Quotes of the Day:

"To know what life is worth, you have to risk it once in a while." 

- Jean-Paul Sartre

"The television, that insidious beast, that Medusa which freezes a billion people to stone every night, staring fixedly, that Siren which called and sang and promised so much and gave, after all, so little."

- Ray Bradbury

"A player who makes a team great is better than a great player." 

- John Wooden

​1. Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, July 6, 2023

2. China-Taiwan Weekly Update, July 6, 2023

3. Xi Jinping’s Hidden Goals for the PRC Law on Foreign Relations

4. China’s military is leading the world in brain ‘neurostrike’ weapons: Report

5. Will AUKUS Pay Major Dividends in a Taiwan Contingency

6. Army Fires Tomahawk Missile From Its New Typhon Battery In Major Milestone

7. The Disinformation Industry’s Jig Is Up

8. U.S. to Send Cluster Munitions to Bolster Ukraine’s Fight Against Dug-In Russians

9. Yellen criticizes Chinese treatment of US companies during visit to revive relations

10. DoS Duty to Plan and Execute Evacuations | SOF News

11. Why the US is willing to send Ukraine cluster munitions now

12. U.S. cluster bombs for Ukraine would exceed legal limit on duds

13. New Ukraine Footage Shows U.S.-Made HIMARS Destroying Putin's Military

14. Identity Politics Could Kill America’s Scientific Edge

15. Doubts about scout snipers arose in infantry units, No. 2 Marine says

16. Ukraine spy chief says nuclear threat at Zaporizhzhia plant subsiding

17. Ukraine says it is advancing near eastern city of Bakhmut

18. The America That Americans Forget

19. Coalition Kill Chain for the Pacific: Lessons from Ukraine

20. The Difference Between "Special Operations" and "Special Forces"

21. Ukraine's attacks on Russian commanders have the US Army worried about its own 'fat and ponderous' command posts

22. World War III Will Be Fought With Viruses

23. Why no one can end the Ukraine war

24. Six lessons of Prigozhin’s revolt

25. To deter China, the US should build rings of fire

26. NATO, China, and the Vilnius Summit

1. Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, July 6, 2023

Maps/graphics/citations: https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-july-6-2023

Key Takeaways:

• Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko stated that Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin and Wagner forces are not in Belarus as of July 6, indicating that Prigozhin may be failing to uphold the deal Lukashenko mediated between Prigozhin and Russian President Vladimir Putin following Wagner’s armed rebellion on June 24.
• Russian sources also indicated that Prigozhin is in Russia, although ISW cannot confirm Prigozhin’s whereabouts at this time.
• Lukashenko appears to be distancing himself from the deal he reportedly mediated while continuing to tout his ability to mediate between Putin and a formerly loyal lieutenant in the first place, thus still highlighting Putin’s weakness.
• Prigozhin’s ability to freely operate in Russia suggests that Prigozhin is still protected by some security guarantees and/or that the Kremlin continues to prioritize undermining his reputation in Russia over targeting Prigozhin physically or legally.
• Select Russian ultranationalists criticized Russian state propaganda for attempting to villainize Prigozhin, however, suggesting that the Kremlin’s attempt to alienate the ultranationalist community from Prigozhin is not succeeding.
• Ukrainian forces conducted counteroffensive operations on at least three sectors of the front on July 6 and are continuing efforts to gradually degrade Russian manpower and logistics assets.
• Ukrainian and Russian officials largely de-escalated their rhetoric regarding the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) on July 6.
• Russian political actors continue attempts to court or control Russian milbloggers, indicating that many view the milblogger community as a critical constituency.
• Russian opposition media outlet Vertska reported that Russian forces and occupation authorities are conducting a campaign of systematic religious persecution in occupied Ukraine.
• Russian milbloggers claimed that aspects of Russian defensive operations in southern Ukraine have severe limitations and may not be as effective as Russian sources have previously portrayed them.
• Russian and Ukrainian forces conducted ground attacks along the Svatove-Kreminna line.
• Visual evidence confirms that Ukrainian forces have advanced southwest of Bakhmut as of July 6.
• Russian forces continued ground attacks in the Bakhmut and Avdiivka-Donetsk City areas.
• Ukrainian forces conducted counteroffensive operations along the administrative border between Zaporizhia and Donetsk oblasts and in western Zaporizhia Oblast.
• Russian officials continue efforts to create territorial defense units in Russian border oblasts.
• Occupation officials continue efforts to forcibly assimilate Ukrainian legal and cultural traditions into the Russian system in occupied territories.
• Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko claimed on July 6 that Russia will transfer all planned tactical nuclear weapons to Belarus by the end of 2023, if not earlier.

RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, JULY 6, 2023

Jul 6, 2023 - Press ISW

Download the PDF

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, July 6, 2023

Kateryna Stepanenko, Riley Bailey, Karolina Hird, Angelica Evans, and Frederick W. Kagan

July 6, 2023, 8:25pm ET 

Click here to see ISW’s interactive map of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This map is updated daily alongside the static maps present in this report.

Click here to access ISW’s archive of interactive time-lapse maps of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. These maps complement the static control-of-terrain map that ISW produces daily by showing a dynamic frontline. ISW will update this time-lapse map archive monthly.

Note: The data cutoff for this product was 2pm ET on July 6. ISW will cover subsequent reports in the July 7 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko stated that Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin and Wagner forces are not in Belarus as of July 6, indicating that Prigozhin may be failing to uphold the deal Lukashenko mediated between Prigozhin and Russian President Vladimir Putin following Wagner’s armed rebellion on June 24. Lukashenko and the Kremlin previously announced that Prigozhin, Putin, and Lukashenko reached an agreement that offered Prigozhin and the Wagner forces that participated in the rebellion unspecified security guarantees in Belarus.[1] The full contents of this agreement have not been revealed, but it appears that Wagner is not fulfilling its end of the deal. Lukashenko stated on July 6 that Wagner forces are currently at their permanent camps (either in Russia or in Ukraine) to which they withdrew following the Battle for Bakhmut.[2] Lukashenko added that Prigozhin is in St. Petersburg or may have even flown to Moscow on the morning of July 6. Lukashenko denied the reports that Belarus is constructing new training camps for Wagner forces and noted that Belarus offered Wagner several former Soviet military camps including some near Asipovichy, Mogilev Oblast.[3] Lukashenko implied that Wagner had not yet agreed to deploy to these bases and that Wagner “has a different vision for [their] deployment,” the details of which Lukashenko refused to share.[4] Lukashenko, however, denied that the deal has been terminated and noted that the question of Wagner forces’ transfer and setup “has not been decided” at the moment.[5]

Russian sources also indicated that Prigozhin is in Russia, although ISW cannot confirm Prigozhin’s whereabouts at this time. A Russian opposition outlet reported that Prigozhin’s plane landed in Rostov Oblast after flying from Moscow Oblast on the morning of July 6.[6] A St. Petersburg outlet reported on July 5 that Prigozhin personally picked up several small arms seized by the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) from the FSB building in St. Petersburg on July 4.[7] The outlet also reported that Prigozhin was in Moscow over the weekend on July 1 and July 2.[8] ISW had not observed any visual confirmations in the open source that Wagner personnel deployed to Belarus at this time. Kremlin Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov also claimed that the Kremlin does not follow Prigozhin’s movements, noting that the Kremlin cannot and does not want to follow Prigozhin.[9] Peskov’s statement is absurd given that the Kremlin and Russian security forces have the ability to detain Prigozhin or restrict his movements in Russia. It is particularly absurd if Prigozhin was actually able to collect his weapons from an FSB facility.

Lukashenko appears to be distancing himself from the deal he reportedly mediated while continuing to tout his ability to mediate between Putin and a formerly loyal lieutenant in the first place, thus still highlighting Putin’s weakness. Lukashenko demonstratively stated that Wagner and Prigozhin are Russian, and the questions about their whereabouts should not be directed to him. Lukashenko appears to be distancing himself from Wagner, and his rhetoric may suggest that he is pinning the responsibility on the Kremlin to enforce the deal. Lukashenko also continued to boast about his skillful negotiations with Prigozhin after stating that Putin’s authority was not weakened during the armed rebellion in response to a journalist’s question.

Prigozhin’s ability to freely operate in Russia suggests that Prigozhin is still protected by some security guarantees and/or that the Kremlin continues to prioritize undermining his reputation in Russia over targeting Prigozhin physically or legally. Lukashenko noted that neither he nor Russian President Vladimir Putin wanted to assassinate Prigozhin, and dismissed suggestions that Putin might attempt to kill Prigozhin in the future.[10] ISW assessed on June 27 that Putin has likely decided that he cannot directly eliminate Prigozhin without making him a martyr for causes concerning the Russian Ministry of Defense’s (MoD) mishandling of the invasion.[11] ISW also observed on June 27 that the Kremlin launched an information operation aimed at presenting Prigozhin as corrupt and a liar, and Russian state outlets have maintained this narrative since. Russian propaganda networks are extensively covering FSB’s raids of Prigozhin’s mansion and his wealth, and one journalist sarcastically called Prigozhin’s house a “palace belonging to the fighter against corruption” on Russian state TV channel Rossiya 1.[12]

Select Russian ultranationalists criticized Russian state propaganda for attempting to villainize Prigozhin, however, suggesting that the Kremlin’s attempt to alienate the ultranationalist community from Prigozhin is not succeeding. A Wagner-affiliated Telegram channel accused the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs of deliberately leaking footage of the FSB raids to the media in order to portray Prigozhin as a traitor who is only interested in a lavish lifestyle.[13] Another Wagner-affiliated Telegram channel attempted to disprove Rossiya 1’s suggestion that the FSB may have found narcotics at Prigozhin’s mansion.[14] It is not necessarily surprising that Wagner-affiliated milbloggers are attacking Kremlin efforts to blackguard Prigozhi, but a Kremlin-affiliated milblogger also condemned the Russian media’s efforts to portray Prigozhin as a corrupt individual, noting that Prigozhin’s home is consistent with that of a wealthy individual and that Prigozhin appears to showcase his military awards throughout his mansion.[15] Another milblogger noted that Prigozhin’s house did not appear that lavish when compared to other Russian billionaires.[16]

Ukrainian forces conducted counteroffensive operations on at least three sectors of the front on July 6 and are continuing efforts to gradually degrade Russian manpower and logistics assets. Ukrainian military officials reported that Ukrainian forces are conducting counteroffensive activities in the Bakhmut, western Donetsk, and western Zaporizhia directions.[17] Geolocated footage posted on July 6 shows that Ukrainian troops have advanced towards the western outskirts of Klishchiivka, about 5km southwest of Bakhmut.[18] Russian and Ukrainian sources continued to discuss Ukrainian counteroffensive operations in western Donetsk Oblast south of Velyka Novosilka and in the Orikhiv area in western Zaporizhia Oblast.[19] Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky acknowledged the generally slower pace of Ukrainian counteroffensive gains in an interview with CNN on July 5 and stated that Ukrainian operations have “slowed down” against entrenched Russian defensive positions, remarking that he believes Ukraine still needs certain Western weapons systems before launching new attacks along the front.[20] Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar emphasized that the Ukrainian efforts to strike Russian concentration areas are imperative for the wider counteroffensive and contribute to the slower rate of ground attacks across the theater. Malyar noted that Ukrainian forces destroyed six Russian ammunition depots in the Tavriisk (Zaporizhia) direction alone in the past day and confirmed that the July 4 strike on Makiivka was an effective example of the destruction of Russian artillery and equipment assets.[21]

Ukrainian and Russian officials largely de-escalated their rhetoric regarding the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) on July 6. Ukrainian Main Military Intelligence Directorate (GUR) Head Kyrylo Budanov stated on July 6 that the danger of a man-made disaster at the ZNPP is “gradually decreasing,” following warnings by various Ukrainian officials on July 4 that Russian forces may have placed objects resembling explosive devices on the roofs of two of the ZNPP’s reactor buildings.[22] First Deputy Chief of Staff of the Russian Presidential Administration Sergey Kiriyenko and Zaporizhia Oblast occupation head Yevgeny Balitsky also notably visited the ZNPP on July 6 and posted images reportedly near the plant’s dry nuclear waste storage facility.[23] Kiriyenko and Balitsky noted that the plant continues to “operate normally” under Russian control, thus downplaying previous Russian claims that Ukrainian actions were imminently threatening the safety of the ZNPP.[24] Kiriyenko and Balitsky may have visited the plant to portray Russia as a capable custodian of the ZNPP, and their rhetorical posturing during the visit suggests that Russian officials may be stepping back from harsh warnings of imminent disaster at the plant. ISW continues to assess that Russian rhetoric surrounding the ZNPP is meant to discourage Western support for Ukraine by accusing Ukraine of nuclear irresponsibility, as well as to dissuade Ukrainian forces from conducting counteroffensive operations into occupied Zaporizhia Oblast.[25]

Russian political actors continue attempts to court or control Russian milbloggers, indicating that many view the milblogger community as a critical constituency. Russian Liberal Democratic Party (LDPR) head Leonid Slutsky met with select milbloggers on July 5 to discuss a series of proposals to grant benefits and protections to military correspondents and bloggers covering the war in Ukraine.[26] Slutsky stated that the LDPR will aim to pass legislation that will grant military correspondents the status of combat veterans and provide state guarantees and payments in cases of injury or death.[27] Slutsky claimed that the LDPR sent relevant proposals about Russian military correspondents and bloggers to the Russian MoD and the Ministry of Digital Development.[28] Slutsky added the LDPR and select milbloggers will launch an educational program to teach youth about the “informational realities” of the war in Ukraine.[29] Russian pundits on the Kremlin-affiliated show Solovyov Live recently discussed milbloggers’ potential violation of operational security in Ukraine and urged them to engage in some degree of self-censorship.[30] The Kremlin has routinely sought to appeal to select Russian milbloggers in a bid to win the favor of the community and leverage their connections to the wider Russian ultranationalist community, although the Russian MoD has recently indicated that it once again seeks to curb select milblogger activity.[31] It is unclear what backing the LDPR proposals have from the Kremlin, although the Kremlin could use such measures to exert control over milbloggers and determine who qualifies as a recognized milblogger.

The growing prominence of the milblogger community within the Russian information space and in certain accepted Russian civil society movements is likely creating a competition amongst various political actors vying for control over what is viewed as a critical constituency, either through winning their favor or by establishing authority over their activities. These political actors, both those firmly within the Kremlin’s orbit and those further outside of it, likely believe that it has yet to be decided who will control the political influence of this constituency. Milbloggers, with their own diverging interests and allegiances, have yet to indicate how the overall community will respond to this growing competition for their influence.

Russian opposition media outlet Vertska reported that Russian forces and occupation authorities are conducting a campaign of systematic religious persecution in occupied Ukraine. Verstka found that Russian forces and occupation authorities have committed at least 109 acts of religious persecution and destroyed nearly 600 places of worship in Ukraine since February 24, 2022.[32] Verstka uncovered the stories of people whom Russian forces and occupation authorities kidnapped, arrested, captured, tortured, and killed over their faith.[33] The investigation found that Orthodox and Protestant Christians are the most repressed group in the occupied territories, but that Catholics, Muslims, and Jehovah’s Witnesses have also been persecuted.[34] Verstka cited at least 43 cases in which clergymen were targeted for their faith, including eight who were kidnapped and five who were killed.[35] Verstka reported that at least 66 places of worship have been confiscated or destroyed by Russian forces and turned into warehouses, police departments, National Guard offices, or ‘United Russia’ offices.[36] Verstka noted that the primary purposes of religious oppression in the occupied territories are to suppress the Ukrainian language, which services are commonly conducted, to discourage or punish congregants who refuse to support occupation authorities, and to pressure congregations and priests into supporting the Russian Orthodox Church.[37] ISW previously reported that Russian occupation authorities were likely conducting a campaign of religious persecution in occupied Ukraine to systematically eradicate “undesirable” religious organizations and promote the Moscow Patriarchate.[38] ISW previously assessed that Russian forces would likely intensify their campaign and that Russian authorities are conducting religious persecution in a way that is entirely at odds with efforts to frame Russian President Vladimir Putin as the true protector of the Christian faith.[39]

Russian milbloggers claimed that aspects of Russian defensive operations in southern Ukraine have severe limitations and may not be as effective as Russian sources have previously portrayed them. A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian mobilized service members operating in Zaporizhia Oblast have been on the frontlines since October 2022 without any rotations.[40] The milblogger stated that Russian forces have not been able to rotate these mobilized personnel out of these positions because there are no available personnel to replace them with.[41] The milblogger’s description of acute rotation issues supports ISW’s previous assessment that Russian forces likely lack combat-ready reserves.[42] The failure to conduct any rotations will likely result in a quicker rate of degradation for Russian formations defending against Ukrainian counteroffensives in southern Ukraine. Other Russian milbloggers accused Russian attack helicopters of striking already destroyed Ukrainian military equipment and suggested that the Russian MoD may be using these repeated hits to report inflated Ukrainian losses.[43] The Kremlin has previously used reports of wildly inflated Ukrainian armored vehicle losses to portray Russian defensive operations as extremely effective.[44]

Key Takeaways:

• Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko stated that Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin and Wagner forces are not in Belarus as of July 6, indicating that Prigozhin may be failing to uphold the deal Lukashenko mediated between Prigozhin and Russian President Vladimir Putin following Wagner’s armed rebellion on June 24.
• Russian sources also indicated that Prigozhin is in Russia, although ISW cannot confirm Prigozhin’s whereabouts at this time.
• Lukashenko appears to be distancing himself from the deal he reportedly mediated while continuing to tout his ability to mediate between Putin and a formerly loyal lieutenant in the first place, thus still highlighting Putin’s weakness.
• Prigozhin’s ability to freely operate in Russia suggests that Prigozhin is still protected by some security guarantees and/or that the Kremlin continues to prioritize undermining his reputation in Russia over targeting Prigozhin physically or legally.
• Select Russian ultranationalists criticized Russian state propaganda for attempting to villainize Prigozhin, however, suggesting that the Kremlin’s attempt to alienate the ultranationalist community from Prigozhin is not succeeding.
• Ukrainian forces conducted counteroffensive operations on at least three sectors of the front on July 6 and are continuing efforts to gradually degrade Russian manpower and logistics assets.
• Ukrainian and Russian officials largely de-escalated their rhetoric regarding the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) on July 6.
• Russian political actors continue attempts to court or control Russian milbloggers, indicating that many view the milblogger community as a critical constituency.
• Russian opposition media outlet Vertska reported that Russian forces and occupation authorities are conducting a campaign of systematic religious persecution in occupied Ukraine.
• Russian milbloggers claimed that aspects of Russian defensive operations in southern Ukraine have severe limitations and may not be as effective as Russian sources have previously portrayed them.
• Russian and Ukrainian forces conducted ground attacks along the Svatove-Kreminna line.
• Visual evidence confirms that Ukrainian forces have advanced southwest of Bakhmut as of July 6.
• Russian forces continued ground attacks in the Bakhmut and Avdiivka-Donetsk City areas.
• Ukrainian forces conducted counteroffensive operations along the administrative border between Zaporizhia and Donetsk oblasts and in western Zaporizhia Oblast.
• Russian officials continue efforts to create territorial defense units in Russian border oblasts.
• Occupation officials continue efforts to forcibly assimilate Ukrainian legal and cultural traditions into the Russian system in occupied territories.
• Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko claimed on July 6 that Russia will transfer all planned tactical nuclear weapons to Belarus by the end of 2023, if not earlier.

We do not report in detail on Russian war crimes because these activities are well-covered in Western media and do not directly affect the military operations we are assessing and forecasting. We will continue to evaluate and report on the effects of these criminal activities on the Ukrainian military and the Ukrainian population and specifically on combat in Ukrainian urban areas. We utterly condemn these Russian violations of the laws of armed conflict, Geneva Conventions, and humanity even though we do not describe them in these reports.

• Russian Main Effort – Eastern Ukraine (comprised of two subordinate main efforts)
• Russian Subordinate Main Effort #1 – Capture the remainder of Luhansk Oblast and push westward into eastern Kharkiv Oblast and encircle northern Donetsk Oblast
• Russian Subordinate Main Effort #2 – Capture the entirety of Donetsk Oblast
• Russian Supporting Effort – Southern Axis
• Russian Mobilization and Force Generation Efforts
• Activities in Russian-occupied areas

Russian Main Effort – Eastern Ukraine

Russian Subordinate Main Effort #1 – Luhansk Oblast (Russian objective: Capture the remainder of Luhansk Oblast and push westward into eastern Kharkiv Oblast and northern Donetsk Oblast)

Russian forces continued offensive operations along the Svatove-Kreminna line and south of Kreminna on July 6. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian troops attempted to advance near Novoselivske (15km northwest of Svatove), Novoyehorivka (15km southwest of Svatove), Karmazynivka (12km southwest of Svatove), and Bilohorivka (10km south of Kreminna).[45] Russian milbloggers claimed that Russian forces continued attacks near Novoselivske and in the Serebryanske forest area south of Kreminna.[46] Ukrainian Eastern Group of Forces spokesperson Colonel Serhiy Cherevaty noted that Russian forces are actively trying to break through Ukrainian defensive lines along the Kupyansk-Lyman front using “Storm-Z” assault units staffed with former convicts.[47] Cherevaty also stated that elements of BARS (Russian Combat Reserve of the Country) and unspecified private military companies (PMCs) are active in this area.[48] A Russian milblogger posted footage reportedly showing Central Military District (CMD) in the Kreminna area.[49] Another Russian milblogger claimed that elements of the 3rd Guards Separate Special Purpose Brigade are striking Ukrainian fortifications near Kreminna.[50]

Russian sources claimed that Ukrainian forces conducted several counterattacks along the Svatove-Kreminna line on July 6. Russian Western Group of Forces spokesperson Sergei Zybinsky claimed that elements of the 7th Guards Motorized Rifle Regiment (11th Army Corps, Baltic Fleet) and 1st Guards Tank Army (Western Military District) repelled Ukrainian attacks near Novoselivske.[51] The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) claimed that elements of the Central Grouping of Forces repelled Ukrainian attacks about 16km west of Kreminna near Yampolivka and Torske.[52]

Russian Subordinate Main Effort #2 – Donetsk Oblast (Russian Objective: Capture the entirety of Donetsk Oblast, the claimed territory of Russia’s proxies in Donbas)

Visual evidence confirms that Ukrainian forces have advanced southwest of Bakhmut as of July 6. Geolocated combat footage posted on July 6 shows Russian artillery striking a Ukrainian infantry fighting vehicle on the western outskirts of Klishchiivka (about 5km southwest of Bakhmut), indicating that Ukrainian forces have made gains in the area.[53] A Russian milblogger reported that Ukrainian troops captured several forested areas west of Klishchiivka and are increasing pressure on Russian positions southwest of Bakhmut.[54] Russian sources claimed that Klishchiivka itself remains under Russian control, and milbloggers circulated footage wherein several Russian soldiers claim they control the settlement, and that heavy fighting is ongoing on the outskirts.[55] The Ukrainian General Staff additionally reported that Ukrainian forces continued counteroffensive operations south and north of Bakhmut and took up new positions.[56] Ukrainian Eastern Group of Forces Spokesperson Colonel Serhiy Cherevaty noted that Ukrainian troops maintain the initiative around Bakhmut and are pushing Russian forces back on Bakhmut’s northern and southern flanks.[57]

Russian forces continued ground attacks around Bakhmut on July 6. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian troops repelled Russian attacks southwest of Bakhmut near Ivanivske (5km southwest) and Bila Hora (14km southwest) and northwest of Bakhmut near Berkhivka (1km northwest) and Bohdanivka (5km northwest).[58] A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces attacked along the Dubovo-Vasylivka—Bohdanivka line and towards Orikhovo-Vasylivka.[59] Russian sources reported that elements of the 331st Guards Airborne (VDV) Regiment and 200th Motorized Rifle Brigade (14th Army Corps, Northern Fleet) are fighting in this area.[60]

Russian forces continued ground attacks along the Avdiivka-Donetsk City line on July 7. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces conducted unsuccessful ground attacks near Avdiivka, Pervomaiske (on the northwestern outskirts of Donetsk City), Marinka (on the southwestern outskirts of Donetsk City), and Novomykhailivka (just southwest of Donetsk City).[61] A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces unsuccessfully tried to attack the southwestern approaches of Avdiivka and within Marinka.[62] The Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) People’s Militia posted footage of the 103rd Motorized Rifle Regiment (150th Motorized Rifle Division, Southern Military District) striking Ukrainian positions near Marinka.[63]

Russian Supporting Effort – Southern Axis (Russian objective: Maintain frontline positions and secure rear areas against Ukrainian strikes)

Ukrainian forces conducted counteroffensive operations along the administrative border between Zaporizhia and Donetsk oblasts on July 6. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces conducted offensives in the Zaporizhia Oblast-Donetsk Oblast border area and consolidated control of their new positions.[64] Russian Eastern Grouping of Forces Spokesperson Oleg Chekhov claimed that Russian elements of the Eastern Grouping of Forces repelled Ukrainian assaults south of Velyka Novosilka.[65] Russian milbloggers claimed that Ukrainian forces attacked Russian positions near Staromayorske (9km south of Velyka Novosilka) and Pryyutne (16km southwest of Velyka Novosilka) on July 5 and 6.[66] Geolocated footage published on July 5 indicates that Russian forces still maintain positions near Pryyutne and are likely in control of the settlement.[67]

Ukrainian forces continued counteroffensive operations in western Zaporizhia Oblast on July 6. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces conducted offensives in the Melitopol direction (western Zaporizhia Oblast) and consolidated control of new positions.[68] Russian Eastern Grouping of Forces Spokesperson Oleg Chekhov claimed that Russian elements of the Eastern Grouping of Forces repelled a Ukrainian attack near Pyatykhakty (25km southwest of Orikhiv).[69] Russian milbloggers notably continue to give diverging accounts of the nature of Ukrainian counteroffensive operations in western Zaporizhia Oblast. One Russian milblogger claimed that Ukrainian forces attempted to advance from Pyatykhakty towards Zherebyanky (27km southwest of Orikhiv) in two small groups with 15 personnel each.[70] Other milbloggers claimed that larger Ukrainian groups conducted waves of unsuccessful assaults towards Zherebyanky with groups of up to 50 personnel.[71] One milblogger criticized other milbloggers for intentionally downplaying the Ukrainian presence in Pyatykhatky and stated that Ukrainian forces have been entrenched in the settlement since June 17 despite repeated Russian claims that Russians forces have cleared the settlement or prevented Ukrainian forces from reaching it.[72] Russian milbloggers claimed that Ukrainian forces also conducted assaults in the direction of Robotyne (12km south of Orikhiv) and made unspecified gains in the direction of Verbove (18km southeast of Orikhiv).[73] Another Russian milblogger claimed that Ukrainian did not conduct active operations in the Zaporizhia direction at all outside of the Pyatykhatky area.[74] Russian milbloggers also claimed that Russian forces conducted counterattacks in western Zaporizhia Oblast and captured previously lost positions near Robotyne.[75] Russian milbloggers who have reported smaller Ukrainian counteroffensive operations in western Zaporizhia Oblast in previous days tend to be those who claim to be in contact with Russian forces operating in the area.

Russian forces continue to target Ukrainian positions near the Antonivsky bridge in Kherson Oblast on July 6. A BARS-13 (Russian Combat Reserve of the Country) affiliated source claimed that Russian aviation conducted strikes on Ukrainian concentration areas near the bridge on the west (right) bank of the Dnipro River.[76] Russian First Deputy of the Presidential Administration Sergei Kiriyenko visited occupied Kherson Oblast on July 6 and congratulated the 387th Regiment of the 7th Guards Airborne (VDV) Assault Division for reportedly clearing Ukrainian from the east (left) bank near the Antonivsky bridge.[77] A prominent Russian milblogger recently claimed that Russian forces transferred elements of the 7th VDV Division to an unspecified location in the Zaporizhia direction, although it is possible that separate elements of the division are now deployed to diverging axes.[78]

Ukrainian officials reported that Russian forces are continuing to return to previously flooded positions on the left bank of Kherson Oblast. Ukrainian Southern Operational Command Spokesperson Natalya Humenyuk reported on July 5 that Russian forces are returning to these positions, with some of these previously flooded positions located up to 15km away from the Dnipro River.[79] Humenyuk added that flooding destroyed the Russian first lines of defense and that Russian forces are increasing artillery fire in the area.[80]

Russian Mobilization and Force Generation Efforts (Russian objective: Expand combat power without conducting general mobilization)

Russian officials continue efforts to create territorial defense units in Russian border oblasts. Belgorod Oblast Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov stated during a live broadcast on July 6 that the Belgorod Oblast Territorial Defense will form a second regiment with 3000 personnel.[81] Gladkov stated that a previously formed territorial defense regiment will be partially armed with weapons within the next week.[82] Gladkov stated that battalions stationed near the border will be fully armed during their rotations but that it is not possible to issue weapons to all 3000 members of the existing regiment.[83]

Russian officials continue measures to punish Russian draft dodgers. Russian head of traffic police Mikhail Chernikov claimed that the Russian government will not provide draft dodgers with certain public services, such as applications for driver’s licenses or registration for their cars.[84] The Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs approved procedures for restricting the licenses of mobilization evaders on July 4 based on a law signed on April 14, 2023, by Russian President Vladimir Putin intended to further crack down on mobilization evasion.[85]

A Kremlin-affiliated Russian milblogger claimed that Russian defense industrial base (DIB) producers have made efforts to speed up military equipment production during the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The milblogger claimed that the Uralvangonzavod Research and Production Corporation in Nizhny Tagil, Sverdlovsk Oblast has sped up the production of wheeled and tracked vehicles during Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.[86] The milblogger also claimed that the employees of Uralvangonzavod switched to a three-shift schedule in the fall of 2022 to increase tank production.[87] This increased effort has not apparently translated into a significant increase in tank production if United Kingdom Chief of the Defense Staff Admiral Sir Antony David Radakin’s estimate that Russia can produce only 200 tanks per year is correct.[88]

Activities in Russian-occupied areas (Russian objective: Consolidate administrative control of annexed areas; forcibly integrate Ukrainian civilians into Russian sociocultural, economic, military, and governance systems)

Occupation officials continue efforts to forcibly assimilate Ukrainian legal and cultural traditions into the Russian system in occupied territories. Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) Head Denis Pushilin met with Chairman of the Association of Lawyers of Russia Sergey Stepashyn and discussed the acceleration of the integration of DNR legislation with Russian legal traditions, the improvement of DNR legal culture, and the creation of bodies to oversee the integration process.[89] Pushilin claimed that representatives of the Association will help develop DNR legal regulations and train DNR legal personnel.[90] ISW recently reported on issues with the streamlining of DNR and Russian law in the context of criminal trials of Ukrainian prisoners of war, and it appears as though Russian officials are interested in remedying these issues.[91] Kherson Oblast occupation head Volodymyr Saldo also claimed that Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered Ukrainian cultural objects in the occupied territories to be “raised to the all-Russian level,” likely meaning that Russian occupation authorities will begin the process of registering Ukrainian cultural heritage under Russian legislative standards.[92] Saldo claimed that the Kherson Occupation Administration has begun the “restoration” of regional and district cultural organizations, such as theaters, concert halls, and museums, and has received assistance from the Russian government.[93]

Russian forces continued to use civilians and civilian infrastructure as human shields to shelter military assets. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces continue to use children’s institutions to accommodate Russian troops and leverage civilians as “human shields.”[94] The Ukrainian General Staff stated that Russian forces set up a military base of over 800 personnel at the Vesna children’s sanatorium in Novopetrivka in occupied Zaporizhia Oblast and converted a recreation center into a military base in Chumakivka in occupied Kherson Oblast.[95] Customary international humanitarian and Third and Fourth Geneva Conventions define the use of human shields as “utilizing the presence of a civilian or other protected person to render certain points, areas, or military forces immune from military operations,” which is prohibited under international humanitarian law.[96] ISW has not observed evidence to confirm or deny that Russian forces have removed all civilians from these facilities.

Significant activity in Belarus (Russian efforts to increase its military presence in Belarus and further integrate Belarus into Russian-favorable frameworks).

ISW will continue to report daily observed Russian and Belarusian military activity in Belarus, as part of ongoing Kremlin efforts to increase their control over Belarus and other Russian actions in Belarus.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko claimed on July 6 that Russia will transfer all planned tactical nuclear weapons to Belarus by the end of 2023, if not earlier.[97] Lukashenko claimed that all hardened storage areas for Russian tactical nuclear weapons have been fully completed as of a month ago and that a large portion of the promised tactical nuclear warheads is currently located in Belarus.[98] Lukashenko also responded to a Western journalist’s question about the unnoticed transfer of tactical nuclear weapons, stating that the West has not noticed transfers of tactical nuclear weapons and that Belarus has not used railways to transfer warheads.[99] Lukashenko did not exclude the possibility that Belarus might use railways to transport tactical nuclear weapons in the future.[100] ISW has not observed any imagery of the construction of special hardened storage facilities necessary to store tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus, and Ukrainian officials indicated that Russia likely has not deployed tactical nuclear weapons to Belarus as of July 5.[101] ISW continues to assess that any confirmed construction of a special hardened storage facility would be a notable indicator of preparations for such transfers.

