Quotes of the Day:

He who dares not to offend cannot be honest. 

- Thomas Paine

The people are the sea; the revolutionaries are the fish. The sea

supports the fish. It also hides them from predators. The revolutionaries

only want to show themselves when they are not themselves vulnerable.

Then they fade back into the sea, or the mountains, or the jungles.

- Mao Tse-tung

“I am no longer accepting the things I cannot change. I am chaining the things I cannot accept.” 

- Angela Y. Davis

1. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, DECEMBER 26

2. Ukraine war: Five ways conflict could go in 2023

3. The whistleblower who could blow open the Covid lab leak theory in 2023

4. Juan Williams: Ukraine unites Americans like little else

5. Taiwan to extend conscription to one year, citing rising China threat

6. Taiwan extends mandatory military service to prepare soldiers for cross-strait conflict

7. Revisiting Japan’s comprehensive security strategy

8. Lavrov: Ukraine must demilitarize or Russia will do it

9. As the United States walks away, Asia can’t give up on the rules based economic order

10. The indispensable but always irksome nation

11. TikTok Security Dilemma Revives Push for U.S. Control

12. Facebook, Twitter stocked with ex-FBI, CIA officials in key posts

13. Psychological Capabilities for Resilience

14.  Ukraine Converts $21.9 Billion In U.S. Military Surplus Into Fearsome Force

15. China’s Approach to Taiwan: Rhetoric vs. Reality

16. Pentagon, intelligence community eye cloud collaboration

17. Physical attacks on power grid surge to new peak

18. Should the Pentagon invest in microreactors?

19. Kissinger Sees a Global Leadership Vacuum

1. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, DECEMBER 26

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

Key Takeaways

• Russian President Vladimir Putin did not offer to negotiate with Ukraine on December 25 contrary to some reporting.
• Putin is likely concerned over the lack of support for his war in Ukraine among elites and may be setting information conditions for the nationalization of their property.
• Ukrainian intelligence reported that a Wagner Group-linked Russian officer was appointed commander of the Russian Western Military District (WMD).
• Ukrainian strikes on legitimate military targets far in the Russian rear continue to be points of neuralgia for the Russian milblogger community.
• Russian and Ukrainian forces continued offensive operations along the Svatove-Kreminna line.
• Ukrainian sources reported that Ukrainian troops are fighting near Kreminna.
• Russian sources claimed that Russian forces made limited gains northeast of Bakhmut.
• Russian forces continued ground attacks on the western outskirts of Donetsk City.
• Ukrainian military officials indicated that Russian forces may be concentrating some unspecified forces for offensive or demonstration operations in Zaporizhia Oblast and that Russian forces are attempting to conduct small-scale reconnaissance-in-force operations to reach right-bank Kherson Oblast.
• Russian officials and nationalists began to criticize the Kremlin’s lenient migration and passportization policies for Central Asian migrants.
• Russia is continuing efforts to consolidate control of occupied territories in Ukraine through the manipulation of citizenship procedures.

RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, DECEMBER 26

Dec 26, 2022 - Press ISW

Download the PDF

understandingwar.org

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, December 26

Kateryna Stepanenko, Karolina Hird, George Barros, and Frederick W. Kagan

December 26, 11 pm ET

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

Russian President Vladimir Putin did not offer to negotiate with Ukraine on December 25 contrary to some reporting. Putin, in a TV interview, stated that he does not think that the war is approaching a “dangerous line" and noted that Russia has no choice but to continue to defend its citizens, before stating that Russia “is ready to negotiate with all parties” involved in the conflict.[1] Putin did not explicitly state that Russia was ready to negotiate directly with Ukraine, instead maintaining his false narrative that Ukraine – which he simply called the “the other side” - had violated Russia’s pre-invasion diplomatic efforts. Putin’s discussions of negotiations have focused on putative discussions with the West rather than with Ukraine, and reflect his continual accusations that Ukraine is merely a Western pawn with no real agency.[2] This statement was not a departure from that rhetorical line. Putin also stated that he thinks Russia is “operating in a correct direction,” which indicates that he has not set serious conditions for negotiations and still wishes to pursue his maximalist goals.

Putin’s December 25 statement is a part of a deliberate information campaign aimed at misleading the West to push Ukraine into making preliminary concessions. The Kremlin did not publish the full transcript of Putin’s interview on its official website in contrast with its normal pattern, possibly to facilitate the misrepresentation of Putin’s full statement originally broadcasted in Russian and highlight his vague statement on negotiations.[3] The Kremlin’s use of the interview clip on the Christmas holiday may also be a response to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s recent speech at the US Congress amidst the holiday season.[4] The Kremlin has been intensifying this information campaign throughout December.

Putin is likely concerned over the lack of support for his war in Ukraine among elites and may be setting information conditions for the nationalization of their property. Putin pointed out that there are people in Russia who act solely in their self-interest when responding to a relatively positive interview question on his sentiments toward Russians’ commitment to the war.[5] Putin added that 99.9% of Russians would sacrifice everything for the “motherland.” Putin’s instant criticism of some members of society suggests that he is focused on those who do not fully support the war rather than on those who do. Putin made similar statements last week, noting that some businessmen who drain Russia’s money aboard are a “danger” to Russia.[6] Putin’s statements are also consistent with the Russian State Duma’s preparations to introduce a bill to increase tax rates for Russians who had left the country after the start of the “special military operation,” likely as a form of punishment for evading the war effort.[7] The Kremlin will likely use funds generated through the tax to fund its war in Ukraine.

Ukrainian intelligence reported that a Wagner Group-linked Russian officer was appointed commander of the Russian Western Military District (WMD). The Ukrainian Main Military Intelligence Directorate (GUR) reported on December 26 that former Chief of Staff of the Eastern Military District Lieutenant General Evgeny Valerivich Nikiforov was appointed as the new commander of the WMD and that Nikiforov is commanding the Russian western grouping of forces in Ukraine out of a command post in Boguchar, Voronezh Oblast.[8] The report states that Nikiforov replaced Colonel General Sergey Kuzovlev as WMD commander (November – December 2022) because Nikiforov is a member of the internal Russian silovik alliance formed by Commander of the Russian Armed Forces in Ukraine Army General Sergey Surovikin and Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin. Ukrainian intelligence previously reported that Prigozhin formed an alliance with Surovikin and that both Prigozhin and Surovikin are rivals of Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu.[9]

Nikiforov has previous experience commanding Wagner Group elements in Donbas from 2014 to 2015. A Bellingcat investigation found that Wagner founder Dmitry Utkin reported to Nikiforov – among other Russian military intelligence officials – when Nikiforov was the Chief of Staff of the Russian 58th Combined Arms Army in 2015.[10] A Ukrainian State Security Service (SBU) investigation found that Nikiforov ordered Utkin and his Wagner Group to destroy a Ukrainian Il-76 transport plane on June 14, 2014.[11]

Ukrainian strikes on legitimate military targets far in the Russian rear continue to be points of neuralgia for the Russian milblogger community. Russian sources began reporting explosions near the Engels Airbase in Saratov Oblast on the night of December 25 and the morning of December 26.[12] The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) stated that Russian air defense shot down a Ukrainian unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) that was approaching the Engels airfield at low altitude and that the wreckage of the UAV killed three Russian servicemen.[13] Several prominent Russian milbloggers latched onto the Russian MoD report on the incident as an opportunity to criticize domestic Russian air defense capabilities and question Russian authorities’ handling of and response to reported Ukrainian strikes deep in the Russian rear. One Wagner Group-affiliated milblogger questioned why Russian air defense only “miraculously” prevents strikes “exactly above the airfield/military unit” and noted that the Engels airfield is 500km into Russian territory.[14] Former militant commander and prominent Russian milblogger Igor Girkin sarcastically congratulated Russian air defense for activating before striking the airbase and questioned why Russia is allowing Ukrainian drones so deep into its territory.[15] Several Russian milbloggers also criticized the technical capabilities of Russian air defense and electronic warfare systems and voiced their concern over Russian authorities’ inability to protect critical Russian infrastructure.[16] Prominent voices in the pro-war information space will likely continue to seize on perceived attacks on Russian domestic security to criticize Russian military capabilities and leadership and call for escalated actions against Ukraine.

Key Takeaways

• Russian President Vladimir Putin did not offer to negotiate with Ukraine on December 25 contrary to some reporting.
• Putin is likely concerned over the lack of support for his war in Ukraine among elites and may be setting information conditions for the nationalization of their property.
• Ukrainian intelligence reported that a Wagner Group-linked Russian officer was appointed commander of the Russian Western Military District (WMD).
• Ukrainian strikes on legitimate military targets far in the Russian rear continue to be points of neuralgia for the Russian milblogger community.
• Russian and Ukrainian forces continued offensive operations along the Svatove-Kreminna line.
• Ukrainian sources reported that Ukrainian troops are fighting near Kreminna.
• Russian sources claimed that Russian forces made limited gains northeast of Bakhmut.
• Russian forces continued ground attacks on the western outskirts of Donetsk City.
• Ukrainian military officials indicated that Russian forces may be concentrating some unspecified forces for offensive or demonstration operations in Zaporizhia Oblast and that Russian forces are attempting to conduct small-scale reconnaissance-in-force operations to reach right-bank Kherson Oblast.
• Russian officials and nationalists began to criticize the Kremlin’s lenient migration and passportization policies for Central Asian migrants.
• Russia is continuing efforts to consolidate control of occupied territories in Ukraine through the manipulation of citizenship procedures.

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

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

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

Eastern Ukraine: (Eastern Kharkiv Oblast-Western Luhansk Oblast)

Russian forces continued counterattacks to regain lost positions northwest of Svatove on December 25 and 26. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces unsuccessfully attacked towards Lyman Pershyi (50 km northwest of Svatove), Stelmakhivka (15km west of Svatove), and Novoselivske (15km northwest of Svatove) on December 25.[17] Russian milbloggers remarked that Russian troops continued attacks in these areas on December 26.[18] Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) Deputy Interior Minister Vitaly Kiselyov claimed that Russian forces took control of Masiutivka (50km northwest of Svatove) on December 26, but ISW has not observed visual confirmation to corroborate this claim.[19] A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces are continuing offensive actions near Svatove and maintaining a stable pace of progress to make measured meter-by-meter advances.[20] Russian sources highlighted purported Ukrainian losses near Svatove and claimed that Ukrainian troops are transferring manpower and equipment to the area to compensate for massive personnel losses.[21]

Russian and Ukrainian forces continued offensive operations along the Svatove-Kreminna line between December 25 and 26. The Ukrainian General Staff noted that Ukrainian troops repelled Russian attacks near Ploshchanka (16km northwest of Kreminna), Chervonopopivka (5km north of Kreminna), and Nevske (17km northwest of Kreminna) on December 25 and 26.[22] Russian milbloggers noted that the Russian forces along the Svatove-Kreminna line are comprised of mobilized elements from Moscow Oblast, as well as elements of the 144th Motor Rifle Division of the 20th Combined Arms Army of the Western Military District and the 8th Combined Arms Army of the Southern Military District.[23] This composite force grouping suggests that Russian forces are pulling troops from various points throughout the theater to fill holes in the Svatove-Kreminna line and compensate for the continued degradation of conventional units. Russian sources also claimed that Ukrainian troops attempted to attack Russian positions near Kreminna and that elements of the Russian Legion and the 8th Combined Arms Army of the Southern Military District repelled Ukrainian attempts near Kreminna.[24] Ukrainian Luhansk Oblast Head Serhiy Haidai noted on December 26 that hostilities are taking place “not far” from Kreminna and that the Russian command in Kreminna has evacuated to Rubizhne, about 10km southeast of Kreminna and further behind the line of contact.[25] Haidai denied reports that Ukrainian forces liberated Kreminna and urged patience.[26] Russian milbloggers accused Ukrainian sources of “inflating” claims of success near Kreminna and called such reports an active information operation.[27]

Ukrainian troops continued to strike Russian concentration areas in rear areas of Luhansk Oblast. The Ukrainian General Staff confirmed on December 26 that Ukrainian forces struck a Russian manpower concentration near Polovynkyne, a settlement on the southern outskirts of Starobilsk and along the H21 Starobilsk-Luhansk City highway.[28] Russian sources additionally claimed that Ukrainian artillery strikes hit Rubizhne (just southeast of Kreminna) and Shchastia (20km north of Luhansk City) on December 25.[29]

Russian Main Effort—Eastern Ukraine

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

Russian forces continued offensive operations around Bakhmut on December 25 and 26. Donetsk Oblast Head Pavlo Kyrylenko noted on December 26 that the pace of Russian offensives on Bakhmut has not slowed and that Russian troops are deploying forces to the area and potentially raising additional reserves.[30] Kyrylenko’s observation may contradict ISW’s December 24 assessment that the pace of Russian offensives on Bakhmut has slowed in recent days, although it does not necessarily contradict ISW’s forecast that Russian troops may seek to initiate a tactical pause or slowdown in operations to regroup in this area.[31] The Ukrainian General Staff reported on December 25 and 26 that Russian troops conducted unsuccessful ground attacks on Bakhmut itself; northeast of Bakhmut near Vesele, Yakovlivka, Soledar, Bakhmutske, and Pidhorodne; and south of Bakhmut near Klishchiivka, Kurdiumivka, Mayorsk, and Pivnichne.[32] Russian milbloggers claimed that Wagner Group fighters launched an offensive northeast of Bakhmut towards Soledar and took control of a school between Bakhmutske and Soledar and cleared Ukrainian strongholds on the outskirts of Pidhorodne on December 26.[33] Social media footage posted on December 25 shows Ukrainian troops fighting south of Bakhmut in Opytne, and Russian milbloggers continued to discuss Russian operations in this area.[34] Former militant commander and prominent Russian milblogger Igor Girkin noted that Ukrainian troops have had eight years to prepare defenses south of Bakhmut and that Russian forces are unlikely to advance in this area beyond marginal tactical gains.[35]

Russian forces continued offensive operations along the western outskirts of Donetsk City on December 25 and 26. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian troops conducted unsuccessful ground attacks on Krasnohorivka, Vesele, Vodiane, and Marinka (all ranging from the northwestern to southwest outskirts of Donetsk City) between December 25 and 26.[36] Geolocated combat footage posted on December 26 shows Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) forces taking control of a Ukrainian fortification about 8km north of Avdiivka.[37] Russian milbloggers claimed that Russian troops additionally attacked Nevelske and Pervomaiske (both just northwest of Donetsk City) and Novomykhailivka (10km southwest of Donetsk City) on December 25.[38] Russian sources continued to discuss reported Russian advances within Marinka and claimed that Russian troops, including elements of the 150th Motor Rifle Division of the 8th Combined Arms Army of the Southern Military District, are pushing Ukrainian troops to the western outskirts of the settlement.[39] Russian sources continued to claim that Ukrainian forces conducted limited counterattacks southwest of Donetsk City to regain lost positions in the Vuhledar area.[40]

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

Ukrainian military officials indicated that Russian forces may be concentrating some unspecified forces for offensive or demonstrative operations in Zaporizhia Oblast. The Head of the Ukrainian Joint Press Center of the Tavrisk Direction Defense Forces, Yevhen Yerin, stated that Russian forces are gathering forces in unspecified areas that could be formations for an offensive operation.[41] Yerin noted that this group occasionally changes its positions but that the Russian command has not yet chosen a specific operational direction. Yerin added that it is unclear if the Russian military command will use this group for demonstration actions or in preparation for an offensive operation and stated that Ukrainian forces have not observed a significant increase in forces in Zaporizhia Oblast at this time. Russian occupation officials and milbloggers amplified reports that Russian forces finalized the construction of fortifications along the Zaporizhia Oblast frontline on December 25.[42] A Russian milblogger also commented on Ukrainian reports that Russian forces are engineering positions around Melitopol, noting that Russian forces gathered a lot of military equipment in the city “as if they are preparing for the battle of the century.”[43]

Ukrainian military officials reported that Russian forces are attempting to conduct small-scale reconnaissance-in-force operations to reach right-bank Kherson Oblast.[44] Spokesperson for the Ukrainian Southern Defense Forces, Nataliya Humenyuk, also stated that Russian forces are continuing to lose positions in unspecified areas, while Ukrainian forces are maintaining artillery fire to prevent additional personnel from reinforcing advanced Russian groupings.[45] Humenyuk added that Ukrainian forces are continuing unspecified combat operations against Russian forces on Kinburn Spit, while Russian forces are using their positions on the spit to shell port areas in Mykolaiv Oblast. Russian forces are continuing to target liberated settlements and Ukrainian positions in right-bank Kherson, Mykolaiv, Dnipropetrovsk, and Zaporizhia oblasts.[46] Russian forces also continued to shell the densely populated cities of Beryslav and Kherson.[47]

Ukrainian forces continued to strike Russian targets in southern Ukraine. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces struck Russian headquarters in Zabaryne (approximately 30km southwest of Kherson City) during a meeting of Southern Military District (SMD) officers.[48] The strike reportedly injured up to 70 Russian servicemen. The Ukrainian General Staff also reported that a Ukrainian strike on an unnamed location in occupied Kherson Oblast killed up to 50 Russian servicemen and wounded up to 100 troops.[49] Ukrainian local officials and social media users also reported that Ukrainian forces struck Russian military equipment in Oleshky and Chaplynka, 10km and 67km southeast of Kherson City respectively.[50]

