Quotes of the Day:
"I have what I call an 'iron prescription' that helps me keep sane when I drift toward preferring one intense ideology over another. I feel that I'm not entitled to have an opinion unless I can state the arguments against my position better than the people who are in opposition. I think that I'm qualified to speak only when I've reached that state...
"That is probably too tough for most people, although I hope it won't ever become too tough for me... This business of not drifting into extreme ideology is very, very important in life. If you want to end up wise, heavy ideology is very likely to prevent that outcome."
- Source: Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger
"When a man finds no peace within himself, it is useless to seek it elsewhere."
- Francois de La Rochefoucauld
"Lasting change is a series of compromises. And compromise is all right, as long as your values don't change."
- Jane Goodall
1. Biden Administration Foreign Policy Tracker:October 7, 2021-November 2, 2021
2. Needed: A Military Strategy for China
3. Opinion | When It Comes to China, Don’t Call It a ‘Cold War’
4. Shutting Down Historical Debate, China Makes It a Crime to Mock Heroes
5. Military Grants Few Vaccine Exemptions as Deadlines Loom
6. The Most Dangerous Global Flashpoints
7. Why hundreds of QAnon supporters showed up in Dallas, expecting JFK Jr.'s return
8. Extending that 'Loving Feeling' (Maritime Strategy) by Frank Hoffman
9. SOCOM Head On Global Terrorism: 'I Think It's Spread'
10. From Little Green Men to Little Blue Helmets: Imagining the Future of Russian Aggression—and What to Do About It
11. MWI Podcast: On Resistance
12. US probe of undersea sub collision raises doubts
13. White House creates new national strategy for preventing veteran suicide
14. Biden administration considers adjusting rationale for U.S. nuclear arsenal
15. Nuclear arms hawks give bureaucratic mauling to Biden vow to curb arsenal
16. ‘Nine Eyes’? Bill Would Look at Adding Four Countries to Intel-Sharing Pact
17. U.S. Marines training Taiwan elite troops in Guam
18. Bulls, Bears, and Trolls: Social Media Influence Operations and Financial Market Risk
19. Why the promise of nuclear fusion is no longer a pipe dream
20. The Defense Policy Bill Is Late Again. This Year, the GOP Is Blaming Democrats
21. Yes, It Was An 'Evil Empire'
1. Biden Administration Foreign Policy Tracker:October 7, 2021-November 2, 2021
November 2, 2021 | FDD Tracker: October 7, 2021-November 2, 2021
Biden Administration Foreign Policy Tracker: October
David Adesnik
John Hardie
Trend Overview
Edited by David Adesnik and John Hardie
Welcome back to the Biden Administration Foreign Policy Tracker. Once a month, we ask FDD’s experts and scholars to assess the administration’s foreign policy. They provide trendlines of very positive, positive, neutral, negative, or very negative for the areas they watch. Testifying before the Senate, a top Pentagon official revealed the U.S. intelligence community’s assessment that the Islamic State in Afghanistan may be able to attack the United States in as little as six months, while al-Qaeda could do so within a year or two. On this and other fronts, the era of relentless war did not appear to give way to an era of relentless diplomacy, as President Joe Biden forecast in his first address to the UN General Assembly. Iran took further steps to limit UN inspectors’ oversight of its nuclear program and was likely behind a drone attack on an American base in eastern Syria. North Korea showed off its newest missiles while rebuffing a U.S. offer to negotiate without preconditions. Russia continued to block inquiries regarding its illicit chemical weapons program while escalating its harassment of independent journalists. Chinese leader Xi Jinping rejected an invitation to the UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow, a sign that Beijing plans to withhold cooperation until the United States dials back criticism on human rights and other issues. Regardless, the White House continued to advocate for Taiwanese membership in multilateral organizations. The apparent lesson for Biden is that relentless diplomacy does not elicit cooperation from adversaries when Washington does not build the leverage necessary to put a price on intransigence.
Trending Positive
Trending Neutral
Trending Negative
Trending Very Negative
2. Needed: A Military Strategy for China
Excerpts:
Achieving this would entail the most sweeping reorientation of American force structure and deployment since the end of World War II. But it is the safer strategic choice given the dangers of a longer conflict.
There is no articulated plan for the U.S. to defend our allies while conducting offensive operations against China. We build ships, buy aircraft and tanks, and train solders with no strategy in mind, lumbering forward under institutional inertia, guided by policies 10 to 30 years out of date. In Iraq it took the U.S. military three years to grasp the nature of the conflict, another year to implement a new strategy, and another year for the country to stabilize. We won’t have five years from China’s first missile launch. We may not have five months.
Needed: A Military Strategy for China
The Pentagon, with its outdated policies, may not have the luxury of time when a crisis develops.
Illustration: David Gothard
‘Strategic ambiguity” is the longstanding U.S. policy toward Taiwan, but President Biden’s approach has been more ambiguous than strategic. Asked at an Oct. 21 town hall whether he would defend the island nation against a Chinese attack, Mr. Biden replied, “Yes, we have a commitment to do that.” The White House then “clarified” his answer by reasserting its commitment to ambiguity.
All this begs the question: What should the U.S. do in defense of Taiwan? And it raises a broader one: What should the U.S. do to counter China’s military challenge?
These two inextricable questions are united by U.S. policy makers’ failure to answer either. China’s strategic objective is to monopolize the South and East China seas and use the resulting economic power to reshape the global order. But doing so requires breaking the U.S. Indo-Pacific alliance system, which in turn requires shattering the First Island Chain, which runs through the Japanese archipelago, Luzon in the Philippines, and Borneo, terminating with the Vietnamese coastline. The First Island Chain limits China’s maritime exit points into the Philippine Sea and the Indian Ocean, making control central to Chinese strategy. Taiwan lies at the center of the First Island Chain.
In such a conflict, deterrence and warfare become synonymous in policy. The U.S. has yet to articulate what victory would mean in a war with China. The Biden administration has suggested no desire to overthrow the Chinese Communist Party and replace it with a regime that respects international order. Rather, the objective seems to be to maintain the status quo, which means defending the sovereignty of all Pacific states, the territorial integrity of regional allies including Taiwan, and the freedom of navigation that undergirds the international system. Accomplishing these objectives means convincing China to stand down from its increasing regional aggression or in a war, to sue for peace. Accomplishing that requires identifying what China holds most valuable.
The answer is simple. The Chinese Communist Party desires survival. President Xi Jinping fears that the managed capitalism of his predecessors won’t prevent the emergence of a middle class that challenges the party domestically. He has turned for inspiration to three past Chinese rulers: Mao Zedong ; Qin Shi Huang (247-221 B.C.), the first Chinese emperor; and Gaozu (202-195 B.C.), the first Han emperor.
The most effective way to destroy the Chinese economy is a long-term blockade. A Sino-American confrontation would trigger a global economic depression that would harm Americans and their allies. But democracies’ electoral legitimacy makes them more resilient to such shocks than authoritarian regimes. A war-generated economic downturn in the West would bring high unemployment and tighter household budgets in the U.S. and, at the very least, an energy crisis elsewhere in the world. In China, such a downturn would usher in cascading power failures, production stoppages, soaring unemployment, and likely riots challenging the Communist Party’s legitimacy.
The huge Chinese social-media site Weibo reveals discontent with some government acts. For example, despite being accused of murder, Ou Jinzhong, who died Oct. 18 while awaiting arrest by Chinese police, received widespread public support on Weibo. He had lived in a shack for five years while local officials denied his requests to build a proper home. Similarly, although the Communist Party appears to have the Evergrande default under control, protests in Shenzhen and Hubei broke out when the full extent of the disaster was revealed.
China isn’t on the cusp of revolution. But the party understands that a sustained economic downturn would trigger unrest that could overwhelm its internal security. A blockade carries risks, not least because it is a long-term strategy that the U.S. would conduct over months or years. The People’s Liberation Army may believe that it can destroy enough U.S. combat ships in the first weeks of a war that such a blockade would become unfeasible, or that co-belligerents—likely Iran, Pakistan and Russia—would complicate the blockade enough to reduce its viability. Beijing may—understandably—assess that the U.S. logistics fleet is unlikely to sustain a multimonth conflict, and that Washington lacks the political will to do so.
Or Beijing may miscalculate, encounter its worst-case scenario, and adopt Russia’s mentality to “escalate to terminate”—that is, use nuclear weapons. The general assumption that the U.S. and its allies are better equipped to handle a long war than the Chinese Communist Party, and that the party therefore hopes to avoid a long war, is likely correct.
The alternative to blockade is to “fight forward” or, as Lord Nelson signaled at the Battle of Trafalgar, to “engage the enemy more closely.” That means defending Taiwan and the sovereignty of U.S. allies by denying China its short-term operational objectives. This would require much more naval and amphibious basing in East Asia than the U.S. currently maintains. American aircraft carriers must be equipped with long-range antiship missiles, and U.S. Marines with ground-based antiaircraft and antiship missiles, to disrupt an amphibious assault on Taiwan. The U.S. Navy must deploy more submarines to Guam, Yokosuka, Sasebo and perhaps the Australian cities of Sydney and Perth to exploit the PLA’s undersea vulnerabilities and sink Chinese merchantmen and warships. A Marine expeditionary force or Army airmobile division must be deployed within range of the Taiwan Strait, likely to Southern Japan or Darwin, Australia. Air Force and Marine fighter squadrons must be placed in new bases throughout the First Island Chain, supported by ground-based antiaircraft missile units, to deny the PLA immediate air control.
Achieving this would entail the most sweeping reorientation of American force structure and deployment since the end of World War II. But it is the safer strategic choice given the dangers of a longer conflict.
There is no articulated plan for the U.S. to defend our allies while conducting offensive operations against China. We build ships, buy aircraft and tanks, and train solders with no strategy in mind, lumbering forward under institutional inertia, guided by policies 10 to 30 years out of date. In Iraq it took the U.S. military three years to grasp the nature of the conflict, another year to implement a new strategy, and another year for the country to stabilize. We won’t have five years from China’s first missile launch. We may not have five months.
Mr. Cropsey is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and director of Hudson’s Center for American Seapower. He served as a naval officer and as deputy undersecretary of the Navy.
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3. Opinion | When It Comes to China, Don’t Call It a ‘Cold War’
Excerpts:
At home, the United States must reinforce its technological advantages by increasing support for research and development. On the military board, this means restructuring traditional forces to incorporate new technologies and strengthening the aforementioned alliances.
On the economic board, American withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership left a gaping hole in an important area of trade. And on transnational issues we need to strengthen and develop institutions and international treaties — such as the World Health Organization and the Paris climate accord — to cope with health and climate issues.
Pessimists look at China’s population size and economic growth rates and believe they will prevail. But if we treat our allies as assets, the combined military strength and economic wealth of Western-aligned democracies — the United States, Europe, Japan — will far exceed that of China well into this century.
President Biden is correct that Cold War rhetoric has more negative than positive effects. But he also needs to ensure that his China strategy suits the three-dimensional game.
Opinion | When It Comes to China, Don’t Call It a ‘Cold War’
Guest Essay
When It Comes to China, Don’t Call It a ‘Cold War’
Nov. 2, 2021
Credit...Doug Mills/The New York Times
Mr. Nye, who coined the term “soft power” in 1989, is a professor at Harvard University and a former senior defense official.
A new idea is gaining currency among some politicians and policymakers in Washington: The United States is in a “Cold War” with China. It’s a bad idea — bad on history, bad on politics, bad for our future.
The Biden administration has wisely pushed back on the framing. But the president’s actions suggest that his strategy for dealing with China may indeed suffer from Cold War thinking, which locks our minds into the traditional two-dimensional chess model.
Competition with China, though, is a three-dimensional game. And if we continue to play two-dimensional chess, we will lose.
While neither the conflict with the Soviet Union nor the current competition with China has led to all-out combat, the games are very different. During the Cold War, the Soviet Union was a direct military and ideological threat to the United States. We had almost no economic or social connections: Containment was a feasible objective.
Because the game was based on a simple two-dimensional premise — that the only fight was between their respective militaries — each side depended on the other not to pull the trigger. But with China, the three-dimensional game features a distribution of power at each level — military, economic and social — not just one.
That is why the Cold War metaphor, although convenient, is lazy and potentially dangerous. It obscures and misleads us by underestimating the real challenge we face — and offering ineffective strategies.
On the economic level, the United States and China are deeply interdependent. The United States had more than half a trillion dollars in trade with China in 2020. While some voices in Washington talk about “decoupling,” it would be foolish to think we can separate our economy completely from China without enormous costs. And we should not expect other countries to do so either, since China is reportedly now the largest trading partner of more countries than the United States.
The social fabrics of the United States and China are also deeply intertwined: There are millions of social connections, from students and tourists and others, between the two countries. And it’s physically impossible to decouple ecological issues like pandemics and climate change.
Interdependence is a double-edged sword. It creates networks of sensitivity to what is happening in another country that can encourage caution. But it also creates vulnerabilities that both Beijing and Washington can try to manipulate as tools of influence.
Despite the above factors, a two-dimensional mind-set assumes the United States can take on China largely because of its military superiority. While China is modernizing its forces, the United States is still the only truly global power. (Though it’s unclear how long that will last.) We must carefully plot our horizontal moves — like improving relations with India and reinforcing our alliance with Japan — on the traditional military board of chess to maintain the balance of power in Asia. At the same time, we cannot continue to ignore the different power relations on the economic or transnational boards — and how those levels interact. If we do, we will suffer.
On the economic board, the distribution of power is multipolar, with the United States, China, Europe and Japan the largest players. And on the transnational board, when it comes to issues such as climate change and pandemics, nongovernmental actors play powerful roles and no country is in control.
No country can solve transnational issues like climate change and pandemics alone. And so the politics of ecological interdependence involve power with as well as over others.
The political competition today is also different. The United States and its allies are not threatened by the export of communism in the same way they were in the days of Stalin or Mao. There is less proselytizing; few today take to the streets in favor of “Xi Jinping thought.”
Instead, China manipulates the system of deep economic and political interdependence to support its authoritarian government and to influence opinion in democracies to counter and pre-empt criticism. For evidence of that, we just have to look at China’s economic punishment of our allies Norway and Australia for daring to knock China on human rights. A three-dimensional strategy would recognize and respond to the fact that these actions taken by China create opportunities for us to take supportive steps that will in turn increase our influence. Trade agreements would help, as does the recent agreement to export our nuclear submarine technology to Australia.
For better and worse, we are locked in a “cooperative rivalry” with China that requires a strategy that can accomplish those two contradictory things — compete and cooperate — at the same time.
At home, the United States must reinforce its technological advantages by increasing support for research and development. On the military board, this means restructuring traditional forces to incorporate new technologies and strengthening the aforementioned alliances.
On the economic board, American withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership left a gaping hole in an important area of trade. And on transnational issues we need to strengthen and develop institutions and international treaties — such as the World Health Organization and the Paris climate accord — to cope with health and climate issues.
Pessimists look at China’s population size and economic growth rates and believe they will prevail. But if we treat our allies as assets, the combined military strength and economic wealth of Western-aligned democracies — the United States, Europe, Japan — will far exceed that of China well into this century.
President Biden is correct that Cold War rhetoric has more negative than positive effects. But he also needs to ensure that his China strategy suits the three-dimensional game.
Joseph S. Nye (@Joe_Nye) is a professor at Harvard University and the author, most recently, of “Do Morals Matter? Presidents and Foreign Policy From FDR to Trump.”
4. Shutting Down Historical Debate, China Makes It a Crime to Mock Heroes
Excerpts:
China’s Communist Party has long policed dissent, severely restricting public discussion of topics it deems to be politically incorrect, from Tibet to the Tiananmen Square protests. The new law goes further. It has criminalized as slander topics that were once subjects of historical debate and research, including Mao’s rule itself up to a point. Since March, the law has been used at least 15 times to punish people who slight party history.
The campaign reflects an ambition by Mr. Xi to solidify a moral foundation for the Communist Party’s supremacy, a theme the Chinese leader often evokes in speeches and articles.
The party once could rely on the financial inducements of a booming economy and coercive control of the security state to cement its rule, but now appears to be using political and historical orthodoxy as a foundation, said Adam Ni, a director of the China Policy Center in Australia and editor of China Story.
“There are limits to these tools,” he said of the economy and security state. “They need the moral — the moral legitimacy to maintain their rule.”
A version of the slander law was first adopted in 2018, but an amendment to the country’s criminal code that took effect March 1 allowed prosecutors to seek criminal punishment, including prison sentences of up to three years.
Shutting Down Historical Debate, China Makes It a Crime to Mock Heroes
Under a new law, China has zealously prosecuted even the perceived slander of Communist figures, broadening Xi Jinping’s campaign to dominate party orthodoxy.
A painting showing Mao with Red Army soldiers and officers at the National Art Museum in Beijing during the exhibition “100 Years Toward Greatness” in June.Credit...Gilles Sabrié for The New York Times
By
Nov. 2, 2021
The young woman in Beijing began her post complaining about mobs gathering online, where recluses vent misogynistic insecurities from the safety of desk chairs. As provocative as it was, it might have passed unnoticed except that she added another beat.
She mocked the toxic masculinity of users imagining themselves as Dong Cunrui, a textbook war hero who, according to Chinese Communist Party lore, died valiantly during the civil war that brought the party to power in 1949.
For that passing reference, the woman, 27 and identified in court only by her last name, Xu, was sentenced last month to seven months in prison.
Her crime: violating a newly amended criminal code that punishes the slander of China’s martyrs and heroes. Since it went into effect in March, the statute has been enforced with a revolutionary zeal, part of an intensified campaign under China’s leader, Xi Jinping, to sanctify the Communist Party’s version of history — and his vision for the country’s future.
Was Mao Zedong’s Long March really not so long? Did the Red Army skirt heavy fighting against the Japanese during World War II to save its strength for the civil war against the Nationalist forces of Chiang Kai-shek? Was Mao’s son, Mao Anying, killed by an American airstrike during the Korean War because he lit a stove to make fried rice?
A poster of a film about Dong Cunrui, who was a textbook war hero according to Chinese Communist Party lore, during an exhibition in 2006 in Nanjing, China.
Asking those very questions risks arrest and, now, prosecution. “It is a sign of the establishment of an absolute political totalitarianism,” said Wu Qiang, an outspoken political analyst in Beijing.
China’s Communist Party has long policed dissent, severely restricting public discussion of topics it deems to be politically incorrect, from Tibet to the Tiananmen Square protests. The new law goes further. It has criminalized as slander topics that were once subjects of historical debate and research, including Mao’s rule itself up to a point. Since March, the law has been used at least 15 times to punish people who slight party history.
The campaign reflects an ambition by Mr. Xi to solidify a moral foundation for the Communist Party’s supremacy, a theme the Chinese leader often evokes in speeches and articles.
