Informal Institute for National Security Thinkers and Practitioners

Quotes of the Day:

“Purposeful, reflective judgment which manifests itself in reasoned consideration of the evidence, context, methods, standards, and conceptualization in deciding what to believe or what to do.”

- Peter Facione, The Delphi Project

“If you are emotionally attached to your tribe, religion or political leaning to the point that truth and justice become secondary considerations, your education is useless. Your exposure is useless. If you cannot reason beyond petty sentiments, you are a liability to mankind.”

- Dr. Okadigbo Chuba, a Nigerian philosopher, political scientist, and academic

A Japanese proverb says, “If you believe everything you read, you better not read.” Interpretation: "Or you need to question why you believe everything you read.”

- Thinknetic

1. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, OCTOBER 15 (Putin's War)

2. Ukraine: CDS Daily brief (15.10.22) CDS comments on key events

3. How Biden’s New National Security Strategy Gets China Wrong

4. Iran plans to send missiles, drones to Russia for Ukraine war, officials say

5. Is Taiwan’s Fate Really Tied to Ukraine?

6. Failure to Control Ukraine’s Skies Betrays Key Flaw in Russia’s War Strategy

7. The U.S. Marine Corps Has a Choice: Transform or Die

8. Xi Jinping’s Quest for Control Over China Targets Even Old Friends

9. American Executives in Limbo at Chinese Chip Companies After U.S. Ban

10. Yoon's office on 24-hour standby against possible N.K. nuclear test

11. The Man Who Said Ukraine Would Win

12. China's Semiconductor Industry 'Decapitated Overnight': What 'Annihilation Looks Like'

13. Russia Not About To Become An Iran Or A North Korea – OpEd

14. 3 events that shaped Xi Jinping’s worldview

15. It's time for the US to revoke China's 'normal trade' status

16. Fire, gunshots at Tehran jail holding political prisoners, dual nationals

17. Tajik President's Demand For 'Respect' From Putin Viewed Millions Of Times On YouTube

18. Before Ukraine Blew Up Kerch Bridge, British Spies Plotted It

19. 'Threshold of revolution': Why Iran's protests are different this time

20. A tale of three generals — how the Ukrainian military turned the tide

1. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, OCTOBER 15 (Putin's War)

Maps/graphics: https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-october-15

Key Takeaways

Russia is conducting forced deportation of Ukrainians that likely amount to a deliberate ethnic cleansing campaign in addition to apparent violations of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
Prominent Russian milbloggers who yesterday announced the existence of “hit lists” reportedly originating with the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) and targeting milbloggers for their coverage of operations in Ukraine walked back their claim on October 15.
The Wagner Group Private Military Company is likely continuing efforts to assert its supremacy over the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) and more conventional Russian ground forces.
Russia may have signed a new contract with Iran for the supply of Arash-2 drones.
Russian forces continued counterattacks west of Kreminna.
Russian milbloggers widely discussed the likelihood of a Ukrainian counteroffensive on Kreminna and Svatove.
Russian sources claimed that Ukrainian troops launched a general counteroffensive in northern Kherson Oblast.
Russian forces continued ground attacks in Donetsk Oblast.
Ukrainian forces likely struck Russian military assets situated along Russian ground lines of communication (GLOCs) in Zaporizhia Oblast and southern Donetsk Oblast.
Mobilized Russian forces engaged in a fratricidal altercation at a training ground in Belgorod Oblast.
Russian and occupation administration officials continued to enact restrictions on movement and conduct strict law enforcement activities in Russian-occupied territories.

RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, OCTOBER 15

Oct 15, 2022 - Press ISW

understandingwar.org

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, October 15

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

October 15, 8:30pm ET

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

Russia continues to conduct massive, forced deportations of Ukrainians that likely amount to a deliberate ethnic cleansing campaign in addition to apparent violations of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Russian Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin stated on October 14 that “several thousand” children from Kherson Oblast are “already in other regions of Russia, resting in rest homes and children’s camps.”[1] As ISW has previously reported, Russian authorities openly admitted to placing children from occupied areas of Ukraine up for adoption with Russian families in a manner that may constitute a violation of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.[2]

Russian authorities may additionally be engaged in a wider campaign of ethnic cleansing by depopulating Ukrainian territory through deportations and repopulating Ukrainian cities with imported Russian citizens. Ethnic cleansing has not in itself been specified as a crime under international law but has been defined by the United Nations Commission of Experts on violations of humanitarian law committed on the territory of the former Yugoslavia as “rendering an area ethnically homogeneous by using force or intimidation to remove persons of given groups from the area” and “a purposeful policy designed by one ethnic or religious group to remove by violent and terror-inspiring means the civilian population of another ethnic or religious group from certain geographic areas.”[3] According to the UN definition, ethnic cleansing may be carried out by forcible removal, among other methods.[4] These definitions of ethnic cleansing campaigns are consistent with reports of the forcible deportation and adoption of Ukrainian children, as well as reports by Ukrainian sources that reconstruction projects in Mariupol are intended to house “tens of thousands of Russians” who will move to Mariupol.[5]

Prominent Russian milbloggers who yesterday announced the existence of “hit lists” reportedly originating with the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) and targeting milbloggers for their coverage of operations in Ukraine walked back their claim on October 15. As ISW reported on October 14, prominent Russian milblogger Semyon Pegov of the WarGonzo Telegram channel accused “individual generals and military commanders” of the Russian MoD of developing a “hitlist” of Russian milbloggers whom the MoD intends to prosecute for “discrediting” the MoD’s handling of the war in Ukraine.[6] Pegov’s claim was amplified by several other milbloggers and generated substantial panic about censorship in the hyper-nationalist Russian information space.[7]

Pegov announced on October 15, however, that “there are no more lists”, and that the issue of lists has been removed from the agenda and congratulated his following and the wider milblogger community for being untouchable in the face of attempted crackdowns.[8] Pegov also reiterated that he has been aware of the list for weeks and knew that administrative and political power structures had already begun working on investigations of individual channels. Pegov claimed that he has learned who the author of the list was and praised his followers and colleagues for supporting him. Other prominent milbloggers amplified Pegov’s statements and stated that milbloggers continue to lead the fight for truth in the information space.

As ISW has previously assessed the announcement of mobilization served as a catalyst for a breakdown in the Russian information space that put the increasingly alienated MoD further at odds with Russian President Vladimir Putin and the cohort of milbloggers that he has periodically supported and empowered.[9] The Russian milblogger community may have strategically weaponized the rumors of MoD hit lists against the MoD itself by exposing the information and appearing to defeat the MoD attacks against it—whether or not they were real in the first place. The discourse surrounding the existence of these lists indicates continued structural fractures between the MoD establishment, the milbloggers, and the Kremlin.

The Wagner Group Private Military Company is likely continuing efforts to assert its supremacy over the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) and conventional Russian ground forces. A video posted to social media on October 13 shows servicemen of the 126th Coastal Defense Brigade of the Black Sea Fleet in an unspecified location in Kherson Oblast complaining that they have been fighting in the area since the beginning of the war without breaks or troop rotation.[10] The servicemen asserted that they are being “crushed” by Ukrainian forces and emphasized that they have one BTR (armored personnel carrier) for 80 people, which is greatly restricting their maneuverability.[11] After the video circulated, a Wagner Group-affiliated Telegram channel announced on October 14 that Wagner Group leadership decided to transfer four off-road vehicles to the 126th Coastal Defense Battalion in support of their efforts to hold the frontline in Kherson Oblast.[12] This exchange is noteworthy in light of ISW’s previous assessment that Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin is actively attempting to curry favor with Russian President Vladimir Putin and set Wagner Group forces apart from conventional MoD forces.[13] The move to donate basic equipment to a detachment of conventional Russian ground forces may be an implicit critique of the MoD’s apparent inability to provide such necessities to its own soldiers.