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

Russian officials and nationalists began to criticize the Kremlin’s migration and passportization policies for Central Asian migrants aimed at incentivizing force generation efforts. The Tajik branch of Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) reported on December 22 that the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) offered Russian passports to more than 119,000 Tajiks between January and September, with the number of acquired citizenships peaking in July-September.[51] An expert told RFE/RL that Russian officials had simplified the acquisition of citizenship for Central Asian migrants by allowing them to sign a contract with the Russian Armed Forces in exchange for a passport. ISW previously reported that the Kremlin initiated a volunteer recruitment campaign between June and September in which federal officials offered citizenship, social benefits, and one-time enlistment bonuses to migrants in exchange for participation in the war.[52] The report upset several prominent Russian milbloggers who had made xenophobic remarks that these 119,000 migrants from Tajikistan will never integrate into Russian society, will form their own diasporas that hate Russians, and are already committing violent crimes in Russia.[53] One prominent milblogger complained that thousands of people of “foreign culture and ideology” aim to exploit Russian charity while viewing Russia as a colonizing power.[54]

The Russian MVD felt compelled to respond to and deflect criticism from Russian nationalists regarding immigration spikes among Central Asian nationals. Head of the MVD Vladimir Kolokoltsev stated that 16 Russian ministries are migration beneficiaries, but that “society only questions the MVD” over these migration concerns.[55] Kolokoltsev also reinforced the nationalists’ xenophobic rhetoric by claiming that most criminal offenses committed by Central Asian migrants are related to drug trafficking. Such rhetoric may foster societal tensions and does not reflect Putin’s repeated portrayal of Russia as an equal and tolerant society.[56]

Russian President Vladimir Putin has been increasing his interactions with the Russian military-industrial complex, likely in false hopes that Russia can recreate the Soviet Union’s production capabilities. Putin had been visiting several defense factories and had met with the heads of the Russian military-industrial complex during the past week.[57] Putin had also appointed Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev to the new position of First Deputy Chairman of the Military Industrial Commission responsible for coordinating weapons production for the Russian Armed Forces.[58]

Russians continue to express confusion and concern over Russian partial mobilization and force generation efforts. A Russian news outlet reported that Russians had viewed an official partial mobilization FAQ tab over 50 million times and have viewed an official “special military operation” FAQ website over 239 million times.[59] A few Russians are continuing to commit arson against Russian military recruitment centers likely in protest of Russia’s force generation efforts. Former United Russia parliamentarian Daniil Akimov set a military enlistment office on fire in Saratov, badly damaging the building.[60] The Russian military command is attempting to tighten its grip on Russian saboteurs, however, and reclassified one of the attacks on a military recruitment center in Nizhnevartovsk, Khanty-Mansi Republic as a terrorist act.[61]

Russian officials have expressed an interest in creating additional military training centers across the country, but Russia is unlikely to be able to recruit sufficient trainers to staff these facilities without compromising the ongoing war effort in Ukraine. Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yuriy Trutnev stated that Russia plans to create special forces training grounds analogous to the SPETZNAZ University in the Republic of Chechnya.[62] Russian officials will need to withdraw some of their most experienced fighters from the frontlines in Ukraine to staff these centers.

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

Russia is continuing efforts to consolidate control of occupied territories in Ukraine through the manipulation of citizenship procedures. Russian President Vladimir Putin approved a decree on December 26 that simplifies the procedure for submitting certain applications related to citizenship procedures for residents of Kherson, Zaporizhia, Donetsk, and Luhansk oblasts.[63] The decree clarifies procedures for application for Russian passports, the recognition of children under 14 years old as Russian citizens and filing and recording applications for the renunciation of Ukrainian citizenship (presumably without seeking Russian citizenship).[64] This decree essentially codifies various avenues for acquiring Russian citizenship, and likely indicates a widespread unwillingness of residents of occupied areas to apply for Russian passports. This notably undermines the Kremlin narrative of widespread support for Russian citizenship in annexed areas of Ukraine.[65]

Russian occupation authorities are continuing to intensify law enforcement activities and restrictions on movement in occupied areas in response to Ukrainian partisan activities. Spokesperson for Ukraine’s Southern Operational Command, Nataliya Humenyuk, stated on December 25 that Russian occupation elements are strengthening the police regimes in Hornostaivka, Kherson Oblast, and Vasylivka, Zaporizhia Oblast, due to continued pressure levied by Ukrainian partisans.[66] The Ukrainian General Staff similarly noted on December 26 that Russian forces in Tokmak, Zaporizhia Oblast, are working with local collaborators to search the population for pro-Ukrainian sentiments and are checking personal laptops, phones, and residences.[67] The Ukrainian Resistance Center noted that Russian forces in occupied areas are kidnapping Ukrainian citizens in order to search for partisan elements and extract confessions on the underground movement.[68] Ukrainian sources widely reported on the continued restriction of movement out of occupied areas on December 25 and 26.[69]

Russian authorities are continuing to employ various social guises to justify the transfer of Ukrainian children to Russia and other Russian-occupied areas. Zaporizhia Oblast occupation head Yevheny Balitsky posted a picture on December 25 reportedly of children from occupied Zaporizhia Oblast in Moscow and stated that 240 children arrived in Moscow to see the Kremlin’s Christmas tree as part of the “New Years with Big Changes” youth engagement scheme.[70] It is unclear whether and under what circumstances these children will return to Zaporizhia Oblast. ISW has previously reported on Russian efforts to transfer Ukrainian children to Russia under the guise of participation in youth education and civil service programs.[71]

Russian occupation officials are reportedly using religious institutions to consolidate social control of occupied areas. The Ukrainian Resistance Center reported on December 26 that Russian authorities began to “integrate” churches in occupied areas by only allowing Kremlin-affiliated churches to remain active.[72] The Resistance Center noted that this “integration” is carried out by a program that is financed through grants from the Russian Presidential Administration.[73] ISW has previously reported that Kremlin-backed elements of the Moscow Patriate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC MP) supported Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea and the current war.[74] Russian occupation authorities are likely working with the UOC MP and other similarly Kremlin-linked religious organs to build the veneer of religious legitimacy and therefore consolidate social control of occupied areas.

ISW will continue to report out daily observed indicators consistent with the current assessed most dangerous course of action (MDCOA): a renewed invasion of northern Ukraine possibly aimed at Kyiv.

ISW’s December 15 MDCOA warning forecast about a potential Russian offensive against northern Ukraine in winter 2023 remains a worst-case scenario within the forecast cone. ISW currently assesses the risk of a Russian invasion of Ukraine from Belarus as low, but possible, and the risk of Belarusian direct involvement as very low. This new section in the daily update is not in itself a forecast or assessment. It lays out the daily observed indicators we are using to refine our assessments and forecasts, which we expect to update regularly. Our assessment that the MDCOA remains unlikely has not changed. We will update this header if and when the assessment changes.

Observed indicators for the MDCOA in the past 48 hours:

• Nothing significant to report.

Observed ambiguous indicators for MDCOA in the past 48 hours:

• Ukrainian Air Force Command Spokesperson Yuriy Ihnat stated on December 25 that an unspecified number of Russian MiG-31 interceptors returned to an unspecified airfield in Belarus after redeploying to Russia for a few weeks.[75] Russia reportedly deployed three MiG-31K interceptors to the Belarusian airfield in Machulishchy on December 13.[76]
• The Head of the Main Directorate of Ideology at the Belarusian Ministry of Defense Leonid Kasinsky stated on December 25 that the Iskander tactical ballistic missile systems and the S-400 air defense systems that Russia deployed to Belarus are on active combat duty and are fully prepared to perform unspecified “tasks for their intended purpose.”[77]

Observed counter-indicators for the MDCOA in the past 48 hours:

• The Ukrainian General Staff reiterated that it has not observed Russian forces in Belarus forming a strike group as of December 26.[78]
• Chief of the Ukrainian Main Military Intelligence Directorate (GUR) Kyrylo Budanov stated on December 26 that that he does not expect fundamental changes in the situation soon and that Russian forces are concentrating forces north of Bakhmut and in the Zaporizhia direction.[79]
• Head of the Ukrainian Joint Press Center of the Tavrisk Direction Defense Forces Yevhen Yerin stated on December 26 that the Russian military is gathering forces that can support an offensive on December 26 but did not specify where: “The [Russian military] did not choose any specific direction or area. It changes positions from time to time, so whether it is a demonstration force or preparation for an offensive, it is still difficult to say.”[80]
• Geolocated footage posted on December 25 shows a train with at least seven tanks in Kamensk-Shakhtinsky, Rostov Oblast reportedly heading to the Donetsk or Luhansk area of operations.[81] Russian equipment deployments to Luhansk are consistent with ISW’s assessment that the Russian military is likely setting conditions for an offensive in northwestern Luhansk Oblast.[82]

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.

[1] https://smotrim dot ru/video/2536499

[3] http://kremlin dot ru/events/president/transcripts/interviews

[5] https://smotrim dot ru/video/2536499

[7] https://tass. dot u/ekonomika/16683593; https://t.me/vv_volodin/588; https://t.me/readovkanews/49597; https://...

[8] https://gur.gov dot ua/content/okupanty-pryznachyly-novoho-komanduvacha-zakhidnoho-vo-chetvertoho-z-pochatku-povnomasshtabnoi-ahresii.html

[11] https://ssu.gov dot ua/ua/news/1/category/2/view/6157#.VgWQkX3a.dpbs; https://old.defence-ua dot com/index.php/home-page/7606-sbu-vstanovyla-prychetnist-kremlya-do-zbyttya-ukrayinskoho-viyskovo-transportnoho-litaka-il-76; https://mil.in dot ua/uk/sbu-poimenno-vstanovylo-vbyvcz-ukrayinskyh-desantnykiv-ta-lotchykiv/

[13] https://ria dot ru/20221226/bespilotnik-1841275336.html

[26] https://gordonua dot com/ukr/news/war/pid-kreminnoju-jdut-bojovi-diji-misto-shche-ne-zvilnili-gajdaj-1642582.html

[41] https://armyinform.com dot ua/2022/12/26/vorog-ukriplyuye-svoyi-pozyczij-shho-svidchyt-pro-jogo-bazhannya-zakripytysya-ale-ne-diyaty-aktyvno/

[45] https://armyinform dot com.ua/2022/12/26/vorog-vtrachaye-svoyi-pozycziyi-postupovo-ale-dosyt-upevneno/

[56] http://kremlin dot ru/events/president/news/69465

[57] http://kremlin dot ru/events/president/news/70180; https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-ass...

[58] http://publication.pravo dot gov.ru/Document/View/0001202212260013?index=1&rangeSize=1; http://www.consultant dot ru/document/cons_doc_LAW_168420/6ad32bea2a5a8840857fcf000756d58a52214c73/; http://pravo dot gov.ru/proxy/ips/?docbody=&prevDoc=102473270&backlink=1&&nd=102358203

[62] https://rg dot ru/2022/12/25/trutnev-po-vsej-rossii-planiruiutsia-sozdat-centry-podgotovki-bojcov-specnaza.html; https://ria dot ru/amp/20221225/spetsnaz-1841241429.html; https://t.me/RKadyrov_95/3222

[63] https://tass dot ru/obschestvo/16692359; http://publication.pravo dot gov.ru/Document/View/0001202212260018; https://t.me/readovkanews/49690

[64] https://tass dot ru/obschestvo/16692359; http://publication.pravo dot gov.ru/Document/View/0001202212260018; https://t.me/readovkanews/49690

[65] https://tass dot ru/mezhdunarodnaya-panorama/15888905

[66] https://suspilne dot media/345826-vijska-rf-posiluut-policejskij-rezim-u-gornostaivci-ta-vasilivci-bo-vidcuvaut-silu-sprotivu-proti-nih-gumenuk/

[68] https://sprotyv.mod.gov dot ua/2022/12/25/rosiyany-prodovzhuyut-vykradaty-lyudej-na-tot-2/

[72] https://sprotyv.mod.gov dot ua/2022/12/26/okupanty-hochut-zachystyty-tot-vid-nepidkontrolnyh-kremlyu-czerkov/

[75] https://armyinform dot com.ua/2022/12/25/prognozy-na-konkretni-daty-shhodo-zbilshennya-kilkosti-raketnyh-udariv-sprava-nevdyachna-yurij-ignat/

[77] https://charter97 dot org/ru/news/2022/12/25/529705/; https://reform dot by/v-minoborony-rasskazali-pro-uskorennyj-process-poluchenija-s-400-i-iskander

[79] https://gur.gov dot ua/content/nashi-pidrozdily-zaidut-do-krymu-zi-zbroieiu-v-rukakh.html

[80] https://armyinform.com dot ua/2022/12/26/vorog-ukriplyuye-svoyi-pozyczij-shho-svidchyt-pro-jogo-bazhannya-zakripytysya-ale-ne-diyaty-aktyvno/

understandingwar.org

2. Ukraine war: Five ways conflict could go in 2023

​The five from five experts:

'Russia's spring offensive will be key'

'Ukraine will win back its land'

'There is no end in sight'

'No other outcome except Russian defeat'

'Expect more of the same'

​

Ukraine war: Five ways conflict could go in 2023

BBC · by Menu

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• Russia-Ukraine war

Image source, Getty Images

Image caption,

Destroyed Russian tank in liberated town of Sviatohirsk

The conflict in Ukraine is about to enter its second calendar year. We asked several military analysts how they think events on the ground will unfold in 2023.

Could it conclude in the coming year and how - on the battlefield or at the negotiating table? Or might it grind on to 2024?

'Russia's spring offensive will be key'

Michael Clarke, associate director of the Strategic Studies Institute, Exeter, UK

Those who seek to invade another country anywhere across the great Eurasian steppes are condemned eventually to winter in it.

Napoleon, Hitler and Stalin all had to keep their armies moving in the face of a steppes winter, and now - his invasion going backwards on the ground - Vladimir Putin is digging his forces in for the winter to await a new Russian offensive in the spring.

Both sides need a pause but the Ukrainians are better equipped and motivated to keep going, and we can expect them to maintain the pressure, at least in the Donbas.

Around Kreminna and Svatove they are very close to a big breakthrough that would throw Russian forces 40 miles back to the next natural defensive line, close to where their invasion effectively began in February.

Kyiv will be reluctant to halt when the immediate prize is so great. Ukrainian offensives might, nevertheless, pause down in the south-west, following the recovery of Kherson.

Crossing over to the east side of the Dnipro river to pressure Russia's vulnerable road and rail links into Crimea might be too demanding. But the possibility of Kyiv launching a surprise new offensive can never be ruled out.

• How Russia is rebuilding its key bridge to Crimea

For 2023, the key determinant will be the fate of Russia's spring offensive. Putin had admitted that about 50,000 of the newly mobilised troops are already at the front; the other 250,000 of those just mobilised are training for next year.

There is no scope for anything but more war until the fortunes of those new Russian forces are settled on the battlefield.

A short and unstable ceasefire is the only other prospect. Putin has made it clear he will not stop. And Ukraine has made it clear it is still fighting for its life.

'Ukraine will win back its land'

Andrei Piontkovsky, scientist and analyst based in Washington DC

Ukraine will win by restoring completely its territorial integrity by spring 2023 at the latest. Two factors are shaping this conclusion.

One is the motivation, determination and courage of the Ukrainian military and Ukrainian nation as a whole, which is unprecedented in modern war history.

Image source, Reuters

Image caption,

Ukrainian artillery in action near Bakhmut on 26 December

The other is the fact that, after years of appeasement of a Russian dictator, the West has finally grown up to realise the magnitude of historical challenge it faces. This is best illustrated by a recent statement by Nato General Secretary Jens Stoltenberg.

"The price we pay is in money. While the price the Ukrainians pay is in blood. If authoritarian regimes see that force is rewarded we will all pay a much higher price. And the world will become a more dangerous world for all of us."

The exact timing of the inevitable Ukrainian victory will be determined by the speed at which Nato can deliver a new game-changing package of military assault weapons (tanks, planes, long-ranged missiles).

• What weapons are being supplied to Ukraine?

I expect Melitopol will become the key battle point in the coming months (maybe weeks). Having taken over Melitopol, Ukrainians will easily move to the Azov Sea, effectively cutting off supply and communication lines to Crimea.

Russian capitulation will be formally agreed upon at technical talks after devastating Ukrainian advances on the battleground.

The victorious powers - Ukraine, UK, USA - will shape a new international security architecture.

'There is no end in sight'

Barbara Zanchetta, Department of War Studies, King's College London

Vladimir Putin expected Ukraine's passive acceptance of its more powerful neighbour's actions, with no meaningful involvement of other countries. This grave miscalculation has led to a protracted conflict, with seemingly no end in sight.

The winter will be difficult, as Russian attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure will try to break the morale and endurance of an already shattered population. But Ukrainian resilience has proved to be remarkable. They will stand firm. The war will drag on. And on.

