Quotes of the Day:
"Change your life today. Don't gamble on the future, act now, without delay."
- Simone de Beauvoir
“Whether the perception, and in some cases the reality, of America pulling back from global leadership can be reversed, whether America will reassert its willingness to bear the mantle of such leadership, whether America has the will and the creativity to cope with China’s global ambitions and those of other authoritarian regimes—not to mention other international challenges—depends upon a better understanding of what constitutes American power, how to revitalize it, and how to wield it more effectively.”
— Exercise of Power: American Failures, Successes, and a New Path Forward in the Post-Cold War World by Robert Michael Gates
https://a.co/bZey3R6
Unhappy is the fate of one who tries to win his battles and succeed in his attacks without cultivating the spirit of enterprise; for the result is waste of time and general stagnation. Hence the saying: The enlightened ruler lays his plans well ahead; the good general cultivates his resources.
-Sun Tzu
1. WARNING UPDATE: RUSSIA MAY CONDUCT A CHEMICAL OR RADIOLOGICAL FALSE-FLAG ATTACK AS A PRETEXT FOR GREATER AGGRESSION AGAINST UKRAINE
2. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, MARCH 9
3. Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg says 'no two countries run by women would ever go to war'
4. Resistance Is in Our Blood: A Personal History of Ukraine
5. Volodymyr Zelenskiy has used mythmaking to turn public opinion in Ukraine’s favor
6. The New Great Game
7. Opinion | Why the US should think twice about arming a Ukrainian insurgency
8. Budget deal would fully fund Defense Department, add $13.6 billion in Ukraine aid
9. Biden’s Ukraine aid package is getting super-sized by Congress
10. In search of a just war: Why American veterans are answering a call to serve in Ukraine
11. Zelensky, having rallied world leaders, shames them for not joining the fight
12. Russian military vehicles are flying Soviet hammer and sickle flags in Ukraine
13. Nuclear reactors in a war zone: A new type of weapon?
14. Miscalculation and Myopia in Moscow: Understanding Russia’s Regime Change Folly
15. Putin the Gambler
16. The UN Is Another Casualty of Russia’s War
17. What is a no-fly zone? Why Ukraine wants one, and why NATO is refusing.
18. FDD | The New Nuclear Deal Would Allow Tehran to Access Up to $131 Billion of Its Foreign Assets
19. FDD | Treasury Targets Hezbollah’s West African Finance Network
20. Aligning U.S.-Israeli Cooperation on Technology Issues and China
21. Special Forces, Unprivileged Belligerency, and the War in the Shadows
22. FDD | Turkey Walks a Tightrope on Ukraine
1. WARNING UPDATE: RUSSIA MAY CONDUCT A CHEMICAL OR RADIOLOGICAL FALSE-FLAG ATTACK AS A PRETEXT FOR GREATER AGGRESSION AGAINST UKRAINE
WARNING UPDATE: RUSSIA MAY CONDUCT A CHEMICAL OR RADIOLOGICAL FALSE-FLAG ATTACK AS A PRETEXT FOR GREATER AGGRESSION AGAINST UKRAINE
By Katherine Lawlor with Kateryna Stepanenko
Key takeaway: The Kremlin has set informational conditions to blame Ukraine for a Russian-conducted or Russian-fabricated chemical or radiological false-flag attack against civilians as a pretext for further Russian escalation. The Kremlin is likely still evaluating this course of action but is building out the necessary conditions to justify broader violence against civilians. That risk must be addressed. The United States and NATO must “pre-bunk” such Kremlin efforts, destroy in advance Moscow’s efforts to create informational cover for escalation, and deter Russia’s potential use of a chemical or radiological weapon.
Recent Russian state media narratives have built upon a long-running Kremlin information operation to falsely claim that Ukraine, the United States, and NATO are plotting a chemical or radiological attack on Russia or Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory. Russia may conduct or fabricate such an attack and blame Ukraine and NATO to justify additional aggression against Ukraine.
The Kremlin may have initially intended its recent information operations to set conditions for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. That invasion plan likely included conducting a false-flag operation against Donbas civilians and blaming Ukrainian forces, thereby justifying further military action (if only to the Russian population and credulous global partners). However, US and allied intelligence services “pre-bunked” many planned Russian false-flag attacks intended to justify the invasion, declassifying US intelligence of the planned Russian operations and sharing it with the media.[1] Such intelligence sharing likely forced President Vladimir Putin to choose between delaying or canceling the invasion and conducting it without informational cover. He chose the latter.
The Kremlin previously used claims of US and Ukrainian exploitation of eastern Ukraine to set conditions for its 2014 invasion of Crimea and proxy invasion of eastern Ukraine. The Kremlin has long falsely claimed that the United States and NATO maintain a ring of chemical or bioweapon facilities in post-Soviet states and has previously falsely accused the United Kingdom of preparing to conduct chemical weapons attacks within Ukraine.[2]
Russian state-affiliated media has set conditions for a false-flag chemical weapons attack in eastern Ukraine since December 2021.
- Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu accused the United States of planning a chemical attack in Donbas at a Ministry of Defense collegium with Russian President Vladimir Putin on December 21, 2021.[3]
-
The Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics (DNR and LNR) falsely claimed on December 22 that the United States shipped botulinum toxin (a noncontagious biochemical agent) to Mariupol and Kharkiv and provided the antidote to Ukrainian forces.[4]
- Kremlin-sponsored media quoted a former Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) officer on December 24 stating that Ukrainian Armed Forces will use chemical weapons to attack schools, hospitals, and mass gatherings in then-Ukrainian-controlled eastern Ukraine.[5]
- Russian-backed DNR leader Denis Pushilin said on January 18 that the DNR is ready to respond to an expected Ukrainian chemical weapons provocation. Pushilin falsely alleged that Ukraine may accuse Russia or the DNR of a chemical attack in Donbas or on other Ukrainian territory to justify Ukrainian aggression.[6]
- Members of the Russian State Duma Committee on the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) discussed non-existent US biological laboratories near Russian borders with Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) Secretary General Stanislav Zas on January 20, 2022.[7]
- Russian Foreign Intelligence Service Director Sergey Naryshkin implied that the United States was preparing a false flag chemical attack in eastern Ukraine on February 10.[8]
- Russian Ministry of Defense Spokesperson Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov falsely claimed on March 6 that Russian forces discovered evidence of US-funded biological weapons research in Ukraine near the Russian border.[9] Konashenkov described evidence of anthrax, plague, cholera, and tularemia bioweapons.
- Russian Radiation, Chemical, and Biological Defense Chief Igor Kirillov falsely claimed on March 7 that US-funded Ukrainian laboratories in Lviv, Kharkiv, and Poltava were rapidly destroying “plague agents” to keep evidence of US-Ukrainian bioweapons research out of Russian hands.[10] Kirillov claimed that destroyed agents included plague, anthrax, brucellosis, diphtheria, salmonellosis, and dysentery. Kirillov falsely blamed alleged US bioweapons research for Ukraine’s high rates of measles and polio infections.
- Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Zhao Lijian claimed to Chinese media on March 8 that Russia had found labs that the United States uses to conduct bio-military plans. Zhao urged the United States to disclose information about what is stored and what research is being conducted in these alleged facilities. Zhao urged all relevant parties to ensure the safety of the labs. Russian state-run propaganda outlet RT English shared Zhao’s statements on March 8 and tied them into previous Russian claims, emphasizing the risk posed by alleged US bioweapons facilities in Ukraine.[11]
- Russian Ministry of Defense Spokesperson Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov told Russian media on March 9 that “Ukrainian nationalists” delivered 80 tons of ammonia to Zolochiv, a village northwest of Kharkiv. Konashenkov claimed that the Ukrainians taught villagers how to act in case of a chemical attack. Konashenkov warned that “nationalists” were preparing to conduct a “provocation using toxic substances to accuse Russia of allegedly using chemical weapons.”[12]
- Russian Permanent Representative to the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) Alexander Shulgin claimed on March 9 that Russia would send documents to the OPCW documenting Russian fears of an alleged Ukrainian chemical escalation.[13]
Putin and his allies have re-purposed their pre-existing “chemical attack” information operation and may now be using it to set conditions for an actual Russian false flag attack. In this scenario, Russian forces would conduct an attack employing dangerous chemicals, likely in eastern Ukraine, but possibly in Russian territory. Russia would immediately blame Ukrainian forces. Domestic Russian media, which is now mostly closed off from the international information space, would leverage this false flag to stoke domestic outrage and to establish a pretext for additional escalation in Ukraine.
Despite false Russian rhetoric surrounding Ukrainian bioweapons, ISW has no reason to assess that the Kremlin intends to conduct a biological attack. Russia is extremely unlikely to use a contagious bioweapon because of the inherent risks to its own forces and population. Russia could leverage its longstanding false claim of NATO bioweapons facilities in post-Soviet states to plan a Russian-caused “leak” of a non-contagious biochemical agent from a Russian-staged lab in Ukraine and blame the United States. ISW has not seen additional indicators of such preparations, though publicly observable indicators are likely limited.
There is extensive precedent for the Kremlin supporting chemical weapons attacks and accusing its adversaries of responsibility without suffering consequences. Conducting illegal chemical attacks against civilians and then blaming those attacks on opposition fighters has become a standard part of the Russian-backed Syrian regime’s playbook. Russian media usually presages such attacks by warning of US or opposition plans for chemical weapons attacks, thereby setting conditions to blame Russian adversaries when Russian-backed forces carry them out.[14] Russian media also often warns about chemical weapons attacks that do not occur, likely to stoke panic among civilians and international monitors and to establish a ”boy who cried wolf” effect. The United States rightfully argues that Russia bears ultimate responsibility for Syrian chemical weapons attacks against civilians and that Russia has failed in its responsibilities as a signatory of the Chemical Weapons Convention.
The Kremlin is complicit in the use of chemical weapons in Syria, but there is no evidence that Russia has directly carried out chemical weapons attacks there. However, the lack of major consequences imposed against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad by the international community for his illegal use of chemical weapons against Syrian civilians has eroded the international norm against the use of chemical weapons.[15] China’s parroting of Russia’s information operation likely also reassures the Kremlin that China would not oppose a false-flag chemical weapons attack in Ukraine.[16]
Russian state media has also set conditions for a false-flag radiological attack in eastern Ukraine or in Russia. The Kremlin could cause an intentional radiological disaster or use a radiological weapon of its own to falsely blame Ukraine for use of a “dirty bomb” or other radiological attack. A dirty bomb is not a nuclear weapon, but a radiological dispersion device that combines a conventional explosive with radioactive material. A traditional nuclear bomb could irradiate thousands of square miles. A dirty bomb could immediately irradiate no more than a few square miles, though radioactive material could be further dispersed if unintentionally carried by fleeing people. The purpose of using radiological material in a dirty bomb is to cause mass panic, not mass casualties—the conventional explosive is likely more immediately deadly than the radiation. Russian use of a dirty bomb combined with an effective information operation blaming Ukraine or NATO could help Putin justify increased demands on his own population to support the failing war effort as well as possible escalations against Ukraine. The Kremlin could also rely on this running narrative for damage control to reframe an unintentional radiological leak caused by Russian aggression, such as the shelling of a nuclear power facility.
- Kremlin-affiliated military commentator Alexei Leonkov claimed on February 16 that the United States would strike Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant to stage a provocation in Ukraine.[17] Russian forces attacked Zaporizhzhia on March 4 and caused a fire in the facility.[18] Russian media blamed Ukrainian forces for the attack on Zaporizhzhia.
- Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed in his February 24 pre-invasion speech that Ukraine was preparing for a nuclear attack against Russia.[19]
- State-run Russian media has since heavily covered alleged improvements in Ukrainian nuclear capabilities and research and development toward acquiring nuclear weapons.[20]
- Russian state-owned news agency Tass cited an anonymous “trusted” Russian government source who falsely claimed that Ukraine is “months” away from having a nuclear weapon in a March 6 article.[21]
- Putin warned on March 6 that Russia cannot allow the West to deploy nuclear weapons to Ukraine and threatened that such a deployment would delegitimize “Ukrainian statehood.”[22]
- Russian media falsely alleged on March 6 that Ukraine used the heavily irradiated Chernobyl exclusion zone to test nuclear weapons without detection and to create a radiological “dirty bomb.”[23] Russian media implied that Russian forces uncovered evidence of that capability after Russian forces began occupying the Chernobyl nuclear power plant on February 24 and the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant on March 4. Kremlin-sponsored news program Vesti Nedeli falsely claimed on March 6 that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky threatened NATO with a Ukrainian nuclear attack if NATO does not soon intervene on Kyiv’s behalf.[24]
- Russian Permanent Representative to the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) Alexander Shulgin claimed on March 9 that Ukraine planned a “provocation” at an experimental nuclear reactor in Kharkiv and that the Russian military prevented Ukrainian sabotage at the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant.[25]
The March 9 disconnection of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant could also be a Russian attempt to trigger nuclear panic over a potential radiological incident.[26] Attacks like the March 4 Russian attack on the Zaporizhia nuclear facility or the March 6 Russian shelling of a physics research facility containing a small nuclear reactor in Kharkiv could be Russian attempts to trigger such a radiological incident for which it could blame Ukraine.[27] The Kremlin would likely use such an incident to claim to the Russian public that Ukraine is a nuclear-armed or soon-to-be nuclear-armed national security threat that may require a more aggressive response. The Kremlin could also forgo a false-flag operation entirely and build on its already-established information operation to claim that Russia must conduct a more aggressive attack against Ukraine to deter Ukraine from a “planned” nuclear strike. Ukraine is a signatory of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and has no nuclear weapons capabilities. Ukraine joined that treaty and surrendered its entire nuclear stockpile to Russia per the Budapest Memorandum of 1994 (in which Russia, along with the United States and the United Kingdom, guaranteed the integrity of Ukraine’s territory at that time—a guarantee Russia violated in 2014).
The United States and NATO must continue to orient around deterring and pre-bunking Russian false-flag attacks. The United States and its allies demonstrated the ability to pre-bunk and prevent Russian false-flag operations prior to the Russian invasion of Ukraine but have less aggressively declassified and shared intelligence since the invasion began. The objective of earlier pre-bunking may have been to ensure that Western audiences did not believe Russian information operations to justify Russia’s invasion. That objective has been achieved. The United States and its allies should again aggressively leverage their superior intelligence to share information, this time to publicly reject Russian claims that Ukraine has any access to or intention to use chemical or radiological weapons. Such a Russian claim is less likely to gain traction in the current information environment, but aggressive US pre-bunking and deterrence efforts could still prevent Russian attempts to carry out a false-flag attack in the first place.
[11] www dot fmprc dot gov dot cn/mfa_eng/xwfw_665399/s2510_665401/2511_665403/202203/t20220309_10649938.html; https://news dot cgtn dot com/news/2022-03-08/China-urges-U-S-to-disclose-details-about-biolabs-in-Ukraine-18eA7VpwQRG/index.html; https://www dot rt dot com/russia/551468-china-details-pentagon-biolabs/
[16] www dot fmprc dot gov dot cn/mfa_eng/xwfw_665399/s2510_665401/2511_665403/202203/t20220309_10649938.html; https://news dot cgtn dot com/news/2022-03-08/China-urges-U-S-to-disclose-details-about-biolabs-in-Ukraine-18eA7VpwQRG/index.html; https://www dot rt dot com/russia/551468-china-details-pentagon-biolabs/
[22] https://iz dot ru/1301329/2022-03-05/putin-rasskazal-o-vozmozhnykh-posledstviiakh-razmeshcheniia-iadernogo-oruzhiia-na-ukraine
2. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, MARCH 9
RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, MARCH 9
Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, March 9
Fredrick W. Kagan, George Barros, and Kateryna Stepanenko
March 9, 3:00 PM EST
Russian operations to continue the encirclement of and assault on Kyiv have likely begun, although on a smaller scale and in a more ad hoc manner than ISW expected. The equivalent of a Russian reinforced brigade reportedly tried to advance toward Kyiv through its western outskirts and made little progress. Smaller operations continued slowly to consolidate and gradually to extend the encirclement to the southwest of the capital. Russian operations in the eastern approaches to Kyiv remain in a lull, likely because the Russians are focusing on securing the long lines of communication running to those outskirts from Russian bases around Sumy and Chernihiv in the face of skillful and determined Ukrainian harassment of those lines. The battle for Kyiv is likely to continue to be a drawn-out affair unless the Russians can launch a more concentrated and coherent attack than they have yet shown the ability to conduct.
The Russian military is clearly struggling to mobilize reserve manpower to offset losses and fill out new units. The Kremlin admitted that conscripts have been fighting in Ukraine (in violation of Russian law) for the first time on March 9, although in a customarily bizarre fashion: according to the Kremlin, Vladimir Putin himself discovered that conscripts were operating in Ukraine while he was reviewing a report on the conflict. The Kremlin says Russian military judicial authorities will reportedly open an investigation into this practice and punish those responsible.[1] Putin himself would, of course, ultimately be responsible for having issued the mobilization orders that sent conscripts to the front. Reports have also surfaced that students at medical and theater schools were being conscripted in late February, along with some denials of those reports.[2] Social media users also flagged the movement of Russian peacekeeping forces in the Nagorno-Karabakh region, speculating that they may be withdrawing to participate in the war in Ukraine.[3] ISW cannot independently verify any of these reports. Their general tenor, however, aligns with our published assessment that Russia faces challenges in generating a new wave of combat-effective reservists or recruits in a short period of time and our assessment that Russia will need such a wave to complete its objectives.[4]
Key Takeaways
- Russian forces have likely begun renewed offensive operations into Kyiv and to continue its encirclement on the west, but have not made much progress.
- Russian troops east of the Dnipro near Kyiv are likely attempting to consolidate their lines of communication against significant Ukrainian counter-attacks and disruption to set conditions for attacking the capital from the east.
- Russia is unlikely to attempt to seize Kharkiv through a ground offensive in the coming days, but will probably continue efforts to encircle and/or bypass it.
- Russian and Russian proxy forces in Donetsk and Luhansk are driving to gain control of the full territorial extent of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts, but have not yet done so.
- Mariupol remains encircled and under bombardment.
- Russian forces continue to prepare for operations against Zaporizhya City but have not yet initiated them at scale.
- Russian forces from Kherson appear to be encircling Mykolayiv from the east but have not yet crossed the Southern Bug River. Russian operations against Odesa are unlikely to commence before Russia establishes a secure line of control from Crimea across the Southern Bug.
Russian forces are engaged in four primary efforts at this time:
- Main effort—Kyiv (comprised of three subordinate supporting efforts);
- Supporting effort 1—Kharkiv;
- Supporting effort 1a—Luhansk Oblast;
- Supporting effort 2—Mariupol; and
- Supporting effort 3—Kherson and advances westward.
Main effort—Kyiv axis: Russian operations on the Kyiv axis are aimed at encircling the city from the northwest, west, east.
Russian forces have likely begun renewed offensive operations that ISW has been forecasting, but at a lower level of intensity and a smaller scale than we had anticipated. Individual Russian attacks at roughly regiment size reported on March 8 and March 9 may represent the scale of offensive operations Russian forces can likely conduct on this axis at any one time. The possibility of a larger and more coherent general attack either to encircle Kyiv or to assault it in the coming days remains possible, but the continued commitment of groups of two to five battalion tactical groups (BTGs) at a time makes such a large-scale general attack less likely.
Subordinate main effort along the west bank of the Dnipro
The Ukrainian General Staff reported on March 8 that up to five Russian BTGs attacked from near Babintsi toward Bucha, roughly 25 kilometers northwest of Kyiv, but were repulsed.[5] This area has been the site of frequent fighting for many days, and the former mayor or Irpin said on March 8 that the Russians controlled much of it. The Ukrainian General Staff report, if accurate, would be noteworthy because a Russian force the size of a reinforced regiment or brigade, presumably reconstituted and prepared after the operational pause and resupply efforts of the past several days, should have been able to make more progress. If the Ukrainian military is neither overstating the size of the Russian attacking force nor understating its success, then this incident would support the Ukrainian General Staff’s overarching assessment that Russian forces, especially around Kyiv, have lost much of their effective combat power and possibly will to fight.[6] ISW cannot independently verify the Ukrainian General Staff report at this time.
The Ukrainian General Staff also reported on March 8 that a total of four BTGs (two each from the 5th Separate Tank Brigade and the 37th Separate Motorized Rifle Brigade) advanced to Yasnohorodka, roughly 37 kilometers southwest of the center of Kyiv.[7] Yasnohorodka is between two areas to which ISW had already assessed Russian forces had advanced, although it is along a spoke road leading from Byshiv, which the Russians have likely already occupied, to Kyiv. This attack is likely part of an effort to consolidate Russian control of the southwestern approaches to Kyiv and set conditions for the concentration of Russian forces closer to the city from this direction.
The Ukrainian General Staff also noted that Russian forces appear to be readying to renew offensive operations toward Fastiv, a key road junction southwest of Kyiv and roughly 22 kilometers south of the forward-most Russian advance on this axis at Byshiv.[8] ISW has observed no indications that the Russians have initiated new operations toward Fastiv in the past 24 hours.
ISW has received no reports of renewed Russian offensive operations in the area of Ivankiv, and the Ukrainian General Staff explicitly reported on March 8 that the Russians had not conducted operations near Dymer.[9]
Subordinate supporting effort — Chernihiv axis
Russian forces have continued efforts to take Chernihiv town as well as to bypass it to the southeast and east. The Ukrainian General Staff reported on March 9 that elements of the 2nd Combined Arms Army, 41st Combined Arms Army, and 90th Tank Division are attempting to renew the offensive toward Chernihiv and Kyiv from the north, likely committing an additional reserve BTG of the 55th Motorized Rifle Brigade of the 41st CAA to this effort.[10] Ukrainian forces reported on March 9 that they continue to hold Chernihiv.[11]
Subordinate supporting effort — Sumy axis
Russian forces have continued efforts to consolidate control of their lines of communication to eastern Kyiv along the Sumy axis in the past 24 hours, as Ukrainian forces continue to contest them. Russian forces from the Chernihiv concentration may be operating on the east bank of the Desna south of Chernihiv in support of this effort. The Ukrainian General Staff reported on March 8 that Russian troops were moving pontoon bridging equipment in the vicinity of Kozelets, roughly 65 kilometers northeast of Kyiv.[12] The area around Kozelets is very wet, with several small rivers that likely necessitate the pontoon bridges, although it is possible that the Russians intend to use them to cross the Desna itself.
