Quotes of the Day:

“You can ignore the reality, but you cannot ignore the consequences of ignoring that reality.”

- Ayn Rand

“All that is gold, does not glitter, not all those who wander are lost; the old that is strong does not wither, deep roots are not reached by the frost. From the ashes, a fire shall be woken, a light from the shadows shall spring; renewed shall be blade that was broken, the crownless again shall be king. 

- J.R.R. Tolkien

"You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read." 

- James Baldwin

1. Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, September 26, 2023

2. Exploring the Ukrainian Way of War by Mick Ryan

3. The War in Ukraine Is Also a Giant Arms Fair

4. CIA builds its own ChatGPT-style AI tool to rival Chinese intelligence

5. China says drills near Taiwan target 'arrogance' of separatists

6. Air Force shakes up military education in bid to build better leaders

7. U.S. General Met Notorious Libyan Warlord

8. The U.S. Government Should Stockpile More Critical Minerals

9. America Needs a National Maritime Strategy

10. Pentagon Mum on Biden Appointee's Alleged Membership in Iranian Influence Network

11. Nepal Refuses To Join China’s Security Alliance – Analysis

12. Nato is weakening America

13. Iraq as It Is

14. Landmines in Ukraine: Lessons for China and Taiwan

15. House adopts MTG amendment to slash Lloyd Austin salary in ‘dead on arrival’ defense bill

16. Palantir wins $250 million US Army AI research contract

17. China unveils its vision for a new world order

18. Military Educators Converge on New Workshop Series to Discuss Resilience in Evolving Clima​te

19. How is the falling confidence in America’s military creating a real crisis?

20. How the U.S. Created Its Own Reality

21. US ‘strategic ambiguity’ invites war over Taiwan

1. Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, September 26, 2023

Maps/graphics/citations: https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-september-26-2023

Key Takeaways:

• The tactical situation in Verbove remains unclear as Ukrainian forces continued offensive operations in western Zaporizhia Oblast on September 26.
• Likely degraded elements of the Russian 58th Combined Arms Army’s 42nd Motorized Rifle Division are increasingly counterattacking in the Novoprokopivka area, suggesting that Ukrainian counteroffensive operations may have degraded relatively more elite Russian Airborne (VDV) elements that were responsible for counterattacking in the area.
• Elements of the 42nd Motorized Rifle Division are reportedly deployed as far back as Tokmak, continuing to suggest that the Russian command has not manned the multi-echeloned defense in southern Ukraine in depth.
• Interethnic tensions appear to be sowing division between elements of the Russian 42nd Guards Motorized Rifle Regiment defending against the Ukrainian counteroffensive in western Zaporizhia Oblast.
• Interethnic tensions may also threaten Chechen Republic Head Ramzan Kadyrov’s broader standing within the Russian political sphere amid an ongoing controversy surrounding Kadyrov’s son.
• Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu discussed ongoing Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) efforts to increase Russian Airborne (VDV) Forces’ combat capabilities and add elements similar to those normally found in motorized rifle units to the VDV, likely to better align VDV elements with their current combat roles in Ukraine.
• Russian forces conducted a series of Shahed-131/136 drone strikes on port and military targets in Ukraine on the night of September 25-26.
• Russian and Western sources largely claimed that Russian Black Sea Fleet (BSF) Commander Admiral Viktor Sokolov is alive after the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) posted footage of Sokolov allegedly attending a meeting on September 26, although the situation remains unclear at this time.
• The Russian MoD has reportedly recruited some former Wagner Group personnel for MoD-affiliated private military companies (PMCs) fighting in Ukraine, while negotiations between the reported Wagner leadership and the Russian National Guard (Rosgvardia) have allegedly stalled over disagreements concerning Wagner’s independence and cohesion.
• Russian forces conducted offensive operations along the Kupyansk-Svatove-Kreminna line, near Bakhmut, along the Avdiivka-Donetsk City line, and in western Zaporizhia Oblast and reportedly advanced in some areas on September 26.

RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, SEPTEMBER 26, 2023

Sep 26, 2023 - ISW Press

Download the PDF

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, September 26, 2023

Riley Bailey, Christina Harward, Grace Mappes, Angelica Evans and Frederick W. Kagan

September 26, 2023, 8:35pm ET 

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

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

Correction: We are correcting this report to note that the additional parachute regiment is subordinate to the Russian 98th Guards Airborne (VDV) Division, based in Ivanovo Oblast. We previously reported that the additional regiment is subordinate to the Russian 106th Guards Airborne (VDV) Division. We apologize for the error. 

Note: The data cut-off for this product was 3pm ET on September 26. ISW will cover subsequent reports in the September 27 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment.

The tactical situation in Verbove remains unclear as Ukrainian forces continued offensive operations in western Zaporizhia Oblast on September 26. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces continued offensive operations in the Melitopol (western Zaporizhia Oblast) direction and offensive actions in the Bakhmut direction.[1] A Kremlin-affiliated milblogger claimed that Ukrainian forces reached the northern outskirts of Novoprokopivka (13km south of Orikhiv).[2] Russian sources have still not directly addressed a claim from a source reportedly affiliated with the Russian Airborne (VDV) Forces that Ukrainian forces control half of Verbove (18km southeast of Orikhiv) as of September 24.[3] ISW has not observed evidence of such a Ukrainian advance, and the source reporting it has a very small following. It is still noteworthy that other VDV-connected sources have not responded to these claims.

Russian President Vladimir Putin awarded the Russian 58th Combined Arms Army (CAA) the “Guards” honorific on September 26.[4] The Russian 58th CAA (Southern Military District) has been responsible for the ongoing Russian defense against Ukrainian counteroffensive operations in southern Ukraine.[5]

Likely degraded elements of the Russian 58th Combined Arms Army’s 42nd Motorized Rifle Division are increasingly counterattacking in the Novoprokopivka area, suggesting that Ukrainian counteroffensive operations may have degraded relatively more elite Russian Airborne (VDV) elements that were responsible for counterattacking in the area. Elements of the 42nd Motorized Rifle Division’s 70th and 71st Guards Motorized Rifle Regiments have increasingly engaged in limited counterattacks near Novoprokopivka in the past week, and a Russian milblogger claimed that elements of the 42nd Motorized Rifle Division pushed Ukrainian forces from positions near Novoprokopivka on September 25.[6] Elements of the 42nd Motorized Rifle Division's 70th, 71st, and 291st Motorized Rifle Regiments routinely engaged in combat engagements and counterattacks against Ukrainian forces at the forwardmost Russian defensive positions in the Orikhiv area before withdrawing behind the Russian defensive layer between Verbove and Solodka Balka (20km south of Orikhiv) in mid-to-late August.[7] Russian forces laterally redeployed elements of the more elite 7th and 76th VDV Divisions to the Orikhiv direction in early-to-mid August to counterattack against a widening Ukrainian breach in the area, which may have provided these elements of the 42nd Motorized Rifle Division respite from hostilities.[8] Elements of the 70th Motorized Rifle Regiment may have conducted one of the few unit rotations that ISW has observed on this sector of the front, possibly allowing these elements to partially reconstitute.[9]

The 70th and 71st Motorized Rifle Regiments’ involvement in counterattacks around Novoprokopivka suggests that Ukrainian counteroffensive operations may have significantly degraded the combat capabilities of elements of the 7th and 76th VDV Divisions and that these VDV elements can no longer conduct all counterattacks along the entire Ukrainian breach in the Orikhiv direction. The Russian command may have committed the 70th and 71st Motorized Rifle Regiments to defending and counterattacking in the Novoprokopivka area to allow VDV elements to prioritize defensive operations on the western and eastern flanks of the Ukrainian salient in the Orikhiv direction.[10] It is also possible that elements of the 70th and 71st Motorized Rifle Regiments have held positions near Novoprokopivka since withdrawing from positions further north and are now engaging Ukrainian forces because the Ukrainian advance has reached the outskirts of Novoprokopivka. Roughly a month of respite and possible reconstitution are unlikely to offset the significant degradation that elements of the 70th and 71st Motorized Rifle Regiments suffered while defending earlier in the counteroffensive. Elements of the 810th Naval Infantry Brigade (Black Sea Fleet) similarly defended to hold forwardmost defensive positions earlier in the counteroffensive, and Ukrainian counteroffensive operations recently reportedly rendered these elements combat ineffective.[11] The Russian command risks rendering the already degraded elements of the 70th and 71st Motorized Rifle Regiments combat ineffective if they heavily commit these elements to counterattacking the Ukrainian advance near Novoprokopivka.

Elements of the 42nd Motorized Rifle Division are reportedly deployed as far back as Tokmak, continuing to suggest that the Russian command has not manned the multi-echeloned defense in southern Ukraine in depth. Russian sources reported on September 25 and 26 that elements of the 71st Motorized Rifle Regiment’s 3rd Battalion were involved in an altercation with military police from the 70th Motorized Rifle Regiment in occupied Tokmak.[12] The presence of elements of the 70th and 71st Motorized Rifle Regiments in Tokmak suggests that Russian forces have deployed elements of these regiments throughout the multi-echeloned defense between the current frontline and Tokmak. Russian forces, however, appear to be continuing to deploy most of their combat power in western Zaporizhia Oblast to immediate frontline areas.[13] The deployment of the 70th and 71st Motorized Rifle Regiments as far back as Tokmak suggests that elements of the same Russian formations and units defending at forward positions are holding positions, likely in smaller numbers, in subsequent defensive layers. It is possible that unobserved elements of other Russian units and formations hold positions at rear defensive positions, although the current Russian manpower commitment to holding positions on the frontline indicates that this is unlikely.

Interethnic tensions appear to be sowing division between elements of the Russian 42nd Guards Motorized Rifle Regiment defending against the Ukrainian counteroffensive in western Zaporizhia Oblast. Arsen Temiraev, a mobilized serviceman from the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania serving with the 70th Guards Motorized Rifle Regiment, posted a video on September 25 alleging that Russian military police of the 70th Regiment beat Temiraev and two other soldiers of the 71st Guards Motorized Rifle Regiment’s 3rd Battalion in Tokmak on September 24.[14] Temiraev claimed that the military police asked about his ethnicity before telling Temiraev that “Russia is for Russians.” Temiraev claimed that the military police beat him and the other servicemen because a Tokmak local alleged that the soldiers had sexually assaulted children, a crime that Temiraev denied having committed. Temiraev complained that he thought the “Nazis were on the other [Ukrainian] side, [but] it turns out they [the Nazis] are among us.”[15] North Ossetian-Alanian Republic Head Sergey Menyailo responded on September 26, claiming that the elements of the “Storm Ossetia” and “Alania” volunteer battalions in the area verified the incident.[16] Menyailo reported the incident to the Southern Military District command, which informed the commander of the 58th Combined Arms Army, and called the incident unacceptable towards any Russian soldier. Interethnic tensions between Russian units operating in the frontline and near the rear of western Zaporizhia Oblast may threaten the integrity of Russian defenses and unit cohesion amidst recent Ukrainian gains in the area.

Interethnic tensions may also threaten Chechen Republic Head Ramzan Kadyrov’s broader standing within the Russian political sphere amid an ongoing controversy surrounding Kadyrov’s son. Kadyrov posted footage on September 25 of his son, Adam Kadyrov, beating a detained man accused of burning a Quran, and Ramzan Kadyrov praised his son for the beating.[17] The incident prompted varied condemnation and calls for investigations from Russian officials. Russian Human Rights Council (HRC) Head Valery Fadeev stated that burning the Quran is a serious crime but that officials must follow rules for detaining suspects, while HRC member Eva Merkacheva called for an investigation and called the situation a “challenge to the entire legal system of Russia.”[18] Merkacheva levied a thinly veiled criticism of the Chechen Republic, claiming that “in a particular region [Chechen Republic] they [Chechen officials] have shown that they commit crimes and nothing will happen to them about it.”[19] Other Russian officials, including Human Rights Commissioner Tatyana Moskalkova, called for Adam Kadyrov to answer for his crime in a Russian court.[20] Ramzan Kadyrov reportedly responded to a journalist’s request for a follow up and reportedly claimed that he had not witnessed the attack and that Adam Kadyrov is “independent and temperamental.”[21] Ramzan Kadyrov reportedly praised Adam Kadyrov’s behavior and stated he did not punish his son, but said that Adam Kadyrov will be punished to the fullest extent of Russian law if a Russian court convicts him.[22] ISW has long observed tensions between Chechen and non-Chechen officials and military units, and senior Russian officials’ emotional reactions suggest that Kadyrov’s political standing may be insufficient to protect his son from the consequences of this situation.[23]

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu discussed ongoing Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) efforts to increase Russian Airborne (VDV) Forces’ combat capabilities and add elements similar to those normally found in motorized rifle units to the VDV, likely to better align VDV elements with their current combat roles in Ukraine. Shoigu stated during a speech to the Russian Defense Ministry Board on September 26 that the Russian MoD is implementing measures to increase the Russian VDV’s combat potential by creating new airborne assault formations and increasing the VDV’s reconnaissance, strike, and fire capabilities.[24] Shoigu stated that the Russian MoD has nearly finished forming a fifth Russian VDV division, the 104th Airborne Assault (VDV) Division, and an additional parachute regiment subordinate to the Russian 98th Guards Airborne (VDV) Division, based in Ivanovo Oblast.[25] Shoigu stated that the Russian MoD plans for all Russian VDV divisions to have a logistics brigade and repair and restoration battalions by the end of 2023.[26] Shoigu stated that Russian VDV divisions will be “completed” with an artillery brigade but did not specify a time frame for this addition.[27] These additional elements will bring Russian VDV divisions into closer alignment with the force composition of a typical Russian motorized rifle division.[28] Shoigu did not state that Russian VDV divisions would receive tank regiments, which are common in Russian motorized rifle divisions.[29] These additional units will likely allow the Russian military to use Russian VDV divisions almost interchangeably with motorized rifle divisions in the future, and VDV elements in Ukraine have been increasingly operating as combat infantry similar to motorized rifle divisions.[30] The Russian MoD’s provision of additional elements to Russian VDV units and formations serving in Ukraine is a recognition of the role Russian VDV forces are currently playing in Ukraine and highlights the non-standard way in which the Russian military is using these forces. These Russian formations have become “airborne” in name only, and it is not clear when the Russian MoD intends for them to take to the skies again.

Russian forces conducted a series of Shahed-131/136 drone strikes on port and military targets in Ukraine on the night of September 25-26. Ukrainian military officials reported that Russian forces launched 38 drones from Krasnodar Krai and Cape Chauda, Crimea, targeting Ukrainian port and border infrastructure and that Ukrainian air defenses shot down 26 drones.[31] Russian forces hit the Orlivka-Isaccea ferry crossing that connects Odesa Oblast and Romania, and Ukrainian Southern Operational Command Spokesperson Captain First Rank Nataliya Humenyuk denied speculations that the Russian drones crossed into Romanian territory.[32] Geolocated footage shows that Russian forces destroyed a Ukrainian MiG-29 fighter aircraft at the Kulbakino airfield in Mykolaiv Oblast.[33]

Russian and Western sources largely claimed that Russian Black Sea Fleet (BSF) Commander Admiral Viktor Sokolov is alive after the Russian MoD posted footage of Sokolov allegedly attending a meeting on September 26, although the situation remains unclear at this time. Russian and Western sources largely speculated that footage posted by the Russian MoD on September 26 of Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu’s remarks at the Russian MoD Board meeting purportedly shows Sokolov attending via teleconference.[34] The Ukrainian Special Operations Forces previously reported on September 25 that the Ukrainian strike on the BSF headquarters in Sevastopol on September 22 killed Sokolov, and Russian officials have not yet issued a response confirming or denying reports of Sokolov’s death.[35] The Ukrainian Special Operations Forces stated on September 26 that it was clarifying information about Sokolov’s possible death but that available sources indicate that he is dead.[36] Kremlin Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov stated on September 26 that he had not received any information from the Russian MoD about the matter and that the Kremlin had nothing to say as this is “solely [the Russian MoD’s] prerogative.”[37] ISW is unprepared at this time to make an assessment about the authenticity of the Russian MoD’s footage of Sokolov or about Sokolov’s status on Earth.

The Russian MoD has reportedly recruited some former Wagner Group personnel for MoD-affiliated private military companies (PMCs) fighting in Ukraine, while negotiations between the reported Wagner leadership and the Russian National Guard (Rosgvardia) have allegedly stalled over disagreements concerning Wagner’s independence and cohesion. A reported Wagner-affiliated source claimed on September 26 that the Wagner Group is still operating in Africa and Belarus and that there are no plans to close the organization.[38] A Kremlin-affiliated milblogger claimed that former Wagner personnel that left the organization with Andrey Troshev (known under the callsign “Sedoy”) after Prigozhin’s rebellion have joined the MoD-affiliated “Redut” and “Volunteer Corps” PMCs and have begun to redeploy to the Bakhmut area in Ukraine.[39] The milblogger claimed that Troshev is trying to recruit Wagner personnel who are currently operating in Belarus, Africa, and the Middle East for Russian MoD-affiliated PMCs. The milblogger also claimed that Anton Yelizarov (known as “Lotos”) is now the head of Wagner and is negotiating with Rosgvardia about the inclusion of Wagner units within Rosgvardia. Yelizarov is reportedly resisting Rosgvardia’s condition that Wagner personnel sign individual contracts, which the milblogger complained would allow Rosgvardia to divide the Wagner units and send them to various areas. ISW previously reported that Russian State Duma deputies will reportedly propose a bill allowing Rosgvardia to include volunteer formations, and Yelizarov is likely pushing for Wagner personnel to be considered a distinct Rosgvardia volunteer formation.[40]

Key Takeaways:

• The tactical situation in Verbove remains unclear as Ukrainian forces continued offensive operations in western Zaporizhia Oblast on September 26.
• Likely degraded elements of the Russian 58th Combined Arms Army’s 42nd Motorized Rifle Division are increasingly counterattacking in the Novoprokopivka area, suggesting that Ukrainian counteroffensive operations may have degraded relatively more elite Russian Airborne (VDV) elements that were responsible for counterattacking in the area.
• Elements of the 42nd Motorized Rifle Division are reportedly deployed as far back as Tokmak, continuing to suggest that the Russian command has not manned the multi-echeloned defense in southern Ukraine in depth.
• Interethnic tensions appear to be sowing division between elements of the Russian 42nd Guards Motorized Rifle Regiment defending against the Ukrainian counteroffensive in western Zaporizhia Oblast.
• Interethnic tensions may also threaten Chechen Republic Head Ramzan Kadyrov’s broader standing within the Russian political sphere amid an ongoing controversy surrounding Kadyrov’s son.
• Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu discussed ongoing Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) efforts to increase Russian Airborne (VDV) Forces’ combat capabilities and add elements similar to those normally found in motorized rifle units to the VDV, likely to better align VDV elements with their current combat roles in Ukraine.
• Russian forces conducted a series of Shahed-131/136 drone strikes on port and military targets in Ukraine on the night of September 25-26.
• Russian and Western sources largely claimed that Russian Black Sea Fleet (BSF) Commander Admiral Viktor Sokolov is alive after the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) posted footage of Sokolov allegedly attending a meeting on September 26, although the situation remains unclear at this time.
• The Russian MoD has reportedly recruited some former Wagner Group personnel for MoD-affiliated private military companies (PMCs) fighting in Ukraine, while negotiations between the reported Wagner leadership and the Russian National Guard (Rosgvardia) have allegedly stalled over disagreements concerning Wagner’s independence and cohesion.
• Russian forces conducted offensive operations along the Kupyansk-Svatove-Kreminna line, near Bakhmut, along the Avdiivka-Donetsk City line, and in western Zaporizhia Oblast and reportedly advanced in some areas on September 26.

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

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

Russian Main Effort – Eastern Ukraine

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

Russian sources claimed that Russian forces conducted ground attacks along the Kupyansk-Svaotve-Kreminna line on September 26 but did not make any confirmed advances. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces did not conduct any assaults in the Kupyansk and Lyman directions.[41] A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces captured unspecified positions near Kyslivka (20km southeast of Kupyansk) and attacked near Dibrova (7km southwest of Kreminna) and the Serebryanske forest area (11km south of Kreminna).[42] A Russian news aggregator claimed that Russian forces attacked near Dvorichna (17km northeast of Kupyansk), Petropavlivka (7km east of Kupyansk), Synkivka, Novoyehorivka (16km southwest of Svatove), and Bilohorivka (13km south of Kreminna) on September 25.[43]

The Russian MoD claimed on September 26 that Russian forces repelled Ukrainian attacks near Kuzmyne (3km southwest of Kreminna) and Dibrova.[44] A Russian news aggregator claimed that Russian forces also repelled Ukrainian attacks near the Serebryanske forest area on September 25.[45]

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

Ukrainian forces continued offensive actions in the Bakhmut area on September 26 and reportedly advanced. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces continued offensive actions in the Bakhmut direction, and Ukrainian Eastern Group of Forces Spokesperson Captain Ilya Yevlash stated that Ukrainian forces were successful near Ivanivske (6km west of Bakhmut), Klishchiivka (7km southwest of Bakhmut), Odradivka (7km south of Bakhmut), and Zaitseve (20km south of Bakhmut).[46] Russian milbloggers claimed that Ukrainian forces continued assaults near Klishchiivka and that Russian forces withdrew from positions along a section of the railway line northeast of Klishchiivka.[47] A prominent Russian milblogger claimed that small Ukrainian assault groups continue periodic assaults along the entire Klishchiivka-Andriivka-Kurdyumivka line (up to 13km southwest of Bakhmut).[48]

The Ukrainian General Staff reported on September 26 that elements of the Russian 200th Separate Motorized Rifle Brigade (14th Army Corps, Northern Fleet) operating on Bakhmut’s northern flank are suffering heavy casualties.[49] Elements of the 200th Separate Motorized Rifle Brigade arrived in the Bakhmut area to defend Bakhmut‘s northern flank against localized Ukrainian counterattacks following the Russian capture of Bakhmut in May 2023.[50] Ukrainian counteroffensive operations have fixed these elements of the 200th Separate Motorized Rifle Brigade to Bakhmut’s northern flank since the start of the counteroffensive in June 2023.

