Former Vice Chief of Staff of the United States Army General Jack Keane spoke in honor of the 20th year of Myers, Brier & Kelly, LLP. The Thursday, March 26, 2015 celebration was hosted at the Scranton Cultural Center with dignitaries, lawyers, family and friends of MBK. Gen. Keane began the evening by saying that the lawyers at MBK are “honorable and results-oriented people who are tough when they need to be.” There were 250 in attendance.

Gen. Keane, a nationally recognized expert on military and national security matters, comments regularly on Fox News. He has served as a military adviser to Hillary Clinton during her presidential bid, and recently met with Secretary of State John Kerry.

The only thing that is going to stop a “deal with Iran on its stockpile nuclear material is Iran itself.” Gen. Keane expressed concern over the Administration’s apparent willingness to negotiate with the Iranians when they are inciting Islamic extremist groups to take actions against U.S. interests throughout the world. “We have not had a challenge of this scale since the rise of the Soviet Union after World War II. What’s driving that is radical Islam has grown into a global jihad. The Iranians are on the march.”

Not mincing words, Gen. Keane described President Vladimir Putin as a “thug” who wants “to redo the political order.” Gen. Keane said that President Putin infiltrated the Crimea, instigated unrest, and sent in “green suits” (unmarked military uniforms) who were Russian-trained soldiers supported with heavy artillery to combat the Ukranian Army.

The general’s paramount concern was the “inadequate strategy to reclaim territory in Iraq.” “We need to strengthen that hand or the struggles will be longer than what they should and the casualties will be more. The brutality, the barbarism that you see is almost exclusively done in Syria. There seems to be no plan to deal with that. It will be deferred to the next administration.”