The Ukrainian General Staff reported fighting all along the Russian line of communication from near Sumy to Nizhyn and even further north toward Hlukhiv, which is nearly at the Russian border.[13] This continued fighting likely indicates that the Russians are struggling to consolidate control over this lengthy line of communication and that Ukrainian forces are actively contesting it. That phenomenon may partially explain the relative paucity of Russian activity reported in Kyiv’s eastern outskirts in the past 24 hours.
Supporting Effort #1—Kharkiv:
Russian forces continued to bombard Kharkiv but have not renewed attempts to take the city through ground assault on a large scale.[14] The Russians have likely diverted considerable combat power from Kharkiv to focus on capturing Sumy. The Ukrainian General Staff reported on March 9 that the Russians were concentrating aircraft to support possible airborne operations as part of larger preparations to attack Sumy.[15] Social media reports confirm that there has been considerable combat around Sumy.[16]
Russian forces, likely from the Kharkiv axis, also continued operations to the southeast. The Ukrainian General Staff reports that the Russians have continued efforts to seize Izyum, roughly 110 kilometers southeast of Kharkiv, and to cross the Northern Donets and Bereka Rivers.[17] Social media reports from March 9 confirmed Russian shelling at Balakliia, about halfway between Kharkiv and Izyum.[18]
Supporting Effort #1a—Luhansk Oblast:
The Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) claimed on March 8 that it now controls most of Luhansk Oblast.[19] The Russian Ministry of Defense claimed more modest gains for the LNR on March 9.[20] ISW has no independent confirmation of these claims.
Supporting Effort #2—Mariupol:
Russian forces continue to encircle and bombard Mariupol, resulting in the widely-reported destruction of a maternity hospital in the city. The military situation around Mariupol has not materially changed in the past 24 hours.
Supporting Effort #3—Kherson and west:
The Ukrainian General Staff assessed as of March 9 that as many as 17 Russian BTGs belonging to the 49th Combined Arms Army, 22nd Army Corps, 20th Motorized Rifle Division of the 8th Combined Arms Army, and airborne troops are assembled north of Crimea from Kherson to Rozivka, roughly 47 kilometers northwest of Mariupol.[21] The General Staff had previously suggested that this grouping of forces was preparing for an offensive in the direction of Zaporizhya, but it seems likely that only a portion of these Russian troops will participate in that advance.[22] Russian forces around Kherson appear concentrated on the drive toward Mykolayiv and ultimately west toward Odesa, although they could attempt to drive northeast toward Zaporizhya instead of Odesa. Initial limited Russian advances along the road from Mykolayiv toward Novyi Buh were small in scale and not very successful.[23]
Social media reports show considerable Russian force, possibly arriving reinforcements, in and around Kherson on March 9.[24] A Ukrainian General Staff report from March 9 that Russian servicemen dressed in civilian clothes are moving from Kherson toward Mykolayiv may indicate that those reinforcements are intended to take or bypass Mykolayiv.[25] Social media reports also show Russian forces bypassing Mykolayiv, possibly to encircle it at least on the east bank of the Dnipro.[26]
The Ukrainian General Staff continued on March 9 to warn that Russia might attempt to activate its forces illegally present in the Moldovan territory of Transnistria, although it noted that the morale and combat capability of those forces is likely very low.[27]
Immediate items to watch
- Russian forces may launch an attempt to encircle Kyiv from east and west and/or to seize the city center itself within the next 24-96 hours;
- Russian troops may drive on Zaporizhya city itself within the next 48-72 hours, likely attempting to block it from the east and set conditions for subsequent operations after Russian forces besieging Mariupol take that city;
- Russian forces may attempt amphibious landings anywhere along the Black Sea Coast from Odesa to the mouth of the Southern Bug in the next 24-48 hours.
[2] https://spb.tsargrad dot tv/news/v-vuzah-peterburga-oprovergli-dobrovolno-prinuditelnyj-prizyv-studentov-medikov_501180; https://newdaynews dot ru/ekaterinburg/751411.html; https://zona dot media/article/2022/03/02/draft; https://fedpress dot ru/news/78/society/2948033; https://ekb.sm dot news/studentov-ekaterinburgskogo-teatralnogo-instituta-prizyvayut-projti-sluzhbu-v-fsb-karelii-71358-u3t5/?utm_source=yxnews&utm_medium=desktop
[3] https://t dot me/caliber_az_official/5813
3. Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg says 'no two countries run by women would ever go to war'
Another McDonald's or "Golden Arches" theory. I guess we need to ensure women win all elections from now on.
Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg says 'no two countries run by women would ever go to war'
The Hill · by Maureen Breslin · March 9, 2022
Sheryl Sandberg, the chief operating officer (COO) of Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, said Tuesday that she believes “no two countries run by women would ever go to war” when speaking with CNBC’s Hadley Gamble on International Women's Day.
Sandberg's comments come amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The Meta COO said she also believes that if half the world were run by women, it would be “safer” and “much more prosperous,” according to CNBC.
She noted, however, that the pandemic has seen major setbacks for gender equality and women in the workforce.
There is a “complete crisis for gender equality,” Sandberg said, according to CNBC, adding that women’s roles in the workforce are “plummeting all over the world."
Sandberg also mentioned that she believes social media is "bad for dictators" when speaking with CNBC. "That’s why [Vladimir] Putin took us down," she added, referring to the Russian president's nixing of Facebook in his country during the widely condemned Ukraine war.
“When [Facebook and Instagram] go down in Russia, people are losing their ability to actually understand what’s happening," Sandberg said.
“We need to fight for access [and] make sure that social media exists so that people do get information from from all over the world, and that that information is valid and real," she said.
The Hill · by Maureen Breslin · March 9, 2022
4. Resistance Is in Our Blood: A Personal History of Ukraine
Read this so we do not ask dumb questions.
Excerpts:
This story should help us understand what a lot of people in the West now perceive as almost inconceivable: the brutality of Soviet (now Russian) tactics, and Ukrainian resistance against the enormous odds. Several days before the beginning of the war Putin is now waging, when the peace option had still been on the table, an Israeli colleague of mine asked if Ukrainians would resist. I was surprised that he would even ask. “Of course,” I responded, then thinking to myself: what other options do we have? Nolan Peterson, an American war veteran and journalist who has been living in Ukraine for the past several years, emphasizing repeatedly that Ukraine was not going to be another Afghanistan. After American withdrawal, Afghanistan fell back under the Taliban’s control. Peterson’s claims about Ukraine not becoming another Afghanistan were also somewhat surprising for me to hear. Why would we need to state the obvious? But what is obvious for many Ukrainians might not have been obvious for Western observers. I knew we would resist, with or without Western support or intervention.
My father, who is now almost 84 and has spent most of his life in L’viv in Western Ukraine, is refusing to leave home for shelters. He remembers war from his childhood. He has seen worse, and, objectively, things are not too bad in Western Ukraine. Occasional air sirens—but no shelling. The overcrowded L’viv quickly became a safe haven for many of those fleeing the Russian army from the east. Just over a week into the war, it is crystal clear, that Ukraine, indeed, will not become Afghanistan. And the fighting will go on. We all grew up during peace time, but trauma and resistance is part of our genetic code.
Resistance Is in Our Blood: A Personal History of Ukraine
“Lenin created Ukraine,” declared Putin in one of his speeches on February 23rd, 2022 causing outrage among intellectuals and historians in Ukraine and abroad. Putin is being humble here. He might as well have stated that he, personally, invented Ukraine. As he denies Ukraine’s existence, he emboldens true Ukrainians who are more conscious of the trauma and resistance from the past. Putin’s statements about artificial Ukraine, moreover, are not new. Nor is the history of Russian intervention into Ukrainian affairs. Even today, Russian liberals oppose the war with references to the history of Russian-Ukrainian friendship and the Russian legacy in Ukraine. But for many of us Ukrainians, this legacy has a very precarious meaning: the ruthless shelling of civilians, the destruction of hospitals, maternity wards, neonatal care units, daycare, and schools. We have paid an enormous human price for Russia’s claims of shared culture and legacy. And we want none of it.
This is, of course, not the first time, we are left to deal with this “legacy.” Over the past century, it has manifested itself in immense tragedies that cost us millions of Ukrainian lives. Between three and five million people died in Ukraine between 1932 and 1933 as the result of an artificial famine, a lot of them spending the last months or weeks of their lives in sheer agony, feeding on grass, soil, and frogs. In utter desperation, some turned to cannibalism. Many who died were young children. This tragedy remains largely unknown in the Western political and intellectual discourse, which has focused mainly on Hitler and his crimes.
A starvation victim appears in this documentary photograph displayed at an exhibition in Kyiv, dedicated to Holodomor, the great Ukrainian famine of early 1930s. (Photo ITAR-TASS / Vladimir Sindeyev)
The famine was a by-product of Russian-Soviet inheritance in Eastern Ukraine. Most of Eastern Ukraine had been part of the Russian Empire before 1918—what Putin, and many others in Russian intellectual and political circles claimed as belonging to the larger Russian speaking space. While the history of this belonging has always been complicated, the 20th century was particularly tragic for the Ukrainians who after 1922 found themselves under Soviet rule.
“It is important to study Russian imperial history so that we understand that what came next was so much worse”—one professor at Yale insisted during my graduate student years. The Soviet Union was, indeed, much worse than its imperial predecessor. The most severe consequences affected not ethnic Russians but other nationalities—primarily, the Soviet West, and Ukraine, in particular. Repressions against national minorities in the Soviet Union were more brutal than against ethnic Russians. Cross border ties between Ukrainians in the Soviet Union and Poland were a concern for Stalin, who suspected Soviet Ukrainians of disloyalty. These suspicions, confirmed by recent research, were founded. With the assistance of its European counterparts, Poland’s intelligence services targeted Ukrainians inside the Soviet Union in an attempt to destroy the Soviet Union from within. When Stalin struck back, he did so with unprecedented brutality that resulted in the death of millions of Ukrainian civilians.
The year 1929 marked a new beginning in Stalinist policies at home and abroad. As part of the so-called “Great Turn,” Stalin ordered the complete collectivization of agriculture and set up quotas for grain requisition. The grain, ironically, would later be sold to the West for profit. Ukraine was the Soviet and European granary, and it was affected most by the new policies. The bad weather and the drought in 1932 resulted in poor agricultural performance, and grain requisitions were well below the targeted quotas. Stalin blamed nationalist resistance. It was the nationalists, he believed, who brainwashed the peasants, forcing them into acts of defiance. He dispatched security forces to Ukraine to “facilitate” requisitions. By the early spring of 1933, Soviet security forces went house to house in Ukrainian villages removing any traces of agricultural produce as well as stock they could find to the point that nothing was left. The inhuman horrors of the famine in Soviet Ukraine never quite made into 20th-century European historical narratives. We would later learn about Russian losses and Russian sufferings during WWII, even though that war also severely affected life in Ukraine as well as Belarus. As Timothy Snyder has brought to our attention, over and over again, Ukraine was part of the Bloodlands—a territory in which millions upon millions of non-combatants were mass-murdered during WWII by both Nazi Germany and Soviet Russian forces.
I generally dislike the narrative of victimhood and suffering—even though my and many of my friends’ parents in Ukraine enforced it on us from early age. But numbers matter, and history might help us understand the present. As Ukrainians died of starvation and later perished in the war, ethnic Russians moved in to take their space.
Eastern Ukraine had been subjected to Russification since the pre-1918 imperial period, but it took new forms under the Soviet Union. These included the massive loss of Ukrainian populations in the 1930s and the 1940s as a result of the famine and repressions during the war, all while Russification grew stronger. Russian became the language of the elites, while Ukrainian persisted largely in the country-side. Over the decades, however, the boundaries between Russians and Ukrainians in the East became looser.
The traumas of the 1930s and the 1940s may seem to be a distant past, irrelevant to the present. But Putin and the war that started in Ukraine in 2014 shook this balance. At that time, a lot of those who grew up speaking Russian started switching to Ukrainian and identifying themselves in sharp opposition to everything Russian.
I myself grew up in Western Ukraine, which joined the Soviet sphere of influence only in 1939. My father, who was born in Poland in 1938 but raised in Soviet Ukraine—as a result of the forceful population resettlement between Poland and Soviet Union in 1944—used to walk five miles to school each way through what was essentially an active war zone. He was born in Eastern Poland, a year before the beginning of the war. In September of 1939, as a result of the Soviet-Germany (Molotov-Ribbentrop) pact, Germany occupied Western Poland, and later the same month, the Soviet Union took the East. The war took a turn in 1941, the Nazi advancing into Soviet occupied Poland and later into the Soviet Union proper, via Belarus. By 1944, the Soviets had cleared most of Poland (and Eastern Europe) of the German forces. My father’s family found themselves on the Polish side of what would now become the new Polish-Soviet border. In 1944, their house was set on fire. My grandparents and their three young children, having lost everything but their lives, were forced to move East. Ethnic Poles from what now became Western Ukraine would move to Poland. And ethnic Ukrainians from Eastern Poland would now find themselves in Western Ukraine, part of the Soviet Union. This forceful population exchange, one of many taking place in Europe post-war, defined the history of the Soviet Union not just during the immediate post-1945 years but into the 1990s.
Western Ukraine became Soviet as a result of the Soviet-Germany non-aggression treaty in 1939 and Soviet aggression into Eastern Poland. The war for my family thus started in 1939, much earlier than it did for most Europeans, and it came to an end only in 1949, much later than it did for most Europeans. When the Soviets were finalizing their control of Western Ukraine, the Ukrainians refused to give up fighting over the territories that they considered as their own. In Western Ukraine, the partisan warfare between Ukrainians and the regular Soviets continued intermittently through to 1949. This is a story of defiance against all odds that is largely unknown in Western political and intellectual discourses. I was raised on the memories of tragedies and resistance. Just like nearly everyone else around me, I learn Russian not because I wanted to but because I had no choice. I became a Soviet pioneer not because I wanted to but because I had no choice. My and my peers’ parents, in the meantime, offered us many other choices at home. My father’s sizable library at home had a large collection of Ukrainian classics—all of them in Ukrainian. The only Russian titles I remember from childhood are university-level textbooks in chemistry and civil engineering—my parent’s specialties.
This story should help us understand what a lot of people in the West now perceive as almost inconceivable: the brutality of Soviet (now Russian) tactics, and Ukrainian resistance against the enormous odds. Several days before the beginning of the war Putin is now waging, when the peace option had still been on the table, an Israeli colleague of mine asked if Ukrainians would resist. I was surprised that he would even ask. “Of course,” I responded, then thinking to myself: what other options do we have? Nolan Peterson, an American war veteran and journalist who has been living in Ukraine for the past several years, emphasizing repeatedly that Ukraine was not going to be another Afghanistan. After American withdrawal, Afghanistan fell back under the Taliban’s control. Peterson’s claims about Ukraine not becoming another Afghanistan were also somewhat surprising for me to hear. Why would we need to state the obvious? But what is obvious for many Ukrainians might not have been obvious for Western observers. I knew we would resist, with or without Western support or intervention.
My father, who is now almost 84 and has spent most of his life in L’viv in Western Ukraine, is refusing to leave home for shelters. He remembers war from his childhood. He has seen worse, and, objectively, things are not too bad in Western Ukraine. Occasional air sirens—but no shelling. The overcrowded L’viv quickly became a safe haven for many of those fleeing the Russian army from the east. Just over a week into the war, it is crystal clear, that Ukraine, indeed, will not become Afghanistan. And the fighting will go on. We all grew up during peace time, but trauma and resistance is part of our genetic code.
5. Volodymyr Zelenskiy has used mythmaking to turn public opinion in Ukraine’s favor
Excerpts:
G: Have you seen this kind of successful propaganda effort in other conflicts with Russia?
SR: One comparison I would make is with the Russian invasion of Georgia in 2008. There, there was a very similar situation in which Russia invaded a sovereign country on its border and put in minimal effort into shaping the narrative to suit its purposes. Whereas the president of Georgia — also a young, handsome, Western-leaning, English-speaking president — was extremely effective at shaping the narrative in Georgia’s favor. He gave lots of interviews to the international press. Social media was not a very big part of that war. But from the very beginning, Georgia managed to shape the war to fit their version of events.
Subsequently, a lot of analysts thought that Russia understood how it failed in its media operations in that war and got a sense for how social media works, and what kind of messages are more likely to resonate around the world, especially in Europe and the U.S. And in 2014, with its more recent invasion of Ukraine, it did a better job of kind of muddying the waters about what was happening there. There was not a lot of bloodshed or violence. And Russia, I think, managed to persuade a lot of people that what it did wasn’t really that bad. So, I think one reason a lot of people are surprised now is that we had a sense that Russia had figured out its media strategy and was prepared to implement a similar campaign this time around. And it’s really striking how ham-fisted they’ve been.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has used mythmaking to turn public opinion in Ukraine’s favor
The Russian invasion of Ukraine is a literal war, but it is also a conflict playing out through the manipulation of information. For years, the Kremlin promoted a false narrative of the Ukrainian government committing genocidal atrocities in eastern Ukraine against ethnic Russians.
Mythmaking from Ukraine is something different. Since the Russians invaded Feb. 24, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has emerged as a savvy commander of information warfare. The comedian-turned-politician has leveraged both social and traditional media to swing the balance of Western public opinion staunchly in his favor.
“I can’t think of a precedent of this magnitude, a true wartime president, who is also extremely conversant in social media, and who was not just an avid social media user before his election, but was, of course, an actor,” said Emerson T. Brooking, a resident senior fellow at the Digital Forensic Research Lab of the Atlantic Council and co-author of “LikeWar: The Weaponization of Social Media.” “He is uniquely suited to capture and sustain a certain attention in this moment.”
Zelenskiy has come to be viewed in stark contrast to Russian President Vladimir Putin. Once understood to be a master of disinformation, Putin’s propaganda efforts related to his invasion of Ukraine have been chaotic at best and often outright incompetent.
“The Kremlin prioritized selling this war to its own population, and, I think, made minimal and halfhearted efforts to try to sell its story about the war to the rest of the world,” said Scott Radnitz, a professor of Russian and Eurasian Studies at the University of Washington where he researches protests, authoritarianism and identity in the post-Soviet region. “To the extent that the Kremlin has made the same arguments to international audiences, it falls flat.”
Grid spoke with Brooking and Radnitz, both experts on disinformation in the region to understand Russian and Ukrainian propaganda efforts underway and the figure of Zelenskiy as unlikely wartime leader.
The following interviews were conducted separately and have been edited for length and clarity.
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Grid: What kind of pro-Ukrainian propaganda are you seeing? How are average news consumers involved in its spread?
Emerson T. Brooking: I would divide this between Ukrainian primary sources and then the broader ecosystem of the West, which is a mixture of people passionately supporting Ukraine, and then war spectators, who have often taken things from these primary Ukrainian sources, and amplified or added additional mythology atop them, before there’s really an opportunity to contextualize the claims.
In the lead up to the invasion, one could have a very good sense of military movements on most fronts, because of the volume of TikToks and other open-source footage [showing] the fact that these army groups were going to staging areas. But even in our hyper-connected age, there aren’t people livestreaming, in most cases, fighting in real time. Little snippets of video are uploaded later, but they’re often decontextualized. So even in the 21st-century information environment, the fog of war doesn’t go away.
Attention comes with a half-life. The Ukrainians have so far benefited from Western attention. But as time goes on and the realities of war set in, the fact that this is likely to be a grinding and potentially inconclusive conflict that will go on for months or maybe years — I think large parts of the audience will begin to tune out. And there might even be a counter reaction where some people might wonder why this moment drove such attention in the first place. There’s often a sort of backlash that follows any great sort of coming together online.
G: What do you make of the figure of Zelenskiy himself and the way that he has become an object of so much admiration and near-mythology?
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Scott Radnitz: He’s depicting himself through what he says, how he dresses and the way he has engaged with the world through social media, as the leader of a resistance. He’s no longer wearing suits like he used to. Now he’s wearing olive green T-shirts. He looks like a guerrilla leader. He’s making these videos on his iPhone, presumably, from underground bunkers … and speaking like a wartime resistance leader. He’s tapping into the sympathy that people have for Ukraine, but also reimagining himself as a heroic resistance leader rather than simply a statesman.
He’s a performer, he’s an actor. He understands the media. He understands how to shape images and narratives. The style that he’s taken up … is not completely new to him. He campaigned for the presidency in 2019 in similar ways: speaking to the voting public directly through social media, using hand-held iPhones in an amateurish kind of way. It was a wildly successful campaign because he showed himself stylistically to be unlike any other Ukrainian political figure people had ever seen. He used ordinary language, he made jokes. He showed himself to be a regular person.
ETB: I can’t think of a precedent of this magnitude, a true wartime president, who is also extremely conversant in social media, and who was not just an avid social media user before his election, but was, of course, an actor. So he is uniquely suited to capture and sustain a certain attention in this moment. Given how much Ukraine is dependent on Western aid and Western action, he’s the perfect person for this role.
He is still a wartime president, and he’s still a head of state with many competing factions in it. … There was an announcement on the Facebook page of a Ukrainian special forces branch a few days ago that they were going to stop taking any prisoners of artillery men and were going to shoot them on sight. These things should be condemned, but they happen in war.
G: Who is Zelenskiy’s audience?
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SR: He’s speaking to world leaders and their citizens, who he hopes will put pressure on their leaders to support Ukraine, financially and militarily.
He’s also, of course, speaking to his own citizens. He’s a rallying point for people who are hiding out in metro stations and barricading themselves against bombs. In wartime, people have always looked to a leader who can rally them, who can be inspirational. And that’s why we mythologize some of the greatest wartime leaders in modern times. Winston Churchill, for example. Charles de Gaulle, leading the French Resistance. This is the kind of charismatic figure that, whether deliberately or not, I think it’s fair to compare him to.
And then a third audience, although I’m sure this is not his primary concern, is to reach Russians themselves. … But the challenge in general is for Russians to get any good information that comes from outside the country, because they’re being fed propaganda on state TV.
