Hoping to write on the role that Chinese (and perhaps other non-Western) satellite companies are playing both in the Middle East crisis & more generally. Keen to hear views from anyone who deals with them & uses their imagery, and how they compare to US providers.
Fun story from 1980: Carter's supposed plan to seize Kharg island. "The plan was originally designed to compensate for not getting the hostages, kind of a tit for' tat," explained a top source. "They'd have the hostages; we'd have their key oil depot." www.cia.gov/readingroom/...
The handful of American officials seconded to UK government departments are increasingly being asked to leave meetings when sensitive information is discussed
www.ft.com/content/7b96...
Last week I wrote about US intelligence. John Ratcliffe, CIA director, says morale is high. Hard to generalise in a big institution. But many others familiar with the agency questioned this, describing unhappiness among analysts & operations officers. www.economist.com/united-state...
"850 missiles would account for around half of available launchers in the region...Because VLS cells are also loaded with other types of missiles...this amount could represent most of the Tomahawks on station. These launchers cannot be reloaded at sea." www.csis.org/analysis/850...
We wrote a few weeks ago about a possible US ground operation to grab Iran's highly enriched uranium. The issue is not just the vast scale of any raid, it's also the fact that it might need to be performed across three sites—and with little surprise left. www.economist.com/middle-east-...
"Eyewitnesses have told the BBC they have seen children, including some armed, in security roles in the capital and other [Iranian] cities"
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
All of southern Lebanon ordered evacuated south of the Zahrani river on March 12. The order for south of the Litani is explicitly open-ended, like the 2025 orders in Gaza that preceded the IDF's demolition on the ground of almost all buildings in the evacuated areas. Includes the city of Tyre.
"Israel’s Parliament passed a law on Monday that would allow the hanging of Palestinians convicted of deadly militant attacks, but experts say it almost certainly cannot be applied to Jewish extremists convicted of similar crimes."
www.nytimes.com/2026/03/30/w...
Wow. Career ending in any normal times. "A broker for Pete Hegseth, the US defence secretary, attempted to make a big investment in major defence companies in the weeks leading up to the US-Israeli attack on Iran, according to three people familiar with the matter." www.ft.com/content/744e...