KCNA news agency, Kim on Sunday visited four units under the 4th Army Corps, which shelled Yeonpyeong Island in October 2010, and was quoted as parroting earlier calls in the official media for "a powerful retaliatory strike" at South Korea, "should the enemy intrude even 0.001 mm" into its waters.

On Saturday, the North's powerful National Defense Commission also denounced the exercises. "Nuclear weapons are not an exclusive property of the U.S.," it said. "We have more powerful means of war than the nuclear weapons of the U.S. and state-of-the-art strike equipment that nobody else has."