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1. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, OCTOBER 19 (Putin's War)

2. Ukraine: CDS Daily brief (19.10.22) CDS comments on key events

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13. Biden’s Tech-War Goes Nuclear – OpEd

14. Opinion | It’s time to stop calling Xi Jinping the ‘president’ of China

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17. Bombing to Lose

1. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, OCTOBER 19 (Putin's War)

Maps/graphics: https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-october-19

Key Takeaways

Russian authorities are likely setting information conditions to justify planned Russian retreats and the loss of significant territory in Kherson Oblast.
Russian forces are setting information conditions to conduct a false-flag attack on the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant (HPP); the Russian military may believe that breaching the dam could cover their retreat from the right bank of the Dnipro River and prevent or delay Ukrainian advances across the river.
Russia continues to use the guise of civilian “evacuations” as a cover for the mass forced removal of civilians from Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s October 19 declaration of martial law readiness is largely legal theater meant to legitimize activities the Russian military needs to undertake or is already undertaking while creating a framework for future mobilization and domestic restrictions.
Wagner financier Yevgeny Prigozhin is continuing efforts to set himself and Wagner Group forces apart from conventional Russian military elements.
Russian forces continued to conduct limited assaults to recapture lost territory in northeastern Kharkiv Oblast.
Russian and Ukrainian forces reportedly continued to conduct assaults in the Kreminna-Svatove area.
Russian sources widely claimed that Ukrainian troops conducted another offensive push in northwestern Kherson Oblast.
Russian President Vladimir Putin passed a decree on October 19 seeking to address Russian military personnels’ ongoing concerns about timely payments and setting the blame on Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu and Finance Minister Anton Siluanov for future payment issues.
The Russian parliament proposed legal measures that would allow Russian authorities to minimize the domestic impacts of partial mobilization in potential future mobilization waves.
Russian military officials continued to forcibly mobilize Ukrainian residents of Russian-occupied territories to labor or fight on behalf of the Russian military.

RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, OCTOBER 19

Oct 19, 2022 - Press ISW

understandingwar.org

Katherine Lawlor, Karolina Hird, Grace Mappes, Riley Bailey, George Barros, and Frederick W. Kagan

October 19, 8:00 pm 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.

Russian authorities are likely setting information conditions to justify planned Russian retreats and significant territorial losses in Kherson Oblast. Commander of Russian Armed Forces in Ukraine Army General Sergey Surovikin reported during an appearance on Russian television that the Russian military leadership has to make “difficult decisions” regarding Kherson Oblast and accused Ukraine of planning to strike civilian and residential infrastructure in Kherson Oblast.[1] Kherson Occupation Head Vladimir Saldo relatedly noted that his administration is evacuating the west bank of the Dnipro River in anticipation of a “large-scale” Ukrainian offensive.[2] Surovikin‘s and Saldo’s statements are likely attempts to set information conditions for a full Russian retreat across the Dnipro River, which would cede Kherson City and other significant territory in Kherson Oblast to advancing Ukrainian troops. Russian military leaders have evidently learned from previous informational and operational failures during the recent Ukrainian counteroffensive in Kharkiv Oblast and are therefore likely attempting to mitigate the informational and operational consequences of failing to defend against another successful Ukrainian advance.

Russian forces are also setting information conditions to conduct a false-flag attack on the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant (HPP). The Russian military may believe that breaching the dam could cover their retreat from the right bank of the Dnipro River and prevent or delay Ukrainian advances across the river. Surovikin claimed on October 18 that he has received information that Kyiv intends to strike the dam at the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant (HPP), which he alleged would cause destructive flooding in Kherson Oblast.[3] Saldo echoed this claim and warned that Ukrainian forces intend to strike dams upstream of Kherson City.[4] Russian authorities likely intend these warnings about a purported Ukrainian strike on the Kakhovka HPP to set information conditions for Russian forces to damage the dam and blame Ukraine for the subsequent damage and loss of life, all while using the resulting floods to cover their own retreat further south into Kherson Oblast. The Kremlin could attempt to leverage such a false-flag attack to overshadow the news of a third humiliating retreat for Russian forces, this time from western Kherson. Such an attack would also further the false Russian information operation portraying Ukraine as a terrorist state that deliberately targets civilians.

Russia continues to use the guise of civilian “evacuations” as a cover for the mass forced removal of civilians from Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine. Saldo’s announcement of a mass withdrawal from the west bank of the Dnipro River is likely intended in part to evacuate Russian occupation officials, collaborators, and other occupation organs in anticipation of imminent Ukrainian advances, but Russian officials are likely also using the façade of humanitarian necessity to deport large populations of Ukrainians to Russia, as ISW has previously reported. Russia does not appear to reap any economic benefits from resettling tens of thousands of unwilling Ukrainians in Russia, suggesting that the purpose of such removals is both to damage Ukraine’s long-term economic recovery as it retakes its territory and, more importantly, to support Russia’s ethnic cleansing campaign, which is attempting to eradicate the Ukrainian ethnicity and culture.[5] The Russians may also intend to press “evacuated” Ukrainians into their armed forces, offsetting the losses and failures of the partial mobilization.

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s October 19 declaration of martial law readiness is largely legal theater meant to legitimize activities the Russian military needs to undertake or is already undertaking while creating a framework for future mobilization and domestic restrictions.[6] Putin declared varying levels of “martial law readiness” across Russia and in Russian-occupied Ukrainian territories. These declarations outline four levels of readiness, ranging from “maximum” (full-scale martial law in Russian-occupied Kherson, Zaporizhia, Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts) to “basic” (across all of Russia).[7]

Putin did not formally declare martial law outside of Kherson, Zaporizhia, Donetsk, and Luhansk oblasts, but instead directed areas outside Ukraine to build out the legal framework necessary to support Russian mobilization.[8] Putin’s speech framed the declaration of martial law in four Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine as a continuation of the wartime status quo, adjusted to Russian legal frameworks after Russia’s illegal annexation of those territories.[9] Putin’s decree did not spell out immediate next steps under martial law or elevated readiness levels but granted sweeping emergency powers to regional governors and gave local authorities until October 22 to develop and submit specific proposals for those next steps. Additional information will become apparent as regional governors and law enforcement submit and implement those proposals, which will likely be directed at least in part by the Kremlin but laundered through local authorities. Putin also left himself a path to expand his declarations of martial law, noting that “If necessary, in the Russian Federation during the period of martial law, other measures provided for by the [federal law covering martial law] may be applied.”[10] That language leaves open the door for future declarations and expansions of government authorities.

Putin’s decrees identified several sectors in which the Russian state will be exerting increasing control:

In areas of maximum and medium readiness, the decree calls for unspecified “mobilization measures in the economic sphere,” likely to provide economic and industrial support to Putin’s so-called “partial” mobilization of at least 300,000 Russian men.
In all areas, the decree makes provisions for government control of transportation and communications infrastructure as well as increased security around government buildings and other critical infrastructure.
In areas of maximum application of martial law (Russian-occupied Kherson, Zaporizhia, Donetsk, and Luhansk), the decree calls for the establishment of “territorial defense” headquarters with unspecified roles.
In areas of medium and elevated readiness, the decree enables regional leaders to take measures for territorial defense and civil defense.
In areas of medium readiness, the decree enables governments to forcibly “temporarily resettle” civilians.
The decree also includes vague language for each category, authorizing local authorities to “implement measures to meet the needs of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, other troops, military formations, bodies and needs of the population.” Such language could be used to legalize almost any government action.
In areas of elevated, medium, and maximum readiness, the decree allows for restricting movements of people and vehicles. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Yevgeny Ivanov claimed on October 19 that the government does not currently intend to restrict movement out of the country.[11] However, Putin’s decree would likely provide legal cover for the implementation of such restrictions without passing additional decrees.

These moves closer to full-scale martial law are unsurprising but disordered—a competent modern military should implement economic mobilization, secure lines of transportation, and coordinate territorial defense before or as initial mobilization for war begins, not as follow-on reserve mobilization nears its completion (Putin announced on October 14 that his “partial” mobilization would end by early November).[12] These moves are likely necessary to fulfill basic military requirements, such as feeding, housing, equipping, and transporting mobilized and conscripted troops to the front lines; forcing defense contractors or other private businesses to align with government production requirements; and more easily controlling both the Russian population and the Ukrainian civilian populations in Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine.

Putin has slow-rolled his introduction of legal concepts and frameworks like military and economic mobilization, annexation, and martial law to the Russian population since September, attempting to normalize these concepts and limit domestic dissent. Putin likely understands that these measures are unpopular but may be counting on an upswell of fatalistic patriotism as more Russian families and businesses become tied to, and implicated in, the war in Ukraine. By gradually introducing additional measures, he likely also intends to work out likely unsolvable bureaucratic flaws in the Russian system, creating a more competent bureaucracy to implement the autumn conscription cycle (beginning November 1) as well as likely future waves of mobilization.

Putin also may be setting conditions for a less orthodox kind of under-the-radar mobilization: the creation of Ukrainian-style Territorial Defense Forces. Putin ordered local authorities to create a “territorial defense headquarters” in the four occupied Ukrainian oblasts and empowered local governors to undertake unspecified “territorial defense activities” in medium and elevated readiness areas (largely territories that border or are near Ukraine). This preparation likely serves at least two purposes: creating a legal framework for the forcible mobilization of Ukrainian civilians in Russian-occupied territories, as ISW has forecasted, and at least experimenting with a new kind of Russian military force.[13] Ukraine’s Territorial Defense Forces played a critical role in the defense of Kyiv and the recapture of other key Ukrainian cities. Ukraine’s Territorial Defense Forces are composed of a core of veterans and part-time reservists, largely officers, but can be built out by civilian volunteers in wartime who are then led by the officer corps.

Wagner financier Yevgeny Prigozhin may also be driving Putin toward unconventional methods of continuing the war. Prigozhin announced on October 19 that he sent senior Wagner commander Andrey Bogatov to Belgorod Oblast within the last two weeks to “create a people’s militia.” Prigozhin claimed that Wagner instructors will teach this “people’s militia” to “defend the borders of the oblast.”[14] The term he used for “people’s militia” (narodnoe opolcheniye) has a long history in the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union but is essentially an irregular and untrained force that fights behind the frontlines or beside a conventional army. Prigozhin may be attempting to draw upon the historical notion of a people’s militia fighting a great patriotic war to reinvigorate Russian enthusiasm for the invasion of Ukraine, a notion that may appeal to the historically-minded Putin. However, Prigozhin’s proposed Belgorod People’s Militia is not apparently similar to the more structured Territorial Defense Forces and uses different language, suggesting at least rhetorical tension between the Kremlin’s and Prigozhin’s visions.

Prigozhin is also continuing efforts to set himself and Wagner Group forces apart from conventional Russian military elements. The Russian outlet RIA claimed that Wagner engineering units are actively building a fortified “Wagner Line” that runs adjacent to territories in Luhansk and Donetsk Oblasts.[15] Prigozhin reportedly stated that the construction of the “Wagner Line” is meant to protect other elements of the Russian Armed Forces while Wagner units capture more territory in Donetsk Oblast.[16] Prigozhin’s statements indicate that he is likely continuing to promote Wagner units as superior to conventional Russian Armed Forces in a bid to increase his influence among Kremlin officials. Russian outlet RIA published a supposed map of the “Wagner line” that suggests that Prigozhin and Wagner forces may expect the Russian military to lose considerable territory in Luhansk Oblast, putting Prigozhin’s publicity of the line at odds with the specious Kremlin narrative that Russia will hold all of Luhansk Oblast.[17]

Key Takeaways

Russian authorities are likely setting information conditions to justify planned Russian retreats and the loss of significant territory in Kherson Oblast.
Russian forces are setting information conditions to conduct a false-flag attack on the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant (HPP); the Russian military may believe that breaching the dam could cover their retreat from the right bank of the Dnipro River and prevent or delay Ukrainian advances across the river.
Russia continues to use the guise of civilian “evacuations” as a cover for the mass forced removal of civilians from Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s October 19 declaration of martial law readiness is largely legal theater meant to legitimize activities the Russian military needs to undertake or is already undertaking while creating a framework for future mobilization and domestic restrictions.
Wagner financier Yevgeny Prigozhin is continuing efforts to set himself and Wagner Group forces apart from conventional Russian military elements.
Russian forces continued to conduct limited assaults to recapture lost territory in northeastern Kharkiv Oblast.
Russian and Ukrainian forces reportedly continued to conduct assaults in the Kreminna-Svatove area.
Russian sources widely claimed that Ukrainian troops conducted another offensive push in northwestern Kherson Oblast.
Russian President Vladimir Putin passed a decree on October 19 seeking to address Russian military personnels’ ongoing concerns about timely payments and setting the blame on Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu and Finance Minister Anton Siluanov for future payment issues.
The Russian parliament proposed legal measures that would allow Russian authorities to minimize the domestic impacts of partial mobilization in potential future mobilization waves.
Russian military officials continued to forcibly mobilize Ukrainian residents of Russian-occupied territories to labor or fight on behalf of the Russian military.

We do not report in detail on Russian war crimes because those 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 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.

Ukrainian Counteroffensives—Southern and Eastern Ukraine
Russian Main Effort—Eastern Ukraine (comprised of one subordinate and two supporting efforts);
Russian Subordinate Main Effort—Capture the entirety of Donetsk Oblast
Russian Supporting Effort—Southern Axis
Russian Mobilization and Force Generation Efforts
Activities in Russian-occupied Areas

Ukrainian Counteroffensives (Ukrainian efforts to liberate Russian-occupied territories)

Eastern Ukraine: (Oskil River-Kreminna Line)

Russian forces continued to conduct limited assaults to recapture lost territory in northeastern Kharkiv Oblast on October 19. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces repelled Russian assaults north of Kupyansk near Dvorichna (17km northeast of Kupyansk) in Kharkiv Oblast.[18] Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) Deputy Internal Minister Vitaly Kiselyov reiterated claims that Russian forces captured Horobivka (17km northeast of Kupyansk) on October 18, although ISW cannot independently verify that Russian forces have captured the settlement.[19] The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) claimed that Russian forces struck Ukrainian control points and concentrations of manpower and equipment throughout Kharkiv Oblast.[20] Kharkiv Oblast Head Oleh Synehubov reported that Russian forces also struck civilian populations in Chuhuiv, Kharkiv, and Kupyansk raions with missiles on October 19.[21] Ukrainian sources reported that Russian forces continued to conduct routine indirect fire along the Oskil River-Kreminna Line.[22]

Russian and Ukrainian forces reportedly continued fighting along the Kreminna-Svatove line on October 19. A Russian source claimed that Russian forces repelled a Ukrainian assault on the Kyslivka-Kotaliarivka line in the direction of Svatove.[23] The Russian MoD claimed that Russian forces repelled Ukrainian formations that attempted to cross the Zherebets River in the vicinity of Stelmakhivka (16km northwest of Svatove), Andriivka (15km west of Svatove), and Raihorodok (11km west of Svatove) in Luhansk Oblast.[24] The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces repelled a Russian ground assault near Bilohorivka (12km south of Kreminna).[25] A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian and Ukrainian forces are continuing to fight west of Kreminna in the vicinity of Terny (18km northwest of Kreminna) and Torske (16km west of Kreminna), although ISW cannot independently verify his claims.[26]

Southern Ukraine: (Kherson Oblast)

Russian sources widely claimed that Ukrainian troops conducted another general counteroffensive in northwestern Kherson Oblast on October 19. Russian-appointed Kherson occupation deputy Kirill Stremousov claimed that Ukrainian troops went on the offensive around noon on October 19 and attacked from Nova Kamianka (northern Kherson Oblast, about 30km south of the Kherson-Dnipropetrovsk Oblast border) toward Beryslav.[27] Other Russian sources similarly claimed that Ukrainian troops launched an offensive south of the Nova Kamianka-Dudchany area and attacked toward Sukhanove and Piatykhatky, both near the current frontline in northwestern Kherson Oblast and about 35km north of Beryslav.[28] ISW is unable to verify these claims. Russian milbloggers reported that elements of the 126th Coastal Defense Brigade, 11th, 80th, and 83rd Air Assault Brigades, and 76th Guards Air Assault Division are holding the line of defense in this area and prevented significant Ukrainian advances.[29] ISW has previously reported that these elements, especially the 126th Coastal Defense Brigade, are severely degraded and understrength, and some have likely been active in Kherson Oblast without rest or rotation for most of the war.[30]

Ukrainian military officials maintained operational silence regarding specific Ukrainian ground maneuvers in Kherson Oblast on October 19. Ukraine’s Southern Operational Command noted that Ukrainian forces are continuing “active combat operations” and focusing on “creating favorable conditions for the development of further offensives.”[31] Ukrainian forces additionally continued their interdiction campaign against Russian concentration areas in Kherson Oblast as part of the ongoing counteroffensive. Ukraine’s Southern Operational Command and other Ukrainian military sources reported that Ukrainian strikes destroyed three ammunition warehouses around Beryslav, Nova Kakhkovka, and Kherson City on October 18.[32] Ukrainian strikes likely also hit a Russian ferry crossing near Kozatske, 3km north of Nova Kakhovka on the opposing bank of the Dnipro River.[33] Satellite imagery from October 18 shows that Russian troops have completed the creation of a barge bridge near Kherson City as part of an effort to reconstitute river crossings as Ukrainian troops continue to target Russian transportation capabilities across the Dnipro River.[34]

Russian Main Effort—Eastern Ukraine

Russian Subordinate Main Effort—Donetsk Oblast (Russian objective: Capture the entirety of Donetsk Oblast, the claimed territory of Russia’s proxies in Donbas)

Russian forces continued ground attacks in Donetsk Oblast on October 19. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces repelled Russian ground attacks south of Bakhmut near Mayorsk, Odradivka, Optyne, and Niu York.[35] Russian sources claimed that fighting is ongoing in Optyne and on Bakhmut’s eastern outskirts.[36] Russian sources also claimed that fighting is ongoing in Soledar’s industrial zone and near Spirne, 18km northeast of Soledar.[37] The Ukrainian General Staff also reported that Ukrainian forces repelled Russian ground attacks northeast of Avdiivka near Novokalynove, west of Donetsk City near Marinka and Nevelske, and in western Donetsk Oblast near Novomykhailivka.[38] A Russian source claimed that Russian forces are continuing to fight southwest of Avdiivka around Pervomaiske.[39] A Russian source also claimed that Russian forces attacked fortified Ukrainian positions in Marinka, and geolocated footage confirmed that Russian forces have advanced further down the C051101 north of Marinka.[40] A Russian source claimed that positional battles are ongoing in the Vuhledar area in western Donetsk Oblast, and a different Russian source expressed continued concern that Ukrainian forces may launch a counteroffensive in the Vuhledar area.[41]

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

Russian forces continued routine artillery, air, and missile strikes west of Hulyaipole and in Mykolaiv and Dnipropetrovsk Oblasts on October 19. Ukrainian sources reported that Russian forces struck Zaporizhzhia City, Hulyaipole, Bereznehuvate Hromada, and Kryvyi Rih, with missile and drone strikes.[42] Ukrainian forces also reported that Russian forces struck Vasylivka, Zaporizhia Oblast, (the only checkpoint from unoccupied to occupied southern Ukraine), Orikhiv, Marhanets and Chervonohryhorivka.[43] Ukrainian sources reported that Ukrainian forces shot down 13 Shahed-136 drones in Mykolaiv Oblast overnight.[44] The Russian Ministry of Defense claimed that Russian forces destroyed a Ukrainian S-300 air defense system near Novoielyzavetivka, roughly 70km northwest of Odesa City.[45] Sevastopol Occupation Governor Mikhail Razvozhaev claimed that Russian air defenses shot down a Ukrainian drone near Belbek Airfield, and footage posted on October 19 shows a destroyed drone in a field.[46] Russian sources expressed continued concern that Ukrainian forces may launch a counteroffensive along the Hulyaipole-Orikhiv front line.[47]

Russian occupation officials again accused Ukrainian forces of shelling Enerhodar and attempting to seize the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) on October 19. Zaporizhia Oblast occupation official Vladimir Rogov and other Russian sources claimed that Ukrainian forces shelled the Enerhodar City administration building and Luch power station before attempting to land 30 boats full of personnel near the ZNPP.[48] These Russian claims remain unsubstantiated. Footage dated October 19 shows explosions at the Enerhodar city administration building and subsequent images confirm extensive damage to the building.[49]

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

Russian President Vladimir Putin passed a decree on October 19 seeking to address Russian military personnels’ ongoing concerns about timely payments.[50] The decree stipulates that personnel of the Russian Armed Forces are guaranteed to receive at least 195,000 rubles per calendar month in a timely manner. The decree charges the Russian MoD and the Ministry of Finance with ensuring that Russian military personnel including all newly mobilized servicemembers receive timely payments. ISW previously reported that Kremlin officials indirectly acknowledged problems with financing Putin’s partial mobilization order and that there have been consistent reports from different regions in Russia about newly mobilized personnel not receiving payments on time or at all.[51] The Ukrainian General Staff reported on October 19 that Russian officials are also experiencing significant problems with paying military personnel participating in combat in Ukraine.[52] The Ukrainian General Staff also reported that some relatives of Russian soldiers killed in action have not received promised compensation.[53] Putin likely signed the decree to prevent further social tensions from forming as a result of payment concerns. Putin also likely placed the responsibility for timely payments partially on Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu (whom Putin named in his decree) so that Shoigu would bear the brunt of public criticism if the issue of timely payments persists.