Russia may have signed a new contract with Iran for the supply of Arash-2 drones. Ukrainian and Russian Telegram channels reported “leaked” information from unspecified Iranian sources that Russia has purchased an unknown number of Arash-2 drones, which are purportedly faster and more destructive than the Shahed-136 drones that are currently in use by Russian forces.[14] Commander of the Iranian Ground Forces Brigadier General Kiomars Heydari previously claimed in early September that the Arash-2 drones have unique long-range capabilities and could target cities in Israel such as Tel Aviv and Haifa from bases in Iran.[15] Reports that Moscow is continuing to rely on Tehran for destructive munitions are consistent with a report from the US Treasury Department that suggests Russia is rapidly expending its supply of microelectronics that are critical for the military-industrial complex because it cannot replace key components unavailable because of sanctions.[16] Russia will likely continue to leverage its relationship with Iran to circumvent sanctions, although it is very unlikely that Russian forces will use the Arash-2 to any greater effect than they have used the Shahed-136 model.[17]

Key Takeaways

Russia is conducting forced deportation of Ukrainians that likely amount to a deliberate ethnic cleansing campaign in addition to apparent violations of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
Prominent Russian milbloggers who yesterday announced the existence of “hit lists” reportedly originating with the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) and targeting milbloggers for their coverage of operations in Ukraine walked back their claim on October 15.
The Wagner Group Private Military Company is likely continuing efforts to assert its supremacy over the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) and more conventional Russian ground forces.
Russia may have signed a new contract with Iran for the supply of Arash-2 drones.
Russian forces continued counterattacks west of Kreminna.
Russian milbloggers widely discussed the likelihood of a Ukrainian counteroffensive on Kreminna and Svatove.
Russian sources claimed that Ukrainian troops launched a general counteroffensive in northern Kherson Oblast.
Russian forces continued ground attacks in Donetsk Oblast.
Ukrainian forces likely struck Russian military assets situated along Russian ground lines of communication (GLOCs) in Zaporizhia Oblast and southern Donetsk Oblast.
Mobilized Russian forces engaged in a fratricidal altercation at a training ground in Belgorod Oblast.
Russian and occupation administration officials continued to enact restrictions on movement and conduct strict law enforcement activities in Russian-occupied territories.

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

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

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

Eastern Ukraine: (Oskil River-Kreminna Line)

Russian forces continued counterattacks west of Kreminna on October 15. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces repelled Russian ground assaults west of Kreminna in the vicinity of Novosadove (17km northwest of Kreminna) and Terny (17km west of Kreminna).[18] A Russian milblogger reiterated claims that Russian forces recaptured Torske (14km west of Kreminna) and that Ukrainian forces maneuvered around Russian positions near Torske to advance to the border of Svatove Raion.[19] ISW cannot independently verify either of the Russian milblogger’s claims. Russian and Ukrainian forces continued to exchange artillery fire along the Oskil-Kreminna line on October 15. Russian sources claimed that Russian forces struck Ukrainian manpower and equipment concentrations near Berestove, Hlushkiva, Kupyansk, Dvorchina, and Olhivka in Kharkiv Oblast and near Torske, Donetsk Oblast and Makiivka, Luhansk Oblast.[20] Russian and social media sources reported that Ukrainian forces struck Russian positions in Severodonetsk and along the Svatove-Kreminna line and conducted a joint strike on Russian military hardware in the Kupyansk direction.[21]

Russian milbloggers widely discussed on October 15 the likelihood of a Ukrainian counteroffensive on Kreminna and Svatove. Several Russian milbloggers asserted that Ukrainian forces would likely launch an offensive on Russian positions in and around Kreminna and Svatove in tandem with Ukrainian counteroffensive operations in Kherson Oblast.[22] One Russian milblogger argued that Ukrainian forces intend to take Svatove by October 17.[23] Another Russian milblogger argued that Ukrainian forces are unlikely to launch a direct assault on Svatove and instead will attempt to cut off the highway leading from Svatove to Kreminna in support of capturing Kreminna.[24] ISW offers no assessment of the Russian milbloggers’ claims.

