Today’s Headlines and Commentary

Bad news from Farah, Afghanistan, where a deadly insurgent attack killed at least 44 and wounded more than 100. Nine Taliban fighters dressed as Afghan soldiers stormed a government compound, and a firefight ensued that lasted nearly seven hours, according to the New York Times. The Washington Post puts the death toll at 48, and BBC.com says 50.

From the Department of More Bad News: A NATO airstrike in Ghazni, Afghanistan, killed four policemen and a civilian who might have been mistaken for Taliban militants. BBC.com has more.

Ryan Evans, a PhD candidate at King’s College, writes in Foreign Policy about the lessons we ought to learn from the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, particularly “Soviet efforts to achieve a negotiated settlement and withdraw their military forces.”

William Milam, former U.S. ambassador to Pakistan, has this op-ed in the Times about the Frenemies’s “precipitous decline”:

In addition to the army, Pakistan inherited its other political and economic institutions from the British (and to some extent the Moguls) and, as in almost all ex-colonial countries, these were taken over by indigenous elites and the state, for the benefit of those elites and the state. This suited the army just fine, as these institutions were soon dwarfed vis-à-vis the army, and remain so. Had its society remained so structured, over time those political and economic institutions might have become stronger and more independent, and Pakistan more modern. Sometimes that happens, but infrequently. The addition of these now-autonomous militant proxies to an already unpromising mix made that mix even more toxic, and modernization much less likely.

Meanwhile, Reuters reports that John McCain pushed for greater U.S. engagement in Mali after a visit there.

Tensions keep escalating between the United States and North Korea: Agence France Presse reports that the latter has now authorized plans for nuclear strikes on the United States. And according to the Hill, the Pentagon has deployed American anti-missile systems to Guam, in order to counter the Supreme Leader's sabre rattling. Calling Kim Jong-Un: I thought you had agreed to this at least. What happened?

Speaking of escalating tensions, Israel and Gaza are trading fire again, says the Times. Gaza fired rockets across the border in support of Palestinian prisoners on a hunger strike to protest the death of a fellow inmate; Israel retaliated with airstrikes.

Canada's CBC News has statements from the Canadian immigration minister, foreign affairs minister, and a former assistant director of the Canadian spy agency, CSIS, regarding two Canadian men---who apparently were part of the Al Qaeda-linked, hostage-taking band of marauders that stormed the In Amenas gas plant in January. The Wall Street Journal reports that Canadian authorities are investigating another fellow associated with the pair, too.

In this must-read piece, Spencer Ackerman interviews Omar Hammami, an American citizen-turned-jihadist who hails from Alabama but currently resides in Somalia. Hammami joined Al Shabab in 2006, and now has a $5 million bounty on his head.

The New York Times reports that the NYPD’s controversial Domain Awareness System---which Paul and Matt discussed last year---is making a profit for the city.

Conor Friedersdorf at the Atlantic discusses the domestic drone bill put forth by the Rhode Island state legislature.

Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, gave his first major policy address yesterday at the National Defense University. Here are CNN’s Security Clearance blog and Thomas Ricks of Foreign Policy with thoughts on the speech, which can be found here.

And, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty gives us the latest on what New York’s grandmothers have been up to while you haven’t been paying attention. You never call, you never write: it’s today’s Moment of Zen.

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