Carlo Muñoz

Obama administration’s $1 billion arms deal aids Saudi brutality in Yemen, lawmakers say

Congressional Republicans are squaring off against the Obama administration's proposed $1 billion weapons deal with Saudi Arabia, which lawmakers say will embolden Riyadh with enough firepower to continue its brutal intervention in the ongoing civil war in Yemen.

September 11, 2016

ISIS makes terrorism threat facing U.S. gravest since 9/11 attacks

The terrorist threat facing the U.S. and its European allies is "bigger, wider and deeper" than at any point since the Sept. 11 attacks 15 years ago, the White House's top counterterrorism official said in a grim review of global threats Wednesday.

September 7, 2016

U.S. struggling to contain al Qaeda in Yemen

The United States is struggling to contain al Qaeda's formidable terror cell in Yemen, despite a devastating aerial campaign coupled with an extended American military presence on the ground, according to the White House's top counterterrorism official.

September 7, 2016

Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, ISIS spokesman and strategist, killed in Syria by U.S. airstrike

The public face of Islamic State's worldwide propaganda campaign and the commander responsible for the organization's attacks against Europe and elsewhere has been killed, the terror group announced Tuesday.

August 30, 2016

Russia using Iranian bases against Islamic State

U.S. military commanders said Tuesday they were given advance warning on Russia's decision for the first time to use Iranian bases as a staging ground for airstrikes into Syria, citing the heads-up as the latest sign of coordination between Moscow and Washington over conflicts in Syria and elsewhere in the region.

August 16, 2016

Coalition troops forced to allow ISIS fighters to flee Syrian battlefield

U.S. and coalition troops were forced to allow hundreds of Islamic State commanders, fighters and their families to flee the embattled northern Syrian town of Manbij, fearing any attempt to attack the escaping forces would end in massive civilian casualties.

August 16, 2016

Hafiz Saeed, head of ISIS in Afghanistan, killed in U.S. drone strike

The reputed head of Islamic State's Afghanistan branch, Hafiz Saeed, was killed by an American airstrike in eastern Afghanistan's Nangarhar province near the Pakistan border, Pentagon officials confirmed Friday.

August 12, 2016

China sees U.S. missile defense plan for South Korea as direct threat

U.S. military officials are trying to pacify a furious China in the wake of Washington's plan to deploy a battery of advanced missile defense systems in South Korea, insisting to angry military leaders in Beijing that the weapons would be solely targeting ballistic missile threats from North Korea and not undercut China's own military deterrent.

August 11, 2016

Sean MacFarland, departing U.S. commander, sees turning point in Islamic State fight

The American-led war against the Islamic State has turned a corner over the last year, from a stalemated conflict to one where local and coalition forces in both Syria and Iraq are on the cusp of driving the insurgents from their Middle East strongholds, the departing U.S. commander leading the fight said Wednesday.

August 10, 2016

Middle East stabilization a chief concern, Ashton Carter says

Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said Wednesday that the Islamic State is nearing defeat in Iraq and Syria, and that stabilizing the Middle East after the terrorist group falls is the key strategic concern facing the international community.

July 20, 2016

Turkish uprising results in thousands of arrests

Thousands of Turkish military and judicial officials have been arrested by state security forces as Ankara cracks down on opposition factions who masterminded a failed coup against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's government over the weekend.

July 17, 2016

U.S. airstrike kills architect of 2014 Pakistan school massacre

The suspected mastermind of the 2014 massacre of Pakistani schoolchildren at a military-run school in Peshawar has been killed by a U.S. airstrike, American and Pakistani officials confirmed Wednesday, giving a first glimpse of how the Obama administration's new rules on drone strikes will affect the conflict with Islamist extremists in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

July 13, 2016

International court rules against China in territorial dispute over South China Sea

Beijing faces a perilous crossroads after an international tribunal decisively ruled against China's territorial claims to the highly disputed waterways of the South China Sea, with the rest of the world waiting to see how it will respond to the first major global check to its aggressive actions in the Pacific.

July 12, 2016

South China Sea ruling has all sides bracing for fallout

Washington, Beijing and nervous capitals around the Asia-Pacific region are bracing for the fallout from a highly anticipated ruling by an international tribunal on China's territorial claims in the hotly contested South China Sea, a decision that could set a key precedent in efforts to curb Chinese expansion in the region.

July 11, 2016

Campaign for Mosul in Iraq to get 560 more U.S. troops

Hundreds of American troops are heading to Iraq in the coming weeks in a bid to accelerate Baghdad's push to retake Islamic State's Iraqi capital of Mosul by the end of the year — a goal set by President Obama that is quickly falling out of reach despite a series of battlefield victories against the terror group.

July 11, 2016

Islamic State rapidly losing ground in Iraq and Syria: report

The Islamic State has lost territory in Iraq and Syria at a faster rate over the last six months compared to all of 2015, shrinking the terror group's total holdings in both countries roughly to the size of West Virginia, according to a new report.

July 11, 2016

ISIS unleashes terrorist attacks amid string of battlefield defeats

Days after the Islamic State was flushed from the Iraqi city of Fallujah, arguably the group's highest-profile defeat in months, its fighters unleashed a barrage of bloodshed and carnage in a series of devastating terrorist attacks from Bangladesh to Baghdad that culminated in a massive suicide bombing in the Iraqi capital that left over 200 dead.

July 5, 2016

Pentagon to allow transgender people to serve openly in military

For the first time, the Defense Department will allow transgendered people to serve in all branches of the armed forces, eliminating the last barrier to any and all U.S. citizens to serve in the military.

June 30, 2016

Navy commander surrendered to Iran to protect Obama’s nuclear deal

The Navy commander in charge of a pair of patrol boats captured by Iranian forces in January opted to surrender rather than fight back, citing later fears that a confrontation could endanger the Obama administration's efforts to lock in a deal with Tehran on its nuclear program.

June 30, 2016

U.S. sailors violated Navy codes of conduct while detained by Iranian forces

The U.S. Navy crewmen detained by Iran after their vessels crossed into the country's territorial waters in January violated the sea service's code of conduct during their brief imprisonment by Iranian forces, according to a recently completed Navy investigation into the incident.

June 30, 2016