Quotes of the Day:
“World War III is a guerrilla information war with no division between military and civilian participation.”
— Marshall McLuhan, “Culture Is Our Business”, 1970, p. 66
"The general who advances without coveting fame and retreats without fearing disgrace, whose only thought is to protect his country and do good service for his sovereign, is the jewel of the kingdom."
-Sun Tzu
"In any problem where an opposing force exists and cannot be regulated, one must foresee and provide for alternative courses. Adaptability is the law which governs survival in war as in life ... To be practical, any plan must take account of the enemy's power to frustrate it; the best chance of overcoming such obstruction is to have a plan that can be easily varied to fit the circumstances met;"
-Sir Basil H. Liddel-Hart (Strategy, 1954)
1. Milley: US 'absolutely' could defend Taiwan from China
2. Thousands of intel officers refusing vaccine risk dismissal
3. How the U.S. Drone Warfare Program Evolved Over Two Decades
4. Likely Drone Attack On U.S. Power Grid Revealed In New Intelligence Report
5. Marine Corps Rejects Reports That It ‘Surrendered’ To British Forces During Exercise
6. China and Russia Are Waging Irregular Warfare Against the United States: It is Time for a U.S. Global Response, Led by Special Operations Command
7. FDD | American NGOs Rally Behind Groups Accused by Israel of Terrorism
8. FDD | How Hezbollah’s hold destroyed Lebanon’s relationship with Saudi Arabia
9. China’s Xi Jinping, preparing for a third term, shuts the door on the past
10. Taiwan Won’t Capitulate to China
11. Humans and Hardware: How Special Operations Can Pioneer Wearable Technology
12. U.S. Policy Toward Myanmar’s Military Junta
13. Special Operations Forces and Great Power Competition
14. China has debated attacking Taiwan-controlled islands, Taiwan official says
15. The Small Pacifist Party That Could Shape Japan’s Future
16. State Department: Thousands of U.S. Residents Still Stuck in Afghanistan
17. Nakasone: Cold War-style deterrence 'does not comport to cyberspace'
18. Why won't Biden save the Afghan commandos?
1. Milley: US 'absolutely' could defend Taiwan from China
Milley: US 'absolutely' could defend Taiwan from China
The Hill · by Ellen Mitchell · November 3, 2021
The U.S. military "absolutely" could defend Taiwan from a potential Chinese attack if asked to do so, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley said Wednesday.
Speaking at the Aspen Security Forum, Milley said he did not expect China to attempt to seize the self-governing island in the next 24 months, but should it happen, U.S. forces “absolutely have the capability” to defend Taipei, “no question about that.”
He also allowed that Beijing is “clearly and unambiguously building the capability to provide those options to the national leadership if they so choose at some point in the future.”
"Near future, probably not, but anything can happen," he added in an interview conducted by NBC News’s Lester Holt.
China in the past several months has amped up its provocations against the island it sees as a rogue territory, flying warplanes into its air identification zone 150 times over the course of about four days in early October.
The aggression has been a critical flashpoint amid the ongoing poor relations between Washington and Beijing, with top Taiwanese and American officials worried about an eventual military confrontation.
Milley on Wednesday stressed the long-held U.S. stance of “strategic ambiguity” when it comes to Taiwan, saying that it would be up to the White House to decide whether to intervene if China sought control of the island.
The Pentagon’s top officer also touched on the recent Chinese hypersonic missile test over the summer, saying that it points to one of the most significant global power shifts since the World Wars.
Milley, who last week said the missile development is “very close” to another "Sputnik moment," said the world is now “witnessing one of the largest shifts in global geo-strategic power.”
--Updated at 2:00 p.m.
The Hill · by Ellen Mitchell · November 3, 2021
2. Thousands of intel officers refusing vaccine risk dismissal
Thousands of intel officers refusing vaccine risk dismissal
AP · by NOMAAN MERCHANT · November 5, 2021
WASHINGTON (AP) — Thousands of intelligence officers could soon face dismissal for failing to comply with the U.S. government’s vaccine mandate, leading some Republican lawmakers to raise concerns about removing employees from agencies critical to national security.
Several intelligence agencies had at least 20% of their workforce unvaccinated as of late October, said U.S. Rep. Chris Stewart, a Utah Republican who is a member of the House Intelligence Committee. Some agencies in the 18-member intelligence community had as much as 40% of their workforce unvaccinated, Stewart said, citing information the administration has provided to the committee but not released publicly. He declined to identify the agencies because full information on vaccination rates was classified.
While many people will likely still get vaccinated before the administration’s Nov. 22 deadline for civilian workers, resistance to the mandate could leave major agencies responsible for national security without some personnel. Intelligence officers are particularly hard to replace due to the highly specialized work they do and the difficulties of completing security clearance checks.
ADVERTISEMENT
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined several requests to provide figures for the intelligence community. The office also would not say what contingency plans are in place in case officers are taken off work due to not complying with the mandate.
Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines declined at a hearing last week to disclose what percentage of the workforce had been vaccinated, but said “we are not anticipating that it is going to be an issue for mission.” There are an estimated 100,000 employees in the intelligence community.
The vaccination rates provided by Stewart are mostly higher than those of the general U.S. population. About 70% of American adults are fully vaccinated and 80% have received at least one dose of a vaccine.
Stewart called on the administration to approve more exemptions for people on medical, religious and other grounds, and delay any terminations of intelligence officers.
“My question is what’s the impact on national security if we do that?” Stewart said. “You’re potentially firing thousands of people on the same day. And it’s not like you put an ad on Craigslist and have people apply by Thursday.”
President Joe Biden has issued several mandates to boost the vaccination rate in the U.S. affecting federal employees, contractors and health care workers. The White House has credited those mandates with driving up vaccination rates and reducing deaths from a pandemic that has killed more than 750,000 people in the U.S. and 5 million people worldwide.
ADVERTISEMENT
Federal regulators and independent health experts have certified that the available vaccines are safe. A recent Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study found that from April to July, unvaccinated people were 10 times more likely than vaccinated people to be hospitalized and 11 times more likely to die of COVID-19.
Mandates to get vaccinated have faced significant resistance, particularly given an already-tight market for businesses looking to hire workers. Some first responders have resisted vaccine mandates as have employee unions, arguing that mandates impinge on personal freedom.
CIA Director William Burns disclosed publicly last week that 97% of the agency’s officers have been vaccinated. The National Reconnaissance Office, which operates U.S. spy satellites, has more than 90% of its workforce vaccinated.
House Intelligence Committee Democrats say they’re confident that the vaccination mandate will not cause a problem for the intelligence community. Rep. Jason Crow, a Colorado Democrat, said the agencies were doing “quite well” and that getting vaccinated was a sign of an employee’s readiness.
“If somebody is not willing to do what’s necessary to protect their own health and the health of their unit, that actually calls into question their ability to effectively do the job,” Crow said in an interview.
The Biden administration classified information it gave the intelligence committee on each of the nation’s 18 intelligence agencies, said Stewart, who noted generally that agencies more closely affiliated with the military tended to report lower vaccination rates.
Several major agencies with large military components all declined to provide their vaccination rate when asked by The Associated Press, including the National Security Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. The NGA, which produces intelligence from satellites and drones, said in a statement that it was “working to ensure that all members of the workforce understand the process and documentation required” prior to the deadline.
Stewart, a former Air Force pilot, has been vaccinated, but said he opposes mandates as being intrusive and counterproductive.
“If you say, ‘You have to do this and we won’t consider any exceptions to that,’ that’s where you get people to dig in their heels,” he said.
Rep. Darin LaHood, an Illinois Republican, echoed Stewart’s concerns in a hearing last week and told agency leaders that the question of unvaccinated employees “affects all of you and us globally.”
Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said in a statement that he supported requiring vaccinations for federal employees. “We need to be using every tool at our disposal to save lives and protect mission readiness,” Warner said.
Federal employees who aren’t vaccinated or haven’t received an exemption by Nov. 22 could face a suspension of 14 days or fewer, followed by possible dismissal. The General Services Administration has advised agencies that “unique operational needs of agencies and the circumstances affecting a particular employee may warrant departure from these guidelines if necessary.”
Steve Morrison, director of the Global Health Policy Center at the Washington-based Center for Strategic & International Studies, said the vaccine mandate was still relatively new and he expected the numbers to change before the administration’s cutoff.
Morrison said that as intelligence agencies broadly work with unvaccinated employees, “they’re going to have to show some flexibility around the margins without compromising away the basic strategy and goals.”
“Getting control over this pandemic in the United States requires getting to a much higher level of vaccine coverage,” Morrison said. “It’s a matter of national security.”
AP · by NOMAAN MERCHANT · November 5, 2021
3. How the U.S. Drone Warfare Program Evolved Over Two Decades
Excerpts:
Depending on which agency was executing the strike (chiefly CIA or military), it was their lawyer’s interpretation that mattered most. While policies may be shifted depending on who sits in the Oval Office, legal standards do not change. However, interpretations of the law certainly change. Presidents appoint their own attorneys general, and with that, they invite a particular legal lens into the conversation.
This lends itself to remarkably murky understandings of who can be targeted by these strikes. The United States authorized a targeted killing against an American citizen abroad, and an assassination-by-drone against a member of a foreign government. These are unique—most drone strikes are carried out against illegitimate actors (members of terrorist organizations, non-state actors). But they outline the liminal legal space in which drones exist.
Today the MQ-1 Predator drone has been retired, replaced by the MQ-9 Reaper—a faster aircraft equipped with more accurate sensors, and the ability to travel with more munitions. Unlike the Predator, the Reaper was initially designed and manufactured for combat, making it a more effective tool in the military’s arsenal. With these updates, the explosive footprint of these weapons is more precise.
When aimed at an accurate target, drones are capable of executing a strike on a single room in a house—leaving the rest of the house standing, and the neighborhood otherwise untouched.
As this technology further develops, leadership gains access to increasingly precise weapons of war. The hope of practitioners is that while the technology develops, it will be used judiciously to reduce civilian casualties, not increase them through haphazard use.
One thing seems to be certain: Drone strikes will continue to be used. The military announced in late October that a U.S. drone strike in Syria took out Abdul Hamid al-Matar, a senior al-Qaeda leader.
How the U.S. Drone Warfare Program Evolved Over Two Decades
As this technology further develops, leadership gains access to increasingly precise weapons of war.
(Photograph by Isaac Brekken/Getty Images.)
On October 7, 2001, a Predator drone armed with an AGM Hellfire laser-guided missile developed specifically for drone missions, was used in a targeted strike against Mullah Mohammed Omar, supreme commander of the Taliban. Instead of striking the facility that Omar was seen walking into, the missile hit a vehicle outside the compound. The strike killed several guards, but the compound was untouched. Before any further action could be taken, Omar and the other Taliban leadership in the vicinity fled. The United States never successfully launched another attack against Mullah Omar; he would eventually die of natural causes in 2013.
On August 29, 2021, in one of its last attacks in Afghanistan, the United States executed a drone strike that killed 10 people. At the time, the strike was lauded as a success—allegedly thwarting an attempted attack on the Kabul airport. Onlookers were told there was one primary target, and nine civilian casualties—collateral damage justified to avoid much greater loss of life if the attack had occurred. However, it soon became clear that American intelligence failed that fateful day. The target posed no provable threat to American security interests in Afghanistan. While the United States has ordered drone strikes in the months since those strikes have been carried out with additional scrutiny from myriad directions.
These bookends of U.S. drone warfare reveal a program enshrined in shadows. The program was launched secretly by the Bush administration after the attacks of 9/11, converting a tool that had been used solely for reconnaissance missions into a weapon that would allow the military to attack targets without risking the lives of American soldiers.
Joe Biden is the fourth president to use drone strikes—officially called targeted killings—but the program was not officially acknowledged until President Obama’s 2013 speech at the National Defense University, when he said: “The United States has taken lethal, targeted action against al-Qaeda and its associated forces, including with remotely piloted aircraft commonly referred to as drones. ”
Reports indicate that Bush carried out only 57 strikes during his presidency. Rough estimates indicate those strikes hit their targets about 60 percent of the time. The Obama administration executed 10 times as many strikes—the official number is 563—with an estimated accuracy of 85 percent. In both cases, the numbers reflect drone strikes outside active war zones, strikes carried out largely in Pakistan, Somalia, and Yemen, rather than places of active hostilities: Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria.
The official number of targeted killings within war zones is not disclosed by the government. The most comprehensive catalog of drone strikes is maintained by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, which estimates the Obama administration authorized more than 1,300 drone strikes in Afghanistan alone. According to this report, these strikes resulted in between 2,370 and 3,035 total people killed, with between 124 and 182 civilian casualties over eight years.
These numbers are controversial, particularly among U.S. government officials who allege these numbers are overestimated. But they are difficult to dispute without adequate information provided by the government.
As the use of drones increased significantly, the Obama administration wrestled with the creation of policy guidelines to codify decision-making for direct action, including targeted killings.
In 2013 an unclassified version of the presidential policy guidance (PPG) was released through open records requests. This document outlined “the standard operating procedures for when the United States takes direct action, which refers to lethal and non-lethal uses of force, including capture operations, against terrorist targets outside the United States and areas of active hostilities.”
This guidance applies only to direct action taken outside areas of active hostilities, which are fundamentally different from the decisions that are made regularly by military commanders. As a senior Obama administration official explained, the military operates using different rules of engagement within war zones, and while they shouldn’t be all that dissimilar to other strikes, military commanders have a duty to mitigate any threats to their forces.
Standard operating procedures within war zones remain largely classified. The U.S. government does not release official numbers of targeted killings or casualties—civilian or combatant.
Obama’s PPG asserted that targeted killings (outside war zones) could be executed only when there was “near certainty” of both the identity of the target and that the strike could be executed without “injuring or killing non-combatants.”
In a move toward greater transparency, President Obama issued Executive Order 13732 in July 2016, requiring the director of national intelligence (DNI) to collect the number of strikes outside of areas with active hostilities, as well the number of deaths of both combatants and non-combatants to be released in an unclassified report annually.
In concert with this order, the Obama administration released its report for strikes outside of areas of active hostilities between January 20, 2009, and December 31, 2015. According to the DNI, 473 strikes were ordered, resulting in between 2,372 and 2,581 combatant deaths, and between 64 and 116 non-combatant deaths. The 2016 summary report indicated the U.S. executed 53 strikes, resulting in between 431 and 441 combatant deaths, and only one civilian casualty.
That is the last year for which we have publicly available data from the United States government. The DNI did not release the reports for 2017 or 2018, and President Trump officially revoked the executive order in 2019.
The policy guidance from the Trump administration was released in May 2021 in response to open records requests. It showed the Trump administration maintained the “near certainty” standard. However, the New York Times reported that Biden administration officials “discovered that Trump-era principles to govern strikes in certain countries often made an exception to the requirement of “near certainty” that there would be no civilian casualties. It kept that rule for women and children, but permitted a lower standard of merely “reasonable certainty” when it came to civilian adult men.
According to external counts from the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, the number of targeted killings grew significantly during the Trump presidency. Targeted killings outside of war zones remained largely similar to past trends—estimations suggest about 340 strikes during Trump’s four years in office. However, estimates indicate a tenfold increase in strikes executed in Afghanistan—nearly 11,761 according to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. This estimate indicates that between 1,727 and 6,976 people were killed, with an unknown number of civilian casualties.
The Trump administration released no official data regarding targeted killings.
Every targeted strike operation must be approved by the president and a lawyer. This typically involves determining the individual legality of each strike. While the overall operation must have the president’s seal of approval, agencies do not need further approval to execute individual strikes. When there are disagreements among leadership, decisions are brought back to the president.
Depending on which agency was executing the strike (chiefly CIA or military), it was their lawyer’s interpretation that mattered most. While policies may be shifted depending on who sits in the Oval Office, legal standards do not change. However, interpretations of the law certainly change. Presidents appoint their own attorneys general, and with that, they invite a particular legal lens into the conversation.
This lends itself to remarkably murky understandings of who can be targeted by these strikes. The United States authorized a targeted killing against an American citizen abroad, and an assassination-by-drone against a member of a foreign government. These are unique—most drone strikes are carried out against illegitimate actors (members of terrorist organizations, non-state actors). But they outline the liminal legal space in which drones exist.