The prospects for negotiation are bleak. For a potential peace deal the core demands of at least one side need to change. There is no evidence that this has happened, or that it will happen soon.

Image source, Getty Images

How will the end come, then?

The costs of the war, both material and human, might break the level of commitment of the Russian political elite. The key will be inside Russia.

Past wars in which miscalculation was a crucial element, such as Vietnam for United States, or Afghanistan for the Soviet Union, only ended in this way. Domestic political conditions shifted in the country that had miscalculated, making exit - either "honourable" or not - the only viable option.

This may only happen, however, if the West stands firm in its support for Ukraine, in the face of increased domestic pressures linked to the costs of the war.

Sadly, this will continue to be a long-protracted political, economic and military battle of resolve. And by the end of 2023 it will most probably still be ongoing.

'No other outcome except Russian defeat'

Ben Hodges, former commanding general, United States Army Europe

It's too early to plan a victory parade in Kyiv but all the momentum is with Ukraine now and there is no doubt in my mind that they will win this war, probably in 2023.

Things will move slower over the winter but there's no doubt that Ukraine's forces will be better able to cope than Russia's because of all the winter equipment coming from the UK, Canada and Germany.

By January, Ukraine could be in a position to begin the final phase of the campaign which is the liberation of Crimea.

We know from history that war is a test of will and a test of logistics. When I see the determination of the Ukrainian people and soldiers, and the rapidly improving logistical situation for Ukraine, I see no other outcome but a Russian defeat.

• Can we expect peace talks to begin?

The Russian pull-out from Kherson has partly led me to this conclusion. Firstly as a psychological boost for the Ukrainian people, secondly as a profound embarrassment for the Kremlin and thirdly by handing Ukraine's forces a key operational advantage - all approaches into Crimea are now within range of Ukrainian weapon systems.

Image source, Getty Images

I believe that the end of 2023 will see Crimea fully restored to Ukrainian control and sovereignty though there may be some sort or agreement that allows Russia to phase out some of its naval presence in Sevastopol… perhaps even to the end of the treaty (approximately 2025) that had existed before Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea.

Reconstruction efforts will be under way on the Ukrainian infrastructure along the Azov Sea coast, including the important ports of Mariupol and Berdyansk, and the reopening of the North Crimean Canal that diverts water from the Dnipro to Crimea will be another important project receiving attention.

'Expect more of the same'

David Gendelman, military expert based in Israel

Instead of "how it's going to end" here is what each side would like to achieve in the next phase.

Only about half of Russia's 300,000 mobilised troops are already in the fighting zone. The rest, together with the forces freed for action after Kherson withdrawal, gives the Russians an opportunity to launch an offensive.

The occupation of the Luhansk and Donetsk regions will continue but a major Russian breakthrough like a drive from the south to Pavlograd to encircle the Ukrainian forces in the Donbas is less likely.

More probable is a continuation of current tactics - a slow grinding of Ukrainian forces on narrow directions and a slow advance, like in Bakhmut and Avdiivka areas, with possible same tactics in Svatove-Kreminna area.

Continuing targeting of Ukrainian energy infrastructure and other attacks on Ukrainian rear will complete this war of attrition strategy.

Significant Ukrainian forces were also freed after a Russian retreat from Kherson. For them the most strategically valuable direction is south, to Melitopol or Berdyansk, aiming to cut the Russian mainland corridor to Crimea. That would be a major Ukrainian victory, and that is exactly why Russians are fortifying Melitopol.

Another option for Ukraine is Svatove - success there would endanger the whole northern flank of the entire Russian frontline.

The big question is how many Ukrainian forces are free and available for the offensive at this point, and what timetable General Zaluzhnyi has on his desk stating how many new reserve brigades and corps that are being built will be ready in one, two or three months from now, including manpower, armoured vehicles and heavy weapons.

After the mud freezes, we will get the answer to this question. And this answer will get us a little closer to "how it's going to end".

The analysts were chosen for their military expertise and their mix of perspectives

BBC · by Menu

3. The whistleblower who could blow open the Covid lab leak theory in 2023

The whistleblower who could blow open the Covid lab leak theory in 2023

Gene therapy and cell engineering specialist Dr Alina Chan has doggedly pursued an investigation into the origins of the pandemic

By

Sarah Knapton,

 SCIENCE EDITOR

27 December 2022 • 7:00am

The Telegraph · by Sarah Knapton,

We asked The Telegraph’s experts to name their 2023 ‘one to watch’. Here’s who, and what, we’ll be talking about in the year ahead. Scroll down to browse the whole series.

If you haven’t heard of the whistleblowing scientist Dr Alina Chan, then you almost certainly will in 2023.

The gene therapy and cell engineering specialist at The Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard was one of the first experts to question whether Covid leaked from a lab in Wuhan, and has doggedly pursued an investigation into the origins of the pandemic.

In the coming year, it is possible that evidence will finally emerge proving that experiments to soup-up coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) led to the accidental release of Covid. ‘Right now it’s not safe for people who know about the origin of the pandemic to come forward,’ she told MPs at a session of the Science and Technology Select Committee in 2021. ‘But we live in an era where there is so much information being stored that it will eventually come out.’

Dr Chan was born in Canada but grew up in Singapore, returning to Canada to attend the University of British Columbia for both her undergraduate degree and her doctorate.

She first suspected a leak in March 2020 after realising nobody had found any infected animals at the Wuhan market where China claims the pandemic began. At that time it was impossible to get most scientists to even consider a non-natural origin, with many suggesting that it was racist to even ask the question. Dr Chan wrote an analysis arguing it was strange that the virus was already ‘pre-adapted’ to humans, and suggested it could have evolved in experiments in humanised mice infected with bat viruses. In 2021 she co-authored Viral: The Search for the Origin of Covid-19 alongside science writer Matt Ridley, a book The Wall Street Journal called ‘perhaps the most comprehensive case for the lab-leak theory currently available’.

But ever since she first spoke out in 2020, Dr Chan has been met with harsh critical reaction – not just from other scientists, but Chinese state media too. Her stance has not made her popular and she has been branded a ‘race traitor’ because of her part-Chinese heritage, with one Chinese news outlet calling her behaviour ‘filthy’. At one time she was even considering changing her name because the abuse got so bad. Although she fully accepts that an animal spillover is possible, she points out that despite years of looking, no culprit has been found. WIV also mysteriously removed a database of viruses shortly before the pandemic began.

Since then hackers have dug up evidence showing that researchers at WIV were indeed collecting bats and carrying out gain-of-function experiments that could have created Covid. And they were doing so at alarming biosecurity levels.

‘You find these scientists who said in early 2018, “I’m going to put horns on horses,” and at the end of 2019 a unicorn turns up in Wuhan city,’ Dr Chan told MPs.

‘It’s important to give the benefit of the doubt,’ she recently wrote on Twitter. ‘However if a suspect wipes their phone record and online search history, deep cleans their apartments, discards their gun collection and won’t tell you where they were at the time of the crime, I think it’s reasonable to ask questions.’

If evidence that supports the lab-leak theory does indeed emerge next year, Dr Chan could go down in history as one of the scientists who uncovered the deadliest scandal of recent times.

The Telegraph · by Sarah Knapton,

4. Juan Williams: Ukraine unites Americans like little else

Some Americans. But not all.

Juan Williams: Ukraine unites Americans like little else

BY JUAN WILLIAMS, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR - 12/26/22 9:30 AM ET

https://thehill.com/opinion/3787871-juan-williams-ukraine-unites-americans-like-little-else/

At year’s end, let’s first sweep away the bad news before we get to the good news.

The bad news is that Americans see political extremism as now second only to inflation as the most important issue facing the country, according to FiveThirtyEight/Ipsos polling.

Now the good news. Americans can agree on one thing. 

Most Republicans, Democrats and every other kind of partisan agree the U.S. is right to stand up against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

A Reuters/Ipsos poll in October found that 73 percent of Americans — including 81 percent of Democrats and 66 percent of Republicans — favor continued U.S. support for Ukraine against Russia.

This tracks with a poll from the Chicago Council of Foreign Affairs conducted in November. It found 65 percent of Americans support continuing to support Ukraine with arms, 66 percent support continuing economic aid and 75 percent favor continuing sanctions on Russia.

Despite intense political polarization on most issues, Americans are unified on backing Ukraine and for now are willing to make sacrifices.

“One area, however, seems to be far less contentious than the domestic strife we hear so much about, U.S foreign policy,” Jordan Muchnick and Elaine Kamarck wrote for the Brookings Institute website earlier this month.

“While there are of course arguments to be had, the level of vitriol is minuscule by comparison, and polling indicates bipartisan unity on many of the foreign policy issues in the news today.” 

Kamarck and Muchnick also looked beyond Ukraine. On U.S. foreign policy for dealing with China and Iran, they again found relative unity across political lines. 

Support for Ukraine stands as the star guiding us to common ground in this era of polarized U.S. politics. 

Unified support for Ukraine showed signs of fraying in a Wall Street Journal poll released at the start of November, however. 

It found 57 percent of Americans favoring continued funding, but 48 percent of Republicans saying the U.S. is “doing too much.” That was a jump in concern among Republicans from just six percent in a March poll.

When Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky spoke to a joint session of Congress last week, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) left their seats empty in a show of dissent.

But they are fringe players even among Republicans. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), struggling to get far-right backing to become Speaker, declares his support for Ukraine even as he says he wants accountability for American money sent to Kyiv.

“The most important thing going on in the world is to beat the Russians in Ukraine,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) told reporters on the evening of Zelensky’s speech . “And also, it’s nice to have something here at the end of the year that we all actually agree on.”

Yes, strong GOP voices agree with President Biden and Democrats on Ukraine.

The result is that since Russia’s February invasion, Congress has directed over $50 billion in aid to the Ukrainians. The end-of-year spending measure passed by Congress last week authorizes another $45 billion.

Some voices on Capitol Hill want to slow further funding. There is concern, too, about debate over sending military “advisers” — a term that stirs fear of Vietnam-style escalation of U.S. involvement.

So far, Biden has held the line on not sending U.S. troops into the conflict. Such a move would threaten domestic political support.

That support extends beyond the U.S. to the impressive international coalition he has formed to stand against Russian aggression. 

The past year of strong public support for Ukraine differs from the critical U.S. public response to the Biden administration’s handling of the withdrawal from Afghanistan.

At around the time of the withdrawal in August of 2021, Pew Research found “about seven-in ten or more said the administration had done an only fair or poor job dealing with the situation there.” 

The criticism was strongly partisan, with Pew finding that 82 percent of Republicans said the Biden administration had done a “poor job” in Afghanistan while 40 percent of Democrats said the administration did an “excellent or good job.”

According to an analysis from FiveThirtyEight, it was the rocky withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan that first sent Biden’s overall job approval rating into negative territory.

Since then, his approval rating, while showing recent signs of improvement, has stayed below 50 percent. 

In my opinion, history will record Biden’s decision to end the nation’s longest war as overdue and right. At the time of the Afghanistan withdrawal, 54 percent agreed it was right, according to the Pew survey.

The flawed execution of the Afghan pull-out came at a political cost for Biden. The president’s success in killing al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri in July this year was a positive afterword. But there is still criticism of the withdrawal. 

In contrast, overall support for U.S. standing with Ukraine has yet to be undone by partisanship. 

While no one is breaking out in choruses of “Kumbaya,” it is good news that Americans can agree on making a difference in Ukraine and setting a red line against aggression by authoritarian regimes such as China.

A year of focus groups tells me this: Americans are traumatized

Here’s why we should all agree to adequately fund the IRS

Nearly a year of public agreement on backing Ukraine stands as a bright star on the Christmas tree of hope in a season of American political polarization.

Happy holidays.

Juan Williams is an author, and a political analyst for Fox News Channel.

5. Taiwan to extend conscription to one year, citing rising China threat

Key points from President Tsai:

"Taiwan wants to tell the world that between democracy and dictatorship, we firmly believe in democracy. Between war and peace, we insist on peace. Let us show the courage and determination to protect our homeland and defend democracy."

Tsai is overseeing a broad modernisation programme, championing the idea of "asymmetric warfare" to make the island's forces more mobile, agile and harder to attack.

While the United States has pressed Taiwan to modernise its military to make it like a "porcupine" - agile and hard to attack - Tsai said there had been no pressure from Washington for these reforms.

Taiwan to extend conscription to one year, citing rising China threat

Reuters · by Yimou Lee

• Summary
• Taiwan to extend military service to one year from four months
• President cites rising threat from China
• President says we choose democracy over dictatorship
• China held mass air force drills near Taiwan on Sunday

TAIPEI, Dec 27 (Reuters) - Taiwan will extend compulsory military service to one year from four months from 2024 due to the rising threat the democratically governed island faces from its giant neighbour China, President Tsai Ing-wen said on Tuesday.

The move, which had been well-flagged, comes as China ramps up military, diplomatic and economic pressure on Taiwan to assert its sovereignty claims, including almost daily Chinese air force missions near the island over the past three years.

Tsai said Taiwan wanted peace but needed to be able to defend itself.

"As long as Taiwan is strong enough, it will be the home of democracy and freedom all over the world, and it will not become a battlefield," Tsai told a news conference announcing the decision to extend the conscription period, which she described as "incredibly difficult".

The current military system, including training reservists, is inefficient and insufficient to cope with China's rising military threat, especially if it launched a rapid attack on the island, Tsai added.

"Taiwan wants to tell the world that between democracy and dictatorship, we firmly believe in democracy. Between war and peace, we insist on peace. Let us show the courage and determination to protect our homeland and defend democracy."

Conscripts will undergo more intense training, including shooting exercises, combat instruction used by U.S. forces, and operating more powerful weapons including Stinger anti-aircraft missiles and anti-tank missiles, Tsai said.

Taiwan has complained of delayed U.S. arms deliveries this year, including of Stingers, but Tsai said the situation was improving after discussions with the United States.

The de facto U.S. embassy in Taiwan welcomed the announcment on conscription reform.

"The United States' commitment to Taiwan and steps Taiwan takes to enhance its self-defence capabilities contribute to the maintenance of peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait and within the region," the American Institute in Taiwan said.

Tsai's security team, including high-level officials from the defence ministry and the National Security Council, have been reviewing Taiwan's military system since 2020, an official briefed on the matter told Reuters.

Taipei, which rejects Beijing's sovereignty claims to Taiwan, on Monday reported the largest-ever Chinese air force incursion into the island's air defence identification zone, with 43 Chinese planes crossing an unofficial buffer between the two sides.

China also staged war games near Taiwan in August following a visit to Taipei by U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

CHINA A 'MAJOR CONCERN'

Taiwan's government says only the Taiwanese people can decide their future.

"China's various unilateral behaviours have become a major concern for regional security," said the official, who took part in the high-level security discussion.

Conscripts would be tasked with guarding key infrastructure, enabling regular forces to respond more swiftly in the event of any attempt by China to invade, the defence ministry said at the same press conference.

Chieh Chung, researcher at the National Policy Foundation, a Taipei-based think tank, estimated that the extension could add an extra 60,000 to 70,000 manpower annually to the current 165,000-strong professional force in 2027 and beyond.

Even after the extension, however, the period of service will still be shorter than the 18 months mandated in South Korea, which faces a hostile and nuclear-armed North Korea.

Tsai is overseeing a broad modernisation programme, championing the idea of "asymmetric warfare" to make the island's forces more mobile, agile and harder to attack.

While the United States has pressed Taiwan to modernise its military to make it like a "porcupine" - agile and hard to attack - Tsai said there had been no pressure from Washington for these reforms.

China's growing assertiveness towards the island it claims as its own, as well as the war in Ukraine have prompted debate within Taiwan about how to boost defence.

Tsai said "a few things" had been learned from that war which have been incorporated into Taiwan's defence reforms, and noted that Ukraine's ability to hold off much larger Russian forces had given the international community time to render assistance.

Writing by Ben Blanchard. Editing by Gerry Doyle, Edmund Klamann & Simon Cameron-Moore

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Reuters · by Yimou Lee

6.  Taiwan extends mandatory military service to prepare soldiers for cross-strait conflict

My tweet in response to the report that this is unpopular with the Taiwan youth. "If this is unpopular with young people then I am not sure they will be able to develop credible resistance. Furthermore there is an adage - we cannot want to defend a country more than the country's citizens want to defend it."

​Steve Ferenzi responded to my tweet with this important comment:

Steve Ferenzi

@SteveFerenzi

Replying to @DavidMaxwell161

Exactly. Societal resilience & will to endure underpin any form of irregular deterrence. Terrible signaling here.

If Taiwan must conscript its youth, then PRC already won.

@IrregWarfare

@ASD_IndoPacific

@ASD_SOLIC

@rwpallas

@kevinbilms

@JJSchroden

@1st_SF_Command

@ZackCooper

​

Taiwan extends mandatory military service to prepare soldiers for cross-strait conflict

• Starting in 2024, men will be required to serve for one year rather than four months, while pay for conscripts will more than triple, according to source
• ‘It is a highly difficult decision to make,’ Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen says of plan seen as unpopular among island’s youth

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3204678/taiwan-extends-mandatory-military-service-train-soldiers-cross-strait-conflict

Lawrence Chung in Taipei

+ myNEWS

Published: 5:56pm, 27 Dec, 2022

Taiwan will extend its mandatory military service to one year to better train soldiers to take on mainland Chinese forces in the event of a cross-strait conflict.