Southern Ukraine: (Kherson Oblast)

Russian sources claimed that Ukrainian troops launched a general counteroffensive in northern Kherson Oblast on October 15. Numerous Russian milbloggers reported that Ukrainian forces initiated a mechanized drive on Russian positions along the entire frontline that runs between Davydiv Brid in northwestern Kherson Oblast and Dudchany in northeastern Kherson Oblast after conducting concentrated artillery preparation of the battlefield.[25] Several Russian sources claimed that Ukrainian troops attempted to break through Russian positions in northeastern Kherson Oblast towards Beryslav and from northwestern Kherson Oblast towards Ishchenka and Stadok.[26] These Russian claims remain unsubstantiated. Russian milbloggers emphatically claimed that Russian troops repelled all Ukrainian attacks.[27] Russian milbloggers specified that elements of the 126th Coastal Defense Brigade and 810th Separate Guards Naval Infantry Brigade of the Black Sea Fleet, 205th Separate Motor Rifle Brigade of the 49th Combined Arms Army, 140th Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade of the 29th Combined Arms Army, and 10th Spetsnaz Special Purpose Brigade are engaged in fierce fighting and holding the defense in this area.[28] The claim regarding the role the 126th Coastal Defense Brigade is playing is noteworthy in light of reports about the brigade’s exhausted state.

Ukrainian military officials maintained operational silence regarding Ukrainian ground maneuvers in Kherson Oblast on October 15. Ukraine’s Southern Operational Command noted that Ukrainian troops destroyed a Russian ammunition warehouse in the Beryslav Raion on October 14.[29] Ukrainian military sources otherwise indicated that Ukrainian troops are continuing their interdiction campaign against Russian military assets and concentration areas throughout Kherson Oblast.[30]

Russian Main Effort—Eastern Ukraine

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

Russian forces continued ground attacks in Donetsk Oblast on October 15. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces repelled Russian ground attacks near Bakhmut, northeast of Bakhmut near Spirne, Berestove, Yakovlivka, and Bakhmutske, and south of Bakhmut near Optyne and Ivanhrad.[31] A Russian source claimed that Russian forces destroyed a shortwave repeater, disrupting a Ukrainian Starlink system in the Bakhmut-Soledar area.[32] Russian sources claimed that fighting is ongoing in the Soledar area northeast of Bakhmut and that Russian forces are increasing unspecified operations in the area.[33] The Ukrainian General Staff also reported that Ukrainian forces repelled Russian ground attacks southwest of Avdiivka near Pervomaiske, Nevelske, and Krasnohorivka, and near Marinka, Novomykhailivka and Pobieda southwest of Donetsk City.[34] A Russian source claimed that Ukrainian forces are losing positions in the Avdiivka area and are withdrawing to Nevelske.[35]

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

Ukrainian forces likely struck Russian military assets situated along Russian ground lines of communication (GLOCs) in Zaporizhia Oblast and southern Donetsk Oblast on October 15. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces struck four S-300 air defense systems in Berdyansk, Zaporizhia Oblast.[36] The Ukrainian General Staff also reported that Ukrainian forces struck Russian personnel concentrations in the areas of Orikhiv (intersection of the T0803, T0812, T0815, and T0408), Kinski Rozdory (intersection of T0803 and T0815), and Tokmak (intersection of T0401 and P37), killing 100 personnel.[37] The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) claimed that Russian forces intercepted 18 HIMARS and Olkha rounds near Svobodne, Donetsk Oblast (near the N20-T0512 intersection north of Mariupol) and other areas of Ukraine.[38] Ukrainian Mayor of Melitopol Ivan Fedorov reported that Ukrainian forces struck a Russian military base in Melitopol overnight on October 14-15, and Luhansk People’s Republic Deputy Interior Minister Vitaly Kiselyov claimed that Russian forces shot down two drones carrying explosives near the city.[39] Ukrainian forces will likely continue targeting Russian forces that operate on and through these remaining Russian GLOCs in southern Ukraine following the Kerch Strait Bridge attack.