The party once could rely on the financial inducements of a booming economy and coercive control of the security state to cement its rule, but now appears to be using political and historical orthodoxy as a foundation, said Adam Ni, a director of the China Policy Center in Australia and editor of China Story.
“There are limits to these tools,” he said of the economy and security state. “They need the moral — the moral legitimacy to maintain their rule.”
A version of the slander law was first adopted in 2018, but an amendment to the country’s criminal code that took effect March 1 allowed prosecutors to seek criminal punishment, including prison sentences of up to three years.
China’s top leader, Xi Jinping, center forefront, at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing last month. The new law reflects Mr. Xi’s efforts to solidify a moral foundation for the Communist Party’s supremacy.Credit...Carlos Garcia Rawlins/Reuters
At least three people were detained in May for derisive comments following the death of Yuan Longping, a scientist who developed high-yield hybrid strains of rice.
Last month, the authorities arrested a man in Nanchang after he posted an irreverent comment about the legend surrounding the death of Mao’s son in 1950. “That fried rice was the best thing to come out of the whole Korean War,” he wrote.
Officials have defended the law as a necessary tool to fight what one director with the Cyberspace Administration of China, Wen Youhua, called “historical nihilism,” which officials often use to describe deviant views.
“These people may be trying to gain clicks or eyeballs, but these behaviors obviously touch moral and legal bottom lines,” Li Liang, a law professor in Beijing told The People’s Daily in April.
The Memorial Hall in Nanjing, China, for victims of Japan’s massacre there in the 1930s. A 19-year-old man who was accused of disparaging those victims was among the first to be charged under China’s new slander law.Credit...Rolex Dela Pena/European Pressphoto Agency
Mr. Xi, preparing for what is likely to be a third term as Communist Party leader beginning next year, will use a gathering of the party elite in Beijing next week to adopt a new resolution on the party’s history — an official summation of the past and its lessons. Among Chinese leaders, only Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping have enacted such decisions, underscoring the ambition of Mr. Xi’s campaign.
“We need to educate and guide the whole party to vigorously carry forward the red tradition,” Mr. Xi said earlier this year.
The tougher slander law took effect shortly after the disclosure by the government in February that four Chinese soldiers had died during a clash with Indian troops along the disputed border in June 2020. Within days, at least seven people were charged for questioning the official version of the death toll, which was reportedly much higher.
They included Qiu Ziming, a prominent blogger with 2.5 million followers on Weibo, the country’s Twitter-like social media platform.
Although he and the others were arrested under a longstanding article in the criminal code called “picking quarrels and provoking troubles,” Mr. Qiu, 38, was prosecuted under the new law, even though the changes went into effect 10 days after he made his comments.
In May, after being shown confessing on state television, he was sentenced to eight months in prison.
The campaign has inspired vigilantism, with internet users calling out potential violations.
The Jiangsu branch of China Unicom, a state-owned telecommunications company, came under investigation after a public uproar started when its Weibo account posted a recipe for fried rice on what was Mao Anying’s birthday. It is not clear whether the company faces criminal charges, but its account was suspended.
A poster advertising “The Battle at Lake Changjin,” a new and wildly popular patriotic film that mythologizes a major Chinese military intervention in the Korean War that was once questioned by senior Communist Party leaders.Credit...Aly Song/Reuters
Some of the cases involved historical events that historians in China have previously debated and studied, at least until now.
Last month, a former journalist, Luo Changping, was detained in Hainan after he wrote a blog questioning the rationale for China’s intervention in the Korean War — and the catastrophic cost for those “volunteers” sent to fight and die in it.
He was responding to a new movie blockbuster that depicts a major Chinese attack known as “The Battle at Lake Changjin.”
The movie, which runs 2 hours and 56 minutes, brims with maudlin patriotism for the selfless sacrifice of soldiers who defeated the American-led forces.
“Half a century later, few Chinese people have reflected on the justifiability of the war,” Mr. Luo wrote on Weibo, before referring specifically to a doomed Chinese military unit “that did not doubt the ‘wise decision’ of the top.”
Made with government backing and heavily promoted in state media, it has become the second-highest grossing film in the country’s history, earning the equivalent of $855 million in the month it has been showing, according to Maoyan, the ticketing service.
When the film opened, Mr. Ni, the researcher, noted on Twitter that the battle it depicts had not previously been a focus of the Communist Party’s propaganda before because it had been seen as a costly strategic blunder, not the resounding victory portrayed on the screen. Now it has become part of a new and unassailable version of history.
John Delury, a professor of Chinese studies at Yonsei University in Seoul and author of a forthcoming book about the war, said that even within the limits of political censorship, Chinese scholars have done “a lot of great work” on the war and other historical events since the founding of the People’s Republic of China.
With the shifting political climate, that may no longer be safe.
“With this, obviously, everyone is going to have to stop what they’re doing,” he said.
Claire Fu and Joy Dong contributed research.
5. Military Grants Few Vaccine Exemptions as Deadlines Loom
Excerpts:
There is a “common understanding that we often work in congregate settings such as shipboard environments and it is understood that in these settings, infectious diseases can spread very rapidly,” said Capt. Robert Hawkins, who leads the Navy Medicine’s Commander’s Action Group. “Immunizations have played a large role in readiness to conduct our mission for a long time, so we have had an understanding of their role in protecting our health and mission.”
In the Marines and the Army, about 93 percent of all active-duty troops have been at least partially vaccinated. Each service branch set its own deadlines and complex disciplinary procedures for those who decline shots, including extensive counseling sessions with clergy and commanders.
Still, only a doctor can give a medical exemption. “It’s a lawful order,” Mr. Kirby said of the vaccine mandate, and commanders have the right to “ultimately do what they need to do for the readiness of their unit, and if that comes to doing something of a punitive nature, they certainly have that right and that authority.”
On a military subgroup on the social news and message board site Reddit, people swapped advice on how to talk to those who were resisting a vaccine, from offering scientific evidence to refuting claims that vaccines stem from aborted fetal cells to noting that troops take far more dangerous risks in combat. Stressing health and safety and readiness is always better than threatening expulsion, commanders say.
The private sector is clearly watching. Many companies, including United Airlines, Procter & Gamble, 3M and IBM, already have mandates, and several have indicated they will allow for “limited” medical or religious exceptions. Almost a dozen states have joined a lawsuit to prevent federal mandates from going forward.
Military Grants Few Vaccine Exemptions as Deadlines Loom
The majority of active-duty troops have gotten a mandatory coronavirus vaccine ahead of deadline, with religious-based exemptions largely dismissed.
About 87 percent of active-duty service members have been fully vaccinated.
Nov. 2, 2021
WASHINGTON — Two months after the Pentagon began requiring all troops to get the coronavirus vaccine or face dismissal, the vast majority have now had shots, in part because none received a religious exemption, military officials said.
While vaccine exemptions are often broadly worded, requests based on religious beliefs are coming under close scrutiny in the military and at the Department of Veterans Affairs, the first federal agency to impose a mandate. They will likely be followed by the rest of the federal government, where most workers are required to be vaccinated by the end of this month. The Biden administration will release a federal vaccine requirement for private companies with 100 or more employees “in coming days,” a representative for the Department of Labor said this week.
The widespread federal and private sector mandates pose a test for the country, and the military and Veterans Affairs are being closely watched by companies and legal experts. Across the country, there are at least 40 legal challenges to vaccine and testing mandates issued by cities, hospitals, universities and other employers that have yet to move forward, while others have been knocked back.
A federal appellate court removed a temporary injunction last week that had allowed health care workers in New York to seek religious exemptions to the state’s mandate.
The Defense Department has granted a smattering of exemptions, including to people who were already leaving the military or have medical issues. However, some of those exemptions, like for people who recently had the coronavirus, may soon be reversed. Officials declined to say how many service members had requested an exemption but said the number was not large.
“I don’t see the courts interfering with the vaccines in any other context than possibly religious exemptions,” said Dorit Rubinstein Reiss, a law professor and expert on vaccine mandates at the University of California, San Francisco. “But I don’t know if courts will be willing to second-guess the military.”
The leaders of most major religious organizations have recommended that their members get the vaccine. Officials say that no one is actively discouraging people in the military from seeking a religious exemption. But anyone seeking one from the Pentagon or Department of Veterans Affairs would be required to have an established history of adherence to a religion that prohibits vaccines, among other things.
“If members of the military want to apply for one, then they should be able to,” said John Kirby, a spokesman for the Pentagon. “And they should be able to make their case.”
About 97 percent of the country’s 1.3 million active-duty service members have had at least one dose of the vaccine, and roughly 87 percent have had both shots. The Air Force, which this week became the first division to hit the deadline for its mandate for full vaccination, will release its latest vaccine data on Wednesday. About 11,000 of its 326,855 active-duty personnel are likely still unvaccinated and facing possible expulsion.
Army veteran William Craig waits after receiving a COVID-19 booster vaccine at the Edward Hines Jr. VA Hospital in Illinois in September. The Department of Veterans Affairs was the first federal agency to impose a vaccine mandate.
At the Department of Veterans Affairs, where thousands of workers who interact with patients were supposed to be fully vaccinated by Oct. 8, officials have taken a dim view of such exemptions. Since the department issued a vaccine mandate for its 115,000 frontline health care workers this past summer, about 88 percent of the 380,000 employees covered by the mandate have had at least one dose, falling short of officials’ hopes for nearly full vaccination.
In hospitals or nursing homes with particularly vulnerable populations, “I think that there will be a point there where it is an undue burden on us to ensure safety in the provision of health care,” said Denis McDonough, the secretary of the department, “at which point we’re going to have to deny religious exceptions.”
Vaccine reluctance in the military and the Department of Veterans Affairs mirrors that of civilian society, where vaccine rates are largely lower without such mandates. Some people have embraced vaccine conspiracy theories or have been fearful of possible side effects, or do not see themselves at risk for the virus.
What to Know About Covid-19 Booster Shots
The F.D.A. has authorized booster shots for millions of recipients of the Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines. Pfizer and Moderna recipients who are eligible for a booster include people 65 and older, and younger adults at high risk of severe Covid-19 because of medical conditions or where they work. Eligible Pfizer and Moderna recipients can get a booster at least six months after their second dose. All Johnson & Johnson recipients will be eligible for a second shot at least two months after the first.
Yes. The F.D.A. has updated its authorizations to allow medical providers to boost people with a different vaccine than the one they initially received, a strategy known as “mix and match.” Whether you received Moderna, Johnson & Johnson or Pfizer-BioNTech, you may receive a booster of any other vaccine. Regulators have not recommended any one vaccine over another as a booster. They have also remained silent on whether it is preferable to stick with the same vaccine when possible.
The C.D.C. has said the conditions that qualify a person for a booster shot include: hypertension and heart disease; diabetes or obesity; cancer or blood disorders; weakened immune system; chronic lung, kidney or liver disease; dementia and certain disabilities. Pregnant women and current and former smokers are also eligible.
The F.D.A. authorized boosters for workers whose jobs put them at high risk of exposure to potentially infectious people. The C.D.C. says that group includes: emergency medical workers; education workers; food and agriculture workers; manufacturing workers; corrections workers; U.S. Postal Service workers; public transit workers; grocery store workers.
Yes. The C.D.C. says the Covid vaccine may be administered without regard to the timing of other vaccines, and many pharmacy sites are allowing people to schedule a flu shot at the same time as a booster dose.
Over the summer, as the Delta variant surged, military officials became alarmed at the growing number of deaths; more active duty members died from the virus in the fall than in all of 2020, and none of them were vaccinated. In total, 71 service members have died. The Navy has led the charge with vaccinations, and roughly 99 percent in the service have had at least one shot ahead of the deadline to be fully vaccinated by the end of the month. Sailors were made acutely aware of the dangers of the virus early in the pandemic when an outbreak occurred on an aircraft carrier deployed to the Pacific Ocean. The captain, who pleaded with the Pentagon for help, was later fired.
There is a “common understanding that we often work in congregate settings such as shipboard environments and it is understood that in these settings, infectious diseases can spread very rapidly,” said Capt. Robert Hawkins, who leads the Navy Medicine’s Commander’s Action Group. “Immunizations have played a large role in readiness to conduct our mission for a long time, so we have had an understanding of their role in protecting our health and mission.”
In the Marines and the Army, about 93 percent of all active-duty troops have been at least partially vaccinated. Each service branch set its own deadlines and complex disciplinary procedures for those who decline shots, including extensive counseling sessions with clergy and commanders.
Still, only a doctor can give a medical exemption. “It’s a lawful order,” Mr. Kirby said of the vaccine mandate, and commanders have the right to “ultimately do what they need to do for the readiness of their unit, and if that comes to doing something of a punitive nature, they certainly have that right and that authority.”
On a military subgroup on the social news and message board site Reddit, people swapped advice on how to talk to those who were resisting a vaccine, from offering scientific evidence to refuting claims that vaccines stem from aborted fetal cells to noting that troops take far more dangerous risks in combat. Stressing health and safety and readiness is always better than threatening expulsion, commanders say.
The private sector is clearly watching. Many companies, including United Airlines, Procter & Gamble, 3M and IBM, already have mandates, and several have indicated they will allow for “limited” medical or religious exceptions. Almost a dozen states have joined a lawsuit to prevent federal mandates from going forward.
6. The Most Dangerous Global Flashpoints
We need more young voices weighing and expressing their opinions and insights.
One key point:
The implications are far-reaching. My own generation is the future of the American political system, and if we are apathetic about America’s status in the world, eventually we are bound to cede the nation’s supremacy. By the time we start caring about our role in the world and the ideals that American democracy seeks to preserve abroad—liberty, equality, free enterprise, human rights—it will be too late. It’s time we stop taking our primacy for granted.
— Cameron Blanchard, University of Notre Dame, political science and psychology
The Most Dangerous Global Flashpoints
From the South China Sea to Iran, students discuss the world and America’s role in it.
WSJ · by Nov. 2, 2021 7:04 pm ET
Taiwan is America’s most dangerous flashpoint. China’s rise and America’s relative decline, when joined with recent polls suggesting that Americans support defending Taiwan against Chinese aggression, increase the odds of a clash in the South China Sea.
America’s post-World War II position was never guaranteed to last. The U.S. military remains the most effective deterrent against Chinese aggression in the South China Sea, but U.S. diplomacy has lost its edge. China may take advantage of these realities.
Defending Taiwan is a noble cause and one that policy makers must consider honestly and seriously. But it would be foolish to rely on a strong military or to be lulled to sleep by public opinion. America must balance diplomacy with clear markers for when military intervention in the South China Sea becomes inevitable.
— Clark Irvine, Harvard University, international and global affairs
Iran’s Nuclear Weapons
The most dangerous flashpoint for American foreign policy in the coming year is the Islamic Republic of Iran. Since the Trump administration’s decision to leave the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action in May 2018, Iran has rapidly accelerated its pursuit of nuclear weapons. Instead of nuclear centrifuges sitting idle with electronic seals and routine international inspections, Iran’s nuclear facilities are being used to increase the nation’s supply of highly enriched uranium, quickly diminishing the breakout time necessary to create a weapon.
The stakes could not be higher than having to negotiate with the world’s leading state sponsor of terror, armed with a nuclear weapon capable of threatening Israel. The Biden administration would have to acquiesce to a nuclear-armed Iran, which is an untenable position and could have a severe impact on every future administration’s foreign-policy priorities in the Middle East. Despite Iran’s antagonism to the U.S. since the Islamic revolution of 1979, the Obama administration achieved the Iran nuclear deal. Unfortunately, Iran now has a decreased incentive to work with America after the abandonment of the deal and the assassination of Gen. Qasem Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force.
Hard-line President Ebrahim Raisi seems open to continuing talks but has made no concrete steps to reach a deal since taking office this August. The next year will be crucial to establishing the future of geopolitics in the region and beyond.
— Nicholas Martin, Quinnipiac University, journalism
The Test of Free Markets
The most dangerous flashpoint is not a flashpoint. It’s a slow burn, caused by economic globalization and enduring engagement with China by American business elites.
By ignoring the malign activities of the Chinese Communist Party and accepting its coercive influence, Wall Street, Silicon Valley and other bastions of American economic power are undermining the free-market system, which is the source of their success. Operating under the rubric of engagement has allowed firms to ride China’s economic boom.
China’s rise has led to marked changes in Beijing’s behavior, however, and with it a new geopolitical reality. Beijing’s stated goal is to realize “the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation” and a return to the geopolitical centrality of the Middle Kingdom. In part, this means revising or replacing the extant international order that renders the world safe for capitalism. By prioritizing profits over principles, American firms have paradoxically abetted China’s authoritarian mistrust of free markets.
More Americans than ever hold a negative view of China. In Washington—where there is precious little bipartisanship—there is a growing consensus about China. In the coming year, American firms face strong political headwinds if they want to continue doing business with Beijing. If they continue ignoring geopolitical reality, we may hear less talk of tariffs and trade deals, and more of the Trading with the Enemy Act.
—Austin Dahmer, Georgetown University, security studies
American Disinterest
The most dangerous problem facing U.S. foreign policy is young Americans’ apathy toward America’s standing in the world. A Pew Research Center poll shows that almost half of young adults would be content if China or another rival surpassed U.S. military power.
American indifference toward global engagement should not come as a shock. From the Founding, American isolationism has dominated Americans’ perceptions. This concept ingrained a tendency in our democracy to be detached from the outside world and focused inwardly.
It is alarming, however, that young adults are becoming less concerned with American primacy. This trend, coupled with China’s military growth, ensures that future public opinion will discourage America’s leaders from focusing on threats to U.S. supremacy in the global arena.
The implications are far-reaching. My own generation is the future of the American political system, and if we are apathetic about America’s status in the world, eventually we are bound to cede the nation’s supremacy. By the time we start caring about our role in the world and the ideals that American democracy seeks to preserve abroad—liberty, equality, free enterprise, human rights—it will be too late. It’s time we stop taking our primacy for granted.
— Cameron Blanchard, University of Notre Dame, political science and psychology
The Battle Over Taiwan
Saying that Taiwan is the biggest flashpoint for U.S. foreign policy feels like stating the obvious. The old game of expansionism and conquest is again afoot, and the ball is in the possession of Russia and China.
It only seems logical that Taiwan would be the first flashpoint. It is to Xi Jinping’s China what the Rhineland was to Hitler’s Third Reich and what Georgia was to Vladimir Putin’s Russia. In each case, the ruler’s claim to it is based on an old empire’s borders, and it sits conveniently in his backyard.
Taiwan also provides a meaningful benchmark for the Chinese military. The island has been provided with significant defensive training and technology by the U.S. and other allies. A victory over Taiwan would make a powerful statement about the capabilities of the Chinese military.
Conflict in Taiwan seems all but inevitable as part of the rebuilding of the Chinese identity. The West should prepare accordingly.