Today the MQ-1 Predator drone has been retired, replaced by the MQ-9 Reaper—a faster aircraft equipped with more accurate sensors, and the ability to travel with more munitions. Unlike the Predator, the Reaper was initially designed and manufactured for combat, making it a more effective tool in the military’s arsenal. With these updates, the explosive footprint of these weapons is more precise.
When aimed at an accurate target, drones are capable of executing a strike on a single room in a house—leaving the rest of the house standing, and the neighborhood otherwise untouched.
As this technology further develops, leadership gains access to increasingly precise weapons of war. The hope of practitioners is that while the technology develops, it will be used judiciously to reduce civilian casualties, not increase them through haphazard use.
One thing seems to be certain: Drone strikes will continue to be used. The military announced in late October that a U.S. drone strike in Syria took out Abdul Hamid al-Matar, a senior al-Qaeda leader.
4. Likely Drone Attack On U.S. Power Grid Revealed In New Intelligence Report
Excerpts:
This particular incident in Pennsylvania last year highlights separate security concerns relating to Chinese-made small drones that are now widely available in the United States and are even in use within the U.S. government. DJI, or Da Jiang Innovations, is by far the largest Chinese drone maker selling products commercially in the United States today and has been at the center of these debates in recent years.
Whether or not the modified Mavic 2 posed a real danger in this instance or if this was truly the first-ever attempted drone attack on energy infrastructure in the United States, it definitely reflects threats are real now and will only become more dangerous as time goes on.
Likely Drone Attack On U.S. Power Grid Revealed In New Intelligence Report
An apparent attack on a power substation in Pennsylvania underscores the very real threat drones pose to domestic critical infrastructure.
DHS via ABC News
SHARE
U.S. officials believe that a DJI Mavic 2, a small quadcopter-type drone, with a thick copper wire attached underneath it via nylon cords was likely at the center of an attempted attack on a power substation in Pennsylvania last year. An internal U.S. government report that was issued last month says that this is the first time such an incident has been officially assessed as a possible drone attack on energy infrastructure in the United States, but that this is likely to become more commonplace as time goes on. This is a reality The War Zone has sounded the alarm about in the past, including when we were first to report on a still unexplained series of drone flights near the Palo Verde nuclear powerplant in Arizona in 2019.
ABC News was first to report on the Joint Intelligence Bulletin (JIB) covering the incident in Pennsylvania last year, which the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) published on Oct. 28, 2021. The document, which ABC obtained a copy of, but only released a small portion of, is marked unclassified, but parts also labeled Law Enforcement Sensitive (LES) and For Official Use Only (FOUO). Other outlets have since obtained copies of this document, which reportedly says that this likely attack took place on July 16, 2020, but does not identify where the substation in question was located.
DHS via ABC News
A portion of an annotated satellite image from a US Joint Intelligence Bulletin regarding a likely attempted drone attack on a power substation in Pennsylvania in 2020.
"This is the first known instance of a modified UAS [unmanned aerial system] likely being used in the United States to specifically target energy infrastructure," the JIB states. "We assess that a UAS recovered near an electrical substation was likely intended to disrupt operations by creating a short circuit to cause damage to transformers or distribution lines, based on the design and recovery location."
ABC and other outlets have reported that the JIB says that this assessment is based in part on other unspecified incidents involving drones dating back to 2017. As already noted, The War Zone previously reported on another worrisome set of incidents around Arizona's Palo Verde Generating Station, the largest nuclear power plant in the United States in terms of its output of electricity, in 2019. In the process of reporting that story, we uncovered other reported drone flights that prompted security concerns near the Limerick Generating Station nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania earlier that year.
"To date, no operator has been identified and we are producing this assessment now to expand awareness of this event to federal, state, local, tribal, and territorial law enforcement and security partners who may encounter similarly modified UAS," the JIB adds.
Beyond the copper wire strung up underneath it, the drone reportedly had its camera and internal memory card removed. Efforts were taken to remove any identifying markings, indicating efforts by the operator or operators to conceal the identifies and otherwise make it difficult to trace the drone's origins.
DHS via ABC News
A low-quality image showing the drone recovered after the likely attempted attack in Pennsylvania. The green lines are the nylon cables. A copper wire was attached to the bottom ends of both lines.
It's unclear how much of a threat this particular drone posed in its modified configuration. The apparent intended method of attack would appear to be grounded, at least to some degree, in actual science. The U.S. military employed Tomahawk cruise missiles loaded with spools of highly-conductive carbon fiber wire against power infrastructure to create blackouts in Iraq during the first Gulf War in 1991. F-117 Nighthawk stealth combat jets dropped cluster bombs loaded with BLU-114/B submunitions packed with graphite filament over Serbia to the same effect in 1999.
Regardless, the incident only underscores the ever-growing risks that small drones pose to critical infrastructure, as well as other civilian and military targets, in the United States. If this modified drone did pose a real risk, it would also highlight the low barrier to entry to at least attempt to carry out such attacks. New DJI Mavic 2s can be purchased online right now for between $2,000 and $4,000.
This particular incident in Pennsylvania last year highlights separate security concerns relating to Chinese-made small drones that are now widely available in the United States and are even in use within the U.S. government. DJI, or Da Jiang Innovations, is by far the largest Chinese drone maker selling products commercially in the United States today and has been at the center of these debates in recent years.
Whether or not the modified Mavic 2 posed a real danger in this instance or if this was truly the first-ever attempted drone attack on energy infrastructure in the United States, it definitely reflects threats are real now and will only become more dangerous as time goes on.
Contact the author: joe@thedrive.com
Don't forget to sign up Your Email Address
5. Marine Corps Rejects Reports That It ‘Surrendered’ To British Forces During Exercise
We learn more from mistakes and failure than we do from being successful due to luck or chance.
Units should not be judged on "failed" training exercises. They should be judged on the failure to learn, the failure to adapt, and the failure to anticipate.
Units getting whipped at NTC in the 1980s were well prepared for combat in Desert Storm.
Excerpts:
What could be reasonably described as the "resetting" of units, including those playing
the role of enemy troops, does happen, especially if one side succeeds in gaining the upper hand for any number of reasons. This ensures that the drills can continue and meet the desired training objectives. Exercises impose real and artificial limits on how and when forces can engage each other and what tactics and weapons they can employ. All of this appears to have impacted what really happened recently at Green Dagger.
"The US and allied unit successfully isolated and destroyed the US pure force," George Hasseltine, CSO at investment company Xenon Partners and a Marine veteran, wrote on Twitter based on what he said he had learned from contacts at Twentynine Palms. "Seems a waste to stop so they regenerated and kept fighting over the scheduled days of the exercise."
How decisions to reboot or otherwise restructure an exercise while it's in progress are made can definitely be controversial if the intent looks
to be to mask failures, but there's no indication that the Marines won't be learning valuable lessons from this experience. "The exercise was conducted in a free-play environment designed to stress commanders, derive learning points and allow participants to improve their ability to conduct offensive and defensive operations, and adapt to changes on the battlefield," MCAGCC said in its statement.
Beyond that, exercises like Green Dagger offer an environment to explore how certain tactics, techniques, and procedures, including all new concepts of operation, might hold up in an actual conflict. The Royal Marines who came to Twentynine Palms brought with them an entirely new method of doing things, known as the Littoral Response Group (LRG) concept, which their service is in the process of refining. Being presented with new ideas, and challenges, can only be valuable for all of the participants in any exercise.
Marine Corps Rejects Reports That It ‘Surrendered’ To British Forces During Exercise
The U.K. Royal Marines that reportedly trounced a U.S. Marines Corps unit were actually fighting right alongside other American Marines.
The U.S. Marine Corps has refuted claims that its personnel "surrendered" or demanded a "reset" after squaring off against U.K. Royal Marines in a recent exercise in the United States. Multiple newspapers in the United Kingdom had earlier run stories about how British forces had "dominated" the Americans in the drill, but those reports downplayed or even entirely left out important context about exactly what had happened.
The exercise in question was the latest iteration of one nicknamed Green Dagger, which the Marine Corps runs in the Mojave Desert from its base at Twentynine Palms in California. Green Dagger is a multinational event, and contingents from Canada, the Netherlands, and the United Arab Emirates also participated in the drill, which lasted for five days between the end of September and the beginning of October. This particular Green Dagger exercise was a lead-in to a larger training event known as Marine Air Ground Task Force Warfighting Exercise 1-22 later in October, which involved the same U.S. and foreign units.
Crown Copyright
U.K. Royal Marines and U.S. Marines together during Exercise Green Dagger 21.
Per The Telegraph and other British outlets, Royal Marines reportedly proved so superior to U.S. Marines in the exercise that the latter surrendered halfway through, and their simulated losses were reset to allow them to continue fighting. By the end of the drill, the British contingent was in control of 65 percent of the exercise area, 45 percent more terrain than had been under its control at the start. This is hardly the first time media outlets in the United Kingdom have courted this kind of controversy in their framing of the performance of British forces in multinational exercises.
"During this exercise, a U.S. Marine Regiment augmented with subordinate units formed an adversary force to actively challenge and test a peer regiment of U.S. Marines," the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center (MCAGCC) at Twentynine Palms told The War Zone in a statement. "This training opportunity increased warfighting readiness and interoperability of the U.S. Marine Corps with multinational forces."
This is the particularly important immediate context that many of the initial media reports at best glossed over. The Royal Marines were attached to a larger force that included elements of the U.S. Marine Corps itself, as well as Canadian, Dutch, and Emirati troops. The British contingent reportedly worked directly alongside personnel from the Marine Forces Special Operations Command (MARSOC) and the UAE's Presidential Guard, a specialized force modeled after the U.S. Marines, among other elements, for this exercise.
"This training opportunity increased warfighting readiness and interoperability of the U.S. Marine Corps with multinational forces. Exercise scenarios are adjusted as needed to assist commanders in meeting training objectives," the statement from the MCAGCC continued. "'Winners' are never determined. This exercise does not provide an opportunity to 'surrender,' 'keep score,' or 'reset.' The objective of the exercise is to heighten unit performance and increase readiness."
Statements directly from the Royal Marines and the Royal Navy regarding the exercise were certainly triumphant but were also much more nuanced and grave credit to allied and partner forces for their victories during the exercise. "Victorious! @RoyalMarines triumph in part of multinational team on Exercise Green Dagger 21," a post from 40 Commando, Royal Marines' official Twitter account read. 40 Commando formed the core of the British force in the drill.
After the initial British media stories emerged, members of the U.S. military and veterans were quick to take to social media themselves to point out the discrepancies in the framing of those reports.
Many of them further pointed out that, even if the description of what had happened was entirely accurate, exercises are intended to evaluate units' abilities to carry out various mission sets specifically to identify potential weak areas before they might have to put those skills to the test in a real-world contingency.
What could be reasonably described as the "resetting" of units, including those playing the role of enemy troops, does happen, especially if one side succeeds in gaining the upper hand for any number of reasons. This ensures that the drills can continue and meet the desired training objectives. Exercises impose real and artificial limits on how and when forces can engage each other and what tactics and weapons they can employ. All of this appears to have impacted what really happened recently at Green Dagger.
"The US and allied unit successfully isolated and destroyed the US pure force," George Hasseltine, CSO at investment company Xenon Partners and a Marine veteran, wrote on Twitter based on what he said he had learned from contacts at Twentynine Palms. "Seems a waste to stop so they regenerated and kept fighting over the scheduled days of the exercise."
How decisions to reboot or otherwise restructure an exercise while it's in progress are made can definitely be controversial if the intent looks to be to mask failures, but there's no indication that the Marines won't be learning valuable lessons from this experience. "The exercise was conducted in a free-play environment designed to stress commanders, derive learning points and allow participants to improve their ability to conduct offensive and defensive operations, and adapt to changes on the battlefield," MCAGCC said in its statement.
Beyond that, exercises like Green Dagger offer an environment to explore how certain tactics, techniques, and procedures, including all new concepts of operation, might hold up in an actual conflict. The Royal Marines who came to Twentynine Palms brought with them an entirely new method of doing things, known as the Littoral Response Group (LRG) concept, which their service is in the process of refining. Being presented with new ideas, and challenges, can only be valuable for all of the participants in any exercise.
6. China and Russia Are Waging Irregular Warfare Against the United States: It is Time for a U.S. Global Response, Led by Special Operations Command
As an aside, I heard that the term low-intensity conflict (LIC) may be resurrected.
If we want USSOCOM to lead in Irregular Warfare it must have campaign quality headquarters properly resourced, trained, and educated for long duration operations (and I am not talking about JSOC in these conditions - it needs to continue to sustain what it does best). Campaigning is key in Irregular Warfare. So if SOF is going to have a larger role and even lead operations in IW it must have expert campaign planners and leaders capable of planning, synchronizing, orchestrating, and executing campaigns that can contribute to achieving acceptable durable political arrangements that will serve, sustain, and advance US national security interests.
However, in the gray zone of strategic competition more than IW is being conducted. It is really political warfare impacting all the elements of national power. IW is the military contribution to political warfare. But to successfully compete in this gray zone, political warfare must be led by non-military civilian agencies. Of course there are antibodies surrounding political warfare so perhaps it should be characterized as competitive statecraft.
Conclusion:
Through the lens of America’s primary adversaries, GPC is an enduring low-intensity war, below the threshold of combat. China and Russia combine all elements of national power in a near continuous and enduring manner, while the United States bifurcates its efforts among its various agencies in a more episodic approach. China’s theft of U.S. science and technology is just one an example of their ongoing IW efforts, which the U.S. has been unable to deter, and against which will require a more enduring and combined interagency strategy. To confront these challenges, the United States should establish a joint interagency task force to better command and control irregular warfare efforts—and SOCOM is the logical choice to lead that task force.
China and Russia Are Waging Irregular Warfare Against the United States: It is Time for a U.S. Global Response, Led by Special Operations Command
The U.S. government’s current approach to strategic competition is problematic, but there are military, technological, interagency, and combined approaches that would enable the nation to stay ahead of its adversaries and keep competition from escalating to kinetic warfare.
By Chief Warrant Officer-3 Jason Gambill, U.S. Army
November 2021 Proceedings Vol 147/11/1,425
America’s adversaries already are fighting a sophisticated, enduring, low-intensity war against the United States and its allies. China and Russia’s ongoing campaigns demand the United States restructure its agencies, strategies, policies, and resources to better employ irregular warfare (IW) and meet the challenge. The U.S. government’s current approach to strategic competition is problematic, but there are military, technological, interagency, and combined approaches that would enable the nation to stay ahead of its adversaries and keep competition from escalating to kinetic warfare. Fortunately, the Department of Defense has a large, capable organization, with forces deployed around the world, that can employ IW to prevail in great power competition (GPC): U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF).
The Challenge
The U.S. government’s approach to conflicts and wars tends to be event based, with clear beginnings and endings. China and Russia, however, view competition as ongoing: It escalates and declines in intensity but should remain under the threshold of combat. Peter Faber and James Callard explain Chinese combination warfare as drawing on “…virtually all spheres of human activity. It has this capacity because it relies on military, non-military, and above military to promote or prevent, expand or localize, and vitalize or neutralize various threats.”1 Similar to China, James Sherr explains that Russian President Vladimir Putin has directed Russia’s military and intelligence services into close alignment with the country’s political objectives. Russia’s “new generation” or “hybrid” warfare methodology, “is designed to blur the thresholds between internal and interstate conflict and between peace and war…. to achieve strategic objectives before the adversary realizes that the war has begun.” U.S. adversaries are perfecting methods of mixing soft and hard power, employing them against the United States and its allies on a continuous basis. In comparison, Callard and Faber further explain, the United States “practiced combination warfare both episodically and unsystematically during the 1990’s, especially against Iraq and Osama bin Laden.”2 The United States continues to employ elements of national power episodically, segregated among various agencies, and further separated by domain and region in the DoD.
Chinese IW Strategy:
China’s perspective of national power is broad and includes several elements which the U.S. government considers either irrelevant or in the realm of private industry and non-governmental organizations. China uses soft power and competes in issues the United States often does not even recognize as a part of a wider conflict. Rand’s Andrew Scobell explains, “China’s current perspective on its relationship with the United States is centered on competition that encompasses a wide range of issues embodied in China’s concept of comprehensive national power.”3 Along with the obvious issues of defense and diplomacy, China’s authoritarian government considers technology, cultural, and internal stability issues essential to national power. China sees a future where “war becomes increasingly civilianized,” relying on non-military means to neutralize threats and gain advantages over competitors.4 The U.S. may not recognize some of these issues are part of the competition, but the authoritarian Chinese Communist Party (CCP) uses all these means to build advantage.