Under the plan, men aged 18 and above will be required to serve for one year instead of four months from 2024, when the self-ruled island will elect a new president.

“I must admit it is a highly difficult decision to make, but as a president and commander-in-chief of our forces, I must do so to uphold the interest of the nation and the persistent survival of Taiwan as well as the free [people] living in the generations to come. This is my responsibility as president,” Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen said when asked if the plan would sabotage her party’s chances in the election.

Better training needed if Taiwan extends mandatory military service, experts say

30 Oct 2022

A legislative source said monthly pay for the conscripts would be raised to just over NT$20,000 (US$651) from NT$6,500.

“Combat instructions currently used by the US military will be included as part of the training for the conscripts under the plan aimed at overhauling the structure of the military forces,” the source said on Tuesday.

Conscripts must be able to work with the civil defence force on missions and need to receive stress resistance training on simulated battlefields so they can handle the challenges of war, according to the source.

Tsai said that in the future, the military would be divided into a main combat force, garrison force, civil defence force and reserve force. Conscripts would mainly serve in the garrison force during their mandatory service

PLA scrambles record 71 warplanes near Taiwan in response to increased US military aid

Before 1987, local conscripts were required to serve for three years. But that was cut to two years in 1990 and then reduced to one in 2008. Since the introduction of volunteer service in 2017, conscripts must only serve four months.

As a result, the island’s active-duty military has shrunk to 165,000 troops from 275,000 a decade ago, compared with the 2 million-strong People’s Liberation Army across the Taiwan Strait.

Facing a growing military threat from Beijing, the island’s authorities have been discussing a revamp of the military structure and conscription period since 2020.

Taiwan air force band boosts morale with music from the front line

Officials and analysts in the US – an informal ally and major arms supplier of Taiwan – have repeatedly called for the island to extend its four-month compulsory service to at least one year, saying the training conscripts received now would be inadequate in the event of a conflict with Beijing.

But because any extension would be unpopular among Taiwanese youth, the Tsai administration struggled to come up with a final plan quickly.

Lawmakers accused the administration of deliberately stalling the decision for fear of affecting the ruling Democratic Progressive Party’s chances at the polls – especially the 2024 election, when voters will elect a new president to replace Tsai.

Faced with this criticism, the island’s defence minister, Chiu Kuo-cheng, announced earlier this month that the Tsai government would make an announcement about extending mandatory military service by the end of the year.

US moves to strengthen Taiwan military ties ‘a sign of malice’

23 Dec 2022

Beijing does not recognise Taiwan’s democratically elected government and views the island as part of its territory to be brought under mainland control. Most countries, including the US, do not recognise Taiwan as an independent state, but Washington opposes any attempt to take the island by force.

Beijing has stepped up its military activities near the island in recent years, seeking to pressure Taipei to accept its claims of sovereignty. In August, it staged unprecedented live-fire drills around Taiwan in retaliation for a visit to Taipei by US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi – a trip it saw as an endorsement of pro-independence forces on the island.

On Monday, the island’s military also reported a record 71 PLA warplanes in operations close to Taiwan, with 47 crossing the unofficial border between the two sides.

CONVERSATIONS (7)

Lawrence Chung

+ myNEWS

Lawrence Chung covers major news in Taiwan, ranging from presidential and parliament elections to killer earthquakes and typhoons. Most of his reports focus on Taiwan’s relations with China, specifically on the impact and possible developments of cross-strait relations under the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party and mainland-friendly Kuomintang governments. Before starting work at the South China Morning Post in 2006, he wrote for Reuters and AFP for more than 12 years.

7. Revisiting Japan’s comprehensive security strategy

Excerpts:

Unlike the 1970s and 80s, Japan’s global position in terms of material resources has declined due to long-term economic stagnation and an ageing population. While it is important for Japan to pursue a more autonomous posture in defence and economic security, this path also has its inherent limitations.

All these factors suggest that international cooperation has become more important than ever. No single country can enhance the resilience of supply chains, develop emerging technologies and respond to hybrid threats without the help of others.

Competition must also be managed through diplomatic measures such as enhancing transparency, confidence-building and crisis management. Today’s comprehensive security should be considered both from competitive and cooperative perspectives. It is high time that Japan considered its comprehensive security strategy with other like-minded partners, rather than on its own.

Revisiting Japan’s comprehensive security strategy | East Asia Forum

eastasiaforum.org · by Tomohiko Satake · December 27, 2022

Author: Tomohiko Satake, NIDS

Economic security, or keizai anpo, dominates the current Japanese strategic debate. Since 2019, the Japanese government has rapidly put in place new positions, organisations and bills related to economic security. According to Takayuki Kobayashi, Japan’s newly appointed minister for economic security, the term refers to securing ‘the Japanese state and national interest through economic measures’.

To achieve this objective, the Japanese parliament passed the Economic Security Promotion Act in 2022 to strengthen supply chain resilience, protect critical infrastructure, develop emerging technologies and prevent technology outflow. Japan’s new national security strategy — to be published by the end of 2022 — will likely incorporate these elements.

It is not the first time that Japan has recognised the economy as an integral part of its security. In the mid-1970s, Japanese politicians, intellectuals and businesspeople began to discuss the need for ‘comprehensive security’ (sogo anzen hosho) that included economic, food and energy security.

A 1980 report published by an advisory board to the Masayoshi Ohira government (the Ohira Report) advocated a ‘comprehensive security strategy’ that promoted Japanese security by various measures in multiple domains. While the report never underestimated the importance of military roles, it acknowledged the importance of other areas — such as economic, food and energy security — and recommended that Japan should enhance its security by coordinating policies across different areas and means.

The report reflected dynamic changes occurring in the international security environment after the early 1970s. The 1973 and 1978 oil shocks and high inflation led Tokyo to recognise that security could be jeopardised by non-military threats. To secure energy resources, it became imperative to review Japan’s overdependence on the Middle East and diversify its energy supply chains.

The Ohira Report also addressed the decline of US primacy and Japan’s growing desire for autonomous economic growth. With ‘the termination of clear American supremacy in both military and economic spheres,’ the report argued the world would enter an era of ‘peace maintained by shared responsibilities’. In such an environment, Japan should enhance its self-help efforts and contribute to the strengthening and the maintenance of the system.

The evolution of comprehensive security also reflects deeper changes in the nature of power politics during the 1970s. As Hiroshi Nakanishi points out, ‘the diversification and the complication of power politics’ promoted the multi-polarisation of international relations. As demonstrated by the US defeat in the Vietnam War, economic relations and psychological factors came to play an important role in power politics alongside military capability.

According to Nakanishi, these diversified and complex power politics also blurred the boundaries between ‘high politics’ associated with ideology, governance and military strategy, and ‘low politics’ concerned with the economy, energy supply and social affairs. In an environment characterised by what Joseph Nye and Robert Keohane termed ‘complex interdependence’, Japan was forced to adopt a more autonomous and comprehensive foreign security posture that could deal with a broader range of challenges.

The conditions identified above — Japan’s energy crisis, the decline of US primacy and the complication and diversification of power politics — have become even more prominent in today’s security environment.

During the 1970s and 1980s, the Soviet Union’s GDP was less than 25 per cent of US GDP. In 2022, China’s GDP amounts to nearly 75 per cent of US GDP. After the 1972 Sino–US Rapprochement, Washington was able to exploit the Sino–Soviet conflict and maintain a pivotal position. Today, however, China is increasingly aligned with Russia, challenging the US-led order.

The rise of the emerging states, the development of military and information technology and the promotion of interdependence has created a highly diversified and more complex security environment compared to with the 1970s. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its nuclear brinkmanship has revealed that traditional power politics have not become a thing of the past. At the same time, Ukraine’s surprising resistance against Russia suggests how non-military or non-kinetic factors, such as national morale, information warfare and cyber defence, play an increasingly important role in determining war outcomes.

Russia’s reduction of energy supplies and Western sanctions against Moscow also demonstrate that the ‘weaponisation of interdependence’ may be no less important than conventional warfare.

Japan has been responding to this complex security environment. Unlike the Cold War era, when the Soviet Union was the primary source of external threat, Japan now faces threats on three fronts: China, North Korea and an increasingly belligerent Russia. In addition to the deployment of its well-known grey-zone tactics, China has already overtaken Japan in terms of the material capabilities of its economy and military and in some areas of newly emerging technologies.

To make up for its disadvantage in material resources, Japan has attempted to integrate resources and capabilities across different areas and domains. Japan’s pursuit of economic security, as well as its adoption of the ‘Multi-Domain Defense Force’ concept, demonstrates the strong crisis mentality of Japanese policymakers in an increasingly contested, diversified and complex security environment.

The problem is that pursuing economic security could restrict free economic activities, which may weaken interdependence and exacerbate global political divisions. While the Economic Security Promotion Act stresses the compatibility between economic security and free cooperation, it remains unclear how the government can achieve such a delicate balancing act.

Unlike the 1970s and 80s, Japan’s global position in terms of material resources has declined due to long-term economic stagnation and an ageing population. While it is important for Japan to pursue a more autonomous posture in defence and economic security, this path also has its inherent limitations.

All these factors suggest that international cooperation has become more important than ever. No single country can enhance the resilience of supply chains, develop emerging technologies and respond to hybrid threats without the help of others.

Competition must also be managed through diplomatic measures such as enhancing transparency, confidence-building and crisis management. Today’s comprehensive security should be considered both from competitive and cooperative perspectives. It is high time that Japan considered its comprehensive security strategy with other like-minded partners, rather than on its own.

Tomohiko Satake is Research Fellow at the National Institute of Defense Studies, Japan.

This article appears in the most recent edition of East Asia Forum Quarterly, ‘Comprehensive Regional Security’, Vol 14, No 4.

eastasiaforum.org · by Tomohiko Satake · December 27, 2022

8. Lavrov: Ukraine must demilitarize or Russia will do it

Hardly a way to set the conditions for negotiation.

My recommended Ukrainian response: "that ain't happening."

Lavrov: Ukraine must demilitarize or Russia will do it

AP · by E. EDUARDO CASTILLO · December 27, 2022

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Tuesday warned that Ukraine must meet Moscow’s demand for “demilitarization” and “denazification,” as well as the removal of the military threat to Russia, otherwise “the Russian army (will) solve the issue.”

Sergey Lavrov also accused the West of fueling the war in Ukraine to weaken Russia, and said that it depends on Kyiv and Washington how long the conflict, which started on Feb. 24 when Russia invaded Ukraine, will last.

“As for the duration of the conflict, the ball is on the side of the (Kyiv) regime and Washington that stands behind its back,” Lavrov told the state Tass news agency. “They may stop senseless resistance at any moment.”

In an apparent reaction, Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak tweeted that “Russia needs to face the reality.”

“Neither total mobilization, nor panicky search for ammo, nor secret contracts with Iran, nor Lavrov’s threats will help,” he said. “Ukraine will demilitarize the RF (Russian Federation) to the end, oust the invaders from all occupied territories. Wait for the finale silently…”

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A day earlier, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba told the Associated Press in an interview that his government wants a summit to end the war but that he doesn’t anticipate Russia taking part.

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Kuleba said Ukraine wants a “peace” summit within two months with U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres acting as mediator. But he also said that Russia must face a war crimes tribunal before before his country directly talks with Moscow.

Both statements illustrate how complex and difficult any attempts to end the war could be. Ukraine has said in the past that it wouldn’t negotiate with Russia before the full withdrawal of its troops, while Moscow insists its military gains and the 2014 annexation of the Crimea Peninsula cannot be ignored.

Meanwhile, fierce fighting continued on Tuesday in the Russia-claimed Donetsk and Luhansk regions that recently have been the scene of the most intense clashes.

Ukraine’s Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar said that Russian forces are trying to encircle the city of Bakhmut in the Donetsk region, but without success. Heavy battles are also underway around the city of Kreminna in the Luhansk region, Luhansk governor Serhiy Haidai said.

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In the partially occupied southern Kherson region, Russian forces shelled Ukrainian-held areas 40 times on Monday, wounding one person, Ukrainian authorities said. The city of Kherson itself — which Ukraine retook last month in a major win — was targeted 11 times, said regional administrator Yaroslav Yanushevich.

Since its initial advances at the start of the war 10 months ago, Russia has made few major gains, often pummeling Ukraine’s infrastructure instead and leaving millions without electricity, heating and hot water amid winter conditions.

Lavrov did not specify how the Russian army will achieve its goals of demilitarizing and de-nazifying Ukraine — which was Russia’s stated goal when the invasion started in February. The reference to “denazification” comes from Russia’s allegations that the Ukrainian government is heavily influenced by radical nationalist and neo-Nazi groups. The claim is derided by Ukraine and the West.

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Lavrov warned further Western support for Ukraine could lead to direct confrontation.

“We keep warning our adversaries in the West about the dangers of their course to escalate the Ukrainian crisis,” he said, adding that “the risk that the situation could spin out of control remains high.”

“The strategic goal of the U.S. and its NATO allies is to win a victory over Russia on the battlefield to significantly weaken or even destroy our country,” he said.

____

Follow the AP’s coverage of the war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

AP · by E. EDUARDO CASTILLO · December 27, 2022

9. As the United States walks away, Asia can’t give up on the rules based economic order

Quite allegation here. Is this so?

Excerpt:

The political realities now suggest that Asia has to ‘price in’ a United States that is not only delinquent in its leadership of the multilateral trading system, but also a United States that is disrupting trade by unravelling international production chains that run through (and from) East Asia. The complicated nature of international supply chains, as we’ve said before, means that any attempt to reshape them to conform with geopolitical rather than economic logic will produce a messy set of winners and losers, with more losers than winners, especially in Asia.

The challenge will be for Asia and the rest of the world to defend and nurture the multilateral framework that is essential to a stable multipolar world but on which America has for the moment turned its back.

As the United States walks away, Asia can’t give up on the rules based economic order | East Asia Forum

eastasiaforum.org · by EAF editors · December 26, 2022

Author: Editorial Board, ANU

For some, a multipolar world is something to cheer for. Yet no balance of global geopolitical power is intrinsically better than another. Indeed, the world has overall gotten a pretty good deal out of Pax Americana, and there’s no reason to assume that whatever order replaces it would be much of an improvement.

The shift towards multipolarity is nonetheless a reality to be managed — not least by the United States, whose political elites and general public have never known anything but global economic and military pre-eminence, and who aren’t well-practised in imagining how US interests and values can be preserved in a world in which less liberal and less-developed countries, particularly China, have a far greater political, economic and military role.

The United States’ struggle with this predicament, and the hazards it creates, is old news.

But it was in 2022 that the United States truly, emphatically put itself on a course of confrontation and competition with China that extends beyond military primacy to encompass dominance over the industries that will define the 21st century economy, as Gary Hufbauer writes in this week’s lead article, part of our annual Year in Review series that surveys the key economic and political developments shaping Asia and the Pacific today.

‘The US public, inflamed by leaders in both political parties and by Chinese President Xi Jinping’s assertive actions, became convinced that China was not merely a competitor, but an adversary out to destroy US jobs and push US military forces out of Asia’, Hufbauer says. And ‘despite congenial atmospherics surrounding the meeting between presidents Xi and Biden at November’s G20 Leaders’ Summit in Bali, all signs indicate further technological decoupling in 2023’.

Meanwhile, ’as the calendar turns to 2023, the challenge of climate change looms as large as ever — for the United States, China and everyone else’. Certainly, there’s no doubting the Biden administration’s commitment to spending big — both in terms of the president and his party’s political capital, and taxpayers’ dollars — in addressing the problem. Witness the disingenuously titled Inflation Reduction Act, or IRA. As Hufbauer reminds us, ’the IRA was largely a green energy law, providing more than US$300 billion for wind, solar and other alternatives to fossil fuels’.

Full marks for enthusiasm. But sitting in Asia, any credit the region is going to give Washington for getting behind decarbonising the US economy will be more than a little tempered by the understanding that the IRA, alongside the massive CHIPS act it accompanies, represents a comeback of industrial policy cloaked in the language of national security.

The United States’ blunt rejection of the WTO ruling against the Trump administration’s steel and aluminium tariffs is also symptomatic of its retreat from the rules-based global order.

These trends are born of deeply entrenched ideational forces in Washington but electoral dynamics are also pushing the administration towards economic confrontation from China and decoupling. Biden, as Hufbauer says, had a close call with losing both chambers of the US Congress in November’s midterm elections — whose results, despite the surprise defence of Senate control by the Democrats, were better for the Republicans than much post-election analysis would have it.

As the 2024 presidential election looms, the stakes of political competition are immense. On one level it’s hard to blame the Biden administration for taking the path of political least resistance with America-first trade policies. If you’re a Democrat supporter who believes — not without reason — that the Republican Party in its post-Trump incarnation threatens the principles of American democracy, then you’re not going to take political risks to champion what many voters in the US industrial heartland see as the discredited vision of free trade and free markets — regardless of their merit.

