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Articles by Kim R. Holmes

President Obama is making the case that Republican opponents of the Iran nuclear deal — which is designed to limit Tehran's ability to acquire a nuclear weapon in exchange for relief from some economic sanctions — essentially want war with Iran. He argues American casualties are all but certain if the deal is not implemented. (Associated Press)

KIM HOLMES: Obama’s ‘the worse, the better’ Syria strategy

What a mess. President Obama says he wants to take in at least 10,000 refugees from the Middle East. Meanwhile Russia's Vladimir Putin is sending fighter aircraft and troops to prop up a Syrian leader that Mr. Obama has said over and over again must go.

September 14, 2015
Illustration on the Obama Iran nuclear arms deal by Alexander Hunter/The Washington Times

KIM HOLMES: Iran nuclear deal raises war risk in Middle East

Let's cut to the chase: Does the Iran deal make war more or less likely? "No deal means a greater chance of more war in the Middle East," President Obama says. His critics disagree. They think it will make war more likely. So which is it?

August 3, 2015
Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey speaks during an interview with The Associated Press at the Pentagon in Washington, Wednesday, June 24, 2015. The man often called America’s top military officer, the most powerful person in uniform, actually commands nothing. No tanks, no planes, no ships, no troops. His voice carries great weight, but he gives no combat orders. As chairman Dempsey is the public face of the military, but he is not in the formal chain of command linking the president to his commanders in the field. Dempsey, who is completing four years in the job, has said it reminds him of entering the Army as a lowly second lieutenant. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

KIM R. HOLMES: Obama’s surrealistic foreign policy

The Joint Chiefs of Staff released a report admitting that nation states like Russia and China pose a greater threat than previously thought. Yet, almost concurrently, the Pentagon announced it will cut the Army by 40,000 soldiers. At this rate the Army will soon be the smallest it has been since 1940 -- not what you'd expect if we are, as Gen. Martin Dempsey, outgoing chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said, "living in the most dangerous time in my lifetime."

July 13, 2015
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia gives the keynote speech at the Snake River Adjudication celebration dinner at the Boise Center on the Grove in Boise, Idaho, on Monday, August 25, 2014. (AP Photo/Otto Kitsinger)

KIM R. HOLMES: The Supreme Court: Speaking power to truth

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia's lament last week that "words no longer have meaning" got me to thinking. I don't claim to know Chief Justice John Roberts' motivations in deciding in favor of Obamacare, but I do know that his deconstruction of the meaning of language is increasingly commonplace in our culture. Could his willingness to bend the meaning of the word "states" indicate something larger than what's happening to the law? Could it actually be a sign of a major cultural shift in the country?

June 29, 2015
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon arrives on the eve of the Geneva Consultations on Yemen at the European headquarters of the United Nations, UN, in Geneva, Switzerland, Sunday, June 14, 2015. (Laurent Gillieron/Keystone via AP)

KIM HOLMES: U.N. at 70, time to turn over a new budgetary leaf

This year the United Nations celebrates its 70th birthday. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon believes it's a "once-in-a-generation opportunity" to reflect on the organization's history. He's right, but we should also think about its future. And one of the things we should be rethinking, as Americans, is how much we pay for the United Nations.

June 15, 2015
Chinese paramilitary policemen march past street cleaners near Tiananmen Square in Beijing Monday, June 1, 2015. The Chinese capital maintains a tight security around Tiananmen Square ahead of the 26th anniversary of China's June 4 bloody crackdown on pro democracy demonstrators. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)

KIM R. HOLMES: China prepping for regional hegemony

What is China up to? It's been building artificial islands in the South China Sea. Recently, two motorized artillery pieces were spotted on one of these artificial islands. Experts believe the Chinese may plan to use them as airstrips.