Chinese manipulation and theft of valuable U.S. science and technology (S&T) is a recognized danger. Chinese intelligence services acquire U.S. and other nations’ scientific research and technology through methods that include: hacking, sending Chinese students and researchers to study and work at western institutions of higher education, and purchasing U.S. companies. William Holsten explains, “There is a massive, coordinated assault taking place on American technology, perhaps the largest, fastest transfer of intellectual property in human history, and much of it is taking place on U.S. soil.”5 In 2017, China passed a legislative framework directing all Chinese to contribute to state security.6 The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) assessed, "It is likely that citizens can be compelled to assist PRC state actors in interference efforts if and when those efforts fall under the broader definition of 'national intelligence work' and 'national intelligence efforts' as noted in the Law.”7 This assessment in combination with the approximately 350,000 Chinese students attending U.S.’ universities, gives China an incredible capacity to use espionage to procure developing technology.8 A second aspect of the theft of science and technology is the acquisition of U.S. businesses and their subcontracted suppliers by PRC-backed private companies. One example is the acquisition of A123, a U.S. company that develops and supplies lithium-ion batteries.9 A123, after receiving approximately $1 billion from private investors and $100 million in federal government backing, as well as technical advice from General Motors, Motorola, and QualComm, went bankrupt and was subsequently purchased by the Chinese Wanxiang Group Corp for $257 million.10 This acquisition gave China the company’s technological research and manufacturing facilities at an incredibly discounted rate.
Within the U.S. government, multiple agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, National Security Agency, Federal Trade Commission, work on different aspects of this problem. They observe, detect, and respond individually to the Chinese intellectual property theft. A coordinated U.S. government effort would be more capable of detecting the Chinese malign behavior, creating comprehensive deterrence, and formulating a powerful response.
What Can DoD Do?
DoD recognizes traditional hard power is a single dimension of grand strategy. The Pentagon has accepted GPC as an enduring operational reality. The Irregular Warfare Annex to the National Defense Strategy (IW annex) states, “U.S. approaches to IW have been cyclical and neglected the fact that IW—in addition to nuclear and conventional deterrence—can proactively shape conditions to the United States’ advantage in great power competition.”11 Even if DoD uses conventional forces and SOF in an enduring fashion, without a comprehensive interagency effort, the United States will fall short in meeting the challenge China poses. The National Security Strategy (NSS) states, “To meet these challenges we must also upgrade our political and economic instruments to operate across these environments” and “By aligning our public and private sector efforts we can field a Joint Force that is unmatched.”12 Clearly, synchronicity across the U.S. government and coordination with private industry is required.
To employ IW successfully against peer adversaries, the USG will need a strategy that expands past episodic fusion of various agencies and partnerships to a more enduring model. Strategy is “the employment of the instruments (elements) of power (political/diplomatic, economic, military, and informational) to achieve the political objectives of the state in cooperation or in competition with other actors pursuing their own objectives.”13 The U.S. can create an enduring IW GPC strategy to conduct measured actions through a Joint Interagency Task Force (JIATF), that combines resources and authorities. Individual members of a JIATF will need to call on their partners in private industry to pursue necessary technology and expertise needed to address Chinese advantages in economic and technological IW. An overarching JIATF can ensure the ends are properly supported with enough means and ways properly planned and executed to reduce strategic risk.
DoD lacks the structure and methodology to synchronize the capabilities of its various services, combatant, and functional commands to conduct global irregular warfare. To tackle these problems, U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) could act as the synchronizer for all USG IW efforts as the single global coordinating authority. SOCOM could also lead DoD’s efforts to collaborate, coordinate, and execute an irregular warfare strategy for great power competition across the interagency, with private industry, and with international partners.
A joint interagency task force (JIATF) would be the best way to command and control
whole-of-government efforts to counter adversary irregular warfare. JIATF-South in Key West,
Florida (shown here) oversees U.S. efforts to thwart illegal drug smuggling, human trafficking,
and transnational criminal threats. U.S. Special Operations Command could lead a similar JIATF
aimed at irregular warfare. (U.S. Air Force image by Marianique Santos)
Establishing a global IW coordinating authority to synchronize conventional and special forces would be a complex but achievable endeavor. The IW annex of the NDS states DoD “must institutionalize irregular warfare as a core competency for both conventional and special operations forces.”14 Though SOCOM is not the sole executer of IW under this annex, there are reasons to make it the overarching global coordinating authority. First, several specific IW missions are SOF core competencies, including unconventional warfare, foreign internal defense, and counterterrorism (CT).15 SOCOM counterproliferation weapons of mass destruction (CWMD) and counter threat finance missions are applicable to GCP IW as well. SOCOM and its assigned forces already possess the expertise not only to conduct the operations themselves, but the training institutions to expand CF comprehensive of IW. Second, compared to a regionally aligned combatant command (COCOM), SOCOM’s activities are not restricted to a specific geographic region. Regional COCOMs focus only on the great power in their area of responsibility. Currently, U.S. European Command primarily focuses on Russia, with minimal reasonability to address China’s activities in their region. SOCOM, therefore, is a reasonable answer to this specific issue. Third, all service branches are represented in SOCOM. Lastly, as the global coordinating authority for CT and CWMD, it has already proven its expertise in coordinating activities across the COCOMs, services, the interagency, and with U.S. international partners.
Way Ahead
Through the lens of America’s primary adversaries, GPC is an enduring low-intensity war, below the threshold of combat. China and Russia combine all elements of national power in a near continuous and enduring manner, while the United States bifurcates its efforts among its various agencies in a more episodic approach. China’s theft of U.S. science and technology is just one an example of their ongoing IW efforts, which the U.S. has been unable to deter, and against which will require a more enduring and combined interagency strategy. To confront these challenges, the United States should establish a joint interagency task force to better command and control irregular warfare efforts—and SOCOM is the logical choice to lead that task force.
1. James Callard and Peter Faber, “An Emerging Synthesis for a New Way of War: Combination Warfare and Future Innovation,” Georgetown Journal of International Affairs 3, no. 1 (2002): 63.
2. Callard and Faber, “An Emerging Synthesis for a New Way of War,” 63.
3. Andrew Scobell et al., “China’s Grand Strategy: Trends, Trajectories, and Long-Term Competition,” July 24, 2020, xiii–xiv, https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR2798.html.
4. Callard and Faber, “An Emerging Synthesis for a New Way of War,” 63.
5. Holstein, William J., The New Art of War: China’s Deep Strategy Inside the United States (First Edition Dering Harbor, New York: Brick Tower Press), 2020, 16.
6. David McGuinty, “National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians Annual Report 2019” (The National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (Canada), August 30, 2019), 60, https://www.nsicop-cpsnr.ca/reports/rp-2020-03-12-ar/annual_report_2019_public_en.pdf.
7. McGuinty, 60.
8. Holstein, William J. The New Art of War: China’s Deep Strategy Inside the United States, 51.
9. Holstein, 71.
10. Holstein, 70.
11. Department of Defense, “Irregular Warfare Annex to the National Defense Strategy Summary” (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Defense, 2020), 2.
12. White House, National Security Strategy (Washington, DC, 2017), 28, https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/NSS-Final-12-18-2017-0905.pdf.
13. Yarger, H. Richard. "Towards a Theory of Strategy: Art Lykke and the Army War College Strategy Model." U.S. Army War College Guide to National Security Policy and Strategy (2006): 107-112.
14. Department of Defense, “Irregular Warfare Annex to the National Defense Strategy Summary,” 3.
15. Joint Publications 3-05, Special Operations, 2011, II–5, https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/ADA543873.pdf.
Chief Warrant Officer-3 Jason Gambill, U.S. Army
CW3 Jason Gambill has served 18 of his 26 years of service in U.S. Army Special Forces. He has deployed for training and operations throughout the U.S. Africa, European, and Central Command areas of responsibility. He is finishing his master's degree in the Defense Analysis Department of the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California, and will soon head back to a special forces assignment at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
7. FDD | American NGOs Rally Behind Groups Accused by Israel of Terrorism
Excerpts:
For example, Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Amnesty International recently issued a statement declaring, “This appalling and unjust decision is an attack by the Israeli government on the international human rights movement.” Similarly, J Street smeared Israel’s move as a “deeply repressive measure that seems designed to outlaw and persecute important Palestinian human rights groups.”
Such groups have every right to express their opinions. However, a number of them have worked uncomfortably close with the accused. HRW has partnered with Al-Haq, frequently cites its research and has campaigned with DCI-P against Israel. Members of Al-Haq sit on HRW’s Middle East and North Africa advisory board. And J Street relied on DCI-P research for a bill that it lobbied for in Congress.
If Israel corroborates its charges, the six NGOs should be designated as terrorist charities here in America. Their U.S.-based partners should also come under scrutiny. No wonder their voices are shriller than most: Their reputations hang in the balance.
FDD | American NGOs Rally Behind Groups Accused by Israel of Terrorism
fdd.org · by David May Senior Research Analyst Jonathan Schanzer Senior Vice President · November 4, 2021
A battle is raging over Israel’s declaration that six Palestinian non-governmental organizations (NGO) are fronts for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a U.S.-designated terrorist group. Several American NGOs are lashing out at Israel for the move. But they are skating on thin ice. Some of them have worked closely with the six NGOs in question. And if Israel’s accusations prove to be true, they could find themselves in hot water.
The PFLP has been listed on the State Department’s list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations since 1997. The group has actually been engaged in terrorist activity since 1968, with hijackings, bombings and shootings that grabbed headlines around the world. Today, Israel believes the PFLP is backed by the Islamic Republic of Iran, despite its roots in Marxist-Leninist ideology.
Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad are often the headline-grabbers in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But the PFLP has slowly worked its way into the conversation in recent years, with a resurgence in terrorism. Yet, few expected Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz to announce last month that six nonprofits—Addameer, Al-Haq, the Bisan Center, Defence of Children International-Palestine (DCI-P), the Union of Agricultural Work Committees (UAWC) and the Union of Palestinian Women’s Committees (UPWC)—were part of the PFLP’s financing network.
Israeli authorities have not yet released the evidence that informed their decision. They must apparently wait until an ongoing court case is resolved, so as not to influence the outcome. However, the Israeli accusations are not hard to fathom. Two defendants now on trial for a terrorist attack that killed an Israeli teenager in 2019 worked for two of the banned organizations. There are many other recent instances of overlap between the employees from the six NGOs and the PFLP.
Israel’s intense scrutiny of the designated organizations began shortly after the August 2019 bombing that killed one Israeli in the West Bank. According to investigators, Samer Arbid led the PFLP cell that planted the bomb. Arbid had served as an accountant for the UAWC and Addameer. Another defendant, Abed el-Razeq Faraj, was the UAWC’s director of finance and administration.
In response to the bombing, Israel arrested some 50 PFLP members and seized a large number of weapons. Authorities arrested Khalida Jarrar, a PFLP activist and Addameer’s former general director. The net has widened in recent years to include other Addameer employees, board members and even its co-founder. All were PFLP operatives.
Defence of Children International-Palestine is another NGO that found itself in the crosshairs of Israeli investigators. DCI-P’s board and staff were filled with PFLP members. Notably, the PFLP lionized the late Hashem Abu Maria, the DCI-P’s community mobilization unit coordinator, as a “leader.” PFLP flags adorned Abu Maria’s house following his death in 2014.
The NGO Al-Haq may be the most notorious of Israel’s recent designations. The organization’s director is Shawan Jabarin, whom the Israeli Supreme Court in 2008 described as a “senior activist” in the PFLP.
Israeli authorities also arrested Ubai Aboudi and Itiraf Hajaj, the current and former executive directors of the Bisan Center, during its 2019 anti-PFLP campaign.
Aboudi worked for the UAWC before coming to Bisan in April 2019. The UAWC’s designation in Israel was among the easiest to predict. USAID and the Palestinian Fatah faction have identified the UAWC as a PFLP affiliate. UPWC was also a no-brainer. UPWC’s president and vice president are a PFLP activist and a central committee member, respectively, according to the terrorist group’s website.
Of course, NGOs serving as terrorist fronts is nothing new. In the early 2000s, the U.S. shuttered numerous charities and organizations for raising funds on behalf of Hamas. Famously, the Texas-based Holy Land Foundation (HLF) was found guilty of funneling $20 million to Hamas. The move was widely jeered by civil rights activists who painted the HLF case and other terrorist designations as violations of the “fundamental rights of American Muslim charities.”
The vast majority of U.S. actions against terrorist-funding charities have withstood challenges over the years. Appealing the evidence is usually a failed legal strategy, but appealing to the court of public opinion has often been more successful. Now, American NGOs are at it again.
For example, Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Amnesty International recently issued a statement declaring, “This appalling and unjust decision is an attack by the Israeli government on the international human rights movement.” Similarly, J Street smeared Israel’s move as a “deeply repressive measure that seems designed to outlaw and persecute important Palestinian human rights groups.”
Such groups have every right to express their opinions. However, a number of them have worked uncomfortably close with the accused. HRW has partnered with Al-Haq, frequently cites its research and has campaigned with DCI-P against Israel. Members of Al-Haq sit on HRW’s Middle East and North Africa advisory board. And J Street relied on DCI-P research for a bill that it lobbied for in Congress.
If Israel corroborates its charges, the six NGOs should be designated as terrorist charities here in America. Their U.S.-based partners should also come under scrutiny. No wonder their voices are shriller than most: Their reputations hang in the balance.
David May is a senior research analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, where Jonathan Schanzer is senior vice president for research. Follow them on Twitter: @DavidSamuelMay and @JSchanzer. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, non-partisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.
fdd.org · by David May Senior Research Analyst · November 4, 2021
8. FDD | How Hezbollah’s hold destroyed Lebanon’s relationship with Saudi Arabia
Excerpts:
Since the 1950s, Saudi Arabia has been one of the biggest supporters and sponsors of Lebanon and its stability. In 1989, Saudi Arabia hosted and engineered the Taif Agreement that led to the end of the 15-year civil war. After the conflict, as after every round of war with Israel, Saudi Arabia was always the first to offer Lebanon donations for reconstruction and to deposit foreign currency at the Lebanese central bank to keep the economy and more importantly the national currency, afloat.
For more than a decade now, many Lebanese have taken Saudi Arabia for granted, reciprocating support with insults, contraband and taking the side of Riyadh’s enemies, first and foremost Iran, which invests nothing in the Lebanese economy.
Lebanese rulers are known for pursuing personal interests at the expense of national ones. As long as Hezbollah decides who rules Lebanon, the Lebanese government will go with Iran against their national interests, which are better served by sticking with Saudi Arabia instead. Too bad the Lebanese do not see this, or see it but do nothing about it.
FDD | How Hezbollah’s hold destroyed Lebanon’s relationship with Saudi Arabia
As long as Hezbollah decides who rules Lebanon, the Lebanese government will go with Iran against their nation’s interests, which are better served by sticking with Saudi Arabia instead.
fdd.org · by Hussain Abdul-Hussain Research Fellow · November 3, 2021
Saudi Arabia may have dealt Lebanon’s rulers, Hezbollah and the oligarchs, a fatal economic blow by scaling down its diplomatic ties and closing off Saudi markets to Lebanese exports. While it is tempting to think of the Saudi move as a welcome wake-up call for the Lebanese, judging by past behavior, the oligarchs are unlikely to change course and will most likely persist in their tried-and-failed policies that have only bred economic collapse and misery.
Riyadh’s escalation might seem to have been the result of comments made by Lebanese Information Minister George Kordahi in which he blamed Gulf countries for the war in Yemen, saying that the Houthis, whose occupation of Sana’a started the war, were only defending themselves against Saudi aggression.
Before serving in the cabinet, Kordahi was best known for hosting televised game shows on Saudi networks. His knowledge of politics is minimal and his awareness of policy-making is even less.
Kordahi’s comments alone, which were made several months ago before he became a minister, could not have flipped Saudi Arabia. They proved to be, however, the last nail in the coffin of a once-thriving relationship that has been deteriorating over the past few years, mainly due to Hezbollah’s expanding influence in Lebanon and its complete domination of its policies.