Russian forces continued limited counterattacks in the Bakhmut area on September 26 but did not make any confirmed gains. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces repelled five Russian counterattacks near Klishchiivka.[51] Russian milbloggers claimed that Russian forces also counterattacked near Andriivka (10km southwest of Bakhmut) and advanced near Orikhovo-Vasylivka (11km northwest of Bakhmut), although several milbloggers denied Russian claims that Russian forces recently captured the settlement.[52] A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian “Storm-Z” units recently advanced into Andriivka under the assumption that Russian Airborne (VDV) forces would provide support, but that VDV elements failed to reach their positions.[53] Ukrainian Ground Forces Commander Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi stated on September 18 that Ukrainian forces destroyed the combat capabilities of elements of the 31st Guards VDV Brigade and the 83rd Guards VDV Brigade during the liberation of Andriivka and Klishchiivka.[54] VDV elements south of Bakhmut may be failing to perform combat tasks due to this reported destruction of combat capabilities.

Russian sources claimed that Ukrainian forces conducted limited unsuccessful ground attacks along the Avdiivka-Donetsk City front on September 26. The Russian MoD reported that elements of the Russian Southern Grouping of Forces repelled Ukrainian assaults near Krasnohorivka (unclear whether the settlement 11km north of Avdiivka or the settlement 22km southwest of Avdiivka) and Pervomaiske (11km southwest of Avdiivka).[55] Russian sources claimed that elements of the Russian 20th Guards Motorized Rifle Division (8th Combined Arms Army, Southern Military District) repelled a Ukrainian assault near Marinka (27km southwest of Avdiivka).[56] A prominent Russian milblogger claimed that Ukrainian forces have repeatedly tried to break through Russian defenses near Opytne (4km south of Avdiivka) and Vodyane (8km southwest of Avdiivka) in recent weeks but that elements of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) 1st Slavic Brigade recaptured lost positions near Opytne.[57]

Russian forces continued limited offensive operations along the Avdiivka-Donetsk City front on September 26 but did not advance. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces repelled Russian attacks near Avdiivka, southeast of Sieverne (6km west of Avdiivka), and near Marinka.[58] A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian “Storm-Z” units captured several Ukrainian strongpoints near Opytne but suffered heavy losses.[59]

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

Russian sources claimed that Ukrainian forces conducted offensive operations in the western Donetsk-eastern Zaporizhia Oblast border area but did not advance on September 26. The Russian MoD claimed that Ukrainian forces unsuccessfully attacked near Staromayorske (9km south of Velyka Novosilka).[60] A Russian milblogger claimed that Ukrainian forces unsuccessfully attacked near Pryyutne (16km southwest of Velyka Novosilka) and in the direction of Zavitne Bazhannya (12km south of Velyka Novosilka).[61]

Ukrainian forces conducted offensive operations in western Zaporizhia Oblast and reportedly advanced on September 26. A Russian milblogger claimed that Ukrainian forces reached the northern outskirts of Novoprokopivka (13km south of Orikhiv).[62] Another Russian milblogger claimed that Ukrainian forces marginally advanced northwest of Verbove (18km southeast of Orikhiv) and have advanced two kilometers in this area in the past three weeks.[63] Russian sources, including the Russian MoD, claimed that Ukrainian forces unsuccessfully attacked near Verbove and in the direction of Novoprokopivka.[64]

Russian forces conducted offensive operations in western Zaporizhia Oblast and reportedly advanced on September 26. A Russian milblogger claimed that elements of the Russian 42nd Motorized Rifle Division (58th Combined Arms Army, Southern Military District) counterattacked and pushed Ukrainian forces from unspecified positions near Robotyne.[65] Ukrainian Tavriisk Group of Forces Spokesperson Colonel Oleksandr Shtupun stated on September 25 that Russian forces continue to mine and build fortifications in the depth of their defenses in the Tavriisk direction.[66]

Ukrainian forces conducted a HIMARS strike against a Russian military headquarters in occupied Kherson Oblast on September 18. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported on September 26 that sources within the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) stated on September 26 that a September 18 Ukrainian HIMARS strike hit the headquarters of the Russian 24th Motorized Rifle regiment (70th Motorized Rifle Division) near Kherson City, killing eight officers and wounding seven.[67] Geolocated footage of the strike from SBU indicates that the headquarters is located in Radensk (24km southeast of Kherson City).[68]

A Russian milblogger claimed on September 26 that Ukrainian forces continue to operate on the islands in the Dnipro River delta and are trying to expand their zone of control in the area.[69]

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

Senior Russian officials continue to present Russian crypto-mobilization efforts as highly successful, likely to signal their lack of intent to conduct another mobilization wave. Russian Security Council Deputy Chairperson Dmitry Medvedev claimed on September 26 that Russia has recruited over 325,000 contract personnel since January 1, 2023, updating Russian President Vladimir Putin’s claims of 280,000 personnel on September 12 and 300,000 personnel on September 15.[70]

A Russian opposition outlet indicated that reduced immigration to Russia and ethnic tensions are exacerbating ongoing domestic labor shortages.[71] Russian opposition outlet Verstka reported that migration has decreased from 5.9 million in the first half of 2022 to 3.5 million in the first half of 2023.[72] Verstka also reported that migrants are increasingly emigrating from Russia to their home countries or other countries due to political and social discrimination, depreciation of the ruble, and fear of mobilization. Verstka reported that there are shortages in transportation and delivery services, construction, and catering as a result and that ethnic Russians are not interested in these professions.

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

Russian and occupation authorities continue efforts to strengthen ground lines of communication (GLOCs) connecting occupied southern Ukraine with Russia. Zaporizhia Oblast occupation Minister of Economic Development Yuri Guskov announced on September 26 that Russia has begun developing plans for a railway that will connect Melitopol and Berdyansk, Zaporizhia Oblast with Rostov Oblast through occupied Crimea and Krasnodar Krai, likely to alleviate some pressure from the Kerch Strait rail and road bridges.[73]

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

Belarusian military and territorial defense forces completed a series of training exercises on September 26. The Belarusian Ministry of Defense (MoD) announced that Belarusian forces completed bilateral training exercises that began on September 22 to improve Belarusian command and control bodies at the tactical and operational levels.[74]

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

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

2. Exploring the Ukrainian Way of War by Mick Ryan

Excerpts:

This is just a short summary of some of my interactions with Ukrainian officials on this visit thus far. I have a busy and quite comprehensive program of meetings planned for the rest of the week. I will provide an update on these in the next couple of days.

Exploring the Ukrainian Way of War

Ukraine Visit Diary #1

MICK RYAN

SEP 28, 2023

mickryan.substack.com · by Mick Ryan

Image: From author

If you follow me on social media, you may know that I am back in Kyiv. This is my third trip to Ukraine over the past year, and to be honest, Kyiv is just such a lovely city to visit and to walk around.

Kyiv is full of interesting people and interesting buildings. It is easy to feel a dissonance however, with people appearing to go about their normal lives while a massive struggle continues on the ground, in the skies and in the information domain to throw back the Russian invaders. But such is the nature of war. At the end of the day, the relative normalcy in Kyiv is what the Ukrainian Armed Forces are fighting for.

My visit this time is split between two efforts. First, I want to keep learning about Ukraine. You can read all the books you want about the history and culture of Ukraine (and I have read quite few), but nothing beats walking the ground and talking to people. So, each journey here helps me expand my understanding and appreciation of this amazing nation.

Second, I am exploring the key elements of what I describe as The Ukrainian Way of War.

The Ukrainian military - with doctrine and equipment from Soviet times and from NATO - is a unique hybrid organisation. While there are foundations in Ukrainian history for its current organisations, culture, equipment and thinking, the events of the last 18 months (indeed since 2014) appear to have led the Ukrainian armed forces to rethink many elements of combat operations, personnel development, logistics, operational strike, learning and adaptation, human-machine teaming, influence operations, meshing civil and military intelligence, and command and control.

It’s a hypothesis, and I am keen to explore it further. To be fair, there are many excellent battlefield studies, especially from Jack Watling and Michael Kofman, that point in this direction. However, the institutional elements of the Ukrainian Armed Forces - those strategic capabilities that enable a military to fight a war, not just battles and campaigns - are what I am examining during this visit. This includes:

1. Command and control. This includes how digital battle command systems are improving coordination and closing ‘detection to destruction’ times. Also, how is the Ukrainian high command coordinating all the various ground, air, maritime and influence campaigns concurrently?
2. Leadership models. How have UAF leadership models and training approaches evolved since February 2022? What are the strengths and weaknesses of the current approach.
3. Training. What is the difference between pre-war training and education and training now. What are the gaps and opportunities individual and collective training.
4. Culture. What is the status of the transition from older Soviet cultures to Ukrainian and western-oriented models for training, organising and fighting.
5. Supply. Field logistics and strategic supply including developments in industry.
6. Strike operations. How has the evolution of operational and strategic strike operations been coordinated with ground operations planning and execution, and what does this growing capability mean for how Ukraine will fight over winter and into 2024?
7. Innovation, learning and adaptation. System learning processes, analysis and dissemination. How are lessons collected from the battlefield and shared at training institutions and with other fighting formations. How is R&D conducted to support battlefield requirements – for the close fight but also for longer range recon and strike activities?

The Ukrainian military has more experience in modern war than any other nation, and the warfighting model it has developed should be studied for its broader application in other nations. Below is a short summary of some of my initial meetings in Kyiv.

Image: @Combined2Forces Twitter / x

Training

If an army is a tree, then it’s training institutions are its roots and trunk. Units might be raised or cut, but if you remove key elements of a training institution, sustaining or building an army is very difficult.

On 26 September, I was able to speak with the head of training for Ukrainian ground forces, Major General Nykoliuk. We had a fabulous discussion, and at a later point, I will write up a detailed exploration of how Ukraine‘s ground force training is evolving. However, the key themes of our discussion included the following:

Time. This is the driver for many aspects of training - there is never enough because of the demands of providing battlefield replacements. It restricts how long basic training and leader courses are, which then places a training liability on units that receive these personnel.

Leader training. Additional emphasis is being placed on battalion and brigade level training, as well as staff training for these units and formations.

Foreign Training. This is, overall, a net positive for Ukraine. However, a constant dialog is required to ensure the training being delivered overseas is relevant for when the soldiers arrive back in Ukraine. This can often be a moving target due to ongoing battlefield adaptations by both sides.

Digital Transformation. A range of activities are underway to improve training efficiency. This includes simulation, and networking simulation centres. However, capacity is currently limited, for both soldier training and HQ staff training. More is needed as is updated software.

Fleet Diversity. The huge array of NATO weapon systems is a challenge for training - for both operators and maintainers. At the same time, not all equipment comes with training stock or some of the software required for training.

Adaptation. This is a key issue. The battlefield is changing quickly, and therefore training institutions need to keep pace. There are several methods of collecting lessons and feeding them back into the training system. And while speed is necessary, capacity limits sometimes mean that adaptation in training is not as fast as desired.

Procurement

This was a fascinating conversation with a senior official from procurement at the Ministry of Defence. The focus was on the global arms market and its capacity. The global arms market, according to the Director, was not ready for a major war. In essence, it is currently a seller’s market. Some ammunition natures have increased by 400% during the war.

Ukraine is competing with countries that donated munitions to Ukraine but who are not attempting to backfill their stocks. At the same time, it only has so much indigenous capacity due to Russian attacks and a focus of Soviet calibres. Solving this issue of steady, reliable munitions available will be a crucial aspect of how Ukraine fights the war over the coming years.

Department of Digital Transformation

I finished 26 September with a great conversation with officials from this department. While Ukraine has introduced some very good digital command and control systems like DELTA, the digital transformation folks are looking at a range of non-battlefield functions for digitisation.

The ongoing evolution of digital transformation for the Ukrainian military will be underpinned by the formation of an IT Coalition at the last Ramstein meeting. As one report noted, this aims to the create a unified digital ecosystem for combat management and the management of defense resources for the Ukrainian Defense Forces.

Evolving the Ukrainian Way of War

This is just a short summary of some of my interactions with Ukrainian officials on this visit thus far. I have a busy and quite comprehensive program of meetings planned for the rest of the week. I will provide an update on these in the next couple of days.

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mickryan.substack.com · by Mick Ryan

3. The War in Ukraine Is Also a Giant Arms Fair

The War in Ukraine Is Also a Giant Arms Fair

Arms makers are getting orders for weapons being put to the test on the battlefield

https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/the-war-in-ukraine-is-also-a-giant-arms-fair-20841740?utm_source=pocket_saves

By Alistair MacDonaldFollow | Photogaphs by Serhii Korovayny for The Wall Street Journal

Updated Sept. 27, 2023 12:02 am ET

MINKIVKA, Ukraine—The Ukrainian crew of a high-tech German artillery system can shoot three shells within seconds that will simultaneously hit the exact same spot more than 25 miles away.

That is, when the big gun hasn’t broken down.

The Panzerhaubitze howitzer is part of an arsenal of weapons being put to the test in Ukraine in what has become the world’s largest arms fair.

Companies that make the weapons being used in Ukraine have won orders and resurrected production lines. The deployment of billions of dollars worth of equipment in a major land war has also given manufacturers and militaries a unique opportunity to analyze the battlefield performance of weapons, and learn how best to use them.

For all the Panzerhaubitze’s technical prowess, the war has shown the importance of being able to fix weapons on the battlefield. A simpler howitzer, the M777, has proven more reliable, but also more vulnerable to attack.

Debate around the performance of the two howitzers, and many other weapons, could help shape military procurement for years to come. At a major arms fair in London this month, exhibitors said they were frequently asked about the performance of their weapons in Ukraine.

Ukrainian artillerymen praise the German-made Panzerhaubitze for its accuracy and rate of fire. PHOTO: SERHII KOROVAYNY FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

A Ukrainian artilleryman from the 47th Brigade surrounded by shells for the Panzerhaubitze gun. PHOTO: SERHII KOROVAYNY FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

The U.S. and European nations have sent billions of dollars worth of equipment to Ukraine from existing military stockpiles, and countries are now starting to replace some of that inventory amid a broader rise in military spending. Global military spending rose for the eighth consecutive year in 2022 to a record high of $2.24 trillion, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, a think tank.

Artillery guns and the shells they fire, drones, missile-defense systems and multiple-rocket launchers are all heavily used in Ukraine. Some of this equipment—made by the likes of 

BAE Systems, Rheinmetall, Lockheed Martin and RTX, formerly known as Raytheon Technologies—is now receiving orders or interest from potential buyers, arms makers say.Ukraine operates 17 different types of Western and Soviet howitzers, here are some of them:

M777

(made by the

U.K. and U.S.)

Around 200 donated by the

U.S., Canada and Australia

L119

(U.K. and U.S.)

At least 72

by the U.S.

Caesars

(France)

38 by France

and Denmark

AS-90s

(U.K.)

30 by the U.K.

Panzerhaubitze

(Germany)

22 by Germany

and Netherlands

M109

(U.S.)

At least 20 by the

U.S. and others

Krab

(Poland)

At least 18 by Poland

Zuzana 2

(Slovakia)

At least 16 by

Slovakia and others

Archer*

(Sweden)

8 by Sweden

*On their way to Ukraine

Note: Data as of Sept. 24

Source: staff reports

“People are looking at Ukraine and seeing what’s working,” said Tom Arseneault, the chief executive of the U.S. operations of BAE Systems.

The British defense giant says it is in talks with Kyiv about making its L119 artillery gun in Ukraine after it has proved useful and that orders for the shells used in the country have ramped up. The company also says it has received increased inquiries for its CV90 combat vehicle and the M777 based on their performance in the war.

While some countries are beginning to replace equipment sent to Ukraine, companies say that military procurement is typically slow, meaning many orders won’t materialize immediately.

The war is already affecting procurement decisions for the U.K., according to Gen. Patrick Sanders, the head of the British army. Other recent conflicts, including Syria, also influence procurement orders by the U.K., which has Europe’s largest military budget.

“You look for repeat patterns,” he said.

One lesson from Ukraine has been the importance of being able to do battlefield repairs, Sanders said.

That has proved particularly pertinent for howitzers, a class of mobile, long-barreled battlefield guns that fire shells and are the most widely used Western weapons in Ukraine.

The M777 howitzer, in action with Ukraine’s 40th Brigade, has proven to be reliable but also vulnerable to attack. PHOTO: JOSEPH SYWENKYJ FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

A soldier from the 40th Brigade pulls the trigger to fire a 155mm shell from an M777 howitzer at a Russian military position. PHOTO: JOSEPH SYWENKYJ FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

A crew of Ukrainian artillerymen operating outside Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine praised the accuracy and rate of fire of the Panzerhaubitze. The weapon’s thick, high-grade steel offers protection in a way that other howitzers don’t, they said, citing how the weapon recently escaped a one-hour bombardment with just shrapnel marks.

The Panzerhaubitze, made by Rheinmetall and the German arm of KNDS, has secured orders from Berlin to replace units sent to Ukraine, while Kyiv has also signaled interest in buying the big gun.

The constant use of the Panzerhaubitze, though, has led to breakdowns, according to Ukrainian artillerymen. One of the machines operated by the Bakhmut crew caught fire and had to be taken back to Germany, and the electronics in the automatic loading process malfunctioned in another. It is now loaded manually.

The weapon’s makers attribute problems to a combination of being fired too much and a lack of servicing. “If they take care of the electronics, it works,” said Armin Papperger, Rheinmetall’s CEO.

Some military analysts say another lesson is that not enough time was spent training Ukrainian operators in the haste to get them back onto the battlefield. The Ukrainian artillerymen received five weeks of training on the Panzerhaubitze. German operators typically train for four months.

Other Western howitzers have also had problems amid constant use. An operator of the Polish howitzer, the AHS Krab, said one machine was being used so intensively that its barrel tore off. A spokesman for its manufacturer, Huta Stalowa Wola, didn’t respond to requests for comment.

A Ukrainian military truck hauls an M777 howitzer near the city of Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine. PHOTO: SERHII KOROVAYNY FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Papperger said the war is showing how fast barrels wear out. Rheinmetall has now tripled its production of gun barrels for armored fighting vehicles.

On average, less than 70% of Ukraine’s foreign howitzers are operating at any one time, according to Col. Serhiy Baranov, chief of the main directorate of missile troops and artillery and unmanned systems of the Ukrainian Armed Forces.  

The mainly British-made M777 is in action more than other foreign howitzers, Baranov said, at about 85% of the time, because it is easier to fix and there are more spare parts. 

The U.S. recently finished training Ukrainians on “truck-size” 3-D printers that can make spare parts for equipment including troop carriers and artillery, Pentagon acquisition chief Bill LaPlante told journalists earlier this month.

Artillerymen also say they find the M777 easier to learn to operate and very accurate, and that its lightweight titanium parts make it easier to move across muddy fields.

Still, the need to be towed means the M777 is slower to move and more vulnerable to counterfire. The big gun’s lightweight parts also make it more susceptible to damage from shrapnel, operators say.

BAE Systems, the company that makes the M777, said that after increased inquiries the company has a plan to restart production, though only if interest turns into orders.

Ukraine has put some Western equipment to the test in a more intense environment than it has previously been deployed.

The CV90, for example, saw combat in Afghanistan and Liberia, but “it’s totally different to what we are seeing in Ukraine,” said Dan Lindell, director of combat vehicles at the Swedish unit of BAE Systems that makes the armored carrier.

Lindell said BAE has had more inquiries about the vehicle based on its performance in Ukraine. The Swedish and Ukrainian governments have also signed an agreement that could lead to production of CV90s in Ukraine.

Other weapons that have received praise in Ukraine, including the high-profile endorsement of President Volodymyr Zelensky, are the Himars mobile rocket launcher and Britain’s long-range Storm Shadow missiles.

Ukrainian artillerymen say the Panzerhaubitze’s thick, high-grade steel offers protection in a way other howitzers don’t. PHOTO: SERHII KOROVAYNY FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

A Panzerhaubitze driver in the 47th Brigade. PHOTO: SERHII KOROVAYNY FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Rocket launchers, including the U.S.’s Himars and M270S, have impressed the British army’s Sanders most in Ukraine, he said, citing their precision, concentration of firepower and range.

Companies that make some of those weapons have won fresh orders and boosted production. Since the war began, the U.S. Army has awarded Lockheed Martin $630 million in contracts to manufacture Himars for itself and allies.

Meanwhile, RTX is increasing production of its Patriot missile defense system to 12 a year, and plans to deliver five more to Ukraine by the end of next year. Its software has been tweaked to enable it to destroy hypersonic missiles.

“Successful operation allows manufacturers to write ‘proven in combat,’ which helps sales,” said Nicholas Drummond, a former British army officer who runs defense-industry consulting firm AURA Consulting Ltd.

A commander of a Panzerhaubitze howitzer from the 47th Brigade. PHOTO: SERHII KOROVAYNY FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Oksana Pyrozhok, Artem Bondar and Doug Cameron contributed to this article.

