It’s the latest twist in the ongoing saga swirling around Pete Hegseth, the former Fox News host and Mr. Trump’s pick to be the next defense secretary. Sen. Lindsey Graham, South Carolina Republican, said Sunday that Mr. Hegseth told him he would release from her confidentiality agreement the woman who has accused Mr. Hegseth of sexual misconduct.

“These allegations are disturbing, but they’re anonymous,” Mr. Graham told NBC’s “Meet the Press” program. “He told me he would release her from that agreement.”

Should the accuser take Mr. Hegseth up on that apparent offer, it could set the stage for bombshell hearings before the Senate, perhaps reminiscent of the remarkable 2018 event in which Christine Blasey Ford publicly testified that Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her decades earlier. Justice Kavanaugh has steadfastly denied that charge. 

Mr. Hegseth has faced his own allegations, including sexual misconduct, excessive drinking and financial mismanagement of veterans’ organizations he ran. But so far Mr. Trump and most Senate Republicans seem to be sticking by his nomination. 

Mr. Assad spoke out Monday for the first time since his stunning removal from power at the hands of the HTS rebels just over a week ago. The longtime Syrian strongman, who was granted asylum in Russia, said he had no plans to flee Syria and intended to keep fighting against the insurgent group. But Mr. Assad said Russian forces evacuated him to their base in the coastal province of Latakia, and when that base came under attack by rebel drones, the Russian troops moved him out of the country.

It’s a fascinating twist in the Assad-Russia relationship. Mr. Putin has been one of Mr. Assad’s strongest supporters, with Russian troops in Syria helping prop up the Assad government for the past decade while giving the Kremlin a key foothold in the region. But Mr. Putin reportedly decided against meeting with Mr. Assad after the ousted Syrian leader arrived in Moscow last week. And now Mr. Assad seems to be blaming Russia for forcing him to leave his country. 

Mr. Putin, meanwhile, made a cryptic threat Monday that U.S. development of short and medium-range missiles has pushed Moscow to its “red lines.”

The Biden administration is closely monitoring the tenuous situation inside Syria, home to nearly 1,000 American troops stationed there to battle the Islamic State. Speaking to reporters in Jordan over the weekend, Mr. Blinken said the U.S. has had direct conversations with HTS and reiterated the importance of locating Austin Tice, the American journalist captured by the Assad regime more than a decade ago. On Friday, the U.S. military flew another American citizen, Travis Timmerman, to safety after he spent about seven months inside Syria’s notorious prison system.

The safe evacuation of Mr. Timmerman has fueled hopes that the new Syrian government can both manage the domestic situation and work with the U.S. to achieve some of its policy aims, including preventing a resurgence of the Islamic State. 

So far at least, HTS seems to be leading a relatively calm governmental transition in Damascus. Reports of reprisals, revenge killings and sectarian violence have been minimal. Looting and destruction have been quickly contained, and insurgent fighters have been disciplined, according to media reports from the ground.

A major war in Asia, perhaps sparked by a Chinese military invasion of the island democracy Taiwan, would quickly spread to the U.S. in cyberspace and could have significant impact on the U.S. homeland.

That was the warning from Jen Easterly, director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, at a Cipher Brief event last week. Lead tech correspondent Ryan Lovelace has all the details. Ms. Easterly warned that cyberattacks against infrastructure used by Americans every day are “not a theoretical threat.”

“This is a world where a war in Asia could see very real impacts to the lives of Americans across our nation, with attacks against pipelines, against water facilities, against transportation nodes, against communications — all to induce societal panic and to deter our ability to marshal military might and citizen will,” she said. 

It was game over for the South Korean president after a bipartisan impeachment vote in the National Assembly suspended his powers Saturday. It was the culmination of a chaotic, divisive 11 days in Seoul after the president’s short-lived declaration of martial law on Dec 3.

Asia Editor Andrew Salmon is on the ground in Seoul and has all the latest on this fast-moving, far-reaching political story in a country that plays host to tens of thousands of American troops. The next move will lie with the nation’s Constitutional Court, which will decide whether to officially remove Mr. Yoon. 

The court has ample precedent, Mr. Salmon reports. Two of Mr. Yoon’s predecessors were impeached: Roh Moo-hyun in 2004 and Park Geun-hye in 2016, and Ms. Park was forced to step down in 2017.

Those celebrating the fall of Mr. Assad are feeling the need to whitewash his replacement’s bloody past, The Times Editorial Board argues, pointing to HTS’ past ties to Islamic jihadist groups such as al Qaeda.

While Abu Mohammad al-Jolani has tried to recast himself as a moderate, there are deep fears in national security circles that he and other HTS leaders remain sympathetic to extremist groups that could directly threaten the U.S. and Israel. 

“Odds are that Mr. Biden will remove Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, from the terrorist watchlist before President-elect Donald Trump moves into the White House. ‘The big guy’ doesn’t want anyone to notice that he just handed Syria to an Islamist movement that is committed to jihad,” the Editorial Board writes in a new piece.

• Dec. 16 — Sea-based Leg of the U.S. Strategic Nuclear Deterrent, Advanced Nuclear Weapons Alliance Deterrence Center

• Dec. 17 — Report Launch: The Reluctant Consensus: War and Russia’s Public Opinion, Atlantic Council

• Dec. 17 — Homeland Security and the China Challenge: A Conversation with Congressman Mark Green, Hudson Institute

• Dec. 17 — Celebrating the U.S. Space Force and Charting its Future, Center for Strategic and International Studies

• Dec. 18 — The NATO Perspective: Strengthening Resilience Within the Alliance, Atlantic Council

• Dec. 18 — Mission Brief | Irregular Warfare in an Era of Great Power Competition, Center for a New American Security