It’s important to his rise as a political figure that he comes from a Russian-speaking part of the country … and speaks Ukrainian fluently. His ability to communicate in both languages and to people who identify more as one or the other was critical in helping him win a broad coalition and win the presidency with 73 percent of the vote.
ETB: I think the attention from the West those first few days was instrumental in galvanizing policymakers to expel Russia from the global economic system. Prior to invasion, the U.S. was trying to put some contingency plans in place. But there was a real sea change. The fact that anyone involved in these discussions could see cruise missiles raining down on Kyiv, and the emotional appeals of President Zelenskiy … was like flipping the switch in how it changed international policymaker perspective. And that’s why we saw this extremely rapid series of steps, which most people would have told you was unthinkable just a few days prior.
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G: Has the Ukrainian propaganda effort been successful?
ETB: I think it’s indirect. Because Ukrainian messaging, the first priority has been bolstering the morale of the Ukrainian people. But then, second, and also very important, has been messaging to the West. And that helped drive the Western response. I think the Western response was so fast that it did give Putin pause.
But much more significant than the Western response is Russian military failure. I think that Putin’s reinvention of his demands is attributable almost entirely to Russian military failure and inability to seize Kyiv on the unrealistic schedule that the Russians were going on.
One can’t disentangle that from the effects of Ukrainian messaging. But at the end of the day, I think Putin is driven by hard military realities. I think if Russia had made the sort of progress that Putin expected, all of Zelenskiy’s emotional and heartfelt messaging, Zelenskiy’s Russian-language appeals to the Russian people — Putin wouldn’t have cared about any of that.
SR: As in any conflict, people should be skeptical of what information governments report. Because in any conflict, including this one, governments are going to want to minimize the number of soldiers killed on their side and exaggerate the number of civilians killed on their side, while saying the opposite about the other side.
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In this instance, the Kremlin prioritized selling this war to its own population, and, I think, made minimal and halfhearted efforts to try to sell its story about the war to the rest of the world. The way that the Kremlin has justified this conflict is so far at odds with reality that it’s almost laughable. And to the extent that the Kremlin has made the same arguments to international audiences, it falls flat. This might be because the decision for launching this war was maybe closely held, and Russia’s media propagandists didn’t have enough time to get together and craft a long-term strategy about how to try to sell the war. If it was Putin’s plan all along, and he was more focused on conquering Ukraine and subduing it than generating good buzz about it, then maybe he simply didn’t care about what the rest of the world thought.
G: Have you seen this kind of successful propaganda effort in other conflicts with Russia?
SR: One comparison I would make is with the Russian invasion of Georgia in 2008. There, there was a very similar situation in which Russia invaded a sovereign country on its border and put in minimal effort into shaping the narrative to suit its purposes. Whereas the president of Georgia — also a young, handsome, Western-leaning, English-speaking president — was extremely effective at shaping the narrative in Georgia’s favor. He gave lots of interviews to the international press. Social media was not a very big part of that war. But from the very beginning, Georgia managed to shape the war to fit their version of events.
Subsequently, a lot of analysts thought that Russia understood how it failed in its media operations in that war and got a sense for how social media works, and what kind of messages are more likely to resonate around the world, especially in Europe and the U.S. And in 2014, with its more recent invasion of Ukraine, it did a better job of kind of muddying the waters about what was happening there. There was not a lot of bloodshed or violence. And Russia, I think, managed to persuade a lot of people that what it did wasn’t really that bad. So, I think one reason a lot of people are surprised now is that we had a sense that Russia had figured out its media strategy and was prepared to implement a similar campaign this time around. And it’s really striking how ham-fisted they’ve been.
6. The New Great Game
Excerpts:
Government mandates on things like electric cars essentially hand China a dominant position in the future of ground transportation. China also retains a near-monopoly on the EV battery supply chain, which includes control of 80 percent of the world's raw material refining, 77 percent of the world's cell capacity, and 60 percent of the world's component manufacturing. China produces four times more batteries than the second-place United States, and controls critical raw materials, including large concentrations of rare earths, lithium, copper, and cobalt. The United States actually possesses some of these minerals, but environmental opposition makes it unlikely they will be developed, at least during the Biden years. China and Russia have moved rapidly to secure those they happen to possess but others can be procured from emerging vassal states in Africa and Central Asia as well as Latin America.
All this supports China’s stated aim of dominating the supply chains and becoming the leading global superpower by 2050—a frightening prospect but one at least more coherent than Western governments’ vague dreams of “building back better” or of an anti-growth “reset.” An industrial revival in the West will be difficult without reliable energy like natural gas and nuclear—unreliable alternatives like solar and wind have to be backed by other sources when the sun does not shine and the wind does not blow.
...
It would certainly help if the Western defense establishment were to refocus on the challenges posed by the duopoly. Sadly, if a bizarre tweet by the head of MI6 is any indication, much of it remains preoccupied by green absolutism and gay rights. Militaries in the US and Europe worry about fighting climate change and rooting out white nationalism, when their time would be better spent improving their dubious war-fighting abilities. China, meanwhile, is building the world’s largest naval fleet—not to be a “force for good,” as the Obama-era Navy crowed, but to extend its influence in the eastern Pacific, and then to Africa and beyond.
Sadly, it’s difficult to identify Western leaders who might provide the liberal democratic world with some backbone. There is no one who resembles Churchill, Roosevelt, Truman, or even Reagan. The chaotic Trump presidency is gone, replaced by a bland and weak-looking Biden, who even the Guardian thinks may be compromised by his family’s connections. The reaction of Biden’s climate tsar John Kerry to the Russian invasion was classic: he was concerned, he said, by its “massive emissions consequences.” Maybe he didn’t consider the reductions from weak economic growth and the deaths of thousands of emissions-producing soldiers and civilians.
Ultimately, the West may have to choose between the current climate agenda and the hegemony of the authoritarians. The best hope now is that Putin’s aggression will cause the West to wake up, reindustrialize, and find a workable energy policy. We need robust policies, and political leaders who can play chess with Xi or Putin, or whoever the next ruler of the Russian state will be. The autocrats are already playing the Great Game and if we don’t learn to play as well, we will lose.
The New Great Game
Russia’s invasion of the Ukraine will be remembered as one of the great crimes of the 21st century. The ensuing humanitarian crisis has already caused more than two million refugees to flee their homeland. With the imposition of sanctions, policymakers will have to weigh their political options as a rise in energy prices may trigger food shortages in the coming European fall, and lead to an even worse catastrophe in Africa and other developing countries. Under such circumstances, it’s easy to see the current war in Ukraine in Manichean terms. But once the conflict ends or devolves into a guerrilla war, national identity, geopolitics, and economics, not abstract principle, will drive events.
We are returning to something resembling the “Great Game” of the 19th century, which saw Britain and Tsarist Russia struggle over the resources of central Asia, while others in Europe—France, Germany, Belgium—strove to expand their empires into commodity-rich Africa. Following a lull after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Great Game has now been renewed, with the US and China now occupying critical roles. The humiliating retreat of the US from Afghanistan, a country central to the old Game, has emboldened China and Russia to win the new one. The players have changed and today’s Great Game sets the stage for a new conflict—the “duopoly” of Russia and China, with their associated allies like Iran and Venezuela, against America and the democratic West.
This conflict will not necessarily be military, and while Russia and China are the keystones of the duopoly, they will play distinct roles. Russia remains a highly militarized nation, whose oil- and gas-driven economy provides its government with roughly 40 percent of its revenue. China, on the other hand, has been using Russia’s oil, and that of allied states like Iran, to build the world’s most formidable industrial economy. China has the financial wherewithal to provide the embattled Russian economy with ballast, including an alternative credit card system to replace that of the West.
Excluding Russia from the Western-dominated economy has pushed the two autocratic giants together, and Russia is now getting Chinese funds to finance its crucial resource sector. What makes Russia attractive and even bankable for the Chinese is not ideology, but energy. Despite dreams of global kumbaya, we are closer to parallels with the last world war than many suspect. “Petroleum products,” wrote the American geographer C.F. Jones in 1943, “are the blood of battles that bring victory.” Energy helped set the stage for the current invasion, as Putin’s resources pay for his chosen instruments of terror. Europe, argues human rights activist Garry Kasparov, essentially gave Putin the “green light” to invade. When Russia invaded Ukraine, so did Germany and “the Netherlands, Italy, France, Great Britain,” all of whom have funded Russia’s “war machine for the past decade.” The missiles hitting Kharkov and strafing Kyiv were, after all, paid for by the West.
If the West understood how to restrain Putin, it would have immediately banned Russian oil, a decision Biden took only reluctantly and under much pressure. Europe says it will get around to cutting consumption by next winter. So, the United States—a country on the verge of becoming the world’s largest gas exporter and self-sufficient in oil—has been forced to beg autocracies in Saudi Arabia and UAE and even Venezuela to bail out America’s angry motorist. So far even this indecent kowtowing is being rebuffed. An opportunity to show American strength and European resolve has collapsed under the weight of energy realities.
Chart by Bloomberg
Tragically, the injuries caused by vulnerability to Russian energy exports are largely self-inflicted—the result of a fantastical approach to reducing carbon emissions. The attempt to force “net zero” emissions on a tight deadline, and to do so absent development of the natural gas and nuclear production needed to make the transition without devastating economic consequences, certainly contributed to Russia’s vast cash buildup prior to the war. The West, including the oil- and gas-rich United States, has looked to Russia as a source of temporary supply in pursuit of the nirvana of fossil-fuel-free existence.
A ruthless dictator like Putin knows a bunch of “useful idiots” when he sees them. Russian interests have reportedly financed anti-fracking activities for years. But he doesn’t need to use surreptitious methods when Western powers have demonstrated such a remarkable lack of seriousness. As Mike Shellenberger has put it: “While we banned plastic straws, Russia drilled and doubled nuclear energy production.” Putin, Shellenberger argues, understands his national interest: Russia produces three times as much oil as it can use domestically and twice the amount of gas or coal it needs. It supplies about 20 percent of Europe’s oil, 40 percent of its gas, and 20 percent of its coal. The most critical case may be Germany, Europe’s dominant economy, whose ballyhooed Energiewende sought to abandon nuclear power and coal at the same time. Not only has the cost of living in Germany gone up, but the country has increased its dependence on Russian gas.
It’s not just green activists and politicians driving the current energy disaster. ESG stakeholder capitalism has created a lack of investment in fossil fuels, even as soaring demand for “rare earths” looks set to create a series of environmental disasters. In 2022, gas storage in Europe has fallen to a dangerous level below 50 percent capacity and the standoff with Russia has caused European gas prices to spike. Even if American LNG gas replaces Russian supply, the changeover will take months. In this sense, we are repeating history as a sad farce. As in the 1930s, Western appeasers have held the door open for Russian expansionism. A deluded West failed to take steps to contain Russia following the 2014 Crimean annexation, instead cutting back on lethal weapons for Ukraine and refusing to sanction the Nordstream 2 pipeline, and Putin responded to the perception of weakness as bullies always do.
Putin is not alone in following the Westphalian energy model, which prioritizes national sovereignty over the demands of global capital or international institutions. China also benefits from the rapid de-carbonizing of the West, pumping money into Western green funds, despite its own continuing heavy coal investment at home. The Chinese know that, for at least the medium-term, fossil fuels will remain critical to their economic growth. After all, fossil fuels still account for 81 percent of all energy supplies, and even if every country meets its respective climate promises, they will still account for roughly three-quarters in 2040.
Russia is already China’s second largest source of oil (after Saudi Arabia), and has just signed a 30-year deal for massive new Russian gas pipelines, and purchased other commodities like coal, barley, and wheat from them. China now accounts for 18.6 percent of Russia’s exports. Buying oil and gas and burning coal is fine in a country that does not care about the scolding of environmentalists and that has no plans to reduce its emissions until 2030. Developing countries like India have even longer timelines. India is likely to emerge as the third world power after China and the United States, and it also depends on Russia for 49 percent of its armaments.
The West’s green agenda—which objects to nuclear and natural gas as well as dirtier fuels—tilts the competitive edge to China. Even before the invasion of Ukraine, the unreliable and expensive reality of “renewable” energy was already accelerating the de-industrialization of the United Kingdom and other parts of the EU. The current energy shortage is causing factories in Europe to close, and short of a concerted attempt to revive manufacturing, high energy prices are likely to hasten the shift to less regulated places like India and China, which are by far the world’s largest emitters of carbon dioxide. By the time China, India, and other developing countries feel able to embrace lower emissions by turning to nuclear power, the self-driven de-industrialization of the West will likely be all but complete, with even once-great industrial powers permanently ensnared in China’s notoriously high-carbon supply chains.
Like Russia, China can thank the ESG movement for all this, led by the likes of financial firms like Blackrock, which insist that developments meet their “net zero” obsessions. Wall Street’s dual standards represent an effective embrace of China’s hegemony by hamstringing Western industry while expanding business with the world’s dominant polluter and autocracy par excellence. So far, more palatable options—increasing remote work, geothermal energy, production of natural gas, nuclear power, and new technologies—are not on the woke corporate agenda.
Government mandates on things like electric cars essentially hand China a dominant position in the future of ground transportation. China also retains a near-monopoly on the EV battery supply chain, which includes control of 80 percent of the world's raw material refining, 77 percent of the world's cell capacity, and 60 percent of the world's component manufacturing. China produces four times more batteries than the second-place United States, and controls critical raw materials, including large concentrations of rare earths, lithium, copper, and cobalt. The United States actually possesses some of these minerals, but environmental opposition makes it unlikely they will be developed, at least during the Biden years. China and Russia have moved rapidly to secure those they happen to possess but others can be procured from emerging vassal states in Africa and Central Asia as well as Latin America.
All this supports China’s stated aim of dominating the supply chains and becoming the leading global superpower by 2050—a frightening prospect but one at least more coherent than Western governments’ vague dreams of “building back better” or of an anti-growth “reset.” An industrial revival in the West will be difficult without reliable energy like natural gas and nuclear—unreliable alternatives like solar and wind have to be backed by other sources when the sun does not shine and the wind does not blow.
So, what will the world look like after the invasion—not tomorrow but in the decade ahead? The past is certainly instructive. The axioms of the neoliberal order are rapidly being replaced by something closer to the law of the jungle. In this world, increasingly naked self-interest will prevail over moral agendas. Europe and America may call this a war for democracy, but the world’s largest democracy, India, has been circumspect on the issue, and Israel, which needs Russia to control its unruly neighbor Syria, has been reluctant to join the anti-Putin cause.
Just as revealing is that many African countries which are highly dependent on China have failed to join the condemnation of the invasion. Whether somewhat democratic or mostly despotic, they are unlikely to give up what the duopoly offers them in terms of resources, financial power, or goods for the sake of being right. High gas prices are already crippling economies across sub-Saharan Africa. Food is also a major concern for developing countries, and Russia plays a big role here as well, producing roughly a fifth of the world’s wheat exports. Unsurprisingly, Africa was split by the UN resolution condemning Russian aggression—Senegal, South Africa, and Namibia abstained, while traditional US trading partners like Botswana, Kenya, and Nigeria voted in favor.
For the West, this is a critical time. One can celebrate European solidarity, including on the traditionally pacifist Left, against Putin. Germany’s move to finally boost its defense spending, and shift its energy policy away from Russian dependence certainly marks a welcome starting point. This includes the gambit of reclassifying nuclear and natural gas as “green fuels.” But such progress could be limited. As we saw after the Crimean invasion in 2014, European will tends to be fragile when it comes to self-interest, and the push to “net zero,” although perhaps temporarily delayed by the invasion, is so dear to the hearts of Western progressives and their corporate allies that it will likely resurface as soon as the war reaches its endgame.
It would certainly help if the Western defense establishment were to refocus on the challenges posed by the duopoly. Sadly, if a bizarre tweet by the head of MI6 is any indication, much of it remains preoccupied by green absolutism and gay rights. Militaries in the US and Europe worry about fighting climate change and rooting out white nationalism, when their time would be better spent improving their dubious war-fighting abilities. China, meanwhile, is building the world’s largest naval fleet—not to be a “force for good,” as the Obama-era Navy crowed, but to extend its influence in the eastern Pacific, and then to Africa and beyond.
Sadly, it’s difficult to identify Western leaders who might provide the liberal democratic world with some backbone. There is no one who resembles Churchill, Roosevelt, Truman, or even Reagan. The chaotic Trump presidency is gone, replaced by a bland and weak-looking Biden, who even the Guardian thinks may be compromised by his family’s connections. The reaction of Biden’s climate tsar John Kerry to the Russian invasion was classic: he was concerned, he said, by its “massive emissions consequences.” Maybe he didn’t consider the reductions from weak economic growth and the deaths of thousands of emissions-producing soldiers and civilians.
Ultimately, the West may have to choose between the current climate agenda and the hegemony of the authoritarians. The best hope now is that Putin’s aggression will cause the West to wake up, reindustrialize, and find a workable energy policy. We need robust policies, and political leaders who can play chess with Xi or Putin, or whoever the next ruler of the Russian state will be. The autocrats are already playing the Great Game and if we don’t learn to play as well, we will lose.
7. Opinion | Why the US should think twice about arming a Ukrainian insurgency
Although I strongly disagree with what I think is the author's intent (to cut away the Ukrainian people and the country) he does provide useful analysis that should be understood and considered. If the Ukrainians are willing to fight and sacrifice for their freedom I believe we should help them while acknowledging and trying to mitigate the difficulties.
This article provides a useful template for those officials who will have to explain our actions in Ukraine. I am sure it will generate questions from Congressional oversight committees.
Opinion | Why the US should think twice about arming a Ukrainian insurgency
The U.S. needs to think long and hard before plunging into what would be a long, bloody proxy war against Moscow.
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Nearly two weeks into the war in Ukraine, the Russian military remains on the outskirts of the country’s major cities. Despite an impressive Ukrainian resistance, there is an acknowledgment in Washington that Ukraine is unlikely to hold out over the long term. The Biden administration is discussing options for a Ukrainian government-in-exile in the event President Volodymyr Zelensky is killed, captured, or forced to flee Kyiv. Washington is also debating whether to arm a budding Ukrainian insurgency against Russian occupation.
The Biden administration, however, needs to think long and hard before plunging into what would be a long, bloody proxy war against Moscow. An unemotional, clear-headed analysis of the costs and benefits is in order.
The benefits of supporting a Ukrainian insurgency are easy to acknowledge. For one, there is something righteous about helping the Ukrainians defend themselves against an aggressor. The U.S. and its NATO allies are already supporting Kyiv with significant shipments of weapons and ammunition. Around 17,000 anti-tank weapons have been delivered to Ukrainian forces in less than a week. Keeping those supplies going after a hypothetical Russian military victory would merely be a continuation of the current policy.
A U.S.-armed insurgency would tie the Russian military down in a long, highly costly stalemate. Russian troops would likely have difficulty sealing off Ukraine’s western border when the bulk of their forces are occupied with preserving order in a country of over 40 million people. Frustrating Russia’s objectives in Ukraine would force Russian President Vladimir Putin to devote ever more resources to the conflict, sapping Moscow’s military strength and draining an already limited Russian economy.
The costs of insurgent warfare, however, should not be overlooked.
First, there is an asymmetry of interests among the parties. The geopolitical alignment of Ukraine is, frankly put, far more important to Russia than it is to the U.S. and the West. Big powers don’t tolerate adversarial neighbors, and to the Kremlin, Ukraine drifting firmly into the Western orbit is a red line the Russians are prepared to prevent with all means at their disposal. Some have even referred to a pro-Western Ukraine as an existential security threat to Russia. Any country willing to sacrifice its own economy is willing to go to extraordinary lengths to preserve a favorable balance of power.
Second, insurgencies take a significant amount of time to work (if they work at all). Assuming Washington makes the decision to support an anti-Russia insurgency in Ukraine, it would have to sustain operations for years, if not decades. It took twenty years for the Taliban to succeed in their own insurgency and over 25 years for Sri Lanka to defeat the Tamil Tigers. With each passing year comes more death and destruction to Ukraine itself.
Third, insurgencies are extremely painful for the civilian population — and the longer they go on, the worse they are in terms of casualties and damage. The ten-year insurgency against Soviet forces in Afghanistan is often held up as a golden example of a successful insurgency. Yet this success came at a very high price to the Afghan people. Soviet forces, frustrated by the resistance, resorted to carpet bombing entire Afghan villages to frighten the population into submission. In one such bombing campaign in 1983, thousands of civilians were killed after fifty Soviet planes used airpower to level the western city of Herat. By the time the war was over, Afghanistan was a broken country with no prospects; half of its agricultural sector was destroyed, a third of the country’s villages were demolished, and at least a million Afghans were killed. Is the U.S. willing to run the same outcome in Ukraine as Russia escalates its use of force to even higher levels in response to the influx of U.S. weapons?
Fourth and finally, there is a significant risk of an insurgency in Ukraine pushing the war beyond Ukraine’s borders.
In order for the U.S. to supply Ukrainian fighters, Washington would have to use countries like Romania and Poland as staging areas. Without a safe haven in a neighboring country, an anti-Russia insurgency simply isn’t viable.
Russia, however, is likely to respond by interdicting those supply lines. This would hardly be novel in counterinsurgency warfare. During the Vietnam War, the U.S. bombed Vietcong safe-havens and transportation nodes in Cambodia and Laos to limit the number of men and equipment reaching the front. The U.S. repeatedly targeted Taliban fighters in next-door Pakistan, often through the use of armed drones. It would be dangerous and reckless to assume the Russian military wouldn’t conduct similar cross-border military operations to disrupt a Ukrainian insurgency. The only difference: disrupting those operations in Romania and Poland would risk a direct Russia-NATO conflict.
As Russia consolidates its position in Ukraine, bogging Russian forces into a taxing quagmire may seem like a low-cost option. But the enemy gets a vote. And there’s a good chance Russia will vote for more escalation, not less.
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Daniel R. DePetris is a fellow at Defense Priorities and a foreign affairs columnist at Newsweek.
8. Budget deal would fully fund Defense Department, add $13.6 billion in Ukraine aid
Budget deal would fully fund Defense Department, add $13.6 billion in Ukraine aid
Now they have to pass it.
House and Senate appropriators worked late into the night on the $1.5 trillion measure, which includes $728.5 billion in military spending for the year. That’s a 5.6 percent boost over fiscal 2021 funding levels, and above what President Joe Biden had requested in his federal spending plan.