Corrections & Amplifications

BAE Systems says it is in talks with Kyiv about making its L119 artillery gun in Ukraine. An earlier version of this article incorrectly referred to the weapon as the L199 artillery gun. (Corrected on Sept. 27)

Write to Alistair MacDonald at Alistair.Macdonald@wsj.com

4. CIA builds its own ChatGPT-style AI tool to rival Chinese intelligence

Excerpts:

The CIA's Open Source Enterprise division developed the tech, which is also intended to be rolled out across the US government's 18 intelligence agencies in an effort to rival China's growing intelligence capabilities.

'We’ve gone from newspapers and radio, to newspapers and television, to newspapers and cable television, to basic internet, to big data, and it just keeps going,' said Randy Nixon, director of the CIA's AI division.

Nixon noted that analyzing the level of data across the web is a significant challenge that the AI program would help handle, adding: 'We have to find the needles in the needle field.'

CIA builds its own ChatGPT-style AI tool to rival Chinese intelligence

• An AI program developed by the CIA will be rolled out across the US government's 18 intelligence agencies 
• The push comes as experts fear China has taken a command over the technology on the global stage
• Despite fears that AI is not fully understood, the CIA's AI boss Randy Nixon said it could grow with 'no limitations other than how much things cost'

By WILL POTTER FOR DAILYMAIL.COM

PUBLISHED: 16:38 EDT, 26 September 2023 | UPDATED: 16:43 EDT, 26 September 2023

Daily Mail · by Will Potter For Dailymail.Com · September 26, 2023

The CIA is set to launch its own ChatGPT-style AI tool to help sift through mountains of data for clues in ongoing investigations.

Intended to mirror the famed OpenAI tech, the Central Intelligence Agency's latest initiative will use artificial intelligence to help analysts better access open-source intelligence, agency officials said.

The CIA's Open Source Enterprise division developed the tech, which is also intended to be rolled out across the US government's 18 intelligence agencies in an effort to rival China's growing intelligence capabilities.

'We’ve gone from newspapers and radio, to newspapers and television, to newspapers and cable television, to basic internet, to big data, and it just keeps going,' said Randy Nixon, director of the CIA's AI division.

Nixon noted that analyzing the level of data across the web is a significant challenge that the AI program would help handle, adding: 'We have to find the needles in the needle field.'

The CIA's Open Source Enterprise division has developed a ChatGPT-like AI program, which will be rolled out across the US government's 18 intelligence agencies

The push to add artificial intelligence to the US military and intelligence apparatus comes amid mounting pressure to compete with China's advancing potency on the world stage.

In particular, China is feared to be stretching well ahead in the race to command artificial intelligence and is seeking to become the global leader by 2030, according to Bloomberg.

In an ominous glimpse into the nation's use of the programs, in 2021 China developed a 'prosecutor' that could identify and press charges with a reported 97 percent accuracy.

In contrast, America's law enforcement sphere has also come under fire for struggling to utilize the power of AI in investigations, but Nixon said the new program will aid in condensing the unprecedented levels of information floating through the web.

Among the CIA's new capabilities under the AI tool will be the capacity to see the original source of any information that they are viewing.

Nixon added that, like ChatGPT, the program will see agents use a chat feature to receive information as succinctly as possible.

'Then you can take it to the next level and start chatting and asking questions of the machines to give you answers, also sourced,' he continued.

'Our collection can just continue to grow and grow with no limitations other than how much things cost.'

Nixon was drafted in as the CIA's new Open Source Enterprise director in January, where he was expected to 'speed up the agency's development in open source intelligence just as the field is causing increasing concern and sparking rivalry in Washington', according to Intelligence Online.

Randy Nixon, the head of the CIA's Open Source Enterprise division, praised the agency's new tech has as he claimed it could have 'no limitations other than how much things cost'

China's embrace of artificial intelligence has worried some that America could be left behind, with the nation even introducing an AI news anchor earlier this year.

To make up its ever-growing AI operation, his division will reportedly draw in information from publicly and commercially available sources.

However, the push to implement AI into intelligence gathering comes at a time when experts are still unsure of the technology's red flags, including the potential for the CIA's information to be accessed in the open internet.

While it won't be made available for Washington lawmakers, Nixon said the program will be rolled out across all 18 of the US government's intelligence agencies, including the FBI, the NSA, and all military branches.

In August, the Defense Department launched a task force to explore using the tech, including a view to better understanding its downsides.

Months before in May, the director of the NSA, Gilbert Herrera, told Bloomberg that the intelligence community was still trying to 'find a way to take benefit of these large models without violating privacy.'

In the announcement of the new AI initiative, the CIA reportedly did not detail how it would protect the information it gathers from the seemingly vulnerable technology, nor which model it would use.

Nevertheless, Nixon stressed the need to keep up with the unrelenting amount of data streaming throughout the internet.

'The scale of how much we collect and what we collect on has grown astronomically over the last 80-plus years,' he said. 'So much so that this could be daunting and at times unusable for our consumers.'

He added that the Ai tool would help analysts work like never before, because 'where the machines are pushing you the right information, one where the machine can auto-summarize, group things together.'

Daily Mail · by Will Potter For Dailymail.Com · September 26, 2023

5. China says drills near Taiwan target 'arrogance' of separatists

Excerpts:

On Thursday, Taiwan is set to launch the first of eight domestically made submarines as it bolsters its defences against China.

In Beijing, when asked about the submarines, Zhu said efforts by Taiwan's DPP to "seek independence with force" would only exacerbate tensions and "push the Taiwanese people into a dangerous situation".

In an unusual revelation last week, Taiwan's defence ministry said it was monitoring China's drills in the southern province of Fujian, opposite Taiwan. Normally Taiwan provides details only of drills in the skies and waters around it.

A senior Taiwan official familiar with security planning in the region told Reuters the information was released to show Taiwan's surveillance and intelligence capacity.

"We can see the details and we are prepared," the source said, speaking on condition of anonymity as they were not authorised to speak to the media.

China's military has also not commented on the Fujian exercises.

China says drills near Taiwan target 'arrogance' of separatists

Reuters · by Bernard Orr

BEIJING/TAPEI, Sept 27 (Reuters) - China said on Wednesday its recent series of drills near Taiwan aimed at combating the "arrogance" of separatist forces, while the frontrunner to be Taiwan's next president said China was trying to "annex" the island.

Taiwan, which China claims as its own territory, has said this month that it had observed dozens of fighters, drones, bombers and other aircraft, as well as warships and the Chinese aircraft carrier Shandong, operating nearby.

The increased frequency of China's military activities has raised the risk of events "getting out of hand" and sparking an accidental clash, the island's defence minister has warned.

Asked about the spurt in drills, and Taiwan's concerns about increased risk, Zhu Fenglian, the spokeswoman of China's Taiwan Affairs Office, acknowledged the drills by the People's Liberation Army.

"The purpose is to resolutely combat the arrogance of Taiwan independence separatist forces and their actions to seek independence," Zhu told a regular news briefing in Beijing.

"The provocation of Taiwan independence continues all day long, and the actions of the People's Liberation Army to defend national sovereignty and territorial integrity are always ongoing," she added.

She urged people in Taiwan to distinguish between "right and wrong", resolutely oppose independence for the island, and work with China to maintain peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait.

China has a particularly strong dislike of William Lai, the frontrunner to be elected president at the island's January elections for previous comments in support of independence.

However, he says he does not seek to change the status quo and has offered talks with Beijing.

The situation across the Taiwan Strait had "not improved due to the passage of time", said Lai, now the island's vice-president.

"China's attempts to annex Taiwan have not changed," he said at an event in Taipei on Wednesday for the 37th anniversary of the founding of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party, or DPP.

CHINESE DEFENCE MINISTER

China's armed forces have not explicitly mentioned or commented on the drills at a time when Chinese Defence Minister Li Shangfu has gone missing from public view. Sources have told Reuters he is being investigated for corruption.

Taiwan's democratically elected government says only the island's people can decide their future, and has repeatedly offered talks with China, which Beijing has rejected.

On Wednesday, Taiwan's defence ministry reported further Chinese military movements, saying it had detected and responded to 16 Chinese aircraft entering the island's air defence identification zone over the prior 24 hours.

Of those, 12 crossed the median line of the Taiwan strait, which had served as an unofficial barrier between the two sides until China began regularly crossing it in August last year.

On Thursday, Taiwan is set to launch the first of eight domestically made submarines as it bolsters its defences against China.

In Beijing, when asked about the submarines, Zhu said efforts by Taiwan's DPP to "seek independence with force" would only exacerbate tensions and "push the Taiwanese people into a dangerous situation".

In an unusual revelation last week, Taiwan's defence ministry said it was monitoring China's drills in the southern province of Fujian, opposite Taiwan. Normally Taiwan provides details only of drills in the skies and waters around it.

A senior Taiwan official familiar with security planning in the region told Reuters the information was released to show Taiwan's surveillance and intelligence capacity.

"We can see the details and we are prepared," the source said, speaking on condition of anonymity as they were not authorised to speak to the media.

China's military has also not commented on the Fujian exercises.

Reporting by Bernard Orr and Roger Tung; Additional reporting by Beijing newsroom, and Yimou Lee in Taipei; Writing by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Gerry Doyle and Clarence Fernandez

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Reuters · by Bernard Orr

6. Air Force shakes up military education in bid to build better leaders

Excerpts:

The changes aim to deliver more consistent lessons in leadership and reinforce the service’s standards, while becoming more relevant to the challenges that supervisors now face. They are part of a broader push to foster well-rounded airmen who are as emotionally intelligent as they are technically skilled, for a stronger force on and off the battlefield.

...

The Air Force also plans to launch on-demand professional military education next year so airmen can study at their own pace, away from the classroom. That can benefit airmen as they move throughout their daily work, prepare for promotions or retain what they’ve learned in earlier courses.

“This shift is about the long game and building the force of the future,” the Air Force said in a Sept. 20 release. “We owe every airman deliberate developmental opportunities throughout their careers to grow and become their very best.”

...

The Air Force’s outlook on higher education for officers is changing, too.

The service announced Sept. 14 it will send more officers to its Alabama-based leadership schools to boost the book smarts airmen need to think critically about the future of war. Larger in-person cohorts will begin with the 2025-2026 academic school year.

Officers are already expected to finish command and staff college once they are promoted to major, and war college once they reach lieutenant colonel, as prerequisites for moving into roles with more responsibility and in joint offices.

Air Force shakes up military education in bid to build better leaders

airforcetimes.com · by Rachel Cohen · September 26, 2023

The Air Force is tweaking its professional development programs as a new generation of airmen begins to rise through the ranks.

The changes aim to deliver more consistent lessons in leadership and reinforce the service’s standards, while becoming more relevant to the challenges that supervisors now face. They are part of a broader push to foster well-rounded airmen who are as emotionally intelligent as they are technically skilled, for a stronger force on and off the battlefield.

“Over the past several years, our service has been working diligently to meet our national defense needs,” Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. CQ Brown and Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force JoAnne Bass wrote in a Sept. 18 letter to the force. “Our most significant advantage remains steadfast — a powerful, capable enlisted corps. We must continue to improve upon how we develop these airmen to sustain our competitive advantage.”

The service now envisions enlisted professional development as an academic ladder, from the 100-level boot camp to the 900-level Chief Master Sergeant Leadership Academy. As airmen take on jobs with more responsibility, how they prepare for those roles will evolve as well.

Starting in October, the Air Force will roll out new classes known as “foundations” courses. The informal, on-base classes get enlisted airmen ready to head to the service’s formal professional development programs, like the Airman Leadership School and Noncommissioned Officer Academy.

Those courses will come in at three points in an airman’s career: one aimed at airmen first class before they head to Airman Leadership School; an NCO course aimed at staff sergeants before they go to the NCO Academy; and a senior NCO course aimed at master sergeants before starting at the Senior NCO Academy.

The classes will replace other enlisted seminars with a new set of topics in which leaders should be well-versed, like discussing mental health with their subordinates.

“The development that we give every single one of our leaders, our airmen, our supervisors is huge,” Bass said of foundations courses during an Aug. 30 livestream. “We will make sure that we have relevant content that we are supplying and … empowering you with, so that you can continue growing those around you.”

Some social media users have questioned whether the classes, which are replacing existing on-base seminars, will be anything more than a name change.

To keep airmen sharp between stints at formal leadership schools, the Air Force has also rolled out crash courses in daily management tasks that troops can take before stepping into supervisory roles. Those “job qualification standards” get enlisted airmen up to speed on how to motivate and discipline others, handle budgets and write job reviews.

Each is tailored to progressively higher leadership roles. They start with supervisor training for senior airmen and move on to information for those becoming NCOs in charge, flight chiefs and senior enlisted leaders.

Those lessons are currently optional at each rank, but may become mandatory for senior airmen after they graduate from Airman Leadership School, the service said in May.

The Air Force also plans to launch on-demand professional military education next year so airmen can study at their own pace, away from the classroom. That can benefit airmen as they move throughout their daily work, prepare for promotions or retain what they’ve learned in earlier courses.

“This shift is about the long game and building the force of the future,” the Air Force said in a Sept. 20 release. “We owe every airman deliberate developmental opportunities throughout their careers to grow and become their very best.”

The Air Force’s outlook on higher education for officers is changing, too.

The service announced Sept. 14 it will send more officers to its Alabama-based leadership schools to boost the book smarts airmen need to think critically about the future of war. Larger in-person cohorts will begin with the 2025-2026 academic school year.

Officers are already expected to finish command and staff college once they are promoted to major, and war college once they reach lieutenant colonel, as prerequisites for moving into roles with more responsibility and in joint offices.

Studying in-residence at the Air Command and Staff College, the service’s graduate-level higher education program for airmen, or Air War College, the postgraduate school, is seen as more competitive and more intensive than completing the coursework online.

To choose its in-person students, the Air Force will first select the top one-third of candidates from each career field. Then 60% of those top ACSC applicants will be offered in-residence spots. Thirty-three percent of the top Air War College applicants will get in-residence spots.

Others can still head to schools run by the other military services, or programs at elite schools like Harvard University. But Brown stressed the importance of the service’s own academic offerings to the future fight.

“To ensure deep airpower expertise is available to joint commands, it is essential we send officers with diverse professional backgrounds and experiences, and with the potential to be senior leaders in our Air Force, to our own in-residence programs,” he said in the release.

About Rachel S. Cohen

Rachel Cohen joined Air Force Times as senior reporter in March 2021. Her work has appeared in Air Force Magazine, Inside Defense, Inside Health Policy, the Frederick News-Post (Md.), the Washington Post, and others.

7. U.S. General Met Notorious Libyan Warlord

127e.

Excerpts:

Over the years, Hifter’s LNA has been backed by France, Russia, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. In 2019, a State Department official told The Intercept the U.S. had not aided Hifter’s forces, but retired Army Brig. Gen. Don Bolduc, who headed Special Operations Command Africa from 2015 to 2017, said that under Obsidian Lotus — a so-called 127e program that allows the U.S. to use foreign troops on U.S.-directed missions targeting America’s enemies to achieve America’s aims — U.S. commandos trained and equipped more than 100 Libyan proxies. Those forces, according to three Libyan military sources and a U.S. official who spoke on the condition of anonymity, became elite troops within Hifter’s LNA. “They could do all the direct-action missions. They could do raids, ambushes, and … go out, sneak around, and do intel,” said Bolduc, referring to intelligence gathering. He described Hifter as a “guy that we could trust.”

U.S. General Met Notorious Libyan Warlord

Victims’ relatives are fighting to hold Khalifa Hifter accountable for war crimes. Last week, a top Pentagon official held court with him.

Nick Turse

September 26 2023, 2:18 p.m.

The Intercept · by Nick Turse · September 26, 2023

The stony boom of artillery echoed across Tripoli as the forces of Libyan warlord Khalifa Hifter laid waste to civilian neighborhoods. Later, as I walked through the ruins of shattered homes, battered apartment buildings, and wrecked shops, the unmistakable scent of death hung in the air.

It was 2019, when attacks by Hifter, a onetime CIA asset, and his self-styled Libyan National Army killed, wounded, and displaced countless civilians. The following year, relatives of some killed by the LNA sued Hifter in U.S. federal court under the Torture Victim Protection Act, which allows relatives of victims of extrajudicial killings and torture to hold perpetrators accountable. That case is now heading to trial.

Meanwhile, Gen. Michael Langley, the four-star chief of U.S. Africa Command, met with Hifter last week during a visit “to further cooperation between the United States and Libya,” according to an AFRICOM press release. “It was a pleasure meeting with civilian and military leaders throughout Libya,” Langley said afterward.

AFRICOM failed to answer questions about Langley’s meeting with Hifter and whether they discussed the warlord’s human rights record.

“It is disgraceful that any senior U.S. official would be interacting, much less seen, with General Hifter, given the allegations against him,” said Mark Zaid, a lawyer representing a group of plaintiffs in the federal case. He described Hifter as “a warlord accused by the international community of horrific crimes against humanity involving his own people.”

Langley’s visit was the latest twist in America’s on-again, off-again relationship with Hifter, once a favorite of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, who, in the late 1980s, joined a U.S.-backed group of dissidents seeking to topple his former boss. After their coup plans fizzled and the rebels wore out their welcome on the African continent, the CIA evacuated Hifter and 350 of his men to the United States, where he was granted citizenship and lived in suburban Virginia for the next 20 years.

The 2011 revolution and NATO intervention, including U.S. airstrikes, toppled Gaddafi and plunged Libya into chaos from which it has never emerged. In the years that followed, Hifter renewed his long-dormant project to seize power in his homeland.

In 2014, railing against the Libyan central government’s failure to beat back militants, Hifter announced a military coup that quickly evaporated. But the warlord’s fortunes changed after he launched a campaign to clear the eastern half of the country of Islamist militant groups like Ansar al-Sharia, which conducted the 2012 attack in Benghazi that killed U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans. Hifter quickly gained a reputation for attacking terrorist groups, but critics have long questioned his commitment and effectiveness, casting his activities as a cultivated effort to curry favor, including with the United States.

Over the years, Hifter’s LNA has been backed by France, Russia, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. In 2019, a State Department official told The Intercept the U.S. had not aided Hifter’s forces, but retired Army Brig. Gen. Don Bolduc, who headed Special Operations Command Africa from 2015 to 2017, said that under Obsidian Lotus — a so-called 127e program that allows the U.S. to use foreign troops on U.S.-directed missions targeting America’s enemies to achieve America’s aims — U.S. commandos trained and equipped more than 100 Libyan proxies. Those forces, according to three Libyan military sources and a U.S. official who spoke on the condition of anonymity, became elite troops within Hifter’s LNA. “They could do all the direct-action missions. They could do raids, ambushes, and … go out, sneak around, and do intel,” said Bolduc, referring to intelligence gathering. He described Hifter as a “guy that we could trust.”

By the late 2010s, Hifter’s LNA increasingly controlled the east of the country, while the U.N.-backed central government held the west. On April 2, 2019, Gen. Stephen Townsend, then the incoming AFRICOM commander, told the Senate Armed Services Committee that Hifter’s LNA and other paramilitary groups constituted a grave risk to Libya’s stability. Days later, Hifter ordered his forces to take the capital. “Use your weapons only against those who prefer to confront and fight you,” he commanded, promising, “Anyone who stays at home will be safe.” Safe hardly describes the scores of displaced people I met as Hifter’s forces rained rockets, missiles, and artillery shells on their neighborhoods.

The U.S. civil lawsuits alleged that, among other crimes, Hifter and his subordinates “waged indiscriminate war against the people of Libya … kill[ing] numerous men, women and children through bombings” and that they “tortured and killed hundreds of Libyans without any judicial process whatsoever.” Journalists and human rights groups have chronicled innumerable atrocities by Hifter’s forces. In 2019, for example, Amnesty International documented indiscriminate strikes often using inaccurate weapons, in violation of the laws of war, by Hifter’s LNA. A year later, Human Rights Watch reported that fighters affiliated with Hifter “apparently tortured, summarily executed, and desecrated corpses of opposing fighters.” Last year, Amnesty researcher Hussein Baoumi stated that armed fighters under Hifter’s command, and led by his son Saddam, have “terrorized people … inflicting a catalogue of horrors, including unlawful killings, torture and other ill-treatment, enforced disappearance, rape and other sexual violence, and forced displacement — with no fear of consequences.”

On April 15, 2019, then-President Donald Trump spoke to Hifter. Days later, in a striking reversal, the U.S. joined Russia in blocking a British-led U.N. Security Council resolution calling for a cessation of hostilities. After a brief embrace, however, the Trump administration cooled on the warlord. AFRICOM later took Hifter and his Russian backers to task. “The world heard Mr. Haftar declare he was about to unleash a new air campaign. That will be Russian mercenary pilots flying Russian-supplied aircraft to bomb Libyans,” Townsend said in a press release that blamed Moscow for prolonging the war and “human suffering.”

Related

Erik Prince and the Failed Plot to Arm a CIA Asset-Turned-Warlord in Libya

But the U.S. continues to send mixed signals about, and to, Hifter. In March 2020, a senior State Department official suggested there might be a “role for Hifter in shaping Libya’s political future.” Months later, as he announced sanctions against two commanders of the Kaniyat militia — part of Hifter’s LNA — then-Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said they “tortured and killed civilians during a cruel campaign of oppression in Libya.”

In March, a State Department human rights report chronicled allegations of “arbitrary or unlawful killings” by the LNA and charges that “contracted elements of Russia’s Wagner Group supporting the Libyan National Army committed numerous abuses.” The next month, Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Barbara Leaf “spoke with LNA commander Haftar on the urgent need to prevent outside actors, including the Kremlin-backed Wagner Group, from further destabilizing Libya.”