— Andrew MacGillivray, University of Kansas, computer science
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WSJ · by Nov. 2, 2021 7:04 pm ET
7. Why hundreds of QAnon supporters showed up in Dallas, expecting JFK Jr.'s return
I have no words.
Why hundreds of QAnon supporters showed up in Dallas, expecting JFK Jr.'s return
In rainy Dallas with temperatures dipping into the low 60s, hundreds huddled with umbrellas, flags and signs to wait for history to be made on Tuesday. Some even brought folding chairs.
At the site overlooking where President John F. Kennedy was assassinated nearly six decades ago, scores of QAnon believers outfitted with “Trump-Kennedy 2024” shirts, flags and other merchandise gathered. They forecast the president’s son John F. Kennedy Jr., who has been dead for 20 years, would appear at that spot, emerging from anonymity to become Donald Trump’s vice president when the former president is reinstated. The prophecy foretold online, of course, did not come true.
The spectacle captivated people, some amused at the ridiculousness of the far-fetched theory that Kennedy faked his death. But the size of Tuesday’s gathering was concerning for Jared Holt, a resident fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab who researches domestic extremism. The claim about Kennedy Jr. is considered fringe even for supporters of QAnon, a collective of baseless conspiracy theories revolving around an idea that Trump is battling a Satan-worshiping cabal who traffics children for sex.
Holt, who monitors online communities like QAnon, saw the Kennedy Jr. theory appear on a handful of Telegram channels trafficking in numerology, when people ascribe different kinds of significance to dates and numbers. However, the theory is written off, even by Q, the movement’s mysterious prophet.
“It surprised me that as many people showed up as they did for something as specific and outlandish as they did,” Holt said. “It was not like this claim is everywhere. This was like a pocket of QAnon.”
Yet the devotion of the QAnon followers, some showing up the night prior at the AT&T Discovery Plaza, has dangerous implications, Holt said. QAnon believers, along with extremist group members and white supremacists, participated in the failed insurrection at the Capitol on Jan. 6, coordinating the deadly event via the movement’s online message boards.
“For people to be in the state of mind where they are utterly and hopelessly detached from reality opens up very dangerous possibilities for what that individual may do going forward,” Holt said.
“Even though this event is ripe for mockery, and I think people should allow themselves to laugh, I think we need to reconcile with the fact that hundreds of people turn out for a celebrity who has been dead for two decades," he said.
“What drove them out to the streets is a kind of a representation of a broader sickness,” he added.
Kennedy Jr. died after crashing his six-seater plane in the Atlantic off Martha’s Vineyard in 1999. Kennedy’s wife, Carolyn Bessette, and sister-in-law, Lauren Bessette, also died in the crash. But several theories suggest Kennedy did not die and is either inconspicuously living under a pseudonym or as a financial services manager from Pittsburgh. Some claim he is Q.
Believers speculated Trump would return to the White House based on an unfounded belief that no president was legitimate after 1871 centered around a misreading of the law. When Kennedy Jr. emerged, Trump would be reinstated and make the Democrat his successor when he stepped down, according to one Telegram post.
“We’re expecting a parade,” an attendee from Nebraska named Ginny told the Rolling Stone. “JFK is going to be here.”
Attendees like Ginny claimed to see dead celebrities, including Robin Williams and Michael Jackson.
Those attracted to these fringe theories incubated by the QAnon movement have certain personality characteristics, such as having malevolent qualities or leaning toward anti-establishment beliefs, said Joseph Uscinski, a political scientist and conspiracy theory expert at the University of Miami.
Uscinski reviewed polling and found QAnon support is founded in anti-social personality traits and behaviors, like narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy.
Although vocal, QAnon’s following remains small and stable, Uscinski said, adding that surveys show 5 to 7 percent of respondents are predisposed to the kind of theory.
Uscinski warned the size of the gathering in Dallas does not mean that people have become more conspiratorial. But the QAnon movement’s “choose-your-own-adventure” quality, in which people can ascribe to different outlandish theories and extrapolate meanings from someone posting anonymously on the Internet, lends itself to a certain type of person.
“These are small numbers of people with a fringe belief and there’s nothing new or apocalyptic about it,” Uscinski said. “I would prefer they don’t have these beliefs, but lots of people happen to believe lots of weird things.”
Read more here:
8. Extending that 'Loving Feeling' (Maritime Strategy) by Frank Hoffman
Conclusion:
The maritime “Mavericks” of the 21st century will need to up their game if they want to both stay ahead and send a strategic signal to China. An Indo-Pacific Center of Excellence for Undersea Warfare would make a smart investment towards those two goals and could be created in the short term. NATO has a number of centers of excellence to assist in doctrine development, identify lessons learned, test concepts and conduct experiments, and improve interoperability and capabilities. This could be a model for the Indo-Pac regional community as well. This program would extend the extant professionalism and competitive edge of the U.S. Navy to a wider array of partners in the Pacific. Instead of the Maverick’s “need for speed,” the need for silent stealth awaits.
Extending that 'Loving Feeling' - War on the Rocks
The Hollywood blockbuster “Top Gun” starring Tom Cruise was a potent recruiting advertisement for aviators. One of its most memorable scenes was of a chorus of pilots at the bar of an Officer’s Club singing “You’ve Lost that Loving Feeling” to a bemused Kelly McGillis. Back during the Vietnam War, the U.S. Navy activated a training school, the Fighter Weapons School, to regain the lost art of air-to-air combat and to ensure that its pilots remained among the elites of their profession. In the movie, the cocky egos of the student pilots stand out as they prepare for war in a demanding training program that honed their combat skills in a competitive setting. Known more commonly as the “Top Gun” course, it is considered a singular success in upping the performance of naval aviation. It is time to extend that “loving feeling” to submarine warfare — including, and perhaps especially, to the submarine forces of U.S. allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific region.
Why Undersea Warfare
To succeed in the Pacific, the United States should expand on the initial move and establish a maritime center of excellence for undersea warfare where U.S. submariners can train in advanced undersea tactics alongside submariners from allies and partners. Submarine warfare is an area of naval competition where the United States presently holds an edge and where it should devote considerable effort to retain its comparative advantage. It is also an area that is capital intensive and where quality professional education and training can pay off.
This point is made by Bruce Jones from the Brookings Institution in his book To Rule the Waves. There he says, “America’s enduring advantage in undersea warfare will become increasingly important in the regional balance of power.” That enduring advantage, however, is perilous without sustained development and operating funding. Washington think tanks have stressed the special challenges posed by Russian submarine competition in Northern Europe but the United States and its allies should now also consider China’s undersea programs. Since the centenary military parade in 2019, U.S. naval analysts have noted the People Liberation Army’s increased capacity for undersea situational awareness and its interest in challenging the dominance of U.S. submarines.
China has now gained a quantitative advantage. As of May 2018, the U.S. Navy consisted of 283 battle-force ships, including 211 surface ships, and 56 attack submarines. Roughly 26 to 30 of these submarines will be allocated to the Indo-Pacific region. As of 2018, the People’s Liberation Army Navy already deployed 66 submarines, albeit of lesser capability. According to a Naval War College estimate, by 2030 China’s naval battle force will consist of roughly 550 ships, including 450 surface ships and as many as 99 submarines.
Back in 2015, a RAND Corporation study suggested that the effectiveness of the Chinese navy’s submarine fleet has risen by “roughly an order of magnitude” since 1996. Undoubtedly, Chinese admirals continue to improve the fleet’s relative capabilities. As noted by the Pentagon’s 2020 China Military Power Report, China will likely build the Type 093B guided-missile nuclear attack submarine in the middle of this decade. This Shang-class sub will measurably improve China’s capability for anti-surface warfare. Chinese submarines may be quieter than the past and could present a credible threat to U.S. and ally ships in a conflict over Taiwan or the South China Sea. The People’s Liberation Army Navy is also improving its anti-submarine warfare skills, but China still lacks comprehensive anti-submarine warfare capability.
As noted by Rep. Elaine Luria in her War on the Rocks contribution, the U.S. Navy needs to be able to impose costs by targeting critical infrastructure and closing maritime chokepoints to strangle the Chinese economy. The problem is exacerbated by an underfunded U.S. Navy ship construction budget, which in Fiscal Year 2022 funds just four warships (including two submarines) and four support ships. This falls short of the robust submarine force defined by defense analysts offering alternative fleet designs for the U.S. Navy. Naval analyst Bryan Clark argues persuasively that the U.S. Navy needs at least 60 attack boats, plus 40 more unmanned undersea systems in its fleet design. However, it is unlikely to be able to afford them. Hence, increasing the size and professionalism of the evolving Indo-Pac coalition for a free and open Indo-Pacific region is also needed.
At present, the Indian Navy has 17 submarines, but a block of them are past their 25-year service life. When those are retired, a fleet of just 12 submarines will be operational to protect India’s coasts and interests. Japan has now launched its second Taigei-class submarine, a diesel-electric goat, which will complete the planned expansion of the country’s submarine fleet to 22 boats when it enters service. When teamed with Australia’s small force of six Collins-class boats and the U.S. Pacific Fleet, the total submarine force of Quad (the United States, Japan, Australia, and India) and AUKUS partners (the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia) should be able to contribute towards balancing against China’s expanding fleet.
Strategic Foundation
This is the background to the recent trilateral defense pact, referred to as AUKUS, which will provide the nuclear technology and wherewithal for Canberra to field nuclear-powered submarines.
The AUKUS pact should not have been a surprise, as it was consistent with published strategic objectives from Washington. The 2018 National Defense Strategy stressed the importance of strengthening the U.S. alliance system and gaining greater collaboration and interoperability. The new AUKUS partnership reflects that strategic effort and could be expanded to include more regional allies and partners. Moreover, the new pact operationalizes a key imperative of the U.S. tri-service maritime strategy, to “expand collaboration and interoperability with allies and partners, and reinforce favorable balances of maritime power.” It is anticipated that this initiative would satisfy U.S. Indo-Pacific Command’s call for greater interoperability and building partner capacity.
Completely overlooked in this discussion is the value added provided by the United Kingdom’s role. The United Kingdom is now putting more than words behind its global ambitions and underwriting its “tilt” to the Indo-Pacific. As expressed in its 2021 defense command paper, the United Kingdom aims to achieve “a more proactive, persistent presence” in the region. So in addition to the initial deployment of HMS Queen Elizabeth, London intends to deploy offshore patrol vessels to the region starting this year and a Littoral Response Group hopefully in 2023. “Global Britain” is more than a slogan at this point and the new pact underscores this.
As Ashley Townsend has noted, the initiative is also consistent with Australia’s 2020 defense strategy. Canberra’s 2020 Defense Strategic Update concluded that Australia needed to “take greater responsibility for [its] own security” by growing a “self-reliant ability to deliver deterrence effects” and “enhance the lethality of the ADF [Australian Defence Force] for … high-intensity operations” to position it to “support the United States and other partners” if deterrence fails. Former Australian Prime Minister Malcom Turnbull is undoubtedly right that “trust is at the heart of Australia’s influence,” but trust is not at the center of its capacity to deter aggression against a large-scale adversary. Credible combat power is.
Yet the deal to develop and operate nuclear submarines poses challenges for Australia. The conventionally powered boats that France was building would have been built and delivered well ahead of the likely delivery of nuclear submarines, as Turnbull noted. In the near term, they would have been manned, deployed, and more easily maintained. Operationally, they would excel in quiet operations in shallow waters, ideal for defensive operations in Australia’s near abroad. Strategically, however, they would give little cause for pause against aggressors in the Indo-Pacific. The sophistication, endurance, and range of submarines produced in the AUKUS deal are another matter entirely, signaling a serious shift in thinking about the naval balance of power. Naval analyst Sidarth Kaushal from the Royal United Services Institute appropriately notes that Australian attack boats would be ideal for interdicting maritime choke points and menacing high-value surface targets from outside the first island chain.
Thus, Australia’s decision to go big and long appears to be a smart military move with some serious geostrategic advantages. The merits of the deal are strategic and long-range for all participants. But it is not enough to buy technology. It has to be harnessed to a strategy and be operationalized with qualified crews and daring leaders who have mastered their profession.
“Top Tubes” Program
That is where the Top Tubes program fits — though it has a unique program design dissimilar to the Top Gun program — most particularly because it would focus heavily on training allies and partners rather than just developing U.S. capabilities. It should include schools and a state-of-the-art combat simulation system to drill and devise new tactics and operating procedures. It would also have an instrumented undersea training area to facilitate learning from training and exercises. This complex could be like the air and ground maneuver spaces at the U.S. Army’s National Training Center or Top Gun at the Naval Aviation Warfighting Development Center at Naval Air Station, Fallon. The two-week unit rotations at the National Training Center is too short a period to provide rigorous training and meaningful assessment. To optimize the value of this program, which is not going to be cheap, a modular program design of at least four weeks is probably needed. The modules could include classroom and simulation time, as well as blocks for offensive and defensive tactics with the adversary force or simulated aggressor boats. The center would tailor the program content depending upon the needs of the attending country. Courses for operating with and against unmanned undersea vehicles could also be additive modules. The center of excellence could also be a site for the collaborative development of and training for autonomous systems capabilities for undersea warfare, as suggested by Bryan Clark at the Hudson Institute. The principal goal of the center would be to strengthen the capabilities and interoperability of the regional navies in one of the toughest and most complex competitions at sea.
Potential participants in this program could include India, Japan, Australia, and the United Kingdom. Certainly, as a critical but overlooked Indo-Pacific power, France would be invited. Other regional navies could also be invited, including Singapore, Taiwan, or Malaysia. Consideration could be given to inviting Vietnam to send students, or even contract with the Vietnamese navy to provide the opposition force with their Russian-built Kilo-class attack boats. An alternative option might include buying boats from the French to both serve as a dedicated adversary force and assuage Paris’ regional and industrial base concerns.
Ideally, the program could be situated in the region, and the Philippines might be a central location for basing, training facilities, maintenance, and support. The likelihood of the Duterte government being amenable to this initiative is low. However, the president’s influence may be waning at the end of the single six-year term allowed by the Philippine constitution and Duterte recently announced his retirement. But if not feasible there, perhaps Perth could be an alternative site.
One potential hurdle to the full exploitation of this initiative is the security/classification challenges that shroud undersea warfare. The submarine force is not called the “silent service” solely for its quiet domain. Some potential participants may not have had access to the U.S. Navy’s most technological systems. However, most of the proposed participants are capable of being granted access and the major players are now sharing closely guarded nuclear technology. A two-tier program may be needed for security purposes, however, it is anticipated that the doctrine, tactics, techniques, and procedures taught in this program could be collaboratively shared with allies and partners. This may pose some risk, but the operational risk is greater for an outnumbered U.S. submarine force that has not appreciably shared its best practices, gained substantial interoperability with combat partners, or benefited from the creative contributions of other regional undersea powers.
The maritime “Mavericks” of the 21st century will need to up their game if they want to both stay ahead and send a strategic signal to China. An Indo-Pacific Center of Excellence for Undersea Warfare would make a smart investment towards those two goals and could be created in the short term. NATO has a number of centers of excellence to assist in doctrine development, identify lessons learned, test concepts and conduct experiments, and improve interoperability and capabilities. This could be a model for the Indo-Pac regional community as well. This program would extend the extant professionalism and competitive edge of the U.S. Navy to a wider array of partners in the Pacific. Instead of the Maverick’s “need for speed,” the need for silent stealth awaits.
Frank Hoffman is a contributing editor at War on the Rocks and works at the Institute for National Strategic Studies, National Defense University. This article reflects his own views and not necessarily those of the U.S. government or Defense Department.
9. SOCOM Head On Global Terrorism: 'I Think It's Spread'
US Special Forces does not just train other special forces. Most indigenous forces are not special forces. We must also ensure we have sufficient alignment of interests with indigenous forces. While we do not conduct training of indeigenous forces just for US requirements we have to have sufficient alignment of interests so that our support provides assistance to indigenous forces to contribute to supporting both their and our interests.
Excerpts:
A common criticism lobbed at Pentagon leaders over the last two months revolve around how the US spent $83 billion since 2002 on training and equipping the Afghan military, only for those forces to rapidly collapse. Given SOCOM’s hand in training special forces units, that’s one area Clark expects to find lessons learned.
“We don’t necessarily need to train with partner forces for what we want them to do,” Clarke said. “We need to train for partner forces of what they need to do for their country and their environment. I think that’s the biggest lesson that we have to take from this, writ large.”
For example, Clarke said that when training special forces in Europe and the Indo-Pacific, the focus is on counter-aggression against a great power. In Africa, partner forces are more likely fighting terrorism and using direct action raids to fight, Clarke said.
“That’s where it’s really important to go what specifically they need,” he noted.
SOCOM Head On Global Terrorism: 'I Think It's Spread' - Breaking Defense
"I don't see a direct threat to the homeland today, but I think it's something that we have to be aware of," Gen. Richard Clarke said.
A U.S. Special Forces Soldier in Afghanistan in a 2016 photo. (US Army/Connor Mendez)
WASHINGTON: The commander of US special operations forces believes that the global terrorist threat has “metastasized” and counterterrorism operations remain a requirement for his forces, even as the Defense Department shifts its focus to the Pacific.
“The threat — I think a good description is metastasized,” Army Gen. Richard Clarke told the Oct. 29 Military Reporters and Editors Association conference. “It’s gone into areas of Africa, where they could seek sanctuary and where there may be some areas of sanctuary that we have to look at. And when I say it is not diminished, I think it’s spread.”
Clarke’s comments come just a few months after the United States’ frantic withdrawal from Afghanistan, ending nearly two decades of war against the Taliban and resulting in the Taliban’s takeover of the country. As the US military pivots to focus on the threats posed by China and Russia, SOCOM’s need to undertake counterterrorism operations “is still a requirement,” Clarke said.
“What we have to be focused on, and I think it’s really important is, what are those specific threats to our interests and our homeland? And while I think we degraded the threats out of Afghanistan, it then spread into other areas of the globe where they could seek sanctuary,” Clarke said. “What we have to prevent is that sanctuary allowing for a future Afghanistan … When I say it’s not diminished. I think it’s actually expanded.”
He told reporters that terror groups in Africa, particularly Al-Shabab in Somalia, are high on the command’s radar. Al-Shabab, an Al-Qaeda-linked group, has demonstrated that its capable of striking outside of Somalia with a string of attacks in recent years in Kenya, including one that killed three Americans at a Kenyan Air Base. Clarke called Al-Shabab the “best resourced, most capable group” inside Africa.
“I don’t see a direct threat to the homeland today, but I think it’s something that we have to be aware of,” Clarke said.
