Bolton: The US military did sink all Iranian mine-laying ships. But Iran is using fast boats, each carrying one mine and able to swarm tankers with man-portable rockets.

Trump has said for weeks the Iranian navy was destroyed. Except for these boats. 1/ Bolton: I wouldn't have entered into this ceasefire — it purely benefits Iran. They were getting pounded for six weeks.

When the bombing stops, they regroup and reorganize. Military pressure is what moved Iran at all. When you relent — they see American weakness. 2/

Von der Leyen: Europe doubles down on support for Ukraine, while Russia doubles down on aggression.

We also adopted the 20th sanctions package. The sanctions are biting so hard that the Kremlin is restricting internet and free communication, creating a digital iron curtain. 1/ Von der Leyen: This is Europe’s second energy crisis in four years. In just 60 days of conflict, our fossil-fuel import bill rose by more than €27 billion without one extra molecule of energy.

The answer is obvious: cut imported fossil-fuel dependence and electrify Europe. 2/

Rubio: It’s unclear whether new Ayatollah has authority.

The key questions are his credibility versus his father, whether succession should be hereditary, if he has the clerical credentials, and whether he’s actually making decisions or someone else is.

1/ Rubio: Iran is run by radical Shia clerics and is deeply fractured. Talk of “moderates vs hardliners” is misleading — they’re all hardliners.

Some focus on running the state, others are driven by ideology, including the supreme leader and his circle.

2/

China is rebuilding how occupied Ukrainian territories function — step by step.

It installs 6,000 Huawei base stations, replaces dollars with yuan, and keeps factories running with Chinese engineers. no ownership, no formal role, but everything depends on Chinese tech, Babel. 1/ Telecom comes first. Huawei supplies servers, antennas, routers.

Russia cuts Ukrainian networks when it captures a city. Miranda-Media reconnects it using Chinese infrastructure — across cities, villages, and roads. 2/

Iran offered the US a new deal: reopen the Strait of Hormuz and end the war, bur nuclear negotiations postponed for a later stage.

The White House received the proposal but has not said whether it will explore it, — Axios.

1/ The problem for Trump: accepting the deal removes his leverage.

Ending the war and lifting the blockade before nuclear talks means Iran keeps its enriched uranium stockpile and faces no pressure to suspend enrichment — two primary US war objectives.

2/

Petraeus: Ukraine is stopping Russia almost cold on the front lines. Its drone warfare keeps improving, with a 35 km “death zone” under constant surveillance.

Production is surging: Ukraine may make 7 million drones this year, versus about 300,000 in the US last year.

1/ Petraeus: Ukraine is ahead of the world in drones — more capable and cheaper than others can make.

But others are racing to catch up, with the Pentagon planning $50bn+ on unmanned systems. Ukraine now has a brief window to secure its lead and protect its technology.

2/

Historian Niall Ferguson: Magyar’s victory over Orbán is good not because the left defeated the right.

What happened is that a non-corrupt populist who is not a lackey of Putin and Xi defeated one who became both corrupt and a lackey of our adversaries. 1/ Ferguson: This is a great day not just for Hungary. It is a great day for Ukraine and for everybody who believes in liberty.

If populists can lose elections, they are not fascists. There is hope here for Europe and for the wider democratic world. 2X

Petraeus: The real future of war is in Ukraine. The mass of unmanned systems there is incomparably greater than anything else on earth.

Ukraine is using nearly 10,000 unmanned systems a day, and traditional combined-arms warfare no longer works on that front. 1/ Petraeus: This is now the most lethal front line in history. You cannot drive through the 35-kilometer death zone.

Drones spot you, then come suicide drones, bomber drones, and glide bombs. Even resupply and casualty evacuation now go by remote vehicle. 2/

Petraeus: The [Hormuz] blockade was the right call. Ending this war with Iran militarily wrecked but still controlling Hormuz would leave Tehran strategically stronger.

We cannot let Iran decide who sails the strait or turn it into a private Panama Canal and charge tolls. 1/ Petraeus: The benchmark is not insurance cost. It is whether crews live.

CEOs told me they will not send sailors into that risk, and about eight crew members have already been killed by Iranian attacks on ships in the Gulf. That alone is enough to freeze traffic. 2/

Keane on Iran: We have about two weeks to complete the operation, with roughly 25% still to go and we now have twice the combat power in the region that we had when we started.

It is time to go back to full military operations and keep the blockade on. 1/ Keane: Opening the Strait without a nuclear deal is not progress at all. After weeks of negotiations, it is pretty obvious the Iranians will never propose a deal we can accept.

All they want is regime survival and the chance to recover enough to become a threat again. 2/

Bolton: I’m not sure Trump knows where he is, because I’m not sure he knew what his objectives were going in.

If you do not know where you are going, any road will do. He wants this over, but because he does not think strategically, he is at a loss over what to do next. 1/ Bolton: The only long-term answer to Iran threat is regime change. New faces are not a new regime.