The political realities now suggest that Asia has to ‘price in’ a United States that is not only delinquent in its leadership of the multilateral trading system, but also a United States that is disrupting trade by unravelling international production chains that run through (and from) East Asia. The complicated nature of international supply chains, as we’ve said before, means that any attempt to reshape them to conform with geopolitical rather than economic logic will produce a messy set of winners and losers, with more losers than winners, especially in Asia.

The challenge will be for Asia and the rest of the world to defend and nurture the multilateral framework that is essential to a stable multipolar world but on which America has for the moment turned its back.

The EAF Editorial Board is located in the Crawford School of Public Policy, College of Asia and the Pacific, The Australian National University.

eastasiaforum.org · by EAF editors · December 26, 2022

10. The indispensable but always irksome nation

America. The irksome nation.

Excerpts:

This does not mean that the US will be a comfortable partner, or leader, over the next two years. Just like under Reagan in the 1980s, Biden’s America has turned quite protectionist, both on national security issues and on global ones such as climate policy. Its economic strategy in Asia looks unhelpful or plain inadequate, just at a time when it needs all the friends it can get in the Indo-Pacific so as to deter China.

Making it an unreliable, often irritating partner, but within normal postwar parameters: That is what Joe Biden has done to restore America’s reputation and position in the world. It is an important achievement. Yet the world is now much more complex than it was during most of the postwar period, because China has become so powerful and because there are now many more large and medium sized powers, in the Indo-Pacific in particular, that have their own interests and values.

This means that America’s friends and allies will still be right to put pressure on Biden to smooth off the sharp edges of its international policies and to give more recognition to the needs of others. Getting America to do that is no simple task, but neither is the task of becoming less dependent on it and more capable of defending ourselves. Both tasks, however, are important.

The indispensable but always irksome nation

Shining city upon a hill may be a bit much but, with Trump gone, we have a fairly clear idea where the US stands

asiatimes.com · by More by Bill Emmott · December 26, 2022

It would be fair to say that ever since the election of Donald Trump to the presidency in November 2016, America’s friends and allies have been worrying about how reliable the country’s future leadership might be.

The first two years of Joe Biden’s presidency, which culminated in a surprise success for him and his Democratic Party in the mid-term elections last month, have not brought that worrying to an end. But as 2022 comes to a close, it would nevertheless also be fair to say that America now looks once again to be an unreliable, often irritating partner within normal post-war parameters – rather than the abnormal parameters that Trump introduced.

The United States has always caused concern among its allies, whether during the Vietnam war that ended in 1975, the Iran-Contra scandal of secret weapons sales under Ronald Reagan in the 1980s or, most recently, the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Yet even allies such as France and Germany that opposed the second Iraq war still felt they knew where they ultimately stood with the United States. That confidence was shaken by Trump. Now, the events of 2022 have restored it.

This is not, and cannot be, a definitive judgement. The worrying will not cease. But the sense that the world’s leading superpower might suddenly do a deal with North Korea over the heads of its allies, as Trump appeared to envisage in 2018-19, or carve up Europe into spheres of influence with Russia or contemplate the same in Asia with China, as Trump might have attempted, has subsided.

February 28, 2019, photo shows North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and US President Donald Trump walking together at the Sofitel Legend Metropole hotel in Hanoi. The United States and North Korea put forward starkly different accounts of the breakdown of a high-stakes summit. Photo: AFP / KCNA VIA KNS

Also in decline, albeit still with fingers crossed for good luck, is the view that America might no longer qualify as a democracy after the 2024 presidential election. An outcome in 2024 endorsing the Trumpian claim that the 2020 election was illegitimate and placing control over electoral results in key states in partisan loyalists’ hands would consign to the historical dustbin the idea that the West works together for common liberal values. Such an outcome is not impossible, but it now looks less likely.

Can America and its global reputation really have changed so radically in such a short time? Not entirely, for many concerns about US foreign policy pre-dated Trump. Nonetheless, the outcome of November’s elections, which bucked the historical trend of mid-term votes going against the unpopular incumbent president and his party, suggests the electoral appeal both of Trump personally and of moves to manipulate democratic processes are reassuringly limited.

Certainly, the Democrats’ retention of a majority in the Senate will strengthen President Biden during the next two years. But we should still interpret the results cautiously: The elections showed how, in a highly polarized democracy such as America, the results can depend on very narrow margins. That doesn’t matter much when both parties accept the legitimacy of the process, but it matters hugely when that legitimacy has been placed in question.

Thus, the sighs of relief heard from America’s friends and allies concerning those elections can be thought of as justified, but not conclusive. Far more important in calming allied nerves, however, has been the conduct of American foreign policy during 2022 by President Biden and his cabinet, and the quite widespread support for it across the party divide.

When Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24th there was some initial criticism of the Biden administration’s refusal to get directly involved in the war on Ukraine’s side. This ignored the enormous amount of intelligence support America (with its traditional partner, Britain, at its side) provided to Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s government and its armed forces.

It did then take some time before Ukraine’s military inspired enough confidence that Washington was willing to provide the advanced weapons Kyiv needed to be able to resist Russia and then to force Russia’s army into retreat.

But the Americans did so, with a generosity and effectiveness that fully confirmed the title that the late Secretary of State Madeleine Albright conferred on her own country during the 1990s: “the indispensable nation.” European countries have also provided generous support, but it is American military and financial aid that has really made the difference.

President Biden hosted President Zelenskyy of Ukraine at the White House on December 21, 2022. Photo: Wikipedia

This has underlined how dependent Europe still is on America for the continent’s own defense. Asian allies such as Japan and South Korea know full well how much they rely on the United States. But the episode has also underlined how willing and able America is to intervene abroad when it sees its own interests and values under threat. In the case of Ukraine, Biden’s America saw the whole of the post-war system of security and international law at serious risk of destruction.

Some analysts, especially in Japan, think that Russia still might prevail, because it is more willing to fight a long war in Ukraine than are the Americans and their European allies. Biden’s success in the mid-term elections should, however, have put this view into serious doubt.

So far, the conflict has lasted 10 months, and Russia is clearly in big difficulties. America’s political will to keep supporting Ukraine is now certain to last for at least another two years until the 2024 elections, which is more than double the duration of the fighting so far. The cross-party support that Biden has received on this issue also suggests that this political will could even endure into 2025 and beyond. Time is not on Russia’s side.

This does not mean that the US will be a comfortable partner, or leader, over the next two years. Just like under Reagan in the 1980s, Biden’s America has turned quite protectionist, both on national security issues and on global ones such as climate policy. Its economic strategy in Asia looks unhelpful or plain inadequate, just at a time when it needs all the friends it can get in the Indo-Pacific so as to deter China.

Making it an unreliable, often irritating partner, but within normal postwar parameters: That is what Joe Biden has done to restore America’s reputation and position in the world. It is an important achievement. Yet the world is now much more complex than it was during most of the postwar period, because China has become so powerful and because there are now many more large and medium sized powers, in the Indo-Pacific in particular, that have their own interests and values.

This means that America’s friends and allies will still be right to put pressure on Biden to smooth off the sharp edges of its international policies and to give more recognition to the needs of others. Getting America to do that is no simple task, but neither is the task of becoming less dependent on it and more capable of defending ourselves. Both tasks, however, are important.

Bill Emmott, a former editor of the Economist, is an independent writer, lecturer and consultant on international affairs. This article, originally published on The Mainichi news site and in the Japanese Mainichi Shimbun newspaper on December 18, 2022, is republished with kind permission.

asiatimes.com · by More by Bill Emmott · December 26, 2022

11. TikTok Security Dilemma Revives Push for U.S. Control

I predict there is going to be some, perhaps significant,blowback from our youth and fro corporations who profit from TikTok.

TikTok Security Dilemma Revives Push for U.S. Control

Some Biden administration officials think TikTok will remain security risk as long as it is owned by Chinese company

TikTok is used by more than 100 million Americans, and businesses see it as a way to connect with customers.

PHOTO: MARIO TAMA/GETTY IMAGES

By Stu WooFollow

, Kate O'KeeffeFollow

 and Aruna ViswanathaFollow

Dec. 26, 2022 10:00 am ET

https://www.wsj.com/articles/tiktok-security-dilemma-revives-push-for-u-s-control-11672064033?mod=hp_user_preferences_pos1#cxrecs_s

Citing security concerns over TikTok, some Biden administration officials are pushing for a sale of the Chinese-owned company’s U.S. operations to ensure Beijing can’t harness the app for espionage and political influence, according to people familiar with the situation. 

The proposal for a forced sale has arisen in discussions by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., an interagency government panel that has been negotiating with TikTok for more than two years on a way to wall off the company’s data and operations from the Chinese government, the people said. 

Pentagon and Justice Department representatives on the panel are among those supporting a forced sale, the people said, citing the risk of Beijing accessing TikTok data or influencing the videos that Americans view on TikTok. They say these issues can only be addressed by separating the app from its Chinese owner, Beijing-based ByteDance Ltd.

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“We’re talking about a government that, in our own intelligence community’s estimation, has a purpose to move global technology use and norms to privilege its own interests and its values, which are not consistent with our own,” Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco said in an interview, in which she declined to discuss TikTok specifically. “That’s the perspective I bring to these issues.” 

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A Wall Street Journal investigation found that TikTok only needs one important piece of information to figure out what you want: the amount of time you linger over a piece of content. Every second you hesitate or rewatch, the app is tracking you. Photo illustration: Laura Kammermann/The Wall Street Journal

But the Treasury Department, which chairs the panel, is worried that such an order might be overturned in court, and is looking for other possible solutions, according to a person familiar with that department’s thinking.

Cfius experts say the committee could make a recommendation to the president, who has the authority to force a sale, or divestiture, of TikTok by its Chinese owners for it to continue operating in the U.S.

A White House spokeswoman declined to comment on a continuing Cfius case.

Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco has expressed concerns over China’s global aims.

PHOTO: KEVIN DIETSCH/GETTY IMAGES

The wildly popular TikTok is used by more than 100 million Americans, and increasingly by businesses as a way to connect with customers. 

But the app’s Chinese ownership has put increasing pressure on the Biden administration to resolve security concerns. Former President Donald Trump unsuccessfully attempted to force TikTok to come under U.S. control, then tried to impose a ban on the app when that didn’t happen. 

President Biden rescinded Mr. Trump’s attempted ban after taking office, saying it wasn’t enforceable in the wake of two separate federal court rulings, which the Biden administration decided not to appeal

His decision to revoke the Trump executive orders drew criticism from China hawks at the time, with Sen. Josh Hawley (R., Mo.) calling it a major mistake.

Mr. Biden promised a comprehensive plan to address the security risk from TikTok and other apps based in adversarial nations but has yet to deliver, helping fuel efforts in Congress and in the states to constrain TikTok. 

TikTok has consistently maintained that it would never share user data with the Chinese government. On Thursday, TikTok said it had fired employees and tightened protocols after discovering they had improperly accessed the data of journalists.

TikTok declined to comment on the prospect of a forced sale. It said it believed it can address the concerns that the U.S. government raised.

TikTok has been negotiating with U.S. officials since 2020 on an arrangement to ensure data on U.S. users can’t be shared with Beijing.

As a result of those talks, TikTok has agreed to have the data of American users managed by a subsidiary called TikTok U.S. Data Security Inc., according to people with knowledge of the proposal.

Only vetted employees of the subsidiary could access user data, the people said. The subsidiary would be monitored by approved third parties, including Oracle Corp., whose servers would store the data, and overseen by a three-person board composed of U.S. national-security experts, the people said.

The agreement would also give Oracle the power to examine TikTok’s recommendation algorithm, which gives priority to the short videos that users see, the people said.

Despite these promises, some U.S. security officials and lawmakers say they believe that no Chinese company could withstand pressure from the Chinese government to turn over information. 

Many of these same people say they are concerned that China could seek to dictate videos that are shown—or blocked—on TikTok in a bid to influence U.S. popular opinion. TikTok has more than 100 million users in the U.S.

Some officials say security concerns surrounding TikTok can only be resolved by separating the app from its owner, Beijing-based ByteDance.

PHOTO: THOMAS SUEN/REUTERS

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has said TikTok poses legitimate national-security concerns, but the people familiar with internal Cfius discussions say Treasury officials are concerned an attempt to force a sale could be caught up in a protracted legal battle the government could ultimately lose.  

In one case in which Cfius did go to court, the government in 2015 settled with a Chinese buyer of American wind-farm companies, but only after a court said Cfius might need to disclose more information in cases it considers.

“Treasury may have concerns regarding litigating the bounds of its jurisdiction because that could result in limitations on their ability to review future transactions,” said Christian Davis, who leads the Cfius practice at law firm Akin Gump.

Besides a potential legal challenge, another hurdle in forcing ByteDance to sell its American operations to a company in the U.S., or perhaps an allied nation, is the cooperation of the Chinese government. Beijing could use export controls and forbid ByteDance from selling technology related to the video-recommendation algorithm that has made TikTok so successful.

The U.S. has long been skeptical of foreign ownership of domestic media. 

For decades it has placed tight limits on foreign ownership of U.S. broadcast media, even local radio stations. But the lightly regulated internet has never had such rules. 

The U.S. has also banned equipment made by Chinese firms such as Huawei Technologies Co. from being used in U.S. telecommunications networks. 

As Cfius remains in a stalemate over the future of TikTok, sentiment against ByteDance has hardened in Congress and among state governments. 

The Pentagon, State Department and other agencies have already banned TikTok on government-issued smartphones and other devices, and Congress recently voted to expand that ban to all government agencies. A bipartisan group of House and Senate lawmakers also have introduced legislation to ban TikTok.

And over the past month, Republican governors in more than a dozen states have enacted orders barring the use of TikTok from government devices. Departing Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts, a Republican who ordered such a ban in his state in 2020, said concerns about TikTok have only grown since his action.

“Two years ago, it was, ‘What kind of data are they collecting?’” he said. Now, he said, another concern is, “TikTok pushes out what the American consumer audience sees.”

John D. McKinnon and Andrew Duehren contributed to this article.

Write to Stu Woo at Stu.Woo@wsj.com, Kate O’Keeffe at kathryn.okeeffe@wsj.com and Aruna Viswanatha at aruna.viswanatha@wsj.com

Appeared in the December 27, 2022, print edition as 'TikTok Security Concerns Revive U.S. Push for a Sale'.

12. Facebook, Twitter stocked with ex-FBI, CIA officials in key posts

Facebook, Twitter stocked with ex-FBI, CIA officials in key posts

New York Post · by Caitlin Doornbos · December 22, 2022

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WASHINGTON — Dozens of former national security officials have gone to work for Facebook and Twitter after leaving government service, raising concerns about the influence of their onetime agencies over the social media giants.

At Twitter alone, at least eight former FBI agents work at the company’s so-called “trust” and “security” divisions — including one who previously worked on “psychological operations” at the National Security Council, The Post has learned.

The discovery of the DC-to-Silicon Valley pipeline comes amid an outcry over revelations that the FBI influenced Twitter to suppress The Post’s account over its reporting on Hunter Biden’s overseas business interests in October 2020 and has regularly demanded specific accounts and tweets be banned.

Multiple releases of internal company documents since Dec. 2 show Twitter developed a close working relationship with the intelligence community, which frequently leaned on them to censor political speech.

Meta’s top policy manager for “misinformation,” Aaron Berman, is a former CIA senior analytics manager.

The migration from the intelligence services is particularly pronounced at Facebook’s parent company, Meta, where at least nine former CIA agents and six former intelligence employees at other federal agencies are or have been employed.

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Senators demand Facebook, Twitter, TikTok be more transparent with data

Jim Hanson, president of information warfare analysis and consulting firm WorldStrat, told The Post Meta took a particular interest in bringing G-men and woman on board after the 2016 presidential election.

“The ones who are ideologically aligned with the woke left saw the danger of Trump and they wanted to affect that and the way they could be most influential was taking over our shared information space,” he said. “And they moved to the socials. And they were successful.”

“The ability of Americans to get information that doesn’t go through a leftist lens doesn’t exist,” he added. “You cannot ask a question online that doesn’t come back to you with a leftists filtered answer.”

Meta’s top policy manager for “misinformation,” Aaron Berman, is a former CIA senior analytics manager who spent 15 years with “The Company” — even writing the president’s daily briefings.

Others include Scott Stern, Meta’s senior manager for trust and safety risk intelligence, who spent more than seven years with the FBI leading “high-stakes operational determinations for complex and ambiguous overseas counterterrorism operations,” according to his LinkedIn page.

Stern joined Meta in January 2020 to help develop algorithms to combat “misinformation,” as well as more traditional FBI bailiwicks like child safety and counterterrorism.

Many former CIA and FBI agents went on to work at Facebook and Twitter after the serving the government.

Still another is Facebook senior strategist for “creator equity and well-being” Corey Ponder, who describes in his LinkedIn profile how he spent more than six years at the CIA — the majority of which was spent as a “senior targeting analyst.”

That job entails identifying and assessing “vulnerabilities and technology trends, uniting technical operations and development activities to collect intelligence against our nation’s threats,” according to a CIA hiring website.