As the military grapples with the aftermath of 20 years of conflict, Clarke said that SOCOM has started a review of lessons learned from Afghanistan. Clarke didn’t go into further detail on the review, saying only that it was an effort to see “what we could have done better in support of the joint force.” The four-star added that parts of the report would be classified and couldn’t commit that a public version would be released, but stressed that the findings will shape SOCOM moving forward.
“We got to take those lessons learned, and where applicable to conditions somewhere else, we have to be able to apply those,” Clarke said.
A common criticism lobbed at Pentagon leaders over the last two months revolve around how the US spent $83 billion since 2002 on training and equipping the Afghan military, only for those forces to rapidly collapse. Given SOCOM’s hand in training special forces units, that’s one area Clark expects to find lessons learned.
“We don’t necessarily need to train with partner forces for what we want them to do,” Clarke said. “We need to train for partner forces of what they need to do for their country and their environment. I think that’s the biggest lesson that we have to take from this, writ large.”
For example, Clarke said that when training special forces in Europe and the Indo-Pacific, the focus is on counter-aggression against a great power. In Africa, partner forces are more likely fighting terrorism and using direct action raids to fight, Clarke said.
“That’s where it’s really important to go what specifically they need,” he noted.
10. From Little Green Men to Little Blue Helmets: Imagining the Future of Russian Aggression—and What to Do About It
Excerpts:
A big step in that direction might include forward-deploying more rotational US forces with NATO units in each Baltic country as a way of signaling further US commitment in Eastern Europe, increasing interoperability between US and allied forces, and practicing how to respond to a possible scenario involving Russian aggression (whether with Little Blue Helmets or otherwise). Moreover, countries might take a cue from the Lithuanian military rules of engagement, which, as we learned during interviews there, are comparatively more relaxed during a crisis than rules common among other NATO militaries that are more strict and risk creating tactical paralysis in the face of a rapidly changing situation. This can serve as a stronger deterrent, as can having more auxiliary and volunteer forces (e.g., the Estonian Defence League and the Lithuanian Riflemen’s Union) capable of going underground and leading a resistance movement against any occupying forces. Finally, NATO leadership should consider how to wargame unconventional scenarios—such as one involving Little Blue Helmets—and figure out ways of integrating and coordinating resistance operations, including on-the-ground activists that could expose masquerading Russian forces, much like InformNapalam and Bellingcat did with Russian activities in Ukraine.
For the foreseeable future, Russia will remain a persistent power, and Western leaders must be willing to imagine the many possible characters of future Russian aggression, including the next Russian force will be dressed up in. Failing to do so—and underestimating Russian capabilities and intent—could easily mean the United States and NATO are caught flatfooted again the next time Putin conjures up an unexpected trick.
From Little Green Men to Little Blue Helmets: Imagining the Future of Russian Aggression—and What to Do About It - Modern War Institute
The Russian bear isn’t going to wear the same outfit the next time it decides to invade another neighbor. While Moscow used the pretext of defending ethnic Russians and peacekeepers in South Ossetia to overtly invade Georgia in 2008, President Putin learned lessons from how that conflict unfurled. In 2014, unmarked Russian troops masquerading as “Little Green Men” seized all of Crimea, with most Ukrainian police and military personnel responding to Russian incentives and joining Russian forces. While local anti-Russian groups formed in Crimea—one such group, called InformNapalm, identified Russian troops using open-source intelligence, while also uploading data and videos naming and shaming Russian forces—Russia still quickly annexed Crimea and created a “civil war” in the Donbas.
As there typically needs to be a casus belli (a justification for war), the next time Moscow attempts to expand its regional sphere of influence there will likely be a similar pretense for deploying Russian troops. But just as Russia’s approach in Ukraine took on a different form from what was seen in Georgia six years earlier, the Russian costume will definitely be different. A fictional scenario of Russia deploying “Little Blue Helmets” (i.e., fake UN peacekeepers) to a Baltic country (Estonia, Latvia, or Lithuania) illustrates one such new form that Russian revanchism could take. To be clear, this is not to suggest that such an outcome is among the most likely, or even that there is evidence that it sits in a playbook somewhere on a dusty Kremlin shelf. But given some states’ willingness to leverage the legitimate image of peacekeeping operations to pursue their unilateral strategic objectives, engaging with this particular hypothetical scenario offers a useful and plausible means of exploring what options are available to respond to another Russian military adventure abroad. In short, it is aimed at ensuring the United States and its European allies and partners are not caught as flatfooted as they were in 2014. The potential solutions that derive from that exploration are all based on recent Homeland Defense Institute (HDI) fieldwork and interviews in Ukraine and the Baltics.
A Dangerous Baltic Scenario: “Little Blue Helmets” Keeping the Russian Narrative
As best put by US Army Lieutenant Colonel Matt Cavanaugh, a successful land grab requires the predatory country to “be quick and ambiguous . . . because everyone’s on camera these days, so they’re going to figure out who you are. You just want to have a time cushion to seize your objective before the cavalry comes.”
Russia has been extensively waging various attacks against the civil society in the Baltics since Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania joined NATO in 2004. This has included bankrolling pro-Russian NGOs in each Baltic country and creating the Baltic Media Alliance, based in London, as a way of serving Russian-speaking populations in the Baltics. Such activities undermine strategic and defense thinking in each Baltic country by creating a different infosphere for Russian-speaking citizens in each country, while causing schismogenesis, polarizing pro- and anti-Russian sides in civil society.
A future Russian invasion scenario—based on past behavior, current capabilities, and existing technologies—that could play out in a Baltic country might go like this:
Russian agents infiltrate towns in the eastern parts of a Baltic country that have the most Russian speakers and foment a fake crisis—for instance, creating a narrative of government forces attacking citizens for speaking Russian. This crisis event is merged with a massive Russian sociopolitical-information warfare campaign through social media with fake news and deepfakes, stoking anomie and protests against the supposedly repressive Baltic government. Simultaneously, Russian agents plan, supply, form, and communicate protests against local government officials and buildings, ensuring that large numbers of agitated Russian speakers show up to create a conflict between local authorities and the pro-Russian protesters. Pro-Russian media outlets start sharing “allegations” and “reports” of authorities attacking peaceful demonstrators, creating the narrative of unjust oppression of ethnic Russians in the Baltic country.
In response to this conjured crisis, President Vladimir Putin holds an immediate joint press conference with the president of Belarus, announcing the need to protect the Russian culture, language, and people. Putin declares the immediate deployment of what he says are UN peacekeepers for R2P reasons, staffed with Russian and Belarusian personnel wearing official-looking UN blue helmets. Within hours, the Little Blue Helmets rush over the border in blue armored personnel carriers and blue transport helicopters, each tagged with a hastily painted “UN” on it (and possibly the Cyrillic “MC,” as well). Meanwhile, Russian forces jam the entire electromagnetic spectrum throughout the Baltics, preventing Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian, and deployed rotational NATO forces from coordinating a military response, let alone being able to utilize cellphones and use GPS accurately to identify Little Blue Helmet locations.
By the time world leaders get briefed on the crisis and the fake peacekeeping mission in the Baltics, Little Blue Helmets have occupied a new chunk of Baltic territory with trenches dug and fortifications established, each Russian position flying United Nations flags. To control information and narratives, Russian forces quickly field their own cellphone towers and networks (e.g., MTS, BeeLine, Megafon, and Tele2), ensuring information dominance within 22–45 miles of each Russian position, while sending propaganda text messages to any local resistance forces.
With a fait accompli established, world leaders decry Putin’s fake operation in the Baltics, finger wagging the violation of international laws and norms, and speak of possible sanctions while at the same time realizing Western European dependence on Russian natural gas pipelines to keep them warm this winter. Meanwhile, NATO commanders struggle with how to militarily respond as Russian air defenses elevate the risks associated with any airborne assault or air campaign, not to mention symbolic issues that might arise with NATO airstrikes against “UN peacekeepers”—regardless of whether these ambiguous Little Blue Helmets not being authorized by the United Nations Security Council.
Shaping and Preventing the Next Innovative Intervention?
When our HDI research team presented this Little Blue Helmets scenario to government and defense officials in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, most responded with some form of, “The Russians can’t do that, it’s not legal.” While this is most certainly a rational response steeped in a belief in international norms and laws, many Ukrainian officials would have said and thought the same thing in 2013 about the prospects of Russia violating Ukraine’s sovereignty as enshrined in the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, which gave security assurances to Kyiv in exchange for giving up its nuclear weapon stockpile. The assumption of Ukrainian security and sovereignty was so ingrained in Ukrainian defense thinking that during our interviews with several government and military officials, they flatly told us that there was no plan or purposeful placement of forces near the Russian border before 2014.
Regardless, in 2021 (and beyond), the specter of the next costumed trick Putin might pull on a neighbor raises a broader issue of what the armed forces of each Baltic country could do, not to mention what NATO and its forces deployed there (each with their own rules of engagement) could do, if such a Little Blue Helmet crisis were to unfold in the Baltics.
While such a scenario might seem unlikely, Putin has been able to exploit the current US-led world order, specifically taking advantage of three US tendencies: “a default toward de-escalation rather than confronting aggression; a desire to compartmentalize issues rather than link them; and complacency about the U.S. role in the world, rather than a drive to compete proactively.” Simply put, US leaders must be willing to defend allies, partners, and friendly nations, in rhetoric and in practice.
A big step in that direction might include forward-deploying more rotational US forces with NATO units in each Baltic country as a way of signaling further US commitment in Eastern Europe, increasing interoperability between US and allied forces, and practicing how to respond to a possible scenario involving Russian aggression (whether with Little Blue Helmets or otherwise). Moreover, countries might take a cue from the Lithuanian military rules of engagement, which, as we learned during interviews there, are comparatively more relaxed during a crisis than rules common among other NATO militaries that are more strict and risk creating tactical paralysis in the face of a rapidly changing situation. This can serve as a stronger deterrent, as can having more auxiliary and volunteer forces (e.g., the Estonian Defence League and the Lithuanian Riflemen’s Union) capable of going underground and leading a resistance movement against any occupying forces. Finally, NATO leadership should consider how to wargame unconventional scenarios—such as one involving Little Blue Helmets—and figure out ways of integrating and coordinating resistance operations, including on-the-ground activists that could expose masquerading Russian forces, much like InformNapalam and Bellingcat did with Russian activities in Ukraine.
For the foreseeable future, Russia will remain a persistent power, and Western leaders must be willing to imagine the many possible characters of future Russian aggression, including the next Russian force will be dressed up in. Failing to do so—and underestimating Russian capabilities and intent—could easily mean the United States and NATO are caught flatfooted again the next time Putin conjures up an unexpected trick.
Jahara “FRANKY” Matisek (@JaharaMatisek) is a senior fellow for the Homeland Defense Institute (HDI) and recently led an HDI research team to Ukraine and the Baltics. He is an active duty US Air Force officer and senior pilot serving as associate professor in the Military and Strategic Studies Department at the US Air Force Academy, and is the director of fellows for the Irregular Warfare Initiative. His forthcoming book, Old and New Battlespaces, describes how adversaries use strategic schismogenesis and employ sociopolitical-information warfare to weaponize everything in society, as every citizen becomes a combatant.
The views expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the United States Military Academy, Department of the Army, or Department of Defense.
Image: Vehicles from a joint Russian-Belarusian peacekeeping unit are lined up for review before the start of an exercise at the Polivno training ground in Ulyanovsk, Russia (credit: mil.ru)
11. MWI Podcast: On Resistance
Support to resistance may be one of the most important contributions SOF can make in this era of Strategic Competition (formerly Great Power Competition) and as a contribution to integrated deterrence (through unconventional deterrence support to resistance) against the revisionist and rogue powers.
MWI Podcast: On Resistance - Modern War Institute
In this episode of the MWI Podcast, John Amble speaks to Sandor Fabian. A former officer in the Hungarian military’s special operations forces, he has extensively researched the concept of resistance as an approach to national defense. Specifically, he argues that resistance is the most viable means of defense for small states—like, for example, the Baltics—facing the threat of aggression from a larger neighbor—like Russia.
Effectively embracing resistance as a strategic approach, however, would require dramatic changes in force structure, training, equipment, doctrine, and more. And if small US allies choose to do so, it would also have important implications for US special operations forces and for NATO.
You can listen to the full episode below. And if you aren’t already subscribed to the MWI Podcast, be sure to find it on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast app so you don’t miss an episode. While you’re there, please take just a moment to leave the podcast a rating or give it a review!
Image credit: Spc. Uriel Ramirez, US Army
12. US probe of undersea sub collision raises doubts
The complexity of submarine operations always amazes me.
Excerpts:
A typical high-frequency, high-resolution sonar may see out to 5,000 yards and is vulnerable to detection out to least 10,000 yards or farther in good conditions.
This means an adversary can localize a submarine’s position, and it can remain undetected while trailing the active-sonar emitting submarine for as long as it uses its high-resolution sonar.
If a submarine is operating in an area where they suspect the presence of adversary submarines, they may choose to not use high-frequency active sonar to verify surrounding topography.
This, as described earlier, is because the sonar transmissions will give away their position if detected. This means the submarine relies on accelerometer dead-reckoning for the ship’s position.
This type of navigation has very small errors that compound over time. Eventually, the submarine can be out of position by hundreds of yards or more. The error grows with time until the next navigational fix.
There are ways to fix the submarine’s position that doesn’t involve sonar, but they don’t reveal what topography is hidden between soundings on a chart.
US probe of undersea sub collision raises doubts
Investigation concludes nuclear-powered attack submarine USS Connecticut hit an uncharted seamount
Did nuclear-powered attack submarine USS Connecticut (SSN-22) hit an uncharted underwater massif while patrolling in the South China Sea on October 2?
That is what US Navy investigators concluded early this week, but not everyone is buying into that story— in particular, Chinese state media outlet, The Global Times.
Other questions are also being asked: Did the collision result in a nuclear leakage that the US is trying to conceal? And what were they doing there in the first place.
A Beijing-based think tank said last week it had satellite evidence showing that US spy planes, including a “nuke sniffer,” recently flew over the South China Sea, according to the South China Morning Post.
Experts told the SCMP that the aircraft were likely establishing whether there was any nuclear fallout from the collision.
Meanwhile, US military authorities are holding their cards close.
“The investigation determined USS Connecticut grounded on an uncharted seamount while operating in international waters in the Indo-Pacific region,” Cdr. Haley Sims, a 7th Fleet spokesperson, told Insider.
“Commander, US 7th Fleet will determine whether follow-on actions, including accountability, are appropriate.”
The damage to the forward section of the Seawolf class submarine damaged its ballast tanks and prompted Connecticut to make a week-long voyage on the surface to Guam.
The Navy has said repeatedly that the submarine’s nuclear reactor and propulsion system are undamaged.
The collision caused a small number of moderate and minor injuries to the crew.
USNI News, which was first to report that the sub had struck a seamount, said damage to the forward section of the submarine damaged its ballast tanks.
The incident happened on Oct. 2 but was not reported by the Navy until five days later.
Submerged objects, such as mines, wrecks, and other submarines are plainly visible to a trained sonar operator. Credit: US Navy photo.
The vessel made its way to Guam for a damage assessment, where it is undergoing initial repairs overseen by Naval Sea Systems Command, personnel from the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and submarine tender USS Emory S. Land.
China claims the South China Sea as its own, and objects to other nations sailing military craft in that region.
The US rejects Chinese claims to the waters, and makes a point of sailing there in so-called freedom of navigation missions, as do other Western nations, often angering Beijing.
The presence of a US Navy submarine in the South China Sea represents an aggression to Beijing, and Chinese state media were quick to attack the official US narrative.
On Tuesday, Global Times published claims from Chinese military experts who said the collision may have resulted in nuclear leakage that the US is trying to conceal.
“A nuclear leakage could have taken place, and a recent flight of a US nuclear material detection aircraft to the South China Sea shows the US understands the possibility,” the Global Times wrote.
Zhang Junshe, a senior research fellow at the Naval Research Academy of China’s People’s Liberation Army, told the Global Times the US justification for the collision “lack sincerity, transparency and professionalism.”
Other outlets also cast doubt on the US version of events.
“Covering up the truth is a tradition of the US military,” the People’s Daily newspaper wrote Monday, referring to the collision as an “accident.”
The newspaper previously referred to the crash as an “example of the superpower’s reckless military presence.”
After the Navy first reported the collision on October 7, five days after it happened, Chinese officials accused the US of a cover-up.
Zhao Lijian, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman, said on on October 26 that the US was “irresponsible” and “cagey.”
The Seawolf-class fast-attack submarine USS Connecticut (SSN 22) departs Puget Sound Naval Shipyard for sea trials following a maintenance availability. (U.S. Navy photo by Thiep Van Nguyen II)
Zhao added that China had “every reason to question the truth and the intention of the US.”
“What was USS Connecticut up to do secretively in the South China Sea this time? What did it collide with? Why did that collision happen?” he said.
“Was there a nuclear leak that creates nuclear contamination in the marine environment?”
Many have expressed their utter puzzlement to us as to how a multi-billion dollar nuclear submarine that is laden with some of the most capable sensors on the planet — literally one of the most advanced vehicles mankind has ever built — can just run into something below the waves.
Meanwhile, the damage and subsequent repairs to the attack submarine have caused renewed attention on the Navy’s attack submarine maintenance backlog.
“If we ended up doing [the Connecticut work] in one of the public shipyards, that would certainly cause perturbations in all the other work in the shipyards,” Jay Stefany, acting assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition, told the House Armed Services Committee readiness subcommittee.
“Right now, it’s in Guam, that’s public record, there is no dry dock in Guam, hopefully, a sub tender can do the work, but that remains to be seen,” he said.
“It just shows how … the world gets a vote and things change and unexpected incidents create more demand for repairs. … The attack subs have always been the poor cousin in the public shipyards in terms of getting priority, but we know particularly a Seawolf-class submarine is extremely valuable in terms of the mission in that part of the world.”
Connecticut is one of three Sea Wolf-class attack nuclear boats that were developed for deep-water operations to take on Soviet submarines in the open ocean.
Since the end of the Cold War, the trio has been upgraded and modified to carry out some of the Navy’s most sensitive missions.
The complicated topography of the South China Sea that submarines of all nations, including the US and China, must navigate. Credit: NASA.
Many have expressed their utter puzzlement to us as to how a multi-billion dollar nuclear submarine that is laden with some of the most capable sensors on the planet — literally one of the most advanced vehicles mankind has ever built — can just run into something below the waves.
According to experts, highly accurate charts are always the first choice. Active sonar transmissions are used to confirm the water depth checks with the chart.
These active sonar pulses can be transmitted in front and to the sides of modern submarines. These short-range, high-frequency sonar systems reveal nearby underwater objects with great clarity.
Submerged objects, such as mines, wrecks, and other submarines are plainly visible to a trained sonar operator.