Satellite imagery shows that the three largest Russian tent camps for mobilized Russian personnel at Belarusian training grounds were dismantled around July 3. Radio Liberty’s Belarusian service observed that tents disappeared from Obuz-Lesnovsky Training Ground near Baranavichy, Brest Oblast no earlier than June 30 after being stationed in the region since October 2022.[102] Radio Liberty noted that there were 150 tents that could house about 3,000 servicemen at Obuz-Lesnovsky Training Ground as of June 6 and noted that a small number of tents were removed in early March following a rotation of mobilized personnel. A Russian tent camp of 75 tents (which could house 1,500 people) at the Lepelsky Training Ground in Vitebsk Oblast was dismantled sometime between July 4 and July 6 despite elements of the Russian 272nd Motorized Rifle Regiment appearing in Lepel on July 3. Satellite imagery captured between July 2 and July 4 also showed the dismantling of 30 tents (which could house 600 servicemen) at the Repishcha Training Ground near Asipovichy, Mogliev Oblast on July 3. Radio Liberty observed that Belarus began building a tent camp in Tsel, Asipovichy Raion with more than 300 tents in late June.[103] It is unclear if Russian forces moved to a different location or have dismantled the camps after another rotation of mobilized personnel. The Ukrainian General Staff reported on July 6 that Russian forces are transferring military personnel back to Russia from Belarus.[104]

Note: ISW does not receive any classified material from any source, uses only publicly available information, and draws extensively on Russian, Ukrainian, and Western reporting and social media as well as commercially available satellite imagery and other geospatial data as the basis for these reports. References to all sources used are provided in the endnotes of each update.

2. China-Taiwan Weekly Update, July 6, 2023

Maps/graphics/citations: https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/china-taiwan-weekly-update-july-6-2023

Key Takeaways  

1. KMT presidential candidate Hou Yu-ih stated his intent to stop the extension of mandatory military service to one year, likely exacerbating existing CCP leverage points targeting the DPP under the dominant but contested “war versus peace” election narrative.
2. The CCP publicly qualifies comments from Chinese Ambassador to the European Union Fu Cong about Ukraine reclaiming its 1991 borders and is unlikely to replace Fu Cong.

CHINA-TAIWAN WEEKLY UPDATE, JULY 6, 2023

Jul 6, 2023 - Press ISW

China-Taiwan Weekly Update, July 6, 2023

Authors: Nils Peterson of the Institute for the Study of War

Editors: Dan Blumenthal and Frederick W. Kagan of the American Enterprise Institute

Data Cutoff: July 4 at 9AM ET

The China–Taiwan Weekly Update focuses on Chinese Communist Party paths to controlling Taiwan and relevant cross–Taiwan Strait developments.

Key Takeaways  

1. KMT presidential candidate Hou Yu-ih stated his intent to stop the extension of mandatory military service to one year, likely exacerbating existing CCP leverage points targeting the DPP under the dominant but contested “war versus peace” election narrative.
2. The CCP publicly qualifies comments from Chinese Ambassador to the European Union Fu Cong about Ukraine reclaiming its 1991 borders and is unlikely to replace Fu Cong.

Taiwan Developments  

This section covers relevant developments pertaining to Taiwan, including its upcoming January 13, 2024 presidential and legislative elections.

Elections

The Taiwanese (Republic of China) political spectrum is largely divided between the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the Kuomintang (KMT). The DPP broadly favors Taiwanese autonomy, Taiwanese identity, and skepticism towards China. The KMT favors closer economic and cultural relations with China along with a broader alignment with a Chinese identity. The DPP under President Tsai Ing-wen has controlled the presidency and legislature (Legislative Yuan) since 2016. This presidential election cycle also includes the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) candidate Ko Wen-je who frames his movement as an amorphous alternative to the DPP and KMT. It is normal for Taiwanese presidential elections to have third party candidates, but none have ever won. The 2024 Taiwan presidential and legislative elections will be held on January 13, 2024 and the new president will take office in May 2024. Presidential candidates can win elections with a plurality of votes in Taiwan.

Terminology: 1992 Consensus: a disputed cross-strait policy formulation supported in different formations by the CCP and KMT that acts as a precondition to cross-strait dialogue. The DPP does not support the 1992 Consensus.

KMT presidential candidate Hou Yu-ih stated his intent to stop the extension of mandatory military service to one year, likely exacerbating existing CCP leverage points targeting the DPP under the dominant but contested “war versus peace” election narrative. Mandatory male military service in Taiwan is currently four months long.[1] Hou stated he would limit the period of mandatory military service to four months to “ensure stability and peace on both sides of the strait.”[2] This would undo President Tsai Ing-wen’s extension of male conscription to one year beginning in 2025.[3] Her decision to extend conscription garnered a majority of societal support but remains a political topic for internal Taiwanese debates on the contributing factors of cross-strait tensions.[4] Hou’s rhetoric links the extension of Taiwanese military service as a driver of cross-strait tensions. His comments also place the onus for reducing cross-strait tensions on Taiwan without accounting for the coercive activities that prompted the conscription reform, such as the PLA escalating violations of Taiwan’s ADIZ since 2020.[5] Hou’s comments contribute to the framing of the Taiwanese election as a choice between peace and war, a narrative that ISW previously assessed provides the CCP with leverage points to influence Taiwanese cross-strait policy.[6] This creates opportunities for the CCP to plant information narratives both domestically in Taiwan and internationally that exculpate the party from blame for cross-strait tension and lay that responsibility at the feet of the DPP.

China Developments  

This section covers relevant developments pertaining to China and the governing Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

The CCP publicly qualifies comments from the Chinese Ambassador to the European Union Fu Cong about Ukraine reclaiming its 1991 borders and is unlikely to replace Fu Cong. Fu Cong stated that he “didn’t see why not” Ukraine should reclaim its 1991 territorial borders during an interview with Al Jazeera in late June.[7] The Chinese state media outlet Global Times published an article claiming that unspecified Western media aimed to use Fu’s comments out of context as a means to sow discord between China and Russia.[8] Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Mao Ning responded to a question about whether Fu Cong’s comments represented the People’s Republic of China’s official position by stating that China wants all parties in the Ukraine crisis to reach a political settlement via negotiation.[9] Fu Cong’s remarks are the second time a high-ranking Chinese official in Europe has strayed from Beijing’s official line on Ukraine as articulated by Mao Ning. In April 2023, Chinese Ambassador to France Lu Shaye dismissed the sovereignty of former Soviet republics.[10] Mao Ning subsequently repudiated Lu’s comments by claiming that China “respects all countries’ sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity.”[11] Despite rumors of his removal, Lu Shaye still serves as Chinese Ambassador to France.[12]

Neither Xi nor any Politburo Standing Committee member has publicly made international calls or remarks in response to Fu’s comments. This differs from China’s response to Lu’s comments, after which CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to mitigate the associated diplomatic fallout in Europe.[13] Keeping Fu Cong’s comments out of public conversation also avoids any high-profile international calls, which plays to the CCP’s advantage in terms of its economic relationship with Europe. Drawing attention to Fu Cong’s comments could risk undermining German and French alignment with Chinese views about avoiding economic disengagement.[14]

3. Xi Jinping’s Hidden Goals for the PRC Law on Foreign Relations

Excerpt:

From more perspectives than one, then, the Law on Foreign Relations serves to legitimize – and reinforce – foreign policy goals set by Xi since he came to power in 2012. These have included the “Great renaissance of the Chinese nation” (which includes a much bigger say for China in setting rules of the road in areas stretching from finance to global geopolitics); the Belt and Road Initiative; and the construction of an alliance of non-Western states which find themselves constrained by the US-led world order. To the extent that Chinese ambitions to be at the front ranks of technology, including semiconductors and AI, have been frustrated by boycotts imposed by the US and its allies, Xi’s ambitious power projection has met with formidable pushback. The BRI has for the past three years performed poorly due to the failure of Chinese banks and conglomerates to adequately finance cross-continental projects whose economic viability is doubtful. The displays of assertiveness by both Moscow and Beijing has consolidated defense cooperation among NATO states – as well as efforts by NATO leaders to boost defense cooperation with American allies in Asia such as Japan and South Korea. Irrespective of the success of the Law on Foreign Relations, it has indirectly shown up the vulnerability of President Xi’s fire-spitting, highly ambitious foreign-policy goals.

Select Language

Xi Jinping’s Hidden Goals for the PRC Law on Foreign Relations

By Willy Wo-Lap Lam

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2023/07/07/xi_jinpings_hidden_goals_for_the_prc_law_on_foreign_relations_964467.html

​July 7, 2023

​

AP

Chinese President Xi Jinping has promulgated a new law on foreign affairs to legitimize tough measures that Beijing is taking against the “bullying” of the “hegemonic West.” The statute, “The Law on Foreign Relations of the People’s Republic of China (PRC),” which takes effect on July 1, will also anchor the supreme leader’s long-standing aspiration to build a China-centric global order that will challenge the framework established by the US-led Western Alliance since the end of World War II.

The law also codifies the total control that Xi, who is Chinese Communist Party (CCP) General Secretary and Chairman of its Central Military Commission (CMC), exercises on all policies regarding diplomacy and national security (People’s Daily, June 30; Xinhua, June 28). The law states that the PRC “stays true to the vision of common, comprehensive, cooperative, and sustainable global security, and endeavors to strengthen international security cooperation and its participation in mechanisms of global security governance.” It stresses Beijing’s right to “take corresponding countermeasures and restrictive measures” against acts that violate international law and norms and that “endanger China’s sovereignty, security and development interests.” The official Global Times said the statute was a response to “new challenges in foreign relations, especially when China has been facing frequent external interference in its internal affairs under the western hegemony with unilateral sanctions and long-arm jurisdiction” (The Global Times, June 28). The legislation legalizes measures such as counter-sanctions and blacklisting of foreign nationals and institutions in retaliation against similar measures that the US and other Western countries have taken against PRC firms (New York Times Chinese Edition, December 16, 2022).

Observers have noted, however, that the latest demonstration of Beijing’s alleged “wolf warrior diplomacy” could hurt China’s international image, particularly among multinationals still interested in the PRC market (China Briefing, June 29). Earlier this year, the promulgation of a counter-espionage law already places businesspeople from different countries in a potentially compromising situation (South China Morning Post, June 17). This is due to the fact that Beijing has its own and unique interpretations of what constitutes “spying” or “leaking of state secrets.” Public security authorities have since the spring cracked down on a number of multinational due diligence companies as well as firms that handle accounting and other sensitive financial data of Chinese concerns. The CCP administration has also restricted the activities of American IT firm Micron in an apparent tit-for-tat response to Washington’s efforts to punish Chinese IT firms with links to national security and military units (Indopremier.com, July 1; fdiintelligence.com, May 10).

Yet another problem raised by foreign governments and China-based chambers of commerce is that while the new law claims that Beijing abides by the charters of the United Nations as well as all international law, well-known global practices such as freedom of information, disclosure of the holdings of shareholders and open bidding for contracts are not often observed by PRC cadres. Moreover, the Xi leadership’s emphasis on respecting the territorial integrity of nations big and small seems to be at variance with its refusal to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) no-holds-barred flexing of its muscle in the Taiwan Strait, the Sea of Japan and the South China Sea also detracts from Beijing’s commitment to upholding international laws and global norms. The PRC’s claims to owning 90 percent of the South China Sea has been repeatedly challenged by UN and authoritative international law bodies such as Court of Final Appeal in the Hague (SCMP, June 17; Center for Strategic and International Studies, May 11).

It is understood that the Xi administration wants to demonstrate China’s diplomatic clout at a time when it is meeting setbacks on various foreign-policy fronts. The so-called “coup attempt” by the Wagner mercenary group against the Kremlin in late June has undermined the strength of Russia in general and President Vladimir Putin in particular (abc.net.au, June 27). While Beijing has continued to offer rhetorical support to Moscow, the declining power of the Russian Federation – seen as a key ally in Xi’s apparent bid to set up an “axis of autocratic states” that includes countries grouped under the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the BRICS mechanism – has hurt Beijing’s ability to counter the challenge of the US and its allies in Europe and Asia (Radio Free Asia, June 29; Radio French International, June 27). The enhanced defense cooperation between the US and India which was reached during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Washington last month (June) has also hurt Beijing’s apparent efforts to prevent India from becoming part of what it sees as a “Asia NATO” (Zaobao.com.sg, June 26; Radio French International, June 26; VOAChinese, January 23). India is a long-standing member of the Quad Group of nations (US, India, Japan and Australia) whose aim includes curbing Chinese expansionism in the Indo-Pacific Region. Instances of defense cooperation between India on the one hand, and Japan, Vietnam and the Philippines on the other, have also increased exponentially.

The Xi administration’s tough response to the “anti-China containment policy” supposedly spearheaded by Washington seems to contradict efforts by Beijing to reassure multinationals that the PRC will continue to push forward the open-door policy begun by Great Architect of Reform Deng Xiaoping in 1978. At the opening of the “Summer Davos” global forum in Tianjin in late June, Premier Li Qiang, deemed a protégé of Xi’s, appealed to particularly Western investors to come to the PRC. “The world economy is in a critical phase of upheaval,” Li said. “We should not return to isolation” (Deutsche Welle Chinese, June 28; Xinhua, June 27). However, Li, whose portfolio is the Chinese economy, did not spell out new measures to attract foreign capital. Promises made earlier by Beijing regarding the liberalization of control of foreign-exchange movements and other measures deemed to restrict the business opportunities of multinationals have yet to be honored​.​

International observers have raised the question of whether the Foreign Relations Law is mainly geared toward consolidating Xi’s Mao-like status as “core of the party for life.” According to Sinologist Minxin Pei, while the statute “provides Beijing a legal instrument to impose sanctions on its adversaries in the future… Beijing does not need this legal instrument to punish its adversaries” (Note 1). Recent clampdowns exercised by the Xi leadership against American companies and other multinationals show the CCP administration already possesses a formidable toolbox to retaliate against sanctions that Western countries have imposed on the PRC. Coming hot upon the heels of the “insurrection” by the Wagner Group in Moscow, the added authority that the new law has given Xi seems an indication that the supreme leader wants additional guarantees against real and potential threats to his “core for life” status (Foreign Affairs Chinese, September 6, 2022). Indeed, since the days of late chairman Mao Zedong and master reformer Deng Xiaoping, the tradition has been well-established that the No. 1 leader in the party has sole responsibilities in formulating foreign and national-security policies, particularly regarding major countries and regions such as the US, Russia, Japan and the EU​.In light of Xi’s controversial decisions to back up his good friend Vladimir Putin and to engage in breakneck competition with the US-led “anti-China” coalition, it is possible that the top Chinese leader feels the need to take cover under a new legislation. In the past few months, Chinese social media has circulated many voices in opposition to Xi’s support of the Putin war effort against Ukraine. According to the Japanese pollster Genron-npo, “over half of Chinese people are either opposed to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine or feel it is wrong.” Additionally, Chinese social media has circulated a note said to be written by former vice-foreign minister Fu Ying opposing the CCP administration’s vehement anti-US stance. Ambassador Fu reportedly raised the question of “which countries will stand with China once it is mired in ferocious confrontation with the Americans.” (Aljazeera, March 31; VOAChinese, March 29; Genron-npo-net, November 30, 2022). While the most urgent problems facing young and old Chinese concern unemployment and the diminution of social-security benefits, Xi might want to divert attention from domestic economic woes to his alleged overseas achievements.

From more perspectives than one, then, the Law on Foreign Relations serves to legitimize – and reinforce – foreign policy goals set by Xi since he came to power in 2012. These have included the “Great renaissance of the Chinese nation” (which includes a much bigger say for China in setting rules of the road in areas stretching from finance to global geopolitics); the Belt and Road Initiative; and the construction of an alliance of non-Western states which find themselves constrained by the US-led world order. To the extent that Chinese ambitions to be at the front ranks of technology, including semiconductors and AI, have been frustrated by boycotts imposed by the US and its allies, Xi’s ambitious power projection has met with formidable pushback. The BRI has for the past three years performed poorly due to the failure of Chinese banks and conglomerates to adequately finance cross-continental projects whose economic viability is doubtful. The displays of assertiveness by both Moscow and Beijing has consolidated defense cooperation among NATO states – as well as efforts by NATO leaders to boost defense cooperation with American allies in Asia such as Japan and South Korea. Irrespective of the success of the Law on Foreign Relations, it has indirectly shown up the vulnerability of President Xi’s fire-spitting, highly ambitious foreign-policy goals.

Dr. Willy Wo-Lap Lam is a Senior Fellow at The Jamestown Foundation, and a regular contributor to China Brief. He is an Adjunct Professor at the Center for China Studies, the History Department, and the Master’s Program in Global Political Economy at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He is the author of six books on China, including Chinese Politics in the Era of Xi Jinping (2015). His latest book, The Fight for China’s Future, was released by Routledge Publishing in 2020.

Notes

[1] Author’s telephone interview with Professor Minxin Pei, June 30, 2023

4. China’s military is leading the world in brain ‘neurostrike’ weapons: Report

Excerpts;

“With additional neurostrike capabilities that can either damage, disorient or even control perceived adversary cognition at the population level, the PLA SSF would represent an exponential escalation in [China’s] aggression in the Indo- Pacific,” the report said.

“Three warfares” operations are underway against Taiwan, Hong Kong, the South China Sea and along the Indian-Chinese border, and the authors warn that the risk of the new brain warfare capabilities being used is increasing.

The SSF “now operates as a type of superstructure on top of a growing and increasingly active platform of Chinese military assets (land, sea, air, cyber, and space) across multiple theaters in the Indo-Pacific while simultaneously serving as the primary deployment platform for new neurostrike weaponry,” the report said.

To counter brain warfare capabilities, the report urges the U.S. military to first expose the threat of neurostrike weapons and call for international talks and policy remedies, such as ethics reviews for neuroscience and cognitive science studies. Proactively, the United State should sabotage critical supply chains of specific institutions or companies engaged in brain warfare research.

...

“This fundamental gap presents a massive vulnerability for decapitating strikes against the neurostrike program provided that these gaps can be surfaced, and precision-targeted,” the report said.

U.S. and allied nations must locate key weaknesses in the networks involved in the brain warfare program. Covert military action can “make involvement in this weapons program a high-risk venture where technical failure and negative international attention are the most likely outcomes,” the report said.

China’s military is leading the world in brain ‘neurostrike’ weapons: Report

Technology could be key asymmetric warfare tool for Taiwan military assault

washingtontimes.com · by Bill Gertz

By - The Washington Times - Thursday, July 6, 2023

China’s People’s Liberation Army is developing high-technology weapons designed to disrupt brain functions and influence government leaders or entire populations, according to a report by three open-source intelligence analysts.

The weapons can be used to directly attack or control brains using microwave or other directed energy weapons in handheld guns or larger weapons firing electromagnetic beams, adding that the danger of China’s brain warfare weapons prior to or during a conflict is no longer theoretical.

“Unknown to many, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its People’s Liberation Army (PLA) have established themselves as world leaders in the development of neurostrike weapons,” according to the 12-page report, “Enumerating, Targeting and Collapsing the Chinese Communist Party’s Neurostrike Program.” A copy of the study was obtained by The Washington Times.

The U.S. Commerce Department in December 2021 imposed sanctions on China’s Academy of Military Medical Sciences and 11 related entities the department said were using “biotechnology processes to support Chinese military end-uses and end-users, to include purported brain-control weaponry.”

Few public studies or discussion, however, have been held regarding the new advanced military capability.

Neurostrike is a military term defined as the engineered targeting of the brains of military personnel or civilians using non-kinetic technology. The goal is to impair thinking, reduce situational awareness, inflict long-term neurological damage and cloud normal cognitive functions.

The study was written by Ryan Clarke, a senior fellow at the East Asian Institute of the National University of Singapore; Xiaoxu Sean Lin, a former Army microbiologist now with Feitan College; and L.J. Eads, a former Air Force intelligence officer and current specialist in artificial intelligence for the U.S. intelligence community. The three authors write that China’s leadership “views neurostrike and psychological warfare as a core component of its asymmetric warfare strategy against the United States and its allies in the Indo-Pacific.”

According to the report, neurostrike capabilities are part of the military standard military capabilities and should not be viewed as an unconventional weapon limited to use in extreme circumstances.

Likely areas of use for the weapons included Taiwan, the South China Sea, East China Sea and the disputed Sino-Indian border.

The threat is not limited to the use of microwave weapons: “[China’s] new landscape of neurostrike development includes using massively distributed human-computer interfaces to control entire populations as well as a range of weapons designed to cause cognitive damage,” the report said.

Research is focused on using brain warfare weapons in the near term, and possibly during a Chinese military assault on Taiwan — a target for future Chinese military operations that U.S. military leaders have said could be carried out in the next four years.

“Any breakthrough in this research would provide unprecedented tools for the CCP to forcibly establish a new world order, which has been [Chinese President] Xi Jinping’s lifelong goal,” the report said.

Militarily, brain warfare can be used in what the Pentagon has called China’s “anti-access, area-denial” military strategy for the Indo-Pacific.

“Imagine (at least partially) immunized PLA troops being inserted into a geography where a specific weaponized bacterial strain has been released prior to their entry to prepare the ground and eliminate points of resistance,” the report states. “Any remaining sources of resistance on the ground are then dealt with through [Chinese] neurostrike weaponry that instill intense fear and/or other forms of cognitive incoherence resulting in inaction.”

That scenario would allow the PLA to establish absolute control over a nation like Taiwan, while at the same time blunting any American strategic options to intervene and send troops in to support Taiwan. The PLA could thus negate U.S. conventional military superiority with few near-term remedies for the United States, the report said.

“This scenario is based on known existing CCP research programs and what the clear strategic aims of those programs are,” the report said.

The report said placing China’s Academy of Military Medical Science the Commerce Department’s blacklist of companies barred from access to U.S. goods was the result of its leading role in developing brain warfare capabilities. A special branch of the Chinese military known as the Strategic Support Force (SSF) is likely the main unit charged with conducting brain warfare.

The ‘three warfares’ strategy

The SSF is the leader in what the PLA calls a “three warfares” strategy of using non-kinetic weapons in war. The three warfares were disclosed in 2014 by China’s National Defense University and call for employing psychological warfare, media warfare and legal warfare.

Little is known about the SSF but available information indicates the force would be used to shape information environments on the ground and provide the PLA with better battlefield information than its adversaries.

“With additional neurostrike capabilities that can either damage, disorient or even control perceived adversary cognition at the population level, the PLA SSF would represent an exponential escalation in [China’s] aggression in the Indo- Pacific,” the report said.

“Three warfares” operations are underway against Taiwan, Hong Kong, the South China Sea and along the Indian-Chinese border, and the authors warn that the risk of the new brain warfare capabilities being used is increasing.

The SSF “now operates as a type of superstructure on top of a growing and increasingly active platform of Chinese military assets (land, sea, air, cyber, and space) across multiple theaters in the Indo-Pacific while simultaneously serving as the primary deployment platform for new neurostrike weaponry,” the report said.

To counter brain warfare capabilities, the report urges the U.S. military to first expose the threat of neurostrike weapons and call for international talks and policy remedies, such as ethics reviews for neuroscience and cognitive science studies. Proactively, the United State should sabotage critical supply chains of specific institutions or companies engaged in brain warfare research.

Cyber capabilities also should be used to target and disrupt Chinese neurostrike programs. Sanctions against all Chinese civilian and military programs linked to brain warfare also should be increased.

The objective of all counter-brain warfare efforts should be to dissuade China’s leadership from deploying the new technology, the report said.

“Like all of the CCP’s asymmetric warfare programs, neurostrike depends entirely on presenting a massively decentralized and fragmented network structure,” the report said. “This renders it nearly impossible to map using traditional investigative or intelligence approaches.”

China currently does not have the defense-industrial base needed to produce the technologies for a neurostrike program that can match Beijing’s military ambitions, the report said, presenting a window of opportunity for the U.S. and its allies.

“This fundamental gap presents a massive vulnerability for decapitating strikes against the neurostrike program provided that these gaps can be surfaced, and precision-targeted,” the report said.

U.S. and allied nations must locate key weaknesses in the networks involved in the brain warfare program. Covert military action can “make involvement in this weapons program a high-risk venture where technical failure and negative international attention are the most likely outcomes,” the report said.

• Bill Gertz can be reached at bgertz@washingtontimes.com.

Copyright © 2023 The Washington Times, LLC. Click here for reprint permission.

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washingtontimes.com · by Bill Gertz

5. Will AUKUS Pay Major Dividends in a Taiwan Contingency

No mention of the potential role for AUKUS SOF.

AUKUS Special Operations Forces in Strategic Competition, Integrated Deterrence, and Campaigning: Resistance to Malign Activities

https://securityanddefenceplus.plusalliance.org/essays/aukus-special-operations-forces-in-strategic-competition-integrated-deterrence-and-campaigning-resistance-to-malign-activities/

Excerpts:

For Australia to attempt to deny China enhanced security for the sea leg of its nuclear deterrent, Australia would have to use its SSNs to strike what China considers its sovereign territory. As documented by Stanford professor Oriana Skylar Mastro, official Chinese government sources consistently refer to the South China Sea as China’s “inherent territory” and has “historically been part of China’s territory”; phrases often used in reference to Hong Kong, Taiwan, Tibet, and Xinjiang. Chinese leader Xi Jinping has also repeatedly vowed to defend China’s perceived sovereignty and relevant rights in the South China Sea in bilateral meetings and at multilateral summits. This means that China has strong incentives for a forceful response to attacks on its island bases, which could well make Australia hesitate from striking them. Come 2035, when Australia should be fielding several SSNs, the U.S. Department of Defense expects China to possess 1,500 nuclear warheads. In the face of such a difference in military power, Australia could well be deterred from using its SSNs to attack China’s island bases.

AUKUS is a worthy initiative to modernize Australia’s armed forces amidst an increasingly dangerous security environment. As the Australian government’s recent Defense Strategic Review concluded, Australia’s “current force structure is not fit for purpose for our current strategic circumstances." But while it is hard to argue that AUKUS will not help to bolster Australia’s defensive capability, the extent to which the U.S. can fully count on Australia to use AUKUS to go ‘all in’ and pay major dividends in a Taiwan contingency is less clear.

Will AUKUS Pay Major Dividends in a Taiwan Contingency?

By Rupert Schulenburg

July 07, 2023

In March this year, the trilateral security partnership between Australia, the UK, and the U.S., known as AUKUS, unveiled its phased plan to provide Australia with nuclear-powered attack submarines (SSNs). This will involve the U.S. selling Australia Virginia-class SSNs in the early 2030s, followed by a new class, the SSN-AUKUS, being built for Australia in the late 2030s.

An important detail, however, remains unclear. In a Taiwan contingency, which of China’s forces would Australia be prepared to target with its SSNs?

While China has not been directly mentioned in AUKUS announcements, it is the clear target of the partnership’s declared aim to “strengthen deterrence and bolster stability in the Indo-Pacific." In Washington, there is growing concern that deterrence is eroding across the Taiwan Strait and that China may soon be confident enough to invade Taiwan. To bolster deterrence, the Biden administration has attempted to signal to China that there could be a combined allied defense to preserve the status quo; a strategy that could perhaps be termed ‘collective strategic ambiguity’. The administration has released a number of joint statements with numerous U.S. allies, including Australia, in which they reaffirm the importance of maintaining peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait and their shared opposition to unilateral changes to the status quo. That said, Australia has been non-committal as to whether it would actually help defend Taiwan.

Australia’s acquisition of SSNs through AUKUS will, however, make an Australian defense of Taiwan more plausible. This is because SSNs could actually reach the waters around the island. Compared to diesel electric-powered submarines (SSKs), which Australia originally planned to acquire from France, SSNs can be deployed for significantly more time because they do not have to vacate the deployment area to refuel. To put this into perspective, if an SNN were to operate out of Sterling Naval Base on Australia’s west coast, it could remain on station around Taiwan for approximately 73 days, while an SSK could last 0. In the South China Sea, an SSN could remain on station for approximately 77 days if it were to operate out of that same naval base, while an SSK could remain for just 11 days.

While acquiring SSNs would allow Australia to deploy submarines in a Taiwan contingency, this does not necessarily mean it will. A review of some of the operations Australia’s SSNs are well suited for in a conflict with China over Taiwan illustrates why the U.S. may be unable to firmly count on AUKUS to pay major dividends in a crisis. This is due to the confrontational nature of these operations, which could make Australia hesitate to make good use of its SSNs.

Australia could harness its SSNs’ torpedoes, speed, and stealth for anti-submarine warfare (ASW) against China’s fleet of attack submarines (both SSKs and SSNs). China could use those subsurface forces to put U.S. carrier battle groups operating around Taiwan, which would be key to a U.S. defense of the island, at significant risk. Importantly, using SSNs to conduct an ASW mission against China could result in Australia threatening China’s ballistic missile submarines (SSBNs), the sea leg of China’s nuclear deterrent. This is because if Australia sunk China’s attack submarines, which protect China’s SSBNs, this would make the latter significantly more vulnerable. Moreover, if Australia hunts China’s attack submarines, it could inadvertently sink some of China’s SSBNs. This is because they will likely be closely accompanied by China’s attack submarines for protection, which makes target differentiation difficult. As Georgetown Professor Caitlin Talmage observes, those kinds of attacks may appear to Chinese leaders as an attempt at softening up China’s nuclear forces for a U.S. nuclear counterforce strike. This could raise the risk of inadvertent nuclear escalation, as degrading China’s nuclear forces might confront Chinese leaders with a ‘use-or-lose’ dilemma, whereby they could be incentivized to go nuclear – before they no longer can – to make the U.S. and its allies back down​.

If Australia is unwilling to risk threatening China's sea-based nuclear forces due to concerns of inadvertent escalation, it may well hesitate to use its SSNs to conduct an ASW mission in a Taiwan contingency. Australia may also be cautious over intervening simply given the severe asymmetry in military power between it and China. Come 2030, when Australia should begin acquiring SSNs, the U.S. Department of Defense expects that China could possess 1,000 nuclear warheads. Although Australia is a U.S. ally and China has a no-first-use nuclear policy, Australia could still be highly risk-averse. American observers have long doubted the sincerity of China’s no-first-use policy, especially in a major crisis over one of its so-called “core interests.” Such concerns may foment in Australia too. As the White House Coordinator for the Indo-Pacific Kurt Campbell recently admitted in December last year, in light of China and North Korea’s nuclear buildups, the “reassuring quality of our extended deterrence of our nuclear umbrella” is “being challenged now."

Australia could also use its SSNs for land-attack operations in the South China Sea, as the Virginia class SSNs that Australia will first acquire through AUKUS are equipped with a vertical launch system (VLS) for firing land-attack Tomahawk cruise missiles. The SSN-AUKUS that Australia will later acquire will likely field a similar VLS capability. Australia could consequently use its SSNs to blanket strike thousands of acres of military infrastructure across China’s island bases in the South China Sea, which includes surface-to-air missiles, anti-ship cruise missiles, runways, and radar facilities. In a Taiwan contingency, China might use these island bases to try and establish control of the South China Sea to create a safe bastion for its SSBNs by preventing U.S. surface ships and ASW aircraft from operating in the region. This added security for its sea-based nuclear forces may embolden China in a crisis, as it could better counter U.S. threats of nuclear escalation. This would be an ideal mission for Australia’s SSNs, as it would reduce operational demands on U.S. forces. As Gregory Poling of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) observes, in a Taiwan contingency, the U.S. would likely divert its important naval platforms, like its SSNs, to Northeast Asia.

For Australia to attempt to deny China enhanced security for the sea leg of its nuclear deterrent, Australia would have to use its SSNs to strike what China considers its sovereign territory. As documented by Stanford professor Oriana Skylar Mastro, official Chinese government sources consistently refer to the South China Sea as China’s “inherent territory” and has “historically been part of China’s territory”; phrases often used in reference to Hong Kong, Taiwan, Tibet, and Xinjiang. Chinese leader Xi Jinping has also repeatedly vowed to defend China’s perceived sovereignty and relevant rights in the South China Sea in bilateral meetings and at multilateral summits. This means that China has strong incentives for a forceful response to attacks on its island bases, which could well make Australia hesitate from striking them. Come 2035, when Australia should be fielding several SSNs, the U.S. Department of Defense expects China to possess 1,500 nuclear warheads. In the face of such a difference in military power, Australia could well be deterred from using its SSNs to attack China’s island bases.

AUKUS is a worthy initiative to modernize Australia’s armed forces amidst an increasingly dangerous security environment. As the Australian government’s recent Defense Strategic Review concluded, Australia’s “current force structure is not fit for purpose for our current strategic circumstances." But while it is hard to argue that AUKUS will not help to bolster Australia’s defensive capability, the extent to which the U.S. can fully count on Australia to use AUKUS to go ‘all in’ and pay major dividends in a Taiwan contingency is less clear.

Rupert Schulenburg is an analyst focusing on Indo-Pacific security, U.S. alliances and force posture, as well as U.S.-China competition. He holds an MPhil in International Security Studies from the University of St Andrews and a BA (Hons) in International Relations from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London. He is the author of the forthcoming chapter “Alignment choices in an era of U.S.-China competition: Navigating a Taiwan contingency and trade relationships” (Springer, 2023).