The Saudi move cost the Lebanese exports their fourth biggest market, more than a quarter of billion dollars a year. Lebanon will also lose Riyadh’s foreign direct investments, which in 2015 reached near $1 billion. Moreover, by prohibiting its nationals from visiting Lebanon, perhaps for fear of harm or harassment by Hezbollah, Riyadh will deprive Beirut of the desperately needed stream of foreign currency that Saudi tourists usually carry with them.
Stopping Lebanese imports into Saudi Arabia has been long in the making after Saudi authorities intercepted shipments of narcotics from Lebanon, usually hidden in produce. The drug trade is one of Hezbollah’s top revenue makers. Saudi Arabia demanded that the Lebanese state enforce better controls on its border crossings to make sure that exports are free of illicit material. In Lebanon, however, state authority proved too weak to intercept any Hezbollah shipments moving in or out of the country. Given such failure, Riyadh decided to stop its imports from Lebanon.
Riyadh, however, proved to be considerate enough by differentiating between Beirut’s rulers and the Lebanese who live and work in Saudi Arabia. Estimates have it that 300,000 Lebanese live in the kingdom, making them the largest expat community. Remittances from these expats help keep hundreds of thousands of people in Lebanon from falling into poverty.
The Saudi government has tolerated Lebanon’s ungrateful and belligerent policies toward the kingdom for a longtime.
When Lebanese diplomacy broke with Arab consensus at the Arab League by abstaining on a resolution that denounced the Iran regime for burning down the Saudi embassy in Tehran and the consulate in Mashhad in 2016, Riyadh still gave Lebanon the benefit of the doubt.
When, in 2018, France led a donor’s conference to lift up a diving Lebanese economy, Saudi Arabia stood out as the largest single donor when it pledged $1 billion out of a total of $11 billion. America threw in a billion of its own and the rest of the world raised the balance. At the time, despite its reservations over Hezbollah’s antagonism toward the kingdom and the complicity of the Lebanese state with the pro-Iran militia, Riyadh still looked the other way and extended Lebanon a lifeline that was designed to help the country reform and reboot its economy. But the Lebanese state proved too weak to implement any of the reforms required before Beirut could receive any aid money. The country’s economy plunged deeper into recession and now suffers runaway inflation and increasing poverty.
Since the 1950s, Saudi Arabia has been one of the biggest supporters and sponsors of Lebanon and its stability. In 1989, Saudi Arabia hosted and engineered the Taif Agreement that led to the end of the 15-year civil war. After the conflict, as after every round of war with Israel, Saudi Arabia was always the first to offer Lebanon donations for reconstruction and to deposit foreign currency at the Lebanese central bank to keep the economy and more importantly the national currency, afloat.
For more than a decade now, many Lebanese have taken Saudi Arabia for granted, reciprocating support with insults, contraband and taking the side of Riyadh’s enemies, first and foremost Iran, which invests nothing in the Lebanese economy.
Lebanese rulers are known for pursuing personal interests at the expense of national ones. As long as Hezbollah decides who rules Lebanon, the Lebanese government will go with Iran against their national interests, which are better served by sticking with Saudi Arabia instead. Too bad the Lebanese do not see this, or see it but do nothing about it.
Hussain Abdul-Hussain is a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy. Follow Hussain on Twitter @hahussain.
fdd.org · by Hussain Abdul-Hussain Research Fellow · November 3, 2021
9. China’s Xi Jinping, preparing for a third term, shuts the door on the past
Excerpts:
Xi’s robust control of Chinese institutions is likely to be at the heart of an ambitious break from China’s economic model of recent decades. In 2017, Xi declared that China had entered a “new era,” and this year he ruled that his predecessor’s goal of building a “moderately prosperous society” had been achieved.
As his expected third term approaches, Xi has begun to disrupt huge portions of the Chinese economy with highly politicized regulatory crackdowns that appear to be a significant rupture from the Deng-era mantra of development being the “only hard truth.”
Instead, Xi has called for “common prosperity,” signaling a new set of priorities for the country. On the emerging agenda are issues such as environmental degradation, a demographic crisis and rampant inequality, but at its core remains a desire to strengthen China by doing away with what Xi sees as sources of division and instability, said Andrew Polk, co-founder of the Trivium China consultancy.
China’s Xi Jinping, preparing for a third term, shuts the door on the past
As world leaders in Glasgow, Scotland, attempted to hash out an agreement to confront the global climate crisis in recent days, Chinese President Xi Jinping was not among them. Instead, his attention was on priorities closer to home, where he intends to make history of a different kind at a meeting of the Chinese Communist Party’s top leaders in Beijing next week.
In an unusual flair of ceremony, a meeting of the Central Committee, a decision-making body of 204 top officials, will review — and almost certainly pass — a resolution on the “major achievements and historical experiences” of the party’s first 100 years.
Only two previous leaders of China have similarly adjudicated on party history: Mao Zedong, the founder of the People’s Republic, and Deng Xiaoping, the strongman leader who unleashed market reforms in 1978. Both used the process to solidify power, settle thorny internal debates about the past and forge ahead with a new agenda.
For Xi, who has amassed personal control of the party to a far greater degree than his immediate predecessors, the passage of a history resolution paves the way for him to break with precedent and take on a third term in power in late 2022. After scrapping presidential term limits in 2018, Xi hopes to fortify expectations of his continued rule by laying out a vision for China comparable in ambition to Mao and Deng.
“It says a lot about his ambition and how he views himself as leader,” said Jude Blanchette, who holds the Freeman Chair in China Studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “The history resolution will mark a new epoch — one that Xi is leading.”
The last history resolution, passed in 1981, came at a difficult moment for the party. After Mao died in 1976, his successors had to confront the legacy of the “great helmsman” at a time when popular works of “scar literature” were exploring the guilt and trauma of the Cultural Revolution, during which Mao directed young zealots to wage a violent class war, resulting in millions of deaths.
The resolution served to set guardrails for criticism of the nation’s founder. It acknowledged Mao’s role in the “the most severe setback” in the party’s history but ruled that his achievements “far outweigh” his shortcomings.
There are few signs that Xi faces comparable internal fissures or the need to explore dark periods of China’s recent past, such as the massacre of pro-democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square in June 1989.
In recent years, Xi has railed against attempts to challenge the party’s official history — efforts he calls “historical nihilism” — and has passed laws that make slandering heroes of the past a criminal offense.
That makes this resolution distinct from those before it, which aimed to resolve concerns over problematic periods of the party’s history and dispel disagreements over a future path, said Deng Yuwen, a former editor at the Study Times, an official Communist Party publication, and now an independent commentator and government critic.
“There is no doubt that Xi’s ‘new era’ will be the focus and the highest priority of the new historical resolution,” Deng said in a video. “There won’t be new content or new breakthroughs in evaluating history.”
Ahead of the plenum, there has been a fresh wave of propaganda stressing Xi’s direct responsibility for recent national achievements. The People’s Daily, the party’s newspaper of record, has been running a series of front-page columns this week on “crucial choices” Xi made as he “personally planned, implemented and advanced” major policies.
Tuesday’s installment related how Xi’s personal devotion to the coronavirus response at times left him unable to sleep. “Every scientific judgment, every assessment of the situation, every decision to reverse the situation — all needed great political courage and wisdom,” the newspaper declared. “At the helm of this weighty ship was one man.”
“The language is far bolder,” said Manoj Kewalramani, a fellow for China studies at the Takshashila Institution think tank in India who writes a newsletter deciphering the newspaper’s messaging. “It’s no longer subtly telling you that Xi is in command. It is closer to demanding fealty.”
Xi may not face a crisis like the one triggered by Mao’s death, but he regularly speaks about profound changes to the global order unseen in a century that create both threats and a “window of strategic opportunity” for China’s rise.
China has “ushered in great leaps from standing up to getting rich and becoming strong,” Qiushi, the official journal of party theory, wrote on Monday to explain the necessity of another history resolution. Today, it said, the nation faces a challenging journey full of unresolved issues that require the party to “figure out how we can continue to succeed and better answer the problems of our age.”
Xi has set himself firmly at the helm of efforts to bring about the “great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation,” it declared.
The focus on Xi’s individual role has drawn comparisons to the personality cult of Mao. But observers of Chinese politics often argue that Xi’s approach is different, shunning the chaotic mass social movements of China’s early years in favor of building party institutions around himself.
“As paradoxical as it may seem, Xi’s ideology is centered around the idea of ruling according to the law,” said Ling Li, a scholar of Chinese politics at the University of Vienna, who has argued that Xi may resurrect a Mao-era “party chairman” title next year as he enters his third term.
But that vision of using law to rule is built not on judicial independence, but rather on melding party control with China’s legal system. He has “championed an effort to build a new party-state legal system where party rules and state laws coexist as an organic whole,” Li said.
Xi’s robust control of Chinese institutions is likely to be at the heart of an ambitious break from China’s economic model of recent decades. In 2017, Xi declared that China had entered a “new era,” and this year he ruled that his predecessor’s goal of building a “moderately prosperous society” had been achieved.
As his expected third term approaches, Xi has begun to disrupt huge portions of the Chinese economy with highly politicized regulatory crackdowns that appear to be a significant rupture from the Deng-era mantra of development being the “only hard truth.”
Instead, Xi has called for “common prosperity,” signaling a new set of priorities for the country. On the emerging agenda are issues such as environmental degradation, a demographic crisis and rampant inequality, but at its core remains a desire to strengthen China by doing away with what Xi sees as sources of division and instability, said Andrew Polk, co-founder of the Trivium China consultancy.
Pei Lin Wu in Taipei, Taiwan, contributed to this report.
10. Taiwan Won’t Capitulate to China
Conclusion from the Defense Minister of Taiwan:
Taiwanese military personnel know that peace has to be earned. We will not capitulate to China. We have the resolve and the ability to overcome challenges. With peace and regional security in mind, we are determined to fight for the survival and prosperity of the Republic of China and for the security and well-being of all Taiwanese people.
Taiwan Won’t Capitulate to China
Changes in military structure will help us meet any challenge.
Taiwanese soldiers hold grenade launchers and machine guns during an operation in Tainan, Taiwan, Sept. 14.
Photo: Ceng Shou Yi/Zuma Press
The Taiwan Strait is attracting a great deal of global attention, mainly because the international community is alarmed by the rise of China. China’s People’s Liberation Army is constantly expanding its ability to project force in the Indo-Pacific region, and its activities in the East and South China seas have unsettled many. China has harassed Taiwan through “gray zone” activities around the Taiwan Strait.
I am a defender of the Republic of China—also known as Taiwan—and a seasoned soldier in the resistance against PLA military threats. I was a director of division command staff during the 1996 Taiwan Strait missile crisis. But the current situation is the most challenging since I joined the army four decades ago. China has never given up its ambition to annex Taiwan. Preparing to counter all possible military actions by China has become a daily practice of the Republic of China Armed Forces. I can say proudly that our armed forces have never failed to protect the country. We serve our country with the highest loyalty, defending freedom and democracy so that the people of Taiwan can maintain their way of life and political system.
But there is no guarantee that peace will last forever. The stark reality: Taiwan is no match for China in resources, manpower and military technologies.
Here’s what Taiwan is doing to turn the tide in a battle against an enemy that is many times larger. China’s intention is to take Taiwan quickly and deny third parties the chance to intervene. Our military is developing asymmetric defense strategies that take advantage of the natural buffer of the Taiwan Strait. Taiwan is increasing its defense spending to build mobile, long-distance and precision strike capabilities. Weapons systems in development would help Taiwan construct multilayered and multidomain capabilities.
Since Taiwan first started the transition in 2012 from a conscription service to a professional fighting force, the military has transformed into an elite operation. Professional servicemen operate sophisticated weapons systems. High-quality manpower and regular combat exercises have strengthened Taiwan’s fighting capabilities. Basic maintenance of military bases is outsourced to allow combat units to focus on training and readiness. As a result of these changes, the proficiency of annual live-fire training evaluations and military exercises has improved.
Another priority is reforming the reserves. The Ministry of National Defense will establish in 2022 an agency designated to manage all-out defense mobilization. The agency will coordinate across government and marshal human and material resources throughout the country. Through peacetime planning and drilling, the reserve force will be able to support military operations in war. The Defense Ministry is also planning to intensify the training of reserve personnel and improve the organization, equipment and missions of the reserve force to augment Taiwan’s overall defense capability.
Taiwanese military personnel know that peace has to be earned. We will not capitulate to China. We have the resolve and the ability to overcome challenges. With peace and regional security in mind, we are determined to fight for the survival and prosperity of the Republic of China and for the security and well-being of all Taiwanese people.
Mr. Chiu is the Republic of China’s (Taiwan’s) minister of national defense.
Copyright ©2021 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8
11. Humans and Hardware: How Special Operations Can Pioneer Wearable Technology
I'm all for developing and acquiring advanced technology. I am not at all resistant to it. But I will always prioritize the human domain over technology. We need to sustain equal or even a higher priority on training and education. Technology without critical thinking and effective strategy and campaigning is not useful. There are no silver bullets.
In any technological revolution, there will be resistance to adopting new technology, especially in large organizations like Special Operations Command. Nevertheless, wearable technology has taken the world by storm. Large corporations have adopted wearables into healthcare policies, and wearable tech is an $81.5 billion industry. With a smaller population that is often presented with high chronic stress, Special Operations Command has the opportunity to lead the U.S. military in the use of wearable technology. By leveraging the recent revolution in wearables, programs such as Preservation of the Force and Family can bring humans and hardware together in the safest and smartest way possible.
Humans and Hardware: How Special Operations Can Pioneer Wearable Technology - War on the Rocks
In 2009, the U.S. Special Operations Command announced that “Humans are more important than hardware.” But with wearables revolutionizing sports medicine and athletics, the distinction between humans and hardware is less relevant than ever. This means that investing in wearable technology for special operations forces is now the best way to put humans first.
What might this look like? With a small population of elite warfighters in high-stress environments, Special Operations Command can lead the force in determining which wearable devices are worth the investment. The Preservation of the Force and Family program, which is already in place to improve the holistic health of special operations forces, can spearhead efforts to distribute, monitor, test, and best utilize wearables for the entire military.
A Wearable Revolution
In the last two decades, sports medicine and sports science have advanced dramatically. Athletes are now bigger, faster, and stronger due, in part, to advancements in technologies that allow them to train smarter. A critical facet of this revolution is wearable technology that offers athletes immediate and continuous feedback on an increasing number of health and performance metrics. The wearable trend started with simple Global Positioning System-enabled devices measuring steps taken in a day and heart-rate monitors allowing users to train in specific heart-rate zones. However, wearable technology is now quickly outpacing older, more expensive, and more invasive technologies. New Apple Watches, for example, allow users to bypass hospital visits by serving as both an electrocardiogram to monitor heart health and a pulse oximeter to measure blood oxygen levels in 10 seconds. Wearables’ rapid development is providing valuable new tools for physical therapists and healthcare professionals and eliciting optimism about the future of individualized self-care.
This revolution hasn’t gone unnoticed by the Department of Defense, which is testing wearables across different military branches. The U.S. Air Force recently began using the Oura Ring, a technology worn on your finger, to more accurately determine pilots’ flight readiness in the morning based on their overall sleep score. Previously, pilots’ flight readiness was determined by hours in bed rather than the quality of sleep. However, Oura Rings offer the ability to both measure sleep quality and potentially improve sleep, making pilots fitter to fly. Additionally, the U.S. Navy regularly tests various wearable devices at the Naval Postgraduate School Human and Systems Integration laboratory to study and improve crew rest, while the U.S. Army tests wearables to study soldiers’ resiliency in harsh winter conditions. As wearable technology continues to progress, so do the applications and opportunities to improve service members’ sleep, fitness, and overall health.
Wearables’ Potential in Special Operations
In 2012, Special Operations Command adopted the Preservation of the Force and Family strategy. The goal was to optimize and sustain mission readiness, longevity, and performance, thereby maximizing the estimated $1.5 million investment that the military makes in each member of special operations. The strategy seeks to provide precise preventative interventions and emphasisizes holistic health across five domains: physical, cognitive, psychological, social and family, and spiritual.