In a press release issued Friday, AFRICOM focused on America’s humanitarian response to the recent devastating floods in Libya and mentioned only in passing that Langley “met with Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar,” without providing any details about their talks. “The United States stands ready to reinforce existing bonds and forge new partnerships with those who champion democracy,” said Langley after meeting with a warlord who has been involved in numerous attempted coups and rebellions going back about 35 years.

Democrats and Republicans in Congress, citing reporting by The Intercept, have recently raised questions about U.S. aid to coup-makers in Africa. The Intercept has revealed that at least 15 officers who benefited from U.S. security assistance have been involved in 12 coups in West Africa and the greater Sahel over the last two decades. While his rebellions in 2014 and 2019 took place in North Africa, Hifter is yet another foreign military officer with U.S. ties who has engaged in armed uprisings.

A federal judge in Virginia issued a default judgement against Hifter last year after the warlord failed to adequately respond to the lawsuit. The judge later reversed the decision. When the case goes to trial next year, Zaid said, the court will likely “render a determination as to whether the unlawful actions of the LNA to target and harm civilians is the legal responsibility of its leader General Hifter.” Faisal Gill, another lawyer representing plaintiffs in the case, said the evidence of Hifter’s crimes would be “overwhelming.”

“It is our hope and intent,” Zaid told The Intercept, “that the same laws and policies that helped show the world that Nazi leaders must be held accountable for their crimes will reveal that General Hifter is legally responsible for his actions, and justice will be achieved.”

Contact the author:

Nick Turse @nickturse

Join The Conversation

The Intercept · by Nick Turse · September 26, 2023

8. The U.S. Government Should Stockpile More Critical Minerals

Excerpts:

Before and after a potential conflict, the National Defense Stockpile should act as a market buffer, similar to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, by offering lower mineral prices to the defense industrial base when high mineral prices disrupt their production. As the top producer and buyer of many critical minerals, China — as the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries does with oil — can influence global prices through production quotas and government subsidies. To mitigate severe market disruptions, the U.S. government should sell critical minerals to defense contractors during costly price spikes. While the governing statute of the National Defense Stockpile states that the stockpile can only be used for national defense, not economic, purposes, it also states that the stockpile should seek “to decrease and to preclude, when possible, a dangerous and costly dependence.” Accordingly, in October 2021, U.S. President Joe Biden noted in an executive order that the stockpile is a key tool for “ensuring that both the Federal Government and the private sector maintain adequate quantities of supplies, equipment, or raw materials on hand to create a buffer against potential shortages and import dependencies.”

Critical minerals form the bedrock of the defense industrial base, but the United States relies heavily on China for many critical minerals despite significant military and economic risks from this dependence. Given the possibility of a high-intensity, long-duration U.S.-Chinese conflict that will attrite platforms and munitions containing critical minerals, the National Defense Stockpile has insufficient critical mineral stocks, which should be increased quickly. Ultimately, securing U.S. critical mineral supply chains will require other policies like subsidies for U.S. critical mineral projects, tariffs on critical mineral imports, and purchase commitments by the U.S. government for American mined and refined critical minerals. But increasing critical minerals in the National Defense Stockpile is the quickest and easiest step to increase mineral security for the defense industrial base — and prepare for a U.S.-Chinese conflict.

The U.S. Government Should Stockpile More Critical Minerals - War on the Rocks

GREGORY WISCHER AND JACK LITTLE

warontherocks.com · by Gregory Wischer · September 27, 2023

The 2022 National Defense Strategy describes China as America’s “most consequential strategic competitor for the coming decades.” Yet the United States is unprepared to fight a major war against the Chinese military — or even to arm Ukraine against the Russian military, as evidenced by the defense industrial base’s struggle to replenish munitions like artillery shells and Javelin missiles. A longer, more intense U.S.-Chinese conflict over Taiwan would expose even deeper cracks in the defense industrial base and undermine the U.S. military’s ability to defeat the Chinese military: The United States lacks sufficient stocks of critical minerals to support the defense industrial base, from nickel in superalloys for jet engines to rare earth elements in magnets for guided munitions.

As a principal at Dei Gratia Minerals and as an independent critical minerals analyst, we, the authors, have an interest in increased U.S. government focus on critical minerals. But our combined years of experience in the sector and our desire to safeguard America’s national security and economic prosperity have led us to the conclusion that the U.S. government does not have enough critical minerals to effectively fight — and win — a war against China. To ensure the defense industrial base indeed has sufficient supplies of critical minerals, we believe that the U.S. government should increase critical mineral stocks in the National Defense Stockpile.

The statutory purpose of the National Defense Stockpile is to stockpile strategic and critical materials in order “to decrease and to preclude, when possible, a dangerous and costly dependence by the United States upon foreign sources or a single point of failure for supplies of such materials in times of national emergency.” In other words, the National Defense Stockpile should contain enough materials to support the U.S. military and essential civilian needs in a hypothetical war scenario. While classified, this war scenario is likely a U.S.-Chinese conflict over Taiwan, including a homeland defense situation. The Department of Defense says the Defense Logistics Agency — the agency responsible for managing the National Defense Stockpile — uses “a robust, data-driven modeling process” to determine the appropriate levels of minerals in the National Defense Stockpile, meeting these levels by acquiring more minerals when necessary and selling some minerals when possible.

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To best ensure the defense industrial base has adequate minerals for a high-intensity, long-duration U.S.-Chinese conflict, the National Defense Stockpile should contain enough critical minerals to satisfy three years of U.S. domestic demand. The U.S. government should prioritize stockpiling critical minerals in platforms and munitions likely to attrit in a U.S.-Chinese conflict and sourcing these minerals primarily from the United States and secondarily from U.S. allies.

A Stockpile Inadequate for War

In a hypothetical conflict, the U.S. military would use platforms and munitions that contain substantial critical minerals. For example, in a 2013 report, the Department of Defense said that one Virginia-class submarine requires 9,200 pounds of rare earth elements and that one Aegis destroyer requires 5,200 pounds of rare earth elements. The attrition of these platforms, munitions, and the critical minerals that constitute them would require replenishment during a conflict. The duration and intensity of the hypothetical conflict should determine whether to prioritize replenishing platforms or munitions and thus which critical minerals to stockpile and to what extent. To illustrate, in a short, intense war, replenishing munitions will take priority as new platforms will not be built and fielded in time for combat; consequently, replenishing antimony in artillery and cruise missiles would be more important than replenishing rare earth elements in submarines and destroyers. The U.S. military would also have to replenish other technologies enabled by critical minerals, like gallium in semiconductors and lanthanum in night vision goggles.

Despite the high attrition of platforms, munitions, and critical minerals in a potential U.S.-Chinese conflict, the value of materials in the National Defense Stockpile has fallen 98 percent from $42 billion in 1952 to $888 million in 2021. While the 1952 National Defense Stockpile likely prepared for a global nuclear conflict with the Soviet Union and the 2021 National Defense Stockpile likely prepares for a limited localized conflict with the Chinese military, the National Defense Stockpile today only requires 2 percent of the Cold War–era stockpile seems low, especially given limited non-Chinese mineral suppliers and high American mineral demand in a potential conflict. Furthermore, mineral stocks in the U.S. stockpile are far less than minerals in China’s strategic reserves. China has an estimated 7,000 metric tons of cobalt in its strategic reserves, while the U.S. National Defense Stockpile contains just over 300 metric tons — down from over 24,000 metric tons in 1990. Given its low mineral stocks, the National Defense Stockpile model may underestimate the duration and intensity of a U.S.-Chinese conflict, underestimating U.S. mineral demand, and it may also overestimate U.S. access to domestic and foreign minerals, overestimating U.S. mineral supply.

The National Defense Stockpile model may underestimate the duration of a U.S.-Chinese conflict, thus underestimating the critical mineral stocks needed in the stockpile. Hal Brands and Michael Beckley of the American Enterprise Institute write, “The Pentagon and many defense planners appear to be focused on winning a short, localized conflict in the Taiwan Strait.” They warn, “If Washington doesn’t start preparing to wage, and then end, a protracted conflict now, it could face catastrophe once the shooting starts.” Similarly, a RAND report on a potential conflict cautions, “Underestimating the duration of conflict was a significant factor in most major strategic blunders of modern times.” John Culver, senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, believes a possible conflict could last from years to decades, which would require immense volumes of critical minerals.

The National Defense Stockpile model may also underestimate the rapid attrition of minerals in the war effort. As the Russo-Ukrainian War has shown, high-intensity conflict reduces stockpiles more quickly than they can be replenished. This mismatch is even more stark with minerals: downstream factories might be retrofitted in months or built in two years to accommodate demand, but upstream mines can take at least five years to produce, while metal refineries can take at least two years to build and at least one year to ramp up to capacity. If the National Defense Stockpile model assumes the hypothetical U.S.-Chinese conflict will be moderately intense or that mineral production can quickly come online, the National Defense Stockpile risks having too few minerals to support a high-intensity war effort.

Lastly, the National Defense Stockpile model may overestimate U.S. supply access. For example, if the model assumes that the U.S. government can rely on U.S. partners quickly ramping up metal production, it will overestimate supply access. This overestimation is because technical challenges often plague refinery commissioning and ramp-ups, delaying production and causing production to be under capacity. To illustrate, the Goro high-pressure acid leach plant in New Caledonia started production two years behind schedule and has never exceeded 70 percent of capacity in over 10 years of production. Moreover, shipping minerals from countries like the Democratic Republic of the Congo is already lengthy and precarious, and contested sea lines of communication would further endanger overseas mineral access. Thus, the National Defense Stockpile model likely overestimates U.S. access to domestic and foreign minerals and, in turn, calls for stockpiling too few critical minerals.

How to Rebuild and Replenish the Stockpile

To compensate for a high-intensity, long-duration conflict, as well as unknown market variables like ramp-up difficulties for domestic refining projects, the National Defense Stockpile should contain enough critical minerals to satisfy three years of U.S. domestic demand. Currently, the U.S. government classifies 50 minerals as “critical minerals,” and based on the existing statute, the National Defense Stockpile must have sufficient materials for a likely war scenario and “to replenish or replace, within three years of the end of the military conflict scenario … all munitions, combat support items, and weapons systems that would be required after such a military conflict.” Considering unknown variables like mineral attrition in a high-intensity conflict, one way to comply with the statute and estimate the mineral volumes needed to replenish military goods within three years after the conflict is to stockpile enough minerals to satisfy at least three years of U.S. domestic demand. Stockpiling such large volumes for 50 critical minerals, including those with high consumption volumes like aluminum, will prove challenging with only six storage depots for the National Defense Stockpile. However, the U.S. government can build, purchase, and lease more storage depots for the National Defense Stockpile, as it did during the Cold War when it stored 92 critical and strategic materials at 102 storage depots. Importantly, the Defense Logistics Agency should prioritize stockpiling critical minerals in platforms and munitions likely to attrit in a U.S.-Chinese conflict. In short, estimating the appropriate critical mineral stocks in the National Defense Stockpile is a challenge with unknown variables, but to ensure compliance with the statute’s requirement to stockpile enough materials to replenish military goods within three years, the stockpile should contain enough minerals to satisfy three years of domestic demand.

Given the immediate risks of limited U.S. mineral production and limited mineral stocks in the National Defense Stockpile, the U.S. government should begin immediately and aggressively stockpiling critical minerals — wherever it can get them. Currently, the United States totally lacks mining and refining capacity for some critical minerals; therefore, in the short term, the U.S. government should source minerals for the stockpile by the following preference levels: (1) domestic, (2) allies like Canada, (3) partners like India, (4) others like Indonesia, and (5) foreign entities of concern like China. The stockpile should contain critical minerals in their most versatile refined form, enabling their use in the widest range of military applications as well as minimizing storage space. For instance, nickel should be stored as nickel powder in the stockpile, as the powder can be pressed into nickel briquettes for alloying or dissolved into nickel sulfate for plating.

Given supply risks from China, the U.S. government must quickly increase critical minerals in the National Defense Stockpile. The United States relies heavily on China for critical minerals, and China can, at its choosing, “turn on the faucet and turn off the faucet” of critical minerals, as U.S. Trade Representative Kathrine Tai said. China demonstrated this ability in August 2021 when it targeted U.S. semiconductor manufacturing by imposing export controls on gallium and germanium. Chinese exporters must now obtain a license to export gallium and germanium products with dual-use applications. Currently, China supplies 53 percent of all U.S. gallium consumption, and the National Defense Stockpile has no gallium. Similarly, China supplies 54 percent of all U.S. germanium imports, and of the 14,000 metric tons of germanium metal in the National Defense Stockpile, the U.S. government may potentially sell 10,000 metric tons cumulatively in 2022 and 2023.

To increase critical mineral stocks in the National Defense Stockpile most quickly, the U.S. government will have to consider sourcing minerals from China. The U.S. government should do these purchases covertly over several years to avoid spiking global prices and spooking China, which can impose export controls at will. While China will undoubtedly become aware of U.S. mineral stockpiling through espionage and market signals, the Department of Defense should try to dupe China into underestimating the scale of the stockpiling. For example, the Department of Defense could hide behind the guise of the energy transition’s increased mineral consumption by secretly purchasing critical minerals through third parties, like using electric vehicle automakers to purchase nickel, cobalt, and manganese. Some people might criticize purchasing minerals from Chinese companies, but the importance of critical minerals and America’s current mineral vulnerability necessitate stockpiling lots of minerals as quickly as possible. China is likely the only source that can provide the scope and volume of minerals necessary to quickly expand the National Defense Stockpile. Already, the Department of Defense purchases some minerals like rare earth elements from China, and for the short term, minerals bought from China in the National Defense Stockpile are better than too few minerals in the National Defense Stockpile. Moreover, purchasing these minerals now makes economic sense as many mineral prices are weakened, given China’s economic struggles.

Conclusion

For the long term, however, the U.S. government must grow the National Defense Stockpile by sourcing domestically produced critical minerals. Onshored mineral supply chains — from mine to market — are the most secure, especially during a conflict. While U.S. allies have significant mineral reserves, a U.S.-Chinese conflict would disrupt global supply lines, endangering U.S. access to overseas critical minerals. By purchasing domestically sourced and produced minerals, the U.S. government would incentivize domestic mineral production, which would help ensure supply access during a conflict. Notably, the Strategic and Critical Materials Stock Piling Act of 1939 — the original governing National Defense Stockpile statute — stated that the stockpile has a dual purpose of both supporting the industrial base and growing domestic mineral production. It says the stockpile would “provide for the acquisition of stocks of certain strategic and critical materials of which the natural resources of the United States were deficient or insufficiently developed to supply the industrial, military, and naval needs of the country for the common defense and to encourage the development of mines and deposits of these materials within the United States.” And for those minerals that it cannot sufficiently source domestically, the U.S. government should prioritize sourcing minerals from its allies: primarily Canada, which is closest to the United States and has large mineral reserves; secondly Australia, which also has large mineral reserves but whose sea lines of communication would be vulnerable to disruption in a U.S.-Chinese conflict; and then other allies.

Before and after a potential conflict, the National Defense Stockpile should act as a market buffer, similar to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, by offering lower mineral prices to the defense industrial base when high mineral prices disrupt their production. As the top producer and buyer of many critical minerals, China — as the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries does with oil — can influence global prices through production quotas and government subsidies. To mitigate severe market disruptions, the U.S. government should sell critical minerals to defense contractors during costly price spikes. While the governing statute of the National Defense Stockpile states that the stockpile can only be used for national defense, not economic, purposes, it also states that the stockpile should seek “to decrease and to preclude, when possible, a dangerous and costly dependence.” Accordingly, in October 2021, U.S. President Joe Biden noted in an executive order that the stockpile is a key tool for “ensuring that both the Federal Government and the private sector maintain adequate quantities of supplies, equipment, or raw materials on hand to create a buffer against potential shortages and import dependencies.”

Critical minerals form the bedrock of the defense industrial base, but the United States relies heavily on China for many critical minerals despite significant military and economic risks from this dependence. Given the possibility of a high-intensity, long-duration U.S.-Chinese conflict that will attrite platforms and munitions containing critical minerals, the National Defense Stockpile has insufficient critical mineral stocks, which should be increased quickly. Ultimately, securing U.S. critical mineral supply chains will require other policies like subsidies for U.S. critical mineral projects, tariffs on critical mineral imports, and purchase commitments by the U.S. government for American mined and refined critical minerals. But increasing critical minerals in the National Defense Stockpile is the quickest and easiest step to increase mineral security for the defense industrial base — and prepare for a U.S.-Chinese conflict.

Become a Member

Gregory Wischer is principal at Dei Gratia Minerals, a critical minerals consultancy. He has written about critical mineral issues in Newsweek, RealClearMarkets, RealClearEnergy, National Defense Magazine, Washington Times, The National Interest, 19FortyFive, the Wilson Center’s New Security Beat, and the Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s The Strategist.

Jack Little is an independent critical minerals and rare earths analyst. He has been published in the Wall Street Journal and the Idaho State Journal.

Image: Defense Logistics Agency

Commentary

warontherocks.com · by Gregory Wischer · September 27, 2023

9. America Needs a National Maritime Strategy

Excerpts:

This means writing new laws that encourage and protect private investment in shipbuilding, shipping, and projects of national interest. Make it easier, safer, and more profitable for Wall Street firms, private equity, and the American public to invest in our nation’s naval activities. 

Only Congress can provide the funding, prioritization, and accountability necessary to revitalize and sustain our maritime enterprise and position America for success on the seas. The strategic maritime environment demands urgent action to develop a national maritime strategy that synchronizes stakeholders, resources, and policy, leading to unity of maritime effort.

As a direct response to this vital need, I sponsored legislation in this year's NDAA to hold the administration accountable for producing such a design. I will continue working with my colleagues Roger Wicker, Trent Kelly, and Rob Wittman on this national security crisis. Working hand in hand with the people of this great nation, we will ensure America’s place as a global leader on the seas.

America Needs a National Maritime Strategy

By Mike Waltz

September 27, 2023

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2023/09/27/america_needs_a_national_maritime_strategy_982193.html

America doesn't have enough ships and building more takes far too long.

A war with any level of attrition in the Pacific could quickly turn catastrophic without sufficient warships, combat logistics vessels, and merchant ships. Outnumbered and without the capacity to replace, refuel, and provision our troops, we would struggle to deliver victory.

This precarious situation carries significant implications for our economy, national security, and international standing. Consequently, America must act now, before it is too late, to set a new maritime trajectory by building a coherent national maritime strategy.

Chinese Communist Party leaders are students of history, and they recognize America’s arsenal of democracy all but ensured America's triumph in the Pacific in World War II. Overwhelming numerical force, new ships, and maritime shipping secured our victory.

Now, the Pentagon considers China the world's top shipbuilder, not America. China controls the world's 4th largest shipping company, and its Navy is the world's largest.

Meanwhile, America's maritime enterprise reflects years of neglect and decline, despite being the world's largest economy, and relying heavily on global maritime trade.

Following World War II, American commercial shipbuilding led the world in output and tonnage. Today, the United States ranks just 19th in shipbuilding and produces less than ½ a percent of the world's commercial ships.

The fate of our shipping heritage is no different. In 1947, the United States fleet of over 5,000 vessels represented 40% of the world's shipping capacity. By the 1960's, however, America's nearly 3,000 ships only carried 16% of the world's cargo. Most recently, our nation's international trading fleet consisted of merely 80 ships, accounting for less than 1.5% of global trade.

What about the United States Navy? During the late 1980s, the fleet size was nearly 590 ships, but it has dwindled to about 290 ships today. Meanwhile, China's naval forces have soared to 340 warships, with hundreds more guided missile patrol boats and armed maritime militia vessels.

These trends directly translated into a decline of our nation’s power and influence.

Rebuilding that power through maritime strength requires a holistic approach, considering the readiness of our entire maritime machinery – infrastructure, workforce, technology, policies, industry, shipping fleets, and sea services. We need our own National Maritime Strategy to pull all these elements together and provide a true strategy for competing with China on the high seas, growing our maritime economy, protecting the freedom of the seas, and sustaining our oceanic resources.

Such a strategic design starts with recognizing our nation needs American-built and crewed ships, but we also need help changing our nation’s maritime trajectory.

We are in a race against time since China now has more than 200 times the shipbuilding capacity of the United States. Of course, we prefer all our ships be American built. But, in the race with our greatest adversary, we need a mix of US, Japanese, South Korean, and European-built ships in a Reagan-style build-up. I applaud efforts like our Navy’s Shipyard Infrastructure Optimization Program, but that program is spread over 20 years and is focused solely on public shipyards. That’s too little too late.

We must complement efforts to improve shipbuilding capacity by using drones. Smaller, cheaper platforms are easier to build and provide an affordable path for quickly ramping up the size and reach of our nation's fleets. Let's not reinvent the wheel but instead tap into the wealth of existing technology and operations to scale our military, civil, and commercial fleets.

Finally, Congress should cultivate a finance and regulatory environment to make civil and commercial shipbuilding and shipping industries more competitive globally. Close loopholes that permit private equity funds to flood Chinese shipyards and harness those resources for domestic projects.

This means writing new laws that encourage and protect private investment in shipbuilding, shipping, and projects of national interest. Make it easier, safer, and more profitable for Wall Street firms, private equity, and the American public to invest in our nation’s naval activities. 

Only Congress can provide the funding, prioritization, and accountability necessary to revitalize and sustain our maritime enterprise and position America for success on the seas. The strategic maritime environment demands urgent action to develop a national maritime strategy that synchronizes stakeholders, resources, and policy, leading to unity of maritime effort.

