The State Department has announced that it will, at long last, designate the Haqqani Network as a Foreign Terrorist Organization.  Apart from the rhetorical value of the designation, the main consequence is to attach to the Haqqani Network an array of liabilities under the headings of U.S.

Two short items involving drug cartel violence in Mexico and the related issue of US cooperation with Mexican authorities in counter-cartel efforts.

First, as readers presumably know, Mexico has just elected a new president: PRI's Enrique Pena Nieto.  It will be very interesting to see how his policies differ from Calderon's vis-a-vis the cartels.  Early signs indicate that he will continue to embrace U.S.

This is a pretty remarkable development.  Authorities have arrested a dual US-Iranian citizen on charges that he conspired with a senior official of Iran's Qods Force (of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps) to assassinate the Saudi Ambassador to the United States (potentially through the bombing of a restaurant in the United States), and potentially to carry out other operations as well.  What is very scary about this fact pattern is the alleged attempt to pay a Mexico-based transnational drug trafficking organization to execute the hit.  The attempt was doomed to fail, fortunately,

Another Mark Mazzetti story from the past week that deserves your attention: this piece, which sheds some additional light on the intelligence and logistical support that the United States is providing to Mexico's conflict with the cartels.   The story primarily focuses on "boomerang" operations in which Mexican security forces preparing to conduct a raid on a cartel target in Mexico first gather and learn of their mission in the far-more-secure and discreet confines of a US government facility within