Russian officials noted that Russia has not completed partial mobilization as of October 19. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov stated on October 19 that Putin has not yet decided to issue a statement concerning the completion of partial mobilization.[54] Peskov also claimed that some oblasts have completed their mobilization plans and that Russian authorities would not mobilize more than their initial 300,000 personnel goal.[55] A Russian government portal explained that Russian authorities can still summon a person for mobilization even after the head of the oblast announces the completion of mobilization because only President Vladimir Putin can complete the process of partial mobilization.[56] A Russian source posted a picture of a public request for Moscow residents to contact military recruitment offices on October 19 despite Moscow Oblast officials and the Russian MoD stating that mobilization ended in Moscow Oblast on October 17.[57] Latvia-based Russian-language outlet Meduza reported that Moscow Oblast officials announced the completion of mobilization efforts because domestic sentiment surrounding partial mobilization had greatly deteriorated.[58] Russian officials are likely to announce the completion of mobilization efforts to appease public opinion while still mobilizing at least some personnel under Putin’s partial mobilization orders prior to Putin’s declaration that will formally end mobilization (for now). Russian authorities likely need to end large-scale mobilization efforts by early November to free up bureaucratic capacity for the autumn conscription cycle, which begins November 1.

The Russian parliament proposed legal measures that would allow Russian authorities to minimize the domestic impacts of partial mobilization in potential future mobilization waves. The State Duma held closed door sessions on the passage of 11 bills concerning mobilization efforts on October 19.[59] The bills included measures that address deferrals for general and partial mobilization, deferrals for parents and guardians of large families, time allowed for mobilized businessmen to resolve organizational issues, mobilization exemptions for citizens if they had a close mobilized relative die as a result of military service, amnesty for mobilized citizens who have traffic violations, removal of certain criminal records as aggravating circumstances for military service for law enforcement officers, and the right to alternative civilian service instead of military service during a period of mobilization.[60] The State Duma likely introduced the bills to minimize the domestic criticism that arose during mobilization efforts while also preparing clearer guidelines for future mobilization efforts. The bills are unlikely to prevent Russian authorities from continuing to mobilize a wide section of the Russian public during the current period of partial mobilization.

Russian military officials continued to forcibly mobilize Ukrainian residents of Russian-occupied territories to labor or fight on behalf of the Russian military. The Ukrainian General Staff reported on October 19 that Russian forces continue the forced mobilization of residents in Russian-occupied Kherson Oblast and to instruct forcibly mobilized residents to construct fortifications around Kherson City.[61] The Ukrainian General Staff reported that many of the forcibly mobilized residents had violated curfews or are individuals that the Kherson occupation administration perceives to be disloyal.[62] Russian forces will likely continue to forcibly mobilize residents in Russian-occupied territories in Ukraine as Ukrainian counteroffensives progress.

Russian military officials continue to insufficiently prepare and equip mobilized personnel for combat. A Russian source reported on October 14 that mobilized personnel from Bataysk, Rostov Oblast that had only received two or three days of training before their deployment died soon after arriving in Ukraine.[63] The Russian source also reported that the mobilized men from Bataysk did not have adequate weapons.[64] Mobilized men of the 15th Motorized Rifle Regiment of the 1st Guards Tank Army who served in Lyman before Ukrainian forces liberated the settlement appealed on October 8 for better training and equipment.[65] The mobilized men of the 15th Motorized Rifle regiment also stated that they had to buy their own ammunition.[66] Russian military officials will likely continue to prioritize filling depleted units with mobilized personnel over providing proper training and equipment for newly mobilized servicemen.

A Russian source claimed that Russian women are increasingly volunteering for military service.[67] The Russian source stated that Russian military officials were only allowing women to volunteer as medical workers, clerks, or law enforcement officers.[68] Russian officials may be pursuing the reported increased recruitment of Russian women to mimic Ukrainian force generation efforts that have more widely opened military service to Ukrainian women since 2014 and have dramatically increased Ukrainian military numbers and capabilities.

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

See topline text.

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.

[6] http://kremlin dot ru/events/president/news/69632

[7] http://kremlin dot ru/events/president/news/69632; https://t.me/readovkanews/44806

[8] http://kremlin dot ru/events/president/news/69631

[9] https://www.interfax dot ru/russia/868562

[10] http://kremlin dot ru/events/president/news/69631

[11] https://tass dot ru/politika/16097817

[12] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign... https://tass dot ru/politika/16061415

[14] https://t.me/Prigozhin_hat/1849; https://www.kommersant dot ru/doc/5621245

[48] https://t.me/vrogov/5662; https://ria dot ru/20221019/energodar-1825025761.html; https://t.me/vrogov/5657; https://t.me/voenkorKotenok/41826; https://t.me/voenkorKotenok/41864; ... https://t.me/mod_russia/20986

[50] http://www.kremlin dot ru/acts/assignments/orders/69634

[54]https://tass dot ru/politika/16084605

[55] https://tass dot ru/politika/16084605

[59] https://republic(dot)ru/posts/105721 ; https://t.me/pchikov/5213

[60] https://notes.citeam.org/mobilization-oct-17-18 ; https://t.me/pchikov/5213 ; DNGTS: https://republic(dot)ru/posts/105721

understandingwar.org

2. Ukraine: CDS Daily brief (19.10.22) CDS comments on key events

CDS Daily brief (19.10.22) CDS comments on key events

Humanitarian aspect:

As of the morning of October 19, 2022, more than 1,243 Ukrainian children are victims of full- scale armed aggression by the Russian Federation, Prosecutor General's Office reports. The official number of children who died and were wounded during the Russian aggression is 428, and more than 815 children, respectively. However, the data is not conclusive since data collection continues in the areas of active hostilities, temporarily occupied areas, and liberated territories.

Human Rights Watch interviewed over 100 [Ukranian] victims that were brutally tortured, including being beaten with electric currents or hands, gun butts, metal pipes, rubber hoses and other objects. Survivors identified at least seven locations in Izyum, including two schools, where they said soldiers detained and abused people. All interviewees, the Russian invaders detained, said that the Russians stole things from them, including money, jewelry, electronics, and cars. "Our findings indicate that Russian forces have committed horrific abuses in many of the areas they have occupied, and there are real concerns about similar abuses in other areas they continue to control," said Belkis Wille, senior crisis and conflict researcher at Human Rights Watch, UkrInform reports. He also added that the brutal violence and ill-treatment of the detained residents of Izyum by the Russian military "were not random incidents." "Several victims shared with us credible accounts of similar experiences of torture during interrogations at facilities controlled by Russian forces and their subordinates, indicating that such treatment was part of policy and plan," he said.

Russian forces again attacked Ukrainian civilians and critical infrastructure during the night and the day of October 19.

In Donetsk Oblast, Russians shelled Avdiivka, Maryinka, Katerynivka, Soledarsk, Chasovoyarsk and Toretsk communities. A high-rise building and 3 private houses were damaged in Paraskoviivka.

At night, the enemy attacked a critical infrastructure facility in one of the villages of Zaporizhzhia Oblast with S-300 missiles. The Russians were shelling Orihiv for more than 7 hours; 8 wounded civilians were reported. The deputy mayor of Orihiv, Svitlana Mandrych, said that the humanitarian headquarters stopped its work. "There is no electricity, water, or communication. Everything is broken," she wrote. According to Mandrych, utility companies are unable to perform their work. Private houses, the city council building, and a school were damaged.

On the night of October 18-19, the occupiers opened fire from barrel artillery on the Seredyno- Budsk community in Sumy Oblast; 12 impacts were reported.

Ukrainian air defense forces shot down two missiles in the sky over Chernihiv Oblast, Operational Command "North" reported. As a result of strikes by Iranian drones on Chernihiv, three people were injured, 2 of them are in intensive care.

Russians attempted to strike Ukraine's capital, Kyiv, with missiles and drones. The air strike alarm lasted for 3 hours and 31 minutes. Air defense shot down all Russian missiles over Kyiv; no damage has been recorded.

The Russian missile hit the energy infrastructure object in the Vinnytsia Oblast, Vinnytsia military administration reported.

Russian occupiers hit the Burshtynsk TPP in the Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast (west of Ukraine). There were no victims, but a fire broke out, the head of the Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast Military Administration, Svitlana Onyshchuk, reported.

Russian troops fired at ambulances in the de-occupied Dvorichansk community in Kharkiv Oblast. The Center for Emergency Medical Aid and Disaster Medicine of the Kharkiv Regional Council reported that the State Emergency Service employees were injured during the shelling.

99% of the population was evacuated from Maryinka and Novomykhailivka in the Donetsk Oblast, reported the press service of the National Police.

In Zhytomyr, due to the Russian shelling of an energy facility, large enterprises cannot operate, and electric transport does not run, Mayor Serhiy Sukhomlyn announced at a meeting of the executive committee of the Zhytomyr City Council.

The Ukrainian government announced that on October 20, electricity supply would be limited throughout Ukraine. "From 7:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. it is necessary to minimize electricity use. This applies to residents of all regions of the country. If this is not done, you should prepare for temporary shutdowns," Kyrylo Tymoshenko, the Deputy Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine, announced. Street lighting will be limited in cities. Outages will be alternating - oblast energy companies would determine the duration of the blackouts to no more than 4 hours.

Occupied territories:

Russia-installed head of the Kherson Administration, Volodymyr Saldo, announced that entry for civilians to the Kherson Oblast is closed for 7 days. All "institutions" and "ministries" of the occupational administration are moving to the left bank of the Dnieper. Kherson collaborators are going to deport 50-60 thousand people.

The legally-elected Ukrainian head of the Kherson Oblast Military administration asks the residents of the temporarily occupied region to ignore the calls of the Russian invaders for the so-called evacuation, "Ignore everything that the occupiers tell you or demand from you." Yaroslav Yanushevich noted that the invaders and collaborators want to take people hostage and use them as a "human shield". He stressed that the Armed Forces of Ukraine do not destroy

Ukrainian cities and villages. Our army hits only the enemy army, its equipment, command posts, warehouses and logistics.

Petro Kotin, president of Energoatom NAEC, said that about 50 Zaporizhzhia NPP employees are currently in Russian captivity. In a comment to AFP, Kotin noted that since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation, the Russians had detained about 150 employees of Zaporizhzhia NPP. "Some of them were later released, but there are also those whose fate is still unknown," he said.

In Mariupol, temporarily occupied by the Russian military, the invaders dismantled the monument to the Victims of the Holodomor, Petro Andryushchenko, adviser to the mayor of Mariupol, reported on Telegram. The monument was erected in 2004 in the city center. It is symbolic that it was located opposite the drama theater, which became a symbol of the Russian war crimes in Mariupol. Ukraine's Minister of Culture and Information Policy, Oleksandr Tkachenko, reacted to the dismantling of the monument to the victims of the Holodomor as an indication of the legal succession of the current Kremlin regime for [Soviet] crimes against the Ukrainian people. The minister reminded that next month, Ukraine will observe the Memorial Day of the victims of the Holodomor of 1932‒1933 - the genocide of the Ukrainian people, carried out by the Soviet leadership through the organization of artificial mass famine.

The Russians shelled Energodar (occupied by the Russians satellite city of the Zaporizhzhya NPP); the electricity and water supply was disrupted.

"Martial law" [announced by Putin] creates an excuse to export Ukrainian cultural heritage to the Russian Federation. First Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Emine Dzhaparova calls on UNESCO and partners to condemn the so-called "martial law" declared by Putin in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine, which endangers cultural heritage and creates a reason for the removal of objects. The first deputy minister also noted that Russia grossly violates international agreements as a state party to the Hague Convention on the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of an Armed Conflict of 1954 and the First Protocol to the Convention.

Operational situation

(please note that this part of the report is mainly on the previous day's (October 18) developments)

It is the 238th day of the strategic air-ground offensive operation of the Russian Armed Forces against Ukraine (in the official terminology of the Russian Federation – "operation to defend Donbas"). The enemy tries to maintain control over the temporarily captured territories. It concentrates on disrupting the actions of the Ukrainian Defense Forces, and continues offensive attempts in the Bakhmut and Avdiivka directions.

During the past day, units of the Defense Forces of Ukraine repelled the enemy attacks in the Ohirtseve and Dvorichna of the Kharkiv Oblast; Bilohorivka in Luhansk Oblast; Novokalynove,

Mayorsk, Odradivka, New York, Novomykhailivka, Nevelske, Opytne and Maryinka of the Donetsk Oblast.

The enemy is shelling the positions of Ukrainian troops along the contact line. The Russian troops are fortifying their defensive positions and lines in some directions and conducting aerial reconnaissance. Violating the norms of international humanitarian law, the laws and customs of war, it continues to strike critical infrastructure.

During the past day, the enemy launched 10 missile and 18 air strikes and carried out more than 76 attacks from rocket systems.

Areas of more than 10 Ukrainian towns and villages, including Kyiv, Zhytomyr, Kharkiv, Dnipro, Kryvyi Rih, Zaporizhzhia, Kurakhove of the Donetsk Oblast, Trykhaty of the Mykolaiv Oblast, and Mykolaiv, were hit by the enemy. For this, the enemy used cruise, aviation and anti-aircraft guided missiles. In addition, the invaders used 14 "Shahed-136" UAVs, and the Ukraine Defense Forces shot down 10 of them. In the border areas, Gai in Chernihiv Oblast, Yunakivka, Khotyn, Tovstodubove, Demchenkove in Sumy Oblast, Vovchanski Khutory, Volohivka, Gatyshche, Krasne, Ohirtseve, Starytsia, Strilecha and Khatne in Kharkiv Oblast were shelled with mortars and barrel artillery.

The Republic of Belarus continues to support the armed aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine; the threat of missile and air strikes and the launch of the "Shahed-136" attack UAV from its territory remains.

The enemy continues to destroy Ukrainian cultural heritage in the temporarily occupied territories, loot museums, and burn Ukrainian literature and textbooks printed in Ukrainian.

The aviation of Defense Forces of Ukraine carried out 24 strikes during the previous day. The impact on 16 areas of concentration of enemy weapons and military equipment, a stronghold point, and 8 positions of the enemy's anti-aircraft missile systems was confirmed. In addition, Ukrainian air defense units shot down 5 cruise missiles and a Su-25 aircraft.

Ukraine's missile troops and artillery struck four enemy command and control points, 5 areas of concentration of manpower, weapons and military equipment, 2 air defense and one artillery objects, 2 ammunition warehouses, an electronic warfare station, and other enemy military targets.

The morale and psychological state of the personnel of the invasion forces remain low. According to the available information, there are significant problems in the Russian Federation with payments to military personnel who participate in hostilities on the territory of Ukraine. Payments of monetary allowances are being delayed. Relatives of the KIA cannot receive the promised compensation.

Kharkiv direction

• Zolochiv-Balakleya section: approximate length of combat line - 147 km, number of BTGs of the RF Armed Forces - 10-12, the average width of the combat area of one BTG - 13.3 km;

• Deployed enemy BTGs: 26th, 153rd, and 197th tank regiments, 245th motorized rifle regiment of the 47th tank division, 6th and 239th tank regiments, 228th motorized rifle regiment of the 90th tank division, 1st motorized rifle regiment, 1st tank regiment of the 2nd motorized rifle division, 25th and 138th separate motorized rifle brigades of the 6th Combined Arms Army, 27th separate motorized rifle brigade of the 1st Tank Army, 275th and 280th motorized rifle regiments, 11th tank regiment of the 18th motorized rifle division of the 11 Army Corps, 7th motorized rifle regiment of the 11th Army Corps, 80th separate motorized rifle brigade of the 14th Army Corps, 2nd and 45th separate SOF brigades of the Airborne Forces, 1st Army Corps of so-called DPR, PMCs.

The enemy fired from tanks, barrel and rocket artillery at the positions of the Ukrainian Defense Forces in the areas of Berestove, Dvorichna, Hryanykivka, Kamianka, Kyslivka, Kotlyarivka and Stelmakhivka.

Kramatorsk direction

● Balakleya - Siversk section: approximate length of the combat line - 184 km, the number of BTGs of the RF Armed Forces - 17-20, the average width of the combat area of one BTG - 9.6 km;

● 252nd and 752nd motorized rifle regiments of the 3rd motorized rifle division, 1st, 13th, and 12th tank regiments, 423rd motorized rifle regiment of the 4th tank division, 201st military base, 15th, 21st, 30th separate motorized rifle brigades of the 2nd Combined Arms Army, 35th, 55th and 74th separate motorized rifle brigades of the 41st Combined Arms Army, 3rd and 14th separate SOF brigades, 2nd and 4th separate motorized rifle brigades of the 2nd Army Corps, 7th separate motorized rifle brigade of the 1st Army Corps, PMCs.