But Democratic leaders said the budget also includes an even larger boost (6.7 percent) for non-defense spending and represents a needed balancing of spending priorities for the government.
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The White House has asked for $270 billion in VA spending for the current fiscal year. Without the planned increases, “I can’t rule out impacts on individual veterans’ lives,” said Veterans Affairs Secretary Denis McDonough.
In a statement, House Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., said the compromise plan “responsibly addresses our national security with funding for a robust mix of diplomacy, defense, and global development.”
If lawmakers can finalize the deal in the next few days, they’ll both stave off a partial government shutdown (current agency funding is set to run out on March 11) and provide budget stability for the rest of fiscal 2022, which runs through Sept. 30.
In recent months, Defense Department leaders have been forced to move money between various accounts to offset funding shortfalls caused by short-term budget extensions passed by Congress. The current fiscal year began on Oct. 1, meaning federal agencies have been operating without a permanent budget deal for nearly six months.
The latest budget breakthrough will require lawmakers to pass one more short-term budget extension — through March 15 — to give lawmakers time to finalize the larger, year-long deal. Chamber leaders said they’ll work on that over the next few days.
Ukraine aid
In addition to the base budget, lawmakers added $13.6 billion to the budget package to provide additional aid and assistance to Ukraine and NATO countries alarmed by Russia’s aggression in eastern Europe over the last few weeks.
Ukrainian leaders have pressed for additional military and humanitarian aid to combat the full-scale Russian invasion of their country which began on Feb. 24. Since then, thousands of Russian troops, Ukrainian military members and Ukrainian civilians have been killed in the fighting.
Congress plans to divide the emergency funding among several agencies. About $6.5 billion will go to the Department of Defense, with more than half of that total set aside to restore military stocks of equipment already transferred to Ukraine.
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The White House has formally asked Congress for $32.5 billion pandemic relief and “critical assistance” to help Ukraine fight off a Russian invasion, with $4.8 billion for the Pentagon, as part of an updated supplemental spending request.
About $3.1 billion will cover “deployment, operational, and intelligence costs” for U.S. forces deployed to Europe in response to the Russian actions. Nearly 15,000 American service members have been deployed to the region in support of NATO allies in recent weeks, but none have been sent into Ukraine itself.
The bill also funds the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative — used to help train and equip the Ukrainian military — at $300 million.
The State Department will receive about $4 billion for “the rapidly expanding humanitarian crisis in Ukraine.” Officials say more than 12 million people in the region are in need of food, shelter, and other basic necessities because of shortages caused by the fighting.
Another $650 million would be provided for military support and “an expansion of existing authorities to bolster the defense capabilities of the Ukrainian military and regional allies.”
Other money would be set aside to enforce sanctions against Russia for the military assault and for economic assistance for Ukraine and other European allies.
Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said the plan “provides critical assistance to Ukraine and our NATO allies at a time when they need it the most.” DeLauro echoed that sentiment, saying American lawmakers must react to “Russia’s unprovoked war of aggression” against its neighbor.
Defense funding
The military spending totals in the budget compromise bill include funding for the 2.7 percent military pay raise that went into effect on January 1 and enough personnel support for an end strength of 1.34 million troops, slightly below the fiscal 2021 total.
Lawmakers also included $278 million in housing assistance for military families facing rental cost increases and other housing issues caused by ongoing coronavirus pandemic, and $686 million to deal with the continuing water contamination issue linked to the Red Hill Bulk Fuel Storage Facility in Hawaii.
About $1.4 billion would be set aside for “Countering China and investing in the Indo-Pacific,” to include new missile tracking efforts in the region and establishing new defense monitoring stations in Hawaii and Guam.
For the Navy, lawmakers agreed to $26.7 billion for 13 Naval vessels, including two VIrginia-Class submarines, two DDG- 51 Arleigh Burke Class destroyers, one Constellation-Class frigate, one expeditionary sea base, two fast transports (including one medical variant), two oilers, two tugs, and one surveillance ship.
Navy and Marine aircraft procurement accounts rose more than $1 billon above Biden’s request, for 12 more F/A-18E/F Hornets, two more CH-53K King Stallions, four added MV-22 Ospreys and two more MQ-4 Tritons.
The Navy’s Shipyard Infrastructure Optimization Plan won more than $500 million above Biden’s request, largely split between industrial equipment and facility renovations.
For the Air Force, appropriators highlighted $1.8 billion to buy 16 C-130J aircraft to modernize two Air National Guard operational wings. They added eight UH-N1 replacement aircraft and four MQ-9s among other moves.
For the Army, appropriators added about $500 million for Army aircraft, chiefly to add more UH-60 Blackhawks, CH-47 Chinooks and Grey Eagle drones. They also added more than $300 million for Stryker and Abrams upgrades.
The bill’s security assistance funding included a sought-after $1 billion for Israel to replenish the Iron Dome missile defense system, used earlier this year to counter rockets fired at the Jewish State from Gaza.
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The House passed legislation overwhelmingly to provide $1 billion to Israel to restock its Iron Dome short-range missile defense system just days after Democrats removed the funding from a broad stopgap spending bill.
In addition to the Ukraine aid, the new defense budget plan also contains more money for other security cooperation programs, including $165 million for coordination with African nations, $500 million to support Iraqi security forces, and $300 million for work with Eastern European partners “facing Russian aggression.”
Veterans Affairs funding
Under the compromise budget, the Department of Veterans Affairs would see nearly $270 billion in available spending this fiscal year, the largest budget in agency history.
In fiscal 2001, the VA budget totaled about $45 billion. By fiscal 2011, it was about $125 billion, almost triple that total. Ten years later, in 2021, the department’s budget was nearly double that again, at $245 billion.
The new funding plan would invest more money in mental health care initiatives ($13.2 billion, up 28 percent from fiscal 2021), efforts to prevent veterans homelessness ($2.2 billion, up 12 percent) and women’s health care programs ($840 million, up 14 percent).
The plan also calls for $1.4 billion in spending for VA’s caregiver support programs, up about 14 percent from last year. The program is scheduled to undergo a major expansion this fall, potentially adding tens of thousands more veterans.
Lawmakers also allotted more money for major and minor construction projects (up 23 percent and 40 percent, respectively), but the roughly $2.1 billion in total spending for those accounts still falls short of what advocates say is needed to update the department’s aging infrastructure.
Both chambers were expected to begin debate on the budget plans on Wednesday. The White House has already signaled support for getting the compromise finalized as soon as possible.
“The bipartisan funding bill is proof that both parties can come together to deliver for the American people and advance critical national priorities,” Shalanda Young, acting director of the Office of Management and Budget, said in a statement.
“It will mean historic levels of assistance for the Ukrainian people … I urge Congress to send this critical legislation to the president’s desk for signature without delay.”
Leo covers Congress, Veterans Affairs and the White House for Military Times. He has covered Washington, D.C. since 2004, focusing on military personnel and veterans policies. His work has earned numerous honors, including a 2009 Polk award, a 2010 National Headliner Award, the IAVA Leadership in Journalism award and the VFW News Media award.
Joe Gould is senior Pentagon reporter for Defense News, covering the intersection of national security policy, politics and the defense industry.
9. Biden’s Ukraine aid package is getting super-sized by Congress
Biden’s Ukraine aid package is getting super-sized by Congress
WASHINGTON ― Lawmakers on Wednesday unveiled a $13.6 billion Ukraine aid package that took President Joe Biden’s request for weapons and training for Ukrainian forces and put it on steroids.
Part of a sweeping $1.5 trillion measure to fund the federal government, the $13.6 billion package would buy $3 billion in new weapons for Ukraine, instead of the $1.5 billion in new weapons included in Biden’s $10 billion request. It’s a win for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who pleaded with U.S. lawmakers in a Zoom call Saturday for more support as his country fights a Russian invasion.
“We are all deeply moved — we can’t stay away from the TV and watching what is happening in Ukraine,” House Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., said in a statement. “This bill responds to Russia’s unprovoked ... invasion of Ukraine with $13.6 billion in emergency assistance to support the people of Ukraine and their neighbors.”
With the West unifying behind Ukraine’s fight, the White House’s initial $6.4 billion ask on Feb. 25, the second day of the war, grew with pressure from lawmakers to a $10 billion request on March 3. After lawmakers met virtually with Zelensky on Saturday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Monday the aid would exceed $12 billion.
The next day, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., hailed Schumer for “working in good faith to accommodate my request that the funding bill significantly increase the security assistance drawdown fund available to the president and to backfill our DoD stockpiles that are helping our friends in harm’s way.”
By that time, a growing sense of urgency had gripped Capitol Hill.
“In the briefings we were getting before this started, we were hearing it would be a matter of days, Kyiv’s going to fall,” said one House Republican aide who was not authorized to speak on the record. “The Russians obviously thought that, and we kind of did too, and I think with the bravery of the Ukrainian people, that they’re fighting and the resilience they’re showing, it’s really inspiring folks.”
At the McAleese and Associates conference Wednesday, Pentagon Comptroller Mike McCord expressed gratitude to Congress for augmenting the package. Congress’s “big move” was to increase Biden’s presidential drawdown authority to send weapons from U.S. military stocks to Ukraine.
“The thing that increased the Ukraine supplemental from the $10 billion that was asked for to the [$13.6 billion] we got was really in” presidential drawdown authority, he said, calling it a “very hopeful sign” of broad bipartisan support.
Beyond funding military aid for Ukraine and NATO allies and the U.S. military’s ongoing troop deployments, there’s billions more for federal agencies to provide economic and humanitarian aid and enforce stiff sanctions on Russia.
More broadly, defense-related spending in the omnibus bill would rise by $42 billion over last year’s level of $782 billion. And Republicans succeeded in making sure the Ukraine package did not eat into the Pentagon’s share of the omnibus.
The Ukraine package, “provides critically needed emergency assistance for our allies that are resisting Russian aggression in Ukraine without decreasing base defense funding by a single dollar,” Appropriations Committee Vice Chairman Richard Shelby, R-Ala., said in a statement.
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The Pentagon is considering whether to add U.S. troops in Eastern European NATO members on a long-term basis in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a senior Pentagon official told lawmakers Tuesday.
The aid package contains $3.5 billion for weapons and training for Ukraine through flexible Pentagon operations and maintenance funds. The account can last through FY24 and be used to backfill stocks of U.S. equipment and training provided to Ukraine (some of which was already sent), provided the Pentagon notifies Congress at least 30 days before, the bill language says.
According to Todd Harrison, director of defense budget analysis and of the Aerospace Security Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the abnormal amount of discretion Congress would approve speaks to the unpredictability of the crisis.
“They’re not putting tight limits on it, and DoD will have to report back on how it’s being used, but it’s a really broad authority,” Harrison said. “It shouldn’t be surprising because it’s impossible to know what the U.S. is going to need to transfer to Ukraine and then what of these things that we transfer do we have to restock.”
Oversight provisions require the Pentagon and State Department to submit a report on U.S. and foreign assistance to Ukraine and plans to replenish U.S. and NATO stocks sent to Ukraine ― as well as a classified report describing Ukraine’s security needs and formal requests for aid.
The U.S. has already committed $1 billion in security assistance to Ukraine over the last year. Since September, that’s included Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, Javelin anti-tank missiles, grenade launchers, and more than 2,000 tons of ammunition including mortar and artillery rounds, small arms and machine guns, DoD officials say.
The $13.6 billion package includes $650 million to build up the forces of Ukraine and Eastern European NATO countries through the State Department’s foreign military financing program. The idea is that some of those countries, which have sent U.S.-supplied weapons to Ukraine, would be able to use the funding to replace them.
It also authorizes $4 billion in loan guarantees, as a means to help NATO allies replace their Russian-made military equipment.
Other funds would cover Pentagon costs since the U.S. activated some 14,000 troops in support of NATO countries, spread from Estonia to Romania. America’s F-35 joint strike fighters, AH-64 Apache helicopters, KC-135 Stratotankers and RC-135 Rivet Joint surveillance aircraft have also been deployed as part of the deterrence effort.
Along these lines, package met the White House’s request for more than $2 billion in operations and maintenance costs, and $200 million in personnel costs, which have both been largely been borne by the Army.
Lawmakers also met the White House’s request, in procurement accounts, for military cybersecurity and weapon systems upgrades, mostly in the Air Force, totaling about $228 million. More than $100 million in research and development funding corresponded with a White House request for “artificial intelligence-algorithm development, cybersecurity, and other information technology requirements,” to include classified programs.
The funding’s not only a sign the U.S. military’s cyberspace operators are at work, but to Harrison, a sign the budgeting process’s spending categories are obsolete in the computer age.
“A example of the ridiculousness of it is that you are funding activities to support ongoing conflict, ongoing operations, and you need to put it in the same accounts as funding for basic research going on at a university lab,” he said.
The military personnel and operations-and-maintenance funding lines would expire Sept. 30, the end of the current fiscal year, while some procurement funding runs through FY24 and other research, development test and evaluation funding runs through FY23.
Joe Gould is senior Pentagon reporter for Defense News, covering the intersection of national security policy, politics and the defense industry.
10. In search of a just war: Why American veterans are answering a call to serve in Ukraine
It is what Americans do.
Excerpts:
But many veterans may see helping the Ukrainians as aiding the right side in a just war, where the differences between Ukraine and Russia are as stark as good vs. evil.
“My sense is that Russia’s unprovoked invasion and its explicit targeting of civilians are such stark moral contrasts to Ukraine struggling to defend itself and chart its future that people in free societies feel incredibly good about helping Ukraine,” said Kori Schake, a respected defense expert with the conservative American Enterprise Institute think tank in Washington. “As Reagan said: ‘There is a profound moral difference between the use of force for liberation and the use of force for conquest.’ Russia and Ukraine are illustrating that difference for us all to see.”
In search of a just war: Why American veterans are answering a call to serve in Ukraine
"I signed up to go overseas and serve my country, not drill for four years."
BY JEFF SCHOGOL | PUBLISHED MAR 9, 2022 8:19 AM
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For one active-duty Marine infantryman who is just weeks away from leaving the Corps, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is an act of naked aggression so egregious that he has been inspired to risk his life for people in mortal danger even though he’s never once set foot on Ukrainian soil.
“I joined the Marine Corps to help innocent people and fight for freedom and I was raised that if someone needs help or is in danger you do whatever it takes to help and save them, even if it means your life,” said the Marine, whom we shall refer to as “Mike.”
He said he hopes to use the medical training that he received in the Marine Corps as well as his firearms skills as part of a nonprofit group that provides medical support and security for Ukrainian troops and civilians who have been wounded by the Russians.
Even though he serves in the infantry rifleman military occupational specialty – the Marine Corps’ largest community, which saw extensive combat in Iraq and Afghanistan – Mike has spent his entire military career in garrison. Now, suddenly he has a chance to save people’s lives and protect them from harm.
“I signed up to go overseas and serve my country, not drill for four years,” he said. “I was raised that freedom was everyone’s right and that right should be defended with every fiber of one’s being.”
Ruslan from the Territorial Defense shows where a bullet came through his jacket as he gets medical help for a wound received during shelling near Irpin on March 6, 2022 in Kyiv, Ukraine. (Photo by Anastasia Vlasova/Getty Images)
It is impossible to get reliable information on how many American veterans are planning to go to Ukraine or are already on the ground to serve as medics or even fight against the Russians. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy recently announced the creation of the International Legion of Territorial Defense for foreigners with military experience or medical training who want to support the Ukrainian military.
While a Ukrainian government official has told Voice of America that 3,000 Americans have volunteered to serve in the unit, Ukraine is also conducting a ferocious information war to undermine Russian morale and solicit more assistance from the United States and other NATO allies. That means truth – often the first casualty of war – is becoming increasingly hard to divine amid competing Ukrainian and Russian propaganda.
What is clear, however, is that American veterans are gravitating towards a war that their country is officially not part of. Even though the United States is providing Ukrainians with anti-tank weapons and other arms, President Joe Biden has repeatedly said that no U.S. troops will deploy to Ukraine to fight the Russians.
U.S. government officials are telling veterans and other Americans not to travel to Ukraine because it is too dangerous. “If you’re an American, and you want to do right by Ukraine, the best thing you can do is find a way to donate to so many agencies that are trying to deal with what is now clearly a humanitarian crisis in the region, certainly there in Ukraine,” Pentagon spokesman John Kirby told reporters on Monday.
Children who fled the war in Ukraine rests inside a temporary refugee shelter that was an abandoned TESCO supermarket after being transported from the Polish Ukrainian border on March 8, 2022 in Przemysl, Poland. Over one million people have arrived in Poland from Ukraine since the Russian invasion of February 24, and while many are now living with relatives who live and work in Poland, others are journeying onward to other countries in Europe. (Photo by Omar Marques/Getty Images)
But many veterans may see helping the Ukrainians as aiding the right side in a just war, where the differences between Ukraine and Russia are as stark as good vs. evil.
“My sense is that Russia’s unprovoked invasion and its explicit targeting of civilians are such stark moral contrasts to Ukraine struggling to defend itself and chart its future that people in free societies feel incredibly good about helping Ukraine,” said Kori Schake, a respected defense expert with the conservative American Enterprise Institute think tank in Washington. “As Reagan said: ‘There is a profound moral difference between the use of force for liberation and the use of force for conquest.’ Russia and Ukraine are illustrating that difference for us all to see.”
One Marine veteran told Task & Purpose that he has spent the past two weeks emailing Ukraine’s health ministry and the country’s embassy in Washington, D.C., as part of his ongoing attempts to volunteer to serve as a medic inside the war-torn country.
A woman walks by apartment building damaged after shelling the day before in Ukraine’s second-biggest city of Kharkiv on March 8, 2022. – The number of people fleeing the war flooding across Ukraine’s borders to escape towns devastated by shelling and air strikes passed two million, in Europe’s fastest-growing refugee crisis since World War II, according to the United Nations. (Photo by Sergey Bobok/AFP via Getty Images)
“I’m mainly trying to go along with what the people who have done this before are advising: ‘Don’t self-deploy, wait for groups on the ground to get situated, etc.,’” said the Marine, identified by Task & Purpose as “Gerald” for security reasons. “It’s easy to become a resource drain as opposed to an asset.”
A former Marine officer, Gerald said he initially looked at joining Ukraine’s international legion, but he noticed that many of the people who claimed on Reddit that they had applied to the unit did not have military experience and “seemed like they maybe hadn’t thought through the decision very well.”
Gerald also said that he was concerned that the U.S. government may penalize Americans who volunteer to fight for Ukraine.
He later discovered on Reddit that the Ukrainians are looking for people to provide medical assistance. That would be a perfect fit for him because he could apply the combat lifesaving and tactical combat casualty care skills that he learned in the Marine Corps, and he previously volunteered to serve with an ambulance crew.
Gerald said he was still in the Marine Corps when Americans went to the Middle East to join Kurdish groups fighting against the Islamic State group, so he was not able to go at the time. He now faces a situation where there is no way to tune out the carnage in Ukraine.
“It’s the first time I’ve done something like this,” Gerald said. “I work in operations for a company at the moment and have been struggling to focus on work while Putin brutalizes Ukraine. The amount of information available from on the ground – footage or reports from different journalists – is too much to ignore.”
Are you a U.S. military veteran in Ukraine now or are you headed there? Share your story with reporter Jeff Schogol on WhatsApp or Signal at 703-909-6488.
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Jeff Schogol is the senior Pentagon reporter for Task & Purpose. He has covered the military for 15 years. You can email him at schogol@taskandpurpose.com, direct message @JeffSchogol on Twitter, or reach him on WhatsApp and Signal at 703-909-6488. Contact the author here.
11. Zelensky, having rallied world leaders, shames them for not joining the fight
He owns the moral high ground.
Zelensky, having rallied world leaders, shames them for not joining the fight
The Washington Post · by Shane Harris, Ashley Parker and John Hudson Today at 7:41 p.m. EST · March 10, 2022
As Russia’s assault on Ukraine enters its second week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has shifted from rallying world leaders — who have levied historic economic and financial sanctions against Russia — to shaming them for not doing more to hasten the war’s end.
On Wednesday, Zelensky shared with his 5.1 million Twitter followers video of what Ukrainian officials said was the aftermath of a Russian military strike on a maternity hospital in Mariupol.
“People, children are under the wreckage. Atrocity!” Zelensky wrote. “How much longer will the world be an accomplice ignoring terror? Close the sky right now!” he demanded, repeating his call for Western nations to enforce a no-fly zone over Ukraine. The United States and other NATO members have refused, saying that would risk putting them in direct conflict with Russia and igniting a wider war.
“Stop the killings!” Zelensky demanded. “You have power but you seem to be losing humanity.”
The actor-turned-president now finds himself playing to two audiences. First, there are the besieged citizens of Ukraine, whom the president has rallied into a makeshift civil defense force, crafting molotov cocktails and barricading city streets in anticipation of tens of thousands of Russian troops.
But the second audience, fellow world leaders, has resisted Zelensky’s demands for direct military intervention. Despite his newfound global influence and personal rapport with President Biden, who has spoken to Zelensky a dozen times since taking office in January 2021, U.S. and European leaders remain cautiously on the sidelines, prepared to ship antitank and antiaircraft weapons to Ukraine’s military but not to step much further into the conflict by sending fighter jets, which Zelensky has pleaded for this week.
“Together we must return courage to some Western leaders, so that they do what they had to do on the first day of the invasion: Either close the Ukrainian sky from Russian missiles and bombs or give us fighter jets so we do everything ourselves,” Zelensky said Wednesday.
Zelensky blasted the White House for not helping Ukraine obtain MiG-29 fighter planes that the Polish government offered to send to a U.S. air base in Germany. The United States has said flying the jets from a NATO country to attack Russian forces risked pulling the alliance into a war. Moscow has warned that any country hosting Ukraine’s military aircraft would be considered a party to the armed conflict.
Poland’s proposal appeared intended to shift the responsibility for delivering the aircraft — and risking a potential Russian military retaliation — to the United States. As a result, the Pentagon said the plan was not “tenable.”
Zelensky has evinced little patience for such caution and portrayed the refusal as a diplomatic game that puts Ukraine’s existence at risk.
“This is not ping-pong! This is about human lives!” he said in a video statement Wednesday ahead of Vice President Harris’s visit to Poland. “We ask once again: Solve it faster. Do not shift the responsibility. Send us planes.”