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It’s not just Meta’s policy makers who have intelligence ties; some of their top tech people do as well.

Mike Torrey spent more than eight years with the CIA as a senior analyst “leading analysis and efforts to counter cyber threats,” before joining Meta in September 2018 as a security engineer investigator.

In March 2022, Amarpreet Ghuman joined Meta to work in “product integrity” and “elections” after six year as a FBI analyst.

“With this many former intelligence people, it’s like Big Tech are basically just becoming … extensions of the intelligence community,” said Bill Ottman, founder and CEO of the social media platform Minds. “It’s just not appropriate.”

According to Ottman, while a single job candidate’s past government work would not preclude him from hiring the person, the apparent trend of hiring shadowy former government figures troubles him.

“If some former intelligence official came to try to work for us, I would probably just say no, just because why is it even worth the risk?” he said. “Why would I want to worry about some sort of back channel happening?

“Not every former intelligence employee is going to continue a relationship with the CIA after they’ve left, but you just don’t know.”

Having swaths of senior social media employees with ties to federal intelligence agencies risks not only free speech, but also privacy and potentially national security, Ottman argued.

“On Twitter, for instance, all the [direct messages] are open to all of the moderators,” he said. “There’s heads of state that DM on Twitter, politicians DM on Twitter. To have some random social media employee have access to that or potentially the intelligence community have direct access to that is also a huge issue.”

New York Post · by Caitlin Doornbos · December 22, 2022

13. Psychological Capabilities for Resilience

Excerpts:

A whole-of-society and whole-of-government approach is inherently inclusive. Inclusion efforts often focus on bolstering national identity to give people a sense of pride and belongingness, but it can simultaneously train critical skills. For example, in response to Polish citizens’ concerns about the war in Ukraine, the Polish Ministry of National Defense recently established a “Train with the Army” project that offers Polish military-led courses to civilians on survival skills, how to properly handle weapons and gas masks, self-defense, and other critical skills. One participant commented that “Even a very strong army can have very big troubles with simple people who can fight in the woods or in the streets, who can resist against regular soldiers … So I think we should all be prepared at least a bit to stay safe, to use arms — even simple ones — and to have some knowledge of survival.”

These three broad means to build resilience serve as a general guidepost, but using them to build specific psychological resilience capabilities is, of course, not easy. It takes time and sustained effort. It also requires dedicated leadership that prioritizes long-term resilience. And unfortunately, there is no “one-size-fits all approach” to cultivate psychologically resilient societies given the unique needs, culture, and threats in different regions. But the psychological capabilities discussed in this article provide a goal to work towards and initial recommendations to iterate on. For nations fighting to keep their democratic values in the face of authoritarian pressures — nations like Ukraine, Georgia, Taiwan, Mongolia, Baltic and Balkan states, and many others — the need is urgent.

Psychological Capabilities for Resilience - War on the Rocks

warontherocks.com · by Shannon Houck · December 27, 2022

When the National Socialists assumed power in Germany in 1933 and ushered in a series of laws that segregated Jews from “Aryan” society, most Jews believed that the Nazi regime would not remain in power for long. It was not until the “Night of Broken Glass” in 1938 — when Nazis coordinated violent, widespread attacks against Jewish synagogues, schools, businesses, hospitals, and homes — that most German Jews realized the gravity of the threat and urgently tried to flee. Resistance movements did not begin in earnest until 1943. Today in 2022, the need for the will and ability to protect civil liberties and defend sovereignty is once again clear, after Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine and China’s escalatory threats to use military force to annex Taiwan. In any society, the capacity to defend itself hinges on resilience.

A resilient populace is prepared to resist — to fight to regain power and sovereignty when it is lost. The Resistance Operating Concept describes resilience as a foundation for resistance. The NATO Special Operations Headquarters’ Comprehensive Defence Handbook echoes this idea, stating that “[r]esilience is the foundation atop the whole-of-society bedrock.” And most recently, the 2022 U.S. National Defense Strategy highlights resilience as a means for deterrence. Each of these foundational documents underscore a critical point: If a nation lacks the will to defend its sovereignty, then its overall resistance capacity is severely impacted.

Despite a renewed focus on resilience and resistance among security planners and practitioners, there is a gap in the current understanding of the psychological capabilities people need to defend and regain sovereignty. Resiliency-building efforts tend to focus almost exclusively on civil preparedness for natural, accidental, or malicious disasters through infrastructure resource management, emergency response protocols, communication networks, and educating the public. This type of preparedness is necessary but insufficient. Preparing individuals and populations for invasion requires cognitive readiness. Determination. Motivation to get in and stay in the fight. Psychologically resilient individuals feel a sense of connection and belonging to their social circles and community environment. They trust their local forces and civilian services. They are knowledgeable about enemy influence attempts. They believe in their country’s narratives and purpose and feel a sense of national identity and pride.

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To achieve these outcomes, resilience building must also equip people to deal with the psychological challenges pre-invasion (anticipation and uncertainty), during invasion (coping, acceptance, and unity), and post-invasion (psychological change). Ukraine provides a model example. After what some call a weak and divided defense against Russia’s 2014 invasion of Crimea, Ukraine’s response to Russia’s 2022 assault is nothing short of impressive. They have so far taken back 50 percent of the territory Russia occupied at the start of the war. What accounts for the difference? After 2014, Ukraine adopted a whole-of-society approach to help bolster its government and civic sector capabilities to include psychological resilience. The result is a Ukraine that remains determined, confident in victory, innovative, and united. Other nations should follow step.

Anticipation Pre-Invasion: The Psychology of Uncertainty

Preparing without knowing if, when, where, or how a threat will occur is psychologically challenging. Uncertainty causes angst. It is also linked to decreases in motivation, focus, cooperation, and sense of purpose. For example, runners are most likely to slow their pace and “give in to pain” when faced with uncertain conditions during a race, or that the reality of losing a job has less of a negative impact on one’s overall health than experiencing job uncertainty. According to neuroscientists Heidi Grand and Tal Goldhamer, “[t]hreats of uncertainty literally make us less capable, because dealing with them is just not something our brains evolved to do.”

Fortunately, people can learn to navigate uncertainty. Indeed, top athletes intentionally train for it. Performance expert Steve Magness writes: “Similar to how we adapt to the stress of a physical workout by increasing the strength of our muscle fibers, building mitochondria, or producing more red blood cells, our brains adapt to the stress of uncertainty, by adjusting our stress response, establishing and reinforcing memory connections, and being better equipped to handle that formerly uncertain situation.” With exposure to uncertainty comes more psychological preparedness, not necessarily for specific incidents, but for the discomfort that unanticipated incidents may bring.

As such, in the same ways athletes train for uncertainty that they may face during competition, societies must also psychologically train for the unexpected. One way to develop this capability is through interagency training and scenario planning and simulation that intentionally injects elements of uncertainty. This not only helps participants learn procedures and practice their responses, but it also provides a forum for participants to develop important relationships with others involved in planning and preparation processes. As evidenced in Ukraine, a comprehensive defense approach is crucial. Comprehensive defense is defined as “an official Government strategy, which encompasses a whole-of-society approach to protecting the nation against potential threats.” This means fostering relationships across government entities (political and military, including conventional and irregular forces) and civilian sectors of society (e.g., community-based organizations, religious leaders, and societal influencers) to serve a critical role in coping if an invasion occurs.

Coping During Invasion: The Psychology of Acceptance and Unity

Resilient people display two essential coping skills during a crisis — the ability to accept what is happening and the ability to adopt a unified front to implement solutions. Psychological acceptance, or “the active embracing of subjective experience, particularly distressing experiences,” is cognitively challenging. When facing distressing events, suppression and denial are often more attractive than acceptance because avoidance offers temporary comfort. But acceptance is critical for action.

People must also be prepared to innovate in the face of unanticipated circumstances. Organizational resilience research underscores the importance of bricolage, or the “capability to improvise and to solve problems creatively.” Ukrainians, for example, must use everything at their disposal in their current defense against Russian invaders. One Ukrainian woman reportedly threw a jar of pickles from her balcony to crash a drone. Ukrainian farmers have used tractors to tow Russian tanks, and one brewery made Molotov cocktails in their bottles, re-labeling them “Putin is a Dickhead.” These examples demonstrate a mastery of bricolage — quickly innovating with whatever available resources one has during a crisis.

Coordinated actions are even more impactful. The most successful groups are those that can unite to achieve a common goal. Sports teams provide a good example. The typical baseball team is made up of very different types of individuals from different regions, backgrounds, ethnicities, beliefs, etc. Oftentimes these various social identities might not easily mix. But the teams that can put aside these individual identities and focus on their team identity tend to win more games.

Similarly, a strong national identity is widely recognized as crucial to successful resilience. However, unity is not automatic. Social psychology research has identified several mechanisms that help bring groups together to collaborate more effectively. Much of this research focuses on the power of contact, which again demonstrates the importance of adopting a whole-of-society approach throughout planning and preparation efforts. Inclusion and consensual (but not co-opted) cohesion generally enhance resilience. But aside from simply getting different entities together, there are four conditions of intergroup contact that can maximize effects: establishing common goals; dedication to cooperation; the development of equality in status; and the presence of institutional support.

These conditions translate into recommended actions to facilitate effective whole-of-society collaborations, the first of which is to focus on common objectives. Bringing different stakeholders together, each of which has their own agendas, requires changing an “us versus them” mindset to a “we” mentality. Individual motivations to collaborate might differ, but emphasizing a clear, overarching mission can assist in bridging differences and facilitating team productivity. The second recommendation is to get genuine buy-in from all participants. This recommendation is obvious on the surface yet is often minimized or ignored entirely. This is not without consequence, as dedicated cooperation rather than passive participation is fundamental to group cohesion and productivity. Genuine buy-in does not come from direct orders that force people to participate. It comes from knowing that one’s participation is needed and valued. As such, recommendation three centers around psychological research on status equality. Successful intergroup cooperation involves the recognition of team members strengths, skillsets, and expertise. Leaning on expertise diversity can lead to more successful, unified action.

Adaptation Post-Invasion: The Psychology of Change

After crises comes a period of learning and adaptation. Reflection and learning require cognitive capabilities to evaluate a crisis and enact change based on “lessons learned.” In organizational psychology research, this process of learning post-crisis is described as an “ongoing process of reflection and action characterized by asking questions, seeking feedback, experimenting, reflecting on results, and discussing errors or unexpected outcomes of actions.” Organizational-level learning also comes from observing others’ successes and failures. For example, airline and railroad accidents decline as accidents by other firms in the same industry increase.

However, simply identifying lessons learned does not necessarily mean effective adaptation. Change is a process. People resist change for a variety of reasons, including the increased work that comes with change and the previously discussed psychological challenges associated with uncertainty. We cannot simply ignore resistance to change. To adapt, we must determine the individual and group drivers of resistance to change and address them. Armed with this understanding, leaders can develop more effective strategic communication. This sounds obvious on the surface, and yet research on organizational change finds that while most senior managers understand the reasons behind major decisions, a relative minority of lower-level supervisors and employees think that management adequately explains the reasons behind these decisions. Leaders must communicate clearly, repeatedly, and reinforce the deeply held societal values that further promote national identity.

Many of the psychological capabilities to improve societal resilience can be integrated into three broad focus areas: education, information, and inclusion. Education should not only raise awareness about trends that may affect national safety or potential threats to sovereignty, but it should emphasize a country’s unique strengths, national history, culture, and values. Mongolia, a democracy bordered by authoritarian Russia and China, has taken several measures along these lines. For example, this year’s Nadaam festival, Mongolia’s most important national holiday that celebrates its independence and nomadic culture, coincided with the Gobi Wolf 2022 exercise, “the Pacific Resilience Disaster Response Exercise and Exchange Program, which focuses on interagency coordination and foreign humanitarian assistance.” Emphasizing resilience during important cultural events is something other nations can do.

A psychologically resilient population must also be informed about the modern information environment and how it plays a role in shaping thinking and behavior. Disinformation education and media literacy, for example, are critical, as disinformation erodes national cohesion, trust, and inclusion. According to a recent study, Taiwan is one of the most frequent targets of disinformation, which has led civic groups such as Taiwan FactCheck Center, Cofacts, and News Helper to improve public media literacy through educating the Taiwanese people on how to more critically evaluate digital information and distinguish between true and false content. According to Taiwan FactCheck Centre Chairman Hu Yuan-hui: “All stakeholders need to be involved – members of the public, the media, tech companies, fact-checking organisations, academia, the government.” This again underscores the importance of a comprehensive, whole-of-society approach.

A whole-of-society and whole-of-government approach is inherently inclusive. Inclusion efforts often focus on bolstering national identity to give people a sense of pride and belongingness, but it can simultaneously train critical skills. For example, in response to Polish citizens’ concerns about the war in Ukraine, the Polish Ministry of National Defense recently established a “Train with the Army” project that offers Polish military-led courses to civilians on survival skills, how to properly handle weapons and gas masks, self-defense, and other critical skills. One participant commented that “Even a very strong army can have very big troubles with simple people who can fight in the woods or in the streets, who can resist against regular soldiers … So I think we should all be prepared at least a bit to stay safe, to use arms — even simple ones — and to have some knowledge of survival.”

These three broad means to build resilience serve as a general guidepost, but using them to build specific psychological resilience capabilities is, of course, not easy. It takes time and sustained effort. It also requires dedicated leadership that prioritizes long-term resilience. And unfortunately, there is no “one-size-fits all approach” to cultivate psychologically resilient societies given the unique needs, culture, and threats in different regions. But the psychological capabilities discussed in this article provide a goal to work towards and initial recommendations to iterate on. For nations fighting to keep their democratic values in the face of authoritarian pressures — nations like Ukraine, Georgia, Taiwan, Mongolia, Baltic and Balkan states, and many others — the need is urgent.

Become a Member

Dr. Shannon Houck is an assistant professor in the Defense Analysis Department at the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School. She is a social psychologist with expertise on the science of influence and persuasion, psychological resilience and resistance, and extremism. She can be reached at shannon.houck@nps.edu.

The views expressed in this article are the views of the author alone. They do not reflect the official position of the Naval Postgraduate School, the U.S. Navy, the U.S. Marine Corps, the Department of Defense, or any other entity within the U.S. government, and the authors are not authorized to provide any official position of these entities.

Commentary

warontherocks.com · by Shannon Houck · December 27, 2022

14. Ukraine Converts $21.9 Billion In U.S. Military Surplus Into Fearsome Force

​We can (and must) learn a lot from the Ukrainians.​

Excerpts:

Use rates of relatively modern man-portable or other small defensive anti-tank and anti-aircraft systems—1,600 Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, 8,500 Javelin anti-armor missiles, 46,000 other anti-armor systems, as well as 1,500 TOW anti-tank missiles, and 13,000 grenade launchers—have likely outstripped America’s ability to produce the munitions. But, again, this largesse has only made a small dent in America’s supplies—over the years America produced tens of thousands of Stingers and almost 50,000 Javelins.

Another worry is Ukraine’s consumption of modern artillery shells. But this “revelation” is, again, worth an enormous amount to the U.S. military. For years, only a lonely team logisticians and other defense experts worried about America’s habit of underfunding munitions production and weapons sustainment.

Until now, their concerns went unheard by a military more interested in funding shiny new weapons than in refreshing the grubby, dirty, and dangerous industrial base devoted to making munitions. Discovering that the critics were right, and identifying this manufacturing shortfall as a major constraint, enables the U.S. to do something about it now, when U.S. national security is not directly threatened on the battlefield.

While, in total, the amount of military funding sent to Ukraine seems large, in real terms, much of the military aid sent to Ukraine—outside of ammunition—is comprised of systems that the Pentagon has already written off. That is worth remembering when demagogues try to sew public doubts about America’s support of Ukraine.

Ukraine Converts $21.9 Billion In U.S. Military Surplus Into Fearsome Force

Forbes · by Craig Hooper · December 26, 2022

Few nations have put U.S. military aid to better use than Ukraine

AFP via Getty Images

The list of American security assistance to Ukraine since the beginning of Russia’s “unprovoked and brutal invasion” is impressive. What is more impressive is that $21.9 billion in U.S. military aid has been dominated by largely second-string gear, comprised of unpopular or lower-tech systems that were, in many cases, on the way to the scrapyard.

As Congress gears up to constrain the Biden Administration’s relative largesse, it is worth emphasizing that the aid, to date, is neither excessive nor threatening to U.S. national security.

In fact, U.S. military support to Ukraine has cost less than what Congress is paying to procure two Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) class nuclear-powered aircraft carriers. In total, taxpayers will put some $26 billion into the USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) and the USS John F. Kennedy (CVN 79). In comparison to these troubled flattops, the $21.9 billion for Ukraine appears to be a far more effective return on investment.

Aid to Ukraine has, in effect, shattered the Russian military, exposing it as little more than a paper tiger. The war has helped destroy Russia’s once-burgeoning arms bazaar, ruining Russian efforts to destabilize strategic regions. Enabling the fight has bolstered Ukraine’s commitment to their nation, critical for advancing society-building and anti-corruption efforts there. Facilitating Ukraine’s resistance may even end the kleptocratic reign of Vladimir Putin, paving the way for a more just—if not more democratic—society in Russia itself.