The enemy fired with the artillery of various types at the Ukrainian Defense Forces in the areas of Grekivka, Zarichne, Novoyehorivka, Serebryanka, Terny, Torske, and Yampolivka.

Donetsk direction

● Siversk - Maryinka section: approximate length of the combat line - 235 km, the number of BTGs of the RF Armed Forces - 13-15, the average width of the combat area of one BTG - 17 km;

● Deployed BTGs: 68th and 163rd tank regiments, 102nd and 103rd motorized rifle regiments of the 150 motorized rifle division, 80th tank regiment of the 90th tank division, 35th, 55th, and 74th separate motorized rifle brigades of the 41st Combined Arms Army, 31st separate airborne assault brigade, 61st separate marines brigade of the Joint Strategic Command "Northern Fleet," 336th separate marines brigade, 24th separate SOF brigade, 1st, 3rd, 5th, 15th, and 100th separate motorized rifle brigades, 9th and 11th separate motorized rifle regiment of the 1st Army Corps of the so-called DPR, 6th motorized rifle regiment of the 2nd Army Corps of the so-called LPR, PMCs.

The enemy fired from tanks, mortars, barrel and jet artillery at the areas of Andriivka, Bakhmut, Bakhmutske, Bilohorivka, Zvanivka, Kurdyumivka, Mayorsk, Opytne, Rozdolivka, Soledar, Spirne, Yakovlivka, Avdiivka, Pervomaiske, Karlivka, Krasnohorivka, Maryinka and Novomykhailivka.

Zaporizhzhia direction

● Maryinka – Vasylivka section: approximate length of the line of combat - 200 km, the number of BTGs of the RF Armed Forces - 17, the average width of the combat area of one BTG - 11.7 km;

● Deployed BTGs: 36th separate motorized rifle brigade of the 29th Combined Arms Army, 38th and 64th separate motorized rifle brigades, 69th separate cover brigade of the 35th Combined Arms Army, 5th separate tank brigade, 37 separate motorized rifle brigade of the 36th Combined Arms Army, 135th, 429th, 503rd and 693rd motorized rifle regiments of the 19th motorized rifle division of the 58th Combined Arms Army, 70th, 71st and 291st motorized rifle regiments of the 42nd motorized rifle division of the 58th Combined Arms Army, 136th separate motorized rifle brigade of the 58 Combined Arms Army, 46th and 49th machine gun artillery regiments of the 18th machine gun artillery division of the 68th Army Corps, 39th separate motorized rifle brigade of the 68th Army Corps, 83th separate airborne assault brigade, 40th and 155th separate marines brigades, 22nd separate SOF brigade, 1st Army Corps of the so-called DPR, and 2nd Army Corps of the so-called LPR, PMCs.

The enemy shelled the areas of Velyka Novosilka, Vuhledar, Vremivka, Mykilske, Neskuchne, Pavlivka, Olhivske, Stepove and Prechystivka.

Tavriysk direction

- Vasylivka – Stanislav section: approximate length of the battle line – 296 km, the number of BTGs of the RF Armed Forces - 42, the average width of the combat area of one BTG - 7 km;

- Deployed BTGs: 114th, 143rd, and 394th motorized rifle regiments, 218th tank regiment of the 127th motorized rifle division, 57th and 60th separate motorized rifle brigades of the 5th Combined Arms Army, 37th separate motorized rifle brigade of the 36th Combined Arms Army, 429th motorized rifle regiment of the 19th motorized rifle division, 33rd and 255th motorized rifle regiments of the 20th motorized rifle division, 34th and 205th separate motorized rifle brigades of the 49th Combined Arms Army, 70th, 71st and 291st motorized rifle regiments of the 42nd motorized rifle division, 10th, 16th, 346th separate SOF brigades, 239th air assault regiment of the 76th Air assault division, 217th and 331st parachute airborne regiments of the 98th airborne division, 108 air assault regiment, 171st separate airborne assault battalion of the 7th Air assault division, 11th and 83rd separate airborne assault brigade, 4th military base of the 58 Combined Arms Army, 7 military base 49 Combined Arms Army, 224th, 237th and 126th separate coastal defence brigades, 127th separate ranger brigade, 1st and 3rd Army Corps, PMCs.

The enemy is trying to improve logistical support and carried out artillery shelling in the areas of more than 20 towns and villages along the contact line. The infrastructure of Vyshchetarasivka, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, suffered the most from enemy fire.

The occupiers are taking measures to covertly move military equipment and personnel. For this purpose, in Tavriysk and Nova Kakhovka of the Kherson Oblast, the enemy is blocking the work of mobile operators and the Internet.

Azov-Black Sea Maritime Operational Area:

The forces of the Russian Black Sea Fleet continue to project force on the coast and the continental part of Ukraine and control the northwestern part of the Black Sea. The ultimate goal is to deprive Ukraine of access to the Black Sea and to maintain control over the captured territories.

The number of the Russian naval group in the open sea is 10 ships and boats located along the southwestern coast of Crimea. Among them are two cruise missile carriers (project 21631 corvette and 636.3 submarine), with a total of 12 Kalibr missiles. Since October 10, the enemy intensified the use of Kalibr missiles from the ships of the Russian Navy; during this period, about 30 missiles were fired at Ukraine.

Enemy aviation continues to fly from Crimean airfields Belbek and Gvardiyske over the northwestern part of the Black Sea. Over the past day, 12 Su-27, Su-30 and Su-24 aircraft from Belbek and Saki airfields were involved.

The enemy continues shelling Ukrainian ports and coastal areas. On the night of October 19, the enemy again attacked Mykolaiv and other regions in southern Ukraine with "Shahed-136" kamikaze drones. The Air Defense Forces of Ukraine shot down 13 drones. In total, the Armed Forces of Ukraine destroyed 223 Shahed-136 kamikaze drones. The first "Shahed" was destroyed on September 13 in Kupyansk. The kamikaze drones were destroyed by Ukraine's anti-aircraft missile units, fighter jets, self-propelled anti-aircraft installations, mobile fire groups with portable anti-aircraft missile systems, anti-aircraft artillery and large-caliber machine guns detachments, and ordinary military personnel with machine guns.

Russian Deputy Prime Minister, "a curator" of the occupied Crimea, Marat Khusnullin, said that trucks carrying up to 40 tons [of cargo] could currently pass through the Kerch bridge. Husnullin also noted that the two destroyed spans of the bridge are planned to be dismantled by the end of December 2022. The day before, the bus traffic was opened on the Kerch bridge. Russian Mass media reported huge queues at the entrance to the damaged traffic crossing.

On Wednesday morning, October 19, the occupation administration of Crimea announced the downing of a drone in the area of the Belbek airfield north of Sevastopol. "In Sevastopol, the air defense system worked again in the North side area. According to preliminary data, a drone was shot down near the Belbek airfield," the so-called governor of the city, Mykhailo Razvozhaev, said. Later, he added that the drone's wreckage fell on a residential building in the garden organisation, but "a small fire was quickly extinguished."

"Grain initiative": Today, October 19, 6 ships with 86.7 thousand tons of agricultural products left the ports of "Odesa", "Chornomorsk" and "Pivdenny" for the countries of Asia and Europe. Bulk carrier KEMAL KURU departed from Odesa port, ALMIRANTE STORNI, CS CALVINA from Chornomorsk, and bulk carriers KUBROSLI-Y, DAYTONA-H and tanker DENSA DEFNE from Pivdenny port. Since the departure of the first ship with Ukrainian food, 7.9 million tons of food have been exported.

A total of 360 ships left Ukrainian ports with agricultural products, which were sent to the countries of Asia, Europe and Africa.

Russian operational losses from 24.02 to 19.10

Personnel - almost 66,280 people (+430);

Tanks - 2,554 (+6);

Armored combat vehicles – 5,235 (+16);

Artillery systems – 1,637 (+15);

Multiple rocket launchers (MLRS) - 372 (0); Anti-aircraft warfare systems - 189 (+1); Vehicles and fuel tanks – 3,999 (+14); Aircraft - 269 (+1);

Helicopters – 242 (0);

UAV operational and tactical level – 1,286 (+10); Intercepted cruise missiles - 323 (+5);

Boats / ships - 16 (0).

Ukraine, general news

Martial law declared by Putin in the occupied territories of Ukraine is a preparation for the mass deportation of Ukrainians, Oleksiy Danylov, Secretary of the NSDC, wrote on Twitter. "Putin's martial law in the annexed regions is a preparation for the mass deportation of the Ukrainian population to depressed areas to change the ethnic composition of the occupied territory. A crime that the UN should condemn as [the same] which was already committed by Russia in Crimea and remained unpunished," Danilov emphasized.

President Volodymyr Zelensky held a strategic meeting on security at energy supply facilities. The participants discussed measures to eliminate the consequences in the event of Ukraine's energy system breakdown. They agreed on the necessary measures in case of a lack of electricity in Ukraine's cities and villages. Zelensky instructed to create mobile power points for critical infrastructure.

The Verkhovna Rada [Ukraine's parliament] adopted a law that provides for the creation of the Fund for Liquidation of the Consequences of Armed Aggression as part of a special fund of the state budget. The funds are to be directed to the construction of public buildings, civil protection structures, reconstruction, and overhaul of critical infrastructure facilities and housing for internally displaced persons and people who lost their houses due to the [Russian] military hostilities. According to the [adopted law], the Fund will be filled from the funds received from the forced seizure of property of the Russian Federation and its residents in Ukraine.

As reported, at least Ukraine's 1,463 housing and communal facilities, 829 educational institutions, 301 medical institutions, and 3,838 residential buildings that were damaged as a result of Russian aggression require immediate restoration.

International diplomatic aspect

Martial law declared by Putin in the occupied territories of Ukraine is a preparation for the mass deportation of Ukrainians, Oleksiy Danylov, Secretary of the NSDC, wrote on Twitter. "Putin's

martial law in the annexed regions is a preparation for the mass deportation of the Ukrainian population to depressed areas to change the ethnic composition of the occupied territory. A crime that the UN should condemn as [the same] which was already committed by Russia in Crimea and remained unpunished," Danilov emphasized.

Vladimir Putin held a meeting of the National Security Council. He signed decrees introducing martial law in the illegally occupied territories of Ukraine, raising to medium the reaction level in bordering Ukraine regions of Russia and illegally annexed Crimea and to the level of high preparedness in Central and Southern Federal districts. He also ordered the setting up of a Coordination Committee, to be chaired by the Prime minister.

The Coordination Committee is an "à la russe" response to the government's inability to support the war efforts. In eight months of the invasion, Russia lost in Ukraine thousands of tanks, IFVs, auxiliary vehicles, hundreds of jets, and helicopters, not to mention some 66,000 soldiers KIA, thus [by conventional culculation] approximately three times WIA/MIA/POWs. The so-called partial mobilization brought in an announced 300,000 men whom the government could not even properly feed and provide with uniforms, bulletproof vests, modern helmets, and light firearms.

So, Putin decided to tighten the grip over the government, which hadn't been independent of his supervision even before. De facto, this decision means mobilization of the economy. The political

(war) necessity, not an economic one, will guide economic activities. In some Russian regions, military personnel will increase their power in civil governance through participation in coordinating committees with local authorities. The further centralization of the decision-making process won't be able to improve governance, for it has structural problems as inherent elements of Putin's system.

The martial law in the occupied territories [of Ukraine] will allow the invaders to conduct total mobilization of Ukrainian citizens into proxy formations (people's militia/territorial defense etc.). It will also introduce a curfew, limitations on movements from and to the regions, as well as within regions, forced searches of people and premises, and detention for up to 30 days. In addition, the occupiers will introduce the war (total) censorship of media and mass wiretapping of phone conversations, forced labor, and expropriation of private and commercial property.

Russian invading forces and proxy administration of Kherson are conducting a forceful transfer, wrongly called by the Western media as an evacuation, of Ukrainian citizens from the left bank of the Dnipro River in the face of the UAF counteroffensive. Earlier, the commander of the invasion forces said that he had information that the UAF may target the dumb of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant, which may flood the right bank. However, there's no military sense for the UAF to target the dumb, not to mention the possible casualties among civilians and the destruction of infrastructure and properties. Moreover, the city and its outskirts' topography prove that the left bank would be severely affected if the dumb were destroyed. It's a worrying sign of possibly planning a false flag operation with enormous casualties.

Russia blames the US for blowing up Nord Stream I and II gas pipelines, though likely it was the Kremlin's false flag operation. It might carry out a destabilization strategy targeting critical infrastructure on the European countries' territory to shake stability, causing a change of governments and dissuading from supporting Ukraine. While Norwegian security services detained Russian spies eyeing critical infrastructure objects, Germany has strengthened the protection of its LNG terminals under construction and increased aerial supervision of its rail network.

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3. Why The Pentagon’s Crush on Elon Musk is Dangerous For Democracy

Excerpts:

There’s a reason that Defense Department bureaucracy moves at the pace that it does and why it is structurally risk averse. Pentagon leadership is accountable to Congress and the public. While Pentagon decision-makers can and must create a new relationship with risk and remove hobbling barriers, they are still ultimately beholden to the same mechanisms of government and public scrutiny that enable democracy.

SpaceX, on the other hand, being a privately-held company functions very much like a startup. As such, it operates more like “a structured monarchy,” as described in the book Zero to One, which is a kind of Machiavellian explainer on startups from venture capitalist and democracy-adversary Peter Thiel. Musk is becoming increasingly comfortable in the role of super-powerful authoritarian, in that model. He’s harassed Tesla whistleblowers for leaking to the media and is famously distrustful of the press. But Musk’s brand of arrogance goes from annoying to dangerous when it’s connected to actual battlefield outcomes.

Last week, Ian Bremmer, president of the Eurasia Group, said that Musk revealed to him that he was personally blocking the Ukrainians from using Starlink in Crimea, and that Musk had taken it upon himself to talk to Russian President Vladimir Putin about the war before floating his “peace plan.” Musk denied it.

Musk’s authoritarian mindset might be a necessary ingredient to start an electric car company or design a new rocket engine. But authoritarianism applied to human beings, their sense of identity, home, justice, and being, is antithetical to democracy. We’re quickly arriving at a point where the cause of democracy in Ukraine—and next, perhaps, Taiwan—is beholden to the ill-informed opinions and personal grudges of a modern-day tyrant. Before they go any further with Musk or his companies, U.S. military and intelligence officials would be right reconsider how closely they want to rely on him to protect democracy in America.

Why The Pentagon’s Crush on Elon Musk is Dangerous For Democracy

Once considered a cross between Thomas Edison and Moses, Musk is revealing himself to be an ill-informed, modern-day tyrant.

defenseone.com · by Patrick Tucker

SpaceX founder Elon Musk’s current spat with the Pentagon over who will pay for satellite internet services over Ukraine illustrates how the future of democracy is vulnerable to the whims of authoritarian-minded tech magnates. But in the case of Musk, Pentagon officials are partially to blame.

Musk is a villain to some and a hero to others. While tweeting affinity for Donald Trump and Kanye West, his company SpaceX owns the Starlink communications satellites that are keeping much internet connectivity up in Ukraine. But until recently, for senior military leaders, he represented a model for how to build things in the age of information technology. Musk would headline military conferences where he would lecture the Defense Department on what it needed to do to be faster and cheaper. He would host key military leaders for private dinners, leaders who spoke about him in public with unguarded adulation.

“Look at SpaceX in this country,” said retired Gen. John Hyten, then former vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, in 2020, lauding how quickly the company was able to learn from launch failures. “Did they stop? No… They launched rapidly again. They changed systems. They changed subsystems. They go in a completely different direction." The anecdote painted a contrast between Musk’s nimble methods and the cumbersome process of Defense Department technology development. For a military that has become obsessed with remaking itself in the mode of a Silicon Valley startup, Musk emerged as a cross between Thomas Edison and Moses.

Of course SpaceX and Musk owe much to the Pentagon and to the federal government. The Air Force and the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, were among the company’s first and most critical backers. Contracts from the DARPA Falcon program in 2005 and the NASA s Commercial Orbital Transportation Services program in 2006 helped the company produce the Dragon spacecraft and the Falcon 9 rocket that would be key drivers for its growth. Musk has said how NASA contracts also have been important to the company’s survival. As a result, SpaceX has moved faster than the rest of the private satellite launch market. And SpaceX has emerged as a major player in virtually every area where the military uses space.

Just how deep is the Pentagon’s reliance on Musk? The U.S. military in recent years has given extraordinary attention to how it is increasingly reliant on space to operate, notably with the creation of the Space Force. In the years ahead the Defense Department will launch hundreds of new satellites to detect and track threats like hypersonic missiles. Space-based satellite images will become even more critical to intelligence collection, and increasingly, to battlefield maneuvers. Advanced communications satellites that transfer vast amounts of battlefield information from one point to another are the cornerstone of the Pentagon’s plans for so-called “joint, all-domain warfare.” From launching image satellites to building missile-tracking satellites and, of course, satellite communications through Starlink, SpaceX is a major player in the military’s most important space-related endeavors.

Last week, amid Musk’s public threat to bill the Pentagon for Starlink services in Ukraine that SpaceX was initially providing for free (which he abandoned days later), the Pentagon’s deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh said “There’s not just SpaceX, there are other entities that we can certainly partner with when it comes to providing Ukraine what they need on the battlefield.” But Singh would not name other options to SpaceX, which says a lot about the current state of space access. The Pentagon isn’t very reliant on Starlink at this time; Ukraine is. But getting to space without SpaceX is like the Beatles without John: not a good bargain.

The satellite communications capabilities provided by Musk’s company are playing a major role in the fight against Russia’s invading forces in Ukraine. From Donetsk to Frankfurt, Starlink is enabling Ukraine’s rapid use of intelligence to out maneuver Russian forces and connecting Ukrainians with weapons maintainers and suppliers to quickly bring damaged weapons back online and bring replacements in.

The battlefield utility of Starlink has given Musk a certain amount of leverage over the people of Ukraine. As Russia has increased its nuclear saber-rattling, Musk has decided to exert it (and do so at a time when he was also asking the Pentagon for money to continue the Starlink services.) A few weeks ago, Musk casually floated on Twitter that Ukraine should simply cede the stolen Crimean Peninsula to Russia.

Ukrainians and others attempted to remind Musk that Crimea was illegally seized and so is by definition Ukrainian. The Kremlin continues a persecution campaign against the Tatars on the peninsula and uses Crimea as a hub to push troops into Ukraine and extend its reach into the Black Sea. Ukrainians were rightly upset that Musk spoke for them and their interests. Western experts on Russia such as Fiona Hill, a former U.S. intelligence official who is now senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, accused Musk of essentially laundering Russian talking points on Twitter. Musk responded by retweeting an opinion piece by venture capitalist turned podcaster David Sacks, warning that “neocons and the woke left” were leading the United States towards nuclear war.