The downside to the use of active sonar is that it is detectable and at approximately two times the range it allows the operator to search, in most ocean environments.
A typical high-frequency, high-resolution sonar may see out to 5,000 yards and is vulnerable to detection out to least 10,000 yards or farther in good conditions.
This means an adversary can localize a submarine’s position, and it can remain undetected while trailing the active-sonar emitting submarine for as long as it uses its high-resolution sonar.
If a submarine is operating in an area where they suspect the presence of adversary submarines, they may choose to not use high-frequency active sonar to verify surrounding topography.
This, as described earlier, is because the sonar transmissions will give away their position if detected. This means the submarine relies on accelerometer dead-reckoning for the ship’s position.
This type of navigation has very small errors that compound over time. Eventually, the submarine can be out of position by hundreds of yards or more. The error grows with time until the next navigational fix.
There are ways to fix the submarine’s position that doesn’t involve sonar, but they don’t reveal what topography is hidden between soundings on a chart.
Sources: Insider, The Global Times, South China Morning Post, USNI News, People’s Daily, US Department of Defense, The Drive
13. White House creates new national strategy for preventing veteran suicide
White House creates new national strategy for preventing veteran suicide
The White House released a new national strategy Tuesday, Nov. 2, 2021, for preventing veteran suicide, purporting that it would harness the full breadth of the federal government to tackle the issue. (Getty Images/iStockphoto)
WASHINGTON — The White House released a new national strategy Tuesday for preventing veteran suicide, purporting that it would harness the full breadth of the federal government to tackle the issue.
The strategy contains five priorities, which includes placing greater emphasis on the safe storage of firearms. The plan tasks the departments of Defense, Justice, Health and Human Services, Veterans Affairs and Homeland Security with educating veterans about how to store firearms to limit their access to them in times of crisis.
In addition to emphasizing firearm safety, the strategy aims to limit barriers to mental health care, reduce housing and food insecurity, increase research and improve emergency room crisis care, among other things. These issues will be addressed with a “series of executive actions” in the coming weeks, the strategy states.
“What’s needed now is a comprehensive, cross-sector, national effort — a public health strategy that unites us around a common mission to reduce military and veteran suicide, and lays out the steps to achieve it,” President Joe Biden wrote in a letter announcing the plan.
In 2019, 6,261 veterans died by suicide. Though suicides decreased slightly from the previous year, suicide among veterans remained disproportionately high when compared to the rest of the population.
Firearm deaths accounted for more than 70% of veteran suicides that year.
The VA recently announced its intent to prioritize firearm safety as a method to prevent veteran suicides. Matthew Miller, executive director of the VA’s suicide prevention program, said in September that the department was “addressing this issue aggressively” by teaching lethal means safety, which is a voluntary action that veterans can take to reduce their suicide risk by limiting their access to firearms.
Citing studies, Miller said the time between someone deciding to attempt suicide and that person acting on the impulse is sometimes less than 10 minutes. To help decrease access to firearms during a crisis, the department is teaching veterans to store their guns locked and unloaded while not in use, with ammunition stored separately.
In addition to the VA, other federal agencies will begin educating the public about the safe storage of firearms and medications, the White House plan states. The strategy also calls on departments to increase training on lethal means safety for counselors, crisis responders and health care professionals — those employed by the government and the private sector.
A VA program titled Safety Planning in the Emergency Department is planned for private health care systems. The program involves medical providers working with patients and their families on a safety plan to help prevent their risk for suicide.
To increase access to mental health care, the strategy includes a provision for the VA and Defense Department to reduce or eliminate copayments for veterans and service members seeking care for mental health and substance abuse.
“It is up to us to do everything in our power to live up to our most sacred obligations,” Biden wrote in the strategy. “We owe it to our memories of those we’ve lost — and we owe it to the futures of those we might save.”
Democrats in Congress applauded the strategy Tuesday. Rep. Mark Takano, D-Calif., the chairman of the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, said many of the ideas in the White House plan were reflected in legislation introduced by his committee this session. He argued for the need to still pass those bills, and he said the committee would soon be introducing a mental health legislative package.
“Today’s announcement makes it clear that President Biden is committed to backing up his priorities with action, and I look forward to working with the administration to pass many of these proposals in our upcoming mental health legislative package,” Takano said. “As long as even one veteran dies by suicide each day, our work will not be finished.”
Nikki Wentling
14. Biden administration considers adjusting rationale for U.S. nuclear arsenal
This could upend nuclear deterrence and have effects on extended deterrence that might cause non-nuclear countries to develop their own nuclear weapons.
Biden administration considers adjusting rationale for U.S. nuclear arsenal
The White House is planning meetings this month to discuss whether to declare the “sole purpose” of the U.S. nuclear arsenal is to deter or retaliate against a nuclear attack – a change in policy supported by President Biden and arms control advocates but opposed by key U.S. allies and GOP lawmakers.
The meetings at the National Security Council are part of the administration’s broader effort to hammer out a new nuclear weapons policy by early next year. Any decision would be announced then, according to officials familiar with the discussions, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal deliberations.
The process is freighted with multiple issues, including whether to roll back a vast, multi-decade modernization of U.S. nuclear systems, scrap new nuclear capabilities that the Trump administration approved and change the policy on when the United States would use a nuclear weapon.
Biden has publicly supported modifying the rationale for the U.S. arsenal.
In a January 2017 speech, delivered days before he left office as vice president, Biden said it would be “hard to envision a plausible scenario in which the first use of nuclear weapons by the United States would be necessary. Or make sense.”
The Obama administration at its outset had rolled out a nuclear weapons policy that stopped short of naming deterrence as the “sole purpose” of U.S. nuclear weapons, conceding that the arsenal could play a role in deterring a conventional or chemical weapons attack in a “narrow range of contingencies.”
While it wasn’t prepared to make a “sole purpose” declaration at the time, the Obama administration pledged to “work to establish conditions under which such a policy could be safely adopted.”
By 2017, Biden said he felt confident that sufficient progress had been made to adopt the policy and declare “that deterring – and if necessary, retaliating against — a nuclear attack should be the sole purpose of the U.S. nuclear arsenal.”
Still, the Obama administration considered and ultimately declined to make such a declaration in its waning days.
On his campaign website in 2020, Biden reiterated his belief in a “sole purpose” declaration and said as president he would “work to put that belief into practice, in consultation with our allies and military.”
Progressive lawmakers have been pushing for the United States to go even further and declare a “no first use” policy, under which United States would pledge not to use a nuclear weapon unless attacked with one first.
Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, earlier this year reintroduced legislation that would make that policy law.
“Threatening to use nuclear weapons first makes America less safe because it increases the chances of a miscalculation or an accident,” Warren said at the time. “There are no winners in a nuclear war, and the U.S. should never start one.”
But people tracking the issue believe such a “no first use” pledge is unlikely, primarily because it would upset U.S. allies and rankle the military by constraining planning and strike options. Biden also hasn’t voiced support for a “no first use” pledge.
One U.S. official with knowledge of the matter said the agenda item for the White House meetings on nuclear policy this month is whether to make a “sole purpose” declaration, not a “no first use” pledge. A “sole purpose” declaration, depending on its wording, wouldn’t necessarily constrain U.S. strike options for nuclear weapons.
GOP lawmakers have vocally opposed either a “no first use” or “sole purpose” declaration.
Sen. James E. Risch (R-Idaho), the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, argued such a pronouncement would embolden China and Russia, which are both expanding their nuclear capabilities, and destabilize the international system by alienating allies. Risch, writing in Defense News, said the United States benefits from some ambiguity about when the president might launch a nuclear weapon.
He denounced a “sole purpose” declaration as “another name for a ‘no first use’ policy.” “Declaring that the United States will never be the first to use a nuclear weapon represents the worst in potential policy,” Risch said. “It scares our friends, encourages our adversaries and damages the very nonproliferation goals it claims to advance.”
In a July 31 letter to the White House, 23 GOP members of the House Armed Services Committee warned that either policy would increase the risk of nuclear war and undermine allies who rely on the U.S. nuclear arsenal to deter not only nuclear attacks but also massive nonnuclear attacks.
Allies have also pushed against the prospect of a change.
British Secretary of State for Defense Ben Wallace, in comments to the American Enterprise Institute in July, said the U.K. government wouldn’t want to see either a “no first use” or “sole purpose” declaration by the United States.
“We’re not in favor of that change of doctrine,” Wallace said, noting that British doctrine reserves the right to deploy nuclear weapons “as we must.”
In testimony to Congress, top Pentagon leaders, including Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks, have said they don’t support a “no first use” declaration, because it would take away options or potentially beneficial ambiguity for the president in a crisis.
In anticipation of the review at the White House this month, the Biden administration sent out a survey to key U.S. allies notifying them that the United States was considering revising its nuclear deterrence policy, said western officials familiar with the matter. The survey was first reported by the Financial Times. France also expressed opposition to the United States announcing a “no first use” policy or making a “sole purpose” declaration, with at least one key ally calling it a gift to Russia or China, according to a western official.
A senior Biden administration official said in a statement that the White House would take the perspective of U.S. allies into account, while renewing American leadership in nonproliferation and addressing the existential threat of nuclear weapons.
“The U.S. will continue to maintain a safe, secure, and effective strategic deterrent while ensuring our extended deterrence commitments to allies and partners remain strong and credible,” the senior official said, reiterating the administration’s commitment to further consultations with allies.
In its nuclear weapons policy released in 2018, the Trump administration explicitly stated that deterring a nuclear attack is “not the sole purpose of nuclear weapons” and made no pledge to work toward such a policy.
The Trump administration also explicitly rejected the prospect of a “no first use” policy, saying it remained the policy of the United States to purposefully “retain some ambiguity regarding the precise circumstances that might lead to a U.S. nuclear response.”
Anti-nuclear advocates say such ambiguity creates a risk of miscalculation.
Jon Wolfsthal, a former top White House adviser on nuclear weapons and senior adviser to the anti-nuclear nonprofit Global Zero, said he believes Biden continues to support a change and is working to balance nervousness among allies with risks of relying too heavily on nuclear weapons. “What remains to be seen is how he balances those issues,” said Wolfsthal, who supports a declaration that the United States won’t start a nuclear war to reduce the risk of an accidental conflict or an unintended escalation with nuclear weapons.
Joshua Pollack, a nuclear expert at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, said he would be surprised if the Biden administration were seriously considering a “no first use” policy and suspected opponents were raising the idea to scupper a more moderate “sole purpose” declaration.
“Nuclear ‘no first use’ has dropped out of policy debates some time ago only to bubble back up when it’s conflated with a ‘sole purpose’ declaration as a way of criticizing them both,” Pollack said.
He noted that a “sole purpose” declaration “doesn’t pledge anything” and is “not a statement about when nuclear weapons would appear on the battlefield.” Rather, he said, it is “simply an explanation” for the country’s current nuclear weapons posture.
15. Nuclear arms hawks give bureaucratic mauling to Biden vow to curb arsenal
A "mauling."
Excerpts:
The White House has sought to placate Democrats by agreeing to an independent review of the feasibility of extending the life of the current Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile, compared with replacing with it a new weapon, the Ground Based Strategic Deterrent (GBSD). The review is expected to deliver its conclusions next year, although as the review panel has been selected by the Pentagon, it is not expected to upset plans to go ahead with the $100bn GBSD.
China’s nuclear weapons development, including the recent reported testing of a nuclear-capable hypersonic glider launched from orbit, has increased the political pressure on Biden to abandon his arms control pledges, although the Chinese arsenal is still dwarfed by the US total of 3,750 warheads.
Emma Belcher, the president of the Ploughshares Fund, an arms control advocacy organisation, argued that China’s rise as a nuclear weapons power only underlines the urgency of arms control.
“The best way to control the situation and head off an arms race with China is through diplomacy and restraint,” Belcher said. “We’ve seen this movie before. It’s expensive and dangerous. So what we’re hoping we’ll see from the NPR is for diplomacy to be put first, and an off ramp from a new kind of cold war.”
Nuclear arms hawks give bureaucratic mauling to Biden vow to curb arsenal
Defence budget and nuclear posture review are battlegrounds as Republicans seek to block limits on US use of weapons
A battle is being fought in Washington over the Biden administration’s nuclear weapons policy, amid fears by arms control advocates that the president will renege on campaign promises to rein in the US arsenal.
The battlegrounds are a nuclear posture review (NPR) due early next year and a defence budget expected about the same time. At stake is a chance to put the brakes on an arms race between the US, Russia and China – or the risk of that race accelerating.
Despite Biden’s pledge during the campaign – and in his interim national security guidance issued in March – that his administration would reduce “our reliance and excessive expenditure on nuclear weapons”, hawks at the Pentagon have won the early skirmishes.
Biden is also under pressure from some allies, nervous about Biden’s past support for limiting the use of nuclear weapons to the “sole purpose” of deterring, and retaliating against, a nuclear attack on the US or its allies.
The current US posture is broader, leaving open a nuclear response to “significant non-nuclear strategic attacks”. Britain and France also retain a certain amount of ambiguity about when they would use their weapons, and are concerned a US change to “sole purpose” would oblige them ultimately to narrow their options. Paris has taken the lead in conveying those anxieties, and Emmanuel Macron raised nuclear posture issues with Biden when the two met in Rome on Friday.
The big struggle, however, is on the home front, where arms control advocates are on the defensive.
The administration’s first defence budget in February included $43bn for an array of nuclear modernisation schemes, including controversial programmes introduced by Donald Trump, like a new sea-launched cruise missile. The total cost of modernisation could be over $1.5 trillion.
In September, one of Biden’s political appointees at the Pentagon, Leonor Tomero, who questioned the need for such a vast and growing nuclear weapons budget, was forced out in a bureaucratic power struggle after just nine months in the post. Her job had been to oversee the drafting of the NPR, which sets out what nuclear weapons the US should have and under what conditions they could be used.
The official reason for Tomero’s departure was that her job as deputy assistant secretary for nuclear and missile defense policy had disappeared as part of efforts to streamline the Pentagon bureaucracy.
“This transition of her duties is the result of a reorganization decision designed to more appropriately align the policy’s shop structure with policy objectives,” John Kirby, the Pentagon spokesman, said. “The nuclear posture review continues and is being handled by a large group of experts from across the department under the purview of the under secretary for policy.”
But several congressional sources said that her departure came after pressure from a Republican hardliner, Senator Deb Fischer of Nebraska, a staunch supporter of the nuclear weapons establishment, who threatened to hold up confirmations of senior Biden nominees if Tomero was not removed.
Senator Deb Fischer of Nebraska is alleged to have been behind the ousting of a Biden appointee from nuclear policy responsibilities. Photograph: Rex/Shutterstock
Senator Fischer’s office did not respond to a request for comment. A Pentagon spokesman said: “I don’t have any information to provide on this, but generally we cannot comment on personal discussions between department leadership and members of Congress.”
“It seems like the minute she got there she was under attack from people who were working behind the scenes, with congressional Republicans, to put pressure on senior Pentagon officials to get rid of Leonor,” said Jeffrey Lewis, an expert in nuclear non-proliferation and geopolitics at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey. “This is all about making progressive views on nuclear weapons unacceptable.”
Senator Edward Markey, a Democrat, has written to Biden demanding to know why Tomero had been removed in the midst of drafting the NPR, demanding to know if “ideology played any role”.
Arms control advocates complain the Democrats have not been as ruthless as Republicans in pursuit of their policies. A Trump appointee, Drew Walter, a former senior Republican staffer on the House armed services committee, has been allowed to “burrow in” as deputy assistant secretary for nuclear matters, converting from a political appointee to a career official. Tomero was Walter’s Democratic counterpart when they were in Congress, but the Biden administration failed to protect her once she moved to the Pentagon.
Nickolas Roth, the director of the nuclear security programme at the Stimson Center thinktank, said: “I am concerned that the removal of Leonor from her position will have a chilling effect throughout the Biden administration, on those who might be willing to propose anything other than the status quo for US nuclear weapons policy.”
The deputy national security adviser, Jonathan Finer, played down concerns that conservatives in the Pentagon would be able to shape the NPR.
“This is going to be the president’s posture review and the president’s policy,” Finer insisted at a Ploughshares Fund event last month. “He has asked the Pentagon, as has been the tradition in the past, to take the lead on drafting the posture review … but by the time we get to the end, it will be the president’s document.”
With that in mind, Democrats have been reminding Biden that every dollar spent on weapons programmes inherited from his predecessors is a dollar less spent on the social aspirations of the administration.
“The administration must harness this opportunity to rethink the status quo and not just rubber-stamp the Pentagon and defense industry’s interest in continuing unnecessary weapons,” Senator Jeff Merkley told the Guardian. “Business as usual risks fuelling an unnecessary arms race and squanders billions of dollars that could go towards improving Americans’ health, education and housing costs or better investments in national security.”
Senator Jeff Merkley: ‘Business as usual risks fuelling an unnecessary arms race.’ Photograph: Bonnie Cash/UPI/Rex/Shutterstock
The White House has sought to placate Democrats by agreeing to an independent review of the feasibility of extending the life of the current Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile, compared with replacing with it a new weapon, the Ground Based Strategic Deterrent (GBSD). The review is expected to deliver its conclusions next year, although as the review panel has been selected by the Pentagon, it is not expected to upset plans to go ahead with the $100bn GBSD.
China’s nuclear weapons development, including the recent reported testing of a nuclear-capable hypersonic glider launched from orbit, has increased the political pressure on Biden to abandon his arms control pledges, although the Chinese arsenal is still dwarfed by the US total of 3,750 warheads.
Emma Belcher, the president of the Ploughshares Fund, an arms control advocacy organisation, argued that China’s rise as a nuclear weapons power only underlines the urgency of arms control.
“The best way to control the situation and head off an arms race with China is through diplomacy and restraint,” Belcher said. “We’ve seen this movie before. It’s expensive and dangerous. So what we’re hoping we’ll see from the NPR is for diplomacy to be put first, and an off ramp from a new kind of cold war.”
16. ‘Nine Eyes’? Bill Would Look at Adding Four Countries to Intel-Sharing Pact
Does the "Nine Eyes" term "sing" like "Five Eyes?" (recall Provo's Privy)
Excerpt:
The provision would require the director of national intelligence and the Defense Department to report on the current status and shortcomings of intelligence sharing between the “Five Eyes” nations: the U.S., Australia, the U.K., New Zealand, and Canada, and what benefits and risks there would be to adding Japan, Korea, India, and Germany to the trusted group.
‘Nine Eyes’? Bill Would Look at Adding Four Countries to Intel-Sharing Pact
Lawmaker says current ‘Anglophile view’ is insufficient against China.
The United States’ “Five Eyes” intelligence-sharing pact is a World War II relic that needs updating to better keep tabs on China, the chairman of a key house subcommittee on intelligence told Defense One.