As a direct response to this vital need, I sponsored legislation in this year's NDAA to hold the administration accountable for producing such a design. I will continue working with my colleagues Roger Wicker, Trent Kelly, and Rob Wittman on this national security crisis. Working hand in hand with the people of this great nation, we will ensure America’s place as a global leader on the seas.

Mike Waltz represents Florida’s 6^th Congressional District and is a member of the House Armed Services Committee, Foreign Affairs Committee, and Select Committee on Intelligence. He is a Green Beret veteran of the war in Afghanistan, a former White House counterterrorism policy adviser, and a defense policy director for secretaries of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Robert Gates.

10. Pentagon Mum on Biden Appointee's Alleged Membership in Iranian Influence Network

I worked with Dr. Tabatabai at Georgetown when she was on the faculty. I never assessed her as a supporter of Iran and in fact she seemed to be very tough on the regime. It seemed as though she was trying to argue for a negotiated settlement favorable to US interests. I never thought her allegiance was to anything other than the US. But I am not sufficiently knowledgeable about Iran issues to make an informed judgment on the policy. But I can say that I found her professional and objective and committed to supporting US interests.

Pentagon Mum on Biden Appointee's Alleged Membership in Iranian Influence Network

The Defense official and two others affiliated with the network served as aides to suspended Biden Iran envoy Robert Malley, Semafor reports

freebeacon.com · by Adam Kredo · September 26, 2023

The Pentagon is standing by a senior official identified in a Tuesday morning news report as a member of a vast Iranian influence network, telling the Washington Free Beacon the individual was "properly vetted" before being awarded a security clearance.

The report from Semafor, based on emails from senior Iranian officials, detailed a vast communications network, known as the Iran Experts Initiative, linked to the hardline regime in Tehran. That network, the emails suggest, includes the Pentagon official Ariane Tabatabai as well as other "influential overseas academics" who reported to Iran's foreign ministry and helped push Tehran's talking points with American policymakers. The existence of this network was outlined in a cache of Iranian government documents reviewed by Semafor.

A Pentagon spokesman told the Free Beacon that Tabatabai was subjected to a full security screening before being hired.

"Dr. Tabatabai was thoroughly and properly vetted as a condition of her employment with the Department of Defense," the spokesman said. "We are honored to have her serve."

Tabatabai, who obtained security clearance for her Pentagon job, and two others affiliated with the influence campaign also served as aides to Biden administration Iran envoy Robert Malley, who was suspended from his post earlier this year for allegedly mishandling classified information. It is unclear whether Malley's suspension is related to his connection to the Iranian influence network documented in the Semafor report.

While the Pentagon has not addressed the news, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller on Tuesday dismissed the story for containing information from "almost a decade ago" and referred further questions to the Pentagon.

The Pentagon would not respond to Washington Free Beacon questions about whether it knew about these ties prior to the public revelations.

White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby evaded questions about the matter during an interview Tuesday evening on CNN, saying the administration has not "come to any conclusion about the press report or its validity."

"We're just now reading this reporting ourselves and I don't want to get ahead of where we're going to be," Kirby said.

The report says that former Iranian president Hassan Rouhani, a key player in the Iran Experts Initiative, had unfettered access to "Washington's and Europe's policy circles," particularly during the Obama administration, when the 2015 nuclear deal was first being sculpted.

In a 2014 email, Saeed Khatibzadeh, who later became the spokesman for Iran's foreign ministry, discussed with then-Iranian foreign minister Javad Zarif how the experts initiative "consisted of a core group of 6-10 distinguished second-generation Iranians," including Tabatabai, who was then working as an Iran analyst at several think tanks.

Tabatabai "on at least two occasions checked in with Iran's Foreign Ministry before attending policy events," according to the emails cited by Semafor.

Iranian dissidents and Republican lawmakers expressed outrage when the Biden administration in 2021 tapped Tabatabai for a State Department post, arguing that based on her family's ties to the Iranian government and the policy views she has espoused, she should not be granted a top-secret security clearance, the Free Beacon reported. Tabatabai's father, Dr. Javad Tabatabai, is a senior faculty member at the state-controlled University of Tehran and is allegedly part of Rouhani's inner circle, according to information published by Iranian dissident groups.

At the time, the State Department dismissed these claims as racist "smears and slander."

"We will not sit idly by as our employees—dedicated public servants—face personal smears and slander," then-spokesman Ned Price told the Free Beacon at the time. "The administration appointed Ariane Tabatabai to a key role in the State Department because she is one of the United States' leading experts on Iranian nuclear policy. The State Department is honored to have her serving in this capacity."

Iranian dissident groups in 2021 also raised questions about Tabatabai, arguing that she was a mouthpiece for the regime.

Miller, the State Department spokesman, said Tuesday that he is not concerned about the links Semafor documented between Tabatabai and the Iranian government and that a "thorough background investigation" was conducted before granting Tabatabai a security clearance. At least two other individuals linked to the Iran Experts Initiative—analysts Ali Vaez and Dina Esfandiary—worked with Malley when he was president of the International Crisis Group, a think tank that advocates for increased U.S. diplomacy with Tehran.

But the revelations about the Iranian influence network and its ties to senior Biden administration officials is turning heads on Capitol Hill. Several Republican lawmakers told the Free Beacon that Tabatabai's security clearance should be revoked pending an investigation. Lawmakers on the House Armed Services Committee on Tuesday afternoon sent an investigatory leader to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, questioning why Tabatabai has access to top secret information and saying that she "should not be employed by the Department of Defense."

"A high-level official at the Biden [Defense Department] was briefing Iran's foreign ministry and ghostwriting essays for the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism," Rep. Jim Banks (R., Ind.), a member of the House Armed Services Committee, told the Free Beacon. "Congress needs to investigate any communications between Ariane Tabatabai and the Iranian regime since Biden took office [and] the Pentagon must review Ms. Tabatatai's security clearance."

Banks and other Republican lawmakers who spoke to the Free Beacon said they are concerned that Tabatabai and others affiliated with the Iran Experts Initiative hid their ties to the hardline regime to land their government gigs.

Banks also raised concerns that Tabatabai may have used her Pentagon position to push U.S. Strategic Command into hosting former top Iranian official Hussein Mousavian at an August conference. Mousavian's appearance at STRATCOM's 2023 Deterrence Symposium, a high-level powwow that brought the former Iranian official shoulder to shoulder with America's top military brass, generated a congressional investigation, the Free Beacon first reported.

"The House Armed Services Committee should see if Ms. Tabatabai was involved in STRATCOM's indefensible decision to host former Iranian nuclear negotiator and propagandist Hossein Mousavian," Banks said.

Rep. Joe Wilson (R., S.C.), also a member of the House Armed Services Committee, said the Biden administration appears to have a knack for granting security clearances to questionable officials.

"First, it was Rob Malley's security clearance and now this," Wilson told the Free Beacon. "The Biden administration owes the American public an explanation on the extent of Iran's influence operations in the United States and whether officials in the Biden administration have been compromised."

Rep. Kevin Hern (R., Okla.), the chairman of the Republican Study Committee, Congress's largest Republican caucus, also expressed concerns that "multiple people within the Biden administration have ties to the Iranian Regime."

"It's no coincidence that Biden has been so soft on Iran," he said. "Why has this gone on for so long? The world's leading state sponsor of terrorism should have zero friends in the U.S. government."

Update 5:46 p.m.: This post has been updated with comment from White House National Security Council spokesman Kirby.

Update 6:19 p.m.: This post has been updated with comment from DOD.

freebeacon.com · by Adam Kredo · September 26, 2023

11. Nepal Refuses To Join China’s Security Alliance – Analysis

Excerpt:

It is well-known that China has been pushing Nepal to join its Global Security Initiative (GSI). But Dahal has been resisting this despite being a Maoist. He is steering clear of any overt security tie with China.

Nepal Refuses To Join China’s Security Alliance – Analysis

eurasiareview.com · by P. K. Balachandran · September 27, 2023

The Belt and Road Initiative is on the back burner

During the just-concluded visit of Nepalese Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal to China, the two countries signed a number of agreements. But security deals and the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) were conspicuously missing,

It is well-known that China has been pushing Nepal to join its Global Security Initiative (GSI). But Dahal has been resisting this despite being a Maoist. He is steering clear of any overt security tie with China.

Secondly, he is not too enthusiastic about Xi Jinping’s pet project and China’s flagship global venture, the BRI. In its current format, the BRI does not suit a poor country like Nepal, he feels.

Dahal told the Nepali paper Kantipur in an exclusive interview in New York last week that he would not enter into any security-related agreements with China during his visit to Beijing.

He said that China had proposed a Global Security Initiative (GSI), a Global Civilizational Initiative (GCI) and a Global Development Initiative (GDI). Among these, Nepal is interested in joining the development initiative, he added.

“We cannot wade into security-related issues. It is our stated policy not to be under the umbrella of any side. Ours is a non-aligned foreign policy. We have said that the American Indo-Pacific Strategy (IPS) and the State Partnership Program (SPP) are security initiatives and that we are not taking part in them. Having said that, we cannot join others security arrangements.,” Dahal explained.

The agreements Nepalese and Chinese officials signed in Beijing on Monday in the presence of Dahal and his Chinese counterpart Li Qiang covered, among others, the economic development of the northern region of Nepal bordering China; digital economy; green and low carbon energy and the translation and publication of ancient Buddhist texts.

A security cooperation agreement was missing as was any mention of the BRI.

There was speculation about a security pact after the Chinese Foreign Ministry issued a statement quoting Dahal saying that “Nepal supports a series of important concepts and initiatives put forward by President Xi Jinping, and is willing to work with China to promote the development of the international order in a more just and reasonable direction, safeguard the common interests of developing countries, and promote the building of a community with a shared future for mankind.”

China wanted to insert something related to the GSI and the GCI in the joint communique, but Nepalese officials stalled it, Kathmandu Post said.

In September 2022. the Nepalese Ministry of Foreign Affairs had advised former President Bidya Devi Bhandari not to take part in a GSI-related, even virtually.

Balancing China and India

Interestingly, Dahal did not want to have any security alliance with India either.

“We did not take part in a joint military exercise in India organised by BIMSTEC. We only took part in programmes related to development. We cannot be under the security umbrella of any country. Nepal’s geo-political sensitivity does not allow us to stay under anyone’s security umbrella,” he said in his interview to Kantipur.

In an interview to the Global Times of China on Nepal’s relations with China and India, Dahal said: “Nepal’s relations with both China and India are guided by principles of good neighbourliness, peaceful coexistence, and a non-aligned foreign policy. Nepal deals with China and India independently. Our relationship with one neighbour will not be influenced by our relationship with the other, nor will we seek to play one against the other.”

“Both neighbours are close friends and important development partners. We will continue to develop our relationships with both the neighbours on a bilateral basis. If any differences arise with either of them, such issues will be resolved through friendly bilateral negotiations.”

“Nepal respects the interests of both China and India. We emphasize the development of a win-win cooperative model that benefits all three countries”.

No mention of BRI

Xi Jiping’s flagship project the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is also missing in the agreements inked during Dahal’s visit, though he mentioned it in an interview to Global Times.

To the Chinese Communist party organ, he said: “A Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) has been signed between China and Nepal, solidifying mutual commitment to the BRI. We are fully prepared to take the maximum benefits from this cooperative framework.”

Perhaps he was referring to the 2017 MOU on the BRI.

However, till date, not a single project under the BRI has taken off.

Dahal told Kantipur that Nepal did not want to take loans to finance projects and BRI projects are loan-based.

“If we are offered grants under the BRI, we will accept them,” he said.

According to Nepalese economists, Nepal is game for low-interest loans, preferably below that offered by the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank and other global lenders.

Dahal has a domestic political compulsion to take a pro-India line on Chinese projects because the pro-India Nepali Congress is a coalition partner.

According to Pragya Ghimire, a member of the Board of Directors at the Institute of Foreign Affairs in Nepal, the BRI has lost steam across the world because it has burdened participating countries with debt. There are transparency and accountability issues regarding BRI loans, project contracts, and the environmental and social impact.

Following India’s economic blockade of Nepal in 2015, Nepal veered to the Chinese side, signing a transport-transit agreement to access seven ports in China. Nine BRI projects were selected, including the ambitious “Trans-Himalayan Multi-Dimensional Connectivity Network”.

But none of the projects was implemented, Ghimire says.

She also points out that China tends to be more interested in its own interests rather than Nepal’s.

“When the northern border was closed for an extensive period, China only cared about its own interests, disregarding the problems the Nepalis were facing. China pressured Nepal to become part of its Global Security Initiative (GSI) and even started openly marketing Xi’s ideology to various Nepali political parties. Chinese Ambassador Chen Song even remarked about how India’s policy towards its neighbouring countries, including Nepal, is unfriendly and not beneficial,” Ghimire wrote in Kathmandu Post recently.

According to Prashanti Poudyal, a researcher at the Centre for Social Inclusion and Federalism, the Nepalese Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Supplies had recommended that Nepal not move on the FTA with China, because it would lead to an exponential increase in imports, while Nepali exports would be unable to compete in the Chinese market, despite the duty waiver.

Poudyal suggested a very careful selection of infrastructure projects. Thought should be given to the loan burden as well as financial viability and return on investment, she stressed.

“It is essential to ask whether Nepal requires a trans-Himalayan Rasuwagadhi-Keyrung railway, advertised as the flagship BRI project, and if so, whether Nepal has the resources to sustain it,” Poudyal said.

(This article was published in The Citizen)

eurasiareview.com · by P. K. Balachandran · September 27, 2023

12. Nato is weakening America

Excerpt: 

... In our current turbulent period of interregnum between American supremacy and retreat from global hegemony, the Nato alliance may provide the framework within which a future, sovereign Europe can establish itself, through the creation of a notionally subordinate European defence pillar ready to take up the burden of the continent’s security from its faltering sponsor. There is no political utility in railing against Nato, given the unshakeable attachment of European elites to their sinecures as loyal auxiliaries. Yet by working within Nato structures, to establish Europe as an equal partner within the alliance rather than a collection of weak and disunited supplicants, our home continent may still quietly prepare itself for the withdrawal of America’s protective shield, and the contested multipolar order already bloodily dawning on its borders. Just as Rome’s successor states, once the legions left, still proudly wore imperial titles, Nato’s ghostly form may yet outlast the empire itself.

Nato is weakening America

Europe, not America, is calling the shots

BY ARIS ROUSSINOS

unherd.com · by Aris Roussinos · September 26, 2023

Nearly three quarters of a century after Nato’s founding, Britain has slid down its league table of political and military power: from a near-peer ally of the United States to more or less open vassalage. To witness the conquered mindset of the British establishment, one need only read a recent article deliberating on what is to be done with the British Army, plummeting in numbers, capability and international esteem. It proposes to reshape our land forces as a collection of Special Forces units at America’s disposal: “we are likely to fight as part of a coalition in future, so why not be the sharpened tip of the American spear?”

On the one hand, the very idea of formalising Britain’s role as Washington’s most loyal and reckless auxiliary, without even the hint that Britain may have vital strategic interests of its own, strikes the reader as a shameful metric of national decline. Yet on the other, it is merely a frank acceptance of Britain’s true role in the world.

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Just as the Five Eyes alliance, promoted as a valuable forum to share secret intelligence, can be more accurately viewed as a means to ensure the Anglophone intelligence establishment orientate themselves towards serving US foreign policy goals, the Nato alliance is as much a Cold War means of organising satellite states to serve imperial interests as was the Warsaw Pact. The distinction between Moscow’s loyal network of European generals, securocrats and pet politicians and those of present-day Washington is barely perceptible. Yet, in recent years, the value of the Nato alliance has declined markedly, both to Washington insiders increasingly disgruntled that the United States finds itself subsidising the defence of rich but feckless European states, and to some European leaders such as Macron, who famously termed the Cold War relic “brain dead”. The alliance’s most recent adventures, in Afghanistan and Libya, were disasters both to the countries fated to host its intervention, and to the European states who suddenly found themselves hosting the unwanted human floods that followed.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, then, came as a godsend to the faltering alliance. Once again, Nato could focus on its core purpose: the American-led defence of Europe from an aggressive Moscow. Summarising an emergent strand of thought on both the Left and Right of European politics, Wolfgang Streeck, writing in Natopolitanism, Verso’s collection of essays from the New Left Review, remarks that by “restoring the West, the war neutralised the various fault lines where the EU was crumbling… while catapulting the United States into a position of renewed hegemony over Western Europe, including its regional organisation, the European Union”. This precise critique, that a war-revived “Turbo-America” has consolidated its wavering hold on our home continent, grasping us ever more suffocatingly to the imperial bosom, is now commonplace in discussions of geopolitics following the Ukraine war: but is it true?

The authors in Natopolitanism robustly make the case that, as the writer Thomas Meaney observes, “in practice, Nato is above all a political arrangement that guarantees US primacy in determining answers to European questions“ and “administers US power in Eurasia, as a regional satrapy and launchpad for excursions elsewhere”. In essays spanning decades, which aim to “stand in contrast to the pieties and propaganda that saturate the Natopolitan scene”, the writers outline Washington’s strategy of “convincing potential competitors” such as Europe “that they need not aspire to a greater role”, while accounting “sufficiently for the interests of the advanced industrial nations to discourage them from challenging our leadership”. As Europe’s leadership shows, this plan was entirely successful, so that “what was once presumed to be an artefact of the Cold War order sits so comfortably at the heart of the Western system that it is frequently mistaken for a natural feature in the geopolitical landscape”.

The book reminds us of the fearful warnings of US defence establishment giants such as William J. Burns that the decision to expand Nato eastwards, enfolding the Baltic and Central European states while leaving Ukraine and Georgia in their current, fateful ante-room to membership, was an act of monumental hubris which. It would, he wrote, “cross the brightest of Russia’s red lines” by “indulging the Ukrainians and Georgians in hopes of Nato membership on which we were unlikely to deliver, while reinforcing Putin’s sense that we were determined to pursue a course he saw as an existential threat”.

Indeed, Natopolitanism’s essential thrust — and the limitations of its analysis — can be summarised by the title of Realist theorist John Mearsheimer’s contribution: “Why the Ukraine Crisis Is the West’s Fault: The Liberal Delusions That Provoked Putin.” It captures a strain of thinking common to European strategic autonomists who regret that the alliance has kept the continent subordinate to Washington, Left-wing anti-imperialists keen to highlight the hypocrisy of the alliance’s newfound commitment to the inviolability of national borders, and to the American anti-interventionists whose stance is, at least in liberal interventionist eyes, now indistinguishable from “IR Realism” Outlining viewpoints mocked by American neoconservative broadsheet columnists and boisterous cartoon dogs on Twitter alike, the collection is perhaps the most sustained and articulate critique so far of Washington’s hubristic attitudes towards Russia.

And yet, much of its argument can be refuted by observation of the Ukraine war’s progress until now. The purported “last chance for peace” lamented by contributors, Russia’s eve-of-invasion request to rule out the alliance’s further eastward expansion, also included a demand to withdraw Nato infrastructure from the Central European and Baltic countries welcomed into the alliance a generation ago: a politically absurd demand made in the full knowledge it was impossible to grant. Far from the United States forcing European states into a stance of radical and self-defeating hostility to Russia, it is European states that have consistently pushed a reluctant Biden administration into delivering ever-more deadly and sophisticated weapons systems to Kyiv. The pattern of hawkish European states browbeating their cautious and reluctant overlord into greater escalation echoes the dynamic of the Libya intervention, where the bright-eyed and idealistic Cameron and Sarkozy pairing cajoled Obama’s intervention in what he later termed the Libyan “shitshow” against his better judgment. If anything, Nato displays the European tail wagging the American dog: instead of keeping Europe subordinate, weak but ambitious European states use the Nato alliance to advance their own foreign policy ends — that these ends would, in Libya, prove disastrous is a European failing rather than an American one.

No wonder that American defence thinkers, such as the Realist strategist Elbridge Colby, dispassionately debate the idea of cutting the Baltic countries loose as a strategic burden a declining US can no longer afford. Yet the sceptical attitude to the alliance displayed by the American Right, and particularly Trump, points to another potential outcome from the war. While Streeck asserts that “the war also seems to have dealt a death blow to the French dream of turning the liberal empire of the European Union into a strategically sovereign global force, credibly rivalling both a rising China and a declining United States”, dwindling American political support for a war in which the EU has fully committed itself leaves Europe forced to assume a position of power, almost against its own will.

Ultimately, Europe’s future defence strategy will be written in the straits and islets of the Western Pacific: either the US will be forced to concentrate on the threat from China, forcing Europe to finally take up the burden of its own defence, or Washington will abandon its role as global hegemon, taking Europe tighter into its embrace as a rich and easily assimilable core empire. Either outcome is possible, and the decision will only come at the time of China’s choosing. But if the first eventuality comes to pass, with a giant and hostile neighbour to its east, and an imperial sponsor distracted from by its own great challenge on the other side of the world, Europe will be forced to extract itself from the position of helpless dependence its role in the Nato alliance has fostered.

For Left-wing writers such as Meaney, such an autonomous Europe is hardly a more appealing outcome than subordinate membership in the American alliance: “considering what the European Union is today, if it ever did succeed in taking a more militarised form, this would hardly be a rosy prospect,” he writes. “A competent EU army patrolling the Mediterranean littoral for migrants, enforcing an elaborate repatriation system, and forcing regimes in Africa and Asia to serve in perpetuity as extraction points for its resources and receptacles of its trash would only clinch the status of ‘Fortress Europe’.” European conservatives, accustomed by habit if not self-interest to look longingly for Washington’s approval, may yet come to welcome this new dispensation.

