Sparks: Iran and US report new wave of air strikes in Gulf

What I call a strategic necessity is often, upon examination, merely a well-disguised terror of appearing weak.

The machine built to guarantee security now demands its own perpetual sustenance, turning its creators into its servants.

Fear of the other’s power, interest in the strait’s control, and honor wounded by a previous strike - these are the true causes, not the stated ones.

Lighting a lamp in broad daylight to search for an honest motive between them.

Their bombs fall in a place I cannot control, but my judgment of their actions remains my own to command.

Observe how the spiraling pattern of retaliation mirrors the turbulent flow of water striking an obstruction.

The joint communiqué expressed a firm commitment to de-escalation right up until the moment the missiles were launched.

Before we tear down the last fraying thread of diplomatic protocol, we must first remember why it was woven there in the first place.

In Basra, the price of dates holds steady, but the fishermen no longer sail where the warships now patrol.

This fever of metal falling from the sky is a sickness of the spirit, an imbalance in the green force that sustains all life.

It is altogether admirable how two nations, each professing a desire for peace, can so diligently arrange for the mutual destruction of their outposts.

Freedom isn't declared in a briefing room; it's won by knowing which backroads the patrols don't watch.

An experiment that consistently produces the same ruinous result is not a policy; it is a stubborn refusal to observe the evidence.

Nothing soothes the civilized conscience quite like draping the old-fashioned business of blowing things to splinters in the latest strategic terminology.