Russian forces did not conduct any confirmed ground attacks west of Hulyaipole on October 15 and continued routine artillery strikes throughout western Zaporizhia, Mykolaiv, and Dnipropetrovsk Oblasts.[40] Russian and Ukrainian sources reported that Russian forces targeted infrastructure in Zaporizhzhia City with S-300 missiles and kamikaze drones.[41] Russian and Ukrainian sources reported that Russian forces targeted Mykolaiv City, Ochakiv, Kryvyi Rih, and other unspecified areas in Mykolaiv and Dnipropetrovsk Oblasts with kamikaze drones.[42] Russian and Ukrainian sources also reported that Russian forces continued routine artillery, MLRS, and kamikaze drone strikes against Nikopol, Marhanets, and Chervonohryhorivka on the north bank of the Dnipro River.[43]

Russian forces conducted a cruise missile launch, likely an Oniks cruise missile using a Bastion system, from Sevastopol, Crimea on October 15. An OSINT analyst assessed that the missile is likely a P-800 Oniks anti-ship cruise missile with a secondary capability to strike land targets.[44] Sevastopol occupation head Mikhail Razvozhaev claimed that the missile launch was an air defense training exercise, but footage of the launch appears inconsistent with anti-air missile launches.[45]

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

Mobilized Russian forces engaged in a fratricidal altercation at a training ground in Belgorod Oblast on October 15. The BBC and Russian MoD reported that the mobilized Russian soldiers shot at each other at an unspecified training ground in Belgorod Oblast, resulting in at least 11 killed and 15 injured on October 15.[46] The Russian MoD described the shooting’s perpetrators as “terrorists” and said they were from an unspecified Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) country.[47] Mobilized Russian men continue to train at training grounds across the Russian Federation.[48]

Russian authorities are reportedly intensifying their tactics to mobilize more Russian men. Authorities in Moscow and St. Petersburg reportedly are conducting mobilization roundups where plainclothes police block the entrances of private homes to make it impossible for men to avoid receiving mobilization notices.[49] Russian sources reported that police in Moscow cordoned off the Mitinsky Radio Market in Moscow to detain men and issue them mobilization summons.[50] Russian authorities reportedly conducted a mobilization raid at the “MIPSTROI1” construction company in Moscow on October 14 and forced 250 men to go to a military commissariat.[51] The Moscow Military Commissariat denied issuing mobilization notices in public places near metro stations.[52]

Russian sources continue to document problems with Russian mobilization. State Duma Deputy Maxim Ivanov reportedly criticized Russian military commissariats in Sverdlovsk Oblast and accused the commissariats of “not chasing quality but quantity” in order to rush and complete the recruitment quotas.[53] Russian sources posted an obituary for a 28-year-old Government of Moscow department head who was mobilized on September 23, deployed a few days later despite having zero combat experience, and killed in action in Ukraine on October 10.[54] This high-profile death reportedly prompted a mass exodus of military-aged workers from the Government of Moscow.[55] Russian sources are expressing frustration that Russian conscripts are not being assigned to roles appropriate for their military specializations. An artillery specialist reportedly was assigned to a motorized rifle unit and a Rosgvardia Spetsnaz officer was reportedly assigned to command a tank battalion.[56] A prominent Russian milblogger reported that there is a lack of uniformity in training standards for mobilized personnel, resulting in some mobilized forces not learning skills beyond basic weapons handling.[57]