Arizona Democrat Rep. Ruben Gallego, chairman of the House Armed Services subcommittee on special operations and intelligence, has added language in this year’s defense bill that opens the door for the decades-old pact’s first expansion.
The provision would require the director of national intelligence and the Defense Department to report on the current status and shortcomings of intelligence sharing between the “Five Eyes” nations: the U.S., Australia, the U.K., New Zealand, and Canada, and what benefits and risks there would be to adding Japan, Korea, India, and Germany to the trusted group.
“We are very much stuck on this ‘Five Eyes’ model, which I think is outdated,” Gallego said at Defense One and Nextgov’s 2021 National Security Forum. “We need to expand the scope. It shouldn’t just be such an Anglophile view of sharing.”
The provision says, in part: “The committee acknowledges that the threat landscape has vastly changed since the inception of the Five Eyes arrangement, with primary threats now emanating from China and Russia. The committee believes that, in confronting great power competition, the Five Eye countries must work closer together, as well as expand the circle of trust to other like-minded democracies."
Dustin Carmack, who served as chief of staff to former National Intelligence director John Ratcliffe, said the U.S. has already increased its intelligence sharing and cooperation with Indo-Pacific nations, and that a formal change to the Five Eyes “is a lot easier said than done.”
“I think a lot of the work is already being done, personally, behind the scenes, to kind of build better links,” said Carmack, now a fellow at the Heritage Foundation.
For example, the U.S. has since 2018 finalized key agreements to share military communications and bases with India, deals that were negotiated by the Obama and Trump administrations.
“I’m all for it,” said Carmack, but cautioned that each added country would need to be assessed to determine whether they could protect the Five Eyes’ intelligence collection sources and methods.
“When it comes to the Five Eyes, you know, information that has to be protected inside that relationship is very difficult to protect,” Carmack said.
The “Five Eyes” started during World War II as an intelligence-sharing agreement between the U.S. and U.K. to defeat the Axis powers, and grew to include the other three member countries. The pact has lasted more than seven decades.
Over the last few years, China has several times surprised the member countries, as with its summer’s tests of a hypersonic missile that circled the globe.
Gallego said adding Japan, South Korea, and India would allow the U.S. to expand its network of espionage assets to better monitor China through those nations’ cultural ties and location.
“We have worked greatly with South Korea for many years and they probably have better assets in China and in Asia that we could be working with, but we don’t have that relationship with them where we can share as much information as we do with Britain,” he said.
Gallego said it would likely be an uphill battle of both bureaucracy and norms to change the pact after so many years, and that further study would be needed on each potential partner’s intelligence relationships. But the benefits—both of securing stronger diplomatic ties and improving intelligence—are worth it, he said.
“It is basically a warning to China, as well as a shot in the arm to these nations, that ‘we trust you so much that we are putting you in our sacred circle of intelligence sharing,’” Gallego said.
Each of the Five Eyes countries are still majority-white countries with shared European ancestry. Gallego said he suspects there will be pushback to diversifying.
“I think you are going to have some people who are culturally unaware and at some base level are just xenophobic about sharing information with largely Asian, non-Anglo nations,” Gallego said. “Honestly, they are just going to have to get over that, because this is a whole new world that we are going to be fighting in. And we are likely going to be fighting with these friends, and we don’t want to be in a fight without them.”
Gallego’s provision was included in the House version of the NDAA, which was passed in September. The Senate has not yet passed its version, which will need to be reconciled with the House version before it is sent on to President Joe Biden for his signature.
17. U.S. Marines training Taiwan elite troops in Guam
U.S. Marines training Taiwan elite troops in Guam
Newsweek · by John Feng · November 2, 2021
A platoon of Taiwan's elite soldiers traveled to Guam to receive a month of combat training with the U.S. Marine Corps (USMC), according to a local newspaper report that was acknowledged by Taiwan's top defense official.
Just under 40 members of Taiwan's Republic of China Marine Corps (ROCMC) 99th Marine Brigade were selected to take part in exercises including amphibious and airborne assault, urban warfare and "joint operations" training, led by their American counterparts, Apple Daily reported.
Speaking outside the Taiwanese legislature early on Tuesday, Taiwan Defense Minister Chiu Kuo-cheng said: "We have a long history of exchanges and cooperation with the United States. There is necessary interaction on some levels, and this forms part of the exchanges."
In an attempt to downplay the news, the otherwise guarded Chiu noted his department's acknowledgement of similar training programs in the past, adding: "There's no need for further speculation."
U.S. Defense Department spokesperson Lt. Col. Martin Meiners told Newsweek: "I don't have any comments on specific operations, engagements, or training, but I would like to highlight that our support for and defense relationship with Taiwan remains aligned against the current threat posed by the People's Republic of China and is in line with our commitments under the Taiwan Relations Act and our One China policy."
Taiwan's Republic of China Marine Corps 66th Marine Brigade, known as “Vanguard,” takes part in an amphibious assault exercise on a beach in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, on July 15, 2021. Taiwan Military News Agency / Ministry of National Defense
The Apple Daily report said the month-long program is happening under the Luhou—"Marine Roar"—program, established in 1958, while the U.S.-Taiwan mutual defense treaty was still in effect. It was revived in 2017 after having concluded with the end of official diplomatic relations between Washington and Taipei in 1979. The treaty was superseded by the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA), which doesn't include a defense guarantee.
However, the TRA—supported by then Senator Joe Biden—obligates the U.S. to supply Taiwan with the necessary arms and services to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability. There is an additional requirement for the U.S. to maintain its own military capacity "to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion that would jeopardize the security, or the social or economic system, of the people on Taiwan."
According to the Taipei-based newspaper, Luhou is run through the American Institute in Taiwan's Kaohsiung office in the south of the island. The ROCMC, which shares the USMC's Semper Fidelis—"always faithful"—motto, is being led in Guam by officials from Taiwan's Marine Corps Command.
The troops are being taught the latest in USMC combat tactics, while American officials are expected to review and assess their capabilities, Apple Daily said.
Retired USMC Col. Grant Newsham, a former liaison officer to the Japan Self-Defense Forces who has also studied Taiwan's defense setup, noted the need for more substantive military cooperation across the board, such as the House's proposal to invite Taiwan's navy to next year's Rim of the Pacific Exercise—also known as RIMPAC.
Due to Taipei's lack of formal diplomatic relations with the U.S. and other major parties in the region, its armed forces have suffered levels of isolation similar to those experienced by Taiwanese diplomats.
Taiwanese marines are benefiting from interacting with troops from another country, Newsham told Newsweek.
"Think of a baseball team that finally gets to play a game with another team, rather than always playing intrasquad games. You only improve when you play with other teams. You need to keep doing this, of course. Not just a one-time event," he added.
"But the real test is what comes next," Newsham said. The expansion of training exercises in both scope and frequency as well as the mutual exchange of liaison officers will all be important.
American Troops in Taiwan Training Forces, President Tsai Ing-wen Confirms
Read more
In a CNN interview last week, Taiwan's president, Tsai Ing-wen, confirmed the presence of U.S. military instructors who are assisting the island's defense preparations.
In a report on Monday, Hong Kong's South China Morning Post said the existence of American military advisers in Taiwan has been an open secret known to the Chinese government for decades. Military sources in Beijing told the paper that Tsai's announcement was taken as a "politically motivated attempt to provoke China."
While Tsai became the first Taiwanese leader in the many decades to openly acknowledge the assistance, she wasn't the one who made the initial revelations. In early October, unnamed U.S. officials separately confirmed to The Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times that American special forces instructors had been rotating in and out of the island for training duties for a number of years.
There are also Taiwanese officers and air force pilots who are being schooled and trained at American academies along with students from other nations.
While speaking to reporters on Tuesday, defense chief Chiu also disagreed that acknowledging U.S. instructors on the island amounted to poking Beijing in the eye.
"We're not provoking anyone. They leave when the training ends. This is completely different from troops being stationed in Taiwan," he said. "As for how the other party wants to define it, I don't know and don't understand."
Updated 2/11/21 at 11:35 a.m. ET: This story has been updated to include a comment from the Pentagon.
Taiwan's Republic of China Marine Corps 66th Marine Brigade, known as “Vanguard,” takes part in an amphibious assault exercise on a beach in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, on July 15, 2021. Taiwan Military News Agency / Ministry of National Defense
Newsweek · by John Feng · November 2, 2021
18. Bulls, Bears, and Trolls: Social Media Influence Operations and Financial Market Risk
Financial markets are targets in Unrestricted Warfare.
Bulls, Bears, and Trolls: Social Media Influence Operations and Financial Market Risk
As the global economy continues to become more interconnected, communication networks and financial marketplaces present compelling battlefields for competition between states. State-driven financial market manipulation is not a new concept or practice in terms of pure economic interest as well as in terms of national security. China has long been accused of manipulating the value of its Yuan currency, much to the detriment of its trading partners.[1] China artificially decreased the value of its currency through “persistent one-sided intervention in the foreign exchange market,” essentially weakening the relative purchasing power of the Yuan by using it to buy and hold foreign currency reserves.[2] Although it manipulated its own currency, China’s actions have incentivized the amount of relatively cheap Chinese goods that its trading partners import. In turn, it also weakened the demand for the relatively more expensive goods produced by the competing domestic industries within those importing countries. In response, the United States Treasury has gone as far as formally labelling China as a Currency Manipulator and pursued remedies and relief through the International Monetary Fund.[3]
Financial markets present unique and evolving risks as states compete through the economic and information instruments of power.
States also have shown the capacity to influence commodity prices in global markets. While heavily dependent on oil exports, Saudi Arabia did not act to counter falling oil prices in 2016.[4] Rather than cutting back its production, decreasing the supply of oil, and pushing the market price back up, Saudi Arabia simply continued to produce oil at a consistent level. As “[t]he countries most negatively affected by low prices are Saudi Arabia’s enemies and competitors…Russia and Iran, which depend heavily on revenue from oil exports,” Saudi Arabia used its market influence to pursue its own interests at the expense of its rivals.[5] While it may first appear that this was inaction on Saudi Arabia’s part, it was a conscious and strategic decision. Saudi Arabia may have suffered economically in the short run by maintaining its oil production and keeping oil prices low, but it also bolstered its national security by diminishing the revenue of its enemies.
Financial markets present unique and evolving risks as states compete through the economic and information instruments of power. States have proven their ability and interest in manipulating both financial and political markets, and amplified through social media. While there are limited military options for response to these challenges, financial and economic markets present an unusual battlefield as states attempt to gain influence on the geopolitical stage.
Social Media Influence on Political and Financial Markets
Although social media is a powerful tool for communication, states have shown the capacity and intent to use it to pursue their own ambitions on the world stage. The Russian Federation has embraced social media platforms as avenues for influencing foreign populations. Russia or its proxies have “created fake social media accounts…posting misinformation and vitriol aimed at sowing confusion among the electorate.”[6] Targets of Russian social media influence campaigns include the 2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum, the 2016 United States presidential election, the 2017 German federal election, the 2018 Italian parliamentary election, and the 2020 United States presidential election.[7] Whether Russia achieved its strategic aims or not, it has shown its interest in social media manipulation campaigns, its intent to repeat the techniques, and it is likely to use them for future political objectives.
Unlike GameStop and AMC, trading in cryptocurrencies is not halted, leaving the markets open for further manipulation and disruption.
Financial markets have proven to be susceptible to influence by social media trends as well. Individual traders reading the widely publicized “Wall Street Bets” forum on the message board website Reddit have influenced the prices of traditional publicly traded equities such as shares of companies like GameStop and AMC Theaters.[8] Large investment managers who had taken short positions on these equities suffered significant losses and even called for regulatory intervention citing manipulation of markets.[9] Market halts on trading did ultimately come into effect for shares of both companies due to excessive volatility. Similarly, the prices of nontraditional assets like the Dogecoin cryptocurrency have fluctuated based on social media-driven speculation.[10] Operating in a decentralized finance environment, cryptocurrencies do not have regulatory oversight by design. Unlike GameStop and AMC, trading in cryptocurrencies is not halted, leaving the markets open for further manipulation and disruption. Spurred by the social media conversation, investors flocked to these financial markets and drove up the prices of the assets.
Targets and Capabilities
The intersection of these examples of market manipulation poses several challenging issues for the economic and security communities. If the prices of equities are susceptible to the influence of social media-based trading, currency prices are likely vulnerable as well. With this in mind, states have the potential to redirect their social media influence campaigns to target financial markets as they seek to expand their strategic influence. Accordingly, it is vital for economic and security professionals to understand which states have the capabilities to carry out these influence operations and who their potential targets could be.
Aggressor states employing social media-driven financial warfare would tailor their actions for states fitting a specific profile. States that are heavily reliant on either imports or exports would be the most vulnerable to and feel the greatest impact from fluctuations in their currencies. If a belligerent actor drove up the value of a target state’s currency, it would effectively make the target’s exports more expensive. Consumers would then turn to producers with a more favorable exchange rate to buy the goods for a cheaper price, effectively reducing the exports from and revenue to the target country. Similarly, if a country is heavily reliant on imports, devaluing its currency would make those imports relatively more expensive. Each unit of the importer’s currency would buy less foreign currency required to purchase imports.[11]
In terms of social media influence, a state must have the technological and financial capacity to support sizable social media influence operations.
States with small economies and whose currency has a small trading base or is not widely issued would be the most vulnerable to this type of manipulation. If a currency does not have a high volume in circulation, it would not take as many purchases or sales of the currency to start to have a significant effect. On the contrary, states with larger economies or which peg their exchange rate to a more stable currency would enjoy a greater level of protection from this type of manipulation. With a larger trade volume and volume of currency to manipulate, the manipulator would be required to influence a greater number of trades and a much higher total price to achieve the same proportional effect.
With these limitations in mind it becomes clear that not every state can wield this type of influence. In terms of social media influence, a state must have the technological and financial capacity to support sizable social media influence operations. Returning to the Russia example, Russia reportedly employed over 600 people in its Internet Research Agency “troll farms” as recently as 2018.[12] The cost of employing the resources required to manipulate a market may prove prohibitive for small states to pursue this strategy. Meanwhile, a state would likely need to jumpstart trading in a currency to influence either a rally to drive currency prices up or a selloff to drive currency prices down. While these trades would need to take place through cutouts or entities that appear to be third parties, the state would ultimately incur the expense of purchasing a foreign currency and would lose access to those funds as long as they are held in reserve and not traded.
Defending Social Media Influence Operations
Mitigation of these risks falls largely outside the realm of military power and instead lies with the regulatory state, private companies, and international non-governmental organizations. In terms of social media, companies largely police their content themselves. Unless a state enacts legislation that limits the uses of social media, it is forced to rely on the third-party social media network companies to monitor and moderate their own platforms.[13] When dealing with currency manipulation that is directly carried out by a foreign government, participating states must work through organizations like the International Monetary Fund and World Trade Organization.[14] Otherwise, they may face potential sanctions or economic penalties themselves for violating trade agreements or other international financial regulatory regimes.
Defensive cyberwarfare would likely appear in the form of counter-messaging, or even monitoring or blocking foreign content from reaching social networks in the first place…
However, militaries have a potential role in what could be a last resort for states looking to combat foreign social media influence. Though doctrinally limited, in a U.S. context, by the “unique legal considerations” of each engagement, both offensive and defensive cyber warfare operations could be used to counter the effects of social media-based influence operations.[15] Offensive cyber warfare operations could target the technological resources of a belligerent state conducting a social media campaign. This is certainly the most decisive action since offensive cyber operations would “involve deliberate intrusions into opponent networks or systems with the intention of causing disruption, damage or destruction” to degrade or eliminate a foreign actor’s ability to use social media to influence a financial market.[16] As with other offensive military actions, the Law of Armed Conflict, the United Nations Charter, and the tenets of just war theory constrain the use of offensive cyber operations.[17]
As states pursue competitive advantages in all possible arenas, financial markets present fertile ground for manipulation and conflict.
Defensive responses face their own structural constraints as social media influence operations take place in publicly accessible systems run by corporations. Defensive cyberwarfare would likely appear in the form of counter-messaging, or even monitoring or blocking foreign content from reaching social networks in the first place, as long as the action is permissible in the legal context of the defending state.[18] Any military response would likely be limited, however, unless such cyber warfare was part of a broader conflict. When actions are ostensibly taken by third parties in open markets, direct military action may be difficult to justify. While Russian and Chinese hackers have repeatedly struck foreign governments and corporations, states have shown significant military restraint in response to cyberattacks lest military responses be considered acts of aggression strong enough to trigger conventional war.[19]
Conclusion
As states pursue competitive advantages in all possible arenas, financial markets present fertile ground for manipulation and conflict. Examples abound of states using their influence to manipulate prices in financial markets, including currencies and commodities. Manipulation does not remain limited to financial markets, however, and has stretched into elections and political systems through the use of social media information operations. Financial markets have proven to be susceptible to influence by social media trends, presenting a challenging risk environment. While there are limited military responses to this emerging threat, states must consider their whole of government options to defend against financial threats away from the battlefield. Although difficult to navigate, financial markets present a unique strategic vulnerability and demand attention as a potential avenue for future conflict.
David Day is an officer in the U.S. Air Force Reserve and a Vice President of Asset Management at a leading manager of commercial real estate lending and investment vehicles. He holds a Master of Science in International Economics from Baylor University’s Hankamer School of Business and a Master of Public Management from the University of Maryland School of Public Policy. The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of his employer, the United States Air Force, Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.
The Strategy Bridge is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.
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Header Image: Stock and Crypto Market Values, January 29, 2021 (Maxim Hopman).
Notes:
[2] U.S. Department of the Treasury Office of International Affairs, “Macroeconomic and Foreign Exchange Policies of Major Trading Partners of the United States,” Report to Congress (May 2019): 38.
[7] Ibid.
[11] Cathy L. Jabara, “How Do Exchange Rates Affect Import Prices? Recent Economic
[17] Herbert S. Lin, “Offensive Cyber Operations and the Use of Force,” Journal of National Security Law & Policy 4, no. 1 (August 2010): 71.
19. Why the promise of nuclear fusion is no longer a pipe dream
Can we use the overused term "game changer" for this?
Why the promise of nuclear fusion is no longer a pipe dream
Fusion – combining atomic nuclei to release energy – is a clean and safe way to power our homes and industry. This ‘holy grail’ of energy has eluded physicists for decades, but there are signs that a bright future could be on the horizon.
Published: 03rd November, 2021 at 04:00
It sounds like the stuff of dreams: a virtually limitless source of energy that doesn’t produce greenhouse gases or radioactive waste. That’s the promise of nuclear fusion, which for decades has been nothing more than a fantasy due to insurmountable technical challenges. But things are heating up in what has turned into a race to create what amounts to an artificial sun here on Earth, one that can provide power for our kettles, cars and light bulbs.