It takes the sort of extreme arrogance of a US technology entrepreneur to substitute his own opinion in the place of democratically-elected presidents and officials across the entire Western world, international institutions like NATO, hundreds of diplomats, foreign affairs professionals, journalists, freedom advocates and, of course, Ukrainians. That’s why the very thing that makes Musk such a successful tech entrepreneur also makes him a danger.

There’s a reason that Defense Department bureaucracy moves at the pace that it does and why it is structurally risk averse. Pentagon leadership is accountable to Congress and the public. While Pentagon decision-makers can and must create a new relationship with risk and remove hobbling barriers, they are still ultimately beholden to the same mechanisms of government and public scrutiny that enable democracy.

SpaceX, on the other hand, being a privately-held company functions very much like a startup. As such, it operates more like “a structured monarchy,” as described in the book Zero to One, which is a kind of Machiavellian explainer on startups from venture capitalist and democracy-adversary Peter Thiel. Musk is becoming increasingly comfortable in the role of super-powerful authoritarian, in that model. He’s harassed Tesla whistleblowers for leaking to the media and is famously distrustful of the press. But Musk’s brand of arrogance goes from annoying to dangerous when it’s connected to actual battlefield outcomes.

Last week, Ian Bremmer, president of the Eurasia Group, said that Musk revealed to him that he was personally blocking the Ukrainians from using Starlink in Crimea, and that Musk had taken it upon himself to talk to Russian President Vladimir Putin about the war before floating his “peace plan.” Musk denied it.

Musk’s authoritarian mindset might be a necessary ingredient to start an electric car company or design a new rocket engine. But authoritarianism applied to human beings, their sense of identity, home, justice, and being, is antithetical to democracy. We’re quickly arriving at a point where the cause of democracy in Ukraine—and next, perhaps, Taiwan—is beholden to the ill-informed opinions and personal grudges of a modern-day tyrant. Before they go any further with Musk or his companies, U.S. military and intelligence officials would be right reconsider how closely they want to rely on him to protect democracy in America.

defenseone.com · by Patrick Tucker

4. A Musk monopoly? For now, Ukraine has few options outside Starlink for battlefield satcoms

This capability is going to be needed in conflict zones in the future. What are we doing to have such a capability available without depending on Elon Musk or someone like him?

A Musk monopoly? For now, Ukraine has few options outside Starlink for battlefield satcoms - Breaking Defense

"I think everyone agrees that if there's a reasonable cost-based argument that paying for use does make sense," industry analyst Tim Farrar said. But "I think Elon has made that more difficult rather than less difficult because you don't normally negotiate your weapons contracts on Twitter."

breakingdefense.com · by Theresa Hitchens · October 19, 2022

Elon Musk attends The 2022 Met Gala on May 02, 2022 in New York City. (Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images for The Met Museum/Vogue)

WASHINGTON — Though the recent tumult over whether Elon Musk’s SpaceX would continue to fund the operation of its Starlink satellite service in Ukraine appears to be over for now, an uncomfortable question remains: If for some reason Starlink is not available, who else might the Pentagon, or Ukrainian forces for that matter, be able to turn to?

While there are other satellite communications firms providing internet connectivity from space, experts say that, at least in the short term, there are few that provide both the wide global coverage and inexpensive, highly mobile and easy-to-use receiver terminals that have made Starlink a vital part of Ukraine’s war against Russia.

“There really aren’t any great substitutes here. I mean, this is why [Starlink has] been such a game changer, because there’s not been anything like it before,” said Tim Farrer, an industry consultant. That situation isn’t likely to change, he added, for “maybe about a year” — meaning that for the moment it is almost the only game in town for keeping the embattled Kyiv government and the Ukrainian military connected.

CNN reported Oct. 14 that SpaceX in September wrote to the Pentagon asking payment in the future for the satellite communications terminals and internet access the company up to now has been donating to the embattled Ukraine government and military. According to CNN, SpaceX’s director of government sales said “We are not in a position to further donate terminals to Ukraine, or fund the existing terminals for an indefinite period of time.”

SpaceX’s mercurial founder Elon Musk on Saturday seemed to reverse course in a typically colorful tweet, and Monday went further, tweeting that the company has withdrawn its request.

Pentagon Press Secretary Pat Ryder on Monday said up to now the Pentagon has not paid Starlink anything for the company’s services in Ukraine — even if CNN suggested others in the US government had — but he reiterated remarks by his deputy on Friday confirming that the Defense Department is in conversations with SpaceX, as well as others, about how to ensuring continued Ukrainian access to satcom.

Beyond Ukraine, DoD has been rushing to contract Starlink not just for experiments to substantiate its Joint All Domain Command and Control (JADC2) effort, but also to provide battlefield connectivity to commanders in the field. Nonetheless, questions about the company’s near market-lock on space-based internet services for military use have been ricocheting around Washington and other allied capitals — with some wondering what options they have aside from the Musk-backed system.

The Alternates To Starlink

In his Monday, comments, Ryder acknowledged other providers, saying “When it comes to the broader issue of providing satellite communication to Ukraine, we are in discussions with SpaceX, as well as other companies, to look at how to best provide that service.”

While Ryder did not provide details about those other providers, there are at least a handful of companies that today offer internet connectivity from space. These include Viasat, OneWeb, SES, Iridium, Inmarsat, Eutelsat and Avanti.

London-based OneWeb intends to have begin global operations next year, after all 648 of its LEO satellites are on orbit. (OneWeb)

These aren’t hypothetical systems. For example, ViaSat’s KA-SAT service is currently operating in Ukraine, as well as providing free wi-fi to Ukrainian refugees in Slovakia, and the firm said on Friday that it is working to rapidly provide additional services. (Spokesperson Dan Bleier told Breaking Defense on Monday that the company couldn’t provide more details at the moment.)

But experts say each of those providers face near-term challenges in competing directly with SpaceX — which has global coverage with almost 3,500 satellites in low Earth orbit at an altitude of about 550 kilometers, and provides cheap receiver terminals that basically are ready to go once you take them out of the box.

Brad Grady, a satellite industry analyst at Northern Sky Research, told Breaking Defense on Wednesday that Starlink has a number of “key advantages” over its closest competitors. These include: “latency, throughput, [and] terminal size/power.”

Satellites stationed in geosynchronous orbit some 36,000 kilometers in altitude — including KA-SAT and those operated by Eutelsat, Intelsat, Avanti, and Inmarsat — can provide world-wide coverage including over Ukraine, but GEO birds have a couple of downsides vice networks in lower orbits.

First, they tend to be more vulnerable to cyber attack, several industry experts noted, as exemplified by Russia’s successful hack of KA-SAT ground terminals in Ukraine right at the start of the war in February. GEO-based networks also have higher latency — the time it takes to downlink and uplink — than those closer to the Earth, because of, well, physics.

Satcom operators in LEO and medium Earth orbit (MEO) also have challenges in meeting Starlink’s capabilities. For example, OneWeb, which is putting up a mega-constellation in LEO to rival Starlink, currently doesn’t operate satellites that cover Ukrainian territory, several sources said, although it has plans to be able to provide capacity there at the end of next year.

“They don’t have the capacity right now,” said one industry expert.

OneWeb last July announced it had started operations covering regions north of 50 degrees latitude (including the Arctic), but according to the company’s website, its full constellation, including satellites that cover lower latitudes, will not be operational until next year. Ukraine lies just below 50 degrees north.

Amazon’s similar network, called Project Kuiper and to comprise some 3,236 satellites, hasn’t even launched yet and won’t begin service until sometime in the 2026 or 2027 timeframe. The launch of the first two satellites was planned for late this year, but has been delayed due to schedule slips in development of the United Launch Alliance’s heavy-lift Vulcan rocket. That launch is now planned for early next year, according to Amazon’s website.

Grady said that in the non-geostationary satellite market, Luxembourg-based telecommunications firm SES’s O3b and future O3b mPower constellations, which are stationed in MEO, come closest to meeting Starlink’s current capabilities. (The company reportedly is a main provider of satellite television in Ukraine and has employees on the ground there.)

“O3b/mPower is probably the next most-viable Non-GEO solution, but [the] terminals aren’t as small as Starlink, so some trades there,” he said.

A Matter Of Receivers

As Grady and other experts noted, SpaceX’s greatest advantage is that Starlink terminals are low cost, highly mobile and, all-importantly for warfighters, simple to set up and use. GEO networks in particular require large, heavy and expensive terminals. But even many terminals designed for satellite networks in lower orbits haven’t quite matched the specifications for Starlink’s small size, weight and power, known as SWaP.

According to SpaceX’s website, Starlink’s dish antenna weighs about 2.9 kilograms (6.4 pounds) and the terminal has very few moving parts.

Kymeta’s new Hawk u8 flat-panel antenna can link to satellites in both low Earth orbits and in geostationary orbit. (Kymeta)

“It’s a question of terminals,” industry analyst Farrar said “The closest thing is, there are some portable terminals for Inmarsat Global Express. But they’re not self-installing. They don’t set themselves up. You have to know where to point them at the satellite. They’re really big, and [they cost] tens of thousands of dollars.”

A number of companies are working to bring new, smaller flat-panel antennas to the market that are electronically steered, and can pick up signals from satellites in across GEO, MEO and LEO. However, many of those new terminals are not yet ready for primetime — either in development or only being deployed in small numbers.

For example, Intelsat for the first time is developing its own antenna specifically for cross-orbit connectivity, called the multi-orbit, tactical terminal, or MOTT, said David Micah, president of Intelsat General Communications.The reason is that DoD is increasingly interested in “hybrid” architectures for satcom that include satellites in all multiple orbital planes, he told Breaking Defense on Oct. 12.

“That’s under development, 100 percent funded by Intelsat and will hit the market about a year from now. It’s been under development for six or nine months, and it’s going to be really a state-of-the-art satellite terminal,” he said.

Antenna maker Kymeta also is focusing on multi-orbit, steerable antennas, with a particular focus on flat panel antennas for mounting on vehicles, Walter Berger, the company’s president, told Breaking Defense on Oct. 12.

While the Hawk u8 terminal, put on the market in April, is much heavier than Starlink’s, weighing in at 100 pounds, Berger said it sports military-grade cybersecurity. And because it can switch “within milliseconds” from connectivity with LEO sats — Kymeta has an agreement with OneWeb to link to its constellation — to satellites in GEO, he stressed that the Hawk u8 is much harder to jam.

“So, it gives the military that kind of redundant pathway when shit hits the fan. We’re gonna stay connected,” he said.

Berger noted that more than 1,000 of the terminals will be deployed by the end of next year, not just by DoD and the Army, but also by the defense ministries of other nations — although he was coy about which ones.

Show Me The Money

As for SpaceX’s somewhat understandable concern about long-term losses to the company as the Ukrainian war stretches far beyond the timeframe almost anyone could have imaged in February, the bottom line is going to be just how much of that pain it can negotiate away.

SpaceX’s letter, according to CNN, specified that Starlink operations would cost more than $120 million for the rest of the year and could cost close to $400 million for the next 12 months. Specifically, CNN quoted the letter as saying that about 85 percent of the 20,000 terminals [provided at the letter’s time] in Ukraine were paid — or partially paid — for by the US, the United Kingdom, Poland or private entities. Those entities also paid for about 30 percent of the internet connectivity, which SpaceX says costs $4,500 each month per unit for the most advanced service.

But in an Oct. 7 tweet, Musk said that the company’s operations in Ukraine has cost $80 million and will exceed 100 million by the end of the year.

“I think everyone agrees that if there’s a reasonable cost-based argument that paying for use does make sense,” Farrar said. The problem, he said, is that the company’s “numbers are constantly changing. … I think Elon has made that more difficult rather than less difficult because you don’t normally negotiate your weapons contracts on Twitter.”

Breaking Defense’s Valerie Insinna contributed to this report.

5. Army Special Operations Command aims to reverse recruiting woes

Good for LTG Braga. He seems to support the 4th PSYOP effort. I heard that the 4th PSYOP was in effect reprimanded for thei work, I hope that the CG's comments mean that was an inaccurate report I received.

Excerpts:

Other corners of the command are making their own content to appeal to prospective recruits, such as 4th Psychological Operations Group’s “Ghosts in the Machine” video. Published in May, the foreboding three-and-a-half minute video has amassed more than 1.1 million views and garnered national headlines.

Braga wants to see more efforts like that, as well as authentic portrayals of special operations life that go beyond Hollywood production value.

“The younger generation — they’re living on different platforms; they’re consuming media in different ways. And we have to adept to that,” said the general. “[Our content]’s got to be organic, because that’s what people like to consume. [If] it’s more believable, and the more transparency I think you have, the more people understand, ‘Oh, I could do that...I want to do that.’”

Army Special Operations Command aims to reverse recruiting woes

armytimes.com · by Davis Winkie · October 19, 2022

WASHINGTON — The Army’s special operations forces could soon be coming to a high school near you.

That’s what Lt. Gen. Jon Braga, the top general in Army Special Operations Command, said during an exclusive interview at the annual Association of the U.S. Army conference on Oct. 11.

The command derives a significant number of its Special Forces soldiers from the 18X program, which allows prospective soldiers to enlist with a guaranteed opportunity to attend Airborne School and Special Forces Assessment and Selection. In recent years, it also quietly launched a similar program, 37X, for psychological operations roles. Another contract option also offers applicants a shot at joining the 75th Ranger Regiment.

Braga wants the 37X program to appeal to young Americans and tap into the rich vein of talent that the direct entry pathway for Green Berets found.

“We’re making up about 50% of our force off the 18X program for direct recruits off the street — and these are highly talented people...[like] journalists, stockbrokers, lawyers” and others with STEM degrees, Braga explained. “It’s been the lifeblood of our [recruiting] efforts.”

There’s also the potential that overproduction on such contracts could help fill the ranks elsewhere in the force, which is grappling with a historically-bad recruiting crisis. Direct entry programs for special operations allow recruits who don’t pass to be reassigned according to the Army’s needs — an oft-repeated joke holds that the 18X program is the 82nd Airborne Division’s top source of recruits.

An end strength crisis is here for the Army

There’s no sugarcoating it: all three components of the Army missed their required end strength for fiscal 2022.

The special ops community could also do a better job of getting the message out, especially when it comes to its PSYOP roles, according to Braga.

“We’ve got to do a better job of translating those opportunities for not only high-schoolers, but...[also] people already in the workforce out there,” he argued. “If I just said, ‘Hey, you want to come and be a psychological operations operator?’ some people are like, ‘What are you talking about?’ But if I went in and said, ‘Hey, do you want to be a military social media influencer?’ I think I know what you told me just there.”

Braga said applicants often have “no clue...[they] can have a career” in influence operations, which require everything from graphic design to copywriting, production skills and more.

Another challenge is getting the right messengers out there.

Traditionally, the Special Operations Recruiting Battalion has focused exclusively on recruiting active duty soldiers, or “in-service” recruiting, Braga explained. But that might change.

“I have asked [if we] can modify that to give them a wider mission statement,” he said.

More of the command’s operational units will join in recruiting efforts during the upcoming year, as well. The Army recently launched its “Meet your Army” campaign, which partners combat units with the service’s recruiting brigades to provide people and resources in support of recruiting events, and USASOC is joining that effort.

But according to Braga, the recruiting push could go beyond collaborating with recruiters or expanding the SORB’s mission.

Some units are already striking out on their own to find talent that fits their needs. Braga highlighted 7th Special Forces Group’s efforts to recruit at colleges and universities with a high concentration of native Spanish speakers. The unit is aligned with Central and South America, and all Special Forces-qualified personnel there are required to maintain Spanish proficiency.

Other corners of the command are making their own content to appeal to prospective recruits, such as 4th Psychological Operations Group’s “Ghosts in the Machine” video. Published in May, the foreboding three-and-a-half minute video has amassed more than 1.1 million views and garnered national headlines.

Braga wants to see more efforts like that, as well as authentic portrayals of special operations life that go beyond Hollywood production value.

“The younger generation — they’re living on different platforms; they’re consuming media in different ways. And we have to adept to that,” said the general. “[Our content]’s got to be organic, because that’s what people like to consume. [If] it’s more believable, and the more transparency I think you have, the more people understand, ‘Oh, I could do that...I want to do that.’”

About Davis Winkie

Davis Winkie is a senior reporter covering the Army, specializing in accountability reporting, personnel issues and military justice. He joined Military Times in 2020. Davis studied history at Vanderbilt University and UNC-Chapel Hill, writing a master's thesis about how the Cold War-era Defense Department influenced Hollywood's WWII movies.

6. Defiant Xi tells world China is ready to stand its ground

Defiant Xi tells world China is ready to stand its ground

americanmilitarynews.com · by Kari Lindberg - Bloomberg News · October 19, 2022

President Xi Jinping had a clear message to those who want to thwart China’s rise: You will fail.

In a speech running almost two hours on Sunday, Xi let the world know that China wouldn’t change course even as it faces “dangerous storms” in a more hostile world. Instead, he declared the “rejuvenation of the Chinese nation is now on an irreversible historical course” and more forcefully offered China up as an alternative to the U.S. and its allies.

“China’s international influence, appeal and power to shape the world has significantly increased,” Xi said in kicking off the Communist Party’s once-in-five-year party congress, at which he’s set to secure a norm-breaking third term in office. “Chinese modernization offers humanity a new choice for achieving modernization,” he added.

Xi’s remarks indicate that China is ready to stare down a growing challenge from the U.S. under President Joe Biden, who has moved to hinder Beijing’s ability to access advanced technology and sought to deter any military action against Taiwan — the biggest flash point between the world’s biggest economies. The Chinese leader hailed the nation’s “fighting spirit” and said the country was “well-positioned for pursuing development and ensuring security.”

“The message to the party is that China can develop its technological advantages without the United States, and is going to be able to withstand the policies that Biden and others are promoting to cut China off from certain high-tech goods like semiconductors,” said Neil Thomas, a China analyst at Eurasia Group Ltd., a political risk advisory and consulting firm. “Whether that’s going to succeed is a totally different question of course, but it’s certainly expressing confidence to those in the system.”

Xi’s speech reflected a changed world from 2017, when he declared that China was “standing tall and firm in the East.” Since then, he’s faced a barrage of U.S. tariffs, financial sanctions and trade curbs aimed at blocking China’s ability to grow even more powerful, culminating in a sweeping order this month restricting Beijing’s access to high-end chips used in artificial intelligence, supercomputing and other technologies set to drive the modern economy.

On Sunday, Xi vowed to “resolutely win the battle in key core technologies.” Pledging to speed up innovation in areas vital to “technology self-reliance,” he said that China “will move faster to launch a number of major national projects that are of strategic, big-picture and long-term importance.”

In many ways, Xi’s defiant tone belied the problems facing China’s economy. The country is facing one of its most challenging periods in decades as COVID zero policies and a property crackdown place pre-pandemic predictions of a 5% growth rate out of reach.