Certainly, the most recent iteration of Nato as a heavily armed liberal NGO would not survive this shift. As noted in Natopolitanism, Poland’s hawkish attitude to the Ukraine war has led Washington to forget its until-recently-held doubts about the strength of the country’s democratic institutions, just as concerns over Meloni’s purported fascism evaporated once she committed herself to the war. So, Streeck warns, controversies over the “‘rule of law’ will become increasingly obsolete as cultural conflicts between “liberal” and “illiberal” democracy will be eclipsed by the geostrategic objectives of Nato and the United States,” while “a shift in political power inside the EU may be imminent in favour of the Union’s eastern front states”. Poland’s massive programme of rearmament, plus the planned incorporation within the EU of whatever iteration of the Ukrainian state follows the war, already promises a shift in Europe’s gravity from the post-national liberalism of the continent’s northwest to the resurgent, militarised nationalisms of the eastern frontier. As long as the new Europe’s defence posture alleviates the burden on the United States, Washington voices which once promoted Nato as an engine for liberal idealism will no more protest Europe’s Rightward political experimentation than their equivalents of past decades did the pliant authoritarian regimes of member states Portugal, Greece and Turkey.

Far from ensuring Europe’s political and economic subordination, America’s retrenchment towards simultaneously managing both a great struggle with China and its own internal political conflict is very likely to leave Europe functionally autonomous. American voters and politicians may already be tiring of what will be a long and bloody war: Ukraine has, it seems, already reached the high-watermark of Pentagon support. Yet committed as Europe now is, with expanding Russian armies on its doorstep, disengagement is a luxury European leaders cannot afford. Perhaps things might have been otherwise, if different decisions had been made at the zenith of American power: but there is no rewriting history, no going back, and we are forced to make the best we can of the cards our masters dealt us.

In all this, the Sixth Form Third Worldist anti-imperialism of Nato sceptics such as Corbyn has been superseded by events. The idea that Corbyn could ever have extracted Britain from Nato was fanciful. As Meaney observes of Central Europe, “were any political leadership in Poland, Romania, Hungary, or any other Eastern European state to become intolerable for Washington, it would have an open, exploitable channel to that country’s military, greased by years of mutual exchanges, including stints at Nato headquarters, bevies of Nato conferences, retreats, and ceremonies, as well as wars fought together in the Middle East”. Precisely the same is true, with the inclusion of securocrats and wonks as loyal devotees, for us Western European countries. As the desperate wheedling for an American pat on their head from Britain’s defence establishment makes clear, the idea of Britain pursuing strategic ends distinct from those of its imperial master is literally incomprehensible to our governing class. Updating this strategic calculus is more likely to result from a sudden external shock than dispassionate consideration of Britain’s interests.

Yet Macron’s sudden pivot from Nato-scepticism towards a full-throated commitment to the alliance’s eastward expansion reminds us that other outcomes are possible. In our current turbulent period of interregnum between American supremacy and retreat from global hegemony, the Nato alliance may provide the framework within which a future, sovereign Europe can establish itself, through the creation of a notionally subordinate European defence pillar ready to take up the burden of the continent’s security from its faltering sponsor. There is no political utility in railing against Nato, given the unshakeable attachment of European elites to their sinecures as loyal auxiliaries. Yet by working within Nato structures, to establish Europe as an equal partner within the alliance rather than a collection of weak and disunited supplicants, our home continent may still quietly prepare itself for the withdrawal of America’s protective shield, and the contested multipolar order already bloodily dawning on its borders. Just as Rome’s successor states, once the legions left, still proudly wore imperial titles, Nato’s ghostly form may yet outlast the empire itself.

unherd.com · by Aris Roussinos · September 26, 2023

13. Iraq as It Is

Conclusion:

The United States has the tools it needs to aid Iraq. It should supplement its troop presence by facilitating investment, providing technical assistance for climate resilience efforts, and empowering Iraqi security services to operate independently. Washington has leverage, too. It is the Iraqi security forces’ most important partner and the largest single provider of humanitarian assistance to the country. Still, it should be clear-eyed about what it can and cannot accomplish in Iraq. U.S. interests will at times bring it into conflict with Baghdad, and U.S. diplomats and military officials will not always be able to monitor or influence their Iraqi partners. But Washington and Baghdad must work together toward a future where the Iraqi state is not reliant on U.S. troops to underwrite its own security and cohesion. The alternative is to keep Iraq in a perpetual state of dependence on the United States, which itself has competing priorities and domestic politics to contend with. The most urgent challenges Iraq and the United States face are not the kind that can be resolved by deploying 2,000 U.S. troops indefinitely.

Iraq as It Is

America Can Help the Country, Despite Iranian Influence

By Steven Simon and Adam Weinstein

September 27, 2023

Foreign Affairs · by Steven Simon and Adam Weinstein · September 27, 2023

Iraq has been an enemy, a friend, and a frenemy of the United States, depending on the administration in Washington. Now, after two years of relative stability in Iraq and a new government in the United States, the two countries may finally be on the path to sustainable relations. In early August, representatives from both countries met in Washington to launch negotiations on a long-term defense partnership. This dialogue and any potential agreement to follow may settle an enduring question: what kind of relationship should the United States seek with Iraq?

Past attempts by U.S. policymakers to answer this question have drawn on the various roles Iraq has played in the American psyche. Under Saddam Hussein, it was a sanctioned pariah state, an enemy purportedly hell-bent on using weapons of mass destruction; after the 2003 U.S. invasion that toppled Saddam’s regime, Iraq in turn became an experiment in nation building, a half-hearted partner in the war against terrorism, and a marionette controlled by Iran. Now, the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden has assigned itself the task of moving beyond this shifting legacy and normalizing the relationship once and for all.

The 2,000 or so U.S. troops stationed in Iraq today focus on training and advising Iraq’s security forces. The end goal is for Iraqi forces to operate autonomously, but for now, the U.S. military conducts campaigns against the Islamic State (also known as ISIS) in Iraq and Syria in cooperation with local partners—including 313 such operations in 2022. Under a new U.S.-Iraqi agreement, technical support and advising will likely continue, with greater emphasis on eventual independence for the Iraqi military—particularly elite units—in the field. Making this transition possible will require better coordination among Iraq’s diffuse security forces, which often compete instead of cooperate.

One factor complicating progress in U.S.-Iraqi relations is the proliferation of militias that report to the prime minister but operate outside the formal command structure of the Iraqi military and, in some cases, appear guided by Iran. There may be a temptation in Washington to predicate future cooperation with Baghdad on the elimination of this channel of Iranian influence, but such an approach would be a mistake. Iraq does not need its already wobbly sovereignty undermined further by misguided U.S. meddling. What it needs is the ability to provide for its citizens and rein in the militias on its own. Helping Iraq strengthen its state capacity is the best way to move toward a more normal, cordial U.S.-Iraqi relationship and to serve the interests of the Iraqi people—without compromising the United States’ own security.

BREAKING THE CYCLE

The recent history of U.S.-Iraqi relations is a story of recurring conflict. In the decade before the first Gulf War, Iraq was on Washington’s radar primarily as Iran’s opponent in a grueling war that lasted from 1980 to 1988. When President Ronald Reagan’s secret sale of weapons to Iran was exposed in the Iran-contra affair, the blowback pushed Washington to open up somewhat to Baghdad. After the war ended, Iraq became both a major market for Midwestern grain despite concerns that it was amassing weapons of mass destruction. With Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990, Baghdad went from trade partner to strategic adversary. President George H. W. Bush launched a war to liberate Kuwait, hoping, in the process, to destroy Saddam’s elite units and render him vulnerable to a domestic revolt. This plan did not pan out. The administration of President Bill Clinton continued to encourage plots against Saddam, and for the rest of the 1990s, the United States waged economic war on Iraqi civilians through punishing sanctions.

President George W. Bush’s 2003 invasion finally toppled Saddam’s regime, triggering a civil war that killed tens of thousands. As the U.S. occupation dragged on, the Bush administration struggled to back a new Iraqi leadership whose objectives aligned with Washington’s. Left with little choice, it settled for Nouri al-Maliki, a staunch Shiite politician, as prime minister. Many Sunnis refused to deal with Maliki, however, setting up a persistent state of political instability. When the administration of President Barack Obama withdrew U.S. forces in 2011, both Iran and radical Sunni insurgents capitalized on Iraq’s precarious state. Iran infiltrated biddable Shiite militias, and aggrieved Sunnis joined with Syrian ISIS fighters to seize large swaths of Iraqi territory. Washington’s initial prevarication in the face of this onslaught left the door open to Iraq’s Shiite militias to counter this new threat, bolstering their own position in the process.

The relationship remained fraught under the administration of President Donald Trump. Officials considered Iraq an Iranian puppet and treated the country with suspicion and contempt, including by killing Iran’s Quds Force commander, Qasem Soleimani, along with the high-ranking Iraqi militia official Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis outside Baghdad’s airport. Under Biden, Washington has so far emphasized economic collaboration while downplaying military relations between the United States and Iraq—a shift made possible by the gradual decomposition of ISIS in recent years.

Now, the Biden administration is turning its attention to the military component of the relationship. The statement released in August after the inaugural meeting of the U.S.-Iraq Joint Security Cooperation Dialogue, as the current bilateral defense negotiations are officially known, primarily addressed efforts already underway to contain ISIS and to train Iraq’s security forces. But the talks may also yield a broader framework for a sustainable security relationship. And critically, they could set the foundations for an eventual withdrawal of U.S. troops. As the Pentagon official Dana Stroul told reporters, “I think it’s fair to say decades into the future, U.S. forces will not be present in Iraq in the current formation that we are today.” Stroul’s phrasing may be overly cautious, but the message is clear: the United States will scale down its military presence.

There is no treaty committing the United States to come to Iraq’s defense.

For now, U.S. military assistance to Iraq will continue. But there are ways to focus these efforts. Rather than make open-ended commitments to the sprawling Iraqi military, Washington should concentrate on its most effective elements, such as the Counter Terrorism Service (a special operations force and a key U.S. partner in anti-ISIS campaigns) and the Federal Intelligence and Investigation Agency (an agency responsible for counterterrorism and organized crime). U.S. military trainers should prioritize mission planning, encouraging coordination and information sharing among different Iraqi units and increasing those units’ capacity to conduct surveillance and collect intelligence in order to choose the right targets. Iraqi forces will also need to develop their capacity for limited combined-arms operations, which bring together infantry maneuvers, air support, and artillery fire in mutually supporting ways. As we have seen in Ukraine’s fight against Russian forces, mastering such operations is difficult and takes time. Expectations in Iraq should be modest. U.S. advisers must also be realistic about the training they introduce. Adopting procedures and technology that will require indefinite U.S. handholding will prove frustrating for both Washington and Baghdad.

As the United States and Iraq advance toward normal diplomatic relations, the drawdown of U.S. forces should follow. Executing that drawdown while sustaining aid will be a difficult needle to thread—the two goals are in tension with each other. A good way to start is to replace Operation Inherent Resolve, the campaign the United States launched against ISIS in 2014, with a mission that is narrower in scope. This could include a small group of advisers working under the Office of Security Cooperation-Iraq in Baghdad, which is responsible for managing security assistance and facilitating U.S.-Iraqi cooperation. OSC-I, however, is affiliated with the U.S. Department of Defense but reports to the U.S. diplomatic mission in Iraq, and its position between the Pentagon and the State Department imposes some limits on the support it can offer a partner military. The advisers under its purview may therefore be supplemented by a second, more flexible mission operated by U.S. Central Command. This small deployment of special operations soldiers highly trained in counterterrorism could assist with training and intelligence operations. Together, this lower-footprint military presence could offer a glide path toward normalization.

A nonmilitarized relationship is a realistic end goal. After all, the U.S. troop presence in Iraq has been declining for years. And absent a war with Iran or a resurgence of ISIS, this trend will continue. There is no treaty committing the United States to come to Iraq’s defense. And the Iraqi government would be loath to seek any such commitment by identifying another state as a threat from which Iraq needs defending, lest it antagonize its neighbors and create the very security crisis it wishes to avoid. Instead, both sides envisage a low-key form of cooperation that de-emphasizes the prospect of U.S. combat operations inside Iraq. U.S. policymakers still need a plan for drawing down the remaining 2,000 or so U.S. troops in Iraq over the next few years, but the current accentuation of economic issues and relatively modest military coordination and assistance suggest a desired future for Iraq as a friend, not an ally, of the United States.

THE MILITIA PROBLEM

This attitude within the U.S. government has emerged despite the presence in Iraq of some Shiite militias that ultimately look to Tehran, rather than Baghdad, for guidance. Skeptics of U.S. cooperation with the Iraqi government often point to its tolerance for these arrangements as evidence of Iraqi perfidy. And they see the Biden administration’s willingness to live with this situation, rather than cracking down militarily or making U.S. assistance conditional on corralling the militias, as evidence of American fecklessness. In this view, Iraq is at best an ambivalent partner and at worst a tacit foe. Given the extent of Iran’s influence, the argument goes, Iraq cannot act as an independent regional partner.

The competing loyalties within Iraq’s army are undoubtedly a problem. But hybrid armies are also a reality of the twenty-first century. The sociologist Max Weber’s definition of a state as having a “monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory” may no longer apply. National governments increasingly contract out the use of force to nonstate actors. In Syria’s civil war, for example, state-sponsored mercenaries known as “shabiha” have been key combatants on the side of Bashar al-Assad’s regime. These hybrid arrangements can prove risky. In Russia, the Wagner private military company recently challenged the authority of the Kremlin, only to be cut down to size weeks later, and in Sudan, the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces have torn the state to shreds. But Iraqi militias have no interest in displacing the state that feeds them, nor the capacity to do so.

In Iraq, militias emerged from the anarchic conditions created by the U.S. occupation. When the 2003 invasion eliminated the Iraqi state’s capacity to maintain order and provide services, warlords picked up the slack, using ethnic and religious identity to manufacture their own legitimacy and authority. Outside powers exploited this development, too. Iran provided advice and resources directly to Shiite militias, and the United States supported Sunni militias, such as the Sons of Iraq. As Iraqis struggled to reconstitute their state, no single actor had the power or incentive to disband these groups or force them to enter a national, nonsectarian military. The growth of ISIS in 2014 provided the Shiite militias with a golden opportunity. They made themselves indispensable by organizing quickly to counter ISIS when it was on the doorstep of Baghdad. More recently, when the Shiite firebrand Muqtada al-Sadr pushed Iraq into a violent political crisis after the 2022 parliamentary elections, it was the Popular Mobilization Forces, an umbrella of Shiite militias with ties to Iran—not the Iraqi army—that successfully battled his followers.

The Iraqi militias are here to stay.

In Iraq, militias hinder the state from fully consolidating its authority even as they occasionally step in to address state shortcomings. Furthermore, militias soak up unemployed young men who might otherwise engage in criminal or violent activities. Militias may offer only meager salaries, but they help keep Iraq’s anemic economy afloat and their recruits out of trouble. As in other countries with hybrid armies, militias in Iraq have created business interests whose profits make them partially self-sustainable, reducing the cost of security for the federal government. In the long run, however, the militias’ forays into business further compromise the country’s economic growth through corruption and inefficient models of development—a debilitating public-private partnership of a kind that is hardly unique to Iraq.

From the United States’ perspective, Iranian-backed militias pose a threat. Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba and Kataib Hezbollah in particular have picked fights with U.S. forces based in Iraq. With few exceptions, the militias have benefited from cover from the Iraqi government—the same government that authorized the U.S. military presence on Iraqi soil. This is no doubt irritating for Washington and a potential source of escalation between the United States and Iran as long as U.S. troops remain in Iraq. But the solution to this dilemma is not to fight the militias directly or compel the Iraqi government to rein them in. Doing so would only further undermine the sovereignty of an Iraqi state weakened by the presence of the Iranian-backed militias.

Instead, the sensible approach for Washington is to strengthen the capacity of the Iraqi state through the slower, less coercive, and ultimately more sustainable levers of traditional diplomacy, targeted aid, and economic cooperation. The militias are here to stay, and challenging them directly would only increase their relevance and leverage—handing the Iranian government a win. Working with the government in Baghdad is far more promising. On the question of the U.S. troop presence, Iraq’s political factions and the militias affiliated with them largely accept the position of their country’s prime minister, Mohammed Shia al-Sudani, who has backed the continuing presence of U.S. military personnel to help develop the Iraqi armed forces. Furthermore, it appears as though a gradual process of integrating militias into the military command structure might be underway, which will eventually impose limits on their independent action.

WHAT AMERICA OWES IRAQ

The mischief of pro-Iranian militias should not deter Washington from extending support to Baghdad, nor should the more complex problem of Iraq’s hybrid military structure. U.S. diplomacy has already turned its attention to other serious problems afflicting Iraq. The overall U.S. approach is to move beyond security concerns and prioritize these pressing economic and humanitarian matters.

For one, the Iraqi government is unable to ensure a consistent, round-the-clock electricity supply, which significantly hinders the country’s productivity. Iraq’s agriculture sector, which employs 18 percent of the population, has taken a severe hit due to drought, poor water management, and temperatures that soar above 120 degrees Fahrenheit in the summer. According to a 2021 survey conducted by the International Labour Organization, unemployment stands at 17 percent overall—and 28 percent for women and 36 percent for youth. Gleaming malls and thriving markets in Baghdad, a rejuvenated riverfront in Mosul, and an economic resurgence in the frequently besieged Anbar Province make for appealing photos to accompany stories about Iraq’s post-ISIS recovery, but the truth is that most Iraqis struggle to make ends meet. The youth of Iraq’s population does create a demographic profile that correlates with higher levels of violence. But the government’s failure to provide for a swiftly expanding population presents a greater menace to Iraq’s future than terrorism does. And persistent government shortcomings will only feed the terrorist threat.

Washington has an ethical responsibility to help Iraqis rectify this situation. Over the course of 30 years the United States has inflicted grave damage on Iraq. A realpolitik approach would eschew an argument based on moral imperative, but in this case, ethics and national interest are on the same side. Helping Iraq recover from decades of conflict, rather than blaming it for a militia structure that is itself the product of the U.S. invasion, would make the United States’ regional posture more secure and enhance its reputation for reliability.

The United States has the tools it needs to aid Iraq. It should supplement its troop presence by facilitating investment, providing technical assistance for climate resilience efforts, and empowering Iraqi security services to operate independently. Washington has leverage, too. It is the Iraqi security forces’ most important partner and the largest single provider of humanitarian assistance to the country. Still, it should be clear-eyed about what it can and cannot accomplish in Iraq. U.S. interests will at times bring it into conflict with Baghdad, and U.S. diplomats and military officials will not always be able to monitor or influence their Iraqi partners. But Washington and Baghdad must work together toward a future where the Iraqi state is not reliant on U.S. troops to underwrite its own security and cohesion. The alternative is to keep Iraq in a perpetual state of dependence on the United States, which itself has competing priorities and domestic politics to contend with. The most urgent challenges Iraq and the United States face are not the kind that can be resolved by deploying 2,000 U.S. troops indefinitely.

• STEVEN SIMON is Professor of Practice in Middle Eastern Studies at University of Washington’s Jackson School of International Studies and a Senior Research Analyst at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. He served on the National Security Council in the Clinton and Obama administrations.
• ADAM WEINSTEIN is Deputy Director of the Middle East Program at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. He served as a U.S. Marine in Afghanistan.

Foreign Affairs · by Steven Simon and Adam Weinstein · September 27, 2023

14. Landmines in Ukraine: Lessons for China and Taiwan

Excerpts:

To state the obvious, the storage and handling of Taiwan’s mines and mine-layers could well be a high priority for Chinese “targeteers.” One factor that might work in China’s favor is that Taiwan forces would be quite reluctant to sow the island with mines given its rather high population density and the related danger of civilian casualties. Therefore, the relevant areas could be known decently well in advance by the PLA, while Taiwan’s forces may wait to the last possible moment to take such a significant step.

Moreover, it should be kept in mind that the PLA has long invested heavily in the work of sappers for mine detection and clearance. For example, Chinese sappers have been widely recognized for their continuing work in southern Lebanon to clear landmines. Placing special recognition on the heroism of such units, a massive outpouring of PLA support recognized the sacrifices of Du Fuguo, a sapper badly injured clearing mines on the China-Vietnam border. It seems likely that Chinese strategists harbor few illusions about the dangers extensive minefields might hold in a Taiwan scenario.

There is additional evidence that the Chinese are monitoring the success of Ukraine’s mine-clearance or breacher vehicles. The PLA is exercising with these vehicles regularly, including with the ability to employ line charges to clear minefields. Perhaps drawing on trends in Russian mine clearance capabilities, the PLA seems to have developed a prototype of an unmanned system for clearing landmines.

If it comes to an all-out assault on Taiwan, the PLA will most likely do everything possible to avoid the kind of static, trench warfare that has characterized the Ukraine War. That may partially explain why the PLA seems to be investing so heavily in airborne and helicopter assault capabilities – with the aim of leaping over the minefields that might lie just beyond the beaches.

Landmines in Ukraine: Lessons for China and Taiwan

Chinese strategists are studying mining and counter-mining efforts in the Russia-Ukraine War.

By Lyle Goldstein and Nathan Waechter

September 26, 2023

thediplomat.com · by Lyle Goldstein · September 26, 2023

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In shaping patterns of future warfare, there is little doubt that militaries across the world will be seeking to absorb the key lessons of the Russia-Ukraine War, ranging from the employment of tanks to the use of anti-ship cruise missiles and the ubiquitous drones. For the Chinese military, these lessons might even assume a greater importance, since the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) lacks recent major combat experience and has leaned heavily on Russian weapons and doctrine for its rapid modernization over the last few decades.