In an address Tuesday to the British Parliament, Zelensky, wearing what has become his trademark military-green T-shirt, vowed, “We will fight in the forests, in the fields, on the shores, in the streets.” The deliberate Churchillian tones resonated with lawmakers, who gave him a standing ovation.
But after Zelensky repeated his calls for the no-fly zone, Prime Minister Boris Johnson promised only that sanctions on Russia, as well as humanitarian and military aid, would continue from Britain “until Ukraine is free.”
Speaking to reporters in Washington on Wednesday, British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss tried to put the planes issue to rest. “The best way to defend” Ukraine, she said, is “with antitank weapons and anti-air weapons.”
Still unclear is exactly why NATO members think handing lethal weapons to Ukrainian forces to kill Russian soldiers is a step short of giving Ukrainian pilots the planes to bomb them.
The telegenic and combative qualities that made Zelensky an unexpected symbol of resistance have also been a source of discomfort for Western leaders.
During a news conference Wednesday, reporters raised Zelensky’s remarks about the fighters with Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who attempted to sympathize with the Ukrainian president’s position and explain Washington’s concerns.
“If I were in President Zelensky’s position, I’m sure I would be asking for everything possible … to help the Ukrainian people,” said Blinken, who added that allies were still trying to work out a solution. But the U.S. position remains unchanged.
Zelensky riveted the world’s attention in the early days of the Russian invasion when he appeared on the streets of Kyiv, along with top members of his administration, declaring they would remain in the capital, even as a massive Russian convoy bore down on them and the city’s 3 million residents. His ubiquitous pronouncements and presence on social media have “definitely had an influence on public opinion” far beyond Ukraine’s borders, said Jacques Pitteloud, the Swiss ambassador to the United States. His country has supported sanctions against Russia despite its long-standing tradition of neutrality.
“There is no question that public opinion and the sympathies of public opinion in Switzerland were influenced by the very successful projection of a certain image,” Pitteloud said, while noting the Swiss government’s interest in defending international law, which benefits smaller countries.
Still, there are limits to what Zelensky’s public browbeating can achieve.
Pitteloud said he sympathized with Zelensky because Ukraine’s weapons stocks “are being depleted” but also understood NATO’s reluctance to start a war.
No one could accuse Zelensky of failing to persuade the West for lack of trying. He has spoken with Biden five times since Feb. 24, the day Russia invaded, according to White House records.
Zelensky irritated some senior Biden administration officials when he downplayed the likelihood of a Russian invasion and accused Washington and London of stirring public panic with their repeated warnings about an imminent attack.
But Zelensky and Biden have forged a rapport that seems to have weathered those early tensions. A senior Biden administration official recounted how in one of their early phone calls Zelensky impressed Biden and his team by referencing a 2015 speech then-Vice President Biden had delivered to Ukraine’s parliament, the Rada, on rooting out corruption.
Zelensky’s hat tip to that speech “demonstrated the level of preparation [he] was doing for these calls,” said the official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the private conversation. “It was great to see Zelensky quoting back Biden’s own speech. It demonstrated to me not just Biden’s history there, but also that Zelensky was preparing for this meeting, that he was really taking it seriously.”
Zelensky’s close aides said that they are not surprised by his candor and that at the same time as he pleads with the world for help, he blames it for enabling his country’s invaders.
“If there’s hypocrisy that needs to be pointed out, he points it out,” said Igor Novikov, a former adviser.
Zelensky was a TV celebrity before he became one of recent history’s more improbable leaders. But that background serves him, Novikov said.
“He’s from the showbiz background,” he said. “The people who are from showbiz are equipped with this really interesting sixth sense, an instinct that tells you what people think and what people like. There comes that moment when you feel them and they feel you and you’re on the same wavelength.”
Even if he can’t persuade NATO to give him jets, Zelensky has arguably done more to unite the United States and Europe against Russia than many leaders in recent memory, leading some observers to compare him to history’s most redoubtable Cold Warriors.
“You can make some comparison to Ronald Reagan, I think,” said Heather Conley, the president of the German Marshall Fund of the United States. “This is where the actor understands the moment, understands the messages that need to be delivered in that moment. You can absolutely credit him and his constant outreach to world leaders, and of course the incredible courage of the Ukrainian people. It is changing policy.”
Conley said that in previous conflicts, including when Russia invaded Georgia in 2008 and Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014, “the Russians really owned the information space, masterfully owned it, and it could not be any more different with President Zelensky.”
“It is authentic,” she said. “We are watching the largest land war in Europe since the Second World War. We are watching it in real time. We are watching in on our phones. We are hearing from friends, family, loved ones who are living it in their basements.”
There’s one offer from U.S. officials that Zelensky has not embraced: helping him leave Kyiv or resettle his administration in a safe location and begin a government-in-exile. He flatly refused, a theme of defiance that has become the Zelensky signature.
The Washington Post · by Shane Harris, Ashley Parker and John Hudson Today at 7:41 p.m. EST · March 10, 2022
12. Russian military vehicles are flying Soviet hammer and sickle flags in Ukraine
Is this what Putin's war is all about?
Russian military vehicles are flying Soviet hammer and sickle flags in Ukraine
"A majority of Russians continue to say the collapse of the Soviet Union has been a bad thing for their country."
BY DAVID ROZA | PUBLISHED MAR 9, 2022 6:01 PM
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The past seems to be present as new footage posted to social media appears to show a Russian armored personnel carrier flying the red banner of the Soviet Union during the invasion of Ukraine.
The minute-long video, attributed to Russia’s Ministry of Defense, shows a column of tanks, armored personnel carriers, mobile missile launchers, and jeeps moving on a rural road in Ukraine. One BMP-2, an infantry fighting vehicle, seen early in the clip flies the scarlet red banner of the Soviet Union, the continent-spanning state that collapsed under political and economic unrest in 1991 and gave way to the modern-day Russian Federation.
— Rob Lee (@RALee85) March 9, 2022
Another photo shared on Twitter also appears to show a Russian tank flying the Soviet flag in Ukraine.
Згори на танку припиздячиний гриль, на грилі вороняче гніздо, з гнізда на патикові стирчить червона шмата. Захист від джавеліна 80lvl. Я хуїю з цих уєбанів! pic.twitter.com/dL25IxNlro
— Мурзік Васильович (@r2d2251) March 9, 2022
Though the Soviet Union is known in the U.S. for its harsh authoritarian regime, human rights violations, and poor economic conditions, there is a wave of nostalgia among many Russians for the global power of the old empire.
“A majority of Russians continue to say the collapse of the Soviet Union has been a bad thing for their country,” wrote the Pew Research Center in a 2017 analysis.
Some of that nostalgia may stem from “current frustration over social policy and economic hardship,” wrote the BBC in 2019. The BBC interviewed sociologist Karina Pipiya, who found that the nostalgia extended not only towards the Soviet Union but also to one of its most infamous leaders, Joseph Stalin.
“Stalin is seen as the main figure who defeated fascism, who gets the honors for victory in the Great Patriotic War,” Pipiya told the BBC, referring to the phrase many Russians use to refer to their fight against Nazi Germany during World War II. “And that war victory is a symbol of national pride for all Russians, even for those born in the post-Soviet period.”
Like other aspects of the Soviet Union, Stalin is not a beloved figure in the U.S. and much of Europe, where he is best remembered for instigating wide-scale human rights violations such as genocide, mass executions, and famines. But as Pipiya pointed out, in Russia, he is remembered for defeating Nazi Germany and laying the foundation for the colossus of the Soviet Union to rival the United States as a superpower. That perception is particularly strong among young Russians from age 18 to 30, Pipiya noted.
“Their perception of Stalin is based on myth, fed by older generations,” she told the BBC.
The nostalgia for the USSR also comes amid a surge in patriotism among some Russians, who have taken to sporting “Zs” in reference to the white markings that dotted Russian military vehicles at the outset of the invasion of Ukraine.
“It is not a surprising development in light of Moscow’s intense propaganda effort to justify the war and generate support for it among Russia’s citizens,” Ian Brzezinski, former deputy assistant secretary of defense for Europe and NATO policy, told Task & Purpose. “Symbols have a power of their own and Moscow’s propagandists surely recognize this.”
Perhaps the most important Russian citizen to buy into, and promote, the nostalgia of the Soviet Union is the one leading the country: President Vladimir Putin. A former agent of the KGB, the Soviet spy agency, Putin said in 2005 that the collapse of the Soviet Union was “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century” which is a strong statement considering the 20th century also hosted World War II and many other bloody nightmares. Putin has repeatedly used the past to try to enforce his present claim to power, noted journalist Shaun Walker in a profile of the president for History.com.
“Putin’s use of the Second World War has been augmented with other, secondary historical figures and victories, as Putin has tried to weave a narrative of Russian glory, starting with the 10th-century Prince Vladimir, founder of Kievan Rus—and ending with the Vladimir currently residing inside the Kremlin,” Walker wrote.
Today, some of the old empire seems to be coming back in the form of a scarlet banner flying into a former satellite state of the Soviet Union. How long it will remain there, and whether it will appear over other nearby countries in the near future, remains to be seen.
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David covers the Air Force, Space Force and anything Star Wars-related. He joined Task & Purpose in 2019, after covering local news in Maine and FDA policy in Washington D.C. David loves hearing the stories of individual airmen and their families and sharing the human side of America’s most tech-heavy military branch. Contact the author here.
13. Nuclear reactors in a war zone: A new type of weapon?
Yes this threat must be considered. Where else could this be a problem? South Korea has some 23 nuclear power plants and Japan has a number as well (and we saw what happened at Fukushima due to a natural disaster). WHo needs nuclear weapons when you can bomb the enemy's nuclear power plants (that is easier said than done but still we must consider it). What are the contingency plans and defensive measures for each nuclear power plant in a potential combat zone?
Excerpts:
Finally, it is possible to make a connection between a nuclear weapon and a nuclear reactor in terms of fission product production. A 20-kiloton weapon, slightly larger than the atomic bomb used against Hiroshima, produces the same amount of energy as a 1,000 megawatt-electric nuclear reactor that operates for one day. Since the energy production is proportional to fission product production, a nuclear reactor accumulates a fission product inventory that rapidly surpasses that produced by a nuclear weapon. Each reactor holds a large inventory of fission products, and any act that releases this highly radioactive inventory creates an environmental bomb.
Despite international agreements to exclude nuclear power plants from war zones, Russia has recklessly attacked these facilities. Although nuclear power plants are designed to operate safely, in a war zone there are no guarantees. Nuclear power plants have become a new instrument for making war and laying waste to the land.
Nuclear reactors in a war zone: A new type of weapon? - Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
Nuclear reactors in a war zone: A new type of weapon?
Rodney C. Ewing
As the tragedy in Ukraine unfolds before the world with each day darker than the next, Russian saber rattling with nuclear weapons is only a part of the nuclear concern. Reported increases in radiation levels at Chernobyl and fires at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, the largest in Europe, with six VVER Russian reactors, are in the headlines. In fact, Ukraine has 15 reactors at four nuclear power plants, which provided about half of its electricity. As war spreads, each of these plants is at risk.
Nuclear reactors and nuclear bombs share a common source of energy—fission of uranium and plutonium. Nuclear fission produces radioactive, fission-fragment elements and excess neutrons that propagate the nuclear chain reaction, releasing huge amounts of energy with each fission event. For a nuclear weapon, the chain reaction of fission events is nearly instantaneous, and the energy released can be on the scale of megatons of TNT. The destructive energy is released as a shock wave that can be felt at distances of tens of kilometers, heat than can burn at distances of kilometers, visible light that can been seen for many kilometers, and finally, ionizing radiation.
Nuclear reactors are different in that the chain-reactions are controlled, the tremendous amounts of energy generated by fission and radioactive decay is removed by a coolant, and the generated steam is used to drive turbines that generate electricity. The main safety challenge with nuclear reactors is the continuous removal of heat that otherwise can lead to meltdown events. Nuclear power plants are monitored and controlled, either by active measures or passive safety designs. Of critical concern is the fate of uranium and plutonium in the fuel and the highly radioactive fission fragment elements that have half-lives that can be as short as seconds or minutes—or extend to millennia.
What are the vulnerabilities of a nuclear reactor in a war zone? Clearly, a nuclear reactor is not a nuclear bomb—reactors are designed to avoid runaway chain reactions. However, there are three vulnerabilities that can have serious consequences. First, an assault on an operating reactor can disrupt critical operations, such as the pumps that drive the coolant through the reactor. Loss of coolant, from an electrical grid shutdown, for example, can lead to meltdowns, chemical explosions, and the release of radioactivity, such as at Fukushima Daiichi. Second, a breach of containment structures and structural barriers can expose the nuclear fuel, leading to fires, explosions, meltdown, and the release of radioactivity, as happened at Chernobyl. Finally, used fuel is often stored on site in pools and dry casks. If these storage facilities are breached or the storage pools drained, then fires can lead to the release of radioactivity. This is the most probable mechanism for the release of radioactivity, as spent fuel remains highly radioactive for many decades after removal from a reactor core, but the storage facilities, particularly pools, are not well hardened against attack.
To understand how serious these three scenarios are, one must realize the size of the highly radioactive fission product inventory in nuclear fuels. On one hand, the inventory is small relative to the amount of fuel, only about 4 to 5 percent in irradiated fuel; however, a typical reactor will contain 100 tons of fuel, so the absolute amounts are significant. Importantly, the small inventory of fission products results in a nearly million-fold increase in the level of radioactivity (as compared with the activity prior to irradiation). At one meter distance, a person exposed to a spent fuel assembly (one year after removal from the reactor) will receive a lethal dose in less than a minute. Spent fuel assemblies or even small spent fuel fragments are an immediate threat to people and a very long-term threat to the environment—requiring exclusion zones on the scale of thousands of square miles.
Finally, it is possible to make a connection between a nuclear weapon and a nuclear reactor in terms of fission product production. A 20-kiloton weapon, slightly larger than the atomic bomb used against Hiroshima, produces the same amount of energy as a 1,000 megawatt-electric nuclear reactor that operates for one day. Since the energy production is proportional to fission product production, a nuclear reactor accumulates a fission product inventory that rapidly surpasses that produced by a nuclear weapon. Each reactor holds a large inventory of fission products, and any act that releases this highly radioactive inventory creates an environmental bomb.
Despite international agreements to exclude nuclear power plants from war zones, Russia has recklessly attacked these facilities. Although nuclear power plants are designed to operate safely, in a war zone there are no guarantees. Nuclear power plants have become a new instrument for making war and laying waste to the land.
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14. Miscalculation and Myopia in Moscow: Understanding Russia’s Regime Change Folly
As an aside, I just heard the Vice President speak in Poland. She must have used "Putin's War" about a half dozen times. I think that must be our new narrative. We need to call Russia's "special military operation" for what it is: "Putin's War."
Conclusion:
What the Russian military is finding out is similar to what most occupiers throughout history have learned. Very few occupations began with the military wanting to occupy; only once they arrived and realized how dire the situation was did the infeasibility of the mission become clear. There is no clear path to avoid occupation and achieve political success for Russia in this war. Instead, the most likely scenario seems to be that if Russia achieves a military victory, the postwar costs of occupation will continue to rise in a way that Moscow is unprepared for and did not price into its calculations. As is common for most cases of regime change throughout history, in opting for regime change to try and achieve quick political success, Russia has instead plunged itself into a situation requiring a costly occupation to even hope to have a chance at any political success. Instead, it is most likely to find that no political victory exists at the end of occupation.
Miscalculation and Myopia in Moscow: Understanding Russia’s Regime Change Folly - Modern War Institute
As Russian forces in Ukraine approach two weeks in the country since their invasion, it has become increasingly clear that Russian efforts to achieve a quick military victory in Ukraine and replace the regime in Kyiv with a more pliable one have failed. Vladimir Putin premised the initial plan of operations seemingly on the idea that military victory would come quickly, toppling the government of Volodymyr Zelenskyy. In its place, Russia would establish a pro-Russian leader that would sign some form of a political agreement with Russia regarding Ukraine’s “demilitarization and denazification,” allowing the Russian military to largely withdraw from the country. Over the first weeks of the war, it has become clear that this naïve plan, based on overly optimistic assumptions about how the Ukrainian public would support toppling the government in Kyiv, has failed.
With the initial aspiration of being welcomed as liberators unfulfilled, Russian forces will now likely need to engage in occupation and pacification to achieve their goals. Putin has continually mentioned he was not interested in occupying the country, yet it will be the only means to achieve his goals and ensure that any lasting resistance will not oust an installed leader, as is likely to happen without continual Russian military support. His desire to avoid occupation appears smart given the historical track record of military occupation. But Putin has appeared to have fallen into a common regime change folly where, in deciding to engage in regime change, he did not consider that a military occupation would most likely be required to prop up the newly imposed regime. Like many other would-be regime changers in history, he has underestimated the costs his regime change plan will require.
This error is common throughout history. Sadly, the mistaken belief in the low cost of this option makes aggressors more likely to launch a war in the first place, only realizing after they invade that they created a quagmire. Now, with an occupation seemingly required to achieve any major political success, it is worth taking time to more fully consider why Putin and the Russian military overlooked occupation in prewar planning and—based on how militaries traditionally engage in occupation—what it will likely look like in this case if Ukraine’s current government is eventually removed.
Regime Change Myopia
Putin has premised his political goals of the war seemingly on the idea that regime change could produce a more pro-Russian government in Kyiv at a relatively cheap price. Because of this, much like most would-be regime changers throughout history, Putin and the Russian military appear to have not invested heavily in postwar planning for what an occupation would look like. And why would they? If the goal and premise of the invasion was to replace the leadership quickly, impose a new government, and leave, then there did not need to be much investment in occupation planning. Given how little planning the Russian military appears to have engaged in for even the first stage of military operations, it seems even less planning attention was given to the postinvasion phase of operations that Russia would require to translate military success into political success.
This myopia has regularly occurred throughout history, and the inability to plan for the occupation period has led to many poor intervention decisions. Aaron Rapport has shown that those who most desire regime change often overlook what such an operation will actually require in the long run. He finds that leaders who seek regime change focus overly on the desirability of that outcome and not on all the steps it will take to get there. Moreover, those who are most wary of engaging in regime change take the most time in planning for what occupation to install a regime will entail, making them less likely to decide to try in in the first place. In this case, Putin’s desire to topple the regime in Kyiv seemingly contributed to his overlooking the costs required to achieve that goal.
Similarly, my research on all cases of occupation since 1898 shows that only roughly 15 percent of the militaries who eventually did set up military occupation actually planned for it ahead of time. Almost all thought they could install a new leader and withdraw, not necessitating investing in civil affairs or occupation forces that they ended up needing for the occupation. In most cases, the leader conceived a regime change mission as a short operation that the military could carry out quickly, which would not require a lengthy presence. Instead, occupiers in most case are like Gilligan and the Skipper: planning for a three-hour tour turns into a years-long venture. As Russia is learning, however, the failure to plan for what occupation will require will only make the occupation phase even more costly. Russia failed to learn the lesson that the only way to ensure you will not be occupying another country is to not try to topple its government in the first place.
What Would Occupation Entail Today?
Given the likelihood of engaging in occupation, what would a Russian occupation now look like in Ukraine? After ousting a government or taking control of a city, historically occupiers have largely two types of strategies they can use to administer the territory: indirect or direct rule. Indirect rule strategies use existing bureaucrats and leaders to administer the territory. This was the strategy used by Nazi Germany in Vichy France. Direct rule strategies require occupying forces to set up direct military administration where military units govern cities and territory themselves rather than local government officials. This was the strategy used by Nazi Germany in northern France.
Traditionally, occupiers prefer to try to maintain current bureaucrats in power, an indirect rule strategy, to allow resources to be focused on advancing militarily. When the war is over and victory is declared, this strategy requires fewer permanently stationed troops to remain behind. The goal is to find local actors willing to work with occupiers to keep the towns functioning. However, more often than not, occupiers arrive in towns and find that local bureaucrats are not as willing to work with them or not as able to maintain law and order as hoped. This, then, requires direct military rule—however reluctant the occupier is to administer it. For instance, in World War II, the Allies initially planned to use an indirect rule strategy in occupying Sicily and southern Italy during the war. However, after the invasion, Allied forces found that there were insufficient local administrators to work with to maintain order, so they had to instead invest in direct rule to maintain stability as best they could.
It seems from initial reporting that Putin assumed a Vichy-like indirect rule strategy would be possible in Kyiv. However, this type of indirect rule is predicated on enough existing bureaucrats and local administrators supporting the newly imposed government, and in this case, Russia’s goals. However, as seen in videos from places occupied by Russian forces, the exact opposite has happened as locals have only turned further against Russia. Thus, the viability of an indirect rule strategy for Russia is becoming more and more unlikely, further increasing the costs and requirements of Putin’s political goals for this war. Rather than citizens passively accepting the occupiers and being willing to work with them to maintain the administration of the cities, Ukrainians in Kherson and elsewhere are actively resisting Russian forces. Even in towns ostensibly more likely to be pro-Russian—like Novopskov in the eastern Luhansk region—public demonstrations against the occupation are requiring Russia to devote more resources to police the town. Now, it is almost certain Russian military will have to engage in direct rule through military administration.
Problematically for Russia, direct rule will require more resources for administering and holding each town, which is why Putin wanted to avoid it if possible. It will also create two occupation dilemmas. First, given Russian forces’ logistics problems, direct administration will force difficult decisions about whether to use resources to administer these towns and feed their populations to keep resistance as low as possible, or to instead give supplies to the mal-supplied troops headed for the front lines.
The second dilemma relates to the number of forces required for successful direct rule occupations. Direct rule often fosters greater resistance against it than indirect rule, and thus requires higher troop levels to pacify the area. With only 150,000 troops mobilized prior to the war, this would not be enough for a lengthy direct rule military occupation in Ukraine facing sustained popular resistance. A dilemma would then emerge where more units—including, perhaps, the Russian National Guard, an independent force that reports directly to Putin—must be sent to Ukraine. This would reduce the number of forces available at home to deal with any potential domestic unrest. These trade-offs would directly lessen the ability to achieve political goals in the war in Ukraine and make an occupation appear even more costly.
