Security

As hostile actors recognize the vulnerability of critical water infrastructure, recognizing water as a national security priority is the first step toward resilience.

As the September deadline for the U.S. troop drawdown approaches, Iraq’s period of comfortable neutrality is ending, but the country’s policymakers should not rush into unsustainable alignments.

After U.S.-Israeli strikes killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on February 28, Iran’s collective leadership has concluded that the best defense is a good offense.

The war between the United States and Iran revealed the vulnerability of static U.S. bases, while also showcasing Gulf Arab states’ capacity – bolstered with U.S. hardware and training – to intercept most Iranian strikes on their own, raising new questions about U.S.-Gulf security partnerships.

Hitting the systems that keep Gulf populations supplied with water and power is a threshold Iran now appears willing to cross.

Oman has benefitted from the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran, but continued conflict and Oman’s highwire neutrality balancing act mean that the sultanate’s economic windfall is still in danger.

President Trump has led the United States into an impossible dilemma in which resuming and intensifying the war presents one set of alarming consequences while ending it under current circumstances offers at least as many disasters for Washington.

The Houthis’ decision to dip their toes into the conflict is a calculated choice based on military capacity, a blueprint, and the need for retaliatory pressure.