6. Army Fires Tomahawk Missile From Its New Typhon Battery In Major Milestone

Army Fires Tomahawk Missile From Its New Typhon Battery In Major Milestone

The U.S. Army says it has now successfully fired Tomahawk and SM-6 missiles from its new ground-based launchers.

BY

JOSEPH TREVITHICK

|

PUBLISHED JUL 3, 2023 2:34 PM EDT

thedrive.com · by Joseph Trevithick · July 3, 2023

The U.S. Army says it has demonstrated the operational capability of its newest ground-based missile launcher with the system's recent successful firing of a Tomahawk land-attack cruise missile. This follows a test launch of a multi-purpose SM-6 missile earlier this year from what is officially known as the Typhon Weapon System. The service currently has one so-called Mid-Range Capability battery equipped with Typhon, which has four trailer-based launchers and other supporting equipment.

The Army's Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office (RCCTO) announced the Tomahawk launch on June 28, but the actual test had occurred the day before. This comes just over six months after the service accepted delivery of the first Typhon launchers and other components of its first Mid-Range Capability (MRC) battery from Lockheed Martin.

"This test follows the successful launch of an SM-6 missile from the Mid-Range Capability system earlier this year, confirming the full operational capability of the system," according to a brief statement from RCCTO.

Army officials have said in the past that their goal is to reach at least some level of true operational capability with the first MRC battery before the end of Fiscal Year 2023 this September.

A complete Typhon Weapon System battery consists of four launchers and a command post, all on trailers, as well as reload and support vehicles, according to details the Army has released in the past. Targeting information is provided by offboard sources.

A briefing slide giving a general overview of the complete Typhon Weapon System. US Army

The Army currently expects Typhon to be employed primarily against land-based targets using either Tomahawk or SM-6. At the same time, anti-ship optimized variants of Tomahawk exist. Originally designed as a surface-to-air missile, SM-6 has a demonstrated anti-ship capability, too, and significantly longer-range and otherwise more capable versions are in development. As it stands now, the U.S. military says that the SM-6 family is its only real capability for engaging incoming highly-maneuverable hypersonic weapons.

An SM-6 missile at the moment of launch from a U.S. Navy Arleigh Burke class destroyer. USN

Altogether, the door is already wide open to the possibility of future Army MRC batteries being employed against a wide variety of targets in the future. These same launchers are already expected to be part of the expanded air and missile defenses that the U.S. military is working to put in place on the strategic U.S. island territory of Guam.

In addition, the Typhon launchers are derived from the Mk 41 Vertical Launch System (VLS) in use on various U.S. Navy and foreign warships. This launcher can already fire a wide array of containerized missiles, and other types could be integrated into it in the future.

A graphic showing various missiles that can be launched from Mk 41 VLSs now. Lockheed Martin

RCCTO said that personnel from the 1st Multi-Domain Task Force, headquartered at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington State, had conducted the test launch with support from the U.S. Navy's Program Executive Office for Unmanned Aviation and Strike Weapons (PEO U&W). The Navy is the lead service responsible for managing the Tomahawk and SM-6 missile programs across the U.S. military.

Furthermore, on top of the Mk 41-based launchers, Typhon has a fire control system derived from the combat-proven Aegis Combat System. The Mk 41 VLS and Aegis are also Navy-managed programs. The Navy itself has been testing a containerized Mk 41-derived launcher called the Mk 70 Expeditionary Launcher, which is very similar to the Typhon design. Variants and/or derivatives of the Mk 70 have been embarked on uncrewed ships and loaded on trailers.

Two Navy Mk 70 launchers, or variants or derivatives thereof, on trailers in a ground-based capacity during a test in Europe in 2022. USN

The Army and the Navy have both been working closely with the Marines, which is acquiring its own ground-based Tomahawk capability, as you can read more about here "All three Services share common fire control, missile launcher canisters, and missiles," a Marine Corps spokesperson told The War Zone in June. The Marines' currently plan to use a smaller remotely-operated launcher based on the 4x4 Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV), but there are questions about the feasibility of that combination.

For the Army, specifically, the successful demonstration of Typhon's full expected operational capability is another important step forward in the service's efforts to field a number of new long-range strike capabilities. This also includes the Dark Eagle Long-Range Hypersonic Weapon (LRHW) and the Precision Strike Missile (PrSM) short-range ballistic missile. PrSM can be fired from existing M270 Multiple Launch Rocket System (MLRS) and M142 High-Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) launchers and the Army is now looking into even longer-range missiles that might work with those systems.

One of the Army's initial batch of launchers for its Dark Eagle Long Range Hypersonic Weapon (LRHW) during a test. US Army

Armed with Tomahawk, Typhon gives the Army a new tool that allows it to create a bubble that extends roughly 1,000 miles in all directions from wherever the launchers within which it can hold land-based targets at risk. The shorter-range SM-6 gives the complete system further flexibility. As already noted, the ability of Tomahawk and SM-6 to engage other kinds of targets means that an MRC battery could have broader anti-access/aerial denial functionality in the future.

With the Navy and Marine Corps programs' ground-based Tomahawk programs moving forward, Typhon is also part of a new and larger joint-service land-based long-range strike ecosystem that is emerging. This is being heavily driven by the U.S. military's desire for more options for hitting targets on land, at sea, and in the air across the vast expanses of the Indo-Pacific region in any future higher-end conflict, especially one against China.

U.S. officials, as well as independent experts, regularly draw attention to China's People's Liberation Army's (PLA) numerical superiority in conventionally-armed ground-based cruise and ballistic missiles. This gives the PLA significant anti-access and aerial denial capabilities in various strategic regions, including the hotly contested South China Sea, as well as a significant non-nuclear deterrent more generally.

A map showing Chinese made-made island outposts just in the southern end of the South China sea, as well as sites belong other countries in the region. DOD

At the same time, questions do remain about exactly where land-based systems like Typhon could be deployed, particularly in the Indo-Pacific. The governments of many U.S. allies and partners have publicly stated that they are not interested in hosting American ground-launched long-range strike capabilities.

These new long-range-strike capabilities could be deployed in response to conflicts and crises elsewhere, too. In 2021, the Army stood up the 56th Artillery Command in Germany specifically to serve as a forward command and control node for future long-range "fires" units. The previous iteration of this unit had overseen Army Pershing and Pershing II nuclear-armed ballistic missiles during the Cold War in Europe.

It's also worth noting that the U.S. Air Force fielded ground-launched nuclear-tipped Tomahawk variants, called BGM-109G Gryphons, in Europe between 1983 and 1991. The Army, Navy, and Marine Corps' new land-based long-range missile systems will all be conventionally armed.

A launcher for the BGM-109G Gryphon variant of the Tomahawk cruise missile. DOD

No matter how the Army's plans for deploying and employing its future MRC batteries continue to evolve, the service, alongside the Navy and Marines, is continuing to make progress in turning this capability into an operational reality.

Contact the author: joe@thedrive.com

thedrive.com · by Joseph Trevithick · July 3, 2023

7. The Disinformation Industry’s Jig Is Up

The irony here is that the author is also putting out his own disinformation.

The Disinformation Industry’s Jig Is Up

https://www.nationalreview.com/2023/07/the-disinformation-industrys-jig-is-up/?fbclid=IwAR0w3WPUN-v8IIw_ycVXZA0eTGupi6n2JIoG39eBQMkrNqs9VGdvEe2JGVw

By NOAH ROTHMAN

·       

July 6, 2023 2:25 PM

Listen to article

A federal judge’s order preventing the government from pressuring social-media firms to suppress content spells trouble for the fact police.

Bottom of Form

On Independence Day, federal Judge Terry Doughty issued a national injunction preventing federal entities from corresponding with social-media firms for “the purpose of urging, encouraging, pressuring or inducing in any manner the removal, deletion, suppression or reduction of content containing protected free speech.”

Doughty’s ruling does make some important exceptions: Government officials and social-media firms are still allowed to share information and exchange recommendations regarding criminal activity and issues that relate to national security. But beyond that, Doughty erred on the side of free expression and a maximalist interpretation of what constitutes governmental coercion.

Joe Biden’s Justice Department has vowed to appeal, and Doughty’s order may not entirely survive the scrutiny of higher courts. But either way, the reaction the decision has produced deserves closer examination, because it suggests the disinformation industry’s days are numbered.

Some objections to Doughty’s injunction are likely to get a favorable hearing from courts tasked with reviewing its logic. Civil-liberties attorney Jameel Jaffer warned that the order could be construed as prohibiting government officials from even criticizing social-media companies in public. But most of the legal scholars and First Amendment activists who took issue with the ruling resented the extent to which it confuses governmental notifications relating to objectionable speech with the application of coercive power. That is precisely the issue that deserves to be litigated, as so many of this ruling’s critics inadvertently confessed.

“The government should be able to inform social-media companies about things that they feel are harmful to the public,” University of California Santa Barbara professor Miriam Metzger told the New York Times. While many of the Times’s sources said Doughty’s ruling confuses governmental nudging with the policing of private speech, which is performed almost exclusively by private actors, others who spoke with the Times did confess that the executive branch’s mere suggestions carry extra weight. “Platforms are very good at ignoring civil-society organizations and our requests for help or requests for information or escalation of individual cases,” said PEN for America’s digital-safety director, Viktorya Vilk. “They are less comfortable ignoring the government.” Precisely.

As CNN White House correspondent Phil Mattingly acknowledged in comments flagged by Jonathan Turley, the Biden White House “would regularly reach out to Twitter and Facebook and other companies in kind of the early stages of their Covid response and say, ‘This person is spreading lies about vaccines, this account is spreading misinformation that is inhibiting — not just our efforts, the administration’s efforts to address Covid — but also public health. Do something about it.’” Mattingly added that “more often than not,” social-media companies found the administration’s arguments convincing — a rate of compliance that is suggestive of the influence of the White House more than its powers of persuasion. As for what constitutes governmental coercion, there is a history of jurisprudence that views state-sponsored activities that are neither mandatory nor conditional as nevertheless coercive. The Supreme Court’s conservative justices have long objected to this expansive standard, but it’s not their standard to defend.

These legal arguments ornament what so many of this ruling’s dissenters expose as, at root, appeals to their own authority. This decision “deals a huge blow to vital government efforts to harden U.S. democracy against threats of misinformation,” legal scholars Leah Litman and Laurence Tribe asserted. The “opinion seems to maintain that the government cannot even politely ask companies not to publish verifiable misinformation.” Duress is obviously a subjective condition, but a request from an entity with a legal monopoly on the use of force carries added authority, the relative politeness of the entreaty notwithstanding.

“It’s bananas that you can’t show a nipple on the Super Bowl but Facebook can still broadcast Nazi propaganda, empower stalkers and harassers, undermine public health, and facilitate extremism in the United States,” one activist told the Times in language so juicy the outlet ran with it as the conclusion of one dispatch on Doughty’s ruling. After all, social media are today the “primary vector for hate and disinformation in society.” This is a lot of bombast to apply to the distinction between FCC-regulated interstate and international communications and private broadcast mediums. This activist conveys his anger but at the expense of a cogent argument.

Maybe the most revealing of the objections the Times accumulated were those that dispensed with all this pretense and issued only narrow appeals to the self-interests of the disinformation industry. Warning of the “chilling effect” this decision could have on the entire information-policing enterprise, the Times fretted that the ruling could dissuade young scholars from pursuing a career in disinformation research, and it will almost certainly close the wallets of the deep-pocketed donors who fund such research efforts.

The ruling carries the message that “misinformation qualifies as speech and its removal as suppression of speech,” the Times warned. That might be more objectionable if what constitutes “misinformation” hadn’t become such a fluid category. So much of the commentary around this ruling sidesteps the fact that the apparatus dedicated to policing disinformation is filled with charlatans. It has proven itself a slave to fashion and uniquely susceptible to pressure from public entities.

The 51 former intelligence officials who insisted that Hunter Biden’s laptop was the work of an absurdly sophisticated Russian espionage operation, none of whom have expressed any remorse, directly led social-media companies to throttle the public’s access to legitimate and relevant news in relation to its discovery. Aggressive efforts to police the discourse during the Covid era suffered the same hubris-fueled flaws. Masking was unnecessary until it was mandatory. Then, it once again became worthless. Those who questioned America’s commitment to keeping schools shuttered longer than anywhere else in the developed world or balanced the benefits of naturally acquired immunity against the efficacy of immunization were subject to overt and covert efforts to limit the public’s access to their thoughts.

So many of our understandings evolved over that period along with the dynamism of the pandemic itself. But the preferred assumptions at any given time were often reinforced through the application of irresistible social pressure. The federal government didn’t create that pressure, but it capitalized on it to advance its own conceptions of what constituted a proper public-health regime.

Doughty’s ruling establishes the federal government’s “extensive contact with social-media companies via emails, phone calls, and in-person meetings.” It couples this with “public threats and tense relations” between the Biden White House and America’s social-media giants as the predicate for “an efficient report-and-censor relationship.” It finds that the plaintiffs established “a causal and temporal link” between the government’s actions and “the social-media companies’ censorship decisions.” And it concludes that the government encouraged “viewpoint discrimination,” which would not have occurred absent government pressure.

It’s not its critics but the disinformation policing industry’s champions who argue that their authority is imperiled if their judgments are not backed by the implied force of the public sector. Yes, higher courts may take issue with the sweep of this ruling. But its substance and the reaction it has produced from those who will now be reduced to making sound arguments against the assertions they believe constitute misinformation suggest the jig is finally up.

NOAH ROTHMAN is a senior writer at National Review. He is the author of THE RISE OF THE NEW PURITANS: Fighting Back against Progressives’ War on Fun and Unjust: Social Justice and the Unmaking of America. @noahcrothman

8. U.S. to Send Cluster Munitions to Bolster Ukraine’s Fight Against Dug-In Russians

I think that part of the after action analysis needs to examine the timelines for decisions to provide advanced equipment at the strategic level (e.e., White House). We need to examine the assumptions we used to at first deny specific capabilities and then slow roll their eventual provision. I think the basic assumption was that not providing certain capabilities would prevent escalation on the Russian side. (was that a valid and useful assumption - did it prove to be true?) On the other hand if we had provided everything asked for up front would the Ukrainian military have been able to effectively employ those advanced capabilities. Did the slow roll actually help Ukraine to develop capabilities (tactics, techniques, and procedures) to prepare to employ these advanced capabilities.. It seems to me that the Ukrainian military has employed these advanced capabilities effectively as well as innovatively (I think we have to be learning a lot from them and how they are adapting our equipment and systems). Now we will be abel to see how effectively they will employ DPICM. (very well I am sure).

U.S. to Send Cluster Munitions to Bolster Ukraine’s Fight Against Dug-In Russians

Biden administration aims to strengthen Kyiv’s hand despite concerns over risk to civilians

By​ ​Michael R. Gordon​​ and​ ​Vivian Salama

July 6, 2023 5:16 pm ET

WASHINGTON—The Biden administration plans to send cluster munitions, which strew small bomblets over a wide area, to Ukraine to strengthen its hand in a high-stakes offensive against Russian forces, senior U.S. officials said.

The White House has agreed to grant a waiver under the U.S. arms export laws to send the weapons, formally known as dual-purpose improved conventional munitions, or DPICM. 

The administration is expected to announce the decision Friday as part of a broader package of military assistance, U.S. officials said. 

Ukraine has long appealed for the weapons, and the Pentagon has said they could be effective when employed against Russian troop and armored formations as well as trench lines.

The munitions “would be useful, especially against dug-in Russian positions on the battlefield,” Laura Cooper, a senior Defense Department official, told Congress last month. 

Human-rights groups say unexploded submunitions could maim or kill civilians long after a conflict ends, which initially made the White House’s National Security Council reluctant to approve the transfer. 

But the possibility the cluster munitions could help Ukraine’s efforts at a critical stage in the conflict has swayed opinion within the administration and among some lawmakers on Capitol Hill. 

Proponents of the decision also say that the provision of cluster munitions would reduce Ukraine’s dependence on 155mm artillery shells, of which the U.S. has a limited supply.

More than 110 countries have signed an international Convention on Cluster Munitions that prohibits all use, transfer, production and stockpiling of cluster bombs. But the list of signatories contains notable absences.

The U.S., Ukraine, Russia, China, India, Pakistan and South Korea haven’t signed the convention. Neither has Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Poland, Romania, Turkey nor most countries in the Middle East.

Ukrainian forces have used cluster munitions rockets on at least two occasions, according to Human Rights Watch. PHOTO: STAFF/REUTERS

Pentagon spokesman Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder, who didn’t confirm the decision, said that the Pentagon has several variants of the munitions. To mitigate the risk to civilians, the munitions that the U.S. has considered providing have a low dud rate, he said. 

Older cluster munitions with dud rates higher than 2.35% wouldn’t be provided, added Ryder. 

Rep. Adam Smith of Washington, the ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee said in May that the provision of cluster munitions should be considered, particularly since the Russians were already using them. 

“Our cluster munitions have a much lower dud rate than the Russian cluster munitions,” Smith told a meeting of the Council on Foreign Relations in May. “I’m not in favor of spreading cluster munitions around the world, but in this particular case the Russians are already doing that in Ukraine.”

According to the Human Rights Watch’s global Cluster Munition Monitor 2022 report, cluster munitions fired by Russian forces have caused at least 689 civilian casualties in Ukraine. Russian forces have attacked 10 Ukrainian regions with hundreds of cluster munitions, while Ukrainian forces have used cluster munitions rockets on at least two occasions, the group said. 

While the provision of cluster munitions could give a boost to Kyiv, they are not a panacea since Ukrainian forces have also been slowed by dense Russian minefields.

The U.S. military currently reserves the right to use cluster munitions against U.S. adversaries, including in a conflict with North Korea. 

In 2008, the Pentagon said that U.S. forces would only use cluster munitions after 2018 if their dud rate was less than 1%. But the Trump administration amended that policy in 2017, saying that cluster munitions could be effective against enemy forces operating across a broad area.

Gordon Lubold contributed to this article.

Write to Michael R. Gordon at michael.gordon@wsj.com and Vivian Salama at vivian.salama@wsj.com

9. Yellen criticizes Chinese treatment of US companies during visit to revive relations

Excerpts:

“The U.S. seeks healthy economic competition with China,” Yellen said, according to a transcript released by her department.

“I am communicating the concerns that I’ve heard from the U.S. business community — including China’s use of non-market tools like expanded subsidies for its state-owned enterprises and domestic firms, and barriers to market access for foreign firms,” Yellen said.

U.S.-Chinese relations are at their lowest level in decades due to disputes over technology, security, Beijing’s military expansion and other irritants.

On Friday, Yellen met with the outgoing governor of China’s central bank, Yi Gang, and former Vice Premier Liu He, previously her counterpart in finance talks, according to the Treasury. She was due to meet later with China’s No. 2 leader, Premier Li Qiang.

Treasury officials said earlier Yellen wouldn’t meet with Chinese leader Xi Jinping. They said no breakthroughs on major disputes were expected.

Yellen criticizes Chinese treatment of US companies during visit to revive relations

BY JOE MCDONALD

Published 3:46 AM EDT, July 7, 2023

AP · July 7, 2023

ASSOCIATED PRESS

BEIJING (AP) — Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen criticized Chinese treatment of U.S. companies and new export controls on metals used in semiconductors during a visit Friday to Beijing to try to revive strained relations.

Talking with a group of businesspeople, Yellen defended U.S. controls on technology exports that irk Beijing, saying they are necessary for national security. She rejected suggestions Washington is trying to decouple, or separate the U.S. economy from China’s.

“The U.S. seeks healthy economic competition with China,” Yellen said, according to a transcript released by her department.

“I am communicating the concerns that I’ve heard from the U.S. business community — including China’s use of non-market tools like expanded subsidies for its state-owned enterprises and domestic firms, and barriers to market access for foreign firms,” Yellen said.

U.S.-Chinese relations are at their lowest level in decades due to disputes over technology, security, Beijing’s military expansion and other irritants.

On Friday, Yellen met with the outgoing governor of China’s central bank, Yi Gang, and former Vice Premier Liu He, previously her counterpart in finance talks, according to the Treasury. She was due to meet later with China’s No. 2 leader, Premier Li Qiang.

Treasury officials said earlier Yellen wouldn’t meet with Chinese leader Xi Jinping. They said no breakthroughs on major disputes were expected.

The Chinese finance ministry called Yellen’s visit a “concrete measure” toward carrying out an agreement by Xi and President Joe Biden during a meeting in November to improve relations. It gave no indication of possible initiatives or compromises.

“There will be no winners in trade wars or ‘decoupling and broken chains,’” the ministry said in a statement. “We hope the United States will take concrete actions to create a favorable environment for the healthy development of economic and trade relations.”

U.S. and other foreign companies are uneasy about their status in China following raids on consulting firms, the expansion of a national security law and calls by Chinese leader Xi Jinping and other officials for greater self-sufficiency.

“I’ve been particularly troubled by punitive actions that have been taken against U.S. firms in recent months,” Yellen said.

China’s government has been frustrated by U.S. curbs on access to advanced processor chips on security grounds. That threatens to delay or derail the ruling Communist Party’s efforts to develop telecoms, artificial intelligence and other technologies.

Xi accused Washington in March of trying to hamper China’s development.

Beijing has been slow to retaliate, possibly to avoid disrupting its own tech industries. But this week, the government announced unspecified controls on exports of gallium and germanium, metals used in making semiconductors and solar panels. That announcement jolted South Korea and other countries that import from China.

Businesspeople have warned the world’s two biggest economies might split into separate markets with incompatible products as Beijing and Washington tighten trade controls and tell companies to reduce reliance on each other. They say that will hurt economic growth and innovation.

″I have made clear that the United States does not seek a wholesale separation of our economies,” Yellen said. “A decoupling of the world’s two largest economies would be destabilizing for the global economy, and it would be virtually impossible to undertake.”

Yellen defended U.S. export curbs and rejected Chinese accusations that Washington uses them for economic advantage.

“I also made clear that actions we take to protect our national security are designed to be narrowly targeted — and that they are premised on straightforward national security considerations and not undertaken to gain economic advantage over China,” Yellen said.

Yellen follows Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who met Xi last month in the highest-level U.S. visit to Beijing in five years. The two agreed to stabilize relations but failed to agree on improving communications between their militaries.

Treasury officials told reporters earlier in Washington the secretary wanted to focus on stabilizing the global economy and challenging Chinese support of Russia during its invasion of Ukraine.

The latest flareup came after President Joe Biden referred to Xi as a dictator. The Chinese government protested, but Biden said his blunt statements are “just not something I’m going to change very much.”

Ties became especially testy after a Chinese surveillance balloon flew over the United States in February and was subsequently shot down.

Biden’s climate envoy, John Kerry, is scheduled to become the next U.S. official to visit China, next week, a State Department official confirmed Thursday.

China and the United States are the world’s No. 1 and No. 2 emitters of climate-changing carbon, making whatever steps they take critical.

The trip will be Kerry’s first to China since it broke off climate discussions with the U.S. in August in retaliation for then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s travel to Taiwan.

AP · July 7, 2023

10. DoS Duty to Plan and Execute Evacuations | SOF News

Note the last section asks if we are ready for NEO in Taiwan. (Few ask if we are ready for a NEO in Korea which could be the mother of all NEOs).

DoS Duty to Plan and Execute Evacuations | SOF News

sof.news · by Charles Davis · July 7, 2023

By Charles Davis.

“Nobody wants to sit where I am and think now about what ‘coulda, shoulda, woulda’ happened in order to avoid this.” – Secretary of State Hilary Clinton 

The Department of State has an abysmal record of conducting Noncombatant Evacuation Operations (NEO), especially when it comes to emergency response to social unrest and instability in conflict zones. There are internal mechanisms in place for leaders to learn from these events and to take steps to strengthen their processes. However, whether an issue of not wanting to have written documentation of failures and shortcomings or general disregard for the requirements, Department of State (DoS) officials are slow to publish after-action documentation of past events and neglect to act on the recommendations of these reports. This calls into question DoS level of readiness as we face continued friction and instability over Taiwan.

A memorandum of agreement between the Departments of State and Defense indicates the Department of State (DoS) will exercise overall responsibility for protecting U.S. citizens and nationals and designated other persons, to include, when necessary and feasible, their evacuation to and welfare in relatively safe areas. DoS further assumes responsibility for minimizing their risk of death or seizure as hostages and reducing their presence in probable or actual combat areas, so that combat effectiveness of U.S. and allied forces is not impaired. 

This same memorandum tasks the Department of Defense (DoD) with monitoring the political, military, economic, and other conditions. DoD will assess levels of hostility; local national willingness to provide protections for US citizens, nationals and other designees; number and locations of the same persons abroad and evacuation and protection capabilities, including transportation/lift requirements and their availability as well as the availability of relatively safe holding or survival areas for staging evacuees during emergencies. 

 These are considered Noncombatant Evacuation Operations (NEOs).While each agency has its own lines of effort, the DoS has ultimate responsibility to prepare plans for protection and evacuation of US citizens and DoD non-combatants. This includes coordination to maximize timely use of available military transportation assets and existing host nation support infrastructure. Given the significant failures of Benghazi and Afghanistan along with questionable decisions about non-government US citizens in Sudan, it is no wonder there is concern and apprehension in the DoS planning approach to Taiwan.

Concerns Over DoS Planning and Readiness for NEOs

National level concerns over DoS planning and readiness is not a new focus. In 2007 the Government Accountability Office (GAO) was tasked with assessing evacuation planning and preparations for overseas posts. As part of the evaluation, the team assessed DoS guidance and plans to prepare for evacuation, training and exercises to prepare post staff for crisis, and efforts to collect, analyze, and incorporate evacuation lessons learned into guidance and training. 

The findings stated, “Posts do not find State’s primary guidance particularly useful in preparing for evacuation. In addition, while State requires posts to update Emergency Action Plans (EAP)s annually, almost 40 percent of posts surveyed have not updated their plans in 18 months or longer. Post-produced estimates of American citizens in a country are best guesses and more than three-quarters of posts said their last estimate was, at best, only somewhat accurate. We also found weaknesses in a memorandum of agreement (MOA) between State and DoD that could limit these agencies’ ability to effectively work together during a large-scale evacuation.” 

Other findings, from the report, suggest Emergency Action Committee members have not been properly trained on their duties, new staff have gone untrained and, crisis management exercises do not reflect likely scenarios given the assignment locations. Furthermore, roughly 60% of posts evacuated between 2002-2007 did not produce the required after action report, so there are no lessons learned to be applied to future crisis management situations.

Several of the GAO findings and recommendations provided in the 2007 report surfaced again in the Final Report of The Select Committee on the Events Surrounding the 2012 Terrorist Attack in Benghazi (H. Rept. 114-848). Select Committee recommendations included “a clear designation of ‘who is in charge of managing and following up on response in emergent situations as well as the roles and responsibilities of involved departments and agencies. There needed to be greater interoperability and improved communications during contingencies. Additionally, relevant agencies need to be involved in each other’s emergency action plans and, where capability on the ground is insufficient and the DoD cannot respond immediately the DoS and other agencies adjust their plans to allow for local or regional resources to be identified ahead of time. 

Commonalities in the GOA report of 2007 and the planning and coordination failures in the 2012 Benghazi report suggest lessons learned were not being captured and shared. This is an indicator that recommendations from 2007 may not have gained traction over the proceeding five years. A final recommendation from the Benghazi report encourages agencies on the ground to plan for standby military support before a crisis occurs in high threat environments. The recommendation also suggests including feasible support from U.S. allies. “In addition, the coordinating body should provide for a specific mechanism to know and understand assets and capabilities actually available at any given time.” 

 It is evident from the failures in the Afghanistan evacuation, these recommendation also gained little or no traction in the proceeding 10 years.

In 2017 the GAO initiated a follow-on assessment of DoS emergency preparedness. GAO findings during this evaluation period indicate only 2 of the 20 evaluated posts, which were approved by DoS Bureau of Diplomatic Security, had updated all key EAPs. “GAO also found that EAPs are viewed as lengthy and cumbersome documents that are not readily usable in emergency situations”, suggesting that EAPs serve as a check the box requirement rather than a functional plan for implementation. 

 Another significant finding indicates only 36% of the posts reported completing their evacuation drills.GAO report 17-174 reiterated what should be obvious from previous agency assessments and actual events. DoS needs to ensure posts complete EAP updates and training exercises. Because of the inconsistency in following requirements, DoS should more closely track the policy requirements and verify posts are following through during EAP cycles. Most importantly, “State could develop a more streamlined version of the EAP—consisting of key sections, checklists, and contact lists—that could be used [by staff in and emergency], in addition to the full EAP… and take steps to ensure overseas post complete required lessons learned reports…” 

 These are all items addressed in some form during the 2007 assessment of DoS readiness.

Kabul NEO – August 2021

Photo: U.S. Marines from the Special Purpose Marine Air-Gournd Task Force – Crisis Response Central Command provide security during the Kabul NEO on August 20, 2021. (Photo by Lance Cpl Nicholas Guevara).

Four years after GAO report 17-174 there was a systemic failure during the evacuation of Afghanistan. House Foreign Affairs Committee (HFAC) Interim Report “A Strategic Failure: Assessing the Administration’s Afghanistan Withdrawal” asserts there was a failure to plan. Findings from the report indicate the “[DoS] took very few substantive steps to prepare for the consequences that were expected.” 

 The report further indicates “Military commanders have clearly stated there was an utter lack of urgency on the part of the White House, the National Security Council (NSC), and the State Department as it pertained to an evacuation, despite repeated dire warnings.”  These comments seem to be echoed by reports that Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Milley believed DoS waited too long to initiate evacuation efforts. The HFAC report also addresses key planning failures regarding NEOs. “[DoS] was unable to provide adequate assistance to U.S. citizens (AMCITs), lawful permanent residents (LPRs), Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) holders and applicants, and other at-risk Afghans who were attempting to evacuate the country during the NEO. Would be evacuees were sent conflicting messages, told they could not be helped, or left standing outside the gates of the airport…” 

 Given our adversaries use of Information Warfare, disinformation operations and deep fakes, DoS needs to be both mindful and prepared with a strong communications plan.Additionally, “U.S. military personnel on the ground involved in the evacuation said they had been prohibited from coordinating evacuation planning with all allies except for the UK until early August 2021.” 

 This is an operational failure which was identified and addressed as a key planning consideration in the Benghazi Report. General Sullivan noted US forces weren’t even allowed to coordinate with the Turkish forces commanding a primary military contingency at the airport and Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman did not begin NEO coordination through her channels until August 22, 2021, which was nine days after the fall of Herat and Taliban seizing control of all national border crossings.  These types of coordination would have been critical to success given the more than 20 countries and organizations that were trying to conduct similar evacuations. Failing to heed this type of coordination in future NEOs, such as Taiwan, will also be disastrous. This is especially true given the number of countries who have a significant population of citizens working in Taiwan.In early July 2023 the U.S. Department of State released its After Action Review on Afghanistan that covers the period of January 2020 to August 2021. The principal finding in the 87-page report was that the State Department acted too late to conduct the NEO and that there was a lack of coordination among the senior leadership of the State Department.

Sudan NEO – April 2023

Photo: Secretary of State Blinken monitoring the evacuation of diplomatic staff from Sudan on 22 April 2023. DoS photo.

On April 22, 2023 DoS initiated an evacuation of Embassy personnel and their dependents from Khartoum Sudan. This evacuation did not include civilians and other designees. Under Secretary for Management, Ambassador John Bass indicated the DoD took the lead on evacuation operations for the Embassy after it was determined that use of commercial air and access to the airport was no longer an option. He further applied to the loss of access to commercial air as a reason not to attempt a US government evacuation of other American citizens in the near term. 

Ambassador Bass did indicate the DoS was attempting to maintain contact with US citizens and provide them with a best assessment of the security environment, while encouraging them to take appropriate precautions. He further asserted the DoS was working with other countries and the United Nations, as well as international organizations to enable US citizens to make their way to safety. 

 There was no indication that this was part of an EAP or that early coordination had been ongoing, with an expectation for the DoS to need the support of partner countries and non-government organizations. Given previous examples of planning failures and the number of posts that have not completed EAP requirements, it is likely these efforts were cobbled together as events unfolded.

Is DoS Prepared for a Future NEO in Taiwan?

Recent reporting from multiple news agencies suggests the United States is conducting advance planning for a potential NEO evacuation of the Taiwan DoS post. While the one China policy has dictated that the US not establish an embassy in Taiwan, DoS works out of the American Institute in Taiwan. A June 13, 2023 piece by dayFREURO suggest multiple sources provided perspective on US evacuation planning that began more than 6 months prior. Unnamed sources indicated the planning process was not a public topic due to its sensitive nature and the potential fear and apprehension it might evoke within the Taiwanese population. 

