US Helmand Strategy Moves Forward Without Taliban

Lisbon Treaty Sees Fissures On Day One
The Czech President Klaus signed the Lisbon Treaty (the last EU leader to do so) today, after the Czech Republic's constitutional court gave the treaty its thumbs-up.But already, fissures have emerged. The Tories in the UK, who are poised to take over in big numbers by next June at the latest, are furious, and David Cameron (the very-likely next PM) is currently under great pressure to come up with some sort of legal scheme to

Afghan Election Gets Key Legitimacy Boost
In an approximately-simultaneous announcement, the Independent Election Commission of Afghanistan declared that no candidate in the election attained 50% of the real ballots cast, and Karzai ra

An Alternative Theory on the S. Waziristan Assault
So you all probably know about the recent string of attacks by the Taliban in Pakistan, against police stations, army headquarters, and random civilians, by raid or by suicide bomb, in Peshawar or Lahore or Islamabad. The Taliban has grown particularly tough and gutsy, and it's not 100% clear to what end. Certainly they have won the ire of the Pakistanis, who are (finally) launching a long-awaited operation into South Waziristan. The BBC provides an image of the approach below:

The Lisbon Treaty
The Lisbon Treaty in the EU finally cleared one of its biggest hurdles today--that set up by the voters of Ireland.Requiring unanimous approval of the member states of the EU, the Lisbon Treaty was signed by heads of state of all 27 member nations in 2007, and was expected to be in force at the beginning of this year. For all but Ireland, national parliaments rubber-stamped the treaty through (though the Czech and Polish executives had refused to sign the treaty until the Irish passed it--not sure what they've done yet). With the Irish vote done, the treaty is likely only some red tape away from coming into effect.The Treaty would strengthen the breadth of powers and

The Middle East Wrap
You'll have to accept my apologies for not writing much lately. I'll try to make up for it today by covering just about everything worth covering in the Middle East (and on Monday I'll try to update the rest of the world).IRAN: Iran's secret nuclear facility has been exposed by intel; Iran's attempts to minimize political losses by admitting it publicly and agreeing to talks worked better than I had anticipated. Israel is currently pulling their hair out over the issue: previously, they had been mulling an airstrike on the known above-ground Iranian facility. The second, underground one has likely ruled that option out. And, as usual, Israel is not ready to depend on Western neg