Last week Barack Obama angrily told reporters “We do not pay ransom” after a Wall Street Journal report suggested the administration paid a $400 million ransom to Iran for the release of four US hostages. But Obama lied. The US State Department admitted today the US paid a $400 million cash payment for the release of US prisoners. BREAKING: State Dept. says $400 million cash payment to Iran was... 

Signs emerge that Washington is trying to convince the US public of the necessity of exercising a more muscular policy in Syria. John Kerry has been for years advocating military actions against the Syrian government, Gareth Porter notes, adding that Kerry’s views on Syria are strikingly similar to those expressed in the recent “dissent memo.” The recent diplomatic memo by US State... 

We topple governments in the Middle East that we don’t like and we encourage movements that will help us in this – regardless of how dangerous these allies are, Karen Kwiatkowsky, retired US Air Force officer, told RT. The US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, led by Kurdish groups, have entered the town of Manbij after they surrounded ISIS militants there. But at the same time dozens of US... 

Advocates of illegal military intervention in Syria to force out Bashar al-Assad signed an internal memo protesting the current Obama administration policy according to a report posted by The Wall Street Journal. “We are aware of a dissent channel cable written by a group of State Department employees regarding the situation in Syria. We are reviewing the cable now, which came up very recently,”... 

The State Department declared it would take 75 years to release all the emails from top aides to Hillary Clinton during her tenure as Secretary of State. The announcement came just a day before the presidential primary on Tuesday, where Hillary Clinton won enough delegates to ensure her the Democratic nomination. “Given the Department’s current [Freedom of Information Act] workload and the complexity... 

The Obama administration blocked release of Hillary Clinton’s Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) related emails until after the November election. Obama said he will do what he can to get a Democrat elected president in the fall and he meant it. Don’t look for Hillary to be indicted for her email crimes either. Investor’s Business Daily reported, via Free Republic: Trade is a hot issue in the 2016... 

The Rothschild-owned magazine, The Economist, describes Michel Temer as Brazil’s “unplanned” president. The 75-year-old law professor, who played a key role in the impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff, became the South American country’s acting president on Thursday after Rousseff was suspended by the Senate on corruption charges. Temer’s rise to power, however, is not merely a happenstance... 

As global powers prepare for the increased role of outer space in future conflicts, the US Air Force has announced the creation of a new team whose sole purpose is to protect American space assets – primarily against Russian and Chinese “aggression.” Currently, US satellite navigation is claimed to be dangerously understaffed. Gen. John Hyten, commander of Air Force Space Command, stated... 

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has expanded its investigation of Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server as secretary of state, according to a report. The ongoing investigation is now focused on determining whether the possible “intersection” of Clinton Foundation affairs and State Department business may have violated public corruption laws, three intelligence sources... 

Donald Trump said on Wednesday, “I know words, I have the best words. I have the best, but there is no better word than stupid.” Speaking at a campaign rally in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, Trump claimed, “The world has blown up around Barack Obama.” Trump then mocked the idea that the State Department claiming that they brought peace to Syria suggesting, “So instead of saying they... 

Officials at the US Embassy in Moscow responded to an article in a Russian publication about attempts to discredit several senior Russian officials. The response was made in the form of “correction of errors” – diplomats tried to arrange a “lesson of literacy.” The Izvestia newspaper has recently published an article about how someone was trying to discredit Russian officials... 

Says defense of country will “risk confrontation” with US-Saudi supported jihadi terrorists. On Saturday the US Secretary of State made a phone call to his counterpart in Russia and said Russian support for the government of Bashar al-Assad will risk a confrontation with “the anti-ISIL coalition operating in Syria.” The anti-ISIL or ISIS forces in Syria fighting to overthrow the Syrian government... 

Officials at the US State Department said that Russia had tested a state-of-the-art cruise missile capable of posing a threat to Europe, Japan and the Republic of Korea. The tests were conducted in violation of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), US officials added. In December 2014, speaking at the Brookings Institution in Washington, US Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and... 

Terror acts rose by more than a third from 2013 to 2014, while deaths nearly doubled, says a new US State Department report. Boko Haram and the Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS) were largely responsible for an increase in terrorist attacks. The State Department’s annual, congressionally-mandated global terrorism report found nearly 33,000 people were killed in about 13,500 terror attacks across... 

Former US Secretary of State James Baker says he had barred current Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from the State Department when he was a senior Israeli official. “I barred him from the State Department,” Baker told CNN on Sunday. “That may not be widely known.” Baker explained that he had made the decision after Netanyahu said that “American policy in the Middle East is based...