 The fact that DoS is taking an active planning approach, suggests recommendations and lessons learned are finally being applied in EAP development for this post.A Messenger report from December 2021 indicates roughly two thirds of the Taiwanese population identifies as Taiwanese rather than Chinese. This growing shift along with recent Taiwan and US efforts to shore up defenses may be contributing to China’s need to act sooner rather than later, on its claims to the island nation. This is not the first time Taiwan and the US have drawn attention over evacuation training. A 2003 Taipei Times report on joint training exercise Han Kuang #19 indicated Deputy Defense Minister Chen Chao-ming specifically addressed the inaccurate perception the US military was participating in evacuation training. 

“China has unsuccessfully attempted military force against Taiwan before, in the 1950s and 1990s. For much of that period, Taiwan itself had a superior military to the People’s Republic, and U.S. naval dominance in the region was unquestioned.” 

 An example can be found in June 1950, when President Truman placed the 7th Fleet between mainland China and Taiwan. In this case deterrence through the neutralization of the Taiwan Strait discouraged Chinese forces from conducting an amphibious assault. However, the same policy of deterrence today may be speeding China’s decision-making timeline.As DoS continues to develop NEO evacuation planning, the Philippines are likely to play a key role. The country’s May 2022 presidential election significantly shifted Philippine relations with the US and China and allowed the US to reestablish democratic relationships that had deteriorated under Rodrigo Duterte. 

 And, as recently as May 2023 the US has reaffirmed its 72 year defense alliance with the Philippines, through a defense treaty in the South China Sea.  Just days after confirming this treaty, President Marcos indicated Philippine bases could play a key role if China were to attack Taiwan. An example of how DoS planning might leverage Philippine bases includes the Ports of Kaohsiung and Subic Bay. Kaohsiung is located on Taiwan’s southwestern coastline and Kaohsiung port is one of the biggest container handling facilities in the world. The port handles roughly 5000 vessels and 18,900,000 tonnes of cargo annually. 

 Along with the port, Kaohsiung boast one of the country’s largest international airports co-located just outside the port area. Subic Bay, Philippines is approximately 500 miles south and served as a US naval base until 1992. The Subic facilities also include an international airport. Given DoS intentions to rely on commercial transportation as a first alternative, these two facilities provide multiple avenues for departure and arrival, not only for US citizens but other countries as well.A possible indicator to the approach above can be found in a DoS Joint Statement from April 11, 2023. “Mindful of the growing complexity of the Indo-Pacific security environment, including the multidimensional nature of modern challenges and threats to the peace and security of the Philippines and the United States, the Secretaries reaffirmed their shared determination to defend against external armed attack in the Pacific… Accelerate the implementation of [Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement] EDCA projects and increase investments in EDCA agreed Locations to further support combined training, exercises, and interoperability between the U.S. and Philippine Armed Forces, as well as the Philippines’ civilian-led disaster preparedness and response capacities. The United States expects to have allocated over $100 million by the end of fiscal year 2023 toward infrastructure investments at the existing five EDCA sites and to support swift operationalization of the four new sites.” 

Whether through learning from previous events or developing new approaches, DoS will face significant obstacles during a NEO event in Taiwan. Reliance on a variety of networks and resources will be paramount to conducting a successful NEO. This will include advance coordination and relationship building before the crisis and NGOs may play a substantial role. In early 2000 Taiwan established the Department of NGO International Relations, which falls under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It is responsible for maintaining positive relationships with NGOs, through open dialogue on difficult topics such as political freedom and civil rights. Associations such as this provide early indicators of instability which may extend operational and execution timelines and in a potential crisis such as this time is a valuable commodity.

**********

Top Photo: U.S. Marines provide security during drawdown of designated personnel in Afghanistan on August 18, 2021. (U.S. Marine Corps photo).

Map: Taiwan map derived from maps from the Central Intelligence Agency.

https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/01/23/top-quotes-from-hillary-clintons-benghazi-hearings

https://prhome.defense.gov/Portals/52/Documents/PR%20Docs/DOS-DOD%20Memo%20of%20Agreement%20on%20Protection%20and%20Evacuation.pdf

Ibid.

GAO-08-23 State Department: Evacuation Planning and Preparations for Overseas Posts Can Be Improved

ibid

https://www.congress.gov/114/crpt/hrpt848/CRPT-114hrpt848.pdf

ibid

https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-17-714.pdf

https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-17-714.pdf

https://foreignaffairs.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/HFAC-Republican-Interim-Report-A-22Strategic-Failure22-Assessing-the-Administrations-Afghanistan-Withdrawal.pdf

ibid

General Mark Milley Privately Blamed the State Department for the Disorganized Evacuation of Afghanistan (sofrep.com)

https://foreignaffairs.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/HFAC-Republican-Interim-Report-A-22Strategic-Failure22-Assessing-the-Administrations-Afghanistan-Withdrawal.pdf

Ibid

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/afghan-commander-ismail-khan-captured-taliban-seize-herat-2021-08-13/

https://www.state.gov/briefing-with-under-secretary-for-management-ambassador-john-bass-assistant-secretary-for-african-affairs-ambassador-molly-phee-assistant-secretary-of-defense-for-special-operations-and-low-intensit/

ibid

https://euro.dayfr.com/trends/352257.html

https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2003/01/03/189539

https://themessenger.com/grid/test-imagining-the-unimaginable-the-us-china-and-war-over-taiwan

https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/2022-philippine-election-trouble-democracy-and-foreign-relations-ahead

https://www.reuters.com/world/us-issues-guidelines-defending-philippines-south-china-sea-attack-2023-05-04/

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/marcos-says-philippines-bases-could-be-useful-if-taiwan-attacked-2023-05-05/

https://www.marineinsight.com/know-more/8-major-ports-of-taiwan/

Joint Statement of the U.S.-Philippines 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue – United States Department of State

sof.news · by Charles Davis · July 7, 2023

11. Why the US is willing to send Ukraine cluster munitions now

Excerpts:

Use of cluster bombs itself does not violate international law, but using them against civilians can be a violation. As in any strike, determining a war crime requires looking at whether the target was legitimate and if precautions were taken to avoid civilian casualties.

“The part of international law where this starts playing (a role), though, is indiscriminate attacks targeting civilians,” Human Rights Watch’s associate arms director Mark Hiznay told The Associated Press. “So that’s not necessarily related to the weapons, but the way the weapons are used.”

A convention banning the use of cluster bombs has been joined by more than 120 countries, which agreed not to use, produce, transfer or stockpile the weapons and to clear them after they’ve been used. The U.S., Russia and Ukraine haven’t signed on.

Why the US is willing to send Ukraine cluster munitions now

AP · July 6, 2023

WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States has decided to send cluster munitions to Ukraine to help its military push back Russian forces entrenched along the front lines.

The Biden administration is expected to announce on Friday that it will send thousands of them as part of a new military aid package worth $800 million, according to people familiar with the decision who were not authorized to discuss it publicly before the official announcement and spoke on condition of anonymity.

The move will likely trigger outrage from some allies and humanitarian groups that have long opposed the use of cluster bombs.

Proponents argue that Russia has already been using the controversial weapon in Ukraine and that the munitions the U.S. will provide have a reduced dud rate, meaning there will be far fewer unexploded rounds that can result in unintended civilian deaths.

Here is a look at what cluster munitions are, where they have been used and why the U.S. plans to provide them to Ukraine now.

WHAT IS A CLUSTER MUNITION?

A cluster munition is a bomb that opens in the air and releases smaller “bomblets” across a wide area. The bomblets are designed to take out tanks and equipment, as well as troops, hitting multiple targets at the same time.

The munitions are launched by the same artillery weapons that the U.S. and allies have already provided to Ukraine for the war — such as howitzers — and the type of cluster munition that the U.S. is planning to send is based on a common 155 mm shell that is already widely in use across the battlefield.

In previous conflicts, cluster munitions have had a high dud rate, which meant that thousands of the smaller unexploded bomblets remained behind and killed and maimed people decades later. The U.S. last used its cluster munitions in battle in Iraq in 2003, and decided not to continue using them as the conflict shifted to more urban environments with more dense civilian populations.

On Thursday, Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder said the Defense Department has “multiple variants” of the munitions and “the ones that we are considering providing would not include older variants with (unexploding) rates that are higher than 2.35%.”

WHY PROVIDE THEM NOW?

For more than a year the U.S. has dipped into its own stocks of traditional 155 howitzer munitions and sent more than 2 million rounds to Ukraine. Allies across the globe have provided hundreds of thousands more.

A 155 mm round can strike targets 15 to 20 miles (24 to 32 kilometers) away, making them a munition of choice for Ukrainian ground troops trying to hit enemy targets from a distance. Ukrainian forces are burning through thousands of the rounds a day battling the Russians.

Yehor Cherniev, a member of Ukraine’s parliament, told reporters at a German Marshall Fund event in the U.S. this spring that Kyiv would likely need to fire 7,000 to 9,000 of the rounds daily in intensified counteroffensive fighting. Providing that many puts substantial pressure on U.S. and allied stocks.

The cluster bomb is an attractive option because it would help Ukraine destroy more targets with fewer rounds, and since the U.S. hasn’t used them in conflict since Iraq, it has large amounts of them in storage it can access quickly, said Ryan Brobst, a research analyst for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

A March 2023 letter from top House and Senate Republicans to the Biden administration said the U.S. may have as many as 3 million cluster munitions available for use, and urged the White House to send the munitions to alleviate pressure on U.S. war supplies.

“Cluster munitions are more effective than unitary artillery shells because they inflict damage over a wider area,” Brobst said. “This is important for Ukraine as they try to clear heavily fortified Russian positions.”

Tapping into the U.S. stores of cluster munitions could address Ukraine’s shell shortage and alleviate pressure on the 155 mm stockpiles in the U.S. and elsewhere, Brobst said.

IS USING THEM A WAR CRIME?

Use of cluster bombs itself does not violate international law, but using them against civilians can be a violation. As in any strike, determining a war crime requires looking at whether the target was legitimate and if precautions were taken to avoid civilian casualties.

“The part of international law where this starts playing (a role), though, is indiscriminate attacks targeting civilians,” Human Rights Watch’s associate arms director Mark Hiznay told The Associated Press. “So that’s not necessarily related to the weapons, but the way the weapons are used.”

A convention banning the use of cluster bombs has been joined by more than 120 countries, which agreed not to use, produce, transfer or stockpile the weapons and to clear them after they’ve been used. The U.S., Russia and Ukraine haven’t signed on.

WHERE HAVE THEY BEEN USED?

The bombs have been deployed in many recent conflicts, including by U.S. forces.

The U.S. initially considered cluster bombs an integral part of its arsenal during the invasion of Afghanistan that began in 2001, according to HRW. The group estimated that the U.S.-led coalition dropped more than 1,500 cluster bombs in Afghanistan during the first three years of the conflict.

The Defense Department had been due by 2019 to stop use of any cluster munitions with a rate of unexploded ordnance greater than 1%. But the Trump administration rolled back that policy, allowing commanders to approve use of such munitions.

Syrian government troops often used cluster munitions — supplied by Russia — against opposition strongholds during that country’s civil war, frequently hitting civilian targets and infrastructure. And Israel used them in civilian areas in south Lebanon, including during the 1982 invasion.

During the monthlong 2006 war with Hezbollah, HRW and the United Nations accused Israel of firing as many as 4 million cluster munitions into Lebanon. That left unexploded ordnance that threatens Lebanese civilians to this day.

The Saudi-led coalition in Yemen has been criticized for its use of cluster bombs in the war with the Iran-backed Houthi rebels that has ravaged the southern Arabian country.

In 2017, Yemen was the second deadliest country for cluster munitions after Syria, according to the U.N. Children have been killed or maimed long after the munitions originally fell, making it difficult to know the true toll.

In the 1980s, the Russians made heavy use of cluster bombs during their 10-year invasion of Afghanistan. As a result of decades of war, the Afghan countryside remains one of the most heavily mined countries in the world.

WHAT’S HAPPENING IN UKRAINE?

Russian forces have used cluster bombs in Ukraine on a number of occasions, according to Ukrainian government leaders, observers and humanitarian groups. And human rights groups have said Ukraine has also used them.

During the early days of the war, there were repeated instances of Russian cluster bombs cited by groups such as Human Rights Watch, including when they hit near a preschool in the northeastern city of Okhtyrka. The open-source intelligence group Bellingcat said its researchers found cluster munitions in that strike as well as multiple cluster attacks in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, also in the northeast.

More recently, in March, a Russian missile and drone barrage hit a number of urban areas, including a sustained bombardment in Bakhmut, in the eastern Donetsk region. Just west of there, shelling and missile strikes hit the Ukrainian-held city of Kostiantynivka and AP journalists in the city saw at least four injured people taken to a local hospital. Police said Russian forces attacked the town with S-300 missiles and cluster munitions.

Just a month later, Donetsk Gov. Pavlo Kyrylenko accused Russian forces of attacking a town with cluster munitions, wounding one person. An AP and Frontline database called War Crimes Watch Ukraine has cataloged how Russia has used cluster bombs.

AP · July 6, 2023

12. U.S. cluster bombs for Ukraine would exceed legal limit on duds

Excerpts:

There is no waiver provision in the 1 percent limit Congress has placed on cluster munition dud rates, written into Defense Department appropriations since 2017. Biden would bypass it, according to a White House official, under the Foreign Assistance Act, which allows the president to furnish assistance, regardless of appropriations or arms export restrictions, as long as he notifies Congress that it is “vital to the security of the interests of the United States.”

Although the United States has used cluster munitions in every major war since Korea, no new ones are believed to have been produced for years. But as many as 4.7 million cluster shells, rockets, missiles and bombs, containing more than 500 million submunitions, or bomblets, remain in military inventories, according to estimates by Human Rights Watch drawn from Defense Department reports.

A 2022 Congressional Research Service report to lawmakers noted “significant discrepancies among failure rate estimates” of cluster weapons in the U.S. arsenal, with some manufacturers claiming 2 to 5 percent, while mine clearance specialists have reported rates of 10 to 30 percent.

Nonproliferation experts said that the Pentagon’s assessed 2.35 percent dud rate most likely refers to aging shells with updated fuses designed to improve their ability to self-destruct, but that it was impossible to know without access to the testing data.

U.S. cluster bombs for Ukraine would exceed legal limit on duds

Transfer will bypass legal limits on dud rates for the controversial weapons

By Karen DeYoung, Alex Horton and Missy Ryan

Updated July 7, 2023 at 1:58 a.m. EDT|Published July 6, 2023 at 8:15 p.m. EDT

The Washington Post · by Karen DeYoung · July 7, 2023

President Biden is prepared to waive U.S. law prohibiting the production, use or transfer of cluster munitions with a failure rate of more than 1 percent to send them to Ukraine, a decision that may come as early as this week amid concerns about Kyiv’s lagging counteroffensive against entrenched Russian troops.

The principal weapon under consideration, an M864 artillery shell first produced in 1987, is fired from the 155mm howitzers the United States and other Western countries have provided Ukraine. In its last publicly available estimate, more than 20 years ago, the Pentagon assessed that artillery shell to have a “dud” rate of 6 percent, meaning that at least four of each of the 72 submunitions each shell carries would remain unexploded across an area of approximately 22,500 square meters — roughly the size of 4½ football fields.

“We are aware of reports from several decades ago that indicate certain 155mm DPICMs have higher dud rates,” said a defense official, one of seven Pentagon, White House and military officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive pending decision. The defense official used the acronym for Dual Purpose Improved Conventional Munitions.

The Pentagon now says it has new assessments, based on testing as recent as 2020, with failure rates no higher than 2.35 percent. While that exceeds the limit of 1 percent mandated by Congress every year since 2017, officials are “carefully selecting” munitions with the 2.35 percent dud rate or below for transfer to Ukraine, should the president decide to do it, Pentagon spokesperson Brig. Gen. Patrick Ryder said Thursday.

A defense official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters said details of the new assessments were “not releasable,” including how, when and where the tests were done, and whether they included actual firing exercises or virtual simulations. Military manuals say these weapons cannot be fired in training because they are part of war reserve stockpiles.

There is no waiver provision in the 1 percent limit Congress has placed on cluster munition dud rates, written into Defense Department appropriations since 2017. Biden would bypass it, according to a White House official, under the Foreign Assistance Act, which allows the president to furnish assistance, regardless of appropriations or arms export restrictions, as long as he notifies Congress that it is “vital to the security of the interests of the United States.”

Although the United States has used cluster munitions in every major war since Korea, no new ones are believed to have been produced for years. But as many as 4.7 million cluster shells, rockets, missiles and bombs, containing more than 500 million submunitions, or bomblets, remain in military inventories, according to estimates by Human Rights Watch drawn from Defense Department reports.

A 2022 Congressional Research Service report to lawmakers noted “significant discrepancies among failure rate estimates” of cluster weapons in the U.S. arsenal, with some manufacturers claiming 2 to 5 percent, while mine clearance specialists have reported rates of 10 to 30 percent.

Nonproliferation experts said that the Pentagon’s assessed 2.35 percent dud rate most likely refers to aging shells with updated fuses designed to improve their ability to self-destruct, but that it was impossible to know without access to the testing data.

Advocates who have warned against using cluster munitions say the claimed lower dud rates are the result of testing in idealized and unrealistic conditions that don’t account for real-world scenarios. The Army’s artillery manuals have said even the military’s own dud rates can increase depending on the angle of impact and type of terrain in which they fall.

Cluster weapons explode in the air over a target, releasing dozens to hundreds of smaller submunitions across a wide area.

More than 120 countries have joined a convention banning their use as inhumane and indiscriminate, in large part because of high failure rates that litter the landscape with unexploded submunitions that endanger both friendly troops and civilians, often for decades after the end of a conflict. The United States, Ukraine and Russia — which is alleged to have used them extensively in Ukraine — are not parties to the convention. Eight of NATO’s 31 members, including the United States, have not ratified the convention.

“It’s dismaying to see the long-established 1 percent unexploded ordnance standard for cluster munitions rolled back as this will result in more duds, which means an even greater threat to civilians, including de-miners," said Mary Wareham, advocacy director of the arms division of Human Rights Watch.

“The lack of transparency on how this number was reached is disappointing and seems unprecedented,” Wareham said.

While Russia has used cluster munitions far more extensively, Ukraine has also allegedly deployed these weapons during the war, using its own Soviet-era stocks or shells obtained from other countries. A new HRW report released Thursday said Ukrainian use has “caused numerous deaths and serious injuries to civilians” in attacks in the city of Izyum and other locations in 2022. Ukraine has denied using cluster munitions.

The dud rate is both morally and legally key to supplying the weapons. In 2008, then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates issued a directive banning the production, use or transfer of cluster munitions with a failure rate of more than 1 percent and imposed a 10-year deadline for destroying existing weapons that exceeded that limit. Numerous nongovernmental and media reports have documented one subsequent use — against an al-Qaeda training camp in 2009 — although the United States has never confirmed nor denied the attack.

The Trump administration in 2017 reversed both the dud limit and the timeline for destroying any munitions that exceeded it, after which Congress adopted the legislative language banning any funding for the use, production or transfer of cluster munitions with a failure rate of more than 1 percent, even as major defense manufacturers canceled production contracts under pressure from shareholders and public opinion.

In an interview Wednesday, Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov said obtaining a significant supply of the weapons has become crucial to Kyiv’s ongoing counteroffensive.

The United States and other Western donors have sent millions of non-cluster howitzer shells to Ukraine, but stockpiles are running low and manufacturing cannot keep up with demand. It “is not enough,” Reznikov said. “The Russians use three or four times more artillery shells of different calibers than we do. And we must conserve because we can’t shell as intensively,” he added.

“Since these projectiles are effective,” Reznikov said of cluster munitions, “they will allow us to make up this difference.” The Russians “are using them against us, so for our self-defense we have full right to use the same munition.”

“This is just for where there are fields, because it’s very important not to bring harm to the civilian population,” Reznikov said. “We won’t use them before the de-occupation of a city.”

As Ukraine’s pleas for the weapons have increased in recent months, they have been met with both agreement and disapproval by U.S. lawmakers. In late March, a group of senior Republicans, including the chairmen of the House Armed Services and Foreign Affairs committees, and the ranking members of the counterpart Senate committees, said they were “deeply disappointed” in the administration’s “reluctance” to provide the weapons.

“Providing DPCIM,” they wrote in a letter to Biden, “will allow Ukraine to compensate for Russia’s quantitative advantage in both personnel and artillery rounds, and will allow the Ukrainian armed forces to concentrate their use of unitary warheads against higher-value Russian target.”

Others, including many Democrats, are less enthusiastic. Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), the ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, said that he was open to supplying the munitions to Ukraine but that he still had not been provided additional information about what is being sent and how it will be used.

The administration is “trying to send the ones with the lowest possible dud rate, which makes sense,” Smith said in an interview Monday. “The question is: Are there munitions that have that low dud rate? I’ve been told repeatedly that ... yes, there are.”

“The Russians have been dropping these things with dud rates that are a hell of a lot higher than 8 percent all across Ukraine for a year and a half now,” he said.

Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, which, along with Human Rights Watch, compiles information for the Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor, a Swiss-based international organization, noted the Pentagon’s failure to release any information on its new assessments and transfer plans. “We requested consultations about this months ago in a formal letter,” he said, but had received no reply.

Provision of the weapons has also been controversial within the administration. In remarks to the U.N. Security Council a week after Russia’s February 2022 invasion, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, accused Moscow of using “exceptionally lethal weaponry,” including cluster munitions, that “has no place on the battlefield” and is “banned under the Geneva Convention.” Her “no place” reference was later excised from the State Department’s official transcript of the speech, which was also amended to note that the Geneva Conventions ban cluster use “directed against civilians.”

The administration began to soften its position on providing cluster munitions this past spring as the shortage of standard artillery munitions became more acute. Biden said in May that cluster weapons “may” be considered, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken is said to have recently dropped his opposition.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg denounced Russia’s reported use of cluster weapons early in the war, saying, “This is brutality, this is inhumane, and this is violating international law.”

The administration has worked in recent weeks to allay allied concern over the transfer of the weapons to Kyiv, according to a second White House official. “The president’s top priority is maintaining unity among our allies and partners in support of Ukraine, and we would not take any actions that would undermine that priority,” the official said. As a result of allied consultations, “if we were to move forward” with cluster munitions, “we are confident that would not be an issue.”

The U.S. military has long considered cluster munitions a useful battlefield weapon. That position was reaffirmed in March testimony before the House Armed Services Committee by Army Gen. Christopher Cavoli, head of the U.S. European Command and supreme allied commander of NATO. “We call it dual-purpose, because it releases bomblets, some of which are anti-personnel fragmentation grenades and some of which are shaped charges that attack vehicles from above,” Cavoli said. “It’s a very effective weapon.”

The munitions can be an attractive option for commanders to destroy troops or equipment in big groups, or when a target can’t be pinpointed by precision artillery. But they also come with drawbacks for the forces using them.

Army artillery doctrine warns that DPICM submunition duds “can pose significant risks to friendly personnel and equipment.” A 2017 manual puts the overall dud rate for cluster rounds at 2 to 3 percent, while warning the rate could increase if procedures aren’t followed or if uneven terrain disturbs the angle required for detonation.

In addition to the risk of civilians picking up unexploded duds long after a battle, they can also pose more immediate danger to the forces deploying them. “There’s definitely a lot of tactical risks in employing these types of munitions. It limits your ability to maneuver, and limits your ability to maneuver quickly, because you have to be clearing a bunch of UXO,” or unexploded ordnance, said a former U.S. Army artillery officer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid conflicts with his current employer. “It’s gonna slow you down, it’s gonna limit the ways in which you can exploit success.”

The U.S. history of what are considered “friendly fire” incidents is a concern: Several U.S. service members were killed during and after the Gulf War by unexploded munitions, according to a 1993 Government Accountability Office report, which said the Army did not hold force-wide training to recognize submunitions on the ground before the invasion.

“Someone within DOD knows the actual dud rate,” the former officer said, “and I hope that would be communicated honestly and accurately to any Ukrainian unit receiving these types of munitions.”

Isabelle Khurshudyan in Kyiv and Abigail Hauslohner contributed to this report.

The Washington Post · by Karen DeYoung · July 7, 2023

13. New Ukraine Footage Shows U.S.-Made HIMARS Destroying Putin's Military

I think the footage the article is referring to is here: https://twitter.com/UAWeapons/status/1675820422779088896

New Ukraine Footage Shows U.S.-Made HIMARS Destroying Putin's Military

In a nearly one-minute-long clip shared on social media by Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) on Monday, counter-battery fire successfully destroyed a Russian 2S7M Malka 203mm self-propelled howitzer and three BM-21 Grad multiple rocket launchers.

19fortyfive.com · by Peter Suciu · July 6, 2023

As the war in Ukraine continues, and each side shares videos of the latest destruction of enemy hardware and position – it is becoming clear that despite a few setbacks, Western platforms have been far more successful.

It is true that a number of Leopard 2 main battle tanks have been destroyed, but it pales to the thousands of Soviet-designed systems that now litter the countryside.

In a video shared on social media this week, a number of additional Russian vehicles have been added to the graveyard of destroyed hardware.

And it appears that the U.S.-made M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) played no small role!

Moscow Hates the HIMARS – And For Good Reason

In a nearly one-minute-long clip shared on social media by Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) on Monday, counter-battery fire successfully destroyed a Russian 2S7M Malka 203mm self-propelled howitzer and three BM-21 Grad multiple rocket launchers.

That should be seen as a serious setback for the Kremlin – to lose four such platforms in a single week.

The 2S7M ‘Malka’ 203mm self-propelled artillery gun is the latest upgrade of the 2S7 ‘Pion,’ which was developed in the 1980s. It was designed to strike vital enemy targets and facilities in the tactical depth behind the front line – and was described as among the most powerful self-propelled guns in the world, where a single 203mm round could fully destroy a building. Moreover, as the blast is so powerful that it can physically incapacitate an unprepared soldier or crew member near it from the concussive force, the gun system is equipped with an audible firing alarm that emits a series of short warning tones for approximately five seconds prior to the charge being fired.

This is not the first time that a HIMARS has destroyed a Malka, but such direct exchanges between the two platforms have been rare. The HIMARS actually has a higher rate of fire and the ability to fire and move far quicker than the Russian system – which contributed to the Ukrainians having the edge in the recent artillery duel. Against the BM-21 Grad, the odds were stacked in the HIMARS’ favor, as the American-made platform has the ability to outrange the Russian military and more importantly strike with such precision. That has offered a huge advantage for the Ukraine forces.

It is unclear where the recently posted video was recorded, but the fighting in the Eastern Donbas region has largely been one of artillery strikes for nearly a year – at times resembling the big gun duels of the First World War. However, it isn’t just the soldiers who are suffering from the endless exchanges.

The constant shelling has devastated the countryside, destroyed countless villages, and nearly razed the city of Bakhmut to the ground. Hundreds, perhaps even thousands of innocent civilians have also been caught in the crossfire.

As the video could be considered graphic we have not embedded it. You can find a link to it here.

Author Experience and Expertise

A Senior Editor for 19FortyFive, Peter Suciu is a Michigan-based writer. He has contributed to more than four dozen magazines, newspapers, and websites with over 3,200 published pieces over a twenty-year career in journalism. He regularly writes about military hardware, firearms history, cybersecurity, politics, and international affairs. Peter is also a Contributing Writer for Forbes and Clearance Jobs. You can follow him on Twitter: @PeterSuciu.

In this article:

Written By Peter Suciu

Expert Biography: A Senior Editor for 1945, Peter Suciu is a Michigan-based writer who has contributed to more than four dozen magazines, newspapers, and websites with over 3,000 published pieces over a twenty-year career in journalism. He regularly writes about military hardware, firearms history, cybersecurity, and international affairs. Peter is also a Contributing Writer for Forbes. You can follow him on Twitter: @PeterSuciu.

19fortyfive.com · by Peter Suciu · July 6, 2023

14. Identity Politics Could Kill America’s Scientific Edge

Pogo: We have met the enemy and he is us.

Identity Politics Could Kill America’s Scientific Edge

Researchers in communist China are less hamstrung by ideology than their counterparts in the U.S. Will the Supreme Court’s ruling on affirmative action improve things?

By​ ​Sadanand Dhume

July 6, 2023 6:07 pm ET

https://www.wsj.com/articles/identity-politics-scientific-edge-china-affirmative-action-medicine-technology-ai-supreme-court-369fe99f?

Photovoltaic panels at Dalat Base in Ordos City, China, April 26. PHOTO: WU HAO/SHUTTERSTOCK

There are many reasons to oppose the sort of race-based affirmative action that the Supreme Court recently struck down at Harvard and the University of North Carolina. Most Americans find judging people by their skin color morally repugnant; Harvard’s policies cruelly stereotyped Asian-Americans as impersonable to keep their numbers down; and race-based policies replace the dream of a colorblind society with an unhealthy obsession with group identities—to name a few.

But one particular reason deserves more attention: It’s good for national security. The high court’s ruling could better equip America to thwart China’s effort to lead the world by overtaking the West in science and technology.

Though the U.S. has long ruled those realms, China is catching up fast. Washington has begun to address this problem in recent years. But as former Google CEO Eric Schmidt and artificial intelligence expert Yll Bajraktari warned in a Foreign Affairs piece last year, it’s “hard to say with any confidence” that the U.S. is “better positioned or organized for the long-term contest” with China than it was a few years ago. “It is entirely possible to imagine a future where systems designed, built, and based in China dominate world markets, extending Beijing’s sphere of influence and providing it with a military advantage over the United States.”

Unlike the former Soviet Union, whose scientific prowess was limited to a handful of domains, China has emerged as a genuine rival to America. The Australian Strategic Policy Institute reported this year that China leads the U.S. in research on 37 of 44 critical technologies, including advanced aircraft engines, electric batteries, machine learning and synthetic biology. In a recent essay in Foreign Affairs, Dan Wang, an expert on China’s technology landscape, wrote that “China now rivals Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan in its mastery of the electronics supply chain.” In 2007, the Chinese added less than 4% of the value-added costs of iPhones made in that country. Now it’s more than 25%.

China leads the world in modern infrastructure such as high-voltage power lines, high-speed rail and 5G telecom networks. It controls most solar-panel production, houses the world’s largest electric-car battery company, CATL, and is racing to catch up with the West in high-end semiconductors. In Mr. Wang’s telling, Shenzhen has come to resemble the San Francisco Bay Area, “where university researchers, entrepreneurs, workers, and investors continually rub elbows.”

Given this challenge, you might imagine that America would re-emphasize the principles of objectivity and merit that made it the world’s leading scientific innovator. You would be mistaken.

Where it once was taken for granted that expanding knowledge was more important than a scientist’s sex or skin color, anyone adhering to that approach in the U.S. now must fend off charges that it is racist, patriarchal, colonial, or a tool of oppression. As a group of 29 scientists and academics contended in a recent paper for the Journal of Controversial Ideas, scientific progress in the West “is being hindered by a new, alarming clash between liberal epistemology and identity-based ideologies.”

Instead of fighting back, traditional gatekeeping institutions seem to have become part of the problem. In 2020 the Lancet published a paper on “Adopting an intersectionality framework to address power and equity in medicine.” Last year Nature published an article titled “Seeding an anti-racist culture at Scotland’s botanical gardens.” In 2018, Scientific American declared that “the idea of 2 sexes is overly simplistic.”

Thirty years ago, when the U.S. lead over all other countries seemed insurmountable, we could arguably afford to humor activists who believe in decolonizing pharmacology or insist that science is bigoted because cutting-edge research output doesn’t meet some race or sex quota. But China’s rapid rise—driven in part by a brutally meritocratic exam system that focuses on test scores—means we no longer have that luxury. You can be pretty sure that nobody in Beijing or Shanghai is wasting time on queer physics, feminist glaciology or indigenous science.

Ironically, scientists in communist China need to care less about ideology than their American counterparts. In the U.S., the National Institutes of Health requires some prospective researchers to demonstrate “a strong commitment to promoting diversity and inclusive excellence” in order to receive funding. The UC Davis School of Medicine now uses “adversity scores” to admit students. The University of California Los Angeles reportedly denied a psychology professor a job because students objected to his skepticism—expressed in a podcast—about the effectiveness of using diversity statements for hiring.

The U.S. will only find it harder to compete with China if activists and administrators are allowed to bully scientists into caring more about artificial diversity goals than about their work. To quote the 29 authors who stood up for merit, “for science to succeed, it must strive for the non-ideological pursuit of objective truth.”

If we’re lucky, last week’s Supreme Court decision brings us a step closer to this laudable goal. Any defeat for identity politics is a victory for American competitiveness.

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Wonder Land: Democrats said decades ago they alone would run policies for black Americans. Now comes the reckoning. Images: AP/Getty Images Composite: Mark Kelly

Copyright ©2023 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8

Appeared in the July 7, 2023, print edition as 'Identity Politics Could Kill America’s Scientific Edge'.

​15. Doubts about scout snipers arose in infantry units, No. 2 Marine says

This should make for an interesting debate (and I am sure will get quite emotional). While shooting is the primary skill of the sniper, what makes the sniper so proficient at reconnaissance are all the skills that go into "making that shot:" stealthy movement, camouflage, tracking, observation and reporting skills and more. The best reconnaissance soldiers I had in my scout platoon in Korea were our snipers. I think one of the problems is that we provide all the reconnaissance training to our snipers and we do not necessarily provide the same level of reconnaissance training (minus all the weapons training for taking the sniper shot) to our non-sniper scouts.