The war served a good proving ground for modern conflict, forcing the U.S. to recognize old “big war” conflict models it had eschewed for decades. The war has also reinforced the value of basic, boring old consumables, items the U.S. often ignores in the constant pursuit of the newest and shiniest technology—like the pricey FordClass carrier.

In all, the $21.9 billion has been very well spent. Had America held back the support, and just let Russia roll over Ukraine, America would have spent far more in keeping Russia from suborning the rest of Europe.

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Helping Ukraine stand against overt aggression has already offered a great return on investment. America has frittered away far more for far less strategic benefit. The second Iraq War of 2003 cost the United States over a trillion dollars. Afghanistan cost another trillion in 2022 dollars. Those two conflicts—which offered little strategic advantage the U.S.— make the $21 billion in Ukraine security aid look like chump change.

... [+]© 2012 Bloomberg Finance LP

Second-String U.S. Gear Has Rarely Been Used So Effectively

While the numbers and lists of gear are impressive, America hasn’t given very much that might impact America’s security in any substantial way. We’ve handed over a lot of former Russian or otherwise obsolete equipment, including 45 Russian-built T-72B main battle tanks and 20 Mi-17 helicopters. Much of the gear sent to Ukraine was headed for either the scrapheap or to other allies.

To a general audience, armored personnel carriers sound impressive. The fact that America gave Ukraine some 200 M113 Armored Personnel Carriers sounds like a big deal. But military experts know that America stopped building these tracked utility vehicles about 25 years ago and is busy stripping them from the U.S. force.

Other surplus gear has gone to Ukraine. During America’s counterinsurgency conflicts, the Army procured lots of M1117 Armored Security Vehicles—a wheeled armored car—between 1999 and 2014. More appropriate for military constabulary duties than full-scale conflict, the U.S. has already been drawing down the vehicle inventory, so the 250 sent to Ukraine won’t be missed. To give an idea of where Ukraine sits in terms of donations, the U.S. gave 200 of these vehicles to Columbia in 2020. Over 700 were produced for the Afghanistan Army and 400 went to the Iraqi armed forces. At least, in Ukraine, these vehicles are directly supporting U.S. goals.

Some fancy militarized-sounding gifts have centered around mobility. A grant of almost 300-400 “Tactical Vehicles” may impress a general audience, but they’re all just military trucks built to carry between 2.5 or 5 tons.

American taxpayers gave Ukraine 477 Mine Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicles (MRAPs). Built for a grinding counterinsurgency, the U.S. military has been so eager to shed the heavy, hard-to-maintain vehicles it has handed them out to police departments all over the United States.

America also provided some 1,200 “High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles.” Better known as Humvees, the U.S. is busy replacing this modern retake of the old military jeep with a newer version called the “Joint Light Tactical Vehicle.”

Even the newly popular tube artillery systems—when donated, the future of much of the 142 155mm and 36 105mm howitzers, the 10 120mm, 10 82 mm and 10 60mm mortar systems donated to Ukraine were in doubt. The Marine Corps was aiming to cut their M777 howitzer batteries from 21 to five, but the importance of artillery on the Ukraine battlefield may have changed a few opinions.

In air defense, all the focus has been on the yet-to-be-delivered Patriot air defense battery and the eight National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems (NSAMS). But the bigger story is in the old HAWK missiles the U.S. is supplying. The U.S. hasn’t used HAWK missiles since 2002, and, given that we made thousands of them, it would be very interesting to know more about how these old missiles are doing in the field.

... [+]Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

Amid The Dross, Ukraine Has Gotten Some “Good Stuff”

This isn’t to say that the U.S. hasn’t supplied “good stuff”—complex, front-line weapons, coupled with always in-demand consumables. But, while the new gear gets a lot of headlines, the truly modern systems are few and far between, dwarfed the array of nearly-obsolete U.S. weaponry.

The modern gear gets headlines. But then again, those modern, front-line systems in Ukraine are very few and far between, reflecting a jaundiced assessment of Ukrainian strategies, technical capabilities, and training. That’s why a modern Patriot air defense system may take time to be fielded in Ukraine. In a few years, eight batteries of National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems (NSAAMS) will arrive. New operators need a lot of training to fully exploit America’s high-tech gear.

Ukraine supporters, when agitating for more and better weaponry point toward Ukraine’s quick exploitation of the 38 U.S. supplied High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, or HIMARS. But these front-line assets are largely “fire-and-forget” platforms, and, as export items, their effectiveness depends more on the end-user’s prowess in finding, reporting and targeting relevant enemy assets.

That is why the U.S. has put a lot of emphasis upon modern command and control assistance. Command post vehicles, including well over 80 different radars of various types, jamming gear, tactical communications systems, SATCOM terminals and surveillance equipment helped Ukraine plug critical capability gaps. And yet, while these tactical tools are high-demand and are, in many cases, considered relatively modern equipment, the U.S. has plenty to offer.

Some high-tech, relatively “experimental” gear has also gone to Ukraine. The U.S. has fed 700 Switchblade kamikaze drones, 1,800 Phoenix Ghost unmanned aerial systems, unmanned costal defense vessels and other interesting trinkets into the war zone. These new high-tech “experiments” do cost money, but, for the U.S., getting an understanding of how these platforms perform on a modern battlefield is invaluable.

Use rates of relatively modern man-portable or other small defensive anti-tank and anti-aircraft systems—1,600 Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, 8,500 Javelin anti-armor missiles, 46,000 other anti-armor systems, as well as 1,500 TOW anti-tank missiles, and 13,000 grenade launchers—have likely outstripped America’s ability to produce the munitions. But, again, this largesse has only made a small dent in America’s supplies—over the years America produced tens of thousands of Stingers and almost 50,000 Javelins.

Another worry is Ukraine’s consumption of modern artillery shells. But this “revelation” is, again, worth an enormous amount to the U.S. military. For years, only a lonely team logisticians and other defense experts worried about America’s habit of underfunding munitions production and weapons sustainment.

Until now, their concerns went unheard by a military more interested in funding shiny new weapons than in refreshing the grubby, dirty, and dangerous industrial base devoted to making munitions. Discovering that the critics were right, and identifying this manufacturing shortfall as a major constraint, enables the U.S. to do something about it now, when U.S. national security is not directly threatened on the battlefield.

While, in total, the amount of military funding sent to Ukraine seems large, in real terms, much of the military aid sent to Ukraine—outside of ammunition—is comprised of systems that the Pentagon has already written off. That is worth remembering when demagogues try to sew public doubts about America’s support of Ukraine.

Forbes · by Craig Hooper · December 26, 2022

15. China’s Approach to Taiwan: Rhetoric vs. Reality

Excerpts:

Qin Gang writes that the “tension across the Taiwan Strait was not created by the Chinese mainland breaking the status quo, but by ‘Taiwan independence’ separatists and external forces [i.e. the United States] continually challenging the status quo of ‘one China,’” while it is Japan, not China, that is attempting to alter the status quo in the East China Sea. This rhetoric from the ambassador of a country that has constructed islands to serve as military bases in the South China Sea, declared that sea to be part of China per its so-called nine-dash line, and is engaging in a massive conventional and nuclear weapons buildup, is evidence of what James Burnham in The Machiavellians explained as the difference between the “formal” and “real” meaning of words and phrases.

...

The “formal” meaning of Ambassador Qin’s article is what Burnham called a “systemic distortion of the truth.” We experienced this all throughout the Cold War with the Soviet Union, whose leaders and spokespersons repeatedly pledged “peaceful coexistence” while waging ideological and geopolitical war against the citadel of capitalism. “In the hands of the powerful and their spokesmen,” Burnham wrote, “… this method [of communication] is well designed … to deceive us, and to lead us by easy routes to the sacrifice of our own interests.”

The ancient Chinese strategist Sun Tzu taught that it was the acme of skill to subdue an enemy without fighting. We would be wise and prudent to view and listen to what Chinese leaders write and say but only in the context of their actions, which, as we know, speak louder than words.

China’s Approach to Taiwan: Rhetoric vs. Reality - The American Spectator 

spectator.org · by Francis P. Sempa · December 27, 2022

China’s Approach to Taiwan: Rhetoric vs. Reality

He formally writes about “upholding world peace,” but the real meaning is a world peace with China in control of Taiwan.

December 26, 2022, 8:35 PM

Military weapons are displayed for the 90th anniversary of the founding of the People's Liberation Army (testing/Shutterstock)

Just one day after China sent 71 warplanes and seven warships toward Taiwan, the National Interest published a propaganda piece by China’s ambassador to the United States, Qin Gang, that pledged “mutual respect, peaceful coexistence, and win-win cooperation.” At least 47 of China’s warplanes crossed the median of the Taiwan Strait in what People’s Liberation Army spokesman Shi Yi called a “firm response to the current U.S.-Taiwan escalation and provocation.”

This show of force follows a series of military drills that China conducted last week near southern Okinawa that involved China’s aircraft carrier Liaoning, two destroyers, and a frigate, as well as 180 carrier-based fighter jets and helicopters. Yet Qin Gang writes that “China is committed to its foreign policy goals of upholding world peace and promoting common development, and it remains dedicated to building a community with a shared future for mankind.” And the ambassador warns that viewing the world from a “democracy vs. authoritarianism perspective” will result in a world of “division, competition, and conflict.”

Qin Gang writes that the “tension across the Taiwan Strait was not created by the Chinese mainland breaking the status quo, but by ‘Taiwan independence’ separatists and external forces [i.e. the United States] continually challenging the status quo of ‘one China,’” while it is Japan, not China, that is attempting to alter the status quo in the East China Sea. This rhetoric from the ambassador of a country that has constructed islands to serve as military bases in the South China Sea, declared that sea to be part of China per its so-called nine-dash line, and is engaging in a massive conventional and nuclear weapons buildup, is evidence of what James Burnham in The Machiavellians explained as the difference between the “formal” and “real” meaning of words and phrases.

Burnham began The Machiavellians with an analysis of the Democratic Party’s platform in 1932 and Dante Alighieri’s 14th-century work De Monarchia. In both instances, the “real” meaning of the words and phrases was disguised by the “formal” meaning. The Democrats of 1932 rhetorically committed themselves to a balanced budget and a sound currency, but that formal meaning of the words disguised the real meaning, which was the Democrats wanted to control the budget and the currency. Similarly, Dante in De Monarchia promotes the notion of “universal peace, salvation, a unified world government,” but in reality he is promoting one side in a conflict over who is to rule Florence. The formal words, Burnham explained, told us nothing and should be assessed only in the context of the political or geopolitical situation of the time.

Qin Gang’s rhetoric in the National Interest should be viewed according to Burnham’s “formal” and “real” meaning dichotomy. He formally writes about “upholding world peace,” but the real meaning of those words in the context of China’s actions is a world peace with China in control of Taiwan. He formally writes of promoting “common development,” but the real meaning of those words is spreading China’s economic and political influence by economic means per China’s Belt and Road Initiative. His formal warning about viewing the world as a struggle between democracy and authoritarianism hides the real meaning, which is to convince the United States to accept a China-led autocratic world order, i.e., Xi Jinping’s “China Dream.”

The “formal” meaning of Ambassador Qin’s article is what Burnham called a “systemic distortion of the truth.” We experienced this all throughout the Cold War with the Soviet Union, whose leaders and spokespersons repeatedly pledged “peaceful coexistence” while waging ideological and geopolitical war against the citadel of capitalism. “In the hands of the powerful and their spokesmen,” Burnham wrote, “… this method [of communication] is well designed … to deceive us, and to lead us by easy routes to the sacrifice of our own interests.”

The ancient Chinese strategist Sun Tzu taught that it was the acme of skill to subdue an enemy without fighting. We would be wise and prudent to view and listen to what Chinese leaders write and say but only in the context of their actions, which, as we know, speak louder than words.

spectator.org · by Francis P. Sempa · December 27, 2022

16. Pentagon, intelligence community eye cloud collaboration

Pentagon, intelligence community eye cloud collaboration

Defense News · by Courtney Albon · December 27, 2022

SAN ANTONIO — The Pentagon’s recently inked Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability contract sets the stage for greater collaboration between the U.S. Department of Defense and intelligence agencies, according to officials from both communities.

The department awarded the JWCC deal in early December to four companies: Microsoft, Oracle, Amazon and Google. Under the arrangement, the companies will compete for task orders worth up to $9 billion through June 2028. The vendors, each only promised $100,000, will provide cloud computing, storage and other services to users around the globe and across all classification levels.

Speaking this month at the Department of Defense Intelligence Information Systems Worldwide Conference in San Antonio, Texas, leaders from the military and intelligence agencies said the award of JWCC provides an opportunity for unprecedented collaboration as the organizations design an enterprise-wide architecture.

“This enables us for the first time ever to be able to jointly use, co-use, these capabilities from these vendors, between the DoD and the IC,” Lt. Gen. Robert Skinner, director of the Defense Information Systems Agency, said during a Dec. 14 speech. “That’s huge.”

The intelligence community has its own multi-cloud construct, similar to JWCC, called Commercial Cloud Enterprise, or C2E. The 15-year contract, awarded in 2020, includes the same vendors as JWCC plus New York-based IBM, which provide services to intelligence agencies and other users.

DoD and the IC are establishing “co-use” agreements that allow intelligence officers to access the tactical elements of cloud that the military will build out and, conversely, lets defense users take advantage of the top-secret environments that the IC will establish. It also means the agencies can both draw from the same pool of vendors for various services.

DISA is the lead on JWCC, and while the Office of the Director of National Intelligence is managing the IC contract, the Defense Intelligence Agency is helping create the top-secret cloud environment. DIA’s highly classified communication network, the Joint Worldwide Intelligence Communications System — which is in the midst of a significant modernization and expansion effort — will connect the top-secret elements of the cloud.

DIA Chief Information Officer Doug Cossa told reporters during a Dec. 13 roundtable at the conference the benefit of working so closely with the Defense Department to establish the foundational infrastructure is that it allows for interoperability further down the line.

“It really is a huge step forward for the department and the IC as a whole that we’re actually planning the design together and not waiting until things are in operation only to find out that it’s not interoperable,” he said.

The early partnership and access to both contract vehicles also gives the user communities options, Cossa added. DoD officials have said they believe the competition baked into the JWCC arrangement — with Microsoft, Oracle, Amazon and Google competing for every task — will produce best-of-breed products and drive down costs.

“As we define the vendors and the capabilities on JWCC and we make our awards on C2E, we have two vehicles that we could use,” he said. “When you lock yourself into one IT phenomenology or one IT capability, you limit your function as a result of that. Expanding the offerings to where we can leverage the best cloud service provider for the best function really helps us build up our enterprise.”

How and where will the cloud be accessed?

Some of the initial collaboration will involve determining where to locate cloud access points, Cossa said. While today’s cloud infrastructure is largely focused in the U.S., part of the goal of JWCC and C2E is to move that connectivity overseas.

Expanding access to users by creating entry points that are closer to combatant commands and other overseas locations will speed up communication, he said. Quicker, more protected communications are critical to the Defense Department as it increasingly focuses on competition with technologically advanced competitors, such as China and Russia, and less on counterterrorism operations.

“Creating these cloud connection points around the world to be able to decrease the amount of distance . . . that’s the real change that we’re talking about,” Cossa said.

Determining where to place those connection points won’t be easy, he said. While the intelligence and defense communities share about 80% of their requirements, they’ll need to negotiate the remaining 20%.

“The biggest challenge is deciding where in the world are the most efficient locations that get to the equities of both the IC and the DoD,” Cossa said. “How do we balance those? That’s probably the hardest decision that we need to make.”

Colin Demarest contributed to this story.

17. Physical attacks on power grid surge to new peak

Physical attacks on power grid surge to new peak

By CATHERINE MOREHOUSE

12/26/2022 11:41 AM EST

Politico

People are shooting, sabotaging and vandalizing electrical equipment in the U.S. at a pace unseen in at least a decade, amid signs that domestic extremists hope to use blackouts to sow unrest.

A Tacoma Power crew works at an electrical substation damaged by vandals early on Christmas morning after they cut a padlock to gain entry, according to a crew manager, Sunday, Dec. 25, 2022 in Graham, Wa. | Ken Lambert/The Seattle Times via AP

12/26/2022 11:41 AM EST

The U.S. power grid is suffering a decade-high surge in attacks as extremists, vandals and cyber criminals increasingly take aim at the nation’s critical infrastructure.

Physical and computerized assaults on the equipment that delivers electricity are at their highest level since at least 2012, including 101 reported this year through the end of August, according to federal records examined by POLITICO. The previous peak was the 97 incidents recorded for all of 2021.

This year’s tally doesn’t even include 2022’s most visible attack — the shootings of two Duke Energy substations that knocked out power to 45,000 people in Moore County, N.C.

And the lights went dark on Christmas Day for 14,000 customers in Washington state after four Tacoma Public Utilities and Puget Sound Energy substations were vandalized, with no suspects in custody, the Pierce County Sheriff’s Department said in a statement on Sunday.

