“Last month, there was a terrorist attack in India-controlled Kashmir that killed 26 tourists. Yesterday, India conducted several airstrikes on Pakistan, saying the strikes were retribution for the attack.
The strikes may not have been as successful as the Indian military had hoped. “At least two aircraft were said to have gone down in India and the Indian-controlled side of Kashmir, according to three officials, local news reports, and accounts of witnesses who had seen the debris of two,” reports The New York Times. “Pakistani military officials said that more than 20 people had been killed and dozens injured after six places were hit on the Pakistani side of Kashmir and in Punjab Province. Residents of the Indian side of Kashmir said at least 10 people had been killed in shelling from the Pakistani side since India carried out its strikes.””
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“”The scale of the strikes went far beyond New Delhi’s response to previous attacks in Kashmir it has blamed on Pakistan, including in 2019 and 2016, which some analysts said meant the risk of escalation was higher,” reports Reuters. But “the last time India and Pakistan faced off in a military confrontation, in 2019, U.S. officials detected enough movement in the nuclear arsenals of both nations to be alarmed,” reports The New York Times.
There’s also, of course, the China factor: Pakistan now gets lots of its weapons from China, whereas India is more reliant on the West; relations between India and China have soured in recent years, while China and Pakistan have gotten much closer.”
“the Houthi movement, one of the two rival governments in Yemen, has not attacked commercial ships since the beginning of Trump’s term, when Trump brokered a ceasefire in Gaza. (The Houthis had started the attacks in November 2023, demanding such a ceasefire.) Trump began an air campaign in Yemen three days before the Israeli-Palestinian ceasefire broke down. The new Yemeni ceasefire is simply a return to the status quo ante bellum, at least with regard to shipping.
Although no American troops have died during Trump’s war in Yemen, the campaign has been incredibly costly for U.S. military preparedness. The military spent $1 billion in just the first three weeks, a U.S. official told CNN. Last week, the U.S. Navy accidentally dropped a $64 million fighter jet into the sea. It lost another one to a landing accident on Wednesday; the jet was returning to its carrier after the ceasefire was announced. And it’s not just about the financial price tag. The Department of Defense warned Congress behind closed doors that it was “risking real operational problems” due to being stretched thin by the Middle Eastern war.
Significantly, Trump seems to be extracting the U.S. from Israel’s war. Asked whether the deal included a Houthi-Israeli truce, State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce told reporters that “this is about the Red Sea, the attacking of ships.” Israel was reportedly not even informed of the deal beforehand. After the deal was announced, Houthi leader Mahdi al-Mashat said that the attacks on Israel would continue and warned Israelis to “stay in your shelters.” Trump told reporters at the White House that he “will discuss that if something happens with Israel and the Houthis.”
Just three days ago, Houthi forces hit the international airport in Tel Aviv with a ballistic missile, wounding six people and shutting down all of Israel’s international air traffic.””
“India launched military strikes on targets in Pakistan, both countries said on Wednesday and Pakistan claimed it had shot down five Indian Air Force jets, in an escalation that has pushed the two nations to the brink of wider conflict.
India’s missile strikes early Wednesday morning targeted “terrorist infrastructure” across nine sites in Pakistan’s densely populated Punjab province and Pakistan-administered Kashmir, it said. They came in response to a massacre by militants of tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir two weeks ago, that New Delhi blamed on its neighbor.
Pakistan said at least 26 people were killed in Wednesday’s strikes – including women and a three-year-old girl – and 46 wounded. The country’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif described the strikes as “an act of war” and Islamabad has vowed to retaliate.”
“A wave of Israeli strikes across Gaza on Sunday hit a hospital and other sites, killing at least 21 people, including children, as Israel vowed to expand its security presence in the small coastal strip.
The predawn strike on Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City was the latest of several attacks on northern Gaza’s last major hospital providing critical health care.”
““I think we are making a mistake,” Vance wrote in the Signal chat, later published by The Atlantic. Vance argued that although Trump wanted to send a message with the strikes, “I am not sure the president is aware how inconsistent this is with his message on Europe right now.” He did say, though, that he was “willing to support the consensus of the team and keep these concerns to myself,” but went on to say “there is a strong argument for delaying this a month.”
Minutes later, White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller shut down the conversation, writing, “As I heard it, the president was clear.””
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“The senior Republican official added: “It’s one thing to have a healthy interagency debate before a decision is made. It’s another to try and undo a Commander-in-Chief decision once Trump gives the execute order. This is the latter, and it’s very [John] Bolton-esque.”
Some Republicans believe Vance raising questions about an action the president had already agreed to amounted to a form of obstruction, the same senior Republican official said.”