What the Russian military is finding out is similar to what most occupiers throughout history have learned. Very few occupations began with the military wanting to occupy; only once they arrived and realized how dire the situation was did the infeasibility of the mission become clear. There is no clear path to avoid occupation and achieve political success for Russia in this war. Instead, the most likely scenario seems to be that if Russia achieves a military victory, the postwar costs of occupation will continue to rise in a way that Moscow is unprepared for and did not price into its calculations. As is common for most cases of regime change throughout history, in opting for regime change to try and achieve quick political success, Russia has instead plunged itself into a situation requiring a costly occupation to even hope to have a chance at any political success. Instead, it is most likely to find that no political victory exists at the end of occupation.
Benjamin Denison is a nonresident fellow with Defense Priorities. Previously he was the assistant director of the Notre Dame International Security Center and a postdoctoral fellow at Dartmouth College and The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. His research focuses on regime change, military occupation, and international security. He earned his PhD in political science from the University of Notre Dame.
The views expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the United States Military Academy, Department of the Army, or Department of Defense.
Image credit: kremlin.ru
15. Putin the Gambler
Putin gambled on "Putin's War."
Excerpts:
The lesson of Putin’s repeated surprises is that analysts must continually re-examine their assumptions. The best way to avoid being caught off guard is to identify one’s assumptions and consider what might happen if they turn out to be wrong. For instance, what if Putin isn’t bluffing when he obliquely threatens to use nuclear weapons to prevent outside interference in Ukraine? Analysts should also resist the temptation to explain events retroactively as having been inevitable, rather than the result of choices and circumstances. A classic example of this kind of flawed thinking is that the Soviet Union was destined to collapse when it did. Similarly, if Putin achieves his objective of a neutralized, non-NATO Ukraine, even at the expense of the lasting hostility of Ukrainians and punishing Western sanctions, some analysts will likely explain his war in retrospect as having been all but inevitable. It will not have been.
Finally, observers should be careful not to impose their own understanding of rational behavior on Putin or assume that he weighs risks and rewards as they do. Rather, they should seek to understand his evolving risk tolerance and sense of what works best to accomplish his goals. Putin himself is not immune to faulty assumptions. His past successes in Syria and Crimea have probably bred flawed assumptions about his ability to accomplish his objectives militarily in Ukraine. Pastukhov’s warning about unnecessary wars may yet catch up to Putin.
Putin the Gambler
Why the Kremlin Rolled the Dice on Ukraine
March 10, 2022
Right up to the moment when President Vladimir Putin ordered his invasion of Ukraine, many Russia experts and analysts did not believe he would pull the trigger. Some, such as the Russian journalist and critic Yulia Latynina, argued that Putin was bluffing and would most likely back down at the first sign of real conflict. Others, including Hans Petter Midttun, a former Norwegian defense attaché in Ukraine; Andriy Zagorodnyuk, Alina Frolova, Oleksiy Pavliuchyk, and Viktor Kevlyuk of the Ukrainian Center for Defense Strategies; and several current and former Ukrainian officials, predicted that Moscow would opt to escalate the hybrid political and military warfare it has waged in eastern Ukraine for the last eight years rather than risk an all-out military assault. Nearly everyone who misread Putin’s intentions believed that the Russian president viewed the risks to Russia and to himself of a full-scale invasion as greater than the potential rewards. They assumed he would opt for cyberattacks, proxy warfare, and other more covert and deniable means.
Such assumptions had become so rooted in the prevailing view of Russia that it was easy to forget even these so-called gray zone techniques once seemed reckless and inconsistent with Putin’s apparent appetite for risk. The world has grown to expect Russian covert influence operations almost everywhere, for instance. But when Kremlin-backed hackers interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, their actions struck many in the West as almost inconceivably brazen. I have been similarly surprised by Putin’s actions. After protesters toppled the Kremlin-friendly government in Kyiv in 2014, I assumed Putin would not overreact. Russia had deep enough political, economic, and sociocultural ties to Ukraine that he could afford to play the long game there, I reasoned. After all, that is what he did after Ukraine’s 2004 Orange Revolution, which had posed a similar threat to Russia’s sway over the country. But Putin confounded me and many other analysts with his willingness to use Russian forces covertly to seize Ukrainian territory.
The truth is that Putin has gradually evolved into an ever-higher-stakes gambler. Although many observers continued to assume that he measures the risks and rewards of particular actions as they do, Putin has grown more and more willing to take risks as he has come to believe that doing so pays off. He has not lost touch with reality or become “unhinged,” as some analysts have suggested. Rather, from his previous foreign interventions—especially in Ukraine and Syria—he has learned that boldness, surprise, and playing on his opponents’ fears of a wider war are the keys to getting what he wants. And that is why it is dangerous to assume that Putin’s future actions will mirror his past ones.
FROM DEFENSE TO OFFENSE
Putin’s appreciation for boldness, surprise, and playing on the West’s fear of war likely predates his presidency. In 1999, when Putin was director of Russia’s Federal Security Service, a small contingent of Russian peacekeepers made an unauthorized dash to Pristina, the capital of Kosovo, thwarting U.S. and NATO plans to take control of the airport. Russia and NATO were not in conflict with each other and were nominally pursuing compatible goals in Kosovo, but the administration of U.S. President Bill Clinton pushed NATO to intercept the Russian peacekeepers or beat them to the airport. In the end, however, the British NATO commander on the ground refused to challenge the Russians for fear of starting a “third world war.”
Putin took a similar lesson from his 2008 invasion of Georgia, when NATO forces also declined to confront advancing Russian troops. In the aftermath of Russia’s victory in that brief conflict, NATO showed support for Georgia by sailing a flotilla of naval ships to the country’s Black Sea coast. Russian analysts noted at the time that if NATO had wanted a fight, it could have easily defeated Russia’s Black Sea Fleet. But the alliance’s ships kept safely to the south of Russian ships, which Moscow saw as validating its bet that “even [U.S.] neoconservatives do not need a nuclear war,” as one Russian military official told the media.
Putin has gradually evolved into an ever-higher-stakes gambler.
Experiences such as these likely fed Putin’s risk appetite. But to understand why he graduated from risky but limited interventions such as those in Georgia in 2008 and Ukraine in 2014 to gambling on a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, one must recall what happened in Syria between 2013 and 2015. This period, during which Moscow capitalized on Western indecision to alter the course of the Syrian conflict, was a turning point in Putin’s risk calculus. It was when Russia shifted from its back foot to its front foot. In August 2013, President Bashar al-Assad’s regime used chemical weapons, crossing a U.S. redline and prompting Western plans to respond with airstrikes. But Moscow seized on an impromptu idea floated by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and persuaded Assad to announce he was willing to give up his chemical weapons, clearing the way for an agreement that averted U.S. military intervention. Overnight, Russia’s public narrative about Syria changed. Moscow went from passively defending Assad and attempting to deflect blame for his actions to congratulating itself on keeping the United States out of another dangerous conflict in the Middle East.
Within three months, Putin had seized the initiative in Ukraine, as well. In November 2013, he convinced Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych to back out of a free-trade and association agreement with the EU; a month later, Yanukovych agreed to a Russian economic rescue package instead. Putin’s gambit faltered when Ukrainian protesters who opposed the deal with Russia forced Yanukovych to flee the country in February 2014. But the Russian president responded to the threat of losing influence in Ukraine by taking an even bigger gamble: occupying and illegally annexing Crimea. The rest of the world was forced to play catch-up, imposing sanctions as punishment in the wake of Russia’s transgressions instead of attempting to deter them ahead of time.
BLIND SPOTS
Russia’s increasingly risk-tolerant behavior both in Syria and Ukraine might have opened observers’ eyes to the reality that a new and bold Russian strategy in Syria was taking shape. Instead, Putin’s decision to intervene directly in Syria on behalf of Assad in September 2015 “surprised even the closest observers of Moscow’s foreign and security policy,” as the RAND analysts Samuel Charap, Elina Treyger, and Edward Geist have written.
In retrospect, most observers have come to explain Putin’s motives for the Syrian intervention in terms of the benefits it has brought Russia. For the price of a relatively modest deployment of mostly air and air-defense assets, Putin was able to turn the tide of the war in Assad’s favor and defend Russia’s own facilities and investments in Syria. Moscow demonstrated that it was a reliable partner to authoritarian allies and that it would no longer tolerate Western-sponsored regime changes such as those in Iraq and Libya. Russia gained valuable opportunities to test weapons and train personnel in live combat conditions without draining its budget. And the intervention made Russia a central player in the Middle East, ending a period of relative diplomatic isolation for Moscow that had followed its aggression against Ukraine.
Some of the benefits of Russia’s intervention in Syria look so self-evident in hindsight that it seems puzzling that almost no one predicted it in advance. But the blind spot for many observers was having outdated assumptions about Putin’s risk-reward calculus. It is hard to know exactly why so many experts assumed Russia wouldn’t get directly involved in the Syria fight. Assumptions, by their very nature, are infrequently spelled out and often unconscious. But one assumption cited by various analysts after the fact was that Putin would not commit forces to a fight outside Russia’s so-called near abroad. The Middle East was seen as peripheral to Moscow’s interests. And risking Russian lives in a nonessential war evoked memories of the Soviet Union’s disastrous experience in Afghanistan—a lesson, many analysts assumed, Putin would not want to repeat.
It is dangerous to assume that Putin’s future actions will mirror his past ones.
A related assumption was that Russian leaders would be unwilling to risk a clash with a vastly superior U.S. military by challenging it—or even placing Russian troops in proximity to it—outside Russia’s sphere of influence. Moscow had kept its military at a safe distance from the Americans during U.S.-led military operations in Serbia, Iraq, and Libya, even as it used a variety of diplomatic means to manage or try to thwart each operation. So when U.S. forces began operations against the Islamic State in Syria as part of an international coalition in August 2014, many assumed Russia would want to keep its distance there, too.
These assumptions weren’t unreasonable. Russia’s leaders had for many years acknowledged their country’s military inferiority to the United States and limited their geopolitical ambitions primarily to the post-Soviet space. Putin made a show of withdrawing from Russian facilities in Cuba and Vietnam shortly after 9/11. And even after the Syria conflict broke out in 2011, Russia’s actions appeared consistent with these assumptions. When the Assad regime began losing ground to its opponents in 2012 and early 2013, Moscow did not signal readiness to defend Damascus by force but rather focused on drawing down personnel and evacuating civilians from the country.
Even after the Assad regime recovered its battlefield advantage in May 2013, Russian officials continued to talk about diminishing Russia’s presence in Syria. Moscow was delivering arms and supplies to the regime and supporting it at the United Nations, but doing little else. Starting with the chemical weapons deal in September of that year, however, Russia grew more confident in its ability to mitigate risks and more convinced that its strengths and capabilities were equal to challenges and challengers it faced. A bolder, more brazen Putin was about to emerge.
THE TYRANNY OF ASSUMPTIONS
It is often said that intelligence failures are failures of imagination. One way to break out of the cognitive trap of flawed assumptions is to imagine a seemingly implausible future scenario—state failure or civil war in a developed country, for instance —and then work backward, reconstructing the events that could have plausibly brought about this hypothetical future. Such an exercise can alert analysts to possibilities they hadn’t previously considered. It also can help them identify potential actors and factors—sometimes even so-called black swan events—that could contribute to an otherwise unlikely outcome.
Of course, it is also possible to reach seemingly implausible conclusions by working in traditional chronological order. One scholar who did so was Vladimir Pastukhov, a political scientist at University College London, who wrote in August 2013, “I will not be surprised if in the skies over Syria Russian [war] planes start to fly, and in Ukrainian territorial waters Russian submarines emerge.” His prediction of a Russia at war, six months before Moscow’s occupation of Crimea and two years before its intervention in Syria, appeared shortly after the Syrian chemical weapons attack that month. By contrast, U.S. media outlets at the time were highlighting the consensus view that Putin saw himself as powerless to stop imminent Western airstrikes in Syria.
Pastukhov based his prediction in part on three trends that he saw as driving Russia’s choices: Russian leaders’ periodic compulsion to fight “unnecessary wars” such as World War I and the Soviet-Afghan war, Putin’s need to shore up his domestic support, and Moscow’s increasingly nationalist rhetoric about supposed enemies in Ukraine, Syria, and elsewhere. Pastukhov saw Putin as a “power junkie” who was becoming hostage to his own brinkmanship and might eventually push Russia into another unnecessary war that, like the previous two, could be suicidal to the regime or even to the state itself. In hindsight, there is enough to quibble with in Pastukhov’s prediction. Most notably, the war in Syria has not been harmful, much less suicidal, to Russia or to Putin’s regime. But Pastukhov’s prediction of the combined effect of trends that were visible to almost anyone was a rare example of success, rather than failure, of imagination.
Putin himself is not immune to faulty assumptions.
Moreover, Pastukhov’s description of Putin as a man increasingly driven to take risks helps explain the Russian leader’s willingness to chance it all with an all-out invasion of Ukraine. Necessary or not, Putin almost certainly sees the war in Syria as a resounding success. From his perspective, Russia’s military has been his most reliable tool for advancing his interests and persuading the West to take his demands seriously. His success has fueled bravado and confidence, if not overconfidence. Putin also knows that in the back of his opponents’ minds lurks a fear of escalation to nuclear conflict, which limits their willingness to challenge him militarily. Putin’s warning on February 24—moments before his military carried out its first strikes in Ukraine—that anyone who interfered would face “consequences you have never seen” was correctly interpreted as a threat to use nuclear weapons.
The lesson of Putin’s repeated surprises is that analysts must continually re-examine their assumptions. The best way to avoid being caught off guard is to identify one’s assumptions and consider what might happen if they turn out to be wrong. For instance, what if Putin isn’t bluffing when he obliquely threatens to use nuclear weapons to prevent outside interference in Ukraine? Analysts should also resist the temptation to explain events retroactively as having been inevitable, rather than the result of choices and circumstances. A classic example of this kind of flawed thinking is that the Soviet Union was destined to collapse when it did. Similarly, if Putin achieves his objective of a neutralized, non-NATO Ukraine, even at the expense of the lasting hostility of Ukrainians and punishing Western sanctions, some analysts will likely explain his war in retrospect as having been all but inevitable. It will not have been.
Finally, observers should be careful not to impose their own understanding of rational behavior on Putin or assume that he weighs risks and rewards as they do. Rather, they should seek to understand his evolving risk tolerance and sense of what works best to accomplish his goals. Putin himself is not immune to faulty assumptions. His past successes in Syria and Crimea have probably bred flawed assumptions about his ability to accomplish his objectives militarily in Ukraine. Pastukhov’s warning about unnecessary wars may yet catch up to Putin.
16. The UN Is Another Casualty of Russia’s War
So will Putin's war destroy the UN system?
Excerpts:
With the Security Council facing a period of increasing fragmentation and paralysis, the United States and its allies will need to see what parts of the UN system they can still use to limit international instability. The Ukrainian conflict marks the most severe test for multilateralism since the end of the Cold War, and the full scale of its impact on international diplomacy is still unclear. But it may still be possible to preserve significant parts of the UN system to face future crises.
The UN Is Another Casualty of Russia’s War
Why the Organization Might Never Bounce Back
March 10, 2022
“Multilateralism lies on its deathbed tonight,” Kenya’s ambassador to the United Nations, Martin Kimani, warned the Security Council in a debate on the looming war in Ukraine in late February. Since then, UN diplomacy has remained in critical condition. Russia has blocked the council from taking any action in response to its “special military operation.” On March 2, the UN General Assembly passed a resolution deploring Russia’s actions by 141 votes to five. Moscow won only the support of Belarus, North Korea, Eritrea, and Syria. But Russian forces pushed on with their assault regardless.
This war threatens to do long-term damage to the UN. If hostilities drag on in Ukraine, or Moscow ends up occupying part or all of the country by force indefinitely, Russia and the United States will find it very hard, or simply impossible, to cooperate on other crises through the Security Council. Policymakers in Washington and its allies in Paris and London–who represent three of the five veto-wielding permanent seats on the UN Security Council–will have to explore whether there are some issues, such as containing Iran’s and North Korea’s nuclear ambitions, on which they can continue to work with the Russians, regardless of events in Ukraine. And the Western powers will need to invest in those parts of the UN system, such as its humanitarian agencies, that can mitigate conflicts without Security Council mandates.
The spectacle of Moscow flagrantly violating the UN Charter’s core principles, including respecting sovereignty and refraining from the use of force, has caused profound disquiet in New York and beyond. There has been talk in UN and academic circles of reforming the charter to stop Russia or other permanent members of the Security Council from using their veto to shield their own aggressive acts in future. Ukraine has suggested stripping Moscow of its Security Council seat altogether.
These are politically satisfying notions but almost impossible to implement. Russia is able to block both UN Charter reform and any effort to expel it, under rules laid down in the charter itself. And while the United States may condemn Russia’s use of its veto, Washington has objected to initiatives that would restrain the use of the veto in the recent past, and will surely reject any proposals that could limit its own right to block Security Council resolutions it does not like. And although playing around with the UN rulebook may seem smart, it would not give the Security Council additional real leverage over Russia–or, indeed, other nuclear powers–in a future crisis. Rather than forcing dramatic reforms on the UN, the war in Ukraine is much more likely to accelerate a preexisting decline in the organization’s role in maintaining international peace and security.
The Troika
Mounting tensions between China, Russia, and the United States have weighed heavily on the Security Council. The three powers have repeatedly fallen out over the war in Syria, the subject of 17 Russian vetoes since 2011. Moscow stopped the Security Council from condemning its seizure of Crimea in 2014. It has continued to play the spoiler in New York: last year, Beijing and Moscow ensured that the UN responded to the coups in Myanmar and the war in Ethiopia with nothing more than statements of concern.
Great-power rivalry is not the only cause of drift at the UN. Western governments have lost faith in the ability of UN peacekeeping operations, such as those in Mali and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, to stabilize weak states. African and Asian members of the Security Council have tried to limit the role of the UN in their neighborhoods, arguing that regional bodies such as the African Union and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations should tackle crises instead. Nonetheless, tensions between the Security Council’s veto powers cast a long shadow over the UN well before the escalation in Ukraine. UN Secretary-General António Guterres warned in 2019 that the relationship between China, Russia, and the United States “has never been as dysfunctional as it is today.”
U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration came into office hoping to improve cooperation with Russia through the UN. Last year, U.S. officials led a successful diplomatic push to persuade Moscow to extend a Security Council mandate authorizing UN humanitarian assistance to non-government-controlled parts of Syria. Biden raised this directly with Russian President Vladimir Putin at their June summit in Geneva, and Moscow agreed to renew the mandate fairly smoothly. Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the U.S. ambassador to the UN, declared that the two powers could “work together to find solutions and deliver actions on the world’s most pressing challenges.”
It will be hard for U.S. and European diplomats to work with Russia if there is a long war in Ukraine.
The notion that Moscow and Washington can use the UN as a channel for global problem-solving now looks exceedingly remote. In New York, diplomats worry that the breakdown over Ukraine will make negotiations on other issues difficult or impossible. But a breakdown is not inevitable. In the aftermath of the initial Russian invasion in 2014, the United States and Russia succeeded in compartmentalizing their differences over Crimea and Donbas from cooperation on other issues ranging from peacekeeping in Africa to the Iran nuclear deal.
This year, in the days immediately following the full-scale Russian assault on Ukraine, Security Council diplomats once again tried to keep regular business going on other topics. Russia and the United States signed off on a statement endorsing continued humanitarian help for Syria, although France eventually blocked it on the grounds that now was not the moment to take joint positions with Moscow. In late February, the Security Council passed a resolution extending sanctions on Yemen. Diplomats say that other routine business, such as an upcoming renewal of the mandate for UN peacekeepers in South Sudan, will go on much as before. Away from the UN, the United States and Russia have managed to keep coordinating on the Vienna talks on revitalizing the Iran nuclear deal, although Moscow has demanded that the United States provide guarantees that Western sanctions on Ukraine wouldn’t harm future Russian-Iranian trade, complicating the already fraught discussions.
But council members acknowledge in private that they will struggle to maintain business as usual for much longer. This is not necessarily because Russian diplomats will use their veto on issues unrelated to Ukraine to score points. In fact, they may keep open the possibility of cooperation on problems in places such as Afghanistan or Yemen to seem reasonable. But it will be hard for U.S. and European diplomats to work constructively with their Russian counterparts if there is a long war in Ukraine or an open-ended Russian military occupation, especially if the West maintains its sanctions on Moscow. Even if, by some miracle, Russia withdraws from Ukraine relatively quickly, it will take a long time to regain trust in New York.
Beyond Ukraine
Some items on the Security Council agenda look especially likely to fail because of tensions between Russia and the West. In Libya, friction between Moscow and NATO powers–already deeply enmeshed in the country’s factional politics–could at a minimum weaken UN efforts to keep a 2020 peace deal on track. In a worst-case scenario, Russia’s allies in eastern Libya, who launched an assault on Tripoli in 2019, could return to war. Meanwhile, France and Russia are already vying for influence in sub-Saharan African countries, with Russian private military contractors deployed in Mali and the Central African Republic. A further deterioration in relations between Paris and Moscow will make it even more difficult to agree on UN mandates for sanctions, peacekeeping, and mediation in the region. In the meantime, Russia and the United States will surely struggle to repeat last year’s relatively constructive talks on aid to Syria.
Another obvious potential flash point could be the annual UN resolution approving the presence of European Union peacekeepers in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Russia came close to vetoing this last November due to disagreements with U.S. and European representatives over the role of the Office of the High Representative, which was set up in 1995 to oversee the implementation of the Dayton peace accords. Moscow argues that the office is too pro-Western and is no longer necessary. Facing heavy EU sanctions over Ukraine, Moscow could decide to carry through on the veto threat this year.
One uncertainty is how China will maneuver at the UN in the coming months. China and Russia have cooperated closely in the Security Council, jointly opposing Western initiatives on conflicts like Ethiopia’s civil war. But the Chinese have taken a low profile during the Ukraine crisis, abstaining on resolutions on the war in the council, the General Assembly, and the Human Rights Council. Beijing has invested in UN peacekeeping in Africa, and will likely want to protect the mandates for blue helmet operations in countries where it has economic or energy interests, such as the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Sudan. But it is equally unlikely to break ties with Russia on areas of shared interest such as North Korea and Myanmar.
The UN Security Council is facing a period of increasing paralysis.