Wearable technology is already improving individual physical fitness and should be a critical component in enhancing operator health across every all of these domains. Wearables currently track a host of physical and biological metrics and use algorithms to generate useful approximations of additional metrics, including sleep quality, readiness, and stress. Many wearable interfaces offer coaching to “nudge” users towards healthier behaviors. Leading wearables, including the Oura Ring, Apple Watch, and Whoop Strap, offer nuanced sleep and activity coaching based on users’ unique metrics and trends. Put simply, wearables can tell you when you are overworked and need a break.
In an organization like Special Operations Command, which demands long hours under highly stressful conditions, having a tool that provides an objective measurement of readiness is uniquely valuable. Operators are specially selected and trained for resilience to adverse physical and mental conditions. Constant adaptation to a changing environment, however, comes at a cost. But this advantageous adaptation can produce allostatic load, leading to chronic physical maladies including pain, fatigue, and compromised immunity. Reduction of allostatic load first requires identification of increased stress. Enter wearables. Wearables can provide feedback on a host of biological metrics correlated with stress, including heart-rate variability, resting heart rate, and sleep quality. This makes it possible to identify chronic physiological stress, implement nuanced interventions, and prevent the difficulties associated with allostatic overload.
Mitigating Concerns
In a profession where chronic stress is so abundant that it produced the term “operator syndrome,” why are wearable technologies not already commonplace? For one thing, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all wearable. While one wearable specializes in sleep, for example, it may not be as effective at measuring physical activity. Concerns over operational security also dampen wearable enthusiasm in the Defence Department. And for good reasons — in 2018, the fitness and location tracking application Strava infamously illuminated the location of multiple overseas military bases. Similarly, privacy risks regarding collected data can cause hesitation in an increasingly connected and data-driven world. Data security and patient confidentiality are paramount concerns with aggregated health information collected from wearables, and have legal implications under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. While data is routinely stripped of identifiers, including names and addresses, it can become re-identifiable when correlated with other datasets.
Special Operations Command has an important role to play in helping to address these security and privacy concerns. Letting the Preservation of the Force and Family program lead the development of wearables can help by removing military commanders from the loop, preventing mandatory use and giving participants the power of consent. Personnel associated with this program are also trained and certified to handle protected health information, reducing the risk of a Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act violation and relieving military commanders of such a burden. Assigning random user identifications can help to avoid the disclosure of personal data. Preservation of the Force and Family personnel can further prevent the re-identification of anonymous users by isolating the wearables’ data, thereby preventing their merging with larger military data sets.
While there are simple ways to mitigate the known concerns over wearables, there will always be risks, especially with the early adoption of technology. These risks should be explored, preferably in a small and competent population, to best identify and understand wearables’ capabilities and limitations. Implementation and open dialogue will enable the force to exploit wearables’ significant potential to improve holistic health.
Wearables Are Coming!
In any technological revolution, there will be resistance to adopting new technology, especially in large organizations like Special Operations Command. Nevertheless, wearable technology has taken the world by storm. Large corporations have adopted wearables into healthcare policies, and wearable tech is an $81.5 billion industry. With a smaller population that is often presented with high chronic stress, Special Operations Command has the opportunity to lead the U.S. military in the use of wearable technology. By leveraging the recent revolution in wearables, programs such as Preservation of the Force and Family can bring humans and hardware together in the safest and smartest way possible.
Maj. Kevin Butler and Maj. Frank Foss are Army Special Forces officers currently pursuing a masters in Defense Analysis at the Naval Postgraduate School. Between them, they have over a dozen combat and operational deployments to the Central Command and Southern Command.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are the views of the authors alone. They do not reflect the official position of the Naval Postgraduate School, the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense, or any other entity within the U.S. government and the authors are not authorized to provide any official position of these entities.
12. U.S. Policy Toward Myanmar’s Military Junta
From one of our nation's experts on Southeast Asia.
The United States, of course, is not going to intervene directly in Myanmar. This is a peripheral, internal conflict and should be treated as such. But the United States should take advantage of a changed international context: The ASEAN states and China have shown a changed attitude towards the junta. A limited amount of U.S. leadership could go a long way.
The State Department is unlikely to recognize the National Unity Government as the official government of Myanmar, but it can step up meetings with them, and at least lobby for observer status and greater representation in regional meetings. Biden missed an opportunity to call for recognition of the National Unity Government when he attended the ASEAN summit in October. The Treasury Department is clearly in a position to put significantly more pressure on the regime. While imposing secondary sanctions is likely too drastic, more targeted sanctions against a cash-strapped military should happen moving forward. As the situation on the worsens in Myanmar, Washington should expect more cooperation from regional partners, including Thailand and Singapore.
The Treasury Department, Drug Enforcement Agency, U.S. Agency for International Development, State Department, the U.S. Agency for Global Media are already doing good work with respect to Myanmar — they just need to do more of it and in a more orchestrated fashion with a better defined political end state. U.S. Myanmar policy so far has been disjointed because it has lacked a high-level champion in the administration.
Congress, in an unusually bipartisan manner, has supported Myanmar’s democratic transition in the past, albeit in a manner too focused on Aung San Suu Kyi herself. It can endorse and fund these proposals, and give the administration the support it needs. Recently, the House passed the Protect Democracy in Burma Act of 2021, but it simply calls on the State Department to report on developments and find ways to hold the junta accountable. It is a first step, but needs teeth. With the first anniversary of the coup approaching, the time is ripe for both congressional chambers to hold hearings. Much has changed on the ground since the House Foreign Affairs Committee held hearings in early May.
The United States and the opposition in Myanmar share a common interest in ending military rule in the country and allowing it to become a federal democracy. This comports with U.S. values and geopolitical objectives. A failed state whose conflict is spilling over into a region of critical economic, political, and strategic importance does not. The United States should think about what a potential and realistic solution to this crisis looks like. It is time to enact a limited number of policies to help create the conditions for Myanmar’s people, the National Unity Government, and other ethnic armed organizations to chart a new constitutional and democratic course. Biden has stated that human rights are at the center of U.S. foreign policy — working to oppose a military junta in Myanmar would demonstrate that those words have meaning.
U.S. Policy Toward Myanmar’s Military Junta - War on the Rocks
Ten days after the inauguration of President Joe Biden, his foreign policy team faced a crisis in Southeast Asia. Namely, how should the United States respond to a military coup in Myanmar? On Feb. 1, 2021, Myanmar’s Army chief Gen. Min Aung Hlaing overthrew the democratically elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi. Her National League of Democracy routed the military-backed party two months earlier in national elections, marking the third straight election in which her party humiliated the military. Myanmar’s armed forces (also known as the Tatmadaw) baselessly claimed that the National League of Democracy had committed electoral fraud and arrested Suu Kyi on multiple charges. She and other party leaders have been under arrest ever since.
A nation-wide civil disobedience movement erupted after the coup, and has sustained itself ever since despite a crackdown from the security forces. The military has arrested over 9,600 people and killed more than 1,220 civilians. Reports suggest that the junta has tortured 131 people to death in government detention. In April 2021, members of the National League of Democracy — with representatives of Myanmar complex ethnic patchwork — established the National Unity Government of Myanmar, largely in exile.
The new Biden administration quickly sanctioned the regime (which calls itself the State Administrative Council) and seized $1 billion in assets. Ever since, however, the White House has done little else but pay lip service to the restoration of democracy and call on the Association for Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to do more. A recent high-level interagency delegation — led by State Department Counselor Derek Chollet — to Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, and Japan built on a recent decision by ASEAN members to disinvite junta leader Min Aung Hlaing to the ASEAN summit. This was followed by a virtual meeting National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan held with representatives of the National Unity Government on Oct. 25, and a virtual summit Biden attended alongside ASEAN leaders in which he called for the regime to be further isolated.
While it may not grab headlines like the collapse of the Afghan government, tensions over Taiwan, or Russian cyber attacks, the military coup in Myanmar and ongoing, deadly civil conflict touches on important elements of Biden’s foreign policy agenda. Specifically, it represents a setback for the president’s stated commitment to promoting democracy abroad. That Myanmar’s new military junta has extensive ties with China and Russia raises the stakes. U.S. interests in Myanmar are two-fold: restoring civilian rule and making sure the country does not fall under the complete sway of China. To advance U.S. interests amid a changed economic, diplomatic, and security situation in Myanmar, the Biden administration should recognize the National Unity Government, broaden current sanctions to take advantage of the military’s economic vulnerability, and increase humanitarian assistance through the National Unity Government and civil society organizations. In addition, the United States should consider changing its longstanding policy of avoiding contact with the various ethnic armed organizations that are fighting the regime.
A Continued Descent to a Failed State
Myanmar is teetering toward becoming a failed state. The new military junta has overseen economic collapse and the breakdown of basic administrative functions. Inflation is soaring and the financial system is on the brink. The kyat, Myanmar’s currency, lost 60 percent of its value, though it has slightly rebounded. From September to October, the Central Bank of Myanmar spent $110 million defending the kyat. Trade has dried up and the military is now banning the import of cars because foreign exchange is so hard to come by.
The World Bank predicts an 18.4 percent contraction in gross domestic product in 2021, while the United Nations predicts that half the population will be living under the poverty line in 2022. The decline in imported fertilizer portends declining crop yields. The government’s economic minister recently revealed that foreign exchange holdings ($6 billion) are significantly below what had been previously estimated, so the government’s ability to defend the kyat or withstand a further economic slide is limited. While some of the economic troubles are the result of the prolonged civil disobedience movement, any hope that the junta would be able to stabilize the economy has been dashed.
A Changing International Landscape
The junta has benefitted from global preoccupation with other crises, as few states have put much if any pressure on the regime beyond targeted sanctions. Within the U.N. Security Council, Myanmar’s new government has benefitted from Russian and Chinese backing. For Russia, Myanmar is a cost-effective way to leverage influence in a peripheral region, and it has shielded the junta from U.N. Security Council sanctions and an arms embargo. But the State Administrative Council’s main source of comfort was ASEAN’s strict policy of non-interference in the internal affairs of its member states.
That is changing. Myanmar’s junta is becoming increasingly isolated internationally as conditions in the country deteriorate and spill over. Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore successfully persuaded the organization to not invite junta leader Min Aung Hlaing from the ASEAN summit held Oct. 26 to 28 despite significant misgiving from states like Thailand and Vietnam. It was the first time the bloc had ever voted to exclude a leader. And there was very little sympathy for the junta. Indeed, ASEAN put the onus on the State Administrative Council by criticizing it using unprecedented language. Myanmar’s foreign ministry protested the ASEAN decision and chose not to send senior foreign ministry personnel in his place. The Malaysian foreign minister recently suggested that “Maybe now is the time for ASEAN to do serious soul searching on the application of the principle of non-interference and look at other experiences of other regions.” Although this is unlikely to gain traction, it is clear that the junta overplayed its hand and humiliated ASEAN by refusing to start implementing the five-point consensus reached with the group in April 2021.
Frustration within ASEAN is sure to mount, as the junta continues to delay meetings with the ASEAN special representative to Myanmar, who was only appointed after needless delays. Stung by Min Aung Hlaing’s exclusion from the ASEAN summit, the State Administrative Council might go further to thwart the mission of the ASEAN envoy. The new U.N. special representative for Myanmar is also likely to have little access.
Of equal concern for the junta is China’s growing frustration. Though Beijing quickly downplayed the coup d’etat and referred to it as a “” they have grown frustrated with the military government, whose economic and pandemic mismanagement have curtailed border trade and hindered Belt and Road Initiative projects. The wider conflict in Myanmar between the army and the various ethnic armed organizations threatens China’s $2 billion oil and gas pipelines across the country. China’s special representative demanded access to Aung San Suu Kyi, which was denied. When the junta threatened to dissolve the National League for Democracy, the Chinese Communist Party sent a message celebrating the party-to-party relations — a clear warning to the generals to back down. In August, China warned the junta that it would “make the necessary response” after artillery shells and bullets from fighting hit a Chinese town. China has provided COVID-19 vaccines to rebel groups along its border fighting the junta. In September, China reached a backroom deal with the United States to keep Myanmar’s U.N. ambassador — who had defected to the National Unity Government — seated at the United Nations, a huge embarrassment for the junta. It is inconceivable that countries that are so economically dependent on China, like Laos and Cambodia, would have acquiesced to the recent ASEAN decision to disinvite the junta’s leader without Beijing’s tacit support. China is clearly hedging.
A Changed Security Landscape
Myanmar’s economic and diplomatic position has clearly deteriorated since the military coup. What’s worse, from the perspective of junta, is that the country’s internal security situation is declining, too. A nationwide civil disobedience movement has opposed the junta since it overthrew the government. The protests have persisted despite government coercion and a brutal crackdown, which has led to the deaths of over 1,200 civilians.
Myanmar has always had a complex security landscape with dozens of ethnic armed organizations and pro-government rivals within their regions. Traditionally, they have not worked together, which has allowed Myanmar’s army to divide and rule. This time is different. Never has opposition to the military cut across so many of Myanmar’s ethnic and political fissures.
The coup did not clarify the situation. Several of the largest ethnic armed organizations, including the Kachin Independence Army and the Karen National Liberation Army have pledged support to the National Unity Government and have worked to train and arm its fighters. While the opposition government has significantly more representation from the ethnic minorities, and has pledged to establish a federal republic, there remains deep mistrust of the ethnic Bamar majority that dominates both the National League for Democracy and National Unity Government. The United Wa State Army is more willing to live with the junta if it looks the other way while they continue to participate in the lucrative illegal drug trade. The Arakan Army has maintained its pre-coup ceasefire with the army, but is clearly taking advantage of the army’s multiple fronts to consolidate its political autonomy. The military has just launched a major offensive in Chin State, in the country’s northwest, a region that has traditionally not seen large amounts of ethnic insurgent activity. Other offensives are under way in Sagaing township. But fighting is widespread.
An estimated 500 anti-military people’s defense forces and allied ethnic armed organizations are spreading the Myanmar military thin. The people’s defense forces are ostensibly the armed wing of the National Unity Government. And yet, they are proliferating so quickly that less than half are believed to be be under any semblance of being part of the National Unity Government’s chain of command, which is something it is working to address.
Despite earlier predictions that the people’s defense forces would be massacred in short order by the military, the Tatmadaw is not as disciplined as it was in the past and the label “battle hardened” ignores that so often it is fighting unarmed civilians. The militias are doing much better than anyone would have imagined, and clearly frustrating the army.
The National Unity Government claims nearly 1,600 government soldiers have been killed since it declared war against the junta on Sept. 7. There is no independent verification, and the military denies it, but casualties are definitely mounting. The Tatmadaw is constantly ferrying their best combat forces from one region to the next as casualties are starting to take their toll. During an eight-day period in October, three improvised explosive devices hit the military’s fortress-like capital, targeting military and police facilities. A recent bombing at a pro-junta rally in another government stronghold wounded three police and a soldier. The National Unity Government claims over 100 local-level administrators have been assassinated, including one in Naypiydaw. The assassinations and threats against them are starting to add up: hundreds of administrators have resigned in the last two months. Local militias continue to issue new deadlines for administrators to resign. And the violence is getting more targeted: The chief financial officer of one of the army-owned telecommunications firms was gunned down in broad daylight min Yangon, a move likely to make other military-linked executives very nervous..
The National Unity Government, its people’s defense forces, and the aligned ethnic armed organizations are not going to militarily defeat the Tatmadaw. But what they can do is create the conditions for growing factionalism within the ranks of the officer corps. The National Unity Government’s focus should be on creating “off ramps” for a significant number of officers before they can begin the arduous task of establishing a federal democratic system.
At the rank-and-file level, the National Unity Government is making some headway in getting soldiers and police to desert and defect. The opposition government and military defectors established People’s Embrace, an nongovernmental organization to support defectors, and stepped up a social media campaign to encourage more defections. People’s Embrace claims over 2,000 have joined their civil disobedience movement. The opposition government has stepped up rewards for officer defectors and is using them more effectively to encourage additional defections.
The National Unity Government is getting better at using social media to show the geographical spread of their resistance to the military. They are trying to demonstrate to military planners that they cannot win on so many fronts simultaneously. In response, the senior leadership is clearly doubling down. Indeed, a few personnel reshuffles have put some of the military’s most hardline generals in direct control of some of the offensives in Chin State and Sagaing. But the goal of the National Unity Government is to get a sufficient number of officers — from the rank of colonels to two-star generals — to withdraw their support from the senior leaders.