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

Russian and occupation administration officials continued to enact restrictions on movement and to conduct strict law enforcement activities in Russian-occupied territories on October 15. Ukraine’s Southern Operational Command reported on October 14 that Russian forces are intensifying inspections at checkpoints and are carefully checking the contents of residents’ phones and cars as well as conducting more raids on residents’ homes.[58] Ukraine’s Southern Operational Command also reported that Russian forces arrested two people in Kherson Oblast for pro-Ukrainian views and looted their properties for equipment, clothing, and money.[59] Head of the Kherson occupation administration Vladimir Saldo stated on October 15 that Russian and occupation law enforcement agencies arrest “offenders” every day.[60] The Ukrainian Resistance Center reported that Russian and occupation administration officials are drawing up lists of residents who refuse to cooperate with Russian forces in Berdyansk, Zaporizhia Oblast, where offenses can include refusing to recognize Berdyansk as a Russian city.[61] Advisor to the Head of Kherson Oblast Serhey Khlan reported on October 15 that Russian forces shot a man in his own apartment in Kherson City after he refused to cooperate with the demands of occupation administration officials.[62] Mayor of Melitopol Ivan Fedorov reported on October 15 that Russian and occupation administration officials in the past two and half weeks have only allowed 200 cars to pass through the Vasylivka checkpoint, where more than 4,000 people are still queueing to enter Ukrainian-held Zaporizhia Oblast.[63] Russian and occupation administration officials are likely to increase restrictions on movement and law enforcement activities as Ukrainian counteroffensives progress.

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

[15] https://en.mehrnews dot com/news/191318/Arash-2-drone-designed-for-attacking-Haifa-Tel-Aviv; https://www.tehrantimes dot com/news/476659/Iran-able-to-strike-Tel-Aviv-Haifa-with-Arash-2-drone-commander

[45] https://iz dot ru/1410803/2022-10-15/glava-sevastopolia-soobshchil-o-rabote-pvo-v-trenirovochnom-rezhime; https://twitter.com/TpyxaNews/status/1581251916390354948

[46] https://www.bbc.com/russian/live/news-63179143?ns_mchannel=social&ns_sou... tv/news/rasstrel-mobilizovannyh-na-poligone-pod-belgorodom-pojavilis-pervye-versii-chp_645685; https://ria dot ru/20221015/terakt-1824340847.html

[47] https://ria dot ru/20221015/terakt-1824340847.html

[61] https://sprotyv.mod.gov dot ua/2022/10/15/u-berdyansku-okupanty-skladayut-spysky-neloyalnyh-meshkancziv/

understandingwar.org

2. Ukraine: CDS Daily brief (15.10.22) CDS comments on key events

CDS Daily brief (15.10.22)

CDS comments on key events

Humanitarian aspect:

In Ukraine, due to the armed aggression of the Russian Federation during the past day, October 14, 11 people were killed, and 11 more were injured, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, the deputy head of the Office of the President, informed in his Telegram, referring to the data of the regional military administrations.

According to the October 15 morning round-up of Oblasts Military Administrations of Ukraine:

At night and in the morning, the Russians shelled several energy and industrial infrastructure facilities in Zaporizhzhia. In total, 4 drones and 10 S-300 missiles were launched. No victims were reported.
In Sumy Oblast, the occupiers fired mortars at Bilopilska and Rychkivska communities in the morning.
At night and in the morning, the enemy continuously attacked the Nikopol region of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast. 5 wounded civilians were reported. More than 10 high-rise apartment buildings and private homes, administrative buildings, a transport company, several shops, a garage cooperative, cars and several offices were damaged in Nikopol.
Around 7 in the morning, the enemy targeted one of the districts of Kyiv Oblast; the energy infrastructure object was seriously damaged. "Ukrenergo" is already working to restore a reliable energy supply. But at the same time, it warns about the possibility of emergency shutdowns. The deputy head of the Office of the President of Ukraine, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, called on Kyiv Oblast residents to limit the use of electricity from 5:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. due to the shelling of an energy infrastructure facility.
In Mykolayiv Oblast, the Russians shelled the outskirts of one of the villages of the Berezneguvate amalgamated community. No casualties were reported.
During the past day, the enemy shelled Kharkiv and Kharkiv Oblast, killing 2 people in Kharkiv and Izum and wounding 1 in the Kupyansk districts. A private house was damaged in Vovchansk.
On October 14, 2 residents of Bakhmut in Donetsk Oblast were killed by enemy shelling. Pavel Kirilenko, the head of the Donetsk Military Administration, reported that six more civilians were found in liberated Lyman, who the Russians killed during the occupation. Also, six people were injured in Lyman due to the Russian shelling on October 14.