Doubts about scout snipers arose in infantry units, No. 2 Marine says

marinecorpstimes.com · by Irene Loewenson · July 6, 2023

WASHINGTON — The Marine Corps’ controversial decision to scrap scout sniper platoons “came from the ground up,” the second-in-command Marine said June 29.

The service in February announced an end to the elite scout sniper platoons, made up of marksmen who also were trained in reconnaissance. Infantry battalions will still have access to platoons’ precision rifles, and reconnaissance and special-operations units will still have snipers, the Marine Corps stressed at the time.

In place of 18-Marine scout sniper platoons, infantry battalions are establishing 26-Marine scout platoons focused on reconnaissance, Marine Corps Times previously reported.

At a speech at the annual Modern Day Marine conference in Washington, D.C., Gen. Eric Smith said the idea for the change originated in infantry battalions and then made its way through the regiments and then the division commanders, who brought the matter to top Marine leaders in the Pentagon.

RELATED

Marines remove scout sniper platoons from infantry battalions

Instead of scout sniper platoons, infantry battalions will have scout platoons.

Commanded by two-star generals, the four Marine Corps divisions are the ground combat forces at the heart of the Marine Corps.

“It was the four division commanders who brought that and said, ‘Hey, we need more scouting. We need ISR — intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance. We need less precision shooting,’” said Smith, the assistant commandant.

“I mean, that was from the division commanders,” he continued. “So if you wish to argue with the four sitting division commanders, go argue with the four division commanders. Good luck.”

The 1st Marine Division is based at Camp Pendleton, California, with 2nd Marine Division at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, and 3rd Marine Division at Camp Butler in Okinawa, Japan. The Reserve’s ground combat division, 4th Marine Division, is headquartered in New Orleans, with reservists all across the United States.

Smith told reporters after his speech that the division commanders provided the feedback through the twice-annual ground board. In this case it was the one in November 2022, Marine spokesman Capt. Ryan Bruce clarified June 30.

The ground board is an opportunity for those commanders to share their thoughts directly with the commandant: “Hey, boss, here’s what you need to know,” as Smith put it.

“They just give us ideas,” Smith told reporters. “We don’t accept them all. But some we do, and that was one we accepted.”

Experimentation with infantry battalions revealed that the units had insufficient intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities, Bruce had said in a written statement to Marine Corps Times in February. But Marines in the new scout platoons can stay hyper-focused on providing those capabilities for the battalions, he noted.

The change comes as the Marine commandant, Gen. David Berger, has instructed the Corps to get better at reconnaissance and counter-reconnaissance.

“If you’re so big and fat and immobile and vulnerable to their sensors, all the lethality in the world ain’t going to help you,” Berger told Defense News in May 2022.

Force Design 2030, as Berger’s vision for a more modern Marine Corps is called, also asks the service to “divest the preponderance of weapon-specific military occupational specialties in the infantry battalions and build highly trained Marines who are capable of employing a range of weapons and equipment,” Bruce said in the February statement.

With a shortfall in the number of snipers, the scout sniper platoons have in recent years consisted of a limited number of full-fledged scout snipers, plus marksmen who undergo on-the-job training from their officially trained peers.

That’s not the fault of the Corps’ marksmen, retired Master Sgt. Tim Parkhurst, president of the USMC Scout Sniper Association, argued in according to a February message.

“Replacing an 18-man Scout Sniper Platoon with a 26-man Scout Platoon will not solve the ‘all weather information gathering’ problem,” Parkhurst wrote. “Retaining the skill set and the combat capability of Scout Snipers by offering a viable career path to Scout Snipers and providing them with more engaged leadership might.”

Smith, a career infantryman, maintained in his speech June 29 that even non-sniper riflemen nowadays are training in precision shooting.

“Your average rifleman, who’s an expert, was plinking targets at 700 meters,” Smith said of recent experimentation with an infantry battalion. “In fact, if you didn’t hit the 700-, 800-meter target, you’re kind of chastised, you know, for being a loser.”

“That used to be a significant emotional event, hitting a target at 800 meters,” added Smith, who, judging from his uniform, has qualified as a rifle expert at least five times.

After the fall of 2024, there will be no more seats in the Scout Sniper Basic Course, though Marine snipers can still get trained at the Reconnaissance Training Center and the Marine Raider Training Center, according to the Marine Corps’ message announcing the change.

“All schoolhouses cost people,” Smith said.

About Irene Loewenson

Irene Loewenson is a staff reporter for Marine Corps Times. She joined Military Times as an editorial fellow in August 2022. She is a graduate of Williams College, where she was the editor-in-chief of the student newspaper.

​

​16. Ukraine spy chief says nuclear threat at Zaporizhzhia plant subsiding

I hope that is the case.

Ukraine spy chief says nuclear threat at Zaporizhzhia plant subsiding

Reuters · by Reuters

KYIV, July 6 (Reuters) - Ukraine's military spy chief said on Thursday that the threat of a Russian attack on the vast Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant was receding, but that it could easily return as long as the facility remained under occupation by Moscow's forces.

The intelligence chief, Kyrylo Budanov, made the comment in an interview with Reuters after days of warnings by Ukrainian and Russian officials accusing each other of plotting an attack at Europe's largest nuclear plant.

"The threat is decreasing", said Budanov, who is the head of Ukraine's Main Directorate of Intelligence at the Ministry of Defence, declining to say how he was able to say.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has for days warned of the grave threat at the facility, most recently saying Russian forces had mined the roof of several reactors.

Budanov did not give details of what had been done to reduce the threat, or what it consisted of. He made clear he believed the threat had only been postponed until later.

"Sorry I can't tell you what happened recently but the fact is that the threat is decreasing", he said. "This means that at least we have all together with joint efforts somehow postponed a technogenic catastrophe".

"It's not eliminated. As long as the station is occupied this can happen again any time if they want", he said.

He also commented on the major counteroffensive which Ukraine launched against Russian occupying forces last month.

"The counteroffensive is in progress. In general, let's just say it's happening. There will be success, but later", he said.

He compared the Ukrainian operation with Russia's months-long battle to capture the eastern city of Bakhmut in April.

"I want to remind you this famous story with Bakhmut. The Russians were attacking it for more than 10 months. Our task is a bit bigger than Bakhmut, but we have a bit less time than 10 months".

Reporting by Tom Balmforth and Sergiy Karazy; editing by Frank Jack Daniel

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Reuters · by Reuters

​17. Ukraine says it is advancing near eastern city of Bakhmut

Ukraine says it is advancing near eastern city of Bakhmut

Reuters · by Reuters

KYIV, July 7 (Reuters) - Ukraine said on Friday its troops had advanced by more than a kilometre near the eastern city of Bakhmut in the past day of fighting against Russian forces.

The comments were the latest by Kyiv signalling that the counteroffensive it launched in early June is gradually making progress although Russian accounts of fighting in the Bakhmut sector differ from Ukraine's.

"The defence forces continue to hold the initiative there, putting pressure on the enemy, conducting assault operations, advancing along the northern and southern flanks," Serhiy Cherevatyi, spokesperson for the eastern military command, told Ukrainian television.

"In particular, over the past day, they have advanced more than one kilometre (0.62 mile)."

General Oleksander Syrskyi, who is in charge of Ukraine's land forces, also said Ukrainian troops were pushing forward in the direction of Bakhmut.

"The defence forces are making progress and advancing," he said, adding that some territory had been regained but providing no details.

A spokesperson for the armed forces general staff said Ukrainian forces had had "partial success" near the village of Klishchiivka, just southwest of Bakhmut.

Ukrainian military analysts have said that securing Klishchiivka would help Ukraine take back Bakhmut, which was captured by Russian forces in May after months of fighting.

Russia's RIA news agency cited a Russian army source as saying this week that Moscow's forces had repelled a attack on Klishchiivka and were mopping up remaining Ukrainian troops in the area.

Reuters could not verify the battlefield situation.

Moscow, which began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, sees Bakhmut as a stepping stone to attacking other cities. Russia still holds Bakhmut but Ukrainian forces hope to encircle the city.

Kyiv says it has taken back some villages in the south since launching its counteroffensive, but Russia still holds large parts of eastern and southeastern Ukraine.

Reporting by Pavel Polityuk, additional reporting by Anna Pruchnicka, Editing by Timothy Heritage

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Reuters · by Reuters

18. The America That Americans Forget

Do not forget the importance of these geopolitical locations and their people.

Excerpt:

Since then, Guam has become a strategic node in America’s designs in the Pacific. It is commonly referred to as “the tip of the spear” — a place from which the United States can project military might across Asia, an essential conduit to the first island chain of Japan, the Philippines and Taiwan and then on to China. As geopolitical tensions rise, Guam’s importance to American military planners only increases, and so does the risk to those who live there. In every iteration of war games between the United States and China run by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (C.S.I.S.), Beijing’s first strike on U.S. soil has been to bomb Guam.

The America That Americans Forget

The New York Times · by Sarah A. Topol · July 7, 2023

Roy Gamboa, a member of Guam’s native CHamoru people and a Marine veteran.

As tensions with China mount, the U.S. military continues to build up Guam and other Pacific territories — placing the burdens of imperial power on the nation’s most ignored and underrepresented citizens.

Roy Gamboa, a member of Guam’s native CHamoru people and a Marine veteran.Credit...

Photographs by Glenna Gordon

• July 7, 2023

On the weekends, when Roy Gamboa was a little boy, his grandfather woke him before dawn. He would pour some coffee into a bowl of rice, and that would be the boy’s breakfast. Roy knew better than to question anything; he sat quietly in his grandfather’s truck as they rumbled down the big hill from their village, Hågat, to Big Navy, as the U.S. Naval Base in Guam is known. They passed through the military gates, along a dirt road and onto the shore of a little cove, next to one of America’s deepest harbors, where skipjacks flipped out of the aquamarine water. The boy noodled with seashells as his grandfather cast. When his grandfather caught a fish, he would unhook it and throw it on the ground, and Roy would snatch it up and quickly stuff it, still wriggling, in the bag. If the fish weren’t biting at one spot, they packed up and moved to another. No one from the Navy ever stopped the old man and the young boy.

Some mornings, his grandfather would take Roy back across the dirt road into the jungle to pick papayas, lemons and coconuts. He would thrash a course into the thicket to collect firewood from the slender trees — tangen tangen in CHamoru, the language of the Indigenous inhabitants of Guam, which Roy’s grandmothers and grandfathers were. They would cut the logs into quarters to dry, and stack them higher than Roy could even reach. Other mornings, the man and the boy went to the same spot to cut the grass, all the way from the cove’s blue waters to the ruins of an old cemetery. “Why are we the only ones cutting the grass here?” Roy would ask.

“Boy, this was our land before the war,” his grandfather would reply, pointing to 40 acres running from the cemetery to the water to the jungle, over the road and back almost as far as their eyes could see. “We’re taking care of it because we hope, one day, in the future, our land will be returned to us.”

Roy didn’t really understand what his grandfather was talking about; it would take him years to realize it was related to Guam’s status as an “unincorporated territory” — which means the island is a possession of the United States. It was just normal that no one residing on Guam could vote for president, that the U.S. territory had no senator and only one, nonvoting, member of the House. Roy’s grandfather never spoke about how their island had been colonized for hundreds of years: first by the Spanish, beginning in 1668, and then the Americans, in 1898, until they fled in 1941, returning three years later to liberate the CHamoru people from brutal Japanese occupation.

Growing up, Roy was told that Uncle Sam had saved the CHamoru — and that in return, because their people did not have much, they gave up their sons and their daughters to military service, so others around the world could have their own freedom. “You know the saying: ‘If you can read and write, thank a teacher; if you can read and write in English, thank a veteran,’” Roy told me.

Guam, with its strategic location, quickly became home to Andersen Air Force Base, where B-52 bombers deploy on a rotational basis, and Naval Base Guam was expanded. The Guam tourism board’s slogan, Where America’s day begins!, was everywhere. The Guam Chamber of Commerce proudly proclaimed the island America in Asia! while Guam’s license plates read Guam, U.S.A.; but underneath that they also said Tano Y Chamorro — “the land of the CHamoru.”

This sense of dual identity, but also a kind of second-class status, was confusing in ways Roy couldn’t even begin to express, so Roy and his family, like many around them, just didn’t. It wasn’t really in their culture to rock the boat or talk about some of the more unpleasant things. Roy wasn’t taught that the Americans had banned the CHamoru language for decades (which is one reason Roy himself didn’t speak it well) or that the Americans had been the ones to abandon the CHamoru to the Japanese in the first place, or that upon their return, the U.S. Navy annexed the entire island, and then started carving out the best land for military use, displacing entire villages including that of his paternal and maternal grandparents. Today the military owns nearly a third of Guam’s 217 square miles (which is roughly the size of Chicago).

Since then, Guam has become a strategic node in America’s designs in the Pacific. It is commonly referred to as “the tip of the spear” — a place from which the United States can project military might across Asia, an essential conduit to the first island chain of Japan, the Philippines and Taiwan and then on to China. As geopolitical tensions rise, Guam’s importance to American military planners only increases, and so does the risk to those who live there. In every iteration of war games between the United States and China run by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (C.S.I.S.), Beijing’s first strike on U.S. soil has been to bomb Guam.

Yet the island is largely forgotten by most Americans. Guam plays a central role in “homeland defense,” though it rarely shows up on maps or in textbooks about the homeland — no place tries harder to show its patriotism and gets so little recognition in return. The island is missing from many NGO and U.S. government lists — for example, a U.S.D.A. Economic Research Service poverty chart — while websites like those of Air France and the World Bank list Guam as a separate place entirely. The New York Times, like many other publications, did not include Guam or any American Pacific Island territory on the national Covid map.

Guam is one of many islands in various political alignments across the giant expanse of the Pacific that make up America’s empire outside the 50 states — ranging from “unincorporated territory” to “commonwealth” to “freely associated state.”

Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (C.N.M.I.), American Samoa, the Republic of Palau, the Federated States of Micronesia and the Republic of the Marshall Islands are vitally important to the maintenance of America’s global power, yet the United States’ history there is rarely examined by Americans.

Now these islands are the setting of a soft-power tug of war between the United States and China, and an American military buildup in the region on a scale that hasn’t been seen since World War II.

U.S. military construction projects in the Pacific Islands total nearly $5 billion.

On Guam alone, there are currently 71 military construction projects valued at over $4 billion, and the Department of Defense has committed to more than $11 billion in construction there over the next five years, including a missile-defense system comprising up to 20 individual sites to achieve “360-degree defense” of the island, expected to be operational by 2027. There are three military construction projects in Micronesia for $432 million, seven in the Northern Marianas for $388.6 million, three projects at $180.4 million on Wake Island and one in Palau for $121 million.

These islands are the United States’ closest allies or territories; they are also among the poorest, most disenfranchised parts of America. If the United States decides to go to war in the Pacific, would the rest of America really understand what that means, whom it involves or what injustices it perpetuates? What does America in Asia really look like? Where does America’s day actually begin?

The Pacific Island region — sometimes called the Blue Continent, stretching from Australia and New Zealand to Kiribati and French Polynesia — has long been on the periphery of America’s understanding of its empire. The United States has ruled, nuked, resettled, been attacked from and fought wars on the smaller islands scattered across the Pacific over a span of more than 100 years. Yet Washington never issued a national security document for the region until September 2022, when the Biden administration released the first-ever Pacific Partnership Strategy.

“The United States is a Pacific nation,” the document stated, going on to explain that Washington has an interest in “ensuring that growing geopolitical competition does not undermine the sovereignty and security of the Pacific Islands, of the United States or of our allies and partners.” The country’s renewed attention came in response to China’s growing regional assertiveness; a rising brinkmanship between the two powers now threatens all the islands caught between. Buildup begets buildup. The difference between deterrence and escalation is a matter of perspective.

China has created islands in the South China Sea with the explicit purpose of building military bases on them. The Defense Department says Beijing has roughly 300 DF-26 intermediate-range ballistic missiles capable of striking Guam. In 2020, China’s Air Force released a slick video showing a pilot in a nuclear-capable H-6 bomber launching a cruise missile strike against an airfield that looked exactly like Andersen. In March 2021, America’s top military officer in the Indo-Pacific region told a Senate hearing that he believed China could invade Taiwan in the next six years. “I hope I am wrong,” Gen. Mike Minihan, commander of Air Mobility Command, wrote in a memo leaked in January 2023. “My gut tells me we will fight in 2025.” China’s warplane incursions into Taiwan’s air defense zone nearly doubled last year. The C.S.I.S. war games that decimated Guam every time was modeling a conflict over Taiwan set in 2026.

Naval Base Guam in Apra Harbor.

American policymakers seem equally enthusiastic to beat the drums of war. China appears to be the only bipartisan word on the Hill these days — the Pentagon’s budget for the Pacific Deterrence Initiative is up 40 percent this year; the National Security Council is stacked with China hawks talking about economic decoupling; and the State Department has set up a “China House” to track what Beijing is doing around the world. The spy-balloon incident earlier this year showed just how quickly brinkmanship can get out of control. According to U.S. officials, the balloon was originally sent to survey military activity on Guam, before it went in the wrong direction.

China is not the only perceived threat in the region. In January 2022, North Korea test-launched an intermediate-range ballistic missile capable of reaching Guam, its most significant weapons launch in years; the missile, which is capable of carrying a nuclear warhead, was nicknamed the Guam Killer when it was first tested in 2017. It would take just 18 minutes to reach the island.

America has long expected subservience from Guam. Over hundreds of years of colonization, the island has been used as an outpost, a naval base, a launching pad and a pawn. A poem people often cited to me about Guam is titled “My Island Is One Big American Footnote.”

Credit...Graphic by La Tigre

Footnote or not, from the time of their acquisition Guam and the other territories exerted their own subtle influence on the United States. The country wasn’t colloquially referred to as “America” until 1898. Theodore Roosevelt popularized the term in speeches after the country became much greater than a federation of states. Three years after Manifest Destiny’s conquest of the American West ended, the country began to expand overseas. First, it took possession of dozens of uninhabited islands in the Caribbean and the Pacific, primarily for the harvesting of guano. The United States purchased Alaska from Russia in 1867. In 1893, Americans overthrew the monarchy in Hawaii, then later annexed the island. In 1898, under the Treaty of Paris that ended the Spanish-American War, Spain sold the United States the Philippines for $20 million and included Puerto Rico and Guam for free. Wake Island and American Samoa followed in 1899, and the United States purchased the Virgin Islands in 1917. By the end of World War II, 135 million people lived under U.S. rule outside the continental United States; America’s overseas territories made up nearly a fifth of its land area, according to Daniel Immerwahr, associate professor of history at Northwestern University, in his book “How to Hide an Empire.”

Guam’s value as a strategic location was evident immediately — a convenient point between Hawaii and the Philippines, the island was to become a naval coaling and watering station. Guam was put under the control of the Navy, and the CHamoru became American subjects, not U.S. citizens. “Fewer permanent guarantees of liberty and property rights exist now than under Spanish domain,” a 1901 CHamoru petition to the Naval authorities requesting a civilian government read. The Navy blocked their requests. As Robert F. Rogers, retired professor of political history at the University of Guam, wrote in “Destiny’s Landfall”: “Until World War II, the island would be administered as if it were a warship, the ‘U.S.S. Guam,’ with the governor as captain, American military personnel as crew and the CHamorus as mess attendants.”

In 1941, as Washington watched the Japanese buildup across the Pacific, the United States began evacuating all American military dependents from Guam. In an earlier military assessment in the run-up to the war, the Navy graded Guam as “Category F” — unworthy of protecting and fortifying. All that remained to face the Japanese was a small Navy detachment and the CHamoru Insular Force Guard, who had a few basic training rifles. Many of them went home to protect their own families and land. After two days of bombing, on Dec. 10, the U.S.-military-appointed governor surrendered.

The Japanese rounded up CHamoru leaders with ties to the United States, Insular Force Guard members were taken as prisoners of war and CHamoru women were raped. The entire population of Sumay village, where Roy Gamboa’s family lived, was displaced. In 1944, with the American recapture of Guam clearly on the horizon, the Japanese launched a campaign of rapes and mass killings. Though some CHamoru tried to fight the Japanese, the overwhelming narrative holds that American soldiers were the saviors of Guam. Every year on July 21, the island shuts down for the Liberation Day Parade, a grand military procession down Marine Corps Drive to mark the anniversary of Uncle Sam’s return.

“One of those things that comes about from a long colonial experience is this idea that things change because somebody brings it to you — you are not the agent of change,” Michael Lujan Bevacqua, historian and curator of the Guam Museum, told me. “When you’re thinking about remembering the war, do you put a brave American soldier, or do you put a shirtless CHamoru man coming out of a concentration camp — which one fits? At the time, CHamorus couldn’t see themselves in that role.”

Upon America’s return at the end of World War II, the island reverted to Naval control. CHamoru were denied U.S. citizenship, and land dispossession was rampant. Sumay was developed into Naval Base Guam. Nearly 11,000 CHamoru — half the population at that time — lost their property. (A class-action lawsuit filed in 1983 ended with a settlement of $39.5 million, a sum many still believe was too low.) Traditional farmers, like Roy’s grandfather, now found themselves in the daily labor economy for the first time. He went to work at the Navy Ship Repair Facility, painting and reconstructing boats. Those fortunate enough to find employment still faced discrimination. In the Navy itself, locals were only allowed to work as waiters or mess-hall attendants. Pay rates for Americans were almost twice that of natives’.

A U.S. Naval explosive-ordnance disposal team conducting a training exercise on Guam.

At the time, Guam’s status complicated the military’s land-taking — it is illegal to seize land that’s not within the United States by eminent domain — and so, in 1950, Congress passed the Organic Act, which established Guam as a territory, granted citizenship to inhabitants who traced their ancestry to the 1898 Treaty of Paris and provided for an appointed governor, an elected legislature and a judicial branch. (Puerto Ricans, colonized in the same Spanish concession as Guam, were granted American citizenship in 1917.) Guam remained under federal control; the Navy approved who could or couldn’t arrive on the island. It was only in 1968 that Guam was permitted to elect its own governor.

The federal government’s expansive power over Guam exists because of a series of Supreme Court rulings called the Insular Cases that began in 1901, five years after the court allowed “separate but equal” segregation. The U.S. Congress already had plenary power over all American territories under Article IV, Section 3, Clause 2 of the Constitution, referred to as the Territorial Clause. In the Insular Cases, the court reasoned that certain U.S. territories were “inhabited by alien races,” so the full Constitution did not have to apply there, and they were not assumed to be on a path to statehood. As a result, any legislation passed by Guam’s local government can be overruled by Congress in perpetuity. The island is governed by consultation, not consent.

In 1946, eight United Nations member countries including the United States created a list of their territories “whose people have not yet attained a full measure of self-government,” in accordance with the U.N. Charter’s principle of self-determination. Guam is among the 17 that remain there today. Delegates from the Guam Decolonization Commission regularly travel to New York to appear before the United Nations Special Committee on Decolonization to bring attention to the failure of the self-determination process. Testimony is given by the Guam delegation, the U.S. government delegation and an independent expert, and results in a draft resolution. Every time the Guam delegation requests the United States allow a U.N. fact-finding mission to assess the colony’s trajectory toward self-determination, the request is denied.

A miniature Statue of Liberty in Paseo de Susana Park on Guam, erected in 1950 by the Boy Scouts of America.

It took me three flights and more than 30 hours to travel the 8,000 miles to Guam from New York City. The island’s G.D.P. is roughly a third tourism and a third military, so there are basically no business hotels, only beach resorts. In the mornings, my hotel elevator was full of uniformed service members cramming in next to multigenerational Korean families on holiday — grandmothers, parents and toddlers wearing inflatable life vests and full-length rash guards. Clutching snorkels and sunscreen, they wandered among camouflage and combat boots.

Outside the resorts, Guam looks like strip-mall America on military steroids. Fast-food and drive-through joints are everywhere. Chain-link fences surround high schools. Sidewalks are few, and there is no functional public-transit system. The sole public hospital is in such poor shape that the Army Corps of Engineers told the governor it would be cheaper just to build a new one.

The U.S. military presence across the island has become so normalized that it’s part of the fabric of society. Reminders of wars past and present are ubiquitous. Monuments and veterans’ cemeteries are around every corner: Chagui’an Massacre Memorial, War in the Pacific National Historical Park and Mañenggon Memorial Foundation Peace Park. Signs cautioning pedestrians about unexploded ordnance from World War II are common, and it seems as if everywhere you look there’s a military recruitment office of some kind. R.O.T.C. is active in high schools and has its own dormitory floor at the University of Guam. Since a third of Guam’s land belongs to the Defense Department, it’s hard to go anywhere without encountering military fencing or giant radar defense installations that look like white golf balls the size of mansions.

Satellite communications systems on Andersen Air Force Base, Guam.

Guam is also the site of the new Marine Corps Base Camp Blaz, the first Marine base to be activated since 1952. While geopolitical tensions have sharpened Washington’s attention on the region, the decision to build Camp Blaz had little to do with the current U.S.-China rivalries. In 1995, two Marines and a Naval medic abducted a 12-year-old schoolgirl walking home from a stationery store in Okinawa. They threw her into the back seat of a rented car, then taped her mouth, her arms and legs and her eyes. They drove to an isolated farm road, where they beat and raped her. The incident was far from the first instance of U.S. service-member violence against the Indigenous people of Okinawa, but its heinousness sparked waves of protests that led the U.S. government to agree to remove a substantial number of troops stationed there since Japan’s surrender in World War II.

The story of how these troops were moved to Guam, and the response of the local community, offers a case study in the dynamics that define relations between the military and the islanders. In 2006, Washington and Tokyo announced they had agreed to transfer 8,600 of the 18,000 U.S. Marines from Okinawa to Guam. No one asked anyone on Guam how they felt about it. When the Defense Department released an environmental-impact statement in 2009, it was over 8,000 pages long and allotted 90 days for community comment. It proposed dredging nearly 72 acres of live coral reef; drilling an additional 22 wells into the island’s northern aquifer; absorbing even more land, amounting to roughly 42 percent of the island; increasing the population by 80,000; and constructing a live firing range in Pågat village, home to a sacred CHamoru cultural and burial site.

There was an unprecedented outcry. A group of activists came together under the umbrella of We Are Guåhan, the CHamoru name for Guam, and pulled apart every page of the document to create a CliffsNotes version of the plan. They brought illustrated poster boards to town halls to engage the community on the dangers of the expansion. In the end, they solicited 10,000 comments — said to be a Defense Department record. In 2011, We Are Guåhan sued the department over the proposed destruction of Pågat, saying the military had not adequately explored other locations for a live firing range. We Are Guåhan’s lawsuit prompted the Navy to make changes to its plan — a remarkable victory for a small group of Indigenous activists facing off with the military that had controlled their island for so long. The following year, the department proposed reducing the number of Marines coming to Guam and moving the training range to Litekyan, on a cliff above the site of an ancient CHamoru village as well as the habitat of the sole remaining endangered hayun lagu tree technically within the military’s existing footprint.

A small greenhouse for raising endangered native plants at the newly built Camp Blaz, a Marine base on Guam.

Today the construction of Marine Corps Base Camp Blaz is nearly completed. It is named after the first CHamoru general, Vicente T. Blaz, known as Ben, who went on to become Guam’s Republican representative to the House from 1985 to 1993. (In a 1991 letter to the editor in The New York Times, Blaz deployed a phrase about Guam’s political status in America that is repeated as dogma on the island today: “Equal in war, unequal in peace.”)

When I visited Camp Blaz in December, the controversial fifth and final live firing range on Litekyan was proceeding rapidly. The base would bring 5,000 Marines, a third of whom would be coming with their families, with the rest on staggered six-month rotations. (The missile-defense system would bring in at least another thousand service members.) Currently, military personnel and their families number around 22,000, while the civilian population is 154,000 — 41 percent of whom identify as CHamoru. The military pays its troops in Guam a monthly overseas housing allowance (though Guam is not “overseas” as the word is normally understood; it is part of America). The O.H.A. — which, at $2,205 and up, is higher than the domestic allowance — inflates the market and makes apartments impossible for locals to afford. Everyone agrees Camp Blaz will only make the islandwide housing crisis worse.

But the U.S. military is not just an outside force occupying the island. Of the 154,000 civilians who live in Guam, an estimated 7,500 are veterans of the armed services, one of the highest rates per capita in the nation (though Guam ranks at the very bottom for veteran services). Roughly 3 percent of the territory’s work force is in the Guam Army and Air Force National Guard — and when their units were called up and deployed to Afghanistan, every village on the island felt it. So many people are in the service that casualty rates in Guam from the forever wars are four and a half times the national average. Every extended family has at least one member who is a veteran.

It’s not necessarily love for country that attracts many; it’s the benefits. Roughly 17 percent of the island lives in poverty (compared with a 12 percent national average), and in any given quarter, according to Lisa Linda Natividad, a professor of social work at the University of Guam, 38 to 42 percent of CHamoru families are on food stamps. Military recruits are issued IDs that grant them access to multiple bases to buy cheaper groceries. Because of the huge distances and the Jones Act, which restricts transportation of cargo between U.S. ports to U.S.-owned, U.S.-crewed, U.S.-registered and U.S.-built ships, a gallon of milk in the local supermarket costs $17. A gallon of milk at the commissary on base costs $5.97. There are base-only franchises for cheaper fast food and subsidized gas. Add to this the promise of medical coverage, dental care and a huge sign-up bonus.

A practice village for large-scale tactical mission training being built at Camp Blaz will prepare the next generation of Marines for a potential war with China.

As a territory, Guam gets a small fraction of the federal funding a state does. When Congress passed the Covid relief bill, Guam got one-tenth of the minimum amount allotted for a state. Those who live in Guam are not entitled to Supplemental Security Income (what most people call disability). Medicaid is currently capped at $137 million; the rest has to come from the territory’s budget, unlike in a state, where there is no cap.

The Defense Department activated Camp Blaz on Oct. 1, 2020. Many are still hoping for the job creation the military touted, though even the pro-buildup members of Guam’s Chamber of Commerce admitted to me that it has yet to really materialize. (Much of the labor for the base construction was done by H-2B visa workers.) Anecdotally a large portion of Guam’s population supports the buildup, but even many in this camp seemed nervous, concerned over adding so many people to an already overwhelmed island. “Are we going to flip over?” one woman asked me, not entirely joking. “You’ve seen this island. Where will the cars go? Where will we go?”

Civil-military relations are already low. Everywhere I went during my time on the island was totally segregated — from dinner at California Pizza Kitchen to a U.S. Fish & Wildlife-sponsored tent by the beach inviting kids to weave and paint plants. Military are supposed to receive a cultural training session when they arrive, but multiple service members I spoke to didn’t remember taking one. The ones who did didn’t seem to have been given much of a primer on Guam’s history, status or CHamoru culture. When I asked about places where locals and the military mingled, people thought about it awhile and directed me to strip clubs and church.

Local housing at Tumon Bay, Guam, still without power a month after Typhoon Mawar.

Like many on the island, Roy grew up and joined the military. With special permission from his parents, he enlisted in the Guam Army National Guard reserves at 17. “I was just a dumb kid,” he told me. “I wanted to get out of my mother’s house.” When he arrived at basic training in Fort Leonard Wood, Mo., in 1994, his fellow recruits asked him questions he wasn’t expecting:

“Where the hell is Guam? Is that, like, near Guatemala?”

“Yeah, in the dictionary!” he would reply.

“Damn, bro, you speak really good English!”

“Thanks! I learned it two months ago!”

“Do you all live in huts?”

Other Pacific Islanders would share stories about the ignorant things they heard and how they replied — telling their peers that they were chiefs or princes back home, and that their people rowed them from Guam to Hawaii in order to catch the flight to basic training. Pacific Islanders and those from other U.S. territories stuck together. They had to develop a sense of humor about these things, but other daily indignities grated. It wasn’t just the inability to vote for the commander in chief they served, but how the military-designated voting rep walked around handing out absentee ballots, shouting: “All right, New York, here’s your absentee ballot! New Jersey, here you go! Guam? No. Puerto Rico? No. Virgin Islands? Nope.”

After Sept. 11, Roy watched the coverage endlessly. He was angry. He was patriotic. Or perhaps he just wanted to put his training to use. “Maybe it was bravado and machismo, but I wanted to see what war was like,” he told me. “I wanted to fight and defend my country. I felt personally ticked off that someone had attacked the United States.” Roy watched as the Guam Army National Guard’s units remained stationary. “I kept asking the National Guard unit: Are we going to deploy? Is this unit going to deploy?”

The Navy Security Force during a patrol-shift handover on Naval Base Guam.

When Roy couldn’t get a straight answer, he decided to join the Marines. He was sure they would see combat. When he got to Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, he was 27, older than most of his drill instructors. At Camp Lejeune, Roy met a soldier named Michael Franquez, and the two quickly became friends. Michael carried a Guam flag with him during his deployments to Iraq, tucked inside his flak jacket as a talisman. When Roy’s turn came to deploy to Falluja, Michael gave him the flag. “Keep it folded, keep it inside your flak vest, it’ll keep you safe,” Michael told him. Michael had written his own name and deployment dates on it.