To that end, the National Unity Government wants lethal assistance. Their declaration of war is both morally defensible and lawful — they are clearly fighting in self-defense against a rapacious military junta. But though they may be deserving, that is not in the cards from the United States in the immediate aftermath of Afghanistan.
Eight Steps for U.S. Policy
In Myanmar, the United States has an interest in seeing the restoration of democracy under civilian rule and preventing an isolated autocratic regime completely under China’s sway. There are eight steps the Biden administration should take to advance its interests in Myanmar.
First, the United States should recognize the National Unity Government as the lawful government of the people of Myanmar. Chollet, the counselor of the State Department, “expressed appreciation for the National Unity Government’s leadership and dedication to the people of Burma in the face of the horrific violence perpetrated by the Burmese military regime.” However, the United States continues to recognize that same regime. Sullivan’s meeting with the National Unity Government was important, but fell far short of recognition.
Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin both attended ASEAN meetings with representatives of the military government. While shoring up relations with ASEAN is important, the United States should use growing frustration within ASEAN to isolate the junta’s representatives. This is the legitimacy the military craves. The Biden administration should deny it that satisfaction. At the same time, sending emissaries like former New Mexico governor Bill Richardson will achieve no concessions, but will instead be used by the military for propaganda and legitimizations.
At the same time, there are clear risks to establishing diplomatic relations with the National Unity Government. Most importantly, the State Department wants to be able to maintain a line of communications with the State Administrative Council. But there is little evidence that America’s diplomatic presence in country has any bearing on the junta.
The French Senate and European parliament both voted to recognize the National Unity Government. Although these were symbolic votes, they have merit. Malaysia was the first country in the region to threaten to talk with, if not formally recognize, the National Unity Government due to the military’s lack of good faith in implementing the five-point consensus. ASEAN parliamentarians are now calling for their governments to recognize the National Unity Government, although ASEAN itself has refused to formally meet with and recognize it.
Short of that, the State Department could withdraw its ambassador to downgrade ties with the junta. It could also step up meetings and coordination with the National Unity Government’s representatives and leadership. The United States can use its diplomatic leverage to demand that it be given a seat at the table, even as an observer in ASEAN or other international fora. At the very least, the Biden administration should threaten to recognize the National Unity Government as long as the Tatmadaw is launching major offensives and committing war crimes against its own people, war crimes the State Department acknowledges are happening.
Second, if the United States recognizes the National Unity Government it could either release the junta’s frozen assets to it or open a line of credit backed by the frozen assets. While the National Unity Government wants to be able to use the funding in order to purchase arms, the United States could limit this to humanitarian aid and relief supplies or non-lethal equipment.
Third, the United States should increase humanitarian assistance to the National Unity Government, circumventing the military regime. During the latest COVID-19 outbreak, the United States provided the National Unity Government with $50 million in vaccines and assistance. Washington needs to increase that amount. The military government has failed to deliver basic social services to its population, a space the National Unity Government is through civil society organizations and ethnic armed organizations. Myanmar’s medical community has been the backbone of the civil disobedience movement.
The National Unity Government clearly has limited administrative capacity on the ground, despite its legitimacy. So the United States should give Myanmar’s civil society organizations more resources so that they can undermine the military’s flagging legitimacy. And it should create the means to do so, as the junta seeks to control the formal and online banking sectors to starve civil society of funding.
Chollet began an important discussions with the Thai government (itself borne out of a 2014 coup d’etat) about opening up access for humanitarian assistance along the border. Thailand will be reluctant, as it have been a close supporters of the junta. More diplomatic pressure is needed on Bangkok, something that will be harder to accomplish without an ambassador in place. But after meeting with Chollet, the Thai foreign minister convened a meeting with the National Unity Government and civil society representatives about stepping up COVID-19 vaccine assistance to the ethnic armed organizations and displaced communities along the border. And Thailand’s prime minister just invited Biden to Thailand for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in 2022 in a bid to improve the alliance.
While the situation on the ground is chaotic, the United States Agency for International Development has a long history of monitoring aid projects and assistance programs. Both the National Unity Government and civil society organizations should be held to account for any international assistance and provide as much transparency as possible.
Chollet pressed Singapore, the largest investor in Myanmar and its key financial interlocutor, to do significantly more. He noted, “Singapore has significant financial leverage over the regime and we discussed how we can partner effectively to wield that.” To date, Singapore has been reluctant to sanction the State Administrative Council in any way or prevent three of its banks or other conglomerates from continuing operations in Myanmar. But there have been discernible changes after Chollet’s visit: The Singapore Stock Exchange began investigations into a local real estate development firm with large holdings in Myanmar and Singapore’s bourse has Myanmar’s only overseas-listed firm, a real estate development company with close ties to the military. This is a small but significant change in tone. Some Singaporean investors are starting to sever their ties with military-owned firms.
The United States should press Singapore specifically on Myanmar military front companies headquartered in the city state. Two military-linked corporations, LTR and Asian Aviation Resources, have offices in Singapore. Another two, Excellence Metal Casting and STE Global Trading, have previously been in the Singapore government’s crosshairs and wound up on the U.S. sanctions list for trading with North Korea. The latter firm’s owner is reportedly based in Singapore.
Beyond the region, Washington may have to target military suppliers of the junta in countries like Ukraine, where Washington has some leverage. Sadly the United States has none in Russia, Belarus, or Pakistan — where Myanmar’s military regime also has ties — but it should apply pressure where it can.
But sanctions are going to have to hit the junta much harder to have an impact. The United States has already targeted the more than a hundred companies owned or controlled by the military’s two conglomerates, Myanmar Economic Corporation and Myanmar Economic Holdings Public Company Limited. But the United States should consider broader sanctions, in particular in the banking sector.
While some have called for imposing secondary sanctions on the overseas operations of military-owned or military-linked entities, the U.S. government would get little support for this. Indeed, secondary sanctions could backfire if Washington hopes to get more assistance in targeted sanctions.
Fifth, the United States should revisit its policy on not maintaining ties with the various ethnic armed organizations. There is good reason that the government has had this policy: some have been involved in illicit narcotics production or trafficking and some have been too close to China. But any solution to Myanmar’s current conflict will entail greater participation from the different ethnic armed organizations, despite their lingering mistrust of the Bamar majority. Several have done much to support the National Unity Government’s militias and many have stepped up their own military engagements with the Tatmadaw. The Kachin Independence Organization, the Karen National Liberation Army, the Arakan Army, and other groups will have a seat at the table in any future negotiated settlement, so the United States should consider how best to engage them without the potential of significant blowback. There needs to be channels of communication with them.
At the very least, the United States could engage the political wings of these ethnic armed organizations (they all have them) regarding the distribution of medical supplies, COVID-19 vaccines, and other humanitarian assistance. The United States has been engaging Thailand on this thorny issue.
A riskier course of action would be to authorize the intelligence community to establish liaisons with several key ethnic armed organizations, especially those with least allegations of involvement in transitional crime. A less risky approach would be to authorize the intelligence community — if it has not already done so — to establish a liaison relationship with only the National Unity Government and let it leverage that relationship with the different ethnic armed organizations. For example, the United States could provide information on the army’s troop movements. This does not have to be the provision of high-level imagery. The United States could provide the commercial-grade — but timely — overhead imagery that the National Unity Government cannot afford.
This would have one additional benefit: As mentioned above, only half of Myanmar’s some 500 people’s defense forces are under the National Unity Government’s command. This is not good for the country in the long term. The National Unity Government does not have much to offer (weapons, equipment, or funding) the various people’s defense forces as an inducement. Some intelligence — or even the legitimacy garnered by U.S. recognition of the National Unity Government — would help draw some militias into some, albeit limited, command and control.
Sixth, the United States could provide assistance to the families of defecting senior members of the Tatmadaw. The key to the National Unity Government’s success is getting more and more senior officers to defect. The key to this happening is ensuring the safety of their families. Most — but not all — remain cantoned on military bases. Again, the United States will have to work with regional partners.
This is easier said than done. The military lives in cantonments, shops at military-owned stores, bank their money in military-owned financial institutions, and use military-owned mobile phones networks. Their family members are often employed by military-owned businesses. As such, they are more economically insulated. This has prevented army factionalism in the past. But that is not always true when the economic shocks are as great as they are today. Even military families are not immune, with a collapsed kyat and soaring inflation, especially when the ill-gotten gains of the country’s plundered natural resources are hoarded by the senior leadership. While some families could become more dependent on the military to insulate them from these shocks, not all will.
Seventh, the United States should step up law enforcement coordination and intelligence sharing in counter-narcotics, not just with Thai counterparts but also those in neighboring states. One of the key ways that the army funds itself — especially at the local level — is through taxing the production and transportation of illicit narcotics. Transnational criminal organizations have set themselves up in Shan State, now one of the world’s epicenters for methamphetamine production. The largest ethnic armed organization in this region is the United Wa State Army, which has been consistently tied to large-scale narcotic trafficking by the Drug Enforcement Agency. The group has neither endorsed the National Unity Government nor is it loyal to the junta. It has bought itself some autonomy through ceasefires and has clearly benefitted from the Tatmadaw’s campaigns on other fronts.
While the Thai government backs the military junta and sees themselves as a model, it is deeply concerned about the flow of narcotics into Thailand. In September, Thai authorities seized 60 million methamphetamine tablets from Myanmar. The first week of October saw the seizure of 16.2 million tablets of methamphetamine, 1.4 tons crystal meth, and 365 kilograms of ketamine. This is one area where the United States and Thailand can cooperate, despite their sputtering alliance and different approaches to political developments in Myanmar.
Orchestrating a Strategy
Absent a profound political change in Myanmar, the situation there is going to get progressively worse. The military has started its dry season offensives and there are well-founded fears of significant war crimes. The military leadership is clearly growing impatient with the spectrum of opposition to its rule. Confronted with diplomatic isolation and economic misery, the armed forces know that its window of opportunity to consolidate its rule is closing. Min Aung Hlaing and the other generals want results ahead of the anniversary of the coup. The military is not going to throw in the towel and accept the results of the election that it overturned. Similarly, there is little reason to trust that it will hold elections again, as it has already delayed them once. Despite its best efforts, the military is not going to defeat the National Unity Government and affiliated militant groups and impose its will on the population. The National Unity Government, its affiliated militias, and the ethnic armed organizations have little recourse but to escalate violence. The violence — and likely stalemate — will only compound the country’s humanitarian and economic morass.
The National Unity Government has real limitations on the ground. It is largely in exile and has tenuous command and control over the militias. But it does have popular legitimacy and is really the only hope for stability in Myanmar. Aung San Suu Kyi and some of the other imprisoned and aging National League for Democracy leaders have been discredited internationally because of their whitewash of the Rohingya genocide. There is little in the way of international support for her despite her shambolic trial. Indeed, Myanmar’s governance will have to look very different moving forward, which is why it is incumbent on the United States to engage the National Unity Government and its future leaders.
The Biden administration should put together an interagency strategy that will first create the context for a sufficient number of officers to withdraw their support from the military leadership. Second, such a strategy would help the National Unity Government enhance its legitimacy by providing humanitarian and public health assistance to ordinary people in Myanmar. Third, it would help begin a political dialogue that would strip away the military’s vast political powers and establish a civilian rule under a federal republican system.
The United States, of course, is not going to intervene directly in Myanmar. This is a peripheral, internal conflict and should be treated as such. But the United States should take advantage of a changed international context: The ASEAN states and China have shown a changed attitude towards the junta. A limited amount of U.S. leadership could go a long way.
The State Department is unlikely to recognize the National Unity Government as the official government of Myanmar, but it can step up meetings with them, and at least lobby for observer status and greater representation in regional meetings. Biden missed an opportunity to call for recognition of the National Unity Government when he attended the ASEAN summit in October. The Treasury Department is clearly in a position to put significantly more pressure on the regime. While imposing secondary sanctions is likely too drastic, more targeted sanctions against a cash-strapped military should happen moving forward. As the situation on the worsens in Myanmar, Washington should expect more cooperation from regional partners, including Thailand and Singapore.
The Treasury Department, Drug Enforcement Agency, U.S. Agency for International Development, State Department, the U.S. Agency for Global Media are already doing good work with respect to Myanmar — they just need to do more of it and in a more orchestrated fashion with a better defined political end state. U.S. Myanmar policy so far has been disjointed because it has lacked a high-level champion in the administration.
Congress, in an unusually bipartisan manner, has supported Myanmar’s democratic transition in the past, albeit in a manner too focused on Aung San Suu Kyi herself. It can endorse and fund these proposals, and give the administration the support it needs. Recently, the House passed the Protect Democracy in Burma Act of 2021, but it simply calls on the State Department to report on developments and find ways to hold the junta accountable. It is a first step, but needs teeth. With the first anniversary of the coup approaching, the time is ripe for both congressional chambers to hold hearings. Much has changed on the ground since the House Foreign Affairs Committee held hearings in early May.
The United States and the opposition in Myanmar share a common interest in ending military rule in the country and allowing it to become a federal democracy. This comports with U.S. values and geopolitical objectives. A failed state whose conflict is spilling over into a region of critical economic, political, and strategic importance does not. The United States should think about what a potential and realistic solution to this crisis looks like. It is time to enact a limited number of policies to help create the conditions for Myanmar’s people, the National Unity Government, and other ethnic armed organizations to chart a new constitutional and democratic course. Biden has stated that human rights are at the center of U.S. foreign policy — working to oppose a military junta in Myanmar would demonstrate that those words have meaning.
Zachary Abuza is a professor at the National War College and an adjunct professor in Georgetown’s University’s Security Studies Program. He is a columnist with Radio Free Asia. The views expressed here are his own and do not reflect the opinions of the National War College or Department of Defense.
13. Special Operations Forces and Great Power Competition
I think Linda Robinson and General Clarke do emphsisize and indirectly describe the two "SOF Trinities" and seeking balance between CT/DA with UW/FID.
Irregular Warfare
Unconventional Warfare
Support to Political Warfare
The Comparative advantage of SOF:
Governance
Influence
Support to indigenous forces and populations
With exquisite capabilities for the no fail CT and CP national missions
Special Operations Forces and Great Power Competition - Modern War Institute
Will the role and capabilities required of special operations forces change in a geopolitical context characterized by great power competition? How will SOF balance enduring counterterrorism missions with new requirements to deter great power rivals? Episode 39 of the Irregular Warfare Podcast brings together the commander of US Special Operations Command and a leading researcher of special operations to dig into these questions.
Key to mapping the way ahead is a substantive understanding of the contemporary competition environment, along with a recognition that the requirements for SOF vary greatly across regions and mission sets. Our guests discuss the SOF competencies that are likely to be most relevant to future conflict, with an emphasis on information operations and the importance of working with partner forces, and how US Special Operations Command and the Department of Defense can cultivate SOF talent that is ready to meet these dynamic requirements.
General Richard Clarke currently serves as the commander of US Special Operations Command. He has held command positions at all levels in both conventional and special operations units, to include serving as the commander of the 82nd Airborne Division and as the regimental commander of the 75th Ranger Regiment.
The hosts for this episode are Kyle Atwell and Shawna Sinnott. Please contact them with any questions about this episode or the Irregular Warfare Podcast.
Image credit: Staff Sgt. Thomas Mort, US Army
14. China has debated attacking Taiwan-controlled islands, Taiwan official says
China has debated attacking Taiwan-controlled islands, Taiwan official says
Chinese and Taiwanese national flags are displayed alongside a military airplane in this illustration taken April 9, 2021. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration//File Photo
TAIPEI, Nov 4 (Reuters) - A top Taiwan security official told lawmakers on Thursday that China had internally debated whether to attack Taiwan's Pratas Islands but will not do so before 2024, the year President Tsai Ing-wen's term ends.
National Security Bureau Director-General Chen Ming-tong did not say how he knew that such a move had been debated or why it would not happen during the next few years.
China's defence ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday.
Taiwan, a self-ruled island claimed by Beijing, has complained for over a year of repeated sorties by China's air force, often in the southwestern part of its air defence zone near the Taiwan-controlled but lightly defended Pratas Islands.
Lying roughly between southern Taiwan and Hong Kong, the Pratas are seen by some security experts as vulnerable to Chinese attack due to their distance - more than 400 km (250 miles) - from mainland Taiwan.
