The Friday Brief, March 20, 2026

Inside

The Intel Trainwreck
Why The $200 Billion Supplemental Means Ground War
The Ghost in the Machine: Russia’s Helping Hand
Target’s Long Year of Living Dangerously
Yes, Yes They Effing Will
ICE-ing The 1st Amendment
$166 Oil and the Strait of Hormuz
Digital Iron Curtain
Magazine Covers Are Art

The Big Picture

The Intel Trainwreck

By now, you’ve seen the headlines. The “imminent threat” that supposedly necessitated Operation Epic Fury, the massive joint U.S.-Israeli air campaign launched on February 28, is looking less like a concrete intelligence assessment and more like a fever dream cooked up in the West Wing.

What? Was Curveball not available?

This week, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard went before the Senate Intelligence Committee for the annual “Worldwide Threats” hearing. It was, to put it mildly, a slow motion car crash on the top of Burning Tire Mountain. In her written testimony, the DNI’s office stated that Iran’s nuclear program had been “obliterated” by strikes back in June 2025 and that there had been “no efforts” to rebuild it since. But when she opened her mouth to testify, she pivoted, suggesting Iran “maintained the intention” to rebuild.

The disconnect is staggering. We are currently three weeks into a hot war. American B-2s have turned Iranian missile facilities into rubble, the Strait of Hormuz is effectively closed to commercial traffic sending global oil prices into a vertical climb, and 13 Americans have already come home in flag-draped coffins.