Chinese media coverage of the war in Ukraine has been extensive. The close nature of the China-Russia “quasi-alliance” means that Chinese military analysts have not engaged in the ruthless critiques of Russian military performance that have been commonplace in the West. Yet, Chinese military analyses are still probing deeply for lessons to understand the shape of modern warfare. They have taken particular interest in the U.S. employment of novel weapons and strategies.

To fully grasp the scope and depth of these Chinese analyses it is important to take assessments from a full range of Chinese military media, which is more extensive than is often appreciated in the West. These articles are generally associated with research institutes that are directly involved in the Chinese military-industrial complex.

This exclusive series for The Diplomat will represent the first systematic attempt by Western analysts to evaluate these Chinese assessments of the war in Ukraine across the full spectrum of warfare, including the land, sea, air and space, and information domains. Read the rest of the series here.

For some time, specialists have debated how mines could play an important role in a Taiwan contingency. Analysts have focused, in particular, on how the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) could deploy sea mines both to blockade Taiwan’s ports, and also to try to keep the U.S. Navy away from the island. A related concept would involve using landmines extensively to help turn the island into a genuine “porcupine” and thus prevent, or at least slow down, a Chinese attack on Taiwan.

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Chinese strategists have followed these discussions closely, of course, and are particularly attuned to the major role that landmines have played in the Ukraine War. That conflict increasingly shows signs of becoming a stalemate, as defensive technologies, such as man-portable air defense and anti-tank systems have demonstrated their value. A mid-2023 detailed Chinese-language survey of landmine warfare in the Ukraine War yields the conclusion that mines have played the most important role in stymieing the Ukrainian counteroffensive. The article states, “Landmines…as everyone knows, are easy to sow, but hard to remove.”

Somewhat paradoxically, PLA planners could be unnerved by this conclusion, since it may demonstrate anew the difficulties of the kind of rapid maneuver warfare that has long been envisioned for any hypothetical Chinese strike against Taiwan.

The Chinese analysis begins by noting that it was the Ukrainians who first effectively used landmines during the original Russian invasion in late February and March 2022. Early on, the Ukrainians were apparently employing the UMZ mine-layer, a system deployed by the USSR during the 1970s. While old, this system apparently proved quite effective.

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The Chinese analysis observes that each truck could lay a minefield of 1,500 meters by 150 meters in one to two hours. Noting that the Kremlin’s war preparations were inadequate, this rendering gives high marks to the Ukrainians’ initial employment of landmines. It is explained that due to Ukrainian mines, “Russian losses of equipment were extremely high.” Moreover, the article says that the requirement for advanced de-mining operations in areas the Russians had conquered “pinned down” and limited the speed of the Russian advance in that crucial early phase of the war.

The Chinese analysis also highlights Ukrainian effectiveness with PFM-1 “Petal” landmines. These are said to be highly effective because they do not resemble other landmines in appearance, but it is also noted that they have proven dangerous to civilians as well.

With respect to the summer 2023 Ukrainian counter-offensive, the Chinese analysis explains that as Ukrainian forces began to assemble NATO armored equipment in preparation, the Russians stepped up efforts at defense, “putting a high degree of emphasis on planting mines.” As noted above, the Chinese article gives the most credit for stalling the Ukrainian attack to these Russian landmine operations. Often the Ukrainian armored vehicles became immobilized in the minefields, but were then subsequently destroyed by either Russian helicopters or small anti-tank groupings. Such tactics inflicted “major losses” on the Ukrainian side. A picture in the Chinese article shows the now famous image of a cluster of destroyed Western armor, including a Leopard-2A tank, two Bradley AFVs, and a Leopard mine clearance vehicle.

The article discusses that Russian mine-laying vehicles are quite similar to the ones Ukraine had employed but are generally more advanced. With satellite navigation linked to an automated control system, the UMZ-K system has increased speed and precision. The vehicle has the ability to launch its entire payload in 15 seconds and can also put the mines on timers or even deactivate them to prevent friendly soldiers from being injured. Russia additionally has deployed a “long-range rocket mine-layer vehicle,” which can apparently spread mines at a distance of 5 to 15 kilometers.

Of course, in a Taiwan scenario, Chinese invaders would likely be confronting not Russian mine-layers, but rather Western-made equivalents. Thus, it is not surprising that the PLA has been closely following NATO’s development of such mine-laying systems. In mid-2023, the Chinese military newspaper China National Defense News reported on the specifics of a new Polish system: “In combat mode, the vehicle can lay a minefield with an area of 90 m by 1800 m on both sides of the vehicle at a speed of 5 to 25 kilometers per hour, which can be completed in less than 22 minutes. The vehicle can be reloaded with mines in 30 minutes.” To defeat such systems, the PLA will endeavor to fully understand their capabilities.

Taipei, naturally enough, is also studying the Ukraine War for applicable lessons and it is likely not at all coincidental that it just placed a major order in July 2023 for rapid mine-laying vehicles from Northrop Grumman that are quite similar to the types discussed above. In an attempt to defeat such systems, the PLA might adopt a “shoot the archer” approach – attempting to destroy the mine-layers before they are able to sow their deadly crop of mines. For that task, Chinese strategists would need exquisite intelligence. This possibility cannot be ruled out in today’s world of high-quality satellite imagery supplemented by drone surveillance, along with the use of human agents as well.

To state the obvious, the storage and handling of Taiwan’s mines and mine-layers could well be a high priority for Chinese “targeteers.” One factor that might work in China’s favor is that Taiwan forces would be quite reluctant to sow the island with mines given its rather high population density and the related danger of civilian casualties. Therefore, the relevant areas could be known decently well in advance by the PLA, while Taiwan’s forces may wait to the last possible moment to take such a significant step.

Moreover, it should be kept in mind that the PLA has long invested heavily in the work of sappers for mine detection and clearance. For example, Chinese sappers have been widely recognized for their continuing work in southern Lebanon to clear landmines. Placing special recognition on the heroism of such units, a massive outpouring of PLA support recognized the sacrifices of Du Fuguo, a sapper badly injured clearing mines on the China-Vietnam border. It seems likely that Chinese strategists harbor few illusions about the dangers extensive minefields might hold in a Taiwan scenario.

There is additional evidence that the Chinese are monitoring the success of Ukraine’s mine-clearance or breacher vehicles. The PLA is exercising with these vehicles regularly, including with the ability to employ line charges to clear minefields. Perhaps drawing on trends in Russian mine clearance capabilities, the PLA seems to have developed a prototype of an unmanned system for clearing landmines.

If it comes to an all-out assault on Taiwan, the PLA will most likely do everything possible to avoid the kind of static, trench warfare that has characterized the Ukraine War. That may partially explain why the PLA seems to be investing so heavily in airborne and helicopter assault capabilities – with the aim of leaping over the minefields that might lie just beyond the beaches.

thediplomat.com · by Lyle Goldstein · September 26, 2023

15. House adopts MTG amendment to slash Lloyd Austin salary in ‘dead on arrival’ defense bill

I have no words. Well maybe I do. How can we take something like this as representing a serious attempt to govern?

House adopts MTG amendment to slash Lloyd Austin salary in ‘dead on arrival’ defense bill

by Cami Mondeaux, Congressional Reporter September 27, 2023 03:36 PM

Washington Examiner · September 27, 2023

The House adopted an amendment proposed by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) to slash Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s annual salary to just $1 despite the Georgia Republican indicating she’ll vote against the defense spending legislation as a whole when it comes up for a vote later this week.

Lawmakers voted to include the amendment, which would utilize the Holman Rule that allows lawmakers to reduce the salary of specific federal employees, effectively firing them from that position. The amendment was adopted as part of the annual defense appropriations bill, which is scheduled for a full vote on its final passage on Thursday afternoon.

GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN: HOW YOUR SOCIAL SECURITY PAYMENTS WILL BE AFFECTED

“It's different than impeachment. You're taking their salary completely away and essentially firing them,” Greene told the Washington Examiner. “[Austin’s] a complete failure, an absolute failure, and passing this Holman Rule today, the amendment will allow us to fire him.”

Despite Greene praising the inclusion of her amendment, the firebrand conservative noted she would be voting against the annual defense spending bill when it comes up for a vote because of its inclusion of additional aid to Ukraine, something she has vocally opposed for months. Greene said she would also vote against the state and foreign operations appropriations bill because of its provisions providing support to Ukraine.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., speaks to the media outside of the Fulton County Jail, Thursday, Aug. 24, 2023, in Atlanta.

Brynn Anderson/AP

Greene’s opposition could spell trouble for House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) by putting two of the GOP-led spending bills in peril just days ahead of a government shutdown, with the Georgia Republican claiming at least two of the four appropriations bills are “dead on arrival” on the floor.

“Both of those bills are going to fail on the floor, and the money will have to be taken out,” she said.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

Greene said she has no specific headcount of how many members will vote against the bill but told the Washington Examiner it would be enough to sink the legislation without any Democratic support.

The comments come just days before federal funding is set to lapse with no spending plan finalized in either the House or the Senate, making it increasingly likely the government will shut down just after midnight on Sunday.

Washington Examiner · September 27, 2023

16. Palantir wins $250 million US Army AI research contract

Palantir wins $250 million US Army AI research contract

Defense News · by Colin Demarest · September 27, 2023

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Army awarded Palantir Technologies a contract worth as much as $250 million to research and experiment with artificial intelligence and machine learning.

The arrangement, announced by the Department of Defense on Sept. 26, runs through 2026. Exactly where work will be done and from where funding will be pulled will be determined with each order, it said.

Interest in AI and ML in the defense world has exploded in recent years, with military officials lauding their potential battlefield applications and industry matching the energy.

The Defense Department was juggling more than 685 AI-related projects as of 2021, according to the Government Accountability Office, a federal watchdog. At least 232 were in the Army’s bailiwick.

Palantir in 2016 won a lawsuit against the service concerning procurement procedures. The company has since secured multiple multimillion-dollar contracts.

The Army in October 2022 tapped Palantir for a five-year predictive maintenance contract worth a little more than $85 million. Military officials want to identify efficiencies and pain points within the supply chain and reduce the amount of time units are sidelined and are leaning into machine-powered forecasts to do so.

Palantir is also helping roll out the Army’s Global Force Information Management system, which consolidates more than a dozen aging applications and provides leaders an automated and holistic view of manpower, equipment, training and troop readiness.

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.

​17.  China unveils its vision for a new world order

Excerpts:

Fortunately, we learn that China "does not interfere in the internal affairs of other countries." This will be a relief to the security services of nations from the Netherlands to New Zealand to the United Kingdom to Canada to the U.S., all of which are targeted by vast Chinese influence and espionage campaigns.

My sarcasm aside, it's clear that there is a deep insecurity bubbling below the surface of this document. This is clearest when the claim that "democracy and freedom are the common goals of humanity. There is no single model of democracy that is universally applicable, far less a superior one." China's governance model is, of course, the antithesis of "freedom" or any basic notion of democracy. But were the CCP to admit that it governs without the consent of the Chinese people, it knows its new world order might not seem so desirable to the rest of the world.

China unveils its vision for a new world order

by Tom Rogan, National Security Writer & Online Editor September 26, 2023 03:53 PM

Washington Examiner · September 26, 2023

Courtesy of the Chinese Communist Party, we have a new vision for world order. The proposal released on Tuesday, "A Global Community of Shared Future," is designed as a framework to replace the U.S.-led international order of democratic sovereignty. Befitting the communist penchant for verbosity, the proposal is rather long. Still, it is notable both for its hypocrisy and its effort to woo developing nations into a Beijing-led autocratic global political structure.

We're told this new "theoretical structure" effectively "confronts the hegemonic thinking of certain countries that seek supremacy" (translation: the United States). The Chinese Communist Party's hyperbole is on full display. The paper observes that "some countries' hegemonic, abusive, and aggressive actions against others, in the form of swindling, plundering, oppression, and the zero-sum game, are causing great harm." Again, this is a very thinly veiled rebuke of U.S. efforts to organize international resistance to China's espionage and militarism.

FISHING NET DISPUTE ESCALATES CHINA-PHILIPPINES TENSIONS IN THE SOUTH CHINA SEA

Seeking to contrast its vision with Washington's, Beijing asserted, "We pursue development and revitalization through our own efforts, rather than invasion or expansion. And everything we do is for the purpose of providing a better life for our people, all the while creating more development opportunities for the entire world, not in order to supersede or subjugate others."

This must be news to Taiwan, which faces literal invasion from China. It must also be news to South China Sea nations, especially the Philippines, which faces aggressive Chinese "expansion" in its exclusive economic zone. It must also be news to the Uyghur people, subjected to a genocide that doesn't necessarily support the CCP's claim that "everything we do is for the purpose of providing a better life for our people."

Indeed, in a telling slip of the pen, the paper later claimed Beijing's social modernization involves "cultural-ethical advancement." That's a stellar Orwellian term for "annihilating the Uyghur identity." Similarly, European Union governments concerned about Chinese manufacturing subsidies and African fishermen concerned about Chinese fishing fleets stealing their livelihoods might not agree that China offers "more development opportunities for the entire world."

The silliness continues with Beijing's claim that "we should respect nature, follow its ways, and protect it. We should firmly pursue green, low-carbon, circular and sustainable development." Again, China's rapacious fishing fleets and soaring construction of dirty coal plants don't exactly testify to China's honesty here. Next, we're told that "countries should respect each others sovereignty and territorial integrity." Except, presumably, if it's Russia's war on Ukraine, which China actively enables. Or Taiwan's sovereignty and territorial integrity. Or that of the Philippines.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

Fortunately, we learn that China "does not interfere in the internal affairs of other countries." This will be a relief to the security services of nations from the Netherlands to New Zealand to the United Kingdom to Canada to the U.S., all of which are targeted by vast Chinese influence and espionage campaigns.

My sarcasm aside, it's clear that there is a deep insecurity bubbling below the surface of this document. This is clearest when the claim that "democracy and freedom are the common goals of humanity. There is no single model of democracy that is universally applicable, far less a superior one." China's governance model is, of course, the antithesis of "freedom" or any basic notion of democracy. But were the CCP to admit that it governs without the consent of the Chinese people, it knows its new world order might not seem so desirable to the rest of the world.

Washington Examiner · September 26, 2023

18. Military Educators Converge on New Workshop Series to Discuss Resilience in Evolving Clima​te

I am sure this will cause some political criticism from some factions.

So I decided to review the new Joint Pub 1, Joint Warfighting. The word climate is used only once in this phrase:

"... a command climate of mutual trust and shared understanding."

​There is nothing about climate change in the document.

Resilience is used quite extensively. But only in terms of warfighting and about the effects of climate.

This goes to the fundamental question: What should be the focus of PME?

​Excerpts:

Baxter said the goal is for these institutions to equip military leaders with the information and tools necessary to make "climate-informed decisions." 

"Climate change and the knowledge of why it matters for our national defense...need to be wrapped into the curricula and integrated with other emerging and enduring warfighting topics," she said. 

She added that the instruction should be suited to the learning environment and meet the service members where they are in their careers, explaining that the goal is to make climate change knowledge relevant and applicable to any military career. 

The learning objectives are meant to provide military education institutions with guidance to accelerate, amplify and harmonize their efforts to build climate literacy. Baxter also underscored that there is no tradeoff between teaching service members about this issue and instructing them on other core knowledge areas. 

Military Educators Converge on New Workshop Series to Discuss Resilience in Evolving Clima​te

defense.gov · by Joseph Clark

The rapidly changing national security landscape has presented a challenge for faculty throughout the Defense Department's military education institutions: how to match the pace of change on the battlefield with curricula in the schoolhouse agile enough to maintain the United States' warfighting edge.

A workshop series launched this month is offering a forum for faculty across the service academies, war colleges and command and staff schools to gain actionable information and materials to stay ahead of the curve.

The series was launched by the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Readiness and National Defense University.

Workshop Series

Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Force Education and Training, Office of the Secretary of Defense, Caroline Baxter speaks during a workshop focused on military resilience in an evolving climate and security environment at National Defense University, Joint Base Ft. McNair, Washington, D.C., Sept. 13, 2023.

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"The whole point of this series is to ensure that the American way of war continues unimpeded, regardless of the operational environment that we're going to be facing," said Caroline Baxter, deputy assistant secretary of defense for force education and training, in kicking off the inaugural session.

Titled "Military Resilience in an Evolving Climate and Security Environment," the first event featured a full day of panels and presentations focused on what defense officials have identified as among the most pressing challenges shaping nearly all facets of military planning and strategy.

"Climate change is amplifying operational demands on the force. It's degrading installations and infrastructure and increasing health risks to our service members," said Brendan Owens, assistant secretary of defense for energy, installations and environment and the Office of the Secretary of Defense's chief sustainability officer.

"The bottom line is that climate change impacts our ability to do the mission," he said.

U.S. national security leaders have long recognized the implications climate change will have on the operating environment.

In 2008, the National Intelligence Committee assessed that "global climate change will have wide-ranging implications for U.S. national security interests over the next 20 years."

The assessment noted that climate change would impact the flow of trade and market access to critical raw materials, threatening global stability.

"We're seeing all of the things that we knew were coming based on research that's been out for a long time," Owens said. "We're living in the world that we predicted would be here today."

Workshop Series

Assistant Secretary of Defense for Energy, Installations and Environment and the Defense Department’s Chief Sustainability Officer Brendan Owens speaks during a workshop focused on military resilience in an evolving climate and security environment at National Defense University, Joint Base Ft. McNair, Washington, D.C., Sept. 13, 2023.

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Defense leaders have, more recently, worked to understand the threat and how the DOD must adapt to the new operating environment.

In 2021, Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III directed a full-scale climate risk analysis to understand the ways climate change is shaping the strategic, operational and tactical environments and directed military leaders to consider the "effects of climate change at every level of the DOD enterprise."

In an address at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York, earlier this month, Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks underscored the imperative for future defense leaders to not only adapt to the new operating environment but also capitalize on the opportunities to create a more sustainable military.

Hicks said the cadets would have to grapple with climate change for decades to come.

"It is reshaping the geostrategic, operational and tactical environments with profound implications for U.S. defense policy," she said. "But with every challenge we face, comes an opportunity. And in the case of climate change, we have a twofold opportunity: to make our military more sustainable and create an operational advantage for our warfighters. Because, as it turns out, what's good for the environment also benefits our military."

Building that next generation of military leaders capable of both adapting to the evolving environment and maintaining operational advantage depends on the DOD's ability to develop critical knowledge, skills and capabilities.

"We're tackling this as a military resilience question," Baxter said. "This is not climate change for climate change's sake. The American way of war is complicated. It is getting more complicated for a myriad of reasons, one of which is that a changing climate is making nearly every aspect of our mission — from strategic issues like maintaining our readiness under any condition to tactical issues like projecting power during extreme weather events — more difficult."

"That is just the math and physics of it," she said. "Understanding the risks associated with a changing climate is foundational for those [who] hope to lead people in the future. They need to know why that job is going to be harder."

Military educators are a critical part of preparing military leaders to adapt and respond to climate change.

Workshop Series

Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Arctic and Global Resilience Iris Ferguson speaks during a workshop focused on military resilience in an evolving climate and security environment at National Defense University, Joint Base Ft. McNair, Washington, D.C., Sept. 13, 2023.

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In a memo last month, Shawn G. Skelly, performing the duties of the deputy undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, directed military education institutions to make certain their programs include learning outcomes that ensure military personnel "have a commensurate understanding of climate change as a force shaping the strategic threat environment."

Baxter said the goal is for these institutions to equip military leaders with the information and tools necessary to make "climate-informed decisions."

"Climate change and the knowledge of why it matters for our national defense...need to be wrapped into the curricula and integrated with other emerging and enduring warfighting topics," she said.

She added that the instruction should be suited to the learning environment and meet the service members where they are in their careers, explaining that the goal is to make climate change knowledge relevant and applicable to any military career.

The learning objectives are meant to provide military education institutions with guidance to accelerate, amplify and harmonize their efforts to build climate literacy. Baxter also underscored that there is no tradeoff between teaching service members about this issue and instructing them on other core knowledge areas.

Baxter and her team designed the workshop to help educators throughout the DOD collaborate and access the resources necessary to prepare military leaders to adapt and thrive in the changing operating environment.

Throughout the day, attendees were allowed to engage with those managing the impact of climate change on the front lines day in and day out.

The intent behind the exchanges, Baxter said, is for the educators to hear in concrete terms how the combatant commands, services and policy offices are adapting to climate change as they shape their curricula.

The planners behind the quarterly workshop series aren't stopping with climate resilience. Baxter said her team will be applying the same approach to a variety of emerging issues impacting the warfighter.

The next workshop, still in the planning stages, is intended to take place in February and focus on disruptive technologies like artificial intelligence, Baxter said.

"There is a deep appreciation for the speed with which technology evolves," she said. "We need to make sure that the military education institutions have what they need from a content perspective to quickly and effectively communicate related risks and mitigation strategies to service members and maximize their classroom learning."

For more information about the workshop series, contact Navy Cmdr. Charles Harmon.

Spotlight: Tackling the Climate Crisis Spotlight: Tackling the Climate Crisis: https://www.defense.gov/spotlights/tackling-the-climate-crisis/

defense.gov · by Joseph Clark

19. How is the falling confidence in America’s military creating a real crisis?

Excerpts:

The waning confidence in America's military presents a complex crisis transcending traditional defense boundaries. It underscores the intricate connections between military might, economic stability, and international reputation.

As the nation grapples with this challenge, it must recognize that rebuilding confidence in its military is not just a matter of national security; it's also essential for maintaining its economic resilience, global leadership, and diplomatic relationships.

