Secure Freedom Minute
Episodes
Thursday Jun 07, 2012
Panetta In Kabul
Thursday Jun 07, 2012
Thursday Jun 07, 2012
This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.
Enroute home from a long Asian trip, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta visited briefly today with some of our troops at the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. The audience must have found his pep talk confusing, if not absurdly unbelievable.
Mr. Panetta said “We’re not going anywhere.” That must be news to both our troops, Afghan President Hamid Karzai and the Taliban. They all know that President Obama has decided we are outta there in 2014.
The Pentagon chief added that “We have an enduring commitment to the security and stability of Afghanistan” and that the international community is signaling very strongly to the Taliban that “time is not on their side.”
The only thing worse than our losing in Afghanistan is lying to ourselves and others about it.
This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute. Learn more at SecureFreedomRadio.com.
Thursday Feb 02, 2012
The President's Agenda
Thursday Feb 02, 2012
Thursday Feb 02, 2012
This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.
President Obama needs to come clean with the American people about Afghanistan. He clearly wants U.S. forces out ASAP. To that end, his Defense Secretary, Leon Panetta, told us yesterday he hoped our combat operations in Afghanistan would end by December 2013. In the same speech, however, Secretary Panetta indicated that our troops would still be needed to fight terrorists there through the end of 2014.
The 2013 date came as a complete surprise to our so-called ally in Kabul, Afghan President Hamid Karzai, and others. It invites our abject defeat since the Afghans surely won’t be able to secure the place by then without our help.
We can lose Afghanistan without waiting another year. If that is what President Obama intends to do, he should just come out and say it.
This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute. Learn more at SecureFreedomRadio.com.
Friday Jan 13, 2012
Iran Crossing The Red Line
Friday Jan 13, 2012
Friday Jan 13, 2012
@font-face { font-family: "Times"; }@font-face { font-family: "MS 明朝"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p { margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; font-size: 10pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.
Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta is declaring “red lines” with respect to Iran. He says Iran will not be allowed to get the bomb. He also says they won’t be permitted to interrupt energy flows out of the Persian Gulf.
These red lines are fully justified. Disaster will follow if mullahs who seek to bring back their messiah by triggering the apocalypse get nuclear arms. Ditto closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
The trouble is, the Iranians find such warnings as increasingly implausible. Washington is dramatically reducing its military budget and capabilities, retreating from the region and making Asia the new focus of its diminished power projection.
If we don’t want our red lines to turn into green lights for Iran, we going to have to do more than talk about them.
This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute. Learn more at SecureFreedomRadio.com
Wednesday Nov 02, 2011
Our Leaky Umbrella
Wednesday Nov 02, 2011
Wednesday Nov 02, 2011
This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.
Last week, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta assured our South Korean allies and warned their enemies – and ours – in North Korea that America’s nuclear “umbrella” is in place. Such assurances ring increasingly hollow, however, given the sorry state of our deterrent.
Our nuclear-armed missiles and bombers are increasingly antiques. Some of the latter were actually flown by their present pilots’ grandfathers. The weapons they carry are also old and obsolescing; none has been realistically tested underground for almost twenty years.
It must be asked: At what point will our deterrent no longer reliably deter the likes of North Korea, or perhaps China? What if our friends like South Korea, Japan or Taiwan stop feeling secure under our unreliable “umbrella” – and decide to acquire nuclear weapons of their own?
We dare not find out.
This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute. Learn more at securefreedomradio.com.
Thursday Oct 27, 2011
Secretary of Defense Assures Our East Asian Allies
Thursday Oct 27, 2011
Thursday Oct 27, 2011
This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.
Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta is visiting Asia, assiduously assuring our East Asian allies like South Korea that the United States will always stand with them.
But will we?
Secretary Panetta has also said that incipient defense budget cuts will preclude the kind of US presence and power-projection capability around the world that we’ll likely need more than ever in the future.
The question occurs: If such cuts do take place and, as Secretary Panetta has promised, we are going to stay in the Western Pacific, where won’t we be? Will we abandon the Persian Gulf? Or the Eastern Mediterranean? Or how about Latin America?
Leave our interests in such places undefended and there will be grave repercussions for our economy, as well as our national security. We must keep peace through strength.
This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute. Learn more at securefreedomradio.com.