Although Western diplomats and their Russian counterparts will face mounting obstacles to cooperation, there will be little benefit in turning negotiations into point-scoring matches. The UN still has value as a framework for dealing with crises beyond Ukraine, such as the growing humanitarian catastrophe in Afghanistan and nonproliferation priorities including reviving the Iran nuclear deal.
In Afghanistan, UN aid agencies and political officers have a crucial role to play. This month, Security Council members are negotiating a new mandate for the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, which is meant to coordinate this aid work. These talks are difficult, and would have been so regardless of the war in Ukraine. Russia and China have questioned whether the UN should keep prioritizing human rights in Afghanistan, which Western diplomats feel is essential. But all sides will likely support an ongoing UN presence in the country to help avert the risks of state collapse and a further regional crisis.
If the Vienna talks on the Iranian nuclear program are successful, the Security Council and the International Atomic Energy Agency will retain a significant role overseeing Tehran’s return to compliance with its nuclear commitments. U.S. and Russian officials in New York will have to put aside their differences, however grudgingly, to monitor this process.
With the Security Council facing a period of increasing fragmentation and paralysis, the United States and its allies will need to see what parts of the UN system they can still use to limit international instability. The Ukrainian conflict marks the most severe test for multilateralism since the end of the Cold War, and the full scale of its impact on international diplomacy is still unclear. But it may still be possible to preserve significant parts of the UN system to face future crises.
17. What is a no-fly zone? Why Ukraine wants one, and why NATO is refusing.
Excerpts:
“A no-fly zone is a euphemism that conceals the realities of what these operations might actually entail. A no-fly zone is simply war with Russia by another name,” Brian Finucane, a former State Department legal adviser now with the International Crisis Group, told Grid.
That reality would include NATO planes on 24/7 missions over the war zone, and then a call to NATO fighter jets to pursue — and if need be shoot down — Russian aircraft in the skies over Ukraine. It could also involve NATO planes taking exchanging fire with Russian air defense systems on the ground. It is easy to see how quickly the patrols might lead to a direct NATO-Russia war.
Beyond the risks of escalation, it’s also not clear that closing Ukraine’s airspace would be the most effective way to prevent atrocities. The Russian military has made surprisingly little use of air power so far in the war and is fully capable of targeting Ukrainian cities with powerful ground-based artillery. It’s worth recalling that the worst instance of genocide in Europe since the Holocaust, the killing of more than 8,000 Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica, was carried out by ground forces underneath a NATO no-fly zone.
Still, as the war grinds on, so will calls for NATO to do more to protect civilians. The horrors already seen in Mariupol and Kharkiv may soon be repeated in other parts of Ukraine, and many have already invoked the memories of Russian assaults on the Chechen capital, Grozny, in the 1990s and the Syrian city of Aleppo in 2016. It won’t just be Zelenskiy and his fellow Ukrainians demanding that the world do something.
Perhaps the political scientist Seva Gunitsky put it best when he wrote on Twitter recently, “the people calling for a no-fly zone should explicitly say they are willing to risk nuclear war and the people calling for backing off should explicitly say they are willing to tolerate war crimes. there is no moral high ground for anyone here.”
What is a no-fly zone? Why Ukraine wants one, and why NATO is refusing.
The history of these operations shows why a no-fly zone would be so risky in Ukraine.
Global Security Reporter
In the first weeks of war, Western military aid and fierce Ukrainian resistance have made the conflict a somewhat fairer fight. Russia has captured just one city, and Ukrainian forces have slowed Russia’s military advance to a crawl. But as the civilian toll rises and the Russian military steps up its targeting of Ukraine’s urban centers, there are calls for Ukraine’s allies to do more. And one idea is getting most of the attention.
Ukraine’s leaders want NATO to impose a no-fly zone over their country, preventing Russia from using air power. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy makes the case for a no-fly zone every day — most recently in a virtual address to Britain’s Parliament in which he asked the U.K. to “make sure that our skies are safe.” He has also said that Western leaders would have blood on their hands if one wasn’t implemented. In an open letter Tuesday, a group of prominent U.S. national security figures including former ambassadors and Philip Breedlove, the former supreme allied commander for Europe, called for a “limited” no-fly zone, starting with the humanitarian corridors that were agreed to by Ukraine and Russia. In an instantly viral clip, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was beseeched to set up a no-fly zone by Ukrainian activist Daria Kaleniuk at a news conference last week.
The governments involved are firmly rejecting the idea. The Pentagon and White House have said it is not in the cards, with press secretary Jen Psaki calling it “not a good idea” and “definitely escalatory.” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has also dismissed the notion, saying, “We are not part of this conflict.”
What is a no-fly zone? How is it implemented? And why is it considered so dangerous?
No-fly zones: how they work
No-fly zones refer to operations in which an outside military power declares a certain territory off-limits to aircraft in order to discourage military conflict or atrocities against civilians. Typically, the country or alliance imposing the zone has overwhelming air superiority.
Aircraft from the enforcing country generally run continuous sorties to monitor the zone and detect and respond to violations. While in the air, these craft are vulnerable to fire from air defense systems on the ground. The logistical difficulties of maintaining such a zone over the entirety of a country the size of Ukraine would be substantial; even doing so for a smaller area would involve a major operation and significant risk.
“A no-fly zone is a willingness to shoot down an aircraft that is operating in contravention of the zone,” Jeremiah Gertler, a longtime military aviation analyst who directs the Defense Concepts Organization, a consultancy, told Grid. “When people are saying, ‘We should have an no-fly zone in Ukraine,’ they are saying we should be willing to shoot down Russian aircraft.”
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A 30-year history
The first time this tactic was used was in Iraq in 1991. At the end of Gulf War, after the U.S. and its allies reversed Saddam Hussein’s capture of Kuwait, U.S., British and French forces imposed a no-fly zone over the Kurdish region of northern Iraq. Operation Provide Comfort and its successor, Operation Northern Watch, were designed to prevent a repeat of incidents like the 1988 Halabja massacre, an airborne chemical weapons attack that killed more than 3,000 Kurdish civilians. A similar operation, Operation Southern Watch, was launched in 1992 to protect Shiite areas of southern Iraq. Both zones remained in effect until the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003.
In Operation Deny Flight, from 1993 to 1995, NATO imposed a no-fly zone in the airspace over Bosnia and Herzegovina, in this case to protect Bosnian civilians from Serbian aircraft and allow the delivery of humanitarian aid.
In Libya in 2011, after a U.N. Security Council Resolution authorizing force to protect civilians from Muammar Gaddafi’s military, the U.S. and NATO allies launched Operation Odyssey Dawn, imposing a no-fly zone over the country.
As for Odyssey Dawn, that mission evolved into a campaign to strike Libyan government forces on the ground who were attacking civilian areas, leading to the eventual overthrow of Gaddafi’s regime.
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One important similarity between all these missions: The U.S. and its allies enjoyed overwhelming military superiority. The Iraqi, Serbian and Libyan militaries weren’t much of a threat beyond where they were already fighting.
Dangers of a no-fly zone over Ukraine
The U.S. and its NATO allies hold no such overwhelming advantage over Russia, which has a million-strong military and the world’s largest arsenal of nuclear weapons. Russian President Vladimir Putin has already hinted ominously that he is willing to choose the nuclear option if Western countries “create threats for our country.” Putin said last week that he would view a no-fly zone as a threat and that countries that imposed one would be viewed as “participants of the military conflict.”
For some advocates of a no-fly zone, the risk of escalation is less than the risk of letting Russia’s aggression continue unchecked. “This is already World War III,” the exiled Russian chess champion and dissident Garry Kasparov has said. But it’s also possible that many of those who say they support a zone — 74 percent of Americans according to one recent poll — don’t quite grasp what it would entail.
“A no-fly zone is a euphemism that conceals the realities of what these operations might actually entail. A no-fly zone is simply war with Russia by another name,” Brian Finucane, a former State Department legal adviser now with the International Crisis Group, told Grid.
That reality would include NATO planes on 24/7 missions over the war zone, and then a call to NATO fighter jets to pursue — and if need be shoot down — Russian aircraft in the skies over Ukraine. It could also involve NATO planes taking exchanging fire with Russian air defense systems on the ground. It is easy to see how quickly the patrols might lead to a direct NATO-Russia war.
Beyond the risks of escalation, it’s also not clear that closing Ukraine’s airspace would be the most effective way to prevent atrocities. The Russian military has made surprisingly little use of air power so far in the war and is fully capable of targeting Ukrainian cities with powerful ground-based artillery. It’s worth recalling that the worst instance of genocide in Europe since the Holocaust, the killing of more than 8,000 Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica, was carried out by ground forces underneath a NATO no-fly zone.
Still, as the war grinds on, so will calls for NATO to do more to protect civilians. The horrors already seen in Mariupol and Kharkiv may soon be repeated in other parts of Ukraine, and many have already invoked the memories of Russian assaults on the Chechen capital, Grozny, in the 1990s and the Syrian city of Aleppo in 2016. It won’t just be Zelenskiy and his fellow Ukrainians demanding that the world do something.
Perhaps the political scientist Seva Gunitsky put it best when he wrote on Twitter recently, “the people calling for a no-fly zone should explicitly say they are willing to risk nuclear war and the people calling for backing off should explicitly say they are willing to tolerate war crimes. there is no moral high ground for anyone here.”
18. FDD | The New Nuclear Deal Would Allow Tehran to Access Up to $131 Billion of Its Foreign Assets
Excerpts:
The regime’s track record suggests it will use some of these newly liberated resources to pacify domestic discontent by rewarding loyalists and curbing inflation. But Tehran likely will also invest a significant portion in its military, particularly the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. In addition, the regime will likely double down on its support for its terrorist proxies across the region, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and various militant groups in Iraq.
Like the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, the Biden administration’s new Iran deal includes no measures to prevent Tehran from supporting terrorism or other forms of aggression, while at the same time providing the regime with increased resources to fund those activities.
FDD | The New Nuclear Deal Would Allow Tehran to Access Up to $131 Billion of Its Foreign Assets
fdd.org · by Saeed Ghasseminejad Senior Iran and Financial Economics Advisor · March 9, 2022
The Biden administration is finalizing a deal that would provide the Islamic Republic with relief from U.S. sanctions in exchange for temporary and limited curbs on Iran’s nuclear program. When the administration lifts sanctions, Tehran will immediately gain access to an estimated $86.1 billion to $130.5 billion in foreign assets that currently are not fully accessible and readily available.
When the Trump administration quit the Iran nuclear deal in May 2018, it forced the SWIFT global financial messaging service to disconnect Iranian banks and imposed sanctions on Iran’s central bank and financial sector. These actions limited Iran’s access to the global financial system and to its foreign currency reserves and export revenue, much of which remain trapped in foreign bank accounts. Lifting sanctions would allow Iran to regain access to these funds.
The Central Bank of Iran (CBI) publishes data on its own foreign assets and on those held by all other financial institutions in the country. One should take these numbers with a grain of salt, as verifying their veracity is difficult due to the lack of transparency and alternative sources of information. The CBI reported having $117 billion in net foreign assets as of December 2021, while the Iranian financial system — that is, the CBI plus all other financial institutions — had $166 billion.
Table 1: Iran’s Foreign Assets as of December 2021 (Billion USD)
Gross Foreign Assets Foreign Liabilities Net Foreign Assets Central Bank 161.9 44.4 117.5 Financial System 493.1 326.9 166.2
Source: CBI
The graph above shows that the CBI’s net foreign assets grew following the re-imposition of U.S. sanctions. This is the result of several factors. First, U.S. financial sanctions generally take immediate effect, and major financial institutions around the world heed them assiduously, so Tehran lost access to much of its foreign assets rather quickly. Second, Iran’s neighbors and China have not been keen on enforcing trade sanctions against the Islamic Republic, so Iran continued to accumulate export revenue in foreign accounts it could not fully access. Third, to help weather U.S. sanctions, Tehran decided to limit its imports and outflow of capital, so it spent less of its foreign currency than it otherwise would have.
Analysts disagree over exactly how much of Iran’s foreign assets are fully accessible to the regime. In its latest regional report in October 2021, the IMF estimated Iran’s readily available and controlled external assets to be $31.4 billion. Subtracting that figure from the $161.9 billion in gross foreign assets the CBI reported having as of December, one can estimate that sanctions relief will grant Tehran access to an additional $130.5 billion in gross foreign assets.
Depending on the terms of the CBI’s $44.4 billion in foreign liabilities, some of those assets may be needed to retire liabilities. However, the remaining $86.1 billion are not tied to any foreign liability. In other words, the CBI will gain access to at least $86.1 billion and potentially as much as $130.5 billion in foreign assets.
The regime’s track record suggests it will use some of these newly liberated resources to pacify domestic discontent by rewarding loyalists and curbing inflation. But Tehran likely will also invest a significant portion in its military, particularly the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. In addition, the regime will likely double down on its support for its terrorist proxies across the region, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and various militant groups in Iraq.
Like the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, the Biden administration’s new Iran deal includes no measures to prevent Tehran from supporting terrorism or other forms of aggression, while at the same time providing the regime with increased resources to fund those activities.
Saeed Ghasseminejad is a senior advisor on Iran and financial economics at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), where he contributes to FDD’s Iran Program and Center on Economic and Financial Power (CEFP). For more analysis from Saeed, the Iran Program, and CEFP, please subscribe HERE. Follow Saeed on Twitter @SGhasseminejad. Follow FDD on Twitter @FDD and @FDD_Iran and @FDD_CEFP. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, non-partisan research institute focused on national security and foreign policy.
fdd.org · by Saeed Ghasseminejad Senior Iran and Financial Economics Advisor · March 9, 2022
19. FDD | Treasury Targets Hezbollah’s West African Finance Network
Excerpts:
There are strong links between the Shiite Lebanese communities in Ivory Coast and Guinea. Saade illustrates this connection, given his role as Lebanon’s honorary consul in Ivory Coast despite having his business and residential base in Guinea. These links encompass a network of Shiite religious and cultural institutions as well as the business community. Yet this is the first Treasury designation of a Hezbollah network in Guinea.
Treasury’s latest designations are a small, albeit important, step forward in U.S. efforts to identify Hezbollah’s financial backers in West Africa. However, Washington has only begun to document the extent of Hezbollah’s penetration and co-optation of Shiite communities in the region.
FDD | Treasury Targets Hezbollah’s West African Finance Network
fdd.org · by Emanuele Ottolenghi Senior Fellow · March 9, 2022
The U.S. Department of the Treasury imposed sanctions last week on Ali Saade and Ibrahim Taher, two prominent Lebanese entrepreneurs based in the West African country of Guinea. According to Treasury, Saade and Taher have direct links to Hezbollah, used bribery and political influence to curry favor with local rulers on Hezbollah’s behalf, and assisted Hezbollah in the transfer of vast sums of money.
Following previous designations of Hezbollah financiers in West Africa, Treasury’s latest round of designations further exposes the ongoing cooperation between Lebanese expatriate entrepreneurs and Hezbollah’s terror finance activities. Saade and Taher both live and run successful businesses in Conakry, Guinea’s capital, with branches in neighboring countries. Both men deny the accusations against them and announced they would take legal action to reverse their designations.
Saade is the chairman of Lebanon’s SICOM Group, a business conglomerate involved in fishing, food, other food commodities, and real estate. It has affiliates in several West African nations, including Sonit Guinea and Sonit Mali. Saade is also a shareholder in five companies in Lebanon. He is also, reportedly, Lebanon’s honorary consul to Guinea. Treasury accused Saade of having facilitated political contacts on behalf of Hezbollah financier Kassem Tajeddin, who was sanctioned in 2009, arrested and extradited in 2017, and later convicted in federal court for providing financial support to Hezbollah. Saade has publicly confirmed that he served as a go-between for Tajeddin and Guinea’s then-president, Alpha Condé, in 2013.
Taher is the chairman of Taher Fabrique de Guinee (TaFaGui), a business conglomerate that trades in food commodities such as flour. According to Treasury, Taher is a key Hezbollah financial supporter in Guinea, has bribed local officials to move cash through Conakry’s international airport en route to Lebanon, and employs several people whom Treasury called Hezbollah “affiliates” in Guinea. Treasury also notes that Taher, like Saade, holds diplomatic status as an honorary consul of Lebanon — in his case, for neighboring Ivory Coast.
West Africa has been a key center of Hezbollah’s financial activity for over a decade now, with Ivory Coast serving as a hub for money transfers. In 2009, along with its designation of Tajeddin, Treasury also sanctioned Abd al-Menhem Qubaysi, a cleric in charge of a Shiite mosque in Marcory, Abidjan, whom Treasury described as a Hezbollah supporter and personal representative of Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah. According to Treasury, Qubaysi was involved in terror finance and recruitment. Local authorities expelled him shortly after Treasury’s designation. Qubaysi’s successor, Sheikh Ghaleb Khojok, is a major depositor at Hezbollah’s unofficial bank, al-Qard al-Hassan (AQAH), which Washington has also designated. Khojok’s ties to AQAH became public after an anonymous hackers’ group leaked the identities of numerous AQAH account holders in December 2020.
There are strong links between the Shiite Lebanese communities in Ivory Coast and Guinea. Saade illustrates this connection, given his role as Lebanon’s honorary consul in Ivory Coast despite having his business and residential base in Guinea. These links encompass a network of Shiite religious and cultural institutions as well as the business community. Yet this is the first Treasury designation of a Hezbollah network in Guinea.
Treasury’s latest designations are a small, albeit important, step forward in U.S. efforts to identify Hezbollah’s financial backers in West Africa. However, Washington has only begun to document the extent of Hezbollah’s penetration and co-optation of Shiite communities in the region.
Emanuele Ottolenghi is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), where he contributes to FDD’s Iran Program and Center on Economic and Financial Power (CEFP). For more analysis from Emanuele, the Iran Program, and CEFP, please subscribe HERE. Follow Emanuele on Twitter @eottolenghi. Follow FDD on Twitter @FDD and @FDD_Iran and @FDD_CEFP. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focused on national security and foreign policy.
fdd.org · by Emanuele Ottolenghi Senior Fellow · March 9, 2022
20. Aligning U.S.-Israeli Cooperation on Technology Issues and China
Aligning U.S.-Israeli Cooperation on Technology Issues and China
By Jonathan Schanzer, Shira Efron, Martijn Rasser and Alice Hickson
March 09, 2022
Executive Summary
The United States and Israel have a long history of working together as close allies. Theirs is a relationship based on common values and security interests. In recent years, the alliance’s highlights have included close cooperation on counterterrorism and intelligence, as well as deepening economic ties, technological cooperation, and mutual knowledge transfer. The United States continues to provide Israel with significant security assistance based on a memorandum of understanding signed by both countries in 2016, which commits the United States to provide Israel with at least $3.8 billion per year in aid. The relationship is further strengthened by deep personal connections at the government and business levels as well as through collaboration between the two countries’ technology sectors.
In recent years, however, the United States and Israel have differed regarding their threat perceptions and approaches to China. Whereas Israel sees China primarily as an economic partner and is increasing its ties with the country, the consensus view in Washington increasingly sees China as a global strategic rival—militarily, economically, and technologically—even while the Joe Biden administration preserves space for cooperation with Beijing in areas of common interest. In recent years, U.S. and Israeli officials have had public and private disagreements over several Chinese investments in Israeli infrastructure and technology. Although Chinese investments in Israel have declined since their peak in 2018, and even though these disagreements have yet to be aired publicly by the Biden administration and the Naftali Bennett–Yair Lapid government, this issue is likely to remain high on the agenda.
The most critical challenges in the bilateral relationship are technology protection and collaborative innovation. Chinese investment in Israeli technology companies, including those that develop dual-use technologies, remains largely unregulated. Although Israel does not export defense technology to China and has placed stringent regulation on the export of dual-use technologies, the line between civilian and dual use is increasingly blurred, and Tel Aviv has yet to fully adapt to this reality. Washington, for its part, has not been entirely clear about how it expects American companies and allies to limit their roles. The United States has been slow to offer alternatives to allies such as Israel for forgoing cooperation with China and has yet to develop a collaborative technological innovation framework that builds on the cumulative strengths of the United States and its allies, benefits all, and helps to tip the balance in the technological competition with Beijing.
To address the multidimensional challenge presented by China, the United States must enhance collaboration with its allies, including Israel, its closest partner in the Middle East. Fortunately, when the United States and Israel have had differing perspectives in the past, they have successfully engaged in deep bilateral consultations to work through these differences. These efforts have not always resulted in complete alignment, but they have significantly reduced disagreements and allowed for greater cooperation.
This paper represents the most comprehensive public analysis to date of the challenges facing U.S.-Israeli cooperation on issues related to technology and China. It proposes an approach for the United States and Israel to align their policies and bridge differences by focusing on three central areas.
Whereas Israel sees China primarily as an economic partner and is increasing its ties with the country, the consensus view in Washington increasingly sees China as a global strategic rival— militarily, economically, and technologically—even while the Joe Biden administration preserves space for cooperation with Beijing in areas of common interest.
First, the United States and Israel should establish a high-level working group to coordinate U.S. and Israeli policy on technology and China. This group should include a consultative structure led by the White House and the U.S. State Department with the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office and Ministry of Foreign Affairs to address differences in how they see China. It should also include deeper systemic engagement between the U.S. and Israeli private sectors, academia, legislatures, and intelligence and law enforcement bodies.
Second, the United States and Israel should align their regulatory regimes, especially regulations regarding investment screening from China, to ensure their high-tech industries are defended from potential exploitation. This process should include regular dialogue between U.S. officials at the Treasury Department, which serves as the chair of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS); Israeli treasury officials; and experts from a newly established committee responsible for investment screening in Israel. This dialogue—shaped at the political level for implementation by career government staff—should focus heavily on the steps Israel should take to improve investment screening, including: anchoring the committee responsible for investment screening in legislation, building out a complementary intelligence capability, and ensuring that technology companies and investments are covered under this committee. There are also areas where the U.S. government could do a better job of communicating its perspective to Israel, explaining both how the United States defines critical technologies and the types of regulatory steps Israel would have to take for its companies to be granted certain exemptions from U.S. investment-screening requirements, which are available under U.S. law for companies from compliant jurisdictions.