The exhumation has been completed at the mass grave of Ukraine's Armed Forces servicemen in the liberated Lyman. 34 bodies of Ukrainian Defenders were transferred to the morgue. Work continues on the second burial site, where more than 120 civilian bodies are located. The police found 35 graves in the de-occupied territories. During the day, information was received about four more burial places, the police of the Donetsk region reported in their Telegram.

In the village of Volokhiv Yar in Kharkiv Oblast, the radio astronomy observatory was severely damaged by Russian shelling. "We have a disaster with the national property, the world's largest radio telescope of decameter wavelengths UTR-2 and the GURT telescope, which was under construction until recently... The observatory near the now well-known village of Volokhiv Yar was freed from the occupiers, who set up a firing position there. The territory has not been demined yet, more than a month after liberation, our employees can't work there," said Mykhailo Sydorchuk, a scientist at the Radio Astronomy Institute of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. According to his information, the occupiers used the territory of the institute because it had underground collectors, a car park, garages, warehouses, and household appliances. It was all looted; in particular, the invaders appropriated cars, refrigerators, and unique specialized computer equipment.

Occupied territories

The invaders take children from the temporarily occupied Energodar "on vacation" to the Krasnodar region of the Russian Federation, reported the [Ukrainian] mayor of Energodar, Dmytro Orlov, in Telegram. In this regard, he warned that if the front line in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia directions is "cut off" [due to the Ukrainian counteroffensive], there is a risk that the children will not be able to return. As earlier reported, the Mayor of Melitopol, Ivan Fedorov, said that the Russia-installed "authorities" of the temporarily captured territories of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson Oblast offered to take Ukrainian children to Crimea and Russia. According to him, the first group of children from Energodar was taken to Yevpatoria (Crimea).

The Russian invaders want to move the Crimean museums' exhibits to Russia's territory. The Ministry of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine called on UNESCO and all international partners to respond to the decision of the so-called authorities of the temporarily occupied Crimea to begin the "evacuation" of museum collections. It is emphasized that under the pretext of "evacuation", the Russian authorities can rob Crimean museums and institutions of other temporarily captured territories of Ukraine. Thus, the corresponding plan of "external evacuation" provides priority removal of the most valuable objects, particularly archaeological finds made of precious metals. "Such a mass removal of cultural values from the territory of Ukraine by the Russian occupiers will be comparable to the looting of museums during the Second World War and should be qualified accordingly. The actions of the Russian Federation are a violation of international law and will result in both the responsibility of the aggressor state and the criminal responsibility of those involved at the national and international level," the agency emphasized.

______________________________________________________________________________

Operational situation

(please note that this part of the report is mainly on the previous day's (October 14) developments)

The 234th day of the strategic air and ground offensive operation of the Russian Armed Forces against Ukraine (in the official terminology of the Russian Federation – "operation to protect Donbas"). The enemy continues attempts to reach the administrative border of the Donetsk Oblast and to maintain control over the captured parts of the Kherson, Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia and Mykolaiv Oblasts.

The enemy continues shelling Ukraine's critical infrastructure and civilian facilities. During the past day, the Russian fire hit civilian targets and residents of Kharkiv, Kostyantynivka, Soledar, Bakhmut, Chumaky, Lebedynske, Zaporizhzhia, Davydiv Brid and Myrne were affected. Enemy UAVs hit the Dnipropetrovsk Oblast and the city of Ochakiv; six out of nine were shot down by Ukrainian defenders. Over the past 24 hours, the occupiers have launched six rocket strikes, thirty air strikes, and carried out forty-eight MLRS shellings. In the border areas, Rozhkovychi of Sumy Oblast, Bleshnya of Chernihiv Oblast, Gatyshche, Vovchanski Khutory, Starytsia and Dvorichne of Kharkiv Oblast were shelled.