When he got to Iraq, Roy tucked the flag into his vest and carried it everywhere — it was there when his Humvee crashed into a HESCO barrier. Roy smashed his face and then his whole body followed, right into the front windshield. He suffered a concussion. At the base hospital, they saw that his spinal cord was swollen and called for a medevac, but the base was under attack and no helicopters could fly in or out. When Roy finally came to, the doctors told him they had not been sure he was going to make it, that it was a miracle he survived. The flag made it through unscathed.

The doctors told Roy that if he had an M.R.I. he could be medically discharged. But they needed every body, so Roy decided he would push through and see out his deployment. When Roy finally came back to Camp Lejeune, he signed the flag and gave it back to Michael. After Michael did another tour, he gave it back to Roy, who took it with him when he deployed to Ramadi, in central Iraq, in 2007 as a sergeant in supply and logistics in the infantry. Roy’s unit traveled from outpost to outpost. From his arrival until the time they secured the city, 12 members of his unit were killed.

The war was so much more brutal and futile than Roy had imagined — “liberation” so different than what was commemorated in the parades down Marine Corps Drive of his youth. There was no celebrating the arriving American soldiers. Roy had started to wonder what the mission was meant to accomplish. Did any of these people even want them there? He was no longer focused on fighting for country, but more on his brothers to his left and his right.

When Roy’s contract was unilaterally extended for three months, he was furious. In a fit of anger, he took the Guam flag out of his vest and ran it up a makeshift flagpole outside his hooch, 20 feet into the sky, violating military policy. That night, Post-it notes from Islanders from Guam, Saipan, Hawaii and Puerto Rico appeared on his door. Roy organized a meetup, and they got a burn barrel, put a stainless-steel grill on top of it and decided they were going to barbecue as they did at home. The first time they met, nobody came empty-handed: The island custom is to bring something — drinks, chips, canned Spam. It turned into a weekly gathering — the one thing that got Roy through those last few months.

Roy Gamboa holding the Guam flag that he and a fellow Marine swapped when they went on deployments in Iraq.

When Roy returned to Guam in 2008, he got a job in sales and rose through the ranks to become a manager, but it was hard to adjust to civilian life. His greatest struggle was with mental health. Roy’s thoughts scared him. Ideas of harming others would just pop into his mind out of the blue. He could be having a perfectly fine day and a thought would come in, like, “Hey, there’s this stupid dude on the side of the road, I could just run him over with my damn truck.” He didn’t know what to do.

Roy’s unit lost 16 men during their deployments, but they lost more to suicide after they came home. Roy would check their Facebook groups and see their unit crest with a black stripe across it and immediately he knew. Who did we lose today? Why did we lose them today? Roy had been older than many of them — kids who were just starting to figure out their lives used as cannon fodder for the broader goals of empire Roy couldn’t even rationalize anymore. He flew to all the funerals.

In 2010, mental-health care on Guam for PTSD was nonexistent. The closest Veterans Affairs Medical Center was in Hawaii, 4,000 miles away, so getting set up for services and receiving specialized care was a nightmare. It took a few months for Roy even to get a referral for treatment. When he saw his first V.A. psychologist, it was on a videoconference call with someone in Hawaii. It was too impersonal, too weird, and Roy never called back.

The disproportionate lack of V.A. services in the territories is well documented. In 2020, the Center for a New American Security found that while the average state offered 36 distinct benefits to veterans and military families (and the highest offered 60), Guam offered 14. Together, the territories averaged 11 benefits. “Veterans in the U.S. territories are a largely forgotten and unsupported population, despite high rates of service that outpace many U.S. states,” the report’s authors wrote.

“We’ve had many veterans from Guam leave their homeland because they’ve heard stories of, ‘It’s better in California, it’s better in Washington, it’s better in Texas,’” Roy explained. It’s not just dearth of services; Guam’s V.A. system is also wracked with delays. A week after Roy had a heart attack, the community-based outpatient system still hadn’t processed his referral to a cardiologist in Hawaii. He didn’t want to wait, so he paid for his own ticket to get there. Many other veterans would not be able to afford the expensive flight.

“So many veterans just don’t even ask for the support they need,” Roy said. “They don’t want to admit to being what they see as ‘weak,’ and when they do, it’s so hard to get services, they often just give up.” He knew because he had been the same way. After several attempts at mental-health support, he decided he didn’t want to have anything to do with the V.A. setup. But he was dealing with a lot — stress, anxiety, PTSD, some battles on the home front. He felt isolated. A friend of his suggested he talk to John Concepcion. John had served in the Guam Army National Guard and had completed a deployment to Afghanistan. They had some similar experiences, and once they began talking, they just understood. They started trying to keep tabs on each other.

How are you doing, man?

It’s been a rough week.

OK, I’ll come up, hang out.

As time went on, John started to call Roy about other people. “Hey man, do you think you want to help me out?” he would ask. “This person called and told me that he’s on the verge of pulling the trigger.”

The two men would drive out together, without really knowing the right thing to say or do. But it kept happening. So many veterans were in need of care. John and Roy would just visit with them, the ones who were telling them, I’m ready to hang myself, or I’ve got a pistol in my hand, or I’m sitting on my roof ready to jump. They kept in touch. When the island emerged from lockdown in January 2021, John, Roy and another veteran organized their first in-person group meeting. They called it the Battle Buddy Talk, and 25 veterans gathered. They decided to officially establish the group as an NGO, which they named GotYourSix71 (671 is Guam’s area code). John became president and Roy became vice president.

The Battle Buddy Talk, a Wednesday-night veterans’ discussion group on Guam. John Concepcion and Roy Gamboa, two of the group’s founders, are at right.

The protests against Camp Blaz had resurfaced longstanding divisions in the community, where families are large and everyone knows everyone or is somehow related; arguments among friends and family had grown atypically heated. Some took the antibuildup sentiment personally as targeting their own family members in the service. They believed Guam needed more American military for defense during this time of turbulence, not less. Others argued the CHamoru culture of hospitality was being taken advantage of again.

Roy and John were approached by Roman Dela Cruz, a CHamoru cultural advocate and president of the Acho Marianas, a traditional slingstone-throwing organization, who heard about GotYourSix71 and invited them to hold their weekly meetings at the Sagan Kotturan CHamoru — a cultural center that hosts traditional artists, bakers, healers and seafarers. The buildup was happening whether the community liked it or not, and Roman thought having the veterans as a bridge between the activists and the arriving Marines could have its advantages, but first they needed to repair relations within the community.

“The veterans are in a very unique situation, where they can communicate with both sides,” Roman told me. “They are going to play a very critical part as things surge forward.” He saw the veterans as descendants of the ancient CHamoru warfighters, who had taken on the Spanish conquistadors with slings in hundreds of sail-powered outrigger canoes, circling them at two to three times their speed. Acho Marianas was revitalizing CHamoru slinging, competing at tournaments around the world. Roman offered to teach GotYourSix71 members how to sling, and Roy and John offered to teach Acho Marianas members some jungle-warfare tactics. But when the veterans showed up, Roman was the only one who talked to them.

“Sometimes wearing that uniform can carry some kind of a negative connotation,” Roy explained, “because Islanders look at it as, Oh, you went over to the ‘patriotic American side,’ and you’re not local anymore, all you are is a Marine, all you are is a veteran.”

Over the next couple of weeks, the veterans won the Acho Marianas over. They spoke the same language, enjoyed the same food and liked one another’s company. Eventually, Roy and John realized that the sound of balls and stones hitting target posts was triggering for many veterans, so the group got permission to move a bit farther up the hill, where there was a derelict 40-foot container. They painted it green, built a cement and wooden deck and strung up a retractable tarp roof for shade. It became their home base.

Roman Dela Cruz, a CHamoru cultural advocate and president of the Acho Marianas, a traditional slingstone-throwing organization, in the Sagan Kotturan CHamoru, a cultural center that hosts traditional artists, bakers, healers and seafarers.

GotYourSix71 also runs a monthly meeting called Social Grounds, where the group rents out a cafe and gets veterans and their families to sit together for an activity. During the session I went to, three dozen attendees were building model cars. I had come straight from Warrior Day, an all-day recruitment event held by the Guam National Guard. About two dozen high school juniors and seniors gathered in the National Guard base that morning, getting a sign-up pitch to perform drills for two days a month in exchange for dental care, scholarship money and cheaper food and gas not just for themselves but also their parents and grandparents. They got matching T-shirts, crawled through an inflatable obstacle course and shot simulation rifles at a wall-size screen. Driving from young, lithe fresh recruits to struggling, injured veterans felt like twisted time travel, a discomforting feeling made more urgent on an island that would be the first to see destruction — and among people who would be first to see deployment — in the event of a war.

When I mentioned this to Roy, he nodded. “This is why we are doing this,” he told me quietly. “For things to be better for him when he gets out.” He was looking at his son, Roy Jr. The 9-year-old was absorbed in building a model. Roy Jr. was serious, dressed in a green shirt neatly tucked into camouflage pants, and spouted military history and terminology. Roy told me he didn’t want his son to enlist; he would prefer for his kids to stay out of the services completely, but he recognized there was nothing that drew a child toward something more strongly than a parent’s disapproval, so he was trying to be supportive, talking to his son about naval officer school.

I asked Roy what role he thought Guam’s status played in their struggles for better care. “It has everything to do with our status,” he replied. “The people of Guam are only important when there’s threats from China, when there’s threats from Korea, but we’re such a small number, we’re the pawn in the global scheme of things.”

For nearly eight decades since it was placed on the U.N.’s decolonization list, Guam had been waiting for a resolution to its political status. When I asked what he wanted for Guam’s future, Roy, who was so clear and emphatic about the situation for veterans, grew vague. He listed the benefits of statehood, then independence, and ended up in the middle again. Talking about political status was a difficult topic for many in Guam, so I turned off my recorder and asked whether he was comfortable telling me what he really believed. Roy said he’d think about it and get back to me.

In the Northern Marianas, short commuter flights between islands are sometimes too costly for residents.

Across the Pacific, the U.S. military has adopted the “agile combat employment” doctrine — a way to move forces around to confuse an enemy and avoid concentrating forces in one place. Guam would be the “catapult,” as Esther Sablan, an executive director at Andersen, put it when I visited: a place from which, in the event of war, allied forces would spring toward China through other islands like steppingstones. “What we don’t want to do is have to build bases all over the place,” Rear Adm. Benjamin Nicholson, commander of Joint Region Marianas at the time, told me. “Because we have a main hub here in Guam, if we need to flow forces to another area because that’s where the threat is, then we can quickly flow there. If we’ve already set everything up, that gives us the ability to be very agile.”

And so, it would be from the Northern Mariana Islands — a 14-island archipelago north of Guam — and other U.S.-affiliated states across the Pacific that the theoretical war with China would be waged.

At the airport in Saipan, the capital of the Northern Marianas, my bags and I were weighed together on a giant scale and cleared to fly 15.5 miles to Tinian, the first location of the Pentagon’s plan to expand infrastructure on U.S.-affiliated islands across the Pacific to become “forward operating sites” — which contain pre-positioned supplies for war fighting but which the U.S. government doesn’t technically classify as a base.

In the cockpit of a Star Marianas Air Piper PA-32-300 Cherokee Six, the controls looked straight out of an old arcade game, and it was so hot the pilot left my passenger door open as we taxied to the runway. We rose slowly, the propeller spinning as the ocean water churned below. The tiny plane banked right and then left, straight into a cloud, with no visibility inside the gray. Emerging from the mist, we could see North Field, the site of several runways on the north of Tinian built during World War II from which two American planes took off to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.

From behind me, over the din of the propeller, Deborah Fleming, a community historian and my host on Tinian, beckoned me to look left: In the middle of jungle, tractors and bright red earth emerged violently from Tinian’s emerald green. The construction of the Divert Airfield — a facility being built as a place to divert planes in the case of an attack on Andersen Airfield, its existence a testament to expectations around Guam’s vulnerability — was well underway.

The present-day Northern Marianas were conquered first by the Spanish, who sold them to the Germans, who lost them to the Japanese. On Dec. 7, 1941, just hours after bombing Pearl Harbor, Japanese planes taking off from Saipan bombed Guam. (Because the Northern Marianas and Guam are over the international date line, the date was Dec. 8 there.) When Guam capitulated two days later, the Japanese administered the island with the help of Chamorro translators from Saipan and a neighboring island called Rota. As a result, a rift opened within the Indigenous group that continues to cleave them today. (Though they are the same people, CHamoru on Guam and Chamorro in the Northern Mariana Islands spell the same word differently.)

After Allied victory, Japan’s entire Pacific Island empire was placed into a trust of roughly 100 inhabited islands spread out over an area the size of the contiguous United States to be administered by Washington, which was charged “to promote the development of the inhabitants of the Trust Territory toward self-government or independence.” (This included the present-day Northern Marianas, Micronesia, the Marshall Islands and Palau.) Saipan eventually became the headquarters of the Trust, which was administered first by the Navy and then the Department of the Interior, and which arbitrarily divided the islands into six districts, with each one voting to decide its fate.

The commonwealth’s founding fathers, as the group of legislators are known, wrote the Covenant, a governing document that outlined the archipelago’s right to control its internal matters while granting the U.S. federal government sovereignty over the Northern Marianas’ foreign affairs and defense. The Covenant specified which articles of the U.S. Constitution applied, and fundamental changes to the document can be made only by mutual consent between the Northern Marianas and Congress. The Northern Marianas have the right to call for direct negotiations with the federal government on specific issues. This arrangement was made possible by the Insular Cases.

In 1975, 75 percent of Northern Marianas residents voted to adopt the document. (They also voted repeatedly to integrate with Guam, but Guam rejected the proposal.) Northern Marianas residents are now U.S. citizens without federal voting rights. They serve in the U.S. armed forces, but do not have their own V.A. office.

As part of the negotiations, the U.S. government leased two-thirds of the land on Tinian for 50 years to build a military base, saying that it would provide a boost to the economy, and also promising to build a school and provide medical services. Residents are still waiting. Today the 40-square-mile island, home to 2,000 people, has no hospital or dentist, one gas station, one semifunctional A.T.M. and a few small grocery stores. The main employer is the mayor’s office. In a 2010 census, 44 percent of the households on Tinian fell below the poverty line.

When the American military took Tinian from the Japanese during World War II, they laid out roads in the same manner as Manhattan — with Broadway, Wall Street, 86th, 42nd and so on. That morning, Fleming took me to North Field, where American service members built the largest airport in the world at the time, from which planes took off every three minutes during the last year of the war. We drove up Broadway to the two bombing pits that were used to load nuclear weapons into planes, now encased in glass like a mausoleum of the grotesque. Atomic Bomb Pit No. 1 loaded the five-ton uranium bomb, Little Boy, that killed over 100,000 people in one morning explosion. Atomic Bomb Pit No. 2 contained the plutonium bomb, Fat Man, that instantly killed 40,000 people in Nagasaki. Standing at the glass, the duality of past destruction — overlaid with the prospect of the future decimation that would require use of the Divert Airfield — felt like vertigo.

Ruins of a Japanese military bunker on Tinian, among the ubiquitous reminders of World War II on the island.

The thousands of troops relocating from Okinawa to Camp Blaz would need places to train, so the Defense Department decided to use the land they had leased for a base on Tinian to create what they called the C.N.M.I. Joint Military Training facility. The 2015 blueprint included ripping out a reef to practice amphibious landings, high-hazard impact training — shooting and bombing — ship-to-shore launches using howitzers and live-bombing a smaller island just north of Tinian called Pagan Island. There would be no permanently stationed troops, no base, just destruction. The department’s plans were so outrageous that there was a huge backlash: Guam gets 10,000 troops and the promise of a military economy that comes with it, and Tinian gets bullets and bombs?

“Tinian is generally very accepting of military training, but that was the time everyone came out and said hell, no,” said Kimberlyn King-Hinds, the Commonwealth Ports Authority chairwoman and local counsel for the community groups that sued the U.S. military over the plan. Deborah Fleming was the spokeswoman for one of the groups. They lost, so they pressured local leadership to take up the issue. The governor and the mayor got involved. Negotiations over the scope of the training grounds continue.

“There’s just a lot of people who think they can come to these islands and just get away with saying whatever and doing whatever,” King-Hinds told me. She described an encounter at the Tinian mayor’s office with 20 military personnel, including a lawyer from the Pentagon, with whom she ended up in a bitter argument. “I just cursed them out. ‘I don’t give a [expletive] who you think you are, I don’t know what [expletive] rights you think you have here.’ You know what they did? They sent the F.B.I. to investigate whether I was a potential domestic terrorist. So there’s an F.B.I. agent who’s going around the community asking everyone, Do I have propensity for violence?” (The Navy and F.B.I. did not respond to requests for comment.)

Still, the conversations I had about the military buildup in the Northern Marianas felt different from those I had in Guam. In the Northern Marianas, people were demanding their rights. They expected to be heard. “The difference between Guam and us, we chose to be in political union with the United States, and so when we enter into the agreement, we willingly leased two-thirds of Tinian for these purposes,” King-Hinds told me. “Whereas Guam, they became a part of the American family as a spoil of war.”

Yet in practice, the Northern Marianas has lost every important court case when it comes to gray areas in the Covenant’s separation of powers. They lost control over immigration after a series of scandals over sweatshops — clothing companies that came in to make “Made in U.S.A.”-labeled clothes but paid workers pennies. In 2005, they lost their claim to 200 nautical miles off their coast. (The United States has since transferred three miles back.) They also lost the right to submerged properties — all lands below the high-water line. People I spoke to there were surprised by the ruling, because in the view of the Indigenous people in the region, land and water make up the same continuous territory, so it hadn’t even occurred to them it would be a cause for negotiation.

The biggest legal loss was perhaps over the protection of Indigenous land rights. Currently, all land that is not privately held belongs to the native inhabitants of the Northern Mariana Islands — an arrangement made possible by the Insular Cases. But as native Chamorro and native Carolinians — a group that migrated from present-day Micronesia and Palau in the 19th century — are outnumbered by new arrivals, the Northern Marianas amended its Constitution to ensure any future vote on changing land ownership could only be made by these two groups. It was struck down as being a race-based voting classification.

Deb Fleming, left, a Tinian native and CHamoru activist, participates in a ceremony to re-inter CHamoru bones in a jungle cave on the island. The ancient remains were disturbed in the construction of new military infrastructure.

When the federal government saw fit, the authorities took what they wanted. The whole setup seemed like another version of colonialism in a slightly more modern outfit. “You could certainly make a case that it’s all a sham, it’s all [expletive], that they just pull the wool over the eyes of the United Nations, of the Marianas, of the whole world,” Joseph Horey, who argued many of the cases on behalf of plaintiffs from the Northern Marianas, told me. “But the problem with it is, if that’s true, what do we do? It’s a never-ending battle to make the Covenant protections real and to govern themselves rather than be governed by Congress, be governed by the States, be governed by the military, be governed by someone far, far away who thinks they know what’s best or what’s right or what’s enlightened.”

Hundreds of miles to the east and west of Guam, a thousand islands and atolls make up Palau, the Marshall Islands and Micronesia, their 200,000 citizens caught in a vortex of geopolitical competition between the United States and China. The three countries elect their own governments, craft their own foreign policy and have votes in the United Nations, but they are deeply intertwined with the United States and integral to the maintenance of American security and overseas empire.

The U.S. military has at least three construction projects breaking ground in Micronesia, worth $432 million in total. In Palau, the Defense Department is building a high-frequency radar system and expanding a port and an airport, projects worth at least $121 million. The United States already operates a missile defense base in the Marshall Islands.

The unique political relationship of these three countries to the United States is called free association — each country granted the United States the prerogative to operate military bases from their territories and to deny use of their land, air and sea to any country that is seen as a threat to American national security. In exchange, the United States agreed to provide each country with security guarantees and the right for its citizens to reside and work in the U.S. without a visa, in perpetuity. This part of the Compact of Free Association (COFA) agreements is immutable, subject to termination only by mutual agreement. (As a result, citizens of the Marshall Islands, Micronesia and Palau serve in the U.S. armed forces, though their access to V.A. benefits is even more difficult than from Guam or the Northern Marianas.)

But as the United States takes renewed interest in the region, the realities of the poverty there — and America’s direct culpability in it — are inescapable. Both the Marshall Islands and Micronesia are poor, aid-dependent economies. They rank in the bottom third of all the countries on the U.N.’s human-development index. (Palau, held up by many I met in the Pacific to be the success case of the region, ranks significantly higher on all counts.) Corruption is rampant. Transparency International polling found that 61 percent of people in Micronesia using a public service have paid a bribe; 58 percent have been offered money in exchange for their vote.

It was not supposed to be this way. These countries were in the same U.S.-administered Pacific Trust Territory as the Northern Marianas. After nearly four decades of American stewardship, all three voted for the status of “freely associated states” — a term that created a political arrangement that did not previously exist. The compacts signed by each newly established country included a round of economic assistance, initially set to expire in 2003, that was extended for another 20 years. The second, and supposedly final, round created trust funds intended to be built up through joint contributions that would provide future government revenue.

For years, the countries cautioned they needed a third round of funding, but successive U.S. administrations brushed them off. That changed abruptly in 2019, when Beijing announced something that it had never done before — it gave a $2 million contribution to the Micronesian Compact Trust Fund. Three weeks later, Mike Pompeo, the secretary of state at the time, announced Washington was ready to negotiate.

“The response was so incredibly obvious,” Giff Johnson, editor of The Marshall Islands Journal, told me in Majuro, the country’s capital. “The Chinese play a long game, they’re very deliberate, and you can see the progression from the ’80s and ’90s, the diplomacy. Whereas the Americans are, every four years, around the cycle of the presidential election, checking to see what’s going on. If nothing’s going on, the Pacific is just considered to be an American place and that everything’s under control. But now, suddenly, it’s not, and so that’s elevated the interest level.”

Beijing’s outreach since the 1990s has been anchored in economics. By 2019, the P.R.C. had established itself as the second-largest lender to the Pacific Island states. The previous year, China surpassed Australia to become their largest trading partner. It is also the largest destination for regional exports, like minerals, fish and timber.

Housing on Naval Base Guam.

Chinese foreign assistance in Micronesia was everywhere when I visited the island Pohnpei last winter. The P.R.C. funded a road project on the island and built the Pohnpei State Administrative Building and the Tuna Commission building. In Kolonia village in Pohnpei, a green sheet-metal-covered basketball court proclaimed itself the KOLONIA-CHINA FRIENDSHIP CENTER in huge white letters. Around the corner, I saw a sign for the Micronesia-China Friendship Association, but every time I walked by it the door was locked. When I asked a group of students doing a bake sale next to the basketball court, they said they had never seen anyone there. (The Marshall Islands and Palau receive aid from Taiwan; they are among the 13 countries, including the Vatican, that have diplomatic relations with Taipei. Micronesia has diplomatic relations with the P.R.C.)

The skirmishing for influence has reached almost comical proportions. In Micronesia, both the United States and China jockeyed to put their names on big projects, but neither seemed particularly interested in funding ongoing maintenance. As a result, large construction projects that presumably sounded great on paper often sat damaged or empty. The P.R.C.-built government building had holes in the ceiling where I could see the rafters, and loose wires dangling out. I heard a story from Stephen Finnen, former Rotary president in Pohnpei, about U.S. Navy Seabees putting a new roof on the public library. They took off half the old roof before they went to the hardware store and learned it would take six weeks to ship the replacement sheets. “So the library had no roof,” Finnen told me.

New schools were built with similar ignorance of daily realities in the region — with, for instance, air-conditioning hookups instead of traditional slatted window louvers. “It’s like somebody said, This is a hot place, you’re going to use air-conditioning all the time,” Finnen explained. “But the education department can’t afford to pay for the A.C.”

“Competition with China is the lens that we look at the region through, but that’s not the lens that a lot of Pacific Islanders want to solely look at their own engagement with the U.S. through,” said Michael Walsh, a researcher at Georgetown University who served as the chair of the Asian and Pacific Security Affairs subcommittee of the Biden campaign during the 2020 presidential election. “They understand what our motivation is in increasing engagement with the region, and they’re willing to instrumentalize that, but the problem with all of this is, it’s not responding to the needs of the people. It hasn’t over decades.”

The Biden administration’s September 2022 Pacific Partnership Strategy promised to appoint the first U.S. envoy to the Pacific Island Forum (a regional bloc), increase economic support and help combat climate change — a crucial area of concern given the delicate ecology and rising sea levels affecting the region.

A frenzy of diplomatic overtures preceded the announcement. In February, Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Fiji, the first such visit in three decades. In April, the Solomon Islands signed a security agreement with Beijing, and Washington expressed concerns that China would open a base there. In July, Vice President Kamala Harris gave a virtual address at the PIF in which she announced plans to open new embassies, return the Peace Corps and increase funding to the Forum Fisheries Agency. Finally, in September, President Biden hosted the leaders of Pacific Island countries for a first-ever White House summit.

In May 2023, Biden canceled what would have been a much-anticipated historic first U.S. presidential visit to the region to deal with the debt-ceiling crisis, but invited the PIF countries back for a second White House summit later in the year. Blinken went to Papua New Guinea in Biden’s place, and witnessed the signing of the third round of COFA funding with Palau. Micronesia signed the next day.

As the United States asserts itself more and more as a “Pacific nation” — as the Pacific Island national security strategy proclaimed — it raises the question of what exactly America is trying to achieve. “It’s really important to step back as we start to use this term ‘Pacific homeland’ and ask, What’s the intent of using it?” Walsh says. “What are we trying to communicate, and what are we trying to assert? The U.S. government often misrefers to the Freely Associated States as part of the American homeland. Are these mistakes or is there intent behind it?”

The lunch line at the canteen on Naval Base Guam, where many locals are employed.

From the bay, the Marshall Islands’ capital atoll, Majuro, shimmers low off the water. The patches of palm trees, a few tall buildings and a slim bridge rise above the placid aqua blue, as if balanced on nothing at all. The atoll is 10 feet above sea level and so narrow that from the fifth floor of one of the few multifloor buildings, I could see the ocean from both sides. More than 650 miles east of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands — 29 atolls and five islands running in two almost-parallel chains halfway between Hawaii and Australia — presents a different kind of challenge to America’s renewed effort for hearts and minds.

In the Marshall Islands, negotiations over the third Compact funding round continue because of disagreement over the legacy of U.S. nuclear testing and responsibilities related to it. During the Trusteeship period, the United States conducted so much nuclear testing over the atolls of Bikini and Enewetak that it was akin to 1.6 Hiroshima explosions every day for a dozen years. The “Castle Bravo” test was so big it could be seen from Okinawa; the ash settled on nearby populated atolls. The U.S. government later took the opportunity to study those that it resettled; “they are more like us than the mice,” an official with the Atomic Energy Commission explained. Later, the United States took the radioactive waste from nuclear testing in the area, reportedly added 130 tons of soil from an irradiated Nevada nuclear testing site, and buried it in a giant dome on Enewetak. The dome is currently at risk of collapsing from rising sea levels. When the Marshallese government appealed for help to seal it, Washington refused.

The Marshall Islands is also home to one of the world’s largest lagoons, Kwajalein atoll — which is itself a cautionary tale of participating in America’s military ambitions. The Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Defense Test Site was formalized during the negotiations in the original Compact, when the U.S. military leased the land from traditional landowners. Kwajalein now supports U.S. missile and missile-defense testing, space launches and space surveillance. When the U.S. military wants to test whether a missile can fly from California to China or North Korea, they shoot it at Kwajalein. The entire island is a military zone, home to roughly 1,300 American military service members, contractors and scientists and their families.

As a result of the base construction, Marshallese residents of Kwajalein were moved to a nearby island, Ebeye. Rounds of missile testing and live-fire training by U.S. troops caused the relocation of additional nearby atolls. More and more people were crammed onto Ebeye, which is now among the most densely populated places on Earth. Fifteen thousand people, half of whom are children, live on 80 acres — less than one-tenth the size of Central Park — with 20 to 30 family members sharing a single house. Chewy Lin, a Taiwanese-Marshallese journalist who has spent time on Ebeye, told me of how, early into his visit there, he wondered why he saw so many teenagers walking around in the middle of the night. Lin thought they were just out having fun. “But I realized that’s not the issue; it’s that they take turns to sleep.”

Roughly a thousand Marshallese work on Kwajalein. Every morning, they crowd onto a barge that takes them there and then back in the evening. On the base, Marshallese laborers do menial work; they complain of poor treatment by on-base security as they come on and off, subjected to dehumanizing searches and questioning about themselves and their personal items. David Paul, a senator representing Kwajalein, told me how a guard once asked to inspect his water bottle, eyeing him with suspicion for smuggling he didn’t even know what — alcohol? explosive substances? — onto the base. “They think that we’re in Kabul or Baghdad or any other very challenging region of the world, but we’re in the Marshall Islands,” Paul said. “We’re being treated like we’re the enemy rather than friends and close partners.”

I asked Paul if, after all these decades, he felt the deal, negotiated between America and its ward, to lease their island for target practice was really fair. “Can it improve?” he said. “Of course. What is really the true value of them using the Marshall Islands for missile-testing programs to advance national security — for the United States to remain the monolithic superpower — compared to what the locals are getting in exchange for their land?”

Rocky Wishim of 500 sails, a group promoting traditional CHamoru maritime traditions, in Saipan.

One afternoon in Saipan, I went out on a traditional Chamorro canoe — an outrigger with a sail, a hull for the navigators and a plank over the crossbeams for the passengers — steered by one navigator and two voyagers from 500 Sails, an NGO that is reviving maritime traditions of the Mariana Islands. The ocean was clear and quiet, the waves barely discernible in the silence. Someone spotted a sea turtle.

From afar, we could see the Imperial Pacific hotel and casino jutting out of the trees. The Imperial is by far the biggest structure on Saipan; the white marble rimmed with gold ornaments looks as if it fell from another dimension next to the downtown district’s squat cement buildings. Golden dolphins dance atop fountains at the entrance, while eggs the size of cars stand under gilded suspended dragons in the hall below. Part of a 2014 $7 billion development by a Chinese-owned company, at its peak the operation was somehow turning over more per-table bets than any casino in Las Vegas or Macau. In 2020, federal prosecutors opened charges against the company for employing undocumented workers, illegal money transfers and criminal conspiracy. The company owes at least $100 million in taxes and regulatory fees. Today the casino stands empty, its future murky. Residents told me they don’t think the government has enough money to deconstruct it safely.

On the other side of us, farther out at sea, past the reef that rings the sandy bay, loomed three gargantuan American merchant-marine ships full of war supplies. They can be seen from every point on the western side of the island. From the canoe, the picture emerging across the impoverished region seemed almost cartoonish; no matter their status, the Pacific Islands were essentially trapped — forced to choose between Chinese casinos and the U.S. military.

The shuttered Imperial Pacific hotel and casino on Saipan, part of a $7 billion development by a Chinese company that currently owes more than $100 million in fees and that faces multiple federal criminal charges.

On my six-week trip around the Pacific, none of the political alliances I saw seemed to serve the local people on whose behalf they supposedly had been crafted. There did not seem to be a clear strategy of regional development, and in the steady drumbeat toward war, the basic tenets of democracy in the Pacific continued fraying, contributing to a legacy of broken promises and distrust. What made it worse was not simply a lack of solutions to their problems, but the metropole’s ignorance of the existence of the problem itself.

Debate over the exploitative nature of America’s founding history and the country’s behavior overseas are now frequent in the U.S. public discourse, but there is no mention of Guam and the vestiges of American empire that continue in the Pacific. Biden’s new Pacific Strategy claimed to be built to defend sovereignty and freedom, yet its fulcrum was the least enfranchised place in the nation.

“The ‘free and open Indo-Pacific’ is like this new paradigmatic shift against China,” Kenneth Gofigan Kuper, a professor of political science at the University of Guam, told me. “All geopolitical roads in this region lead to Guam — we’re the Rome of the Pacific. We are the price of a ‘free and open Pacific,’ but Guam is not free.”

In two referendums in 1982, the people of Guam voted to become a U.S. commonwealth — like the Northern Marianas — but legislation to change the status stalled in Congress. In 1997, the Guam Legislature passed a law that established the Guam Commission on Decolonization and called for another plebiscite. The choices were: statehood, independence or free association. Voting was restricted to the “Chamorro people,” who were defined as “all inhabitants of Guam in 1898 and their descendants.” (“Chamorro” is the spelling Guam adhered to before 2018.) Three years later, the plebiscite law was amended to replace “Chamorro” with “native inhabitants of Guam” to avoid accusations of racial discrimination. But in 2017, the Ninth District court ruled that since the new law referred to a statute that had previously stated “Chamorro,” it still violated the 15th Amendment, and struck down the law. The Supreme Court refused to hear the case.

The question of who would vote in the plebiscite was complicated, and how it was phrased was contentious. Over centuries of migration, the CHamoru have become a minority on the island. In the 2020 census, 36 percent of the population identified as Asian alone, with 29 percent of self-identifying as Filipino. There were also debates as to whether any of the options on the ballot were truly realistic — was Guam technically too small to be a state, too entwined with the United States to be freely associated and too reliant on American passports to be independent? Would they lose their security or gain a say over it?

