Mr. Biden has vowed to respond to the attack that killed three U.S. soldiers and injured dozens more at a Jordanian base on the border with Syria. Pentagon Correspondent Mike Glenn notes the Pentagon’s unwillingness thus far to confirm reports that U.S. personnel failed to stop the strike because the hostile craft approached the base at the same time a U.S. drone was returning from a mission.

The incident was the latest in a tit-for-tat clash of U.S. forces and Iranian allies and proxies dotted around the volatile Middle East. National Security Correspondent Ben Wolfgang has a deep-dive examining the more than 150 attacks by Iran-linked groups on U.S. and allied forces and interests in the Mideast since Oct. 7, when the Palestinian militant group Hamas (also backed by Iran) launched its terrorist assault on Israel.

Mr. Wolfgang appeared on “This Morning With Gordon Deal” to discuss the conflict. The latest flare-ups come just weeks after the fourth anniversary of the January 2020 U.S. strike that killed Iranian military commander Gen. Qassem Soleimani — an attack ordered by the then-President Trump.

Two key GOP lawmakers are pressing for more answers as the Pentagon inspector general prepares to investigate funding of risky virus research in China, a probe mandated under the new defense authorization law signed by President Biden in December. National Security Correspondent Bill Gertz reports that Sen. Joni Ernst and Rep. Mike Gallagher warned Pentagon IG Robert P. Storch in a letter of “national security threats that could result either from Pentagon procurement of technology from Chinese companies or dangerous experiments being conducted in foreign laboratories with substandard safety conditions.” 

The warning coincides with a new report by the CCP BioThreats Initiative revealing how China’s military is engaged in covert biological weapons research, considered a key element of Beijing’s asymmetric warfare strategy. China’s military is developing biological weapons disguised as civilian research in places like the Wuhan Institute of Virology, considered a leading possible source of the COVID-19 virus outbreak.

China is a treaty ally of North Korea, which has engaged in its own growing military provocations in recent weeks. Washington Times Asia Editor Andrew Salmon is tracking concerns that nuclear-armed Pyongyang has given up on diplomacy and is increasingly preparing for war on the divided, heavily armed Korean Peninsula.

The Biden administration is backpedaling on the sanctions relief it gave to Venezuela last year, relief it offered after having received reassurances from socialist President Nicolas Maduro that he would allow free elections.

In response to the Maduro regime’s arrest of three top aides to opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, the State Department says that starting in April it will suspend relief it had given to Venezuela’s oil and gas sector. The move came hours after GOP lawmakers, including Reps. Michael McCaul and Maria Salazar, and Sen. Jim Risch asserted in a joint statement that it was “past time the Biden administration hold Maduro accountable” for “backtracking on his commitment” to allow free and open elections.