June 1, 2015
FILE - In this April 2, 2015 file photo, President Barack Obama speaks in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington. The framework nuclear deal sealed by world powers and Iran leaves major questions: Could Iran cheat? Possibly. Would the U.S or anyone else be able to respond in time? In theory, yes. Are they prepared to use military force? Questionable. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File) **FILE**

KIM R. HOLMES: U.S.’ nuclear agreement with Iran a rerun of North Korea

A U.S. president reaches a nuclear agreement with a rogue state. He steps before the microphones and declares, "This is a good deal for the United States." The pariah nation will, he continues, "freeze and then dismantle its nuclear program" and the "entire world will be safer as we slow the spread of nuclear weapons." It was President Bill Clinton speaking about the 1994 Nuclear Framework Agreement with North Korea. Of course, it didn't turn out as advertised.

April 13, 2015
Russian President Vladimir Putin holds a terrestrial globe, with Russian territory colored pink, seemingly including Crimea, presented to him as a gift during his meeting with participants in the youth educational forum at the Seliger youth camp near Lake Seliger, Russia, in this August 2014 file photo. As world leaders gather at the U.N., during the week of Sept. 22, 2014, the U.S. and its European allies are consumed by efforts to blunt the savage advance of the Islamic State group, to end the raging Ebola epidemic and to make progress in nuclear negotiations with Iran. That’s likely just fine with Putin, since these issues distract from Russia’s presence in neighboring Ukraine. (AP Photo/RIA-Novosti, Presidential Press Service, Mikhail Klimentyev, Pool, File)

KIM HOLMES: Russia’s, Obama’s endgame in Iran nuclear talks

The Obama administration assumes that it needs Russia to get an Iranian nuclear deal. But behind-the-scenes happenings suggest that Russia has its own plans. That may explain why the administration is willing to bypass Congress to get a pact with Tehran.

March 16, 2015
Illustration on American's diminished economic freedom by Alexander Hunter/The Washington Times

KIM HOLMES: Economic freedom is proven secret of success

Suppose someone told you there were over two decades of economic data showing the secret of success for every nation in the world and that a Nobel laureate in economics inspired the methodology that was used to analyze that data. Would you sit up and listen?

February 2, 2015
President Obama drew a number of lines in his executive order, slicing and dicing the illegal immigrant community. To qualify for the new deferred action program, someone has to have been in the U.S. for at least five years and have either a U.S. citizen or legal permanent resident child. (Associated Press)

KIM HOLMES: Obama’s amnesty bowls over restraints on executive power

Presidents in recent decades carefully tried not to overstep their executive authority in domestic policy. They may have pushed the envelope on national security and war-making powers, but they were reluctant to take any executive action perceived to be a blatant rewriting of a law or a unilateral political move.

November 24, 2014
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry visits the Mattrah market, in Muscat, Oman, Monday, Nov. 10, 2014. In the final stretch of years of negotiations to limit Tehran's nuclear production, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry met Monday for a second straight day with Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif and European Union senior adviser Catherine Ashton in Oman's capital. The Obama administration is facing its last best chance to curb Iran's nuclear program — not just to meet an end-of-the-month deadline for a deal, but also to seal one before skeptical Republicans who will control Congress next year are able to scuttle it. (AP Photo/Nicholas Kamm, Pool)

KIM HOLMES: Post-election, we need a different foreign policy

Foreign affairs may not have played a big part in the midterm elections, but that doesn't mean all is well with current foreign policy. A CBS poll the week before the election found only 34 percent of Americans approved of the president's handling of foreign policy. Within our foreign policy establishment, there is widespread bipartisan unease about his inability to handle crises that seem to be spiraling out of control.

November 10, 2014
Saddam Hussein

KIM HOLMES: Uncomfortable truths: Explaining away Iraq’s real WMD

Iraq's chemical weapons are back in the news. The New York Times reported that American troops found roughly 5,000 chemical warheads, shells and aviation bombs since the Iraq War began. Then last week The Washington Post reported the Islamic State had used chlorine gas against Iraqi police officers.

October 27, 2014