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Today’s nuclear power plants create electricity through nuclear fission, in which atoms are split. Nuclear fusion however, involves combining atomic nuclei to release energy. It’s the same reaction that’s taking place at the Sun’s core. But overcoming the natural repulsion between atomic nuclei and maintaining the right conditions for fusion to occur isn’t straightforward. And doing so in a way that produces more energy than the reaction consumes has been beyond the grasp of the finest minds in physics for decades.
But perhaps not for much longer. Some major technical challenges have been overcome in the past few years and governments around the world have been pouring money into fusion power research. There are also over 20 private ventures in the UK, US, Europe, China and Australia vying to be the first to make fusion energy production a reality.
“People are saying, ‘If it really is the ultimate solution, let’s find out whether it works or not,’” says Dr Tim Luce, head of science and operation at the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), being built in southeast France. ITER is the biggest throw of the fusion dice yet.
Its $22bn (£15.9bn) build cost is being met by the governments of two-thirds of the world’s population, including the EU, the US, China and Russia, and when it’s fired up in 2025 it’ll be the world’s largest fusion reactor. If it works, ITER will transform fusion power from being the stuff of dreams into a viable energy source.
Read more about nuclear fusion reactors:
Constructing a nuclear fusion reactor
ITER will be a tokamak reactor – thought to be the best hope for fusion power. Inside a tokamak, a gas, often a hydrogen isotope called deuterium, is subjected to intense heat and pressure, forcing electrons out of the atoms. This creates a plasma – a superheated, ionised gas – that has to be contained by intense magnetic fields.
The containment is vital, as no material on Earth could withstand the intense heat (100,000,000°C and above) that the plasma has to reach so that fusion can begin. It’s close to 10 times the heat at the Sun’s core, and temperatures like that are needed in a tokamak because the gravitational pressure within the Sun can’t be recreated.
When atomic nuclei do start to fuse, vast amounts of energy are released. While the experimental reactors currently in operation release that energy as heat, in a fusion reactor power plant, the heat would be used to produce steam that would drive turbines to generate electricity.
Tokamaks aren’t the only fusion reactors being tried. Another type of reactor uses lasers to heat and compress a hydrogen fuel to initiate fusion. In August 2021, one such device at the National Ignition Facility, at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, generated 1.35 megajoules of energy. This record-breaking figure brings fusion power a step closer to net energy gain, but most hopes are still pinned on tokamak reactors rather than lasers.
In June 2021, China’s Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) reactor maintained a plasma for 101 seconds at 120,000,000°C. Before that, the record was 20 seconds. Ultimately, a fusion reactor would need to sustain the plasma indefinitely – or at least for eight-hour ‘pulses’ during periods of peak electricity demand.
A real game-changer for tokamaks has been the magnets used to produce the magnetic field. “We know how to make magnets that generate a very high magnetic field from copper or other kinds of metal, but you would pay a fortune for the electricity. It wouldn’t be a net energy gain from the plant,” says Luce.
One route for nuclear fusion is to use atoms of deuterium and tritium, both isotopes of hydrogen. They fuse under incredible heat and pressure, and the resulting products release energy as heat © Getty Images
The solution is to use high-temperature, superconducting magnets made from superconducting wire, or ‘tape’, that has no electrical resistance. These magnets can create intense magnetic fields and don’t lose energy as heat.
“High temperature superconductivity has been known about for 35 years. But the manufacturing capability to make tape in the lengths that would be required to make a reasonable fusion coil has just recently been developed,” says Luce. One of ITER’s magnets, the central solenoid, will produce a field of 13 tesla – 280,000 times Earth’s magnetic field.
The inner walls of ITER’s vacuum vessel, where the fusion will occur, will be lined with beryllium, a metal that won’t contaminate the plasma much if they touch. At the bottom is the divertor that will keep the temperature inside the reactor under control.
“The heat load on the divertor can be as large as in a rocket nozzle,” says Luce. “Rocket nozzles work because you can get into orbit within minutes and in space it’s really cold.” In a fusion reactor, a divertor would need to withstand this heat indefinitely and at ITER they’ll be testing one made out of tungsten.
Meanwhile, in the US, the National Spherical Torus Experiment – Upgrade (NSTX-U) fusion reactor will be fired up in the autumn of 2022. One of its priorities will be to see whether lining the reactor with lithium helps to keep the plasma stable.
Read more about nuclear fusion:
Choosing a fuel
Instead of just using deuterium as the fusion fuel, ITER will use deuterium mixed with tritium, another hydrogen isotope. The deuterium-tritium blend offers the best chance of getting significantly more power out than is put in. Proponents of fusion power say one reason the technology is safe is that the fuel needs to be constantly fed into the reactor to keep fusion happening, making a runaway reaction impossible.
Deuterium can be extracted from seawater, so there’s a virtually limitless supply of it. But only 20kg of tritium are thought to exist worldwide, so fusion power plants will have to produce it (ITER will develop technology to ‘breed’ tritium). While some radioactive waste will be produced in a fusion plant, it’ll have a lifetime of around 100 years, rather than the thousands of years from fission.
At the time of writing in September, researchers at the Joint European Torus (JET) fusion reactor in Oxfordshire were due to start their deuterium-tritium fusion reactions. “JET will help ITER prepare a choice of machine parameters to optimise the fusion power,” says Dr Joelle Mailloux, one of the scientific programme leaders at JET. These parameters will include finding the best combination of deuterium and tritium, and establishing how the current is increased in the magnets before fusion starts.
The groundwork laid down at JET should accelerate ITER’s efforts to accomplish net energy gain. ITER will produce ‘first plasma’ in December 2025 and be cranked up to full power over the following decade. Its plasma temperature will reach 150,000,000°C and its target is to produce 500 megawatts of fusion power for every 50 megawatts of input heating power.
“If ITER is successful, it’ll eliminate most, if not all, doubts about the science and liberate money for technology development,” says Luce. That technology development will be demonstration fusion power plants that actually produce electricity. “ITER is opening the door and saying, yeah, this works – the science is there.”
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20. The Defense Policy Bill Is Late Again. This Year, the GOP Is Blaming Democrats
The Defense Policy Bill Is Late Again. This Year, the GOP Is Blaming Democrats
Four of the past 10 NDAAs passed the Senate in November or December.
Senate Republicans are trying to use Democrats’ support for the president’s Build Back Better Act against them, alleging that their work on the tax-and-social safety net plan constitutes neglect of the military.
The 2022 National Defense Authorization Act, a must-pass bill that has languished in the Senate while Democrats have held votes on other priorities, is typically considered and approved on a bipartisan basis. But this year, the annual legislation is becoming a political talking point for Republicans, who argue the Democrats and President Joe Biden are shirking their duty to defend the nation.
“Democrats in Washington have been so preoccupied with passing their reckless tax-and-spending spree that they have overlooked and ignored some of the basic responsibilities of governing,” Sen. John Thune, R-N.D., said at a press conference on Tuesday. “China is testing supersonic missiles and we are here in Washington talking about things like so-called tree equity. It is an incredible lack of responsibility.”
The House passed its version of the NDAA in September. While the Senate Armed Services Committee finalized its version of the bill in July by a vote of 23-3, the full Senate has yet to take it up.
The NDAA is an authorization bill that sets the military’s priorities for the upcoming year, including a pay raise for troops, dozens of new reports to Congress and changes to how the military justice system handles sexual assault, so those initiatives would not start unless the bill is passed.
The bill is not an appropriations bill, but the legislation to fund the Pentagon is also late. Ever since fiscal 2022 began on Oct. 1, the Pentagon has been running on a continuing resolution that holds funding at 2021 levels and forbids new programs to start.
Republicans blamed Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., the majority leader of the Senate who sets the floor schedule, saying that he has provided no answers for why he hasn’t brought up the bill, which has passed every year for the past six decades.
“This has gotten dangerous, that we are not able to see the NDAA come to the floor,” Sen. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., said. “We are running out of time.”
But the Senate has passed the bill in November or later in four of the last 10 years, suggesting the late consideration is not a drastic departure from the norm. Since 2011, the Senate bill has passed once in April, once in May, three times in June, once in September, twice in November and twice in December—once as late as Dec. 12. Six of those late bills were passed when the Senate was under Democratic control, four under GOP control.
Even though they slammed Schumer and Biden, Republicans were quick to praise Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., the chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, for working in a bipartisan manner and pushing to bring the bill to the floor. Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., the ranking member of the committee, said that Reed has told him that he’s asked Schumer about getting a vote “daily” but has not made progress.
Reed’s office did not return a request for comment.
The bill covers the fiscal year that begins on Oct. 1, but rarely is passed before then. The bill typically passes near the end of the calendar year. Of the past 10 annual bills, six have become law in December, two in January and one in November. The lone bill passed before its fiscal year began was the 2019 bill, which Trump signed in August.
After the bill passes each chamber, top lawmakers from both parties negotiate to merge legislation from the House and Senate and iron out a compromise version that lawmakers must vote on again before it goes to the president for a signature.
Those negotiations can sometimes take months. In 2014, the Senate passed the bill in April, but it didn’t become law until December.
Inhofe said that by delaying consideration of the bill in the Senate, Schumer is shutting lawmakers out of the process, since a faster floor process typically means few or no amendments can be offered by senators who do not serve on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Other Republicans complained that the military had received lower priority than fighting climate change, nominating a team to serve the federal government, and requiring COVID-19 vaccines for troops and contractors working with the Defense Department.
“We build the hypersonic missile in Alabama….We have 5,000 defense contractors. And what are they having to do? They’re having to fight a vaccine mandate,” Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ark., said. “We better wake up and smell the hypersonic missiles.”
21. Yes, It Was An 'Evil Empire'
Excerpts:
It was a system in which any manifestation of personal autonomy or unorthodox interests could make you an enemy of the state. Jazz fans who circulated clandestine copies of Western records were persecuted in the late 1950s. Karate, which became hugely popular in the Soviet Union in the 1970s, was abruptly banned in 1981, reportedly because the authorities were concerned that it was channeling attention away from more important Olympic sports and that it might enable people to fight back against the police in mass protests. Suddenly, teaching karate could earn you a five-year stint in the prison camps.
The Soviet Union's first few decades were the stuff of nightmares, from the Red Terror, which is believed to have killed over a million people after the Revolution, to the "Terror-Famine" in Ukraine (as well as Kazakhstan and parts of Southern Russia), whose death toll is estimated at 7 million, to Stalin's Great Terror, in which hundreds of thousands were shot and many more worked to death in the Siberian gulag camps. Among my parents' friends and coworkers, few did not have a story (if they were candid about it) of a family member or relative imprisoned in the Stalin era for some absurd reason: Someone's aunt was branded a subversive because a neighbor heard her playing a funeral march on the piano the day a notorious "enemy of the people" was executed; someone's father was charged with fomenting "defeatist attitudes" during the war for remarking that Stalin "sounded sad" in his radio address to the people.
By the end of its existence, the Soviet Union was an exhausted totalitarian regime trying to maintain its grip on a society that laughed at official pieties, craved consumer goods, was thrilled by the forbidden, and idolized the West. The woman on the bus who had thought it was ridiculous to call the Soviet Union an "evil empire" came to mind, seven or eight years later, when I saw a photo of a rally in Moscow. A sign was being held by someone who, like me, had lived under the reality of communism. It said: "THE USSR: YES, IT IS THE EVIL EMPIRE!"
Yes, It Was An 'Evil Empire'
Reason · by Cathy Young · November 1, 2021
Nearly every form of Soviet nostalgia gets the facts wrong.
(Photo: Peter Turnley/Corbis/Getty)
It was the summer of 1983, and I, a Soviet émigré and an American in the making, was chatting with the pleasant middle-aged woman sitting next to me on a bus from Asbury Park, New Jersey, to Cherry Hill. Eventually our conversation got to the fact that I was from the Soviet Union, having arrived in the U.S. with my family three years earlier at age 17. "Oh, really?" said my seatmate. "You must have been pretty offended when our president called the Soviet Union an 'evil empire'! Wasn't that ridiculous?" But her merriment at the supposed absurdity of President Ronald Reagan's recent speech was cut short when I somewhat sheepishly informed her that I thought he was entirely on point.
In 1983, the 61-year-old empire looked like it would be eternal. My next memorable conversation about the Soviet Union with a fellow passenger, in December 1991, proved otherwise. I was aboard a flight from Moscow to Newark, New Jersey, after a two-week visit, waiting for takeoff. "Do you know that the Soviet Union doesn't exist anymore?" the man next to me said. I stared. He showed me that day's International Herald Tribune with a headline about the Belovezha Accords, an agreement by which the leaders of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus agreed to dissolve the USSR.
The evil empire was over.
The Gulag Empire
The woman on the bus in 1983 did not surprise me. By then, I had already met many Americans for whom "anti-Soviet" was almost as much of a pejorative as it had been in the pages of Pravda, the official newspaper of the Soviet Communist Party. My favorite was a man in the café at the Rutgers Student Center who shrugged off the victims of the gulag camps by pointing out that capitalism kills people too—with cigarettes, for example. When I recovered from shock, I told him that smoking was far more ubiquitous in the Soviet Union, and anti-smoking campaigns far less developed. That momentarily stumped him.
My mother was also at Rutgers at the time as a piano instructor. She once got into a heated argument over lunch with a colleague and friend after he lamented America's appalling treatment of the old and the sick. She ventured that, from her ex-Soviet vantage point, it didn't seem that bad. "Are you telling me that it's just as bad in the Soviet Union?" her colleague retorted, only to be dumbstruck when my mother clarified that, actually, she meant it was much worse. She tried to illustrate her point by telling him about my grandmother's sojourn in an overcrowded Soviet hospital ward: More than once, when the woman in the next bed rolled over in her sleep, her arm flopped across my grandma's body. Half-decent care required bribing a nurse, and half-decent food had to be brought from home. My mother's normally warm and gracious colleague shocked her by replying, "I'm sorry, but I don't believe you." Her perceptions, he told her, were obviously colored by antipathy toward the Soviet regime. Eventually, he relented enough to allow that perhaps my grandmother did have a very bad experience in a Soviet hospital—but surely projecting it onto all of Soviet medicine was uncalled for.
It wasn't just the campus lefties. The Twitter generation may believe that mainstream American culture at the time was in the grip of Reaganite anti-communism, but some of us remember differently. Media coverage of Soviet human rights abuses, for instance, was frequently accompanied by reminders that the United States and the Soviet Union simply had "fundamentally different perceptions of human rights," as U.S. News & World Report put it in 1985: "To the Kremlin, human rights are associated primarily with the conditions of physical survival." A 1982 guide for high school study of human rights issued by the National Council for Social Studies even suggested that it was "ethnocentric" to regard "our" definition of human rights as superior to "theirs."
As Soviet society began to open up under Mikhail Gorbachev's policy of glasnost (a term that means something like "openness and transparency," and that one Soviet dissident defined as "a tortoise crawling towards freedom of speech"), more information began to come out in the Soviet press that cast serious doubt on the Soviet Union's supposed gains on the social welfare side of "human rights." There were stories about the dismal state of Soviet medicine, about crime, about millions condemned to appalling living conditions, about Dickensian orphanages sheltering abused and malnourished children, and about homeless people who suddenly turned out to exist, despite prior reports to the contrary. (The weekly newspaper Argumenty i Fakty reported that 174,000 vagrants were picked up in 1984 alone.) Meanwhile, the regime was crumbling; as satirist Victor Shenderovich put it later, "the country still had Soviet power but the food had already run out."
In just a few years, Soviet communism was relegated, just as Reagan had predicted to much ridicule, to "the ash heap of history." The leaders of the new Russia that emerged in its place themselves echoed the language of "evil empire" when they spoke of the Soviet past: During the 1996 elections, President Boris Yeltsin told supporters at a campaign rally they had to win "so that Russia can never be called an evil empire again."
For leftists who still saw communism as a noble dream, this was a devastating defeat. In 1999, at the close of what was, in a very real sense, the Soviet century, the Polish-American socialist journalist Daniel Singer—himself the son of a gulag survivor—wrote in The Nation that a reckoning with communist atrocities was necessary; but he also rejected the "corpse-counting" of The Black Book of Communism, a collection of historical essays that sought to chronicle those atrocities. Singer took the authors to task for reducing communism's record to "crimes, terror and repression."
"The Soviet Union did not rest on the gulag alone. There was also enthusiasm, construction, the spread of education and social advancement for millions," Singer asserted, lamenting that the Black Book approach made it impossible to "comprehend why millions of the best and brightest rallied behind the red flag or…turned a blind eye to the crimes committed in its name." (It was apparently not satisfying to answer with the pithy phrase coined by statistician and essayist Nassim Nicholas Taleb: Because they were "intellectuals-yet-idiots.")
As the new century rolled onward, the Soviet Union was still dead, but it turned out to be an unquiet ghost. The new man at Russia's helm, career KGB officer Vladimir Putin, brought back the Soviet anthem (albeit with new lyrics about God and Russian greatness) and the red flag as the Russian Armed Forces banner, working to make Soviet nostalgia respectable—albeit in a weird blend with Russian nationalism, Orthodox Christianity, and reverence for the czars. An idealized image of Soviet communism also bubbled back up among progressives in the West, especially after the reputation of democratic capitalism was left tarnished by the war in Iraq and the Great Recession. "Neoliberalism" was out; "socialism" was in: From 2010 onward, 49 percent or larger portions of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents and of adults under 30 have said they have a positive view of socialism. By the end of the decade, even communism was surging in popularity: It was viewed favorably by 36 percent of millennials (up from 28 percent in 2018) and 28 percent of Generation Z.
Soviet-style communism is also getting favorable press in progressive venues—from the trollish Chapo Trap House podcast to Salon ("Why you're wrong about Communism") to radical chic playpen Teen Vogue, which hailed Karl Marx for his 200th birthday in 2018 as a thinker who "inspired social movements in Soviet Russia, China, Cuba." On the opinion pages of The New York Times, Kristen Ghodsee, a professor of Russian and East European studies at the University of Pennsylvania, dubiously declared that women had better sex under Soviet-style socialism, a thesis she then expanded into a slim book lauding communist strides toward gender equality. Even The New Republic, once a bastion of liberal anti-communism, jumped on the bandwagon in 2016 with "Who's Afraid of Communism?" by former Occupy Wall Street activist Malcolm Harris, who zinged Hillary Clinton for her old-fashioned Cold Warrior mentality and argued that communism was getting a bum rap, given the Soviet Union's heroic role in the victory over Nazism and the key contributions of communists to "liberation" struggles all over the world.