Still, the circuit court’s rejection of Guam’s appeal in 2019 inspired the largest public protest on the island in recent memory. It also left Guam’s government nervous about trying again — Democratic legislators want to ensure any new law is unassailable before announcing it. But no matter how and which way people believe the status discussion should be decided, there is an overall acknowledgment that colonialism is an anachronism — that territorial status should be modernized.

“The absolute, immense power that Congress has in the instance of the Insular Cases is unfair, unconstitutional and un-American, but on the other hand, it gives them immense power to create a different relationship with an entity like Guam,” Robert Underwood, Guam’s representative in the House from 1993 to 2003, told me. “That could be independence, free association or, if arranged in a certain way, it could be unique legislation just for Guam.”

This year is the 125th anniversary of the founding of the American Insular Empire, including Guam and Puerto Rico. “When you think about other empires — the British, the French, the Spanish empires — colonies are part of the national identity, this acceptance that ‘We have an empire, we have colonies,’” Bevacqua, the museum curator and historian, said. “The United States, despite all that it’s done, lacks that basic ability on a national level to acknowledge the colonies problem. Normally it’s just all these piecemeal attempts to deal with the colonies by bringing them in closer to the United States, and that’s part of the problem. Colonizers that are so self-assured of their greatness only think of fixing problems by giving more of themselves.”

When I first started reading about Guam, I imagined the solution was enfranchisement, voting rights, equal opportunity under the law, statehood: more so-called American ideals. The reality was significantly more complicated. But more mortifying was that I simply hadn’t known any of these debates were happening in the first place.

“I refer to Guam as America’s best-kept secret,” Natividad, the social-work professor, told me. “We’re just known as being the U.S. military’s outpost in the Pacific. Even though there’s been thousands of U.S. military troops who have been stationed here, that have rotated for a century. You would think, How could they not know? But the reality is we’re just not a part of the gestalt of the American mind. That goes deep. When I talk about our colonized mind, there’s also something about being the colonizer. The solution is not to give me the right to vote for president, I don’t want it; I want us to exercise our right to decolonization, to self-determination that is due to us and recognized in the international courts by the U.S. signing on to the U.N. Charter. That’s what I want. Don’t give me any more bones if you’re not going to give us freedom.”

Roy Gamboa at the Sumay village cemetery, now part of Naval Base Guam.

When we first met, Roy Gamboa invited me to see his family’s land. He was a veteran with base access, and I was a U.S. citizen; given that he had brought visitors on before, we both thought it would not be a problem. But when he called the public-affairs office of Naval Base Guam to try to bring me in, no one returned his messages. It took nearly two weeks to get us onto the base together and involved appeals that went all the way up to the public-affairs office for Joint Region Marianas Commander Nicholson. When we did receive permission to visit the old cemetery in Sumay, where he had come so freely as a child, a public-affairs officer would have to escort me in her vehicle during our entire trip.

The base-visiting system on Guam is an impenetrable labyrinth. Each base is under the control of a different commander, who sets different regulations on who can come inside and how. During my time on the island, I visited all of the large bases run by different branches or subservices — Andersen Air Force Base, Naval Base Guam and Marine Corps Base Camp Blaz. I also saw the THAAD missile-defense battery operated and controlled by the Army, but to make matters more confusing, I was escorted there by a public-affairs officer from the Air Force. The THAAD also happens to be a place where the Guam National Armed Guard is on active duty. (If you’re confused about who is in charge of what, so are they.)

Leevin T. Camacho, Guam’s outgoing attorney general, took me through Andersen Air Force Base to visit his family’s land. There are about a dozen family plots inside Andersen, so, somewhat confusingly, CHamoru families could still visit their tracts, but because they were inside the base and therefore not connected to power or sewage, they could not live on them. As we stood in line in the equatorial sun to get into the small visitor building, we chatted with an older veteran with a cane waiting with his wife. They had to renew her visitor pass every three days — anytime they wanted to get gas, go to the grocery store or eat at the reduced-price chains. After an hour in the heat, we were the second-to-last visitors let into the checkpoint before they closed for the day at 2 p.m. The 20 people who had been standing and sweating behind us had to come back again tomorrow. Inside, a harried young airman muttered frantically, reminding herself of the steps she had to complete to process everyone in line. I wrote my Social Security number on a plastic card for a background check and left my fingerprint in some kind of electronic system. After over an hour and a half of waiting, we were allowed to get into Camacho’s car and go to his family’s land.

Naval Base Guam was significantly easier to get onto, paradoxically because unescorted visitors were not allowed at all. The P.A.O. drove me through the armed checkpoint without any problems. We pulled up to a small, neat cemetery, all that remains of the largest historic CHamoru village pre-contact, where we waited for Roy to arrive.

There was an eeriness to it, being on a large geopolitical target that resembled a tropical paradise in the middle of the Pacific — a sense of foreboding that was both ever-present and yet somehow totally absent. Many people I spoke to, including Roy, had friends who relocated to the continental United States just because of the danger of a North Korean or Chinese nuclear-missile strike. “I’m not ashamed to say I think of it once in a while,” Roy had told me. “OK, if a nuke hit, there really is nothing anybody can do. Guam is about 30 miles long. If you don’t get hit in the blast, there’s the fallout.”

When we were finally able to sit down together to talk about status, Roy told me he had thought a lot about it and elaborated that he believed the plebiscite should happen and, as all the CHamoru I spoke to told me, only those with CHamoru lineage should vote. “We have a huge target on our back,” he told me, “and that’s because of who we affiliate ourselves with, who’s in charge of our land and being the largest gas station, largest supply line in the Pacific.”

I asked, “Do you know how you would vote?”

“Independence,” he said. “I’m comfortable saying independence, because at least we have a voice, and we have the right to sit at the table to negotiate what our future as a people will be,” he explained. “Status quo can’t be an option; leaving it as it is means we still leave the control in somebody else’s hands.” He thought Guam had the resources and the intellect to decide its own future, that the globalized world meant there could be more jobs and remote work on the island. They could sign a military basing agreement if they chose to; Uncle Sam could stay but on equal terms. They would do better balancing their own needs and putting their own people first, something they had not had a chance to do for 350 years.

When he first got out of the service, Roy wanted to buy a house in North Carolina. He loved it out there, it was beautiful, and by his calculations, the cost of living was half of what it was on Guam. He could have lived there and not worried about so many things, but his parents were on the island. “The one thing about Guam is family is everything,” he told me. “So a lot of families are torn when they have to relocate for better opportunities. I choose to stay here because this is where I want my kids to grow up, in this culture. I want them to know what it’s like to be CHamoru.”

Roy Gamboa Jr., 9, on Guam. His father, holding a photo album commemorating his military service, says he would prefer that his children stay out of the armed forces.

As we talked it over, it seemed perhaps Roy had always felt some version of this but had never sat down to think that hard about it. No one had ever asked him to. Outsiders had always written Guam’s history. Roy and his children had been taught with textbooks from the continental United States — from which their own culture, community and status were absent. The first textbooks to be written by CHamoru, centering their own people and explaining Guam’s history and colonization, would be published next year. “People in my generation have only known this way of life — there’s a continued lack of interest,” he said. “But if it was a required course in high school, maybe things might change over the next 15, 20 years.”

Standing at the shores of the little bay, Roy pointed out the skipjacks, still flipping. His grandmother was born here, on this earth. She was a year old when the Japanese invaded, and lived with traces of what Roy identified as PTSD for the rest of her life. His grandfather held on to their land for as long as he could. But as they got older, the naval base simply became more established. Contractors were hired to do sporadic landscaping. The man and the boy still came every weekend to cut the grass, and sometimes his grandfather would try to plant seedlings, but eventually contractors would mow them down. As time went on, the grass was cut so regularly, there was nothing left for Roy and his grandfather to tend to, so they would pick fruit. Other times, they would come just to visit with the land. “And then, over time, my grandfather just stopped coming on. I guess as he got older, he started to figure, you know, we’re probably never going to get the land back.”

Roy hasn’t told Roy Jr. about their land; something about having that conversation with his son was too hard. “It was disheartening for me to go through all of that stuff. I didn’t want to pass that down to him knowing that the situation that Guam is in,” Roy explained. “While my grandfather was hopeful, I’ve learned to deal with it. I’ve taken him to different places on the base to go look at the monuments, but never mentioned to him the land that we used to own. It’s giving him false hope.”

Sarah A. Topol is a contributing writer for the magazine. She lived in Cairo and Istanbul for over a decade, reporting from the Middle East, the former Soviet Union, Asia and Africa. Her work for the magazine has won a National Magazine Award for feature writing and an Overseas Press Club award. This reporting was supported by the International Women’s Media Foundation’s Howard G. Buffett Fund for Women Journalists. Glenna Gordon is a documentary photographer whose work seeks out unexpected narratives. She is also a teacher and a licensed E.M.T.

A version of this article appears in print on , Page 22 of the Sunday Magazine with the headline: The America That Americans Forget

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The New York Times · by Sarah A. Topol · July 7, 2023

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19. Coalition Kill Chain for the Pacific: Lessons from Ukraine

Communication is key for "F2T2EA." (A new acronym to me tha tI guess has evolved from F3EAD.)

"...Ukraine’s kill chain—the methodology for finding, fixing, targeting, tracking, engaging, and assessing (F2T2EA) an adversarial objective."

​Excerpt:

By building the SATCOM and COP architecture with partners and allies, the United States and partners and allies can achieve relative combat power advantage over the PLA. Trust is the coin of the realm, and the value associated with creating a more robust kill chain outweighs its risks. The two most recent iterations of the U.S. National Defense Strategy stressed the importance of allies and partners to deterring and defending against China’s expansionism. Creating an integrated coalition, however, requires more than diplomacy. True military power will come from sharing tactical intelligence and integrating allies and partners into the link architecture.

Coalition Kill Chain for the Pacific: Lessons from Ukraine

By Majors Dylan Buck and Steven Stansbury, U.S. Marine Corps

July 2023 Proceedings Vol. 149/7/1,445

usni.org · July 5, 2023

Russia’s war in Ukraine offers a critical case study on why—and how—to build a more robust kill chain that leverages partners’ and allies’ capabilities. A more expansive satellite communications (SATCOM) network that enables a real-time integrated common operational picture (COP) will be necessary to generate the relative combat power advantage over the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Russia initiated combat operations in Ukraine with cyberattacks on SATCOM to disrupt Ukraine’s kill chain—the methodology for finding, fixing, targeting, tracking, engaging, and assessing (F2T2EA) an adversarial objective. The United States, alongside partners, allies, and industry, was able to blunt Russia’s invasion by reconstructing Ukraine’s SATCOM network and sharing critical intelligence. However, the kill chain architecture leveraged against Russia does not exist in the first island chain of the western Pacific.

The 2022 National Defense Strategy identified China as “the most comprehensive and serious challenge to U.S. national security,” with integrated deterrence as the primary means for responding. It also stated that “greater intelligence and information sharing, and combined planning for shared deterrence challenges” are vital to effectively implement the strategy for integrated deterrence. To achieve the capability required to deter the PLA, the Department of Defense (DOD) must further develop SATCOM architecture in the first island chain and expand partners and allies’ access to the COP to build a coalition kill chain that can mass fires.

Expand SATCOM and the COP

As the battlefield becomes more expansive across domains, it will inherently become more dependent on SATCOM to enable combatants to close kill chains. A valuable lesson observed from Russia’s invasion is that the joint force can enhance its kill chain by proliferating and diversifying SATCOM infrastructure and expanding access to intelligence. To do this, the United States had to create more permissive policy for intelligence sharing for more effective targeting. Furthermore, kill chains in the Pacific are more dependent on SATCOM as submarine internet cables are more vulnerable and likely already compromised by China.

Leading up to the Ukraine invasion, Russia disabled tens of thousands of military and civilian SATCOM terminals. Both military and civilian broadband Internet was severely degraded. In an anticipated zero-day cyberattack, the degraded SATCOM rendered Ukraine’s long-range artillery counterattack “ineffective.” In one instance, Enercon, a German energy producer, reported that 5,800 of its wind turbines were knocked offline as civilian broadband Internet service in the region was attacked. The United States and Europe were forced to rapidly revert to commercial-off-the-shelf broadband services provided by SpaceX’s Starlink to reestablish civilian and military SATCOM. Remarkably, Starlink also enabled Ukraine to better mask its electronic signature, as SATCOM wavelengths are more difficult to detect compared to those propagated via ground. Based off these lessons, there are two measures the United States could take to create a better kill chain network in the first island chain.

First, to enhance U.S. SATCOM architecture, the DoD could begin to supplement geosynchronous orbit satellites by proliferating low-earth-orbit and medium-earth-orbit satellites. This would reduce vulnerabilities related to adversarial space operations and expand SATCOM range and resiliency. SpaceX’s Starlink functions off the same principle of a mesh networks of low-earth-orbit satellites.

Second, the United States could use partner and allies’ satellite networks and make policy more permissive with intelligence sharing. In March 2022, the Department of Defense announced its Joint All-Domain Command and Control Implementation Plan with the 5th line of effort to “Modernize Mission Partner Information Sharing.” The intent is to enhance the ability to integrate partner and allies’ data for all-domain coalition operations. After all, the value in integrating systems is only as good as the real-time tracks being shared. To build a coalition kill chain, U.S. policy will have to become more permissive with intelligence sharing among partners and allies.

Structure of the Multinational Kill Chain

The United States will also need to create a methodology for building a multinational COP and integrated fires network. Tactical-level forces across the partner and ally network must evolve to contribute more to operational and strategic-level fires and effects. This effort is twofold: first, the joint force could expand partners and allies’ access to Type-1 Link-16 cryptography, so they are built into the operational tasking link; and second, it could reduce constraints on protocols and pathways for sharing information.

The first effort would integrate partners and allies into the tactical data link router used by the U.S. joint force, also known as the Joint Range Extension Applications Protocol. This would require access to the joint Link 16 architecture by assigning partners and allies a cryptographic variable logic label via an operational tasking data link (OPTASK LINK). Access to the Link 16 architecture would provide a shared COP capable of integrating national technical means for finding and fixing targets and cuing assets to track them. Target quality and the probability of successful strike are positively correlated with the number of assets that sense, track, and pass data in the OPTASK LINK architecture. For instance, the Naval Integrated Fires Element (NIFE) serves as a 24/7 watch center to process signals of immediate use to military consumers worldwide. In the proposed system, allies and partners included in the same OPTASKLINK will see the same tracks facilitated and provided by elements like the NIFE.1

After expanding SATCOM and access to a multinational COP, the United States could reduce policy barriers to expand the integrated fires network to partners and allies. There is historical precedence for this. In 1943, several months prior to the successful landing of U.S. and UK troops in Sicily during World War II, the two allies signed the British-United States Agreement (BRUSA), a constitution to “exchange completely all information concerning the detection, identification and interception of signal from, and the solution of codes and cyphers, used by the Military and Air Forces of the Axis power, including secret services.” The pact formed the foundation for what evolved into today’s Five Eyes partnership between the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand.

Given the possibility of a large-scale Chinese offensive within the coming years, it is time for the joint force to increase information sharing and trust building with partners and allies to enhance awareness of the battle space in the first island chain. This would not only enhance F2T2EA but could also enhance regional awareness of China’s malign actions. That awareness would reinforce an international coalition. In response to China’s aggressive acts in the South China Sea, then–Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo stated in 2020 that:

The world will not allow Beijing to treat the South China Sea as its maritime empire. America stands with our Southeast Asian allies and partners in protecting their sovereign rights to offshore resources, consistent with their rights and obligations under international law. We stand with the international community in defense of freedom of the seas and respect for sovereignty and reject any push to impose “might makes right” in the South China Sea or the wider region.

More real-time information and intelligence sharing with partners and allies in the Pacific is required to achieve “defense of freedom of the seas and respect for sovereignty.” China is building a navy that now has more ships than the U.S. Navy, with an estimated 400 ships. “Between 2015 and 2017, Chinese shipyards launched twice as many tons worth of naval vessels as their U.S. counterparts.”2 In response, there are changes the joint force can implement today to respond to China’s growing combat power.

As the joint force continues to develop long-range ship interdiction capabilities, it can tap into capabilities already developed by allies and partners through increased information sharing, collaboration on fires planning and executing, and bilateral and multilateral rehearsals. The Japan Self-Defense Forces have a robust inventory of large and medium-scale ballistic missile capabilities with the SM-3 interceptor, the PAC-3 air defense missile, and the Type 12 ship interdiction missile that will eventually extend out to 1,500 kilometers in range. Taiwan’s Navy maintains the supersonic antiship cruise missiles Hsiung Feng II and III in its inventory, which have ranges of more than 150 kilometers. The Philippine Navy will acquire the Indian made supersonic BrahMos antiship missile by 2023. Given current trajectories for China’s naval and ground-based fires assets, the United States will not be able to unilaterally match China’s relative combat power in the Pacific. Thus, the U.S. strategy must prioritize a multilateral kill chain.

Once the multilateral kill chain is built, it must be rehearsed with common understanding of joint war-at-sea terminology among partners and allies. War-at-sea, zones of action, and zones of fire must be standardized in planning to achieve a common lexicon. The Global Area Reference System is also key to orientation and understanding the battlespace. Rehearsing multilateral plans for fire, specifically including protocols for authorities, and collaborating on battle damage assessments are necessary to achieve true integration.

Looking Forward

By building the SATCOM and COP architecture with partners and allies, the United States and partners and allies can achieve relative combat power advantage over the PLA. Trust is the coin of the realm, and the value associated with creating a more robust kill chain outweighs its risks. The two most recent iterations of the U.S. National Defense Strategy stressed the importance of allies and partners to deterring and defending against China’s expansionism. Creating an integrated coalition, however, requires more than diplomacy. True military power will come from sharing tactical intelligence and integrating allies and partners into the link architecture.

usni.org · July 5, 2023

20.  The Difference Between "Special Operations" and "Special Forces"

Sigh.. .An age-old "conflict."  Yes to Americans (particularly to Special Forces soldiers) there is a difference between Special Forces (SF) and Special Operations or Special Operations Forces (SOF)as described below.

But all Special Forces need to know that the press/ media (look at the Associated press style guide) and academia, most countries outside the US, and the public "special forces" is used generically to describe almost any non-conventional force. Any unit that is designated as special or as a commando organization will be described generically as special forces. So while we want to correct people who do not understand the nuance most people who use special forces generally are not wrong (except in the minds of Special Forces soldiers).

And we should also keep in mind that there are other SF units (and even services) out there, e.g., USAF Security Forces (SF) and the US Space Force (USSF - which is an informal acronym long used by US Special Forces and now "owned" by the Space Force).

The Difference Between "Special Operations" and "Special Forces"

havokjournal.com · by Marty Skovlund, Jr. · July 6, 2023

Possibly one of the most pervasive yet irritating missteps that the media and public in general make about the military is the use of the terms ‘Special Operations Forces’ (SOF) and ‘Special Forces’ (SF) interchangeably. In a day and age where special operations units have a growing presence in the media due to the increase of their importance in the asymmetric, non-conventional combat environment that our country has found ourselves in, the mistake has become all too common in headlines on news channels as well as newspapers and magazines. Consider this article a primer for anyone in the media that even remotely cares about their journalistic accuracy, as well as the curious citizen.

Special Operations, sometimes referred more accurately to as Special Operations Forces (SOF), include any unit that falls under the United States Special Operations Command (SOCOM). Naval Special Warfare, Air Force Special Operations Command, Army Special Operations Command, and Marine Special Operations Command are all included under this umbrella. I won’t go further down the ladder and list every unit under those commands, but they cover everything from the 528th Sustainment Brigade and Civil Affairs to the SEAL Teams and Ranger Regiment.

The shadowy Joint Special Operations Command also falls under SOCOM as a sub-unified command but often reports directly to higher authorities due to their unique and often sensitive missions. Who is not covered by the term Special Operations? Anyone who does not fall under the SOCOM umbrella. For example, although Force Recon companies in the Marine Corps are highly trained and undergo a selection process similar to many SOF units, they are not considered Special Operations as they belong to the Marine Corps, not SOCOM.

Now, what about the term “Special Forces”? Special Forces is not a generic term in the U.S. military and refers to a very specific unit. The 1st Special Forces Regiment falls under the command of the Army Special Operations Command (mentioned above) and includes the 1st, 3rd, 5th, 7th, 10th, 19th, and 20th Special Forces Groups.

They are most often referred to by their distinctive headgear, the Green Beret, or simply as “SF.” The Army’s Special Forces are capable of a wide variety of missions but were designed to be the premier experts on unconventional warfare and foreign internal defense.

As an example of a classic unconventional warfare mission that happened in recent history, after the terror attacks of 9/11 small elements of the 5th Special Forces Group embedded with indigenous fighters from Afghanistan’s Northern Alliance and led them into battle. Within a matter of weeks, they had effectively neutralized the Taliban threat – accomplished not with brigades and divisions of soldiers, but with only a couple dozen Special Forces soldiers. This is the capability that the 1st Special Forces Regiment brings to the table and makes them very unique in the larger SOCOM picture.

To summarize, Special Operations Forces (SOF) is a generic term that you can use to refer to any special operations unit. Special Forces is the title of a very specific unit and is not a generic term for other units. If you don’t know what unit did something, refer to them as SOF or Special Operations. If you know for a fact that it was a unit from one of the seven Special Forces Groups, then refer to them as Special Forces. Simple enough… Right?

The military is always looking for ways to improve warrior morale and build unit pride, and while there are a variety of ways to do this, it seems that an increasingly common method is to use morale patches. It is an interesting symbol of morale or team spirit, which is the ability of a group to believe in the goals or instincts that bind them together despite adversity. Custom patches are increasingly present in our lives today, and are an important part of our military history, with close ties to our military and law enforcement personnel. In the military, however, morale patches are typically found on equipment, clothing, and patch panels.

Marty is a veteran of the 1st Ranger Battalion and Syracuse Recruiting Battalion, a former small business owner, and the author of Violence of Action: The Untold Stories of the 75th Ranger Regiment in the War on Terror (Blackside Publishing) as well as Ranger Knowledge: The Complete Study Guide (St. Martins Press). He is also the executive producer of the award-winning documentary Nomadic Veterans and the award-winning short-narrative Prisoner of War. He is currently working on his third book as well as pursuing a career in film and television.

A U.S. Special Operations soldier provides security overwatch from a rooftop during the early morning hours of a clearing operation in Panjwa’i District in Kandahar province, Afghanistan, on April 25, 2011. Source.

As the Voice of the Veteran Community, The Havok Journal seeks to publish a variety of perspectives on a number of sensitive subjects. Unless specifically noted otherwise, nothing we publish is an official point of view of The Havok Journal or any part of the U.S. government.

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© 2023 The Havok Journal

21. Ukraine's attacks on Russian commanders have the US Army worried about its own 'fat and ponderous' command posts

Here is a test. Direct that every HQ above division level must be able to function self sufficiently AND fit in one CH-47 helicopter. I recall a project the CINC gave us in Korea to give him a mobile HQ organization that could be transported in CH-47. This forced us to look critically at all the functions in the HQ to determine what functions (and personal and equipment) was absolutely necessary to keep the CINC informed and to support his decision making and orders process to fight the war on the move from any location. This led to a lot of questions about what was really needed in the HQ. We put together the ops,intel, plans, logistics, and comms functions and capabilities but we still had to make a key assumption - that we would have "reach back" to other HQ resources. It was an interesting exercise and a lot of the infighting devolved to each staff function demanding a seat on the aircraft because the thought was that if you did not get a seat on the aircraft your staff function was marginalized and devalued.

But can we put our headquarters on a diet and slim them down?

Ukraine's attacks on Russian commanders have the US Army worried about its own 'fat and ponderous' command posts

Business Insider · by Michael Peck

US Army soldiers in a tactical command post.

US Army/Sgt. 1st Class Jeremy Crisp

• Ukraine's military has been using its long-range weapons to attack Russian command posts.
• Such attacks have affected Russian command and control, disrupting its troops' ability to operate.
• Some US Army leaders worry that their command posts are now more vulnerable.

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Ukraine's success in destroying Russian command posts has raised a troubling question for the US military: If Ukraine can do this to Russian headquarters, can other militaries, especially China's, do it to American HQs?

Command posts are battlefield nodes for commanders, intelligence and communications specialists, and other troops who oversee military operations. They are usually packed with electronic equipment and are hubs for vehicle traffic, giving them a distinct electronic and physical footprint.

In recent wars, facing diminished threats from the air and long-range weapons, US Army command posts have gotten larger, with more people and more emissions, and can easily be spotted and struck by the sensors and precision weapons now crowding the battlefield.

"Our command posts have mutated away from the lean, mean, killing machines we need and are instead fat and ponderous," three American officers said in an essay in Military Review, the Army's professional journal.

A command post set up at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin in California.

US Army/Col. Scott Woodward

The Ukraine war illustrates that the most vulnerable part of an army is its brain. Disrupt its command and control, and even the strongest unit becomes almost helpless.

That's exactly what Ukraine did in summer 2022 when it used new US-supplied HIMARS GPS-guided rockets to target Russian command posts near the front lines. The resulting disruption helped Ukraine take large swathes of territory.

In battles around Chornobaivka, near the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson, Ukrainian strikes hit Russian command posts, known as CPs, at least 22 times and killed the commander of the 49th Combined Arms Army.

"This sapped Russian momentum and prevented consolidation of gains, which ultimately led to their expulsion," said the essay's authors, who included Lt. Gen. Milford Beagle Jr., the commander of the US Army's Combined Arms Center at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas.

This may be a major reason for the stunningly poor performance of Russian troops in Ukraine.

"Pinning Russian woes solely on ineptitude, while true to some extent, downplays the effect Ukrainians are having in systematically dismantling their enemy's command-and-control system through multidomain targeting," the authors wrote.

Coping with these attacks undercuts Russian-command efficiency. Russian HQs were pulled back some 75 miles from the front lines, which "imposed significant tactical challenges on Russian forces," a recent report by Britain's Royal United Services Institute think tank said.

A destroyed Russian army command post on March 13, 2022.

Ukrainian Armed Forces

The problem is that US Army CPs are just as vulnerable: "Contemporary tented command posts — with their radio frequency emitting antennas, dozens of generators and vehicles, and extensive support requirements — are easily targetable to even the untrained eye," the Military Review article said.

This is the result of command and control becoming more sophisticated, as command posts must send and receive a constant stream of information. The price is that they are burdened with more tasks and equipment. In addition, years of counterinsurgency and small wars against opponents who lacked the means to target command centers have led to complacency.

"Western command posts have significant challenges with survivability," especially for higher-level HQs, the authors wrote, adding: "Even where efforts have been made to improve the mobility of command posts, our inability to hide the multispectral signatures of these massive structures coupled with persistent battlefield surveillance and precision weapons negates any benefit achieved."

Unsurprisingly, China has focused on disrupting US command-and-control capabilities. Should war come over Taiwan, China could employ a variety of means, including jamming, cyberwarfare, and attacks on communications satellites.

A US Army tactical command post.

US Army

This isn't the first time the issue has come up. After World War II, former German panzer generals commented that NATO command posts had become too large, while German commanders had been able to conduct mobile warfare with much-smaller CPs.

Today's armies can hardly go back to the pre-Napoleonic days of tiny staffs and generals who personally led their troops into battle. Sensor-to-shooter chains and hypersonic missiles will enable ever-quicker strikes against enemy command centers.

But there are ways to at least partially mitigate risk. One is to move command posts further from the lines and fortify them against bombardment or special-forces raids. Russia has also turned to a more-old-fashioned solution: getting off the radio.

"This has often been achieved by commandeering the Ukrainian telecommunications network on the occupied territories, which is dense and robust," the Royal United Services Institute report said. "The Russian military then connects its CPs to the closest point in the civilian network via extended ground-laid telecommunications cables."

US Army soldiers during a command-post exercise at Fort Carson in Colorado.

US Army/Sgt. James Geelen

Command posts connect with supporting units, such as air defense, via micro radio links through relay vehicles.

The Military Review article suggested the creation of "data-centric command posts" that would take advantage of technology such as the cloud. Command and control would be offered as a service as needed, creating such a small footprint in which CPs could be carried in a few armored vehicles.

"If we envision our command posts as less of a place or a thing and more as a service, it may be possible to vastly increase our agility," the authors wrote. "What happens if a corps, division, or brigade commander arrives, takes control of any command post, and receives the capability of the appropriate echelon with a push of a button?"

Another solution may be virtual reality.

"In a virtual world, commanders could replicate, expand, traverse, and interact as needed with their entire physical command post and never have to leave the room or vehicle they are in," the authors added.

Virtual reality would enable command posts to remain in secure locations far from the front. But this could also raise the specter of the "chateau generals" of World War I, who were mocked by their troops for never going near the trenches and remaining ignorant of what the war was really like.

Michael Peck is a defense writer whose work has appeared in Forbes, Defense News, Foreign Policy magazine, and other publications. He holds a master's in political science. Follow him on Twitter and LinkedIn.

Business Insider · by Michael Peck

22. World War III Will Be Fought With Viruses

Einstein: "I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."

World War III Will Be Fought With Viruses

A two-front biological and cyber attack could lead to a U.S. defeat before we know what hit us.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/world-war-iii-virus-vaccine-biological-weapon-russia-ukraine-china-covid-cybersecurity-hack-162a8b08?

By Richard A. Muller

July 6, 2023 6:08 pm ET

Vladimir Putin’s losses in Ukraine and the rebellion of the Wagner Group have increased the chances that the Russian president will lash out and expand the 17-month-old conflict. But World War III may not be what you expect. The current paradigm of escalating nuclear conflict was articulated 60 years ago by physicist Herman Kahn, founder of the Hudson institute, but other technologies have come a long way since then. Conventional guns, bombs, missiles or troops may not figure in World War III at all. Biological and computer viruses are likely to be the weapon of choice.

Covid wasn’t a deliberate attack, but it quickly and successfully damaged the American economy. Any nation thinking of using a deadly virus as a weapon of war would first need to immunize its own people, perhaps under the guise of a flu vaccination. Long-term population-level immunity would require the virus be sufficiently optimized, before release, to reduce the probability of further mutation.

The novel coronavirus was sufficiently optimized so that no serious mutations occurred for nine months. The Delta variant appeared in India in October 2020. A weaponized virus would also need to incorporate an immune suppression gene—Covid had ORF8—that reduces early symptoms, facilitating spread by asymptomatic carriers. For a covert attack to be successful, the virus would need to be released not in the country of origin but in the target country, perhaps near a biological facility so the world would falsely conclude it came as a leak from a surreptitious domestic program.

Recall that early Covid panic came from Italy’s inability to care for all of its infected patients. Thus, for maximum disruption, the second thrust of any aggression might be a cyber attack on hospitals, perhaps disguised as ransomware. Again, the trick would be to make it seem as if the attack were originating outside the aggressor’s country. In other contexts this is called a “false flag” operation. The target country might not even recognize it as part of a two-front, synergistic attack of biological and computer viruses.

Ransomware could simultaneously target energy grids, power plants, factories, refineries, trains, airlines, shipping, banking, water supplies, sewage-treatment plants and more. But hospitals would be the most salient targets. Avoiding obvious military targets would enhance the illusion that World War III hadn’t begun. The attacker or attackers might falsely claim their own systems are also under siege. Misdirection can be more effective than a smoke screen.

This isn’t some far-fetched disaster scenario cooked up by Hollywood screenwriters. Biological and cyber viruses have been, in a sense, field tested. The great value to the attacker of a two-pronged biological and cyber attack is the possibility of achieving destructive goals while keeping the whole operation covert.

Deterring such an attack will require a clear, credible and articulated promise to respond to aggression. It can’t be covert. If China, Russia or both attacked the U.S. this way, how would we react? Policy makers need to come up with an answer. An economic embargo seems suboptimal. Many would interpret nuclear retaliation as disproportionate. Developing a retaliatory virus would take time, and responding this way would clearly violate the Biological Weapons Convention.

Defense matters too. It is essential to be able to develop vaccines rapidly using a viral backbone so that they can be retargeted with minimal additional testing. Hospitals and other critical infrastructure need to harden their cyber defenses.

If deterrence fails and an attack takes place, correctly identifying the perpetrator has to be the first priority. This may or may not be easy, but retaliating against the wrong actor risks making an already bad situation worse. Reopening the Covid-19 origin investigation would provide good practice. Confiscation of the foreign assets of the attacking nation could be effective. A strong cyberattack capability aimed at the enemy’s military and industry is key. Hospitals should be spared, lest the victim of an attack appear to become the aggressor and lose the moral high ground.

There are many reasons why an adversary may want to launch a covert attack on the U.S. economy. America’s leaders need to take seriously the prospect that their country could be defeated without being invaded or even knowing it is under attack. The way to deter such an attack is to convince potentially hostile actors that success is impossible and the consequences for the attacker will be swift and severe. The U.S. needs to make it clear that its commitments to North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies, Ukraine, Taiwan and others won’t waver even if the American economy falters.

Mr. Muller served as a Jason National Security adviser for 34 years. He is a professor of physics emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. His books include “Physics for Future Presidents” and “Energy for Future Presidents.”