In addition to failing to make significant breakthroughs on chip technology despite spending tens of billions of dollars, the nation is also facing the slowest economic growth in more than four decades, excluding 2020’s COVID slump. Restrictive pandemic policies have cut off visitors and hurt spending, while youth unemployment is around record highs. A property crisis has also spurred a wave of mortgage boycotts.

Xi reiterated that economic development was the party’s “top priority,” even as he twice mentioned the need to “balance development with security” — a phrase suggesting growth can be sacrificed for goals like self-sufficiency and national defense. Noting “drastic changes in the international landscape,” he said the party “safeguarded China’s dignity and core interests.”

Peiqian Liu, chief China economist of Natwest Markets, said the remark suggests that “growth rates will no longer be the only and top priority in coming years — security of development also matters.”

Hong Kong and Taiwan were two places where China’s actions have considerably hurt its international reputation during Xi’s current five-year term. Xi proclaimed Sunday that “order has been restored” in the former British colony, while calling Taiwan a “matter for the Chinese” to resolve.

“The wheels of history are rolling on toward China’s reunification and the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation,” Xi said, referring to Taiwan. “The complete reunification of our country must be realized, and it can without a doubt be realized.”

The words are a clear rebuttal to the U.S., where politicians from both major parties have stepped up efforts to demonstrate support for Taiwan. Biden has repeated multiple times that the U.S. would come to Taiwan’s aid if China attacked, a prospect that has become a greater worry particularly after Beijing’s unprecedented military exercises around the island in the wake of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit in August.

While Xi said China “will continue to strive for peaceful reunification with the greatest sincerity and the utmost effort,” he added that the threat to use force was “directed solely at interference by external forces and a few separatists seeking Taiwan independence.”

The speech gave little hope for a breakthrough in U.S.-China ties ahead of a possible meeting with Biden next month at the Group of 20 summit in Bali, Indonesia. Rather than stressing a “new type of great power relations” with the US, Xi focused on initiatives to expand ties with developing nations in the Global South, according to Yu Jie, a senior research fellow on China at Chatham House.

“It also marked Beijing’s realization that its fraught relationship with the West is here to stay without any prospect of improvement soon,” she said.

Scott Kennedy, a senior adviser at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, said Xi’s emphasis on a “Chinese-style everything” amounted to acceptance that the U.S. and China were strategic competitors, even if Beijing disputed Washington’s use of the term.

“He was not backing down from that at all,” Kennedy told Bloomberg Television. “Anyone looking for an opening for greater cooperation, pulling back, stepping back, trying to find common ground — I don’t think that was the message he was trying to convey.”

___

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Flip

americanmilitarynews.com · by Kari Lindberg - Bloomberg News · October 19, 2022

7. How Russian Civil War Could Start and Unfold—Putin Opponent

How Russian Civil War Could Start and Unfold—Putin Opponent

Newsweek · by David Brennan · October 19, 2022

Vladimir Putin could be facing the end of more than two decades in power if he is unable to achieve victory in Ukraine where Russia's military is in retreat on two fronts, according to a former member of Russia's parliament and prominent Kremlin critic.

Mark Feygin—a former deputy in the State Duma and human rights lawyer whose high profile clients have included the Pussy Riot punk band—told Newsweek that a comprehensive defeat for Putin in Ukraine could unleash a "bloody" civil war with a range of factions and regions vying for power.

"What will be depends greatly on the way this war will conclude," Feygin said, adding that Ukraine could "crash" Putin's government even without seizing back the Crimean peninsula if Kyiv's troops are able to liberate the Kherson, Zaporizhia, Luhanks, and Donetsk oblasts Mosocw claims to have annexed.

For Feygin and other expatriate dissidents, thoughts are turning to the transfer of power.

This file photo shows former Russian lawmaker and human rights lawyer Mark Feygin, now a prominent expatriate critic of President Vladimir Putin and the ongoing war in Ukraine. Mark Feygin

"The easiest would be if elites inside Russia will make up their mind and choose a replacement for Putin, a replacement who could negotiate with the West, could provide some initial framework for concluding the logistics of that war, and then also work towards future elections," Feygin said.

The top candidate in this situation would be current Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, Feygin said. Mishustin was elevated to the post from relative obscurity in 2020 and not directly involved with the decision to launch the war or manage its progress.

A Mishustin caretaker-government would "soften the blow" of defeat, Feygin said, and allow Moscow to quickly walk back its claimed annexations of Ukrainian territory.

"That is most likely the most comfortable solution for the elite," Feygin said. "In this case, the Russian elites can find a way to hold power, there is potential for them to regenerate themselves and basically, resolve it with minimum consequences to their own standing and their own position and the hierarchy."

How Russian Civil War Might Look

But there is a darker scenario, Feygin added, in which Putin refuses to bow to opposition. "Russian elites break within themselves into different factions; one supporting Putin, others not supporting him, trying to topple him," he said. "This could lead to a civil war."

"Putin could be a reason for this civil war to start if he feels threatened, if he resists his removal," Feygin added. "You can see that he's already created private war companies: Wagner and the Kadyrov troops. In essence, they're his private armies that he possibly could use."

"They could become part of that civil war scenario inside Russia, which would likely include the army, the FSB, and other inner circles that would resist losing power if Putin is to quit or if he is forced to leave his position."

"This very likely will lead to a scenario all against all. And that could be a much bloodier situation."

Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks during his press conference at the Commonwealth of the Independent States (CIS) Summit on October 14, 2022 in Astana, Kazakhstan. Contributor/Getty Images

A power struggle in Russia would be enormously destabilizing for Eurasia and beyond. Russia's nuclear arsenal—on paper the largest in the world—would be at risk, the viability of energy, mineral, and agricultural exports would be uncertain, and bordering nations might face an influx of refugees.

Feygin said major nations would become involved either through ambition or necessity, while regional Russian leaders might also make a play for independence.

"There are other opposition centres, other territories that will definitely join the fight if this scenario will ensue," Feygin said. "And we cannot also exclude bigger countries outside of Russian territories such as China and others that might be interested in certain outcomes. They will have to play in this game."

"This will definitely be a bloody scenario," Feygin said. "It depends upon how much Putin will resist his removal from power."

Newsweek has contacted the Russian Foreign Ministry to request comment.

Newsweek · by David Brennan · October 19, 2022

8. Why the World Should Be Worried About Chechnya

Why the World Should Be Worried About Chechnya

Foreign Policy · by Lucian Kim · October 19, 2022

Analysis

The tiny territory and its bellicose leader reveal the fragility of Russia’s multiethnic federation.

By Lucian Kim, a global fellow with the Wilson Center in Washington and NPR’s former Moscow bureau chief.

Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov speaks with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov speaks with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Novo-Ogaryovo state residence outside Moscow on Aug. 31, 2019. ALEXEY NIKOLSKY/AFP via Getty Images

On the day after Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February, thousands of fighters in full battle dress rallied in Grozny, the capital of the southern Russian province of Chechnya. Wearing a self-styled uniform and carrying a pistol in a holster, Chechnya’s Kremlin-backed leader, Ramzan Kadyrov, hailed the start of the so-called special military operation and pledged to send Chechen volunteers into battle on Putin’s orders.

“I am sure they will prove themselves worthy and that, in the coming days, we will celebrate the liberation of millions of people from violence and killing,” Kadyrov said.

As Putin’s blitzkrieg to seize Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital, faltered, turning into a slog to hang onto occupied territory, Kadyrov has emerged as one of the most vocal proponents of the Kremlin’s pitiless war. Although Russian military commanders avoid the limelight and regular soldiers are prohibited from using smartphones, Kadyrov, a general officer in Russia’s National Guard, obsessively shares videos, audio messages, and commentary on his Telegram account, which has more than 3 million followers. (When the United States sanctioned Kadyrov for human rights abuses in 2017, he was kicked off Facebook and Instagram.) Kadyrov has boasted of Chechen fighters’ prowess in crucial battles, called for the use of tactical nuclear weapons against Ukraine, and recently posted a video of him receiving—with a smirk—an award for holding the world record in most personal sanctions for one person: 15 sanctions.

On the surface, Kadyrov sends the message that Chechnya, once Russia’s most rebellious region and which paid so dearly for its attempt to secede in the 1990s, is now its most loyal. But it would be a mistake to see Kadyrov’s public displays of fealty as a sign of Russia’s successful pacification of Chechnya. In fact, the outsize role Kadyrov has come to play only highlights the fragility of Russia’s purportedly multiethnic federation.

Chechnya, like most of Russia’s 80-odd regions, is dependent on the Kremlin’s largesse in redistributing oil and gas revenues. “Like in the Middle Ages, Kadyrov is a vassal of Putin personally, not of Russia,” said Nikolai Petrov, a senior research fellow with Chatham House in London. But the more manpower and money Putin expends on the war in Ukraine, the looser his grip on Russia’s far-flung provinces becomes. If Putin’s empire-building project fails, Chechnya — a tiny territory that accounts for 1 percent of Russia’s population — could once again become a source of instability for the Russian state.

“The disintegration of Russia is inevitable,” said Zarina Sautieva, a public policy fellow at the Wilson Center in Washington and a human rights defender from Ingushetia, a Russian province that borders Chechnya. “I don’t think Russia can hold together, but it’s not clear if this is a matter of months or years.”

In Ukraine, the Kremlin has relied disproportionately on troops from impoverished regions with Indigenous ethnic minorities: from the North Caucasus, where Chechnya is located, to provinces such as Buryatia and Tuva, which border Mongolia. When Putin announced a “partial mobilization” in September, protests broke out in Dagestan, which neighbors Chechnya, and Yakutia, in northeastern Siberia, forcing regional leaders to promise to send home men who had been called up “by mistake.”

As long as it keeps funding the regions, Sautieva said, the Kremlin can tamp down demonstrations. “But if social welfare payments stop and more bodies come back, people will rise up, not only in the Caucasus,” she added.

That’s not to say Russia’s regions, especially those in the restless North Caucasus, are about to break with Moscow. The Russian president’s vaunted “power vertical” holds regional leaders on a tight leash by keeping them dependent on financial and political support. Putin came to power, after all, by prosecuting a brutal war to crush Chechnya’s aspirations for independence. He installed Akhmad Kadyrov, Ramzan’s father, as the head of Chechnya’s puppet regime and promoted Ramzan after Akhmad was assassinated in 2004. And he has lavished the younger Kadyrov with petrodollars, tolerating his excesses in return for unquestioning loyalty.

“Russia’s colonial regime has stabilized in the North Caucasus,” said Denis Sokolov, a Russian expert on the North Caucasus. “The regional elites have become part of the system and see their future together with the regime.” Maybe, Sokolov said, they fear separatism even more than Moscow does. As a result, “it would be premature to talk about outright separatism. Of course, people are thinking about it in the Caucasus, , and Buryatia. But they have no political or military organization. That can change very fast.”

Putin’s fateful decision to draft ordinary Russians for his war in Ukraine has renewed interest in regional autonomy, not just along ethnic lines. “The situation has been brought to a head by mobilization,” Sokolov said. “Mobilization equals death, and people will resist it.”

Using his Telegram account as a megaphone and his Chechen warriors—the Kadyrovtsy—as a prop and cudgel, Kadyrov has carved out a unique place for himself as both Russia’s most high-profile governor and military leader. “Today, we see two regimes in Russia: Putin’s and Kadyrov’s,” Petrov said.

The Chechen strongman likes to remind Putin of his loyalty. In September, a month before his 46th birthday, Kadyrov posted a video of himself sitting in a gilded palace, reflecting on getting older and suggesting that after 15 years in power, it was time for him to step down. Three days later, he retracted his statement, saying the Chechen people had entrusted him with his position and that he could only resign after asking them—and Putin.

Kadyrov constantly tests the boundaries of his own authority. Aware of popular discontent with the mobilization announcement, he announced Russia already had enough uniformed men in law enforcement to “take down any Western army.” The call-up, Kadyrov maintained, was needed simply to give reservists a refresher course. He has also lambasted the Russian military leadership for failures on the battlefield and railed against the release of high-profile Ukrainian prisoners of war in a prisoner exchange that was almost certainly approved by Putin. Instead of being reprimanded, Kadyrov announced on his birthday, Oct. 5, that Putin had just made him a colonel general—Kadyrov’s second promotion since the start of the invasion.

The very personal nature of Kadyrov’s relationship with Putin suggests that Kadyrov’s allegiance to the Kremlin is conditional on Putin remaining in power. Russia’s future could hinge on what Kadyrov will do when his patron is gone.

“If chaos should break out in the Kremlin, Kadyrov will be the first to declare independence, ” Sautieva said. Petrov, on the other hand, argues that Kadyrov likely has much bigger ambitions. Kadyrov’s powerful allies in Moscow include Viktor Zolotov, a former Putin bodyguard who now heads the National Guard. Even if the federal authorities have a numerical advantage over Kadyrov, Petrov said, they may not be able to react as decisively as he can in a chaotic transition period.

“If Putin leaves power, Kadyrov could become a kingmaker—or even a pretender to the throne,” Petrov said. Although Kadyrov’s chances of seizing power are not high, Petrov said, they are not negligible given the absence of functioning government institutions and possible disagreements inside the Russian establishment.

Yet Petrov cautioned that the main risk to Russia’s unity comes not from the regions themselves but from decisions made for them in the Kremlin. When the central government runs out of money because of the war and international sanctions, it will be forced to consider new models of cohabitation.

“The economic basis that supports a super centralized, super unitary state has been completely undermined,” Petrov said. “Big transformations are inevitable: hard or soft federalization, regionalization all the way to collapse.” Putin’s successor may well be more concerned with keeping Russia together than in conquering new territories.

Lucian Kim is a journalist who has covered Russia since 2003, most recently as NPR’s Moscow bureau chief. He is currently a global fellow with the Wilson Center in Washington. Twitter: @Lucian_Kim

9. The U.S. Army Is Testing A Data Platform Just For Intel Officers

Excerpts:

The platform is one of the PEO’s first experiences using cloud, and during the test, the goal was to “stress the system” to understand how much data it can handle. That answer so far is about 15 million records and growing, and that total includes various types of intel reports, sensor data, and other content.

The next step is to incorporate localized data, so a brigade can access the platform for geospatial or other information even if they have intermittent communications or spotty network access.

In addition to keeping access and user experience consistent no matter the connection level, the aim is to make sure analysts have tools they need to make sense of the data, “so they can understand the environment, they can make predictions about the environment, and they can inform their commander,” Kitz said.

The U.S. Army Is Testing A Data Platform Just For Intel Officers

It’s part of a larger effort to use commercial and cloud-based technologies to make the service more data centric.

defenseone.com · by Lauren C. Williams

The U.S. Army is testing a data analytics platform that will make intel officers smarter. And if all goes well, it could be available to intel officers across the service.

“We are testing an Army Intelligence Data Platform. So essentially a system that will ingest all of the Army's intel data—data from the intel community, commercial data, whatever data sources our intel professionals may need or want,” Mark Kitz, the program executive officer for Intelligence, Electronic Warfare, and Sensors, told Defense One.

That system, formerly called the Distributed Common Ground System-Army Capability Drop 2, is completely cloud based and just completed testing with military intelligence battalions in Fort Gordon, Ga. Other intel professionals also have access to the platform, including some in the Army’s Intelligence and Security Command, Shaw Air Force Base, and U.S. Central Command.

Results of the test that wrapped Friday are still pending, but the aim was to fine-tune the platform for practical use by units that tested the platform. But the ultimate goal is to expand its use.

“And when we get past this sort of phase,” Kitz said, “we will have a data platform for our intel professionals to access, aggregate, and have tools against the data so they can answer tough questions about the future environment without preparing for any contingency.”

The platform, which soldiers can access from any classified device, is part of the Army’s cloud-based command post computing environment and houses dashboards, data tools, and several apps that feed it data through the platform, including All Source II application, which will process tactical intel data. Palantir, the prime contractor for the platform, just landed a five-year $59 million contract to integrate and deploy that app.

“And so out of this test, our hope is that we widely give this out to the Army so that the 50,000-plus Army intel professionals have a tool where they can access data in a really meaningful way, so they don't have to go to every website to find data and correlate it internally or on a spreadsheet,” Kitz said.

But one challenge with new capabilities—after making sure they work as intended—is getting people to use them, Kitz said.

“Typically when we equip the Army, we show up with a truck or we show up with a piece of equipment and we do new equipment training,” he said. But with this platform, the end product is essentially “a little Java app, they run a website. And so one of the things that we're struggling with and working towards is how do we ensure users know the power of this system.”

Excerpts

defenseone.com · by Lauren C. Williams

10. Palantir wins contract to help Army quickly process battlefield data

Palantir wins contract to help Army quickly process battlefield data

Defense News · by Colin Demarest · October 19, 2022

WASHINGTON — Palantir Technologies won a U.S. Army contract worth as much as $59 million to support the testing and rollout of software that allows analysts to parse vast amounts of data and quickly provide leaders the latest battlefield information.

The five-year indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity deal for the All Source II application was announced Oct. 17 by the Army’s Program Executive Office for Intelligence, Electronic Warfare and Sensors, or PEO IEW&S.

The All Source II application is expected to be deployed as part of the Command Post Computing Environment, a tailorable mission command suite operated and maintained by soldiers.

“ASII is integrated into, and built to interoperate with, the Command Post Computing Environment, which not only reduces the amount of hardware the Army intelligence community is required to maintain, but it also provides a streamlined way to deliver timely intelligence to the commander,” Col. Christopher Anderson, the project manager for intelligence systems and analytics, said in a statement.

The app, he added, will provide “a robust set of tools” to improve planning prior to and during missions.

Booz Allen completes EverWatch purchase challenged by US

EverWatch, a supplier of artificial intelligence, cloud services and insider-threat analysis, will initially operate as Booz Allen Hamilton subsidiary.

All Source II is also part of a larger endeavor, known as Intel Apps, that includes the Intelligence Support to Targeting, Information Collection and Weather Operational Effects software programs. PEO IEW&S in August announced a $1.6 million arrangement with CyOne Inc. for the targeting tranche; the other two are slated for award in fiscal 2023, which began Oct. 1.

The All Source II contract is the latest in a string of wins for Palantir, known for its data analytics and software development.

The Denver-based company this month secured a five-year, $85.1 million deal with the Army to better forecast equipment maintenance and force readiness through predictive modeling. Last month, Palantir said it would continuing collaborating with the Army Research Laboratory on work valued at $229 million.

It’s also teaming with BigBear.ai of Maryland to implement the Army’s Global Force Information Management system, meant to provide service leaders with an automated and holistic view of manpower, equipment, training and readiness.

BigBear disclosed the nine-month, $14.8 million arrangement Sept. 29.

About Colin Demarest

Colin Demarest is a reporter at C4ISRNET, where he covers military networks, cyber and IT. Colin previously covered the Department of Energy and its National Nuclear Security Administration — namely Cold War cleanup and nuclear weapons development — for a daily newspaper in South Carolina. Colin is also an award-winning photographer.