China has blamed Taiwan, and its most important international supporter the United States, for the simmering tensions across the Taiwan Strait.
"Attacking and capturing the Pratas Islands - this scenario where war is being used to force (Taiwan into) talks - our assessment is that this will not happen during President Tsai's tenure," Chen told a parliamentary meeting.
Chen was responding to a question from a lawmaker in Taiwan's main opposition party, the Kuomintang, on whether China would attack before 2024, when Tsai's second term is set to end.
"Frankly speaking, they have internally debated this before," Chen said, referring to China but without elaborating or mentioning when such a discussion occurred. "We obviously have some understanding," he said.
Taiwan's presidential office referred questions on the matter to the National Security Bureau, which did not immediately comment out of office hours.
One scenario Taiwan authorities fear is that China could capture the Pratas Islands in a drastic escalation of tensions that could lead to a war, officials have said previously.
Taiwan has repeatedly said it wants to maintain the status quo with China, but vows to defend its freedom and democracy.
Chen told lawmakers that while the situation is more tense than in the past, it had not reached the point of an actual attack on Taiwan. "In the next one, two, three years, within President Tsai's tenure, it won't happen," he said.
In Washington on Wednesday, General Mark Milley, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, said China was unlikely to try to militarily seize Taiwan in the next couple of years, even as its military develops capabilities that would enable forcibly retaking the island. read more
Reporting by Sarah Wu and Yimou Lee with additional reporting by Yew Lun Tian in Beijing; editing by Mark Heinrich
15. The Small Pacifist Party That Could Shape Japan’s Future
Excerpts:
Accordingly, Kishida will have to find a balance between his LDP, particularly its right wing, and its coalition partner. Yet significant as the gap on China between the two parties appears, it does not necessarily mean the coalition is at risk of breaking. Perhaps the main lesson from their two-decade-old partnership is that both parties have been committed to compromise.
Indeed, it is precisely Komeito’s willingness to be flexible that gives it power. It is willing to negotiate with the LDP but often wants to remind the LDP that it must be mindful of public opinion when pursuing potentially controversial policy changes. As a result, the outcome of the coming debates on Japan’s China and defense policies, which will likely wait until after upper house elections next summer, will most likely reflect a painstakingly crafted consensus between the two parties.
The coalition between the LDP and Komeito may not last forever. When Soka Gakkai founder Ikeda dies—he turns 94 in January—it could lead the movement’s vote-gatherers to reconsider whether Komeito still serves the religion’s interests and whether electioneering is in fact a necessary component of their practice. Soka Gakkai members prevaricating on electioneering would make Komeito a less dependable partner for the LDP. Meanwhile, the LDP’s conservatives may become less tolerant of the party’s more pacifist partner as the regional security environment worsens, leading them to entertain alternative partners or to try their luck without a coalition partner.
Nevertheless, for the time being it remains likely that the LDP will seek to keep Komeito within the coalition for as long as it helps LDP candidates retain their seats. And as long as Komeito is included in the LDP-led government, applying the brakes on the ruling party’s more ambitious policies, it may be more important to pay attention to what its leaders say than to some of the more provocative remarks of their LDP colleagues.
The Small Pacifist Party That Could Shape Japan’s Future
The Komeito party will be a key player in the new government.
By Tobias Harris, a senior fellow for Asia at the Center for American Progress, and Levi McLaughlin, an associate professor in the department of philosophy and religious studies at North Carolina State University.
Komeito leader Natsuo Yamaguchi attaches a paper flower to the name of a winning candidate in Japan’s lower house election at the party’s headquarters in Tokyo on Oct. 31. Miho Ikeya/Yomiuri Shimbun via AP Images
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida returned to work this week with a new mandate after his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and its junior coalition partner Komeito won a majority of 293 seats in Japan’s 465-seat House of Representatives. Kishida was the big winner in Sunday’s elections, limiting the LDP’s losses to only 15 seats. It had been bracing to lose dozens more. However, Komeito also had a good night, increasing its total by three seats to 32.
It’s easy to overlook Komeito. After all, the party’s parliamentary presence seems marginal; with 261 seats of its own, the LDP could control the House of Representatives independently. But after more than 20 years of partnership with the LDP, Komeito has become an indispensable player in Japan’s government.
And as the Kishida government weighs whether to boost defense spending, expand Japan’s role in regional crises, and enable its armed forces to strike targets in foreign countries, Komeito, which was founded on a platform of advancing world peace and has enjoyed decades of close ties with the Chinese government, will play a significantly greater role than its numbers would suggest.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida returned to work this week with a new mandate after his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and its junior coalition partner Komeito won a majority of 293 seats in Japan’s 465-seat House of Representatives. Kishida was the big winner in Sunday’s elections, limiting the LDP’s losses to only 15 seats. It had been bracing to lose dozens more. However, Komeito also had a good night, increasing its total by three seats to 32.
It’s easy to overlook Komeito. After all, the party’s parliamentary presence seems marginal; with 261 seats of its own, the LDP could control the House of Representatives independently. But after more than 20 years of partnership with the LDP, Komeito has become an indispensable player in Japan’s government.
And as the Kishida government weighs whether to boost defense spending, expand Japan’s role in regional crises, and enable its armed forces to strike targets in foreign countries, Komeito, which was founded on a platform of advancing world peace and has enjoyed decades of close ties with the Chinese government, will play a significantly greater role than its numbers would suggest.
Komeito is affiliated with a religious organization, setting it apart from other Japanese political parties. It was created in 1964 by the lay Buddhist organization Soka Gakkai, which exploded from a few thousand to millions of adherents in the decades following World War II, attracting converts in large part from the migrants swelling Japan’s rapidly growing cities.
The religion has gained notoriety for its hard-sell proselytizing, exclusivist beliefs, and reverence for its leader Daisaku Ikeda, whom members regard unequivocally as their prime authority. Created initially to advance the religion’s interests (thus attracting criticism for violating postwar norms on the separation of church and state), Komeito evolved into a more conventional party representing the economic interests of housewives, shopkeepers, and other important Soka Gakkai constituencies. It has been the consummate political survivor, first allying with parties on the left and then securing a lasting place in government after joining forces with the conservative LDP in 1999.
The partnership between the LDP and Komeito was an unlikely one, and few would have expected it to endure as long as it has. After all, there is little policy overlap between them. Komeito focuses primarily on policies that appeal to its key constituency: Soka Gakkai’s Married Women’s Division. These have included maintaining a reduced consumption tax rate on household staples, advocating for reduced schooling fees, and offering child allowances. While these do not necessarily conflict with the LDP’s economic and social policy goals, Komeito’s focus on delivering benefits to its constituents has made it a dogged negotiating partner.
The most significant differences between the two parties are on security policy. At its founding, Komeito was committed to absolute pacifism, and in its early years it rejected the constitutionality of Japan’s Self-Defense Forces and the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty. As the party transformed into a more conventional political player, it softened its opposition to these pillars of Japanese national security.
In coalition with the LDP, Komeito has tended to follow the larger party’s lead on security legislation. It voted to dispatch armed forces in support of allied operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, and in favor of the security laws of 2015, which, following a 2014 reinterpretation of the constitution, enabled the Self-Defense Forces to exercise the right of “collective self-defense” to come to the aid of their American allies.
But Komeito has not merely been a rubber stamp for the LDP. The party’s leaders have often referred to their role in the coalition as a “brake” on the LDP’s more hawkish ambitions. For example, Komeito forced (now former) Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s administration to accept that collective self-defense would be permitted only in a limited number of circumstances. It has also thwarted the push by the LDP conservatives to replace Article 9, the postwar constitution’s famed “peace clause,” with more permissive language.
Why has the LDP remained wedded to its coalition with a party that has been explicitly committed to resisting the ambitions of the ruling party’s increasingly predominant right wing? Ultimately they have achieved a political symbiosis that is particularly well adapted to Japan’s two-tier electoral system. Under that system, voters cast one ballot for a candidate in single-member constituencies and one for a political party in 11 regional proportional representation blocks. The two parties have agreed not to run candidates against one another in single-member districts. In exchange, Komeito directs its supporters to vote for LDP candidates, while the LDP is expected to instruct its supporters in some districts to vote for Komeito.
The secret to this arrangement is Soka Gakkai’s vote-gathering power. While Komeito’s total seat count in the Diet (Japan’s parliament) remains modest, it punches above its weight by mobilizing its religious supporters for every election, from village assemblies up to the Diet. The party also benefits from low overall turnout among the broader Japanese public: When just over half of eligible voters in Japan head to the polls, a reliable bloc of Soka Gakkai supporters wields significant influence. And although Komeito no longer pursues explicitly religious objectives, Soka Gakkai members have consistently treated campaigning for Komeito and its LDP allies as a component of their religious practice. In exchange for securing votes for LDP candidates—a crucial factor in tight races—Komeito retains a seat at the table in the government.
However, with the election behind them, the LDP-Komeito partnership will be stressed as never before. There may be no more urgent issue facing Kishida than what to do about Japan’s relationship with China. While fears of the “China threat” have been barely concealed in Japanese politics for years, China’s crackdown in Hong Kong, revelations about human rights abuses in Xinjiang, and the worsening military balance across the Taiwan Strait have emboldened proponents of a harder line toward China and quieted advocates of engagement.
Few supporters of engagement are as committed as Komeito. Of all parties in the Diet, Komeito enjoys the strongest and most stable relationship with China, and Komeito and Soka Gakkai leaders have forged intimate connections with senior Chinese leaders. Diplomatic normalization between Japan and China depended to a large extent on efforts by the Komeito politician Yoshikatsu Takeiri, whose negotiations with Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai served as the basis for the formal agreement the two countries signed in September 1972. And both the religious group and its affiliated party have continued to keep lines of communication open between Tokyo and Beijing even when diplomatic relations have been strained.
A China gap between the two parties was on full display in their 2021 campaign manifestos. While Komeito’s included planks calling on China to account openly for Beijing’s violations of human rights and civil liberties, and criticized China’s violation of international law in the East and South China seas, these planks were carefully phrased; the overall thrust of Komeito’s China policy is restoring stable relations between the two neighbors, noting their history of “overcoming various disagreements.”
By contrast, the only explicit reference to China in the LDP’s manifesto is as a burgeoning military power threatening to change the status quo by force. China is also the looming threat behind a lengthy section on “economic security,” the byword for the LDP’s growing focus on protecting Japan’s advanced technologies from theft and reducing dependence on China for critical manufactured products. In short, whereas Komeito wants to restore diplomacy and person-to-person exchanges as soon as possible, the LDP’s conservatives view China’s advances as requiring a thorough and prompt upgrading of Japan’s approach to national defense.
The tensions between the parties were plainly visible leading up to the election. Responding to a plank in the LDP manifesto calling for raising defense spending above the long-standing 1 percent of GDP level “with an eye toward the NATO standard 2 percent of GDP,” on election night Komeito leader Natsuo Yamaguchi allowed that while defense spending may increase somewhat, “I don’t think a sudden doubling will win the understanding of the public.” Yamaguchi also criticized as outmoded calls from the LDP, including from Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi, to conduct a review of whether Japan should acquire capabilities to strike “enemy bases” to deter or punish missile attacks on Japan.
Accordingly, Kishida will have to find a balance between his LDP, particularly its right wing, and its coalition partner. Yet significant as the gap on China between the two parties appears, it does not necessarily mean the coalition is at risk of breaking. Perhaps the main lesson from their two-decade-old partnership is that both parties have been committed to compromise.
Indeed, it is precisely Komeito’s willingness to be flexible that gives it power. It is willing to negotiate with the LDP but often wants to remind the LDP that it must be mindful of public opinion when pursuing potentially controversial policy changes. As a result, the outcome of the coming debates on Japan’s China and defense policies, which will likely wait until after upper house elections next summer, will most likely reflect a painstakingly crafted consensus between the two parties.
The coalition between the LDP and Komeito may not last forever. When Soka Gakkai founder Ikeda dies—he turns 94 in January—it could lead the movement’s vote-gatherers to reconsider whether Komeito still serves the religion’s interests and whether electioneering is in fact a necessary component of their practice. Soka Gakkai members prevaricating on electioneering would make Komeito a less dependable partner for the LDP. Meanwhile, the LDP’s conservatives may become less tolerant of the party’s more pacifist partner as the regional security environment worsens, leading them to entertain alternative partners or to try their luck without a coalition partner.
Nevertheless, for the time being it remains likely that the LDP will seek to keep Komeito within the coalition for as long as it helps LDP candidates retain their seats. And as long as Komeito is included in the LDP-led government, applying the brakes on the ruling party’s more ambitious policies, it may be more important to pay attention to what its leaders say than to some of the more provocative remarks of their LDP colleagues.
Tobias Harris is a senior fellow for Asia at the Center for American Progress and the author of The Iconoclast: Shinzo Abe and the New Japan. Twitter: @observingjapan
Levi McLaughlin is an associate professor in the department of philosophy and religious studies at North Carolina State University. He is co-author of Komeito: Politics and Religion in Japan and author of Soka Gakkai’s Human Revolution: The Rise of a Mimetic Nation in Modern Japan. Twitter: @mclaughlin_levi
16. State Department: Thousands of U.S. Residents Still Stuck in Afghanistan
Excerpts:
The struggle to extract Americans, green card holders, and those who qualify for special immigrant visas has gotten more difficult with the Taliban reasserting power and a humanitarian crisis looming for millions of displaced Afghans. The international community is facing increasing pressure from Afghanistan’s satellite embassies, which don’t answer to the Taliban, to address the country’s growing need for humanitarian relief. This week, the United Nations planned three trips to airlift winterization resources to Kabul ahead of cold weather.
Many Afghans who tried to flee the country were ultimately left behind: A report by Human Rights First found the majority of individuals who applied for special immigrant visas—as many as 18,000 people—were not included in the evacuation this summer. But even those who made it out of Afghanistan and touched down in the United States, around 70,000 people in total, continue to face barriers in spite of new efforts by the State Department to allow private citizens to sponsor Afghans as they craft a new life in the country.
Increasing desperation to get vulnerable Afghans out of the country is reflected in Congress. Questioning from McCaul and other Republicans turned a hearing nominally called to quiz the State Department on management reforms into an impromptu oversight hearing on Afghanistan, which sent Democrats reeling to defend the chaotic drawdown.
“When those on the inside are fleeing, you get a stampede,” said Rep. Brad Sherman of California, the second ranking Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. “I’ve never seen an orderly stampede. I’ve never seen an administration be able to plan for an orderly stampede.”
State Department: Thousands of U.S. Residents Still Stuck in Afghanistan
Foreign Policy · by Jack Detsch, Kelly Kimball, Robbie Gramer · November 3, 2021
The department hasn’t made the numbers public, but angry lawmakers are running out of patience.
NEW FOR SUBSCRIBERS: Click + to receive email alerts for new stories written by Jack Detsch, Robbie Gramer
People leave to board a Pakistan International Airlines plane, which is the first international commercial flight to land since the Taliban retook power in Afghanistan on Aug. 15, at the airport in Kabul on Sept. 13. Karim Sahib/AFP via Getty Images
The State Department believes as many as 14,000 U.S. legal permanent residents remain in Afghanistan, Foreign Policy has learned, as the agency faces increasing scrutiny from Congress about the status of U.S. citizens and green card holders that are still stranded in the Taliban-controlled country.
The finding, disclosed by a congressional aide familiar with the matter, has been transmitted by the State Department to aides on Capitol Hill in private, but officials demurred on revealing the figure when questioned by Republican lawmakers on Wednesday, insisting the agency doesn’t track the figure.
“Isn’t the operating assumption about 14,000?” Republican Rep. Chris Smith asked Brian McKeon, deputy secretary of state for management and resources, at a hearing on Wednesday, referring to the figure briefed in private.
The State Department believes as many as 14,000 U.S. legal permanent residents remain in Afghanistan, Foreign Policy has learned, as the agency faces increasing scrutiny from Congress about the status of U.S. citizens and green card holders that are still stranded in the Taliban-controlled country.
The finding, disclosed by a congressional aide familiar with the matter, has been transmitted by the State Department to aides on Capitol Hill in private, but officials demurred on revealing the figure when questioned by Republican lawmakers on Wednesday, insisting the agency doesn’t track the figure.