23. Why no one can end the Ukraine war

Excerpts:

So here’s our paradox. Even though all three key parties want to end the war, the fighting still continues. Why? Because of a virtue that is also a sin. The Ukraine war is not an all-out war like the First or Second World Wars. It is a “limited war”, with US and Russian embassies still functioning in Moscow and Washington, US and Russian astronauts sharing space capsules, concerned phone calls by the CIA director when Moscow is briefly in turmoil. It is bound by reciprocal restraint. The Russians do not attack US aircraft and vessels bringing weapons to their enemy, the Americans do not supply weapons to Ukraine that can attack Russian cities. Putin himself has silenced threats of nuclear attacks by Russian hotheads, declaring that he would only use nuclear weapons if Russia were faced with imminent destruction — that is, inevitably, nuclear destruction.

In other words, the good news is that the Ukraine war is, a polite, “limited war”, just like those of the 18th century that were later envied in the terrible 20th century of all-out, unlimited wars. But the bad news is that as long as only the Ukrainians are under fire, none of the other protagonists has an impellent reason to end the fighting. So like the 18th-century Seven Years’ War, it risks dragging on for at least another 500 days.

Why no one can end the Ukraine war

Five hundred days in, both sides are caught in the same paradox

https://unherd.com/2023/07/why-no-one-can-end-the-ukraine-war/?mc_cid=7916c49dbc&mc_eid=70bf478f36

BY EDWARD LUTTWAK

At an otherwise newsy event last month, Jens Stoltenberg, the Nato chief, made a low-key administrative announcement: “We are working on a multi-year package with substantial funding…”

Not the stuff of headlines, but a rather sobering admission that, as the war approaches its 500th day tomorrow, there is no end in sight. Not this year, or next year or the year after. That should be deeply concerning, especially because, contrary to received wisdom, all those who really matter — the Ukrainians, Russians and the Americans — are actually trying very hard to end it.

For it is not true, contra widely held opinion, that Zelenskyy wants the world to support him forever as he completes a full Reconquista — including Crimea. His current offensive — the push towards the Black Sea to cut off Russian forces further west – is a clear demonstration of this. It was deliberately calculated to push Moscow to the negotiating table or risk losing tens of thousands of soldiers to captivity or death.

But Zelenskyy has consistently refused to spell out the fact that he has a “limited aim” of reaching a negotiated peace without Crimea. And he has done so for both military and personal reasons.

The military reason is straightforward and common to every war: to advance at all, Ukrainians on the front line cannot fight in a “limited” way. They must believe that their absolute commitment and self-sacrifice can end the war in victory.

The personal reason is that Zelenskyy is a Jew, as is his defence minister, Oleksii Resnikov. And like the countless Jews who fought for their countries up and down Europe in the last century, the pair remain suspect in the eyes of the Ukrainian ultra-nationalists who are commonly antisemitic.

It is, for them, no small irony that Ukraine should be led in its struggle for existence by two Jews since its founding hero, Bohdan Khmelnytsky, was Hitler’s only predecessor as a genocidally-antisemitic national leader; but instead of opprobrium, he has a city, a region, countless streets and Zelenskyy’s own Presidential Guard brigade named after him. Given the nationalists’ bigoted mistrust of the president, in spite of his stellar leadership from the first night of war, he cannot be seen to be a compromiser.

But, that’s just the subtext. Like everybody else who matters, Zelenskyy knows only too well that the war must end in a negotiation because nobody is going to march on Moscow to force the Russians to surrender. Talk of “regime change” may offer a seductive promise for some, but it mostly demonstrates a feckless over-optimism about its feasibility, while also ignoring the likelihood that Putin’s replacement will promise not peace but a more effectively prosecuted war. Prigozhin was applauded so enthusiastically in Rostov precisely because he called to fire the losers still charge; the Russians want generals who can march to Kyiv as Zhukov marched to Berlin in 1945. But that the Russians can keep on bombing Ukraine’s cities day after day, however sporadically and uselessly, is one more incentive for a ceasefire that will not be delayed by any dreams of Crimea.

Right now, Ukraine’s forces lack the power for a rapid march to the sea and suffer from equipment shortcomings. After finally obtaining German Leopard tanks, it turns out that Russia’s Kornet anti-tank missiles are truly excellent: neither the Leopards in the field nor the M.1 tanks promised by the US will do well against them. But even if this offensive cannot be truly successful, Ukraine’s strength is clearly rising which should be enough to push Russia to the negotiating table. For, just as Zelenskyy is wrongly accused of refusing a ceasefire because he wants too much, so, too, is Putin.

SUGGESTED READINGDodging shells on Ukraine's eastern front

BY DAVID PATRIKARAKOS

Yes, it is perfectly true Putin started the war determined to conquer Ukraine in less than a week, armed with the marvellously advanced “post-kinetic” war plan — all the rage in the US too —devised by his military chief, Valery Gerasimov. But from the bitter February morning when Putin discovered that Gerasimov and his FSB internal-intelligence chief — along with US, French and German intelligence — were utterly wrong, Putin has refused both of the alternatives available to him. The first was what to do what many believe he did last year: decide to fight in earnest. For that he would have had to declare war, and mobilise his two million reservists to invade with overwhelming military force, as opposed to Gerasimov’s for-show-only advance of 150,000 (including field dentists).

So why didn’t he? Certainly not because he feared nuclear retaliation — Chancellor Olaf Scholz had just declared that Germany would not even delay the planned opening of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline if Ukraine were invaded, let alone support Nato nuclear retaliation with the bombs stored on German soil. And Washington gave up long ago on “extended deterrence”, whereby nuclear weapons would be used in response to conventional attacks against US allies, let alone non-ally Ukraine.

But Putin did fear something just as powerful. Every Russian army unit, except for the fully professional airborne forces, includes 18- and 19-year-old conscripts, whose mothers would swiftly take to the streets across Russia and flood Red Square to vehemently protest if there were any more than a handful of casualties. Modern Russia is just as “post-Heroic” as any other low-fertility country where there are no spare male children to sacrifice for the nation’s glory (China has fewer than most). And Putin was not about to declare war and have his police battle Russia’s mothers. He not only refused to mobilise the Russian armed forces, he even banned the word “war” (война, or voyna) from all official communications.

But neither would Putin just call it all off, blame the Kyiv assault on “neo-Nazi” provocations and quickly retreat. So instead of all-out war or no war, Putin has persisted with his “special military operation”, revealing in the process to the entire world that Russia does have something that no other country still has: full self-sufficiency. Unlike China, the Russian Federation is autarkic in food and fuel, and manufactures all that is needed to sustain its armed forces and civilian population on a war footing, even if they are short of a few luxuries. So all Putin needed to keep fighting till his enemies lost patience was manpower, and to keep his conscripts out of combat.

He also has roubles — which he is wielding. Right now, joining the Russian army earns one a ₽600,000 sign-up bonus, ₽204,000 a month ($2,296 today), and stellar death benefits: ₽5,000,000 from the President himself an additional 2-3 million from the regional government and a monthly widow’s pension of ₽25,000 a month. Enough have joined to provide the forces that dug and fortified the long trench lines now holding up Ukraine’s offensive, along with almost 200,000 of the recalled reservists, who get the same pay and benefits.

And there are still more newly enrolled Russian troops in the east, and in the formerly independent state of Belarus (the country that, in all but name, Putin did conquer last year). But while Putin could keep up a war of low-level attrition for a while, it cannot lead to victory. And now he has Elvira Nabiullina to contend with.

Nabiullina is the formidable head of Russia’s Central Bank. Already very highly respected before the war, she is now the hero of Russian public finance for having successfully controlled inflation — better, in fact, than the Bank of England or the US Federal Reserve. The word is that she is tapering the printing of roubles, not for fear of a greater national debt (Russia’s is much lower than that of the US or UK) but of inflation. For Putin, too, that is a greater threat than anything his troops can encounter on the battlefield. Inflation will quickly drown Russia’s poor, many of whom are scattered across the endless steppe of Russia with very few opportunities to earn their way around rising prices.

These Russians also happen to be Putin’s firmest supporters. That is why unmistakable signals have issued from the Kremlin that Putin is finally ready to consider a compromise. The final party longing for an end to the debacle is the US. Last week, CIA head William J. Burns hurriedly called his Kremlin counterpart, Sergey Yevgenyevich Naryshkin, to reassure him that the US had nothing to do with Prigozhin’s march to Moscow. That phone call is as good as evidence as any that, contrary to foolish Leftist fantasies, the Biden administration (fully backed by most Republicans) does not want Russia destabilised by this war. For it knows only too well that Russian power alone keeps the Chinese from absorbing the vast spaces of Mongolia, Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan — and that Russian weapons still flow to the only countries that actually fight the Chinese in recurring incidents: India on land and Vietnam at sea.

MORE FROM THIS AUTHORUkraine's path to victory

BY EDWARD LUTTWAK

So here’s our paradox. Even though all three key parties want to end the war, the fighting still continues. Why? Because of a virtue that is also a sin. The Ukraine war is not an all-out war like the First or Second World Wars. It is a “limited war”, with US and Russian embassies still functioning in Moscow and Washington, US and Russian astronauts sharing space capsules, concerned phone calls by the CIA director when Moscow is briefly in turmoil. It is bound by reciprocal restraint. The Russians do not attack US aircraft and vessels bringing weapons to their enemy, the Americans do not supply weapons to Ukraine that can attack Russian cities. Putin himself has silenced threats of nuclear attacks by Russian hotheads, declaring that he would only use nuclear weapons if Russia were faced with imminent destruction — that is, inevitably, nuclear destruction.

In other words, the good news is that the Ukraine war is, a polite, “limited war”, just like those of the 18th century that were later envied in the terrible 20th century of all-out, unlimited wars. But the bad news is that as long as only the Ukrainians are under fire, none of the other protagonists has an impellent reason to end the fighting. So like the 18th-century Seven Years’ War, it risks dragging on for at least another 500 days.

24.  Six lessons of Prigozhin’s revolt

The six:

Firstly, this was a full-scale crisis for Vladimir Putin’s presidency. 

Secondly, these events reveal Putin’s extraordinary misreading of domestic realities

Thirdly, the crisis undermines the core rationale of Putin’s rule: to bring stability and security to Russia after the chaotic 1990s.

Fourthly, the crisis exposed the brittleness of the Russian state. 

Fifthly, Putin’s need for mediation by a foreign leader – one whom he despises and has long sought to subordinate – to avert large-scale armed clashes further reveals Russia’s weakness. 

Finally, Russia’s failures in its war against Ukraine have been imposing growing strains at home for months. 

ONLINE ANALYSIS6th July 2023

Six lessons of Prigozhin’s revolt

The crisis – spurred by Russia’s failures in its war against Ukraine and by Putin’s extraordinary misreading of domestic realities – has sown profound uncertainty and anxiety within the Russian system.

Nigel Gould-Davies

@Nigelgd1

Editor, Strategic Survey; Senior Fellow for Russia and Eurasia

https://www.iiss.org/online-analysis/online-analysis/2023/07/six-lessons-of-prigozhins-revolt/?mc_cid=7916c49dbc&mc_eid=70bf478f36

The revolt by Wagner Group forces led by Evgeny Prigozhin on 23–24 June was a tectonic moment in Russian politics. New details continue to emerge and the aftershocks will shape Russia’s – and perhaps Belarus’s – political landscape. But six lessons are already clear.

Firstly, this was a full-scale crisis for Vladimir Putin’s presidency. While Prigozhin did not openly call for Putin’s overthrow, the logic of his escalating rhetoric and demands, his fierce critique of the official justification for the invasion of Ukraine and of the system that had launched it, and the mobilisation of fighters and heavy weapons to march on Moscow presented a direct threat to the regime. The Kremlin’s panicked preparations to defend Moscow betrayed its fear that Prigozhin’s anger and ambition, and the wider sympathy he had cultivated in other security structures, could spin out of control. Tellingly, Viktor Zolotov, head of Rosgvardia – created by Putin as his personal guard – expected Wagner to force entry into Moscow.

Secondly, these events reveal Putin’s extraordinary misreading of domestic realities. The crisis was entirely of his making. Prigozhin was Putin’s creature and his rise has been entirely dependent on Putin’s patronage. As Putin now admits, Wagner was lavishly funded by the state. His failure to realise the threat this posed, despite months of growing tension between Wagner and the military leadership, showed his isolation and fuelled the misjudgements that followed. This raises the question of what else about Russia, and its war in Ukraine, he does not understand.

Thirdly, the crisis undermines the core rationale of Putin’s rule: to bring stability and security to Russia after the chaotic 1990s. His central message from the start of his presidency has been the need to create a ‘power vertical’ of unified, ‘hyper-centralised’ authority. Yet he has presided over a fracturing of security structures that led to open, deadly violence – with at least thirteen aircrew killed in the revolt – even as Russia faces a major counter-offensive by Ukraine.

Fourthly, the crisis exposed the brittleness of the Russian state. Wagner forces marched nearly 1,000 kilometres towards Moscow almost entirely unhindered. Perhaps even more significant, few elites offered rapid public support. Some expressed alarm, others watched quietly to see how events would unfold, still others fled Russia (its parliament now seeks to punish them). Putin himself publicly warned of state collapse and mass disorder by invoking the analogy of 1917 – revolution in the face of military defeat – and the historically resonant smuta, the early seventeenth-century Time of Troubles that saw extreme violence and instability.

Fifthly, Putin’s need for mediation by a foreign leader – one whom he despises and has long sought to subordinate – to avert large-scale armed clashes further reveals Russia’s weakness. It is not yet clear whether Belarusian ruler Alyaksandr Lukashenka was acting autonomously, rather than merely usefully, but he played an active and perhaps indispensable role in defusing the crisis. Having known Prigozhin for 20 years and, being in a position to offer safe exile, he was uniquely placed to play this role. Lukashenka has made clear it was in his interest to help avert a collapse of central authority in Russia. But the Kremlin still needed him. In doing so, he repaid the help that Putin gave him in 2020 in facing down the peaceful uprising in Belarus.

Finally, Russia’s failures in its war against Ukraine have been imposing growing strains at home for months. The question was always how these would translate into an overt political challenge, and what form this would take. As always in highly authoritarian regimes, this was far more likely to come from within rather than below. The striking point is that it has come not from the majority of elites who (despite their performative compliance) have been quietly unhappy about the war from the start, but from the vocal minority – mostly the siloviki, whom Putin has given license to criticise the war effort as insufficiently resolute and effective.

While Putin now faces no immediate threat – Wagner was uniquely well-resourced and established among the so-called ‘private military companies’ – the recent revolt has sown profound uncertainty and anxiety. For all its brutality, Putin has calibrated his war effort to avoid strains at home and condemnation by major non-Western states. A full-scale silovik war would likely dispense with any such limitations and launch something much closer to a full-scale mobilisation. For most elites, this is a terrifying prospect.

This is why the Kremlin’s investigation into wider complicity with Prigozhin’s revolt matters. Putin’s unsparing hatred of those he deems ‘traitors’ is well known. It follows that anyone who was prepared to back Prigozhin knew the stakes and was ready to risk their future regardless. This will indicate the depth of alienation among those with access to the means of violence.

Putin is now weaker and more isolated, the elites around him more divided and alarmed, and the system he has built more unstable. He expected a quick victory in Ukraine, not a long and costly conflict. While he has had to adapt and improvise, he remains confident he can outlast Ukraine and the West in a contest of resolve. This is now less clear than ever. The dogs of war he unleashed may yet return to devour him.

25. To deter China, the US should build rings of fire

To deter China, the US should build rings of fire

Rings of Fire bill will require Pentagon to develop a strategy for offsetting China's missile advantages

 By Rep. Mike Gallagher , Joni Ernst | Fox News

foxnews.com · by Rep. Mike Gallagher , Joni Ernst | Fox News

Video

Chinese military challenges are ‘deliberate,’ ‘strategic,’ ‘aggressive’: Rep. Mike Gallagher

Rep. Mike Gallagher, R-Wisc., tells ‘Fox News Live’ that the U.S. ‘projects weakness’ towards China.

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"Zero."

That’s how Adm. John Aquilino, commander of U.S. forces in the Pacific, answered when asked if the United States has the capabilities to match China’s arsenal of theater-range missiles (between 500 and 5500 km).

Asked if the United States has any missiles under development at the upper end of that range (3000-5000 km), the answer was the same: no.

New recruits of Chinese Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) attend a sendoff ceremony in Ganzhou, Jiangxi province, March 16, 2023. (China Daily via Reuters)

This shocking missile gap calls into question America’s ability to deter war – or win if deterrence fails.

US WOULD BE CRAZY TO IGNORE GROWING HAZARDS OF DOING BUSINESS IN CHINA

The Pentagon reports that China fields over 1,250 ground-launched theater-range ballistic and cruise missiles that can hit U.S. targets across the Indo-Pacific. In fact, in 2021, China tested more ballistic missiles than the rest of the world combined.

The PLA Rocket Force is central to China’s "anti-access/area denial" strategy, designed to push U.S. forces out of the first and second island chains by demonstrating that they can, and will, hit U.S. forces inside it.

Video

Recent war games demonstrate the logic of China’s counter-intervention strategy. In a battle for Taiwan, China’s precision salvos striking U.S. military bases and Navy ships as far out as Guam would deal devastating losses to U.S. air and seapower. A CSIS scenario showed that in four weeks of fighting, the U.S. lost hundreds of aircraft, and bases on Guam were devastated, which would force commanders to only rely on expensive, high-end air and naval forces to counterattack – dangerously limiting the lethality of their forces.

This deadly gap has been decades in the making.

For years, the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty hamstrung our ability to develop these theater-range ground-launched missiles. It prohibited the United States and Russia – but not China – from deploying those kinds of capabilities anywhere in the world.

Video

After Russia was caught cheating, the Trump administration rightly withdrew from the treaty in 2019. Although the withdrawal freed up the Pentagon to develop new missile capabilities, we have made little progress in offsetting China’s rocket force. It will take an act of Congress to force the Pentagon to level the playing field in long-range strike.

And that is exactly what we are going to do. Through our Rings of Fire Act of 2023, we will require the Pentagon to develop a strategy for offsetting China’s missile advantages. The strategy would assess gaps in our theater-range strike capabilities in the Indo-Pacific and the military requirements to close them.

BIDEN'S CLIMATE AGENDA MAKES US DANGEROUSLY DEPENDENT ON CHINA. HERE'S WHAT WE MUST DO

The Pentagon would develop concepts for operating these fires, and identify key allies and basing locations to put them to use. The goal is to field credible and affordable combat power across the Pacific, reducing China’s homefield advantage.

Video

An Indo-Pacific missile strategy should take advantage of geography. While China fields missiles on the mainland, the United States can deploy them across the region with the support of partners and allies. Japan and the Philippines could host shorter-range systems while longer-range systems could be deployed to northern Australia, the Pacific Islands and Alaska. This would establish "rings of fire" that constitute a defense-in-depth across the Pacific.

The United States has some shorter-range capabilities in its arsenal, such as Precision Strike Missiles. But the Biden administration failed to budget for them – with $1 billion of unfunded missile requirements for the Indo-Pacific. This negligence demonstrates a lack of urgency and seriousness in implementing the National Defense Strategy that classifies China as our biggest challenge.

Worse, despite long-range precision fires being a top modernization priority of the Army, the U.S. has no intermediate-range systems under development. Meanwhile, the PRC’s Dongfeng-26, for example, reaches upwards of 4000km – capable of striking Guam.

Video

This is where China’s military has stolen a march, given the vast distances of the Indo-Pacific, and where the United States needs to catch up.

Ground-based missiles would give a U.S. commander a range of affordable, ready strike options and help cover down for other U.S. forces making their way to the fight. They would make China’s forces defend against unpredictable strikes from varying distances and approaches, thereby enhancing deterrence.

CLICK HERE TO GET THE OPINION NEWSLETTER

But it should not only be the United States building and fielding such systems. An Indo-Pacific missile strategy must leverage allies and partners to join in development and production of these systems, reducing the cost to the taxpayer while bolstering interoperability for the warfighter.

Video

The Australians have already indicated a willingness to modernize their guided weapons programs and manufacture long-range weapons in-country. Under Pillar II of AUKUS, we can get more bang for our buck by sharing the costs and mutually accelerating our development and production timelines of next-generation missile technologies with our closest allies in the region where they are needed.

Building these "rings of fire" in concert with our closest allies would enhance deterrence and pose dangerous dilemmas for PLA planners. If we can close the missile gap and thereby shift the regional balance of power in our favor, this gives us a greater chance of making Xi Jinping think twice before attempting to take Taiwan by force.

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But even after our legislation passes and if the Pentagon responds by producing a coherent strategy for fielding these precision fires, making rings of fire a reality will require sustained oversight. Restoring deterrence in the Indo-Pacific demands dedicated attention from the highest levels of the Pentagon, State Department and – of course – Congress.

Given the growing risks of great power conflict in the Indo-Pacific, we cannot waste any more time.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM REP. MIKE GALLAGHER

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM SEN. JONI ERNST

Joni Ernst, a Republican, represents Iowa in the U.S. Senate.

Republican Mike Gallagher represents Wisconsin’s Eighth Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives where he serves as chairman of the House Select Committee on Strategic Competition between the U.S. and the Chinese Communist Party.

foxnews.com · by Rep. Mike Gallagher , Joni Ernst | Fox News

26. NATO, China, and the Vilnius Summit

Excerpts:

Article Five of the Washington Treaty establishing NATO geographically limits alliance obligations to come to one another’s defense in response to attacks on members “in Europe or North America.” A Chinese attack on U.S. forces in the Pacific would not qualify, and so the United States shouldn’t expect a large European defense contribution in the event of a Chinese attack against Taiwan. It would, however, expect significant political and economic support in countering Beijing in such a contingency. In light of the hesitations underlined above, NATO should have serious discussions about the European response in the event of a Chinese attack, and about what those political and economic actions would be in order to ensure cohesion during such a scenario.

That conversation is also particularly necessary because of the current state of public opinion in Europe. Indeed, a recent poll by the European Council on Foreign Relations revealed some nuanced and complex findings. Whereas the needle has clearly moved against Russia, Europeans remain more open to engagement with China.. The European public is generally more supportive of a neutral stance in case of a Chinese attack against Taiwan but would also endorse economic sanctions against Beijing if it provided weapons for Russia to use in Ukraine. And America’s allies in Europe have to consider their nightmare scenario: A majority clearly believe that a return to the American presidency by Trump would weaken the trans-Atlantic partnership.

The Russo-Ukrainian war has dramatically illustrated Europe’s dependency on the United States for its defense, heightening European fears of another wild oscillation in U.S. foreign policy after the next election. It’s not just support for Ukraine that is at stake for NATO in November 2024, but the alliance itself, and a big piece of that is whether there will be trans-Atlantic unity on how to deal with the challenges emanating from the Indo-Pacific. Having conversations at NATO now about how the alliance would react in the event of a Chinese attack on Taiwan would help to ensure a more unified response if Beijing takes such action in the future.

NATO, China, and the Vilnius Summit - War on the Rocks

GARRET MARTIN AND JAMES GOLDGEIER

warontherocks.com · by Garret Martin · July 7, 2023

In late 2019, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg could confidently claim that “there’s no way that NATO will move into the South China Sea but we have to address the fact that China is coming closer to us.” Yet, three and a half years later, the NATO alliance arguably no longer has the luxury to stay out of the Indo-Pacific region. The impact of the war in Ukraine has been felt well beyond the shores of the European continent, creating increasing connections between the Indo-Pacific and European security theaters.

We argue that the war in Ukraine has already reshaped, and will continue to redefine, NATO’s approach to China in several ways. First, the alliance is less and less willing to engage with Beijing, considering its close alignment with Moscow throughout this horrific war. Second, NATO is being increasingly drawn into playing a more active role in the Indo-Pacific, despite its pre-war claims downplaying that prospect. And third, NATO allies should be discussing now how they would react to a Taiwan scenario, even as they seek to avoid exacerbating existing intra-European and trans-Atlantic divisions when it comes to confronting Beijing more generally.

The upcoming NATO summit in Vilnius, Lithuania will be understandably dominated by discussions regarding the Russo-Ukrainian war. Following the meeting, analysts will pay much attention to what the heads of state and government will say about Ukraine’s actual path to membership 15 years after a NATO summit declaration first stated that Ukraine (and Georgia) “will become members of NATO.” If there’s another issue that most analysts will be focused on, it will be Sweden’s accession to NATO membership, currently awaiting ratification by Hungary and Turkey for reasons having nothing to do with the country’s qualifications to join.

Become a Member

Less noticed will be what NATO leaders say about China. This is understandable, given that Europe is dealing with the largest land war on the continent since 1945. And yet what NATO says about China has become increasingly important for the alliance because of its centrality to its most powerful member, the United States. It would be a mistake to ignore what NATO says and does about China because while all eyes are on Ukraine, differences between the United States and Europe on how to approach China loom large in determining the future health of trans-Atlantic relations.

The Rise of China on NATO’s Agenda

The Vilnius summit will demonstrate how NATO currently understands the challenge posed by China. It will also be a marker to judge how the alliance’s rhetoric has changed on this issue over the past year. It is fair to say that the analysis of the Chinese Communist Party’s intentions has undergone a drastic evolution in recent years.

China, for a long time, was not on NATO’s radar. It did not even warrant a single reference in the alliance’s 2010 Strategic Concept. Yet, persistent lobbying by the Trump administration, and a partial convergence of views among European partners, helped to place China on the alliance’s agenda. In December 2019, NATO included a mention of the People’s Republic of China for the first time in an official communique. The allies wrote: “We recognise that China’s growing influence and international policies present both opportunities and challenges that we need to address together as an Alliance.” At that difficult time for the alliance, highlighted by French President Emmanuel Macron’s famous words about NATO being “brain dead,” allies agreed to address China for various reasons. Identifying a new common challenge undoubtedly helped to foster greater cohesion. The allies also feared (with good reason) that President Donald Trump might withdraw the United States from NATO. With this in mind, they wanted to show that they added value on Trump administration security priorities.

The December 2019 communique was just the first salvo, and in subsequent months, NATO increased its references to China, taking a more and more assertive and warning tone. Thus, in the aftermath of the 2021 NATO summit in Brussels, the first one held after the election of President Joe Biden, the communique warned: “China’s stated ambitions and assertive behaviour present systemic challenges to the rules-based international order and to areas relevant to Alliance security.”

Prior to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the alliance took a narrow approach, content to only address China’s role in Europe and not in other regions. As a result, there was little talk about creating a more expansive role for NATO in the Indo-Pacific. Still, China’s growing importance meant that NATO’s 2022 Strategic Concept paid far greater attention to it than the 2010 version, which had not mentioned China at all. Stoltenberg was already highlighting the need for the 2022 Strategic Concept to do more to address the China challenge in 2021. More attention to China in the 2022 document would have likely occurred had it not been for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s decision to expand the war against Ukraine a few months before the Strategic Concept was released.

Even so, the Strategic Concept framed the China challenge as one that could harm the alliance’s “interests, security, and values.” It also warned about Beijing’s disinformation capabilities, as well as its desire for control over technological sectors and critical infrastructure, and underlined the larger geopolitical challenge, especially the deepening Sino-Russian partnership and how it strove to both undermine the liberal international order and divide the Western alliance.

The Impact of the War

Prior to 2022, NATO’s China policy relied arguably on a few key assumptions: European allies agreed to put China on the NATO agenda for the sake of allied unity with the United States; the alliance would confine its focus to Europe, and not the Indo-Pacific; and NATO kept open the prospect of limited engagement with Beijing. This was as a nod to the European Union’s 2019 position of defining China as a “partner, economic competitor, and systemic rival.”

The war, however, has forced NATO member states to re-evaluate the assumptions underpinning its China policy. For instance, the fear of internal disunity has seemingly become far less salient in the context of the Russo-Ukrainian war, which has had a galvanizing impact on NATO’s cohesion.

Additionally, the NATO allies have had to confront some difficult questions, most notably better understanding the continued impact of closer Chinese-Russian relations. The 2022 Strategic Concept did not simply talk about the threats emanating from Beijing. It suggested that the alliance remain open to constructive engagement with China. But the past year has only confirmed the Chinese government’s very close alignment with the Russian government. Whatever reservations China may have about Russia’s policies and actions in Ukraine are dwarfed by the value of having a partner in confronting the Western-led international order.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping has a stake in ensuring that Putin’s folly doesn’t lead to a change of regime that has the potential to bring a new leader interested in rapprochement with the West. The past year has dampened hopes for any meaningful Chinese engagement. The question is to what extent can China be encouraged to play a constructive role in Ukraine, whether by urging Russia to avoid dangerous escalatory moves — particularly involving the use of nuclear weapons — or to push for serious peace talks.

Meanwhile, Stoltenberg’s earlier suggestion that NATO was not moving into the South China Sea is belied by actions over the past year. NATO has conducted a frequent and more sustained dialogue with key partners in the Indo-Pacific — especially Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and South Korea. As with the NATO Madrid summit in 2022, these countries are being invited to attend the Vilnius summit. NATO is debating whether to open a permanent office in Japan. There is no talk of integrating these partners into NATO’s military plans, but the war in Ukraine is certainly drawing the alliance further into Indo-Pacific. The growing realization of the region’s importance and NATO’s success in countering Russia is making it a more desirable partner for Japan and other countries taking stock of their ability to deter and defend against a rising China.

Perhaps most importantly, the Russia-Ukraine war has raised difficult questions about the connections between the European and Indo-Pacific theaters, and the implications for the alliance. Experts have argued that today’s interdependence between Europe and the Indo-Pacific is greater than it was during the Cold War, and that a challenge to the United States in Asia adversely affects NATO and European security. However, accepting that the European security theater and the Indo-Pacific theater are more interconnected means that NATO allies will need to set common priorities and make decisions about the best balance between the two theaters, in order to develop a robust and cohesive strategy toward China.

Notable, of course, is the Taiwan question. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the deepening Russian-Chinese partnership have led many experts and commentators to connect Ukraine and Taiwan, even if they disagree at times as to which of those two partners should be given greater attention or how these two countries are connected. Some experts suggest that the United States should prioritize Taiwan over Ukraine and limit support for the latter to focus on the former. Alternatively, supporting Ukraine has been framed by others as necessary so as not to embolden Chinese designs on Taiwan. This is especially true in the United States, whose commitment to Taiwan’s defense prior to February 2022 far exceeded its commitment to Ukraine.

The Taiwan issue, however, also has the potential to create huge differences across the Atlantic. On a visit to China earlier this year, Macron underlined his concerns about being dragged into a war over Taiwan. And Germany’s recently released National Security Strategy was conspicuous in the fact it did not mention Taiwan a single time.

These two examples are emblematic of broader intra-European divisions when it comes to tackling the alliance’s approach to China and Taiwan. Taiwan’s role as a critical exporter of semiconductors means that its security is critical for European stability, but this is balanced by the fear of the major economic backlash that could ensue with wide-ranging sanctions against China, were it to invade Taiwan. Indeed, a recent report predicted that large-scale sanctions against China could lead to a $3 trillion disruption in world trade. And added to this, geographical distance cannot be ignored. As Philippe Le Corre stated, “the remoteness […] does not favor a possible European involvement in a conflict in Taiwan or in the China Sea.”

Article Five of the Washington Treaty establishing NATO geographically limits alliance obligations to come to one another’s defense in response to attacks on members “in Europe or North America.” A Chinese attack on U.S. forces in the Pacific would not qualify, and so the United States shouldn’t expect a large European defense contribution in the event of a Chinese attack against Taiwan. It would, however, expect significant political and economic support in countering Beijing in such a contingency. In light of the hesitations underlined above, NATO should have serious discussions about the European response in the event of a Chinese attack, and about what those political and economic actions would be in order to ensure cohesion during such a scenario.

That conversation is also particularly necessary because of the current state of public opinion in Europe. Indeed, a recent poll by the European Council on Foreign Relations revealed some nuanced and complex findings. Whereas the needle has clearly moved against Russia, Europeans remain more open to engagement with China.. The European public is generally more supportive of a neutral stance in case of a Chinese attack against Taiwan but would also endorse economic sanctions against Beijing if it provided weapons for Russia to use in Ukraine. And America’s allies in Europe have to consider their nightmare scenario: A majority clearly believe that a return to the American presidency by Trump would weaken the trans-Atlantic partnership.

The Russo-Ukrainian war has dramatically illustrated Europe’s dependency on the United States for its defense, heightening European fears of another wild oscillation in U.S. foreign policy after the next election. It’s not just support for Ukraine that is at stake for NATO in November 2024, but the alliance itself, and a big piece of that is whether there will be trans-Atlantic unity on how to deal with the challenges emanating from the Indo-Pacific. Having conversations at NATO now about how the alliance would react in the event of a Chinese attack on Taiwan would help to ensure a more unified response if Beijing takes such action in the future.

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Garret Martin is a senior professorial lecturer at American University’s School of International Service, as well as the co-director of the Transatlantic Policy Center.

James Goldgeier is a visiting scholar at Stanford University’s Center for International Security and Cooperation, a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution, and a professor of international relations at American University.

Image: The White House

Commentary

warontherocks.com · by Garret Martin · July 7, 2023

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Vice President, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Phone: 202-573-8647

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com