“The U.S. government has put employees on heightened alert across the Middle East and moved to reduce personnel levels at embassies and consulates because of intelligence showing Iran is in the advanced stages of planning attacks against Americans,” the New York Times reports.

“Intelligence officials raised alarms to Secretary of State Marco Rubio in a memo on Friday that warned about the dangers to State Department employees in the Middle East and other regions.”

Financial Times: Intelligence memo warns Iran plotting to kill Americans in Middle East.

“Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton warned Friday that Iran has ‘substantially increased efforts to target U.S. personnel’ abroad, with plots to kill Americans reaching ‘advanced stages’ in the Middle East and other countries,” CBS News reports.

“Ukrainian drones connected to the Pentagon-funded Starshield satellite network have flown at speeds near 250 miles an hour for the first time since the system was throttled last week, Ukraine’s defense minister announced on Saturday,” the New York Times reports.

”It was the first sign that the speed restrictions, which have hampered crucial drone operations, might be easing.”

“Iran’s message is stark: If the U.S. and Israel restart their air campaign, Tehran will respond with strikes not only on American bases and warships but on airports, pipelines and other civilian targets in the neighboring countries of the Persian Gulf,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“The warnings, issued publicly and in private diplomatic communications, are clearly aimed at deterring any attack with tough talk. But they also signal a real threat. Iran retains significant missile and drone stocks and the ability to use them.”

“Analysts estimate Iran has hundreds to thousands of ballistic missiles, and U.S. and regional officials believe it has resumed production of ballistic missiles in limited numbers using stockpiled components and working in underground facilities.”

Paul Krugman: “No private individual should, or indeed even have the capability to, make national security policy. Slowing down Starlink was, in effect, a U.S. intervention in a foreign conflict. It helped Russia, our long-time adversary, and hobbled Ukraine, during a very critical time in this war. It also helped Russia at a time when Putin is increasingly emboldened to menace Europe through acts of sabotage, intimidation and support of the extreme right such as the AfD in Germany.”

“The U.S. and Israeli militaries have developed specific plans for renewed strikes against Iran after the American midterm elections,” the New York Times reports.

“As planning for a short but intensive operation progresses, the U.S. and Israeli militaries have stepped up exercises, flying planes over Iraq to practice strike maneuvers. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel this week to discuss new strikes.”

“The targets would likely include Iran’s energy infrastructure, nuclear facilities, and missile and drone arsenal. Some officials say one more big round of attacks could push Iran’s economy over the brink and force the country to make diplomatic concessions after nearly eight months of conflict.”

“The Pentagon is looking to build a more robust deep-cover spying program to conduct economic warfare against China and other U.S. competitors,” the Washington Post reports. 

“This new next-generation spying program — in which U.S. operatives would go undercover as businesspeople or other private-sector personnel, without any overt U.S. government affiliation — is intended to be a covert prong of the Pentagon’s larger economic warfare campaign.”

“The U.S. military has quietly been scaling back its troop presence at bases across the Middle East in recent days, and the State Department is ordering a further reduction in staff at multiple diplomatic posts in the region,” NBC News reports.

“The reduction of American forces and diplomatic personnel is similar to drawdowns at bases and embassies that the Pentagon and State Department initiated around the start of the war with Iran in February, the sources said. They said the moves are in response to ongoing threats in the region, including from Iran.”

Mediaite: Trump to order families home from Gulf embassies amid war worries.

Foreign Policy: “Many of the immediate consequences of the Israeli-American war with Iran are already clear. The further emergence of drones and missiles as dominant weapons of war; the danger to the global economy from the threats to vital chokepoints such as the Strait of Hormuz and the Bab el-Mandeb; and the inadequacy of U.S. weapons procurement, among other issues, have garnered widespread and entirely merited attention.”

“Yet as important enough as those developments are, the Iran conflict could also have far wider and longer-term implications—changes that could be truly transformative for the Middle East region and the rest of the world. Decades from now, we might look back on this conflict as a watershed event that fundamentally reshaped what had been bedrock principles of modern geopolitics.”