“Isn’t the operating assumption about 14,000?” Republican Rep. Chris Smith asked Brian McKeon, deputy secretary of state for management and resources, at a hearing on Wednesday, referring to the figure briefed in private.
“We don’t track [legal permanent residents],” McKeon responded. “It’s a good question why we don’t,” he added, suggesting the lack of clarity might be because the State Department does not require Americans and legal permanent residents traveling abroad to report their whereabouts.
The new number sheds light on the extent to which the United States’ chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan left U.S. citizens, residents, and important Afghan allies in the lurch as a lightning-fast Taliban offensive swept across the country. McKeon revealed 289 U.S. citizens remain in Afghanistan as of Tuesday and a further 81 Americans are ready to depart. McKeon added that 140 Americans have departed in the last week.
The U.S. State Department also has to confirm that people still in Afghanistan want to leave and have the right travel documents, McKeon said. The agency has prioritized the evacuation of U.S. citizens ahead of legal permanent residents and green card holders, which Foreign Policy reported last month. The State Department did not clarify the numbers of legal permanent residents who wanted to leave, the congressional aide said.
The State Department insisted it does not have an exact tally of U.S. legal permanent residents (LPRs) in Afghanistan in a statement to Foreign Policy. “We do not have an exact number of LPRs and their immediate family members who have departed or who remain in Afghanistan,” a State Department spokesperson said in an email. “In this extraordinary situation we are facing in Afghanistan, we have helped LPRs seeking assistance to depart wherever possible.”
Lawmakers have criticized the State Department for being too slow to release specific numbers on how many citizens, legal permanent residents, and Afghans who supported the U.S. war effort remain in the country. Administration officials said the numbers are difficult to track and constantly shifting while infuriated U.S. lawmakers charge the administration is failing in its duty to keep track of the statistics or is keeping the full scope of people left behind under wraps. In the month after the U.S. withdrawal, the State Department repeatedly said there were around 100 U.S. citizens still in the country seeking to leave—until it revealed in recent weeks there were around 400 people.
The rapid U.S. withdrawal and Taliban takeover left many Afghan allies and their family members in hiding as they awaited news on escape routes out of the country. Some who were left behind were killed by the Taliban or other militant groups in revenge killings while others were safely ferried away to the United States or third countries awaiting U.S. visas. Rep. Michael McCaul, the top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, expressed frustration at the lack of progress in evacuating U.S. citizens trapped in the Afghan northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif.
“These girls and mothers and families, they’re all in safe houses outside Mazar-i-Sharif, and they can’t get out of the country,” McCaul said. “There are many of them. The only response I’ve gotten is that this is under State Department review.”
McKeon, the State Department official, said spotty safety records of charters flying out of Mazar-i-Sharif had prevented some flights. He also said in testimony that one U.S. citizen had recently been arrested in the Taliban-controlled country, and U.S. officials were unsure of that person’s whereabouts.
The struggle to extract Americans, green card holders, and those who qualify for special immigrant visas has gotten more difficult with the Taliban reasserting power and a humanitarian crisis looming for millions of displaced Afghans. The international community is facing increasing pressure from Afghanistan’s satellite embassies, which don’t answer to the Taliban, to address the country’s growing need for humanitarian relief. This week, the United Nations planned three trips to airlift winterization resources to Kabul ahead of cold weather.
Many Afghans who tried to flee the country were ultimately left behind: A report by Human Rights First found the majority of individuals who applied for special immigrant visas—as many as 18,000 people—were not included in the evacuation this summer. But even those who made it out of Afghanistan and touched down in the United States, around 70,000 people in total, continue to face barriers in spite of new efforts by the State Department to allow private citizens to sponsor Afghans as they craft a new life in the country.
Increasing desperation to get vulnerable Afghans out of the country is reflected in Congress. Questioning from McCaul and other Republicans turned a hearing nominally called to quiz the State Department on management reforms into an impromptu oversight hearing on Afghanistan, which sent Democrats reeling to defend the chaotic drawdown.
“When those on the inside are fleeing, you get a stampede,” said Rep. Brad Sherman of California, the second ranking Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. “I’ve never seen an orderly stampede. I’ve never seen an administration be able to plan for an orderly stampede.”
Jack Detsch is Foreign Policy’s Pentagon and national security reporter. Twitter: @JackDetsch
Kelly Kimball is the social media editor at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @kellyruthk
Robbie Gramer is a diplomacy and national security reporter at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @RobbieGramer
17. Nakasone: Cold War-style deterrence 'does not comport to cyberspace'
Excerpts:
Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, who moderated the discussion, noted that some reports said CYBERCOM caused adversaries “pain” in 2018. “Did you make them feel pain?” Ignatius asked Nakasone.
Nakasone smiled, paused for a moment, and said, “You’d have to ask them.”
Still, despite the purported hunt forward operations to protect the 2018 and 2020 elections, as well as interfering with REvil, the ability to permanently stop threat actors via persistent engagement or other means will likely continue to elude the US.
Indeed, Microsoft revealed last week that the Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) has not been deterred from hacking US infrastructure and companies since being outed and sanctioned for the SolarWinds campaign in April. Nor since President Joe Biden in June asked Russian President Vladimir Putin to please stop hacking the US. The SVR has continued operations, merely changing its targets and some tactics. And so the unseen competition in cyberspace continues unabated.
One unknown metric of success, of course, is just how many CYBERCOM (and NSA) operations have succeeded, given their reluctance to confirm or deny their own operations, much less discuss them in detail. So, for every periodic high-profile hack that is discovered, it could be that dozens or even hundreds of hacks are proactively prevented via persistent engagement.
Given the futility of total cyber deterrence, one thing is for certain: “Going forward, cybersecurity is going to be central to our national security,” Nakasone said.
Nakasone: Cold War-style deterrence 'does not comport to cyberspace' - Breaking Defense
"Strategic competition is alive and well in cyberspace, and we're doing it every day with persistent engagement," the CYBERCOM and NSA leader said.
Director of the NSA and Commander of the U.S. Cyber Command Paul Nakasone speaks during a hearing on April 15, 2021 in Washington, D.C.(Photo by Al Drago-Pool/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON: Gen. Paul Nakasone reiterated on Wednesday that traditional military deterrence “is a model that does not comport to cyberspace,” despite oft-heard calls for cyber deterrence in the wake of the latest cybersecurity incident.
“I grew up in the deterrence world,” the CYBERCOM and National Security Agency leader told the 2021 Aspen Security Forum, referring to the Cold War years when the US and Soviet Union operated according to nuclear deterrence, given the mutually assured destruction presumed to follow a misstep by either side. Traditional deterrence is a “binary world” of “yes or no” in regards to conflict, Nakasone observed.
But those rules don’t hold in cyberspace, where much of the nefarious activity — whether by nation-states, cybercriminal ransomware gangs, or other threat actors — plays out non-stop in an ambiguous strategic gray zone.
To this point, in a separate talk at Aspen, Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Mark Milley said the Pentagon sees “millions of attempts” to breach its networks every day. “We are in a very, very contested domain in cyber,” Milley said. “Every day our nation is literally being hacked. Is it out there? Yes. Is it serious? Yes.”
The benefits of cyber operations have proven significant for US adversaries, making total deterrence all but impossible. After all, relative to kinetic conflict, the financial cost to operate in cyberspace is negligible, the barriers to entry practically nonexistence (given the right talent), and the ease of operating trivial. And why bother with the time and risk involved in human intelligence gathering when one can sit halfway across the world and waltz right in the back door to steal reams of data on US cleared personnel? Or snag Americans’ health care data in bulk? Or exfiltrate heaps financial data?
Meanwhile, the consequences to adversaries for acting in cyberspace — assuming a hack can be attributed with high confidence in the first place — are oftentimes insignificant judging by adversaries’ continued operations, despite the high-profile naming and shaming or the occasional arrest.
This is especially the case as long as threat actors, particularly nation-states, keep cyber activities below a level justifying a kinetic response, a concept known as operating in the gray zone. Cyberespionage campaigns such as SolarWinds and the Microsoft Exchange hacks are viewed as gray-zone activities — often frustrating, sometimes costly, but never justifying a traditional military response.
Limited deterrence generally keeps adversaries from escalating beyond the gray zone, observers note. James Lewis, a cyber expert at the Center for Strategic & International Studies, suggested earlier this year it would be foolish for adversaries to do so.
“The question would be: When would it be in Russia’s interest to launch some kind of major, old-style attack, and I think the answer is never,” Lewis said. “Why would they do that? They’re winning now. …The Chinese probably feel the same way.”
To address continued hacks against American infrastructure and institutions, CYBERCOM has adopted a doctrine known as “persistent engagement.” Persistent engagement acknowledges the futility of totally deterring adversaries from operating in cyberspace and instead focuses on proactively disrupting those activities — ideally, before they can inflict damage.
Nakasone has previously characterized persistent engagement as “centered on the construct of both enable and act.” Nakasone said “enable” means sharing threat indicators, pooling resources, and providing insights. “Act” entails “hunt forward” — that is, proactively identifying security vulnerabilities in partners’ networks overseas, with permission — as well as offensive operations and information operations.
So, rather than cyber deterrence, Nakasone and other officials speak instead of “imposing costs” on adversaries via persistent engagement.
“Strategic competition is alive and well in cyberspace, and we’re doing it every day with persistent engagement,” Nakasone told the Aspen audience. “We’re in competition every day…. We’ve got to somehow impact adversaries who don’t get the message. We’ve got to impose costs. The important thing to emphasize here is we have the capabilities, we have a process to enable capabilities, and we have the people to carry out the capabilities.”
The latest known example of persistent engagement allegedly occurred within the past few months, when CYBERCOM worked with an unnamed foreign government to “shut down” the ransomware gang REvil’s operations, as first reported by the Washington Post. REvil has conducted a number of high-profile ransomware attacks in recent years.
CYBERCOM declined to confirm or deny the Washington Post’s report and did not provide additional comments.
Despite the setback, REvil is unlikely to cease operations permanently. More than likely, the disappearance is merely a pause. The gang will likely reemerge in the future with a new online identity and brand before resuming its lucrative ransomware attacks. Or, put another way, it’s unlikely to be totally deterred.
In his talk, Nakasone also harkened back to the 2018 US midterm elections, which he called “the seminal event” in CYBERCOM’s evolution toward persistent engagement. “To understand the future, you have to go back to 2018. Out of ’18, we learned a few things. We were putting the finishing touches on hunt forward,” the general said. In 2018, CYBERCOM decided, “We’re going to act. We’re not going to watch anymore,” he added.
Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, who moderated the discussion, noted that some reports said CYBERCOM caused adversaries “pain” in 2018. “Did you make them feel pain?” Ignatius asked Nakasone.
Nakasone smiled, paused for a moment, and said, “You’d have to ask them.”
Still, despite the purported hunt forward operations to protect the 2018 and 2020 elections, as well as interfering with REvil, the ability to permanently stop threat actors via persistent engagement or other means will likely continue to elude the US.
Indeed, Microsoft revealed last week that the Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) has not been deterred from hacking US infrastructure and companies since being outed and sanctioned for the SolarWinds campaign in April. Nor since President Joe Biden in June asked Russian President Vladimir Putin to please stop hacking the US. The SVR has continued operations, merely changing its targets and some tactics. And so the unseen competition in cyberspace continues unabated.
One unknown metric of success, of course, is just how many CYBERCOM (and NSA) operations have succeeded, given their reluctance to confirm or deny their own operations, much less discuss them in detail. So, for every periodic high-profile hack that is discovered, it could be that dozens or even hundreds of hacks are proactively prevented via persistent engagement.
Given the futility of total cyber deterrence, one thing is for certain: “Going forward, cybersecurity is going to be central to our national security,” Nakasone said.
18. Why won't Biden save the Afghan commandos?
Excerpts:
Moreover, Mann asks why it is that a former barber at Bagram Airfield is prioritized over a commando? The commandos were under Afghan command and thus forced to rely on humanitarian parole submissions for evacuation. That puts them near the back of the queue. But that bureaucratic red tape can't be an excuse that prevents otherwise well-intentioned State Department officers from acting faster. Mann fears that as time goes on, some commandos may be forcibly co-opted into the Taliban's service. Perhaps that will be their only choice to save their families. If that happens, a terrorist group will have the benefit of exceptionally capable special operations forces. Forces who know how the U.S. military operates. Mann is clear: this "transcends political parties, we need to circle up here and do the right thing."
He's right. We're talking about warriors who fought alongside U.S. special operations forces in some of the toughest battles in recent history. These are counterterrorist specialists who chose to take on enemies such as those that attacked us on 9/11. These aren't just allies, they're allies of the highest order. Their kinship with America has been forged in shared blood, courage, and absolute trust. Their allies in the U.S. are doing all they can to see their brothers live free.
Were the world's most powerful nation to tolerate such an abandonment, it wouldn't just be morally pathetic. It would evidence a deep malaise in our national spirit and a collapse of American honor. We need to fix this. If the Biden administration won't do so, Congress must force action.
Why won't Biden save the Afghan commandos?
Here's a question for President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, and members of Congress.
Why are Afghan commandos, some of the most loyal U.S. allies, being left at the back of the queue for evacuation?
It's a complaint that I've heard from many active and former government and defense officials. But this week, I communicated with two former commandos who are on the run from the Taliban.
One told me that "After the flights [were suspended] out of Kabul, we came to [another Afghan city]. I have been living homeless in [said Afghan city]. My house, the furniture, and the clothes are all left in Kabul. I cut connections with all the people I used to know. I do not have any of my former [cellphone] SIM cards." The Taliban dragnet forces this good man to live a life on the run.
Another commando explained, "I want to come to the U.S. because I have worked with American forces for many years. Because of this, my life and the lives of my family are in danger of death. The fact that the U.S. has withdrawn is a political issue. I have nothing to say in this regard. I have been on the run since the occupation of Kabul, trying to save my family."
Scott Mann told me why the U.S. government owes these Afghans a great deal more. A retired Army Special Forces officer, Mann started up Task Force Pineapple. It's a group dedicated to evacuating commandos left behind in the Taliban's gulag. But the need to listen to and act on Mann's warning is urgent.
Mann noted that the Taliban's hunter squads are searching for the commandos and torturing those they're able to find. He estimates that as many as 6,000 special operators are still in Afghanistan.
There's dishonor in play here.
After all, while many senior Afghan military officers were able to escape from Kabul, more junior ranking noncommissioned officers were left behind. That's not the way that leadership should go. But it's the way it went. It needn't have been this way. Mann tells me that "we had the opportunity [to get some of the commandos and their families out], they were told to present themselves" at the Kabul airport gate during the evacuation and did so. Unfortunately, after pledges to the contrary, the gates were kept shut. I have heard this complaint from numerous U.S. and allied sources who were present at the airport.
Making matters worse, the commandos seem to be at the back of the queue. This, Mann says, has fostered an attitude of "both betrayal and frustration." Because of the vetting needed to become a commando, and thanks to the commandos' personal relationships with many U.S. special forces personnel, Mann insists that the vetting process could be expedited.
Moreover, Mann asks why it is that a former barber at Bagram Airfield is prioritized over a commando? The commandos were under Afghan command and thus forced to rely on humanitarian parole submissions for evacuation. That puts them near the back of the queue. But that bureaucratic red tape can't be an excuse that prevents otherwise well-intentioned State Department officers from acting faster. Mann fears that as time goes on, some commandos may be forcibly co-opted into the Taliban's service. Perhaps that will be their only choice to save their families. If that happens, a terrorist group will have the benefit of exceptionally capable special operations forces. Forces who know how the U.S. military operates. Mann is clear: this "transcends political parties, we need to circle up here and do the right thing."
He's right. We're talking about warriors who fought alongside U.S. special operations forces in some of the toughest battles in recent history. These are counterterrorist specialists who chose to take on enemies such as those that attacked us on 9/11. These aren't just allies, they're allies of the highest order. Their kinship with America has been forged in shared blood, courage, and absolute trust. Their allies in the U.S. are doing all they can to see their brothers live free.
Were the world's most powerful nation to tolerate such an abandonment, it wouldn't just be morally pathetic. It would evidence a deep malaise in our national spirit and a collapse of American honor. We need to fix this. If the Biden administration won't do so, Congress must force action.
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.