“It is unknown if there are any motives or if this was a coordinated attack on the power systems,” the department said.

Authorities have yet to identify any suspects in the North Carolina attack, and have only been able to speculate about the motive. But white nationalists, neo-Nazis and other domestic extremists seeking to sow unrest have taken responsibility for other high-profile attempts to take down swaths of the grid — prompting security experts to grow increasingly concerned about the U.S. electricity system’s vulnerability.

The risks have also caught the attention of federal regulators who oversee the interstate power network.

“Is there something more sinister going on?” Richard Glick, chair of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, told reporters last week. “Are there people planning this?... I don’t think anyone knows that right now. But there’s no doubt that the numbers are up in terms of reported incidents.”

Adding to those worries: The number of potential attack points for the grid is set to increase as the Biden administration and Congress seek to expand the power system to accommodate renewable energy such as wind and solar. The rising demand for power for electric vehicles also increases the urgency of securing the grid from attack.

FERC announced at its December meeting last week it would direct a key industry standards-setting body to analyze whether it should bolster regulations for protecting critical infrastructure. But federal authorities don’t have jurisdiction over local electrical substations and distribution lines, the type of equipment that was attacked in North Carolina.

“Are we going to have armed guards at every substation, every transformer in the country, in order to make sure this doesn’t happen?” FERC Commissioner Willie Phillips asked earlier this month, referring to the North Carolina attack. “Or [are these attacks] something that we can just expect more often?”

Even though utilities, federal agencies and state regulators have implemented measures to harden the grid over the past two decades, experts fear the system is more vulnerable than ever.

“If somebody really wanted ... to create a blackout in a certain area to achieve whatever social, cultural, political objectives, it’s fairly easy to get access to that information right now — and the tools necessary to execute it are readily available,” said Jonathon Monken, who oversaw system resilience at PJM Interconnection, a power market covering 13 states. He is now a consultant at Converge Strategies.

Data analyzed by POLITICO showed that through August, utilities this year have reported at least 101 incidents they deemed to be intentional attacks, threats of an attack or vandalism on the utility’s system, according to a compilation of incidents that utilities reported to the Department of Energy. These attacks affected more than 22,000 customers, although the vast majority of instances resulted in no outages.

Utilities classified only four of those incidents — in Texas, Montana, Florida and Washington state — as related to cybersecurity. The totals also included suspicious activities.

The DOE data does not publicly provide details on any of the attacks, including how they were carried out or whether any suspected perpetrators were arrested. DOE itself receives a more detailed accounting of these reports from utilities, according to a senior DOE official, which can range from suspected drone surveillance to intentional gunfire. The department authorized the official to speak to POLITICO on condition that the person not be publicly identified.

Federal regulations require utilities to report any disruption to some portion of the power system, Monken said, but reporting requirements for incidents that don’t necessarily cause a disturbance are less clear.

One example of an incident that falls into that reporting gray area was another shooting at a Duke Energy hydropower facility in South Carolina on Dec. 7, just days after the substation shootings in North Carolina.

CBS News reported that company employees saw someone opening fire with a long gun at the Wateree Hydro Station in Ridgeway before speeding off in a truck. That incident did not disrupt the power supply. A representative for Duke Energy did not respond to multiple requests for comment on whether the utility filed a report on either of December incidents.

“The language is more clear when physical security systems are actively targeted as a mandatory report versus a utility assessment that it was random vandalism that was not intended to disrupt service,” Monken said. “To some degree the ambiguity is intentional because all scenarios cannot be accounted for, and DOE wants to avoid reporting overload that would just create a lot of ‘white noise’ that could obscure meaningful intelligence collection.”

The senior DOE official said that the agency is most interested in quickly reporting incidents that have the potential to cause immediate disruptions, but is also interested in aggregating all incidents, including those that don’t rise to a high level of threat. The official also said utilities sometimes have to make “judgment calls” related to smaller-profile incidents that don’t disrupt its daily operations.

“Generally, the electricity sector in particular is very cognizant of security ... and they are very open to sharing information,” the official said. “And so we do see that they generally share more things out of an abundance of caution, which is encouraged.”

That also means the number of threats to the grid may be even higher than DOE’s data reflects.

According to POLITICO’s analysis of the DOE data, the number of physical or cyber attacks or threats reported through August of this year is nearly 70 percent higher than the 60 reported in the same period last year.

Last year saw a total of 97 reported attacks, including seven cyberattacks, according to the DOE data. Those followed a total of 96 attacks in 2020 and 81 in 2019.

Overall, the past three years have been the most active for reported attacks on the grid in the past decade, after the incidents had dipped to a low of 42 in 2015.

While authorities don’t know the motivation for the North Carolina substation attacks, they said the perpetrators shot at the substations intending to cause widespread outages. And signs exist that the grid is becoming a target for at least some domestic extremists. In February, three white supremacists pleaded guilty to a plot to shut down parts of the nation’s power system to sow unrest and cause a “race war.” Four neo-Nazis in North Carolina were charged last year with a similar conspiracy in which authorities said they aimed to take down a critical substation with guns and explosives.

A senior official at the nonprofit North American Electric Reliability Corp., which sets reliability standards for utilities and reporting rules on outage incidents, told FERC during a supply chain security conference hosted by the agency that this year has seen “a steady uptick” in physical attacks on the grid.

Some incidents have been less disruptive — vandalism or robbery for instance. But Manny Cancel, who heads NERC’s Electricity Information Sharing and Analysis Center, told FERC that there has also been “a significant amount of ballistic gunfire damage” in some parts of the country.

NERC does not provide data on specific security events, and publicly available DOE data does not detail which incidents included gunfire. But many of the attacks in the data reported to DOE included either a “physical attack,” “physical threat” or “actual damage” to some power system facilities.

Federal regulations dictating how utilities bolster their systems against attacks mostly focus on major substations and transformers — the kinds of critical components that DOE and FERC have warned could lead to widespread outages if attacked in a coordinated way.

Facilities that could contribute to that kind of extensive regional catastrophe have strict security requirements that include a range of protective measures, such as armed security staff, bullet-resistant fencing or video monitoring. But smaller, local or rural facilities — such as the pair targeted in Moore County — often don’t meet the criteria for that level of security. Instead, those substations are subject to state or local regulations.

In a statement, an Energy Department spokesperson said the agency “takes the security of the nation’s power grid very seriously and will continue to work with law enforcement, interagency partners, and utilities to address any and all interruptions of electric power and threats to our electric system reliability.”

FERC spokesperson Mary O’Driscoll said in an email that the agency “continues to closely monitor all developments and is coordinating with federal and state agency partners” and NERC.

“The security and reliability of the nation’s electric grid remain our top priorities,” O’Driscoll said.

The Edison Electric Institute, a trade group of investor-owned utilities, did not respond to a request for comment on the trend of rising grid attacks.

Meanwhile, the number of critical grid components vulnerable to attack will only grow as the U.S. expands the power grid over the coming decades and as more people and businesses buy electric vehicles. Wind and solar power plants in particular are often in remote areas where fewer grid protections may exist — and they offer more entry points for attack than a single power plant.

“With more and more [distributed energy resources] going up, ... there’s going to be an issue of additional transmission, say, that creates additional vulnerabilities,” said Emile Thompson, who chairs the D.C. Public Service Commission and serves as co-chair of a joint state utility regulators’ committee on critical infrastructure.

“And then, of course, those assets themselves are vulnerable,” he said. “And so how do you ensure that a solar field in the middle of the country is adequately protected? Same issue you would have with some type of power plant, but now you just have many more smaller assets.”

POLITICO

Politico

18. Should the Pentagon invest in microreactors?

Should the Pentagon invest in microreactors?

Defense News · by 1st Lt. Kyle D. Haak · December 27, 2022

It’s not clear whether the Department of Defense should continue to develop new types of microreactors — primarily because they have uncertain costs and regulations. However, we can use a systematic and repeatable framework for plugging in such information as it becomes available to pave the way for effective DoD investment decisions. We can even use presently available data and information to identify preliminary findings.

For example, the smallest microreactors, which have a power capacity of 1-5 megawatt electric, are too expensive for almost all DoD locations in the United States when comparing average electricity costs to the status quo energy costs — even when a cost of carbon, value of energy resiliency and manufacturing efficiencies are included.

On the other end of the spectrum, larger, advanced nuclear reactors (80-300 MWe) have a lower average cost of electricity but produce too much power for almost any DoD location to consume independently.

In between these two extremes, a medium-sized microreactor (17 MWe) could be a worthwhile investment for up to 21 different DoD locations in the United States.

Regardless of their size, microreactors have significant capital costs. The DoD recently announced a $300 million contract to design, construct and test a microreactor prototype. This is between four and 20 times greater than construction cost estimates from a Nuclear Energy Institute report published in 2019. Although the contract includes more than just construction, the significant cost increase aligns with themes from research out of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology — that nuclear power plant construction cost estimates tend to increase as the microreactor matures from a concept to a prototype.

Rather than just looking at construction costs, a more effective way to compare different electricity-generation sources is their levelized cost of electricity, which is the average cost of electricity over the entire life span. For microreactors, this is largely dependent on how much power can be produced in an instant — the power capacity, or MWe — the percentage of full power capacity delivered over time — the capacity factor as a percentage — and how manufacturing efficiencies decrease costs for each subsequent unit.

Microreactors are more cost-effective if they have a large power capacity (MWe), if they are used consistently for their entire life span (a capacity factor near 100%) and if numerous units are implemented.

The preliminary findings above focus on siting microreactors at DoD locations in the United States. This allows them to have a larger power capacity (MWe) than portable or mobile reactors. The analysis also required DoD locations to have an average power demand greater than the microreactor’s power capacity (MWe) to ensure the microreactor is used consistently for its life span. This increases the capacity factor closer to 100% and keeps the average cost of electricity as low as possible.

Because most DoD locations have relatively low average power demand, there is a trade-off between microreactors with a larger power capacity (MWe) and the number of DoD locations that can use them with a capacity factor near 100%. This partially explains why a medium-sized, 17-MWe microreactor could be a worthwhile investment for the DoD.

In order for a DoD investment in a 17-MWe microreactor to be worthwhile, the DoD must account for a cost of carbon and a value of energy resilience; the microreactor cost estimates cannot increase; and all 21 locations must be viable hosts — all so that manufacturing efficiencies decrease the microreactor costs with each unit.

Therefore, DoD decision-makers may want to first invest in more accurate cost estimates and perform a more targeted investigation of DoD locations to determine if the investment will be worthwhile.

Today, the DoD is developing a stationary and transportable microreactor, but this is not the first time the DoD invested in this technology. The Army Nuclear Power Program, or ANPP, designed, constructed and operated microreactors from 1954-1976 — when nuclear energy was in its infancy. ANPP demonstrated eight microreactors with different designs; three were stationary, three were portable (for transport and reassembly), and two were mobile (on a truck/barge). The program was ultimately discontinued because none of the reactors provided a unique operational capability — each could have been replaced with an alternative energy source — and because they were likely more expensive than those alternative energy sources.

An archival analysis suggests that the energy produced by ANPP microreactors was three to five times more expensive than if diesel generators produced the same amount of energy with a fully burdened cost of diesel fuel, which accounts for costs on top of the fuel itself, like transportation, protection, personnel, etc. These historical examples highlight how important costs are when considering an investment in a substitutable technology.

Ultimately, the decision to invest in a microreactor is complex; numerous assumptions and uncertainties could interact with each other to determine if the investment is worthwhile. Therefore, DoD decision-makers should use a systematic and repeatable decision framework to help manage these complexities; one possible framework can be found in my doctoral dissertation. The framework can equip DoD decision-makers to effectively communicate with each other about the decision to invest in a microreactor and can be reapplied in the future, as microreactor capabilities and DoD location requirements inevitably change.

U.S. Air Force 1st Lt. Kyle D. Haak has a doctorate in policy analysis from Pardee Rand Graduate School. The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily represent the views of the think tank Rand, the U.S. Air Force, the U.S. Defense Department nor the U.S. government. For more details, watch a presentation online and read the dissertation on this topic.

19. Kissinger Sees a Global Leadership Vacuum

Excerpts:

Today, Mr. Kissinger warns, the problem of world order is growing harder. Great-power rivalries intensify, China is a more complex challenge than the Soviet Union ever was, and international trust diminishes as the potential for global conflict steadily grows. We need wisdom more than ever, Mr. Kissinger says, but it is not so easy to find.

It is hard to disagree. American debates today, over domestic as well as foreign policy, often feature a sterile competition between technocrats immersed in conventional groupthink on the one side and populist demagogues armed with superficial slogans on the other. Henry Kissinger thinks we need to do better. I fear he is right, and I hope that “Leadership” gets the wide readership it deserves.

Kissinger Sees a Global Leadership Vacuum

A dearth of statesmen has left the world misruled by populists and technocrats.

By Walter Russell MeadFollow

Dec. 26, 2022 12:06 pm ET

https://www.wsj.com/articles/kisssinger-sees-a-global-leadership-vacuum-world-order-peace-power-civilization-universities-depth-11671990402?mod=opinion_lead_pos9&mc_cid=7a77206236

Is the quality of world leadership declining just as humanity’s need for great leadership has become more urgent than ever? As I learned over a long lunch this month, Henry Kissinger thinks that is exactly where things stand, and he worries that civilization may be imperiled as a result.

Worry comes naturally to Mr. Kissinger. His first book, “A World Restored” (1957), laid out some basic ideas that dominate his thinking to this day. Mr. Kissinger believes that only a handful of people at any given time understand the complicated architecture of a viable world order, and that an even smaller number have the gifts of leadership required to create, defend or reform the delicate international framework that makes even partial peace possible.

Worse, it is not enough for an effective leader to understand the international system. Mr. Kissinger believes that there is an immense gap between the kind of world the citizens of any given country want to see and the kind of world that is actually possible. The world can’t be as Sinocentric as Chinese public opinion wants it to be, as democratic or woke as many Americans would like, as Islamic as many Muslims would wish, as responsive to development concerns as some African and Latin American countries want, or as awed by French grandeur or admiring of British moral leadership as people in those countries want.

Great leaders must bridge the gap between public opinion in their own countries and the compromises inseparable from international diplomacy. They must see the world clearly enough to understand what is possible and sustainable, and they must be able to persuade their fellow citizens to accept outcomes that are, inevitably, often disappointing. Paradoxically, this task is often harder in a powerful state such as America, which is often able to get much of what it wants in the world. Small and weak countries understand the need for compromise; great and powerful ones often think they can have it all.

READ MORE GLOBAL VIEW

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This kind of leadership involves a rare mix of intellectual ability, deep education and the kind of intuitive understanding of politics given to few. Mr. Kissinger’s most recent book, “Leadership: Six Studies in World Strategy,” singles out six leaders (Germany’s Konrad Adenauer, France’s Charles de Gaulle, America’s Richard Nixon, Egypt’s Anwar Sadat, Britain’s Margaret Thatcher and Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew) who achieved great things at home and abroad. But the book looks forward, not back. As Mr. Kissinger emphasized at our lunch, he fears that the exceptional conditions that enabled these leaders to appear may be fading away.

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The six leaders Mr. Kissinger profiled were all born outside the social elite. They were middle-class children from ordinary families. That background gave them an ability to understand how their fellow citizens saw the world. Selected into meritocratic educational institutions, they received a disciplined and demanding education that prepared them psychologically, intellectually and culturally to operate effectively at the highest levels of national and international life.

A question that troubles Mr. Kissinger is whether this pipeline is breaking down—whether elite institutions no longer offer this rigor and discipline, and whether the culture of “deep literacy,” as he calls it, has eroded to the point where society no longer has the wisdom necessary to prepare new generations for leadership.

This isn’t merely about woke college professors dumbing education down or superficial left-wing ideologues driving complex and subtle ideas out of university teaching. It’s about whether the depth and rigor of classic scholarship can withstand the challenge of the more visual culture and the shorter attention spans promoted by electronic media.

Now in his 100th year, Mr. Kissinger has been pondering the problems of leadership for longer than most Americans have been alive. When he entered public life in the 1960s, the old WASP elite still dominated the field of American foreign policy. But the old Brahmins like the Achesons, Bundys and Alsops, who brought America both the Marshall Plan and the Vietnam War, faded away. The Nixon, Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations achieved important successes, but the 21st-century track record of American statecraft is less inspiring.

Today, Mr. Kissinger warns, the problem of world order is growing harder. Great-power rivalries intensify, China is a more complex challenge than the Soviet Union ever was, and international trust diminishes as the potential for global conflict steadily grows. We need wisdom more than ever, Mr. Kissinger says, but it is not so easy to find.

It is hard to disagree. American debates today, over domestic as well as foreign policy, often feature a sterile competition between technocrats immersed in conventional groupthink on the one side and populist demagogues armed with superficial slogans on the other. Henry Kissinger thinks we need to do better. I fear he is right, and I hope that “Leadership” gets the wide readership it deserves.

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Appeared in the December 27, 2022, print edition as 'Kissinger Sees a Global Leadership Vacuum'.

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Senior Fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Senior Advisor, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Phone: 202-573-8647

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com