On social media today, "tankies" with hammer-and-sickle emojis in their usernames and Marx or Lenin profile headers are a loud and proud faction of lefty Twitter. These are overwhelmingly young people, in their 20s and sometimes late teens, steeped in the racial and sexual identity politics of their generation of activists, often sporting gender pronouns and rainbow flags in their bios along with the communist symbology. Many seem convinced that actual Soviet-style communism—not just the "hasn't been tried" utopian ideal—was an admirable vision. "The more I read about the Soviet Union the more obvious it becomes why the west had to demonize it," writes a "queer," "anti-imperialist" Twitter user with the colorful moniker "hezbolleninism." "The USSR's ideology was not only a threat to capitalism, it was a threat to white supremacy."
A Picture of Prejudice
Not surprisingly, like the 20th century "political pilgrims" (as author Paul Hollander called them) who traveled to the Soviet Union or Cuba and came back with glowing reports, the 21st century communist nostalgics often have a tenuous connection with reality.
Hezbolleninism's tweet, for example, featured a screenshot from the 2018 book Politics and Pedagogy in the 'Post-Truth' Era: Insurgent Philosophy and Praxis (Bloomsbury Academic) by Derek R. Ford, a professor of education studies at DePauw University in Indiana, discussing anti-racism in the Soviet Union. Ford describes a 1930 incident involving "Robert Robertson, a Jamaican native and U.S. citizen" who came to work at a tractor factory in Stalingrad alongside a few hundred white American technicians. (The Soviets were strenuously recruiting foreign and especially American specialists, since Lenin's prediction that the new regime would quickly train its own cadre with proletarian backgrounds and impeccable Bolshevik convictions had proved a tad overconfident.) On his first day, the black worker was roughed up by two white Americans when he tried to eat in the American dining hall. The assault was widely publicized and denounced at factory meetings around the Soviet Union; the attackers were convicted of "white chauvinism" at a show trial and sentenced to two years of imprisonment (commuted to 10 years banishment from the Soviet Union). "Robertson remained in the Soviet Union, where he eventually gained citizenship," reports Ford, for whom this episode demonstrates "the seriousness with which the Soviet Union—its people and its state—took racism."
But Ford left out the end of the story. After becoming a Soviet citizen, Robinson (yes, Ford got the name wrong) spent decades trying to get out of the supposed anti-racist paradise. He finally managed it in 1974, when he obtained permission to travel to Uganda as a tourist and never returned. He eventually made it to the U.S., regained his citizenship in 1986, and wrote a scathingly anti-Soviet 1988 memoir titled Black on Red. Robinson conceded that the Soviet Union gave him professional opportunities he probably would not have had as a black American in that era. But he also described the ordeal of the Great Terror, when his friends and colleagues were disappearing one after another, as well as casual and not-so-casual encounters with racism.
Robinson's Soviet saga is richly illustrative of Soviet "anti-racism," deployed almost exclusively as a weapon with which to bludgeon the Americans (and more generally the West). Black people were useful insofar as they advanced the communist cause, but they were treated more as white-savior projects than as human beings in their own right.
Likewise, the African students who began to attend Soviet universities in the 1960s as part of the USSR's outreach to newly decolonized African countries tended to be viewed by their hosts as backward, needy, and often ungrateful recipients of Soviet largesse. In a fascinating 2014 article in the journal Diplomatic History, Russian studies scholar and podcaster Sean Guillory writes that the Africans were given insultingly easy entrance exams with elementary school–level math problems, while their complaints of racist harassment were generally shrugged off as hypersensitivity bred by colonialist oppression. Meanwhile, grassroots Soviet humor generated its share of extremely nasty jokes (which circulated freely at my school in the 1970s) depicting the Soviet Union's African guests as simple-minded savages, perpetually horny for white women and literally related to monkeys.
Anti-black racism was just part of a bigger picture of prejudice. As early as 1926, the Soviet regime began to plan the removal of ethnic Koreans living in the Soviet Far East, who were seen as a threat who might work with the Japanese to undermine the Soviet Union. Deportations began slowly, until 170,000 people were forcibly moved to Central Asia in 1937. While parallels to the internment of Japanese Americans in the United States are obvious, the Soviet version was far deadlier: estimates of the death toll from malnutrition, illness, and exposure (with the deportees transported in unheated cargo cars in cold weather and resettled in hastily constructed barracks or huts) range from 16,500 to 50,000. This ethnic cleansing was followed by others in the 1940s: Kalmyks, Crimean Tatars, Chechens, and other ethnicities were collectively branded as Nazi collaborators and brutally relocated. Some were allowed to return after Josef Stalin's death; others, such as the Crimean Tatars, were not.
Anti-Asian prejudice soared after the Sino-Soviet split, with rabid propaganda depicting the Chinese as the ultimate enemy and generating genuine paranoia about a Chinese invasion. As often happens, anyone who looked Chinese was fair game. My mother once heard a shopper at a Moscow farmers market shout to a vendor, "You! Chinaman! How much for your apples?" When the vendor defensively replied that he was Kazakh, the woman retorted, "Yeah, I know you're not a Chinaman. If I thought you were, I'd bash your head in."
And that's not to mention the anti-Semitism that culminated in the campaign against "cosmopolitans" and Zionists in Stalin's final years, but continued in more low-key ways for decades after that. Discrimination against Jews in college admissions was so common that it was reflected in numerous jokes (e.g., one in which an ethnic Russian taking a college entrance history exam is asked for the year of the sinking of the Titanic while a Jewish applicant is told to list all the casualties by name). The brother of one of my mother's piano students got a failing grade on the entrance exams despite a brilliant academic record; after his father got an influential professor to intervene, it turned out that the examiner thought he looked Jewish. In deference to the professor, the examiner agreed to change the failing grade but irritably remarked, "Just don't tell me he's not a Jew—I'm not stupid!"
On a more basic level, Soviet anti-Zionist propaganda trickled down into a casual anti-Semitism that regularly manifested itself in harassment and even violence. Thankfully, my own bad experiences were very minor (a boy in my building shouting "You miserable Jew-girl!" during a playground conflict; a drunk at a bus stop ranting about Jews). But my parents endured several years of abuse by a Jew-hating neighbor in a communal apartment before they were finally able to move out. Other people had harrowing stories of children being tormented at school by anti-Semitic bullies who acted with impunity. A fellow émigré I met in the U.S. told me her decision to leave was solidified when she learned that her teenaged son had started carrying a knife to school for self-defense.
Ironically for American leftists, the dominant Soviet attitude toward race and ethnicity was precisely the sort of see-no-evil faux colorblindness that progressives love to denounce in the U.S. context. In nine and a half years of Soviet schooling, I sat through numerous lectures on proper Soviet values and only ever heard racial or ethnic prejudice mentioned as an example of Bad Things Over There In America.
Even the enemy's racism could be downplayed if convenient: Witness the Soviet authorities' systematic erasure of the Jewish Holocaust in discussing Nazi atrocities. This adds an ironic asterisk to the praise often heaped on the Soviet Union for its role in defeating the Nazis. Yes, Soviet forces liberated Auschwitz, but the official Soviet report on its horrors described the victims as "citizens of the Soviet Union, Poland, France," and others, with just one specific mention of Jews—a passing reference to "a Jewish woman named Bella" in an excerpt from a survivor's statement. In 1961, the poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko was briefly "canceled," as we would say nowadays, for "fomenting ethnic division" by explicitly focusing on a Nazi massacre of Jews in the famous poem "Babi Yar," and the Literary Gazette editor who greenlit the poem was sacked.
Some Were More Equal Than Others
Class equality in the Soviet Union was just as phony as anti-racism. In Politics and Pedagogy in the 'Post-Truth' Era, Ford admiringly mentions that "wage disparities were relatively minor," with top officials of the economic ministries earning only three to four times as much as skilled workers. He adds that the earnings gap between the highest- and lowest-paid groups shrank in the 1960s and 1970s.
This comical analysis ("post-truth," indeed!) leaves out the fact, known to anyone with the remotest familiarity with Soviet life, that living standards in the Soviet Union were not determined primarily by official earnings. Party bosses and high-level government officials received almost everything for free, from palatial apartments and dachas (vacation homes) to chauffeured limousines and consumer goods. There was also a secret hierarchy of "special distribution shops" where even lower-rank members of the party and state bureaucracy could buy groceries—with variety and quality that ordinary citizens could not even dream of, no lines, and lower prices than in regular stores. (My father once got smuggled into such a place by a savvy friend who conned his way past the security guard by insinuating that he knew someone important on the staff, but no purchase could be made without a membership pass.) Shenderovich, the Russian satirist, recalled that at a conference in Irkutsk in the late 1980s, he and his colleagues subsisted on sparse, barely edible meals at a cafe near their hotel—until they learned that they had a pass for the cafeteria of the regional party committee, which offered a cheap five-course dinner featuring such elusive delicacies as tomato salad, venison soup, and baked whitefish.
And then there was the separate shadow economy of blat (favors) based on connections and access. ("It's not what you know, it's who you know" was never as true as in the Soviet Union.) For instance, if you could arrange a bed at an elite hospital or admission to a prestigious university—either through your own job or through someone you knew—that could be a ticket to a steady supply of quality food, coveted theater seats, a washing machine, or imported footwear. There was also real money to be made on the black market. If you worked for a store or a warehouse, you pretty much had it made—unless you got greedy and reckless enough to get arrested. People with nothing to steal (engineers, for example) were out of luck.
This fundamental lack of understanding of how the Soviet system of privilege worked is also evident in a hilarious 2018 article in Jacobin, summed up in a tweet that got a well-deserved drubbing: "For all the Soviet Union's many faults, by traversing its vast architectural landscape, we can get a glimpse of what a built environment for the many, not the few, could look like." The prime example of architecture "for the many" invoked by author Marianela D'Aprile, an activist with the Democratic Socialists of America, is an elegant writers union resort on Lake Sevan in Armenia that radiated a "quiet luxury." That is D'Aprile's "glimpse of [a] possible better world." Under capitalism, she writes, such a building would be owned by profit seekers and "reserved for those who can pay large sums"—but imagine "if unions could send their members to their lakeside resort."
One can only wonder whether D'Aprile is genuinely unaware that a writers union resort in the Soviet Union would have been reserved for the cream of the elite, or just willfully blind to facts that might get in the way of her fantasy. To be sure, union-run resorts for ordinary people did exist. In the Soviet Union's early decades, they provided heavily regimented vacations that stressed physical fitness and were spent with one's "labor collective," not with family; later, they became more relaxed and family-oriented. But the accommodations definitely did not exude "quiet luxury": they generally ranged from atrocious to decent-but-accessible-only-with-connections.
Another major aspect of how privilege operated in the Soviet Union could be summed up in the famous maxim about real estate: location, location, location. My family was immensely privileged simply by virtue of having been born in the capital. A Moscow propiska (the residency permit that each Soviet citizen was required to have) was one of the most coveted things in the country, an incentive to sham marriages, ingenious schemes, and elaborate deceptions. The city enjoyed a special status when it came to snabzheniye (supply of food and consumer goods), quality of services, housing, medicine, and so on. Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) was only a notch below. Other large cities were in the second tier, and it was a downward slope from there until you got to small towns mired in squalor, deprivation, and crime (especially drunken violence). There, you would find decrepit housing, grungy food stores with bare shelves, dismal transit, and worse roads. A bus trip could easily expand from one hour to three in bad weather.
My parents and I saw some of this firsthand in 1979 when, already waiting for an exit visa, we decided to visit Yaroslavl and Rostov, two towns notable for their medieval Russian architecture. The architecture was not in great shape, but everything else was truly grim. There was nothing but stacks of canned fish at one store, boxes of fudge candy at another. Want food? Be prepared to line up outside a couple of hours before opening, a saleswoman explained. The shelves emptied quickly.
On weekends, hordes of people from towns as far as a four- or five-hour ride away from Moscow would scramble aboard trains to go to the capital in search of food, braving not only the long trip but frequent open hostility from Muscovites. Once, when my mother was standing in line at a grocery store, some of her fellow shoppers turned viciously on a shabbily dressed old woman they felt was buying too much—and all the more when she explained it was for her grandson in some godforsaken Soviet Hicksville. An angry chorus erupted, blaming out-of-town interlopers for the food shortages ("You people come here and pick everything clean!"). When my mother tried to intervene, they turned their ire on her, saying she was no doubt an out-of-towner herself or she wouldn't be sticking up for the old woman.
All Soviet citizens were equal, of course. But there were so many ways in which some were very much more equal than others.
The Patriarchy Strikes Back
The most mystifying of resurgent left-wing myths about the Soviet Union, though, is that of Soviet sexual liberality and gender progressivism. I always wonder if the Twitter tankies with rainbow flags or "queer" and "pansexual" labels in their profiles are aware that sexual relations between men were a criminal offense in the Soviet Union for most of its existence. One could point out that the first criminal code of the Russian Soviet Republic in 1923 did not, in contrast to czarist Russia, criminalize sex between two males. But in a 1995 article in The Journal of Homosexuality, historian Laura Engelstein argues that the 1934 restoration of criminal penalties was not "a clear reversal of the seemingly enlightened legal practice of the 1920s"; in fact, "Soviet courts tried to repress sexual variation even when homosexuality was not a crime," as early as 1922.
At best, the early Bolshevik revolutionaries regarded homosexuality as a sickness and a perverted manifestation of bourgeois decadence. In later years, all it could take to send a man to prison was a neighbor's testimony that he often had male overnight visitors but no visible girlfriends. Unlike most American sodomy laws, the Soviet version required no evidence of specific sexual acts. Meanwhile, Soviet culture ruthlessly censored anything gay: Thus, the Soviet edition of the letters and diaries of Peter Tchaikovsky scrubbed numerous passages in which the composer discussed his same-sex attraction as well as encounters and relationships with young men.
Women's liberation fared only slightly better. True, the early days of the revolution saw an upsurge in female activism, and the Bolsheviks strongly advocated equality of the sexes. In a 1918 speech to a congress of female workers, Lenin declared that the Soviet republic must make it a top priority to ensure equal rights for women. But ultimately, women's rights were only a means to an end: As Lenin said in the same speech, equality was essential because "the experience of all liberation movements shows that the success of a revolution depends on the extent to which women participate in it."
The revolution won; women, not so much. While they joined the workforce en masse, aided by universally available (if poor quality) day care, Lenin's promise of liberation from "petty and mind-numbing" domestic drudgery didn't quite pan out. The Soviet woman's "second shift" was made much worse by scarcity, lack of conveniences, and a consumer sector in which the customer was always screwed. Shopping alone was practically a full-time job, between standing in line and going from store to store to find different items; once the shopping was done, you had to factor in some extra time for scraping dirt off the vegetables and throwing out the rotten ones, trying to find the edible parts of what the store laughingly called a steak, or salvaging the milk from a leaky carton. Add to this the fact that the scarcity of decent clothes often made sewing and knitting a necessity rather than a hobby.
Plenty of women could be found in nontraditional jobs, from road repair and other hard physical labor to medicine and engineering (both low-paid and relatively low-prestige), but they were virtually absent from high-level leadership posts. Especially in the post–World War II period, official Soviet culture vigorously reinforced traditional gender norms. Women were celebrated as mothers, men as warriors; in schools, girls had mandatory classes in housekeeping (mainly sewing and cooking) and boys in craft skills. Meanwhile, attempts to start a conversation on feminism in the early 1980s were treated as a subversive bourgeois activity—after all, according to official declarations, the "woman question" in the Soviet Union had been solved by 1930. When a group of women led by Leningrad writer Tatyana Mamonova published an underground feminist almanac in 1980, they were targeted by the KGB; Mamonova and two other contributors were expelled from the Soviet Union, while several others were imprisoned.
Tear Down This Empire
My own personal experience of the Soviet Union was far from the worst of it. My family lived well by Soviet standards. By the time I was growing up, Soviet totalitarianism had gone relatively soft; ideological diktat wasn't nearly as rigid or omnipresent as some Westerners imagine. Some of the most popular Soviet films and TV movies made in the 1970s were not particularly communist, for example: They were either period pieces (such as a four-part musical miniseries based on The Three Musketeers) or romantic comedies of the "boy meets girl," not "boy meets tractor," kind.
And yet it was still a totalitarian system—a system in which I knew at the age of 10 that if I told anyone at school about the things my parents said at home (for instance, that Lenin was not the greatest genius and humanist of all time and that Soviet children were not the happiest in all the world), "Papa will go to jail." It was a system in which closet dissidents like my parents had to "live by the lie" and regularly demonstrate feigned allegiance to the regime.
It was a system in which "they," the powers that be, could do anything and the individual could do nothing. When I was in ninth grade, about a year before my family's departure, word went around my school that everyone graduating at the end of 10th grade would have to spend a year in Siberia "volunteering" on the construction of the Baikal-Amur Mainline railroad. The rumor, generated by the hype in the Soviet press around the project and its enthusiasts in the Young Communist League, turned out to be false. But it was entirely believable, given that college students, some high schoolers, and young adults who already had jobs were routinely dispatched as "volunteers" to collective farms for a month to help with the fall harvest.
It was a system in which any manifestation of personal autonomy or unorthodox interests could make you an enemy of the state. Jazz fans who circulated clandestine copies of Western records were persecuted in the late 1950s. Karate, which became hugely popular in the Soviet Union in the 1970s, was abruptly banned in 1981, reportedly because the authorities were concerned that it was channeling attention away from more important Olympic sports and that it might enable people to fight back against the police in mass protests. Suddenly, teaching karate could earn you a five-year stint in the prison camps.
The Soviet Union's first few decades were the stuff of nightmares, from the Red Terror, which is believed to have killed over a million people after the Revolution, to the "Terror-Famine" in Ukraine (as well as Kazakhstan and parts of Southern Russia), whose death toll is estimated at 7 million, to Stalin's Great Terror, in which hundreds of thousands were shot and many more worked to death in the Siberian gulag camps. Among my parents' friends and coworkers, few did not have a story (if they were candid about it) of a family member or relative imprisoned in the Stalin era for some absurd reason: Someone's aunt was branded a subversive because a neighbor heard her playing a funeral march on the piano the day a notorious "enemy of the people" was executed; someone's father was charged with fomenting "defeatist attitudes" during the war for remarking that Stalin "sounded sad" in his radio address to the people.
By the end of its existence, the Soviet Union was an exhausted totalitarian regime trying to maintain its grip on a society that laughed at official pieties, craved consumer goods, was thrilled by the forbidden, and idolized the West. The woman on the bus who had thought it was ridiculous to call the Soviet Union an "evil empire" came to mind, seven or eight years later, when I saw a photo of a rally in Moscow. A sign was being held by someone who, like me, had lived under the reality of communism. It said: "THE USSR: YES, IT IS THE EVIL EMPIRE!"
Reason · by Cathy Young · November 1, 2021
V/R
David Maxwell
Senior Fellow
Foundation for Defense of Democracies
Phone: 202-573-8647
Twitter: @davidmaxwell161
FDD is a Washington-based nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.