Addressing this problem requires a comprehensive approach that bolsters defense capabilities, restoring public trust and effectively communicating the nation's commitment to its security objectives. Only through a renewed focus on rebuilding confidence can America navigate these turbulent waters and ensure a secure and prosperous future on both domestic and international fronts.

How is the falling confidence in America’s military creating a real crisis?

wearethemighty.com · by Lyle D. Solomon · September 23, 2023

The decline in confidence in America's military is giving rise to a significant crisis that extends beyond matters of defense and security.

According to a Gallup poll from June 1-22, the latest figures show that Americans' confidence in the military has reached its lowest level in 25 years, standing at 60%.

As a nation's military strength has profound implications for its global standing, economic stability, and diplomatic relationships, a weakening perception of America's military prowess leads to concerns that reverberate far beyond national security.

This crisis concerns military capabilities and the intricate interplay between military confidence, economic resilience and international influence.

Factors Contributing to Falling Confidence in America's Military

Several factors have contributed to the declining confidence in America's military, giving rise to a genuine crisis. One significant factor is the prolonged engagement in conflicts, for instance, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. The extended duration and evolving nature of these conflicts have led to war fatigue among the public, leading to skepticism about the effectiveness and purpose of military actions.

Another factor is the increasing focus on budgetary concerns. The push for fiscal responsibility has led to budget cuts in defense spending, raising concerns about the military's readiness and ability to address emerging threats. These cuts have raised questions about the adequacy of resources for maintaining a strong and capable military.

The rise of asymmetrical threats, such as cyber warfare and terrorism, has also impacted confidence. Traditional military capabilities might not be as effective against these new challenges, leaving the public uncertain about the military's ability to protect the nation in this evolving security landscape.

The media has also played a role with its ability to expose both the positive and negative aspects of military operations. Sensationalized stories, often focusing on failures or controversies, can shape public perception, sometimes leading to undue skepticism about the military's overall competence.

Lastly, political polarization has seeped into discussions about the military, making it a divisive debate. This polarization can lead to biased perceptions, affecting the public's trust in the military's role, actions and motivations.

Addressing these factors requires a multifaceted approach involving transparent communication, responsible use of resources, ethical conduct, adaptability to new threats, and efforts to bridge the political divide.

Impact of the declining confidence in America's military

The declining confidence in America's military is causing significant concerns from a debt and financial perspective.

The U.S. military has long been viewed as a pillar of strength, stability and security, influencing global perceptions and economic factors. When confidence in the military diminishes, it can lead to financial challenges.

Firstly, a strong military has historically contributed to geopolitical stability, attracting investments and fostering economic growth. A weakening perception of the military's capabilities can undermine this stability, potentially affecting trade, investments, and economic partnerships. International investors may become hesitant, leading to economic uncertainty and fluctuations in financial markets.

Secondly, defense spending constitutes a substantial portion of the U.S. budget. If confidence in the military wanes, there might be calls for reductions in defense expenditures. While responsible budgeting is essential, drastic cuts without strategic planning can compromise national security and disrupt defense industry contracts, impacting employment and regional economies.

The current situation may also cause uncertainty in military families. Military families often grapple with daunting uncertainties that make financial planning challenging. Questions about future relocations, potential deployments, housing choices, job prospects, and the possibility of force reductions keep them on their toes.

In such unpredictable circumstances, having an emergency fund and maintaining a budget is vital. Furthermore, military families must exercise caution in making financial commitments that could turn burdensome if situations change. For instance, if financial circumstances become a burden or you are trapped in an endless debt repayment cycle, a debt management plan can be helpful.

A decline in military confidence could also affect the nation's borrowing capacity. The U.S. Treasury often issues bonds to finance military expenditures, relying on investor confidence. Suppose doubts arise about the effectiveness of the military. In that case, it might lead to reluctance among investors to buy these bonds, increasing borrowing costs and potentially adding to the national debt burden.

Additionally, global economic systems are intertwined, and shifts in military confidence can influence international relations. Trade agreements, sanctions, and diplomatic negotiations can affect economic ties and lead to unintended financial consequences.

In essence, the loss of confidence in America's military has broader ramifications than just defense-related issues. It has the potential to ripple through economic sectors, affecting investor sentiment, trade, defense budgets, borrowing costs, and international relations.

Therefore, maintaining a strong military and ensuring public confidence is crucial for national security and the country's overall economic and financial well-being.

Possible Solutions

The falling confidence in America's military poses a significant crisis, but several potential solutions can address this issue.

These solutions include transparent communication with the public, efficient resource allocation, upholding ethical conduct and accountability, adapting to new security threats, public education and outreach, bipartisan support, responsible media reporting, support for veterans, fostering patriotism, and demonstrating global leadership.

By implementing these measures, the U.S. can rebuild trust in its military, ensuring its effectiveness in safeguarding national security and maintaining public support.

The waning confidence in America's military presents a complex crisis transcending traditional defense boundaries. It underscores the intricate connections between military might, economic stability, and international reputation.

As the nation grapples with this challenge, it must recognize that rebuilding confidence in its military is not just a matter of national security; it's also essential for maintaining its economic resilience, global leadership, and diplomatic relationships.

Addressing this problem requires a comprehensive approach that bolsters defense capabilities, restoring public trust and effectively communicating the nation's commitment to its security objectives. Only through a renewed focus on rebuilding confidence can America navigate these turbulent waters and ensure a secure and prosperous future on both domestic and international fronts.

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wearethemighty.com · by Lyle D. Solomon · September 23, 2023

​20. How the U.S. Created Its Own Reality

Excerpts:

McCain was well-known for promising to stand up to Putin, and his running mate Sarah Palin’s claim that she could counter the growing power of Russia in part because “they’re our next-door neighbors, and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska, from an island in Alaska” became a long-running joke. But observers noted that some of McCain’s political advisors were backing the Kremlin’s interests, including Russia’s extension of control over Montenegro.

Steve Schmidt, a campaign advisor who was fiercely loyal to McCain, later explained, “There were two factions in the campaign … a pro-democracy faction and … a pro Russia faction,” the latter led by Davis. Like Manafort, Davis had a residence in New York City’s Trump Tower, owned by one of the first clients Black, Manafort, and Stone had taken on in 1980: a New York City real estate developer named Donald J. Trump.

Increasingly, Republican politicians seemed to be operating on the old hierarchical idea that some people were better than others and should direct the economy, society, and politics, and they maintained that control by advancing a false narrative for their supporters that cast their opponents as enemies of the country.

In 2004, having manufactured information meant to justify the invasion of Iraq, the Bush administration was deeply entrenched in that ideology, no matter what the facts showed. A senior advisor to Bush disdainfully told journalist Ron Suskind that people like him—Suskind—were in “the reality-based community”: They believed people could find solutions based on their observations and careful study of discernible reality.

But, the aide continued, such a worldview was obsolete. “That’s not the way the world really works anymore. … We are an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors … and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”

How the U.S. Created Its Own Reality

Historian Heather Cox Richardson charts the roots of 21st-century disinformation—and how American democracy began to falter.

By Heather Cox Richardson, a professor of history at Boston College and an expert on American political and economic history.

Foreign Policy · by Heather Cox Richardson · September 26, 2023

On Dec. 25, 1991, Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev resigned, marking the end of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The fall of the Soviet Union meant the end of the Cold War, and those Americans who had come to define the world as a fight between the dark forces of communism and the good forces of capitalism believed their ideology of radical individualism had triumphed. With the Soviet Union vanquished, they set out to destroy what they saw as socialist ideology at home.

[Subscribers-only: Watch Heather Cox Richardson discuss her book on FP Live.]

The breakup of the Soviet Union gave political operatives and the politicians in the United States for whom they worked a new, crucial tool to undermine U.S. democracy: money, and lots of it, from international authoritarians, especially those from Russia and other former republics of the Soviet Union. Politicians from the U.S. Republican Party and foreign authoritarians began to make alliances over money, influence, and plots to gain power.

The book cover for Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America by Heather Cox Richardson.

This article is adapted from Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America by Heather Cox Richardson (Viking, 304 pp., $30, September 2023)

Since the 1980s, authoritarian governments had figured out they could score U.S. foreign aid by claiming they were standing against communists. Political consultants Charles Black, Paul Manafort, and Roger Stone, who had come together in 1980 to work on Ronald Reagan’s presidential campaign, racked up clients by touting their connections to the Reagan and George H. W. Bush administrations.

They represented so many authoritarian governments—in Nigeria, Kenya, Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo), Equatorial Guinea, Saudi Arabia, and Somalia, among others—that a 1992 report from the Center for Public Integrity called their firm the Torturers’ Lobby. They brought under one roof lobbying and political consulting as well as public relations. Bundling these functions was groundbreaking: They would get their clients elected and then help other clients lobby them.

As oligarchs began to take over former Soviet republics, the ties between oligarchical methods and the U.S. political system grew. Oligarchs looked to park illicit money in Western democracies, where the rule of law would protect their investments, and they favored the Republicans who championed their hierarchical view of the world. For their part, Republican politicians focused on spreading capitalism rather than democracy, arguing that the two went hand in hand.

At home, Republicans set out to vanquish the liberal consensus once and for all. As anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist wrote in the Wall Street Journal: “For 40 years conservatives fought a two-front battle against statism, against the Soviet empire abroad and the American left at home. Now the Soviet Union is gone and conservatives can redeploy. And this time, the other team doesn’t have nuclear weapons.”

In the 1990s, movement conservatives—who wanted to gut the liberal state that had been in force since 1933 and rely instead on market forces—turned their firepower on those they considered insufficiently committed to free enterprise. Their enemies included traditional Republicans who agreed with Democrats that the government should regulate the economy, provide a basic social safety net, promote infrastructure, and protect civil rights.

Their first public victim was President George H. W. Bush, who had come to office from the traditional wing of the Republican Party and set out during his presidency to repair the holes cut in the country’s fabric by Reagan’s supply-side economics.

Bush was willing to raise taxes to address the $2.1 trillion debt Reagan had run up in his eight years in office. These tax hikes drew the fury of movement conservatives, who called him and other traditional Republicans “Republicans in name only,” or RINOs, arguing that they were helping to bring “socialism” to the United States. Republican lawmakers moved further right, and those openly supporting the liberal consensus disappeared from party leadership.

Their primary target, though, was Democrats, who had frustrated movement conservatives once again in 1992 by putting former Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton into the White House. James Johnson, a jurist from Arkansas who had stood fervently against the integration of Little Rock’s Central High School in 1957, called Clinton a “queer-mongering, whore-hopping adulterer; a baby-killing, draft-dodging, dope-tolerating, lying, two-faced, treasonous activist.” Surely such a man was not a legitimate president. In 1996, the Fox News Channel debuted on cable television, joining right-wing radio talk show hosts to feed the idea that their political opponents were socialists trying to destroy the country.

Clinton frustrated right-wing ideologues, not just with his domestic positions, but also because they thought he did not push U.S. ideology hard enough overseas in the wake of the Cold War. In 1997, political commentator William Kristol and scholar Robert Kagan brought together Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and other neoconservatives, or neocons, to insist that the United States should significantly increase defense spending and lead the world.

Key to their organization, called the Project for the New American Century, was the removal of Iraq’s president, Saddam Hussein, from power because they believed he was destabilizing the Middle East. Iraq had allied with the Soviet Union during the Cold War, and when it invaded its smaller neighbor Kuwait in 1990, U.K. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher had convinced Bush to bring together an international coalition of 39 countries to impose sanctions on Iraq and to stop Saddam from occupying and absorbing Kuwait.

Acting under Article 51 of the United Nations charter, which permits “collective self-defense,” they did so. But after accomplishing that goal, they honored the charter and declined to topple Saddam. To the neoconservatives’ chagrin, the next president didn’t seem to get the point either: The United States must “challenge regimes hostile to our interests and values,” according to the Project for the New American Century, and “promote the cause of political and economic freedom abroad.”

Saddam was out of reach until Sept. 11, 2001, when 19 al Qaeda terrorists, inspired by Saudi exile Osama bin Laden, flew airplanes into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon outside Washington, D.C., and were on course to hit the U.S. Capitol before that plane’s passengers crashed the plane into a Pennsylvania field.

Neocons saw the attack as an opportunity to “hit” Saddam, although he had not been involved. Fifteen of the terrorists were from Saudi Arabia, two from the United Arab Emirates, one from Lebanon, and one from Egypt; they were operating out of Afghanistan, where the ruling extremist Islamic government—the Taliban—permitted al Qaeda to have a foothold.

President George W. Bush launched rocket attacks on the Taliban government, successfully overthrowing it before the end of the year. And then the administration undertook to reorder the Middle East in America’s image. In 2002, it announced the Bush doctrine, saying that Washington would preemptively strike nations suspected of planning attacks on the United States. Then in 2003, after setting up a pro-U.S. government in Afghanistan, the administration invaded Iraq.

But the Iraq War was not popular at home, and its unpopularity pushed the administration to equate supporting the Republicans with defending the nation against Islamic terrorists. That rhetorical strategy permitted them to strengthen the power of the president over Congress, most dramatically over the issue of “enhanced interrogation techniques,” more popularly known as torture, which in 2002 the administration began using against suspected terrorists.

Although the United States had traditionally considered torture illegal, the administration now argued that any limit to the president’s authority to conduct war was unconstitutional. When news of the program broke in 2004, Congress outlawed it, only to have Bush issue a signing statement rejecting any limitation on “the unitary executive branch.”

Meanwhile, the shared ideas and interests among rising global elites began to create a tangled web of money laundering, influence peddling, and antidemocratic plots that festered in foreign governments and infected the United States.

In 1996, Manafort managed the Republican National Convention, and by 2003, he and his partner, Rick Davis, were representing pro-Russia Ukrainian oligarch Viktor Yanukovych. In July 2004, U.S. journalist Paul Klebnikov was murdered in Moscow for exposing Russian government corruption; a year later, Manafort proposed working for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s government in former Soviet republics, Europe, and the United States by influencing politics, business dealings, and news coverage. In 2008, Davis was the director of Republican presidential nominee John McCain’s campaign, and McCain celebrated his 70th birthday with Davis and Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska on a Russian yacht at anchor in the Balkan country of Montenegro.

McCain was well-known for promising to stand up to Putin, and his running mate Sarah Palin’s claim that she could counter the growing power of Russia in part because “they’re our next-door neighbors, and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska, from an island in Alaska” became a long-running joke. But observers noted that some of McCain’s political advisors were backing the Kremlin’s interests, including Russia’s extension of control over Montenegro.

Steve Schmidt, a campaign advisor who was fiercely loyal to McCain, later explained, “There were two factions in the campaign … a pro-democracy faction and … a pro Russia faction,” the latter led by Davis. Like Manafort, Davis had a residence in New York City’s Trump Tower, owned by one of the first clients Black, Manafort, and Stone had taken on in 1980: a New York City real estate developer named Donald J. Trump.

Increasingly, Republican politicians seemed to be operating on the old hierarchical idea that some people were better than others and should direct the economy, society, and politics, and they maintained that control by advancing a false narrative for their supporters that cast their opponents as enemies of the country.

In 2004, having manufactured information meant to justify the invasion of Iraq, the Bush administration was deeply entrenched in that ideology, no matter what the facts showed. A senior advisor to Bush disdainfully told journalist Ron Suskind that people like him—Suskind—were in “the reality-based community”: They believed people could find solutions based on their observations and careful study of discernible reality.

But, the aide continued, such a worldview was obsolete. “That’s not the way the world really works anymore. … We are an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors … and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”

From Democracy Awakening by Heather Cox Richardson, published by Viking, an imprint of Penguin Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House, LLC. Copyright © 2023 by Heather Cox Richardson.

Foreign Policy · by Heather Cox Richardson · September 26, 2023

21. US ‘strategic ambiguity’ invites war over Taiwan

US ‘strategic ambiguity’ invites war over Taiwan

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/4222702-us-strategic-ambiguity-invites-war-over-taiwan/?utm_source=pocket_saves 

BY JOSEPH BOSCO, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR - 09/26/23 10:00 AM ET

Getty Images

One of President Biden’s assistant secretaries has now effectively told Congress to disregard his boss’s four express commitments to defend Taiwan. 

In August 2021, Biden was asked by Scott Pelley of CBS, “So unlike Ukraine, to be clear, sir, U.S. forces — U.S. men and women — would defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion?” Biden replied, “Yes, if in fact there was an unprecedented attack.” Presumably, he meant unprovoked. 

That same month, the president told ABC News’s George Stephanopoulos that the U.S. had a solemn commitment to act “if in fact anyone were to invade or take action against NATO … Japan, South Korea, or Taiwan.”   

In October 2021, CNN’s Anderson Cooper asked the same question about defending Taiwan. Biden answered, “Yes, we have a commitment to do that.” 

And in May 2023, during a Tokyo interview alongside Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, Biden repeated his statement on defending Taiwan: “That’s the commitment we made.” But, when asked whether “the policy of strategic ambiguity towards Taiwan [is] dead,” he replied “No.” Asked if he “could explain,” he again said “No.” 

After each of the Biden statements, officials from the White House, the State Department and the Defense Department stressed that the president was not making any change in U.S. policy. 

Ely Ratner, who heads the office of Indo-Pacific security affairs in the Defense Department, testified last week before the House Armed Services Committee and attempted to make sense of it all. He said that U.S. policy on Taiwan is premised on the Taiwan Relations Act, the Six Assurances, and the Three U.S.-China Communiques. He asserted that U.S. policy has been clear on this over six administrations led by both parties over the past 40 years. “[T]his longstanding policy that has preserved peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait for more than four decades.” 

But the continuity in articulating U.S. policy has not been as clear or consistent as suggested. 

In the Clinton administration, when Ratner’s predecessor in the position, Joseph Nye, was asked by Chinese officials during the Taiwan Strait Crisis of 1995-1996 what America would do if China attacked Taiwan, he responded, “We don’t know … it would depend on the circumstances.”   

He made no mention of any of the documents Ratner cited as scripture. Nye’s failure to cite the 1979 TRA was especially glaring since it is the legislative authority for U.S. arms to support Taiwan’s self-defense and for the U.S. “to maintain the capacity to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion” against Taiwan without actually committing it to do so. 

While subsequent administrations have come around to invoking the TRA as the basis for fortifying Taiwan’s defenses weapons, only in recent years have officials cited the TRA language implying the possibility of a direct U.S. defense of Taiwan.  

And none has ever taken notice of the following potentially tectonic sentence: “[T]he United States decision to establish diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China rests upon the expectation that the future of Taiwan will be determined by peaceful means;.” 

Ratner was asked whether the U.S. policy of strategic ambiguity on defending Taiwan enhances or undermines deterrence of Chinese aggression. He responded that replacing it with a policy of clarity — which is what Biden was attempting to do with his four comments — would not be useful in deterring China from attacking Taiwan. 

“We see the PRC anticipating a U.S. response to an invasion of Taiwan. They train against it. They assume it’s going to happen. Therefore, we don’t think there would be additional deterrence value in terms of changing our position away from strategic ambiguity.” 

The assessment that China expects some kind of initial U.S. kinetic response is probably correct. The determinative question, however, is what Washington does after Beijing predictably counters the U.S. response — that is, how far Washington is prepared to escalate to defend Taiwan. China’s leaders may well calculate that Biden’s paralyzing fear of any great-power conflict escalating to all-out war will serve as an effective counter-deterrent to U.S. military action on behalf of Taiwan.  

Concerned about damage to U.S. credibility after Russia invaded Ukraine, Biden sent an unofficial delegation of former U.S. defense and national security officials to Taiwan to show that the U.S. commitment to Taiwan “remains rock solid.” 

Yet, the perception of Biden administration weakness persists, especially after the calamitous withdrawal from Afghanistan. The Biden inhibition has been demonstrated repeatedly by his reluctance to provide Ukraine with the weapons it needs to inflict decisive damage on Russia’s invasion forces. Ratner’s co-witness at the HASC hearing, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Mira Reznick, stressed the inextricable relationship between U.S. actions on Ukraine and deterrence of aggression against Taiwan. Being “an unreliable partner for Ukraine would send exactly the wrong message to China.”   

She was warning against a threatened congressional cut-off of U.S. funding for Ukraine, but the lesson Beijing is learning about U.S. resolve also applies to Biden’s hesitant and halting arms deliveries to Ukraine and the severe limitations Washington places on what it does provide.  

It may well see parallels in the frequent interruptions and delays in the flow of U.S. arms to Taiwan. For Vladimir Putin and his “no-limits strategic partner,” Xi Jinping, having seen Western acquiescence to the first Russian invasion in 2014, U.S. slow-walking of arms transfers to Taiwan adds to doubts about Western resolve on both Ukraine and Taiwan. 

But Ratner argued not only that strategic clarity on Taiwan would achieve little or nothing to deter Chinese aggression — he asserted that it would be both ineffective and dangerous. 

“In fact, doing that would upset our commitment to the status quo and to opposing unilateral changes to the status quo,” he said. “So we think there is political cost that would be borne by the people on Taiwan for that kind of political action and very little value in terms of deterrence.” 

Yet, China has been changing the status quo on almost a daily basis with its escalating deployment of aircraft and warships around Taiwan. Before he finds himself reacting to a Xi fait accompli like Putin’s on Ukraine, Biden needs to consolidate and formalize his extemporaneous pledges to Taiwan’s democratic security. Only a clear and coherent policy statement reflecting a unified U.S. commitment to defend Taiwan will prevent calamity in East Asia. 

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. 

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Vice President, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Phone: 202-573-8647

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com