11. Xi Jinping’s New Defense Coalition

Excerpt:

Beijing typically blames the U.S. for orchestrating a bloc against China, but Pacific nations that favor stability and democracy don’t need convincing. Mr. Xi’s actions are building the coalition to deter China.

Xi Jinping’s New Defense Coalition

Beijing’s regional aggression brings Japan and Australia closer in an expanded security pact.

By The Editorial BoardFollow

Oct. 19, 2022 6:53 pm ET

https://www.wsj.com/articles/xi-jinpings-new-defense-coalition-china-australia-japan-anthony-albanese-fumio-kishida-11666215130?mod=opinion_lead_pos4

No one has done more for NATO than Vladimir Putin, and Xi Jinping is doing something similar for democracies in the Asia-Pacific. On Saturday Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Australian PM Anthony Albanese will meet in Perth to sign a new security pact to share information about China and other military intelligence.

OPINION: POTOMAC WATCH

Is the U.S. Ready for a Cold War With China?

21:21

The two countries have long had a friendly relationship, and the new agreement updates a 2007 pact. But China’s militarization of islands in the South China Sea and threats against Taiwan are bringing the two even closer on defense matters.

Given events in “the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait, there is no denying that the security environment has become increasingly difficult and challenging,” Japanese ambassador to Australia Shingo Yamagami told the Guardian Australia. “That is why we need to come up with an upgraded self-defense cooperation declaration in order to increase deterrence.”

The new agreement, he added in an interview with the Australian, would be “epoch making” and “will outline the direction of Australia/Japan defense cooperation for the next 10 years.”

In August Japan protested when Chinese military exercises sent five missiles into Japan’s exclusive economic zone. The exercises, which were run as a show of bluster two days after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan, were a reminder that a Chinese takeover of the islands would damage Japanese security.

China has used trade as a weapon against Australia after former Prime Minister Scott Morrison sought an independent investigation into the origins of Covid-19. Australia is also rightly worried by China’s recent efforts to forge a security relationship with Solomon Islands with an eye to building a possible military base or bases in the Pacific.

Beijing typically blames the U.S. for orchestrating a bloc against China, but Pacific nations that favor stability and democracy don’t need convincing. Mr. Xi’s actions are building the coalition to deter China.

12. U.S. has viewed wreckage of kamikaze drones Russia used in Ukraine

I would certainly hope so. I would think the minimum quid pro quo for our support would be complete intelligence access.

Graphics at the link: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/10/20/russia-iran-kamikaze-drones/

U.S. has viewed wreckage of kamikaze drones Russia used in Ukraine

Such information could prove crucial in helping the United States and its Ukrainian allies better identify and ultimately defeat the unmanned craft

By Shane Harris, Dan Lamothe, Alex Horton and Karen DeYoung

October 20, 2022 at 2:00 a.m. EDT

The Washington Post · by Shane Harris · October 20, 2022

The U.S. government has examined the wreckage of Iranian-made drones shot down in Ukraine, deepening its insight into the unmanned craft that Russia has launched in a spate of kamikaze attacks on the country’s critical infrastructure, according to two U.S. officials.

Information about the drones’ structure and technology could prove crucial in helping the United States and its Ukrainian allies better identify and ultimately defeat them before they can reach their targets. Officials said the process has been used in the past to study weaponry deployed by Iran’s proxies in conflicts in the Middle East. People interviewed for this report spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence collection.

The Shahed-136 unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) used in this week’s attacks on the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, have targeted power stations and other utilities, killing at least four, authorities there have said. Their use by Russian forces has underscored the growing ties between Moscow and Tehran, alarming Western leaders whose sanctions and other punitive economic measures have drastically undercut the Kremlin’s ability to regenerate its military after eight months of war.

The Iranian-made drones are being launched from three Russian military bases in Crimea and another position in Belarus, a Ukrainian official said. Tehran has dispatched advisers to Russian-controlled areas, where they have provided operators with technical instruction.

It is unclear how the United States gained access to the drone wreckage, though the Pentagon coordinates closely with Ukraine’s military and maintains a small administrative presence at the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv. That team is led by a one-star Army general.

Drones over Ukraine:

Death in different sizes

Iranian Shahed-136 drones can loiter over areas for hours until their cameras identify

a target and the drone drops on it like a bomb. The Russians are using these weapons to devastating effect without risk to their troops.

SHAHED-136 (IRAN)

Length: 11 feet

Max. speed:

115 mph

Approx. weight: 440 pounds

Range: About 1,100-

1,500 miles

Nose contains explosive warhead as well as cameras

But the Iranian drones are bigger, noisier and reportedly easier to shoot down than the tiny Switchblade 300s the U.S. is supplying to Ukraine.

SWITCHBLADE 300 (U.S.)

Length: 20 inches

Max. speed: 100 mph

Approx. weight: 5.5 pounds

Range: About 6 miles

Sources: Defense Express, AeroVironment

WILLIAM NEFF/THE WASHINGTON POST

Drones over Ukraine:

Death in different sizes

Iranian Shahed-136 drones can loiter over areas for hours until their cameras identify a target and the drone drops on it like a bomb. The Russians are using these weapons to devastating effect without risk to their troops.

SHAHED-136 (IRAN)

Length: 11 feet

Max. speed: 115 mph

Approx. weight:

440 pounds

Range: About 1,100-

1,500 miles

Nose contains explosive warhead as well as cameras

But the Iranian drones are bigger, noisier

and reportedly easier

to shoot down than the tiny Switchblade 300s the U.S. is supplying

to Ukraine.

SWITCHBLADE

300 (U.S.)

Length: 20 inches

Max. speed: 100 mph

Approx. weight:

5.5 pounds

Range: About 6 miles

Sources: Defense Express, AeroVironment

WILLIAM NEFF/THE WASHINGTON POST

Drones over Ukraine: Death in different sizes

Iranian Shahed-136 drones can loiter over areas for hours until their cameras identify

a target and the drone drops on it like a bomb. The Russians are using these weapons to devastating effect without risk to their troops.

SHAHED-136 (IRAN)

Length: 11 feet

Max. speed: 115 mph

Approx. weight: 440 pounds

Range: About 1,100-

1,500 miles

Nose contains explosive warhead as well as cameras

But the Iranian drones are bigger, noisier and reportedly easier to shoot down than the tiny Switchblade 300s the U.S. is supplying to Ukraine.

SWITCHBLADE 300 (U.S.)

Length: 20 inches

Max. speed: 100 mph

Approx. weight: 5.5 pounds

Range: About 6 miles

Sources: Defense Express, AeroVironment

WILLIAM NEFF/THE WASHINGTON POST

Drones over Ukraine: Death in different sizes

Iranian Shahed-136 drones can loiter over areas for hours until their cameras identify a target and the drone drops on it like a bomb.

The Russians are using these weapons to devastating effect without risk to their troops.

SHAHED-136 (IRAN)

Length: 11 feet

Max. speed: 115 mph

Approx. weight: 440 pounds

Range: About 1,100-

1,500 miles

Engine, propeller

Nose contains explosive warhead as well as cameras

But the Iranian drones are bigger, noisier and reportedly easier to shoot down than the tiny Switchblade 300s the U.S. is supplying to Ukraine.

SWITCHBLADE 300 (U.S.)

Length: 20 inches

Max. speed: 100 mph

Approx. weight: 5.5 pounds

Range: About 6 miles

Sources: Defense Express, AeroVironment

WILLIAM NEFF/THE WASHINGTON POST

The Shahed is a large, lumbering aircraft that flies very low and appears to have few metallic parts, making it difficult to detect with radars and other sensors before reaching its target. Examination of the wreckage may help overcome those challenges.

The drones’ points of origin pose another challenge, the Ukrainian official said: They are too far for U.S.-supplied rocket artillery to strike, blunting options for destroying the aircraft before they are airborne.

Ukraine, which says it has destroyed more than 220 Shahed-136 drones since Sept. 13, appears to be studying the platform, Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur told reporters this week. Pevkur said it was of regional urgency to learn about the aircraft.

“We all have to understand that we all have to put our efforts to that. To understand how it works, and to understand how to take it down,” he said. “Because it’s not only the question of Ukraine at war at the moment, but it’s a question of all of us who are in the situation where we are.”

Iran produces a variety of drones and has reportedly supplied them to Hezbollah in Lebanon and Houthi rebels in Yemen, among other groups. The Pentagon believes Iran-allied forces have used them against U.S. military personnel in Syria, including in an August attack at the U.S.-run base at Tanf.

The Houthis claimed to have used Samad-3 drones to attack a refinery in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, last spring, and launched Samad-1 drones at Saudi Aramco facilities in other parts of the country. Those drones are distinct from the weapons used by Russia in Ukraine.

In February, the United Arab Emirates was hit by several drone and missile attacks claimed by the Houthis. In a military parade last month in Sanaa, the Yemeni capital, the Houthis reportedly displayed a local version of the Shahed-136.

Ukraine has asked the United Nations to examine the wreckage, to determine the aircraft’s country of origin. In a letter dated Friday, Ukraine’s U.N. ambassador invited “U.N. experts to visit Ukraine at the earliest possible opportunity to inspect recovered Iran-origin drones.” The letter maintained that Iranian transfers of the drones would violate both U.N. sanctions against Iran and terms of the 2015 U.N. Security Council resolution on the Iran nuclear deal that year.

The Council held a closed-door meeting Wednesday to hear “an expert briefing … on recent evidence that Russia illegally procured Iranian UAVs that it is using in its war on Ukraine,” Nate Evans, spokesperson for the American U.N. mission, said in a statement after the session. “These UAVs were transferred from Iran to Russia in open violation of provisions” of the resolution approving the nuclear deal Iran signed with world powers.

Earlier this week, France and Britain — signers of the deal along with Iran, the United States, Germany, Russia and China — echoed Ukrainian charges that sending the drones to Russia violated a provision prohibiting Iran from transferring unmanned aerial vehicles with a range of more than 300 kilometers (186.4 miles) unless it had specific permission from the council.

“As was outlined during today’s meeting,” the statement from Evans said, “there is ample evidence that Russia is using Iranian-made UAVS” in its attacks on Ukraine. “By procuring these weapons in violation of U.N. Security Council Resolutions, Russia continues to flout international law in its pursuit of a senseless and brutal war.”

The statement did not indicate any immediate action would be taken, although Evans said “we anticipate this will be the first of many conversations at the U.N. on how to hold Iran and Russia accountable for failing to comply with U.N. Security Council-imposed obligations.”

The Shahed loiters in the air until it identifies a target, often a fixed position, and then dives into it, detonating onboard explosives. Unlike bigger reusable drones that fire missiles and return to a base, it flies low and slow.

Ukrainians call it “the lawn mower” because of the loud buzzing sound it makes. The distinct noise has served as a warning of its approach, allowing people to scramble for cover and brace for the explosion, which is smaller than the impact caused by conventional ballistic missiles.

The drones pose a significant problem, analysts say. Many defensive systems capable of defeating them are costly, are designed mostly for bigger threats like jets and helicopters, and take months or years to produce, limiting how many can be distributed and forcing military planners to prioritize sites deemed most vulnerable.

While Ukrainian air defenses have shown some success against the drones, even a few slipping through can cause havoc, said Samuel Bendett, an expert on the Russian military at CNA, a research group. “It’s a demonstration of Russian capability, and now they have cheap plentiful weapons that can constantly remind Ukrainians that their skies are not 100 percent safe,” he said. “It’s a very powerful psychological weapon.”

Russia’s performance with the Shaheds in Ukraine “suggests an evolution,” Bendett said. “They probably started with a basic concept the Houthis and the Iranians used themselves and built on it to possibly overwhelm Ukrainian air defenses, to fly around them, to circumnavigate them, in one way or another.”

Iranian military leaders will probably seek feedback from Russian commanders on how they have evaded Western air defenses, experts have said. Such information could aid Tehran in any potential attacks it pursues against its regional adversaries.

The United States has provided Ukraine with air defense systems capable of destroying drones. One, the Vampire, can take down drones with a launcher attached to a pickup truck.

The Pentagon also has promised to send Ukraine NASAMS, a surface-to-air missile system capable of intercepting ballistic missiles and other aerial threats. Two NASAMS are slated for delivery in the coming weeks, U.S. officials have said. Six others pledged to Ukraine are expected to take years to build and deliver.

There is no one-size-fits-all answer to air defense threats and to these drones specifically, experts say. They point to a diverse set of weapons capable of defending priority targets, from Stinger missiles, which are shoulder-fired weapons developed long ago, to newer, more sophisticated systems like the NASAMS, said Tom Karako, the director of the Missile Defense Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank.

Also needed, Karako said, are electronic warfare systems that can disrupt the connection between drone and operator, taking it offline. “You may not need the world’s biggest interceptors,” he said, “but you are going to need something.”

The Pentagon has not indicated whether this week’s attacks in Kyiv would trigger a rush to deliver more anti-drone weapons. A senior military official pointed to the 1,400 Stingers the United States has provided Ukraine to date and contributions from other Western countries to bolster Ukraine’s air defenses.

Both the Saudis and the United Arab Emirates have said Patriot interceptors have been used to thwart Houthi missile attacks — along with, in the UAE, a THAAD defense system. Neither has specified the defenses they have used against drones.

Ukraine uses kamikaze drones as well. The Pentagon has provided its military with hundreds of Switchblades, which are much smaller than the Shahed and are designed to strike small groups of soldiers or armored vehicles, depending on the variant. While smaller and more evasive than the Iranian drones, they lack the range, with the larger Switchblade version able to travel 25 miles. The domestically produced RAM II also is in use, but its range tops out at 18 miles, making both weapons more suitable near the front lines.

Ellen Nakashima contributed to this report.

The Washington Post · by Shane Harris · October 20, 2022

13. Biden’s Tech-War Goes Nuclear – OpEd

Conclusion:

The Biden administration is squandering American power on unilateral actions it cannot enforce and that will no have meaningful impact on China’s development. They’d be better off looking for ways to ease the transition to a new world, then pathetically trying to turn back the clock to the bygone “unipolar moment”.

Biden’s Tech-War Goes Nuclear – OpEd

eurasiareview.com · by Mike Whitney · October 19, 2022

“Lots of people don’t know what happened yesterday. To put it simply, Biden has forced all Americans working in China to pick between quitting their jobs and losing American citizenship. Every American executive and engineer working in China’s semiconductor manufacturing industry resigned yesterday, paralyzing Chinese manufacturing overnight. One round of sanctions from Biden did more damage than all four years of performative sanctioning under Trump. Although American semiconductor exporters had to apply for licenses during the Trump years, licenses were approved within a month.

With the new Biden sanctions, all American suppliers of IP blocks, components, and services departed overnight – thus cutting off all service [to China]. Long story short, every advanced node semiconductor company is currently facing comprehensive supply cut-off, resignations from all American staff, and immediate operations paralysis. This is what annihilation looks like: China’s semiconductor manufacturing industry was reduced to zero overnight. Complete collapse. No chance of survival.” — Posted at Jordan Schneider’s Twitter account @jordanschnyc from a translated thread at @lidangzzz

The Biden administration intensified its war on China last week when it detonated a thermonuclear bomb at the heart of Beijing’s booming technology industry. In an effort to block China’s access to crucial semiconductor technology, Team Biden announced onerous new export rules aimed at a “comprehensive supply cut-off” of essential semiconductor technology which– according to one analyst– led to an “immediate operations paralysis.” The terror unleashed by the announcement was aptly summarized in a thread posted at Jordan Schneider’s Twitter account from a translated thread at @lidangzzz (See above quote)

Naturally, the Chinese government was blindsided by the draconian new rules which include “all Chinese advanced computing chip design companies” and will undoubtedly “ensure the elimination of all American products and technologies from the entire ecosystem.” The new sanctions regime will likely inflict significant damage on China’s thriving technology industry while causing considerable harm to US partners who were not consulted on the matter. But while the announcement was a complete surprise, it does fit with the much more extensive list of hostile US actions towards China in the last few months. Some of these include:

Multiple US delegations (Nancy Pelosi and other sitting Congressmen) traveled to Taiwan to challenge the One-China policy that has been the cornerstone for normal relations between the two countries for the last 40 years.
Two US warships sail through strait, BBC
US-India maneuvers on the India-China border
The Biden Administration’s persistent determination to provide South Korea with a lethal missile defence system that can be used for offensive purposes and which threatens Chinese security
The relentless strengthening of an “anti-China” coalition
Two U.S. carrier groups conduct exercises in South China Sea
And, now–according to the Financial Times– The EU is being urged to rethink its China policy

While in no way exhaustive, the list should give the reader some sense of the uptick in belligerence that is presently aimed at Beijing. Hectoring China has become a full-time job which is not entirely unexpected as US-China “containment” policy dates back as far as the Cold War. What’s different now –as Biden’s 2022 National Security Strategy indicates– is that the US sees itself in the midst of a “great power struggle” in which the primary enemy is China who is regarded as “the only competitor with both the intent and, increasingly, the capability to reshape the international order.” (NSS) In other words, the Biden administration is admitting that we are at war with China and that we must use any means necessary to prevail in that conflict. As foreign policy analyst Andre Damon recently noted, the NSS is not a strategy for the defense of the Republic but a “blueprint for World War 3”.

Indeed, so containment alone will no longer suffice. What is required is increasingly provocative actions that will help to isolate, vilify and, ultimately, weaken China so that it becomes a “responsible stakeholder” in the “rules-based system”. In other words, Biden seeks a compliant vassal who will click his heels and do as he is told.

Sound familiar?

Biden’s onerous new export rules fit perfectly within this broader strategy of persistent confrontation and hostility. It also jibes with the oft-repeated neoconservative view that there is “no hope of coexistence with China as long as the Communist Party governs the country.” So, once again, we can see that the administration’s attacks on China are not merely designed to “contain” Chinese development but are also aimed at regime change. We believe that the recent ratcheting up of Biden’s Tech War has nothing to do with national security concerns (like “still-emerging fields of artificial intelligence and quantum computing”) but is actually another desperate attempt to preserve Washington’s loosening grip on global power. Here’s how author Jon Bateman summed it up in an article at Foreign Policy Magazine:

“The Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) announced new… limits on the export to China of advanced semiconductors, chip-making equipment, and supercomputer components. The controls… reveal a single-minded focus on thwarting Chinese capabilities at a broad and fundamental level.... the primary damage to China will be economic, on a scale well out of proportion to Washington’s cited military and intelligence concerns….This shift portends even harsher U.S. measures to come, not only in advanced computing but also in other sectors (like biotech, manufacturing, and finance) deemed strategic. The pace and details are uncertain, but the strategic objective and political commitment are now clearer than ever. China’s technological rise will be slowed at any price.” (“Biden is Now All-In on Taking Out China”, Jon Bateman, Foreign Policy Magazine)

There it is in black and white. The US is going to do whatever it takes to preserve its top spot in the global order “come hell or high water.” And Bateman is right, there will undoubtedly be “even harsher U.S. measures to come, not only in advanced computing but also in other sectors (like biotech, manufacturing, and finance)” And that, of course, means more sanctions and tariffs, more disruption to vital supply-lines, and higher costs for everything. If you thought the war with Russia impacted energy prices, “You ain’t seen nothing yet!” Winding back 40 years of globalization is going to be an excruciating experience tantamount to major dental surgery absent the Novocain. This is from Reuters:

“The U.S. is scrambling to tackle unintended consequences of its new export curbs on China’s chip industry that could inadvertently harm the semiconductor supply chain, people familiar with the matter said….as of midnight Tuesday, vendors also could not support, service and send non-U.S. supplies to the China-based factories without licenses if U.S. companies or people are involved. As a result, even basic items like light bulbs, springs, and bolts that keep tools running may not have been able to be shipped until vendors are granted licenses. And without the minute-by-minute support the foundries need, they could begin shutting down, one source said...