The ideology is the same. Trump failed to do what a serious regime-change effort required before hostilities, but he still has time to work with and resource Iran’s opponents. 2/

NYT: Europe is preparing for a long war with Russia as the US has effectively withdrawn from peace negotiations. 15 months ago Trump promised to stop the war in one day. Today analyst James Sherr: “We find ourselves largely where we began in the negotiations.” 1/ Zelenskyy has “lost 80% of his illusions” about Trump’s support. Ukrainians believe they are holding their own militarily and that any resolution “will take place on the battlefield, if at all.” 2/

Russian soldiers are eating each other — literally. The Sunday Times reports that Ukrainian intelligence documented at least five cases of cannibalism among Russian troops due to starvation and Ukrainian drone strikes on supply lines. 1/ The most detailed documented case: November 2025, Myrnohrad, Donetsk Oblast. A soldier with the call sign Khromoy from the 95th Regiment of the 5th Guards Motor Rifle Brigade killed two comrades, cut off the leg of one of them and tried to eat it. 2/

Petraeus: Iran is unquestionably much weaker militarily.

The US and Israel have badly damaged its leadership, missile and drone production, navy, air force, air defenses, security headquarters, logistics bases, and further damaged the nuclear program. 1/ Petraeus: Military objectives largely have been met, but Iran could still emerge strategically stronger if Hormuz stays shut.

It cannot be acceptable for Iran to turn the strait into an “Iranian canal” and charge tolls for ships going in and out. 2/

On Budanov’s desk sits notebook labeled “List of Assholes 2026.”

He is a Hero of Ukraine, former head of military intelligence, now head of the Presidential Office. Babel tells his story. 1/ Born in Darnytsia, raised in an ordinary family. His father engineered parts for the Soviet space program at the Kyiv Radio Plant. He studied at a school with Jewish classes funded by the Jewish community. He learned Hebrew and still keeps ties with Ukraine’s chief rabbi. 2/

Stubb: Russia gained under 1% of Ukrainian territory in 2025 at a cost of 400,000 killed or wounded.

At this pace, taking Donetsk could cost another 800,000. Militarily, this is failure. Putin’s goal remains all of Ukraine; only a threat to his regime may change that.

1/ Stubb: Putin’s war has been a strategic failure. He wanted to take Ukraine, but pushed it deeper into Europe and NATO.

He wanted to stop NATO expansion, but got Finland and Sweden instead. He wanted global power — yet Russia’s influence is fading from Syria to Iran.

2/

Kasparov: Wars end when the cause that produced them is removed. In Ukraine, that cause is Putin’s regime and the imperial policy of Putin’s Russia.

As long as that regime survives, the war will not end. That is the whole answer. 1/ Kasparov: Trump is about Trump, and about money for Trump and his entourage. No real peace talks are possible there.

Witkoff and Kushner are not diplomats. Ukraine was right to refuse territorial concessions, because those concessions could have been catastrophic. 2/

Kasparov: “Russian Taiwan” is a metaphor, but the split is already real.

Hundreds of thousands of Russians have broken with Putin’s Russia, including legally, yet got no new status. Their documents expire every day. Europe needs one cardinal solution: recognize that we exist. 1/ Kasparov: “Russian Taiwan” is not about moving everyone to some island. Territory is secondary

The point is legal recognition for people who cut ties with Putin’s Russia and are stuck in limbo, instead of begging country by country for visas, exemptions, and documents. 2/

Ukrainian robots charged a Russian position through a valley — little green wagons, each carrying 66 pounds of explosives. One blew itself up.

A sheet of cardboard appeared above the trench: "We want to surrender." — NYT.

1/ Last month Ukraine carried out 9,000+ frontline missions using armed ground robots. In November 2025 — 2,900. A year ago they were rare and experimental.

Each robot typically lasts 24 hours before its battery dies or it is destroyed.

2/

Trump follows only the attack half of Machiavelli. He knows how to strike first, but not how to survive the counterstrike.

Iran shows it: he launched the war fast, but eight weeks later he faces higher oil prices, a shaky truce, and falling polls. — Jason Willick for WP.

1/ Machiavelli praised bold moves when timing matters.

Trump followed that rule in June, betting a short war with Iran would show strength, break Tehran, and boost him at home. 2/

In the Iran war, the US was burning $1M interceptor missiles to kill $50,000 drones.

That math is killing Lockheed, RTX, and Northrop — and handing the Pentagon to Palantir, SpaceX, and Anduril. — The Economist. 1/ Three "neo-primes" are leading the shift. Palantir runs AI intelligence, SpaceX operates the Starshield satellite network, and Anduril builds drones and counter-drone weapons.

Together they are worth more than three times Lockheed Martin, RTX, and Northrop Grumman combined. 2/