Finally, the United States and Israel should deepen economic and technology cooperation as a counter-weight to and substitute for Chinese investments. This process should begin with a regular high-level U.S.-Israel dialogue that brings together the key agencies responsible for innovation in both the U.S. and Israeli governments. The United States should also encourage greater U.S. private-sector investment in the Israeli technology sector as a substitute for Chinese investment and should encourage other democratic partners to do the same. The United States and Israel should leverage and increase investment in a number of existing mechanisms for U.S.-Israel technology cooperation, including the BIRD Foundation (Israel-U.S. Binational Research and Development Foundation), which provides matchmaking services between Israeli and American companies in R&D; the BARD Fund (Binational Agriculture and Research and Development Fund), which focuses on U.S.-Israel cooperation in agricultural research; and the U.S.-Israel Binational Science Foundation (BSF), which promotes scientific relations between the U.S. and Israel by supporting collaborative research projects.
This paper is only a first step toward addressing these challenges; more analysis from governments, think tanks, and the private sector is necessary. However, it is apparent that simultaneously aligning strategy, regulation, and economic cooperation is the most effective way for the United States and Israel to deepen their cooperation on this complicated problem set.
Download the full report.
Authors
Senior Vice President, Foundation for Defense of Democracies
Dr. Jonathan Schanzer is senior vice president for research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) where he oversees the work of the organization’s experts and sch...
Director of Research, Israeli Policy Forum
Dr. Shira Efron is director of research at Israeli Policy Forum, a senior research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies, and an adjunct fellow with the RAND C...
Senior Fellow and Director, Technology and National Security Program
Martijn Rasser is a Senior Fellow and Director of the Technology and National Security Program at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS). Prior to joining CNAS, Mr. Ras...
Intern, Middle East Security Program
21. Special Forces, Unprivileged Belligerency, and the War in the Shadows
Conclusion:
It is clear that both Russia and the Ukraine are employing specialized forces in circumstances where issues related to lawful combatancy and the possible commission of war crimes may arise. Such employment raises complex factual and legal issues that military commanders of both countries, and those seeking to hold them accountable must direct their attention. In this respect, particularly considering the potential for paramilitary and other groups not part of the armed forces to be engaged in combat treating all captured fighters to the standard of POWs until their status and disposition can be officially determined provides the most efficient, effective, and humane course of action.
Special Forces, Unprivileged Belligerency, and the War in the Shadows - Lieber Institute West Point
The Role of Special Forces
The use of such forces and tactics should come as no surprise. A February 15, 2022 Royal United Services Institute report, The Plot to Destroy Ukraine, identified that Russian covert services “the Federal Security Service (FSB), Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), and Military Intelligence (GU) and Special Forces (SSO) … are already operating throughout Ukraine” (p. 8). Ukraine had assessed there were two companies of Russian covert forces in Kyiv, and “Russian agent provocateurs—disguised as demonstrators or police officers—will initiate acts of violence.” Sabotage and cyber attacks on critical infrastructure as well as “a decapitation strategy” were expected (pp. 11-12). In this respect the 1979 Spetsnaz decapitation operation (Operation Storm 333) in Kabul of an allied leader highlights Russian willingness to use special military and paramilitary units to carry out such a strike (see Mark Galeotti, Spetsnaz: Russia’s Special Forces 20-22 (2015)).
Contrary to the view that inter-State warfare solely involves conventional military forces, contemporary conflict frequently involves the widespread use of non-conventional or irregular forces. Special forces engagement in clandestine or covert operations is not unique to this conflict. That a wide variety of special forces and intelligence units can be involved finds its genesis in the array of specialized military and paramilitary units developed during the Second World War to carry out a range of operations from direct action to support for resistance movements in occupied territory (e.g., British SOE, U.S. OSS, Russian Partisans).
The development and deployment of such units was a prevalent part of Cold War conflict and has expanded in the post 9/11 period. The result is that there can be an array of military, paramilitary, intelligence and even law enforcement specialized forces engaged in hostilities both overtly and behind enemy lines. Some of those activities may be carried out in civilian clothes or in enemy uniforms, and not all personnel involved may be incorporated into the armed forces of the Parties to the conflict.
International Legal Considerations
This inevitably raises questions whether such participation is contrary to international law, the status of its participants, and what accountability mechanisms may be applied. The unconventional nature of such operations raises important questions about whether those involved are lawful combatants or unprivileged belligerents not entitled to prisoner of war (POW) status, and whether some of their activities constitute crimes under international or domestic law.
As discussed in greater detail here, participation in such shadow warfare appears prima facie to be the antithesis of the open style of warfare that underpinned the 1907 Hague Land Warfare Regulations (Articles 1 and 2) criteria for lawful belligerents and which forms the basis for POW status set out in Article 4 of the 1949 Third Geneva Convention (GC III) as further supplemented by Additional Protocol I (AP I) (see Articles 43 and 44). Regarding status, in his seminal article, So-called ‘Unprivileged Belligerency’: Spies, Guerrillas, and Saboteurs (p. 328), Richard Baxter defined unprivileged belligerents as “persons who are not entitled to treatment either as peaceful civilians or as prisoners of war by reason of the fact that they have engaged in hostile conduct without meeting the qualifications established by Article 4 of the Geneva Prisoners of War Convention of 1949.” Unprivileged belligerents can include both civilians and members of a State’s armed forces.
The present hostilities are part of an international armed conflict reflecting an expansion of the hostilities commenced in 2014 with the Russian takeover of Crimea. It is a war involving States Parties to the 1949 Geneva Conventions and AP I, as well as bound by customary international humanitarian law. The separation of belligerents from those not engaged in combat reflects the principle of distinction, which is recognized as an intransgressible principle of international customary law (see the 1996 Nuclear Weapons Case, paras. 78 and 79) and is reinforced in AP I, Article 48. International law has developed a carrot-and-stick approach towards lawful combatant status. It rewards those who distinguish themselves from the civilian population by meeting certain conditions that are largely focused on encouraging the overt conduct of hostilities, while denying POW status and possibly prosecuting those who do not.
The initial effort to codify lawful belligerency in the 1907 Hague Regulations highlighted a fundamental disagreement. Dominant States with universal service championed recognition for large uniformed traditional armed forces while “patriotic” States concerned about being invaded who relied on a spontaneous resistance to an invader advocated for a more inclusive framework. The result was a compromise providing lawful status for regular armed forces, militia, and volunteers fighting for States; and protection for the levée on masse comprised of civilians in non-occupied territory carrying arms openly who spontaneously acted to thwart an invasion. While not all States agreed with the outcome, the compromise did not provide lawful status to civilians carrying out an insurgency within occupied territory.
The four basic criteria of lawful belligerency for military forces fighting for States are reflected in Article 1 of the 1907 Hague Regulations including: acting under responsible command; having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance; carrying arms openly; and conducting operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war. In its 2020 GC III Commentary the ICRC sets out various interpretations of how POW status is attained including one that suggests since Article 4A(1) of GC III did not specifically refer to these four conditions, they did not apply to State armed forces (para. 1033). However, those conditions would continue to be applicable to other militias, volunteer corps, or organized resistance movements belonging to that same State (Article 4A(2)). An earlier article in this series has suggested this is a “more reasonable approach.” This issue requires further analysis as that interpretation appears to place too much reliance on a strictly textual approach.
The ICRC itself takes the view that the four conditions are “obligations” for regular armed forces, although not collective conditions for POW status (2020 GC III Commentary, para. 1038). Setting aside the issue of the collective denial of POW status, which the ICRC indicates has rarely happened during international armed conflict (para. 1035), there is little to support the view these conditions are not required to be followed by regular armed forces, as well as the other units and groups fighting on behalf of the same State. This requirement is set out in the majority of academic writing, caselaw (e.g. 1942 Quirin Case, U.S Supreme Court; 1967 Krofan Stanislaus v. Public Prosecutor, Malaysian Federal Court; 1968 Mohamed Ali v. Public Prosecutor, U.K. Privy Council, 2002 Lindh Case, U.S. District Court), State approaches, the ICRC’s own 1960 Pictet Commentary (pp. 48, 52, and 62-63), and the long history of lawful combatancy. Further, AP I, article 43 has defined armed forces broadly as “all organized armed forces, groups and units” under a command responsible to a Party to the conflict. As Jens Olin notes under AP I the requirements of distinction and carrying arms openly applies to all combatants and not just militias and volunteer forces.
The U.S. DoD Law of War Manual (para. 4.6.1.3 and footnote 153) recognizes the textual difference in articles 4A(1) and 4A(2) indicating that combatant status is attained by virtue of membership in the armed forces of a State. However, it also states the four conditions reflect the attributes of States’ armed forces, those failing to systematically distinguish themselves from civilians or conduct its operations in accordance with the law of war can expect to be denied combatant privileges, and “members of the armed forces engaged in spying or sabotage forfeit their entitlement to the privileges of combatant status if captured while engaged in those activities.” This means that if Russia and Ukraine want to guarantee their regular armed forces, including the special forces, are viewed as lawful combatants they should continue to meet all the conditions for combatancy.
Given Russia’s increasing occupation of Ukrainian territory, the widespread use of organized resistance movements in occupied territory during the Second World War also becomes significant. That reality resulted in incremental efforts to expand combatant status. Such groups were made eligible for POW status if they met the recognized conditions of combatancy including wearing distinctive signs and carrying arms openly (article 4A(2), GC III). Unfortunately, this provision has also been widely viewed as unrealistic given the normal operational environment within occupied territory. However, the prevalence of irregular warfare during the Cold War led to a reduction of the conditions for lawful combatancy in limited circumstances as set out in AP I article 44(3). As a result, where due to the nature of the hostilities (accepted as including occupied territory) armed combatants cannot distinguish themselves they retain lawful status if arms are carried openly during each military engagement and during the time visible to the enemy while deploying preceding to an attack.
Consequences of Not Wearing Uniforms
Notably any combatants who fails to meet this requirement forfeits their right to be a POW (AP I, Article 44(4)). That State armed forces, frequently special forces, may be engaged in such operations is acknowledged in Article 44(7), which indicates these special provisions do not alter the “generally accepted practice” of regular forces wearing uniforms. Both Russia and the Ukraine are bound by these provisions. That said the challenge for all States and courts in assessing combatant status is there is little guidance, or common understanding of what criteria such as “distinctive signs recognizable at a distance,” “carrying arms openly,” or in the case of the AP I, what the deployment provisions mean. That some Ukrainian irregular forces appear to be wearing yellow arm bands suggests there is a recognition of the need to apply these basic conditions of combatancy.
The impact of failing to qualify as a privileged belligerent has changed somewhat in the aftermath of Second World War. The 1942 Quirin Case had indicated they were punishable under the laws of war. By 1950 The Hostages Case, although still indicating unlawful belligerents were war criminals, signaled a subtle change by identifying such a belligerent as someone who may render great service to their own country, but who may be seen as a war criminal by the enemy (p. 1245). Notably, both these cases equated unlawful belligerency to spying, a theme relied upon by Richard Baxter to suggest such belligerency was not unlawful but rather “unprivileged.” Like spies, unprivileged belligerents should not be considered as acting contrary to international law. Rather they are not privileged by it. They could be denied POW status and be prosecuted under domestic criminal laws. The denial of POW status to spies based on their clandestine activities is reflected in AP I, Article 46. The related approach of “unprivileged belligerents” being punishable under domestic law has gained wide acceptance (see 2019 U.S. Army Commander’s Handbook on the Law of Land Warfare, para. 1-74).
As with spies, unprivileged belligerents wearing civilian clothes or even enemy uniforms is not in itself unlawful under international law. However, such activity can make the unprivileged belligerent more likely to be found in breach of specific provisions of international humanitarian law. Given the reports of Russian special forces operating in civilian clothes, as well as the use of Ukrainian uniforms, and Ukrainian military and OSCE vehicles further investigation is warranted. Considering the reported Russian decapitation strategy, the targeting of Ukrainian leaders raises concerns regarding the unlawful killing of civilians, and the perfidious killing, injuring or capture of Ukrainian military personnel and civilians who are taking a direct part in hostilities (AP I, Article 37). Consideration would also have to be given to whether there has been an improper use of flags, military emblems, insignia, or uniforms of neutral or other States (AP I, Article 39(1)); and the use of flags, emblems, insignia, or uniforms of an adverse party while engaging in attacks or shielding, favoring, protecting, or impeding military action (AP I, Article 39(2)).
Notably AP I, Article 47 denies POW status to mercenaries raising questions regarding the status of Wagner Group personnel, as well as foreign volunteers reported to potentially include former special forces personnel being enrolled in the International Legion for the Territorial Defense of Ukraine. However, the definition of mercenary is very technical, and it is likely their combatant status will hinge on whether those groups are part of the armed forces, as well as compliance with the conditions for privileged belligerent status. Lawful combatant status for Russian and Ukrainian intelligence paramilitary and law enforcement agencies engaged in hostilities would also depend upon their being incorporated into the armed forces of those States (AP I Article 43(3)) and compliance with the criteria for lawful belligerency.
While not entitled to POW status unprivileged belligerents are entitled to considerable rights protection under international humanitarian law. Additional Protocol I, Article 44(4) provides that combatants who fail to meet the more relaxed distinction requirements of the Protocol (Article 44(3)) must be provided the protections equivalent to those of a POW. In respect of occupied territory Geneva Convention IV (GC IV) protections provided to security internees as well as persons charged with a criminal offence would also apply to unprivileged belligerents (e.g., GC IV, Articles 5, 64-76, 78 and 79).
Those not otherwise protected under the Conventions or AP I would be protected by the extensive human rights provisions, including fair trial guarantees incorporated into humanitarian law by virtue of AP I, Article 75. In a European context, the 2021 Georgia v. Russia (II) case indicates that outside of the active hostilities phase (e.g., occupation) the European Convention on Human Rights would be applicable. Given the robust provisions regarding the treatment and trial of unprivileged belligerents under international humanitarian law (the lex specialis) human rights law could most likely be applied to interpret similar provisions under the Geneva Conventions and AP I, or to fill in gaps in that specialized law.
Conclusion
It is clear that both Russia and the Ukraine are employing specialized forces in circumstances where issues related to lawful combatancy and the possible commission of war crimes may arise. Such employment raises complex factual and legal issues that military commanders of both countries, and those seeking to hold them accountable must direct their attention. In this respect, particularly considering the potential for paramilitary and other groups not part of the armed forces to be engaged in combat treating all captured fighters to the standard of POWs until their status and disposition can be officially determined provides the most efficient, effective, and humane course of action.
***
Ken Watkin served for 33 years in the Canadian Forces, including four years (2006-2010) as the Judge Advocate General.
Photo credit: Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation via Wikimedia Commons
22. FDD | Turkey Walks a Tightrope on Ukraine
Excerpts:
Russia will, nevertheless, suffer from Montreux’s restrictions if its invasion of Ukraine turns into a prolonged war. Russian warships that return to their Black Sea ports do not have the right to exit to the Mediterranean through the straits until the war ends. This will prevent Putin from bringing supplies to the Assad regime in Syria by using ships of the Russian Black Sea Fleet. The Kremlin can continue such supply missions by using ships from its Baltic, Northern, and Pacific fleets, but as Nicholas J. Myers argued, “this would require considerably longer supply lines and likely shorter on-station times.”
Erdoğan appears to have become more cognizant of the threat posed by the increasing irredentism and belligerence of his long-time friend Putin. Yet the Turkish president has little room to take concrete action against Russia, given how much leverage Putin has built against Turkey during Erdoğan’s 20-year rule. As the Montreux Convention example also shows, he feels the need to pursue a balancing act between NATO and Russia. Meanwhile, Erdoğan hopes that unsuspecting observers in the West will fall for the spin that the purported blows to Russia represent the wayward country’s return to the NATO fold.
FDD | Turkey Walks a Tightrope on Ukraine
fdd.org · by Aykan Erdemir Turkey Program Senior Director · March 9, 2022
Four days after Russia invaded Ukraine, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu announced his country would limit the transit of warships, including Russia’s, through the Turkish Straits in accordance with the 1936 Montreux Convention, which regulates civilian and military transit to the Black Sea. Minutes later, Secretary of State Antony Blinken thanked Cavusoglu for Ankara’s “continued implementation” of the pact. The Financial Times echoed many other Western observers when it called Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s decision “a striking move from a leader who has fostered close ties with [Vladimir] Putin,” and asked whether this represented “a recalibration of Turkey’s ties with the west.”
Curiously, Russia also welcomed the Turkish action. Two days after Ankara invoked the convention, Alexei Yerkhov, Russia’s ambassador to Turkey, expressed Moscow’s “appreciation” of Turkey’s “protection” of and “compliance” with it. The Kremlin does not seem to think that Ankara’s move was hostile: On March 7, Moscow not only excluded Turkey from its list of 48 states that “commit unfriendly actions against Russia,” but also agreed to have Turkey host a meeting—scheduled for Thursday—between Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his Ukrainian counterpart, Dmytro Kuleba. The planned meeting in the Turkish resort city Antalya suggests the Kremlin still sees Turkey as a neutral party to facilitate Russian negotiations with Kyiv.
If Ankara’s implementation of the Montreux Convention was such a blow to Russia, as some Western observers argue, why did the Kremlin appear unbothered by it? The answer is that Erdoğan implemented the 1936 pact in a manner that closes the straits to almost all NATO ships for the duration of the war, a boon to Russia. The convention requires Turkey to restrict only the passage of warships that belong to belligerents, so Erdoğan effectively did Putin a favor. Yet the Biden administration is so eager to keep Erdoğan on its side that it praises half-measures. Therein lies the effectiveness of the Turkish president’s balancing act between Russia and NATO in the Ukraine war. Turkey is a NATO member, but under Erdoğan’s 20-year rule, the country has deepened energy, trade, and defense partnerships with Russia. Rather than insist that Turkey abide by NATO principles, the Biden administration has rewarded its infidelity.
The historian Howard Eissenstat explained Ankara’s latest move as part of its strategy of “noisy diplomacy,” which involves “engag[ing] in steps that underline [Turkey’s] importance while minimizing its risk.” He added, “In this crisis, Turkey has attempted to play the role of important international participant, while doing as little as possible to antagonize either NATO or Russia.”
In stark contrast to its NATO allies, the Erdoğan government has resisted taking punitive action against Russia since the beginning of the war. Turkey opposes any sanctions against the country, just as it challenged sanctions against Iran and Venezuela. Ankara also aided the Kremlin by abstaining in the Council of Europe’s February 25 vote to suspend Russia. Likewise, Turkish airspace is one of the last NATO airspaces that remains open to Russia.
When Ukraine asked Turkey to close the Turkish Straits in accordance with the 1936 Montreux Convention, it took Ankara three days to recognize that Russia’s invasion constitutes war, which is the convention’s precondition for introducing transit restrictions. It took the government another day to implement the convention’s restrictions concerning the passage of warships through the Bosporus and Dardanelles. This was a significant move, since Turkey did not label earlier Russian aggression in Georgia, Crimea, or eastern Ukraine as war.
But when it comes to Erdoğan’s implementation of the Montreux Convention, the devil is in the details. Article 19 would have enabled Turkey to restrict the transit of warships through the Turkish Straits starting on February 24, the day Russia invaded Ukraine. However, Ankara not only waited until February 28 while it calibrated its balancing act, but also applied these restrictions to both Black Sea and non-Black Sea countries, effectively shutting the Black Sea to NATO navies. That was a choice, not a requirement, of the pact.
Although Article 19 of the Montreux Convention allows Turkey to restrict transit to vessels of war belonging to belligerent parties, the Erdoğan government appears to have also implemented Article 21, which states, “Should Turkey consider herself to be threatened with imminent danger of war,” Ankara can then deny transit to all warships, with certain exceptions for the vessels of Black Sea countries. This includes all NATO warships wanting to enter the Black Sea. As Jill Goldenziel argued in Forbes magazine, “Turkey could have easily blocked only belligerent [ships]—or Russian ships. It likely chose to block all warships to avoid the appearance of taking sides against Russia.”
The Montreux Convention also provides special provisions for countries bordering the Black Sea that will make the Erdoğan government’s move even more agreeable to Moscow. According to Article 19, all Black Sea nations can still have their warships transit through the straits so long as these vessels are returning to their Black Sea bases of origin. This allows Russia, Ukraine, and NATO members Bulgaria and Romania to continue to use the straits to bring their warships into the Black Sea as they go back to their bases. The inability of any other NATO member state to send ships through the straits to the Black Sea until the end of hostilities in Ukraine is a win for Putin.
The Turkish president’s reported decision to prevent four Russian warships from passing through the straits to the Black Sea even before his decision to implement the Montreux Convention also appears to be another blessing in disguise for Putin. As the Turkish foreign minister stated, three of the four ships Russia wanted to send to the Black Sea were not registered to bases in the Black Sea. Had they transited to the Black Sea ahead of Erdoğan’s decision to start implementing the Montreux Convention, those three ships would have been stuck in the Black Sea until the end of the hostilities.
Russia will, nevertheless, suffer from Montreux’s restrictions if its invasion of Ukraine turns into a prolonged war. Russian warships that return to their Black Sea ports do not have the right to exit to the Mediterranean through the straits until the war ends. This will prevent Putin from bringing supplies to the Assad regime in Syria by using ships of the Russian Black Sea Fleet. The Kremlin can continue such supply missions by using ships from its Baltic, Northern, and Pacific fleets, but as Nicholas J. Myers argued, “this would require considerably longer supply lines and likely shorter on-station times.”
Erdoğan appears to have become more cognizant of the threat posed by the increasing irredentism and belligerence of his long-time friend Putin. Yet the Turkish president has little room to take concrete action against Russia, given how much leverage Putin has built against Turkey during Erdoğan’s 20-year rule. As the Montreux Convention example also shows, he feels the need to pursue a balancing act between NATO and Russia. Meanwhile, Erdoğan hopes that unsuspecting observers in the West will fall for the spin that the purported blows to Russia represent the wayward country’s return to the NATO fold.
Aykan Erdemir is senior director of the Turkey program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and a former member of the Turkish parliament. Twitter: @aykan_erdemir. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.
fdd.org · by Aykan Erdemir Turkey Program Senior Director · March 9, 2022
V/R
David Maxwell
Senior Fellow
Foundation for Defense of Democracies
Phone: 202-573-8647
Twitter: @davidmaxwell161
FDD is a Washington-based nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.