The U.S. planned to review licenses for non-Chinese factories in China hit by the new restrictions on a case-by-case basis, but even if approved that could create delays in shipments. Licenses for Chinese chip factories were likely to be denied.” (“U.S. scrambles to prevent export curbs on China chips from disrupting supply chain“, Reuters)

See what I mean? More supply-line disruption means higher prices, more battered household budgets, and fewer American families able to scrape by on their shrinking wages. Does anyone in Washington think about these things before they set the wheels in motion? The Biden administration is so obsessed with containing China, it is willing to send US standards-of-living off a cliff while bringing the world even closer to nuclear annihilation. Here’s more background from an article at the Asia Times:

The US measures won’t affect China’s sensors, satellite surveillance, military guidance and other strategic systems because the vast majority of military applications use older chips that China can produce at home…..The new US restrictions won’t stop China’s 2,000 surface-to-ship and surface-to-surface missiles from targeting US aircraft carriers in the Western Pacific, or US air bases in Guam and Okinawa, and they won’t prevent China’s more than 1,000 interceptors from aiming long-range air-to-air missiles at US planes…

It will also elicit an all-out Chinese effort to replace American chip-making and design technology. CapEx and R&D will shrink drastically in the US semiconductor industry while China allocates a massive budget to the sector.

On a five- or ten-year horizon, America’s technological edge in semiconductor design and fabrication is likely to vanish. As capital budgets collapse in the Western semiconductor industry, the damage to the US and other Western economies is likely to be greater than the harm inflicted on China...an all-out US ban on chip sales to China would eliminate 37% of the revenue of US semiconductor companies, lead to … the loss of 15,000 to 40,000 highly skilled direct jobs in the US semiconductor industry.”..

At worst, the damage to China’s economy is likely to be temporary… But the impact of the incipient depression in the Western semiconductor industry may well do permanent harm. (“China chip ban a US exercise in extreme self-harm”, Asia Times)

So, it could all backfire like the poorly thought-out sanctions on Russia that have thrust all Europe into an unprecedented energy crisis?

Yep, that’s what he’s saying. The new rules will cause China some short-term pain but—in the long run—they will only hurt American industry. It’s another classic example of ‘cutting off your nose to spite your face’, which appears to be Biden’s MO on a great number of issues.

It’s worth noting, that the Biden plan is another giant leap towards “de-globalization. (which is the reimposing of cross-border trade barriers in order to prevent further economic integration and lower costs.) For decades, business and political leaders have been touting the virtues of offshoring businesses and outsourcing jobs as if that was the true expression of God’s divine plan. But now that China’s growth threatens US global hegemony, foreign policy elites have done a quick 180. Now the globalization genie must be drawn-and-quartered and shoved back into his bottle so the West can preserve its primacy by effectively divorcing itself from the Chinese powerhouse.

By the way, “decoupling” is the new buzzword among foreign policy wonks. What the word implies is that the US must implement “some degree of technological separation from China, but shouldn’t go so far as to harm U.S. interests in the process.” In other words, Washington is on track to selectively terminate many areas of commerce with China while trying not to shoot itself in its own foot.

Good luck with that.

So, where is all of this heading, you ask?

To more conflict, more confrontation, higher prices, lower standards of living and, eventually, a disintegration of the prevailing order. That much is certain. The problem, of course, is that the China hawks now control the levers of power in Washington which means that the attacks on China will intensify, decoupling will accelerate, and a massively-destabilizing international crisis will soon follow.

The Biden administration is squandering American power on unilateral actions it cannot enforce and that will no have meaningful impact on China’s development. They’d be better off looking for ways to ease the transition to a new world, then pathetically trying to turn back the clock to the bygone “unipolar moment”.

eurasiareview.com · by Mike Whitney · October 19, 2022

14. Opinion | It’s time to stop calling Xi Jinping the ‘president’ of China

Conclusion:

In China’s own media, Xi is almost always identified as the party general secretary. Let’s follow their example and ditch the word “president.”

Opinion | It’s time to stop calling Xi Jinping the ‘president’ of China

The Washington Post · by Katherine Wilhelm · October 19, 2022

Katherine Wilhelm is executive director of the U.S.-Asia Law Institute and an adjunct professor at New York University School of Law.

In Chinese philosophy we find the concept of “rectifying names” (zheng ming). Confucius taught that failing to call things by their proper names is a failure to recognize reality, which leads to social and moral disorder.

He was right. One excellent case in point: what to call Xi Jinping.

This week, as the world’s media are following the Chinese Communist Party’s 20th National Congress reporters have been referring to Xi almost universally as China’s “president.” But that’s misleading. The congress is likely to give Xi an unusual third five-year term as the leader of the Communist Party. We know the title he holds as party leader: general secretary. And we also know that his immense power as the paramount leader of China derives from this party position, not from his concurrent position as head of state. So why on earth do we persist in calling him “president” instead of “general secretary”?

The position that we have come to call “president” in English is actually styled “state chairman” (guojia zhuxi) in the Chinese constitution. Mao Zedong held the same post for five years in the 1950s but gave it up because he was bored by the paperwork. The next “state chairman” was Liu Shaoqi, who died in detention during the Cultural Revolution, a year after being stripped of all his titles for alleged disloyalty to Mao.

The position fell into disuse but was revived in the 1982 constitution, with fewer powers. In a reflection of the party’s post-Mao backlash against excessive concentration of power, the chairmanship was held by a series of respected veteran members of the party politburo. In 1993, when China was trying to overcome the brief international chill caused by the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, then-party General Secretary Jiang Zemin grabbed the post, and it’s been held concurrently by the party general secretary ever since.

It is generally believed that CCP leaders find the title of president useful when dealing with foreign countries. They can meet as peers with other heads of state rather than with the heads of other countries’ ruling parties — who might not be the same person.

Indeed, the title was so valuable to Xi that in 2018, he had the constitution amended to remove the two-consecutive-term limit on the presidency. Everyone in China immediately understood this as a signal that Xi intended to remain party general secretary for more than two terms. The general secretary position had no such term limit.

The state post holds no charm of its own for an ambitious politician. Mao, not one to share power, was happy to give it up — perhaps because its powers are mostly ceremonial. We never see photos of Xi sitting in a presidential office doing presidential things. It’s not clear that there even is a presidential office per se, with its own staff. The only time we hear from Xi as president is when he signs one-sentence orders proclaiming new laws that have been approved by the National People’s Congress, appoints new ambassadors who have already been approved by the NPC, or takes similar ministerial actions. Virtually all of the powers conferred on the president by the constitution are shared with the NPC or its standing committee. Only the pomp and circumstance of international travel as head of state belong to Xi alone.

Foreign offices and media seem to assume that no harm comes from referring to the CCP general secretary almost exclusively by his state title. But the practice generates a lot of unnecessary confusion about how China’s political system works. Ultimate power in China is held by the Communist Party, with state officials operating solely as its agents. Indeed, under Xi, the party has boldly stepped out of the shadows, issuing more and more policy documents jointly with government bodies or entirely in its own name. When we insist on using Xi’s state title while ignoring his party title, we participate in a charade that pretends important decisions in China are made by the apparatus of the state, instead of by the party.

In China’s own media, Xi is almost always identified as the party general secretary. Let’s follow their example and ditch the word “president.”

The Washington Post · by Katherine Wilhelm · October 19, 2022

15. China's Accelerated Timeline to Take Taiwan Pushing Navy in the Pacific, Says CNO Gilday

"Project Overmatch."

Excerpts:

While Gilday would not say which countries the U.S. is sharing the Project Overmatch information with, Navy officials have repeatedly made the case for interoperability and operating interchangeably with nations like France and the United Kingdom.

Another avenue for the U.S. Navy’s work with allies and partners has been the Task Force 59 effort in the Middle East, where U.S. 5th Fleet commander Vice Adm. Brad Cooper is leading the charge on using unmanned systems to collect data for situational awareness in the region.

Gilday said that this work with allies and partners is helping the U.S. field unmanned capabilities within the next five years.

“I definitely see value in the key operational problem that Adm. Cooper’s getting after. We’re not just experimenting for experimentation’s sake. We are learning from what we’re doing. But the key operational problem we’re solving is increasing maritime domain awareness in an area of responsibility where we have fewer ships than we’d like to have,” the CNO said.

“And so we’re closing that gap with unmanned and we’re learning from it. And as a result of that, working closely with allies and partners, we’ll be able to field capability in this FYDP,” he added, referring to the Pentagon’s five-year budget outlook known as the Future Years Defense Program.

China's Accelerated Timeline to Take Taiwan Pushing Navy in the Pacific, Says CNO Gilday - USNI News

news.usni.org · by Mallory Shelbourne · October 19, 2022

Amphibious infantry fighting vehicle, soldiers assigned to an army brigade under PLA Eastern Theatre Command stay on alert and prepare for landing during a ferrying and assault wave formation training exercise on May 7, 2022. PLA Photo

Amid concerns that China could try to reunify the mainland with Taiwan faster than previously anticipated, the United States Navy is also eyeing a more immediate window for a potential conflict over the island, the service’s top officer said Wednesday.

The Navy is still assessing how China’s recent 20th Party Congress meeting affects its plans for the fleet, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Gilday said at a virtual event hosted by the Atlantic Council.

“It’s not just what President Xi says, but it’s how the Chinese behave and what they do. And what we’ve seen over the past 20 years is that they have delivered on every promise they’ve made earlier than they said they were going to deliver on it,” Gilday said when asked about the so-called “Davidson window,” referring to former U.S. Indo-Pacific Command chief Adm. Phil Davidson testifying to Congress in 2021 that China wanted the capability to seize Taiwan within the next six years.

“When we talk about the 2027 window, in my mind that has to be a 2022 window or a potentially a 2023 window. I can’t rule that out. I don’t mean at all to be alarmist by saying that, it’s just that we can’t wish that away,” the CNO added.

During the Chinese Communist Party meeting on Sunday, President Xi Jinping reaffirmed China’s ambitions to reunify Taiwan with mainland China. The next day, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the People’s Republic of China is moving on a faster timeline to take over the island.

U.S. Navy officials and members of Congress have invoked the 2027 timeline since Davidson’s March 2021 testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, when he said the threat of China taking Taiwan was more imminent.

During the conversation at the Atlantic Council, Gilday also made the case for why readiness is his top priority as CNO.

“We are still recovering with our carrier force as an example for back-to-back deployments that we did 10 years ago. And so we’re still catching up on deferred maintenance so that we can get 50 years out of those platforms. So I’m not going to come off of the maintenance piece in terms of an area where we can save money because we just can’t,” he said. “And I would say the same thing about supply parts – about missiles and magazines, about training and readiness for the force. I just don’t think we can skimp on that. There are lessons of the past as recent as 2017 with the collisions that have caused me to rethink anybody’s challenging the money we’re putting into readiness and training.”

Gilday also discussed the Navy’s Project Overmatch initiative – meant to connect platforms and systems to a network that can share and transmit targeting data.

“Some of our allies and partners – I’m not going to mention which ones – but those that we see a higher likelihood of interoperability in the near term, we are sharing our Project Overmatch work with them. They’re highly interested. Some of our heads of navy have been to San Diego to visit Adm. Small and his team at [Naval Information Warfare Systems Command],” the CNO said, referring to Rear Adm. Doug Small, who Gilday put in charge of leading the Project Overmatch effort.

“And so it’s not lost on me the power of including them. We have to be inclusive, or we’re not going to be able to fight together. So we’re moving forward I think at a good pace with our allies and partners in that effort. We’re not holding back.”

While Gilday would not say which countries the U.S. is sharing the Project Overmatch information with, Navy officials have repeatedly made the case for interoperability and operating interchangeably with nations like France and the United Kingdom.

Another avenue for the U.S. Navy’s work with allies and partners has been the Task Force 59 effort in the Middle East, where U.S. 5th Fleet commander Vice Adm. Brad Cooper is leading the charge on using unmanned systems to collect data for situational awareness in the region.

Gilday said that this work with allies and partners is helping the U.S. field unmanned capabilities within the next five years.

“I definitely see value in the key operational problem that Adm. Cooper’s getting after. We’re not just experimenting for experimentation’s sake. We are learning from what we’re doing. But the key operational problem we’re solving is increasing maritime domain awareness in an area of responsibility where we have fewer ships than we’d like to have,” the CNO said.

“And so we’re closing that gap with unmanned and we’re learning from it. And as a result of that, working closely with allies and partners, we’ll be able to field capability in this FYDP,” he added, referring to the Pentagon’s five-year budget outlook known as the Future Years Defense Program.

news.usni.org · by Mallory Shelbourne · October 19, 2022

16. Biden’s foreign policy may be better than it sounds

Excerpts:

Yet, the confrontational nature of the relationship between the U.S. and the West on one side and the two leading autocratic powers seeking to destroy them is unavoidable. “The United States is a global power with global interests. … If one region descends into chaos or is dominated by a hostile power, it will detrimentally impact our interests in the others,” the NSS says.

In announcing the new strategy approach, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said, “The post-Cold War era is definitively over.” The NSS favors, instead, “The era of competition.” Eventually, if actual conflict does not erupt first, they will have to recognize that, for China and Russia, we have long been in Cold War II. What Mark Twain said of Wagner’s music may now apply to Biden’s foreign policy: It is better than it sounds.

Biden’s foreign policy may be better than it sounds

BY JOSEPH BOSCO, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR - 10/18/22 10:00 AM ET

THE VIEWS EXPRESSED BY CONTRIBUTORS ARE THEIR OWN AND NOT THE VIEW OF THE HILL

The Hill · · October 18, 2022

President Biden and his national security team have come a long way in recognizing the growing danger presented by a risen China and a resurgent Russia. Despite earlier instincts, they now seem willing to confront the reality of a clear anti-Western strategic alliance between those two powers, including mutual support for open aggression in their respective regions.

The Interim National Security Strategic Guidance in March 2021 mostly reflected the priorities that prevailed during the eight years of the Obama-Biden administration. “Pandemics and other biological risks, the escalating climate crisis, cyber and digital threats, international economic disruptions, protracted humanitarian crises, violent extremism and terrorism, and the proliferation of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction all pose profound and, in some cases, existential dangers,” it warned.

This document also mentioned, almost in passing, “We face a world of rising nationalism, receding democracy, growing rivalry with China, Russia, and other authoritarian states.”

Use of the anodyne “rivalry” — which could apply equally to economic relations with U.S. friends and allies such as Canada or France — obscured the reality that with Russia and China, the interaction is potentially nuclear war.

The rivalry included earlier armed standoffs in Syria over Russia’s support for Bashar al-Assad, a proclaimed enemy of America. President Obama’s “red line” on Assad’s use of chemical weapons and his declaration that Assad “must go” were stymied by Vladimir Putin’s deployment of Russian forces.

Putin also triumphed with his invasion of Eastern Ukraine and Crimea in early 2014 when Obama and NATO chose not to enforce the security guarantees given to Ukraine in exchange for surrendering its nuclear weapons. (During the Bush administration, Putin already had gotten away with his 2008 invasion of Georgia — also “protected” by Western assurances.)

The 2021 Interim National Security Strategic Guidance did not mention Russia’s illegal occupation of the two NATO aspirants, nor that Putin’s expansionist appetite remained unsated. It said only, “Russia remains determined to enhance its global influence and play a disruptive role on the world stage.”

It described China as “rapidly becom[ing] more assertive. It is the only competitor potentially capable of combining its economic, diplomatic, military, and technological power to mount a sustained challenge to a stable and open international system.”

Of both countries, it said, “Our task is to ensure [America’s] advantages endure by … reinvigorating our leadership abroad.”

One other passage proved tragically unprophetic: “We will work to responsibly end America’s longest war in Afghanistan while ensuring that Afghanistan does not again become a safe haven for terrorist attacks against the United States.”

Before the administration was ready to release its final document, three major international events heavily influenced the report’s content and direction.

First was the badly botched withdrawal — i.e., abandonment — of Afghanistan in August 2021 that was anything but responsible and deeply damaged America’s reputation for reliability on the world stage. Biden belatedly recognized the urgent need to restore U.S. credibility elsewhere.

Two months later, during a CNN town hall, he unequivocally committed the U.S. to defend Taiwan. Over the next year, he repeated the pledge three more times. (On all four occasions, his staff said afterward that nothing had changed substantively in the U.S-Taiwan relationship or the U.S. policy of strategic ambiguity.)

Second was Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which loomed in late 2021. The Biden administration was unable to deter Putin by warning of punishing economic sanctions, and unwilling to threaten direct U.S. military intervention with a no-fly zone. Biden exclaimed, “That would be World War III.”

Instead, the administration provided Ukraine with a halting delivery of weapons, gradually increasing them in quality and quantity. While suffering great human and infrastructure costs, Ukraine’s bravery and skill using Western arms enabled it to hold its own — and even reverse Russia’s control of large parts of territory. Putin’s reckless threats to use nuclear weapons have not deterred Biden from continuing that level of support for Ukraine, though he continues to withhold long-range systems that could hasten the war’s end but might further “provoke” Putin.

Third, the visit to Taiwan by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), over the objections of both Beijing and Biden, precipitated the Fourth Taiwan Strait Crisis. China conducted its largest ever naval, air and missile exercises over and around Taiwan, effectively constituting a two-week blockade of the island. The only U.S. operational response, after the exercise concluded, was to send a Navy cruiser through the Taiwan Strait as a demonstration of freedom of navigation.

By last week, the administration was ready to release its 2022 National Security Strategy (NSS). It repeats Biden’s statement that “the world is at an inflection point,” noting that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine “shattered the peace of Europe and impacted stability everywhere,” and that China “harbors the intention and, increasingly, the capacity to reshape the international order in [its] favor.”

Says the NSS: “This strategy recognizes that the [People’s Republic of China] presents America’s most consequential geopolitical challenge. Although the Indo-Pacific is where its outcomes will be most acutely shaped, there are significant global dimensions to this challenge.” Nevertheless, it pledges, “the United States remains committed to managing the competition between our countries responsibly.”

The document is replete with references to “competition,” which might suggest an even milder interaction than that between “rivals” mentioned in the 2021 interim guidance. But the document’s nuances are more than semantic.

On the one hand, the NSS declares, “We will build the strongest and broadest possible coalition of nations that seek to cooperate with each other, while competing with those powers that offer a darker vision and thwarting their efforts to threaten our interests.”

But, to alleviate the concerns of those countries “uneasy with the competition between the United States and the world’s largest autocracies,” it states: “We also want to avoid a world in which competition escalates into a world of rigid blocs. We do not seek conflict or a new Cold War.”

The Clean Water Act turns 50 this week, it has never been more essential to our survival Biden’s making a troubling U-turn on the death penalty

Yet, the confrontational nature of the relationship between the U.S. and the West on one side and the two leading autocratic powers seeking to destroy them is unavoidable. “The United States is a global power with global interests. … If one region descends into chaos or is dominated by a hostile power, it will detrimentally impact our interests in the others,” the NSS says.

In announcing the new strategy approach, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said, “The post-Cold War era is definitively over.” The NSS favors, instead, “The era of competition.” Eventually, if actual conflict does not erupt first, they will have to recognize that, for China and Russia, we have long been in Cold War II. What Mark Twain said of Wagner’s music may now apply to Biden’s foreign policy: It is better than it sounds.

Joseph Bosco served as China country director for the secretary of Defense from 2005 to 2006 and as Asia-Pacific director of humanitarian assistance and disaster relief from 2009 to 2010. He served in the Pentagon when Vladimir Putin invaded Georgia and was involved in Department of Defense discussions about the U.S. response. Follow him on Twitter @BoscoJosephA.

The Hill · by Tobias Burns · October 18, 2022

17. Bombing to Lose

Excerpts:

But as Putin has made clear with his escalating nuclear rhetoric, the conflict potentially involves more than conventional weapons. Many in the West, up to and including the Biden administration, have appropriately raised the alarm about the growing threat of nuclear conflict. But Putin’s military advisers have likely explained to him that going nuclear will do little to change his losing game in Ukraine. Any use of a battlefield nuclear weapon would almost surely cause nuclear fallout to blow back over Russian military forces themselves, as well as over the civilians in Ukraine who support Russia. It would almost surely accelerate the collapse of Russia’s military positions in Ukraine and weaken Russia’s ability to defend its own territory from possible escalation. Put simply, Putin may now risk losing Russia’s positions in eastern Ukraine, but by going nuclear he could risk losing large parts of Russia itself. To paraphrase the German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, this would be committing suicide for fear of death.

Indeed, no matter how lethal its bombs against civilians, Russia cannot reverse its strategic failures in Ukraine, which are already playing out. Once Putin lost the gamble that Russia’s military had the wherewithal to defeat and occupy all of Ukraine in the February-March blitzkrieg campaign, and once Ukraine and the West responded by mobilizing a powerful counterbalancing coalition to defend the country, Russia’s options narrowed almost immediately. Since April, many in the West—and Putin and others in Russia—have simply been watching the inevitable aftermath of the initial set of miscalculations that led to that massive failure.

Putin can punish Ukrainians, as his air campaign has shown. But lacking an effective hammer-and-anvil strategy of his own, he is only losing faster. The only question is whether he will accept a new iron curtain separating Russia from Europe, or continue fighting pointlessly to the finish and risk losing parts of Russia.

Bombing to Lose

Why Airpower Cannot Salvage Russia’s Doomed War in Ukraine

Foreign Affairs · by Robert A. Pape · October 20, 2022

Beginning in early October, facing huge territorial loses and other reversals in Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin reached for a military strategy in which Russia should have a decisive advantage: airpower. In the most widespread such campaign to date, he ordered a blistering series of missile attacks against a dozen cities and electrical infrastructure across the country. Ukrainians were forced into basements and bomb shelters and some 30 precent of the country’s power generation capacity was knocked out, causing rolling blackouts that affected homes, hospitals, and even the basic functioning of the economy. In the weeks since, Russia has been sending waves of drones to attack residential buildings and offices in Kyiv and other cities. In effect, Putin was reminding the Ukrainian government of his ability to attack its main population centers—a threat that Ukraine, having scrapped Soviet-era bombers long ago, having no long-range rockets able to hit Russian cities, and having only a tiny number of ground attack aircraft—is unable to match. The goal, it seems, is to punish civilians, wearing them down in the hope of convincing their leaders to sue for peace.

But it is a strategy doomed to failure. As in earlier phases of the war, Russia’s supposed air superiority has done little to shift the overall momentum on the ground. Despite the significant damage they have caused, Putin’s airstrikes have failed to hinder Ukrainian advances in the east. And when they have reached civilian targets they have only served to strengthen Ukrainian resolve.

In fact, the paradoxical outcome of Russia’s bombing campaigns suggests a more important insight about airpower in contemporary warfare. For decades, bombing civilian areas—as ugly and immoral as it gets in war—has been one of the most common strategies that states have used to undermine the target population’s morale and induce the target government to surrender. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, and especially his recent escalation, has been no different. But as dozens of conflicts over the past century have demonstrated, using airpower against civilian targets is almost always doomed to failure. And as target countries like Ukraine obtain more advanced land-based munitions, the flaws of the airpower strategy have only become more apparent.

The Myth of Shattered Morale

Modern states have often sought to punish the civilian populations of their adversaries. Generally, they have done so as a cheap and easy way to compel enemy governments to make concessions, retreat, or even surrender outright. The most common air strategy is attacking civilians, either directly, by bombing residential areas, or indirectly, by damaging the economic infrastructure necessary for the distribution of food, the heating of homes, and the electrical powering of the civilian economy.

The idea got its start in World War I, when German leaders, desperate to knock the United Kingdom out of the war, launched waves of zeppelins—huge maneuverable balloons loaded with bombs—to attack London and other British cities. Later they added Gotha aerial bombers, killing many hundreds but producing no results, until finally calling off the punishment campaign in 1917. Other strategic-bombing advocates, like Italian General Giulio Douhet, wrote highly influential books claiming that huge air attacks on the enemy’s cities would cause civilians to rise up and demand that their government surrender, thus producing victory without the need for messy ground battles. The United Kingdom, Germany, and the United States rapidly expanded their air forces in the 1920s and 1930s, all basing their doctrines on the premise that direct or indirect attacks on civilians would be the key to winning modern wars.

These “get tough” strategies by governments have often been welcomed by their own publics, because they can produce dramatic immediate tactical results at little military cost to one’s own side and extract what is perceived as a measure of revenge for actions of the rival. Occasionally, strategic airpower has had notable results on the battlefield, as when the United Kingdom’s Royal Air Force suppressed tribal rebellions in Iraq in the 1920s and when German planes helped General Francisco Franco’s Nationalist army capture territory in the Spanish Civil War. Often overlooked in these cases, however, was that changes of the military balance on the ground, rather than punishment of civilians, played the decisive role.

A bombed population has never revolted against its own government.

As many other conflicts have shown, the gains of punishment strategies tend to be short-lived. Consider what happened when German bombers blasted London and other British cities in 1940–41, killing more than 50,000 people. Much like Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky today, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill refused to hide in bomb shelters and would walk through the rubble, leading through demonstrative action and rallying the whole of society to make the sacrifices necessary for ultimate victory. Instead of shattering morale, the blitz motivated the British to launch—with their American and Soviet allies—the counterattack that ultimately conquered Nazi Germany.

Indeed, inflicting punishment on civilian areas is not only immoral but has been shown to be singularly unproductive as a strategy for putting pressure on an adversary. Whether punishment is meted out massively or lightly, quickly or slowly, whether it is combined with diplomatic proposals or not, the historical record shows that harming civilians is also unlikely to compel rival states to surrender or to cut deals that effectively abandon territory that are important to the viability of the state or national identity.

Nor is there any case in which a bombing campaign has caused the targeted population to revolt against their own government. For example, in several major wars in the second half of the twentieth century, Washington sought to foment popular uprisings against enemy regimes by attacking civilian infrastructure. Thus, during the Korean War, the United States destroyed 90 percent of power generation in North Korea; in the Vietnam War, it knocked out nearly as much power in North Vietnam; and in the Gulf War, American air attacks disrupted 90 percent of power generation in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. But in none of these cases did the population rise up. Strikingly, the United States did not bother attacking Iraq’s electric power grid or civilians during its 2003 invasion. Concentrating instead on effective military strategy, it was able to easily defeat Iraq’s army and topple the Saddam dictatorship in six weeks.

In World War II, of course, the effects of Allied bombardment of Germany and Japan were much more extreme. Cities were firebombed and destroyed by U.S. and British forces; more than 300,000 German civilians and 700,000 Japanese civilians were killed by conventional munitions—and more than 20 percent of each country’s population was made homeless. Yet even then, there was no public pressure on either regime to surrender. If modern nation-states in fights for the control of their homeland can withstand that, there is little reason to think that Russia’s relatively less punishing bombardment of civilians in Ukraine will cause Ukrainians or their leaders to give in.

Hammer Requires Anvil

By contrast, airpower has proved effective when used to achieve military objectives rather than to punish civilians. In war after war, theater airpower—smashing enemy ground forces and weakening them to the point where one’s own ground forces can dominate a zone of conflict—can provide a powerful tool of coercion when combined with effective land power. In 1972, the United States compelled North Vietnam to cease conventional aggression by coordinating its massive Linebacker bombing campaign with South Vietnamese army forces. In 1991, the United States successfully compelled Saddam to withdraw from Kuwait by combining the first modern precision air campaign with a coalition of ground forces. And the absence of theater airpower can seal the fate of a friendly army, as the United States discovered when Congress blocked the use of U.S. airpower in Vietnam in 1974 and Saigon fell the following year. The lesson was repeated in Afghanistan, with the U.S. withdrawal of theater airpower prior to the collapse of the Afghan army in the summer of 2021.

The combined use of theater airpower and friendly ground forces has a clear logic. Once wars begin in earnest, achieving victory becomes paramount. In war, successful leaders soon discover—sometimes after exhausting cheaper but less effective strategies—that the key to successful coercion is denial. That is, successful leaders come to realize that there is no realistic option other than directly thwarting the enemy’s ability to take or hold territory. In other words, the coercing state succeeds to the extent that it can prevent its opponent from achieving its military objectives.

In actual warfare, denial works best via a “hammer and anvil” strategy, in which the combined force of airpower and ground power puts the enemy in a military catch-22: if the enemy concentrates its ground forces in large numbers to form thick and overlapping fields of fire, in order to best withstand a ground assault, those forces will become vulnerable from the air, and the airpower hammer can smash them to bits. But if the enemy disperses its ground forces across a wide area to make effective airstrikes more difficult, it risks leaving them thinly scattered and exposed to easy defeat on the ground, allowing friendly ground forces to overwhelm isolated enemy units, easily break through weak enemy lines, and encircle vast portions of the enemy forces.

From its own previous wars, Russia should have understood the need for combining air and ground power. Consider its supposed successes in punishing civilians in Chechnya during the 1990s or in Aleppo during the Syrian Civil War. Although it is true that Russian military forces extracted a heavy price against civilian populations in both cases, what ultimately mattered was the balance of forces on the ground. In Chechnya, Russia blasted civilians in Grozny in 1994 but its ground forces were soon defeated by the rebels, and the Russian military successfully conquered the republic by invading with a much larger ground army in 1999. In Aleppo, it was the forces of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad and of Hezbollah that ultimately made the difference, taking rapid control of areas bombed by Russia. Take away these well-equipped ground forces and Russia’s air campaigns would almost certainly have failed.

From the Ground Up

Much has been made in recent years of advances in precision weaponry, ostensibly strengthening the hand of airpower. Yet today’s precision weapons have not proved any more effective in coercing enemies by destroying political and economic targets in civilian areas, since it has long been possible to destroy such targets with large numbers of “dumb” bombs. Nor have precision weapons made strategies targeting the enemy’s leadership any more effective. Such efforts have failed repeatedly against a variety of enemies, including against Muammar al-Qaddafi in 1986; Saddam Hussein in 1991, 1998, and 2003 (he was finally captured by ground forces); and Hezbollah leaders in 2006.

Moreover, nothing motivates an enemy’s civilian base more than killing its leader. In April 1996, Russia used air-to-ground missiles to assassinate the Chechen leader Dzhokhar Dudayev, only to see a new, more energetic leader take over, kick Russia’s ground forces out of the republic, and win control when Russia invaded with massive ground forces three years later. There are exceptions to this pattern, but they only prove the rule: aerial targeting of al Qaeda leaders in Pakistan from 2001 to 2010 succeeded in weakening the group, precisely because it had so little indigenous support in Pakistan.

A HIMARS missile battery has the combat power of several F16s.

The true innovation of precision airpower has been to enhance the value of the hammer-and-anvil strategy. Today’s precision weapons allow airpower to destroy massed enemy ground troops more easily and to attack other smaller but still essential battlefield targets. Until the advent of these weapons, airpower could rarely destroy tanks, trucks, command posts, or bridges used to supply fielded forces, even with thousands of bombs aimed at these tiny targets. Now, satellites, advanced sensors, and various manned and unmanned bombing platforms can reliably locate concentrated enemy forces for precision strikes to destroy.

Nowhere has this precision revolution been more evident than in Ukraine’s military forces. Even before the arrival of advanced precision weapons from the West in the early summer, Ukrainian forces had been greatly strengthened by the fighting resolve that Russia’s failed invasion strategy had provoked. Since then, Ukrainian forces have been able to use hammer-and-anvil tactics splendidly to Kyiv’s advantage—not only in defending against Russia’s initial incursion but also in rolling back Russian forces, even in areas of the east that were far better defended. These tactics have been especially effective against Russia’s most dug-in, best defensively fortified ground forces in eastern zones of the country. Ukraine’s triumphs in these situations have been made possible not by tactical airpower but by advanced ground-based weaponry, such as the HIMARS missile system. It is not a stretch to consider each HIMARS missile battery—the United States has provided Ukraine with 16 of them, with another 18 on the way—as having the air-to-ground combat power and effectiveness of several F-16 aircraft. With the flexibility and range to coordinate with Ukrainian ground forces, they can be used against Russian forces in a given area wherever they may be.

Just as important, Russia has made clear through its battlefield performance that it has hardly begun to move into the precision age. The world has witnessed how poorly a great power with a huge but still largely “dumb bomb” military may fare against a much smaller state with access to precision-age weapons. The Russian military has been losing territory steadily for many months—in March, April, and May near Kyiv and the border with Belarus, and since the early summer in the territories it had newly seized in the east. There is no obvious reason to think that the Russian military’s pre-February 2022 positions in the east and Crimea are not ultimately vulnerable as well.

Losing Ukraine, or Losing Russia?

Given the failure of Putin’s campaign of civilian punishment and the growing effectiveness of Ukraine’s HIMARS-assisted ground offensive, many commentators have begun to ask how the war might end. History shows that when an opponent is persuaded that specific territorial objectives cannot be achieved, it is likely to concede that territory, either tacitly or formally, rather than suffer further pointless losses. But this form of coercion—getting an opponent to recognize that prolonging a war is futile—is rarely cheap or easy. Even successful coercion usually takes nearly as long and costs nearly as much as fighting a war to a finish. This lesson applies readily to the war in Ukraine today.

In view of current military realities, those who are calling for the United States and its allies to persuade Ukraine to accept a deal in the east are effectively asking the West to bail out Russia. This is unrealistic for two reasons. First, Ukraine will not and should not agree. Its forces have the momentum and have every reason to expect more territorial gains, and it would be foolish to force them to abandon a winning hand. Second, Russia might accept a deal in the near term but could easily violate it months or years from now. In short, any deal in eastern Ukraine is unlikely to be credible unless it can be backed up by powerful reinforcing mechanisms. These mechanisms would need to include agreements to respect international borders with the presence of third-party oversight, as well as military forces, and would likely be necessary to stabilize any end to the war, negotiated or not.

In the meantime, the United States and NATO are right to reinforce support and provide additional air defenses for Ukraine. These steps can mitigate some of the harm to civilians of Russia’s attacks and demonstrate that attacking urban centers only hardens the resolve of the West and Ukraine. Ultimately, however, an end to the war while the current regime remains in power in Russia would likely require the establishment of a hard militarized border, in order to keep Russia away from potential conquests in Ukraine and other parts of eastern Europe. As with the Iron Curtain during the Cold War, such a fortified boundary would serve the crucial purpose of preventing advances in both directions. It would also serve to deter any conventional offensive by either side, by denying both Russia and the West the prospect of rapid territorial incursions.

By going nuclear, Putin would be committing suicide for fear of death.

But as Putin has made clear with his escalating nuclear rhetoric, the conflict potentially involves more than conventional weapons. Many in the West, up to and including the Biden administration, have appropriately raised the alarm about the growing threat of nuclear conflict. But Putin’s military advisers have likely explained to him that going nuclear will do little to change his losing game in Ukraine. Any use of a battlefield nuclear weapon would almost surely cause nuclear fallout to blow back over Russian military forces themselves, as well as over the civilians in Ukraine who support Russia. It would almost surely accelerate the collapse of Russia’s military positions in Ukraine and weaken Russia’s ability to defend its own territory from possible escalation. Put simply, Putin may now risk losing Russia’s positions in eastern Ukraine, but by going nuclear he could risk losing large parts of Russia itself. To paraphrase the German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, this would be committing suicide for fear of death.

Indeed, no matter how lethal its bombs against civilians, Russia cannot reverse its strategic failures in Ukraine, which are already playing out. Once Putin lost the gamble that Russia’s military had the wherewithal to defeat and occupy all of Ukraine in the February-March blitzkrieg campaign, and once Ukraine and the West responded by mobilizing a powerful counterbalancing coalition to defend the country, Russia’s options narrowed almost immediately. Since April, many in the West—and Putin and others in Russia—have simply been watching the inevitable aftermath of the initial set of miscalculations that led to that massive failure.

Putin can punish Ukrainians, as his air campaign has shown. But lacking an effective hammer-and-anvil strategy of his own, he is only losing faster. The only question is whether he will accept a new iron curtain separating Russia from Europe, or continue fighting pointlessly to the finish and risk losing parts of Russia.

ROBERT A. PAPE is the author of Bombing to Win: Air Power and Coercion in War and a Professor at the University of Chicago, where he heads the Chicago Project on Security and Terrorism.

Foreign Affairs · by Robert A. Pape · October 20, 2022

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David Maxwell

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RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, OCTOBER 19

Oct 19, 2022 - Press ISW

CDS Daily brief (19.10.22) CDS comments on key events

Russian forces again attacked Ukrainian civilians and critical infrastructure during the night and the day of October 19.

Occupied territories:

Operational situation

Kharkiv direction

Donetsk direction

Zaporizhzhia direction

Tavriysk direction

Azov-Black Sea Maritime Operational Area:

Russian operational losses from 24.02 to 19.10

Ukraine, general news

International diplomatic aspect

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