According to available information, many wounded [Russian soldiers] are admitted to medical facilities in the temporarily occupied territories. About 100 wounded arrived in one of the hospitals of the city of Donetsk this week. Hospitals are overcrowded in Tokmak, Zaporizhzhia region. According to information from local residents, hospitals do not take civilians due to the workload of doctors and the lack of beds. The mortality rate among Russian combatants exceeds 50% due to the low quality of medical care and the refusal of the command of the Russian occupying forces to evacuate the seriously wounded to the territory of the Russian Federation.

During the past 24 hours, the Ukrainian Defense Forces aviation carried out about thirty strikes. Damage to twenty-five areas of enemy weapons and military equipment concentration and three anti-aircraft missile systems was confirmed. Ukrainian air defense units shot nine UAVs.

Ukraine's missile troops and artillery struck four enemy command and control points, fifteen areas of manpower, weapons and military equipment concentration, twelve ammunition warehouses, one artillery system and twenty other important targets during the day.

The morale and psychological state of the personnel of the invasion forces remain low. Russian troops are looting shops in occupied Kherson and preparing pontoon crossings for escape from the right bank to the left bank of the Dnieper.

Kharkiv direction

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

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

The operational situation is unchanged.

Kramatorsk direction

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

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

The enemy fired at the positions of the Ukrainian Defense Forces with mortars, barrel and rocket artillery in the areas of Verkhnokamianske, Vyshneve, Grekivka, Hryhorivka, Zarichne, Kovalivka, Makiivka, Nadiya, Novovodyane, Olhivka, Pershotravneve, Rozdolivka, Tabaivka, Terny and Yampolivka.

Donetsk direction

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

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

The enemy fired with mortars, barrel and rocket artillery in the areas of Bilohorivka, Yakovlivka, Soledar, Bakhmutske, Bakhmut, Opytne, Klishchiivka, Odradivka, Zelenopillia, Kurdyumivka, Mayorsk, New York, Kamianka, Tonenke, Avdiivka, Pervomaiske, Vodyane, Opytne, Nevelske, Maryinka and Krasnohorivka.

The Ukrainian defense forces successfully repelled enemy attacks in the areas of Berestove, Yakovlivka, Bakhmutske, Bakhmut, Opytne, Ivangrad, Spirne, Nevelske, Maryinka, Bilohorivka, Terny, Novomykhailivka, and Krasnohorivka.

Zaporizhzhia direction

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

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

The enemy did not conduct offensive operations and continued to engineer defensive lines and positions. It shelled more than twenty towns and villages with mortars, barrel and rocket artillery, including Velyka Novosilka, Vremivka, Zolota Nyva, Vuhledar, Pavlivka, Mykilske and Novodanylivka.

The destruction of enemy personnel and equipment in the Zaporizhzhia Oblast over the previous days has been confirmed. Thus, due to the effective actions of the Ukrainian Defense Forces, about 100 enemy personnel, including more than 25 newly mobilized ones, were injured in the areas of Orihiv, Kinski Rozdory and Tokmak. Four enemy S-300 complexes were destroyed in the area of Berdyansk.

Tavriysk direction

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

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

Areas of more than thirty Ukrainian towns and villages along the contact line were affected by fire damage.

Azov-Black Sea Maritime Operational Area:

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

In the open sea, the number of Russian naval groups remained unchanged. 14 enemy ships and boats are located along the southwestern coast of Crimea. Among them are three carriers of cruise missiles - two corvettes of project 21631 and a submarine of project 636.3 with a total number of missiles - 20.

In the Sea of Azov waters, enemy patrol ships and boats are located on the approaches to the Mariupol and Berdyansk seaports to block the Azov coast.

Enemy aviation continues to fly from Crimean airfields Belbek and Gvardiyske over the northwestern part of the Black Sea. Over the past day, 14 Su-27, Su-30 and Su-24 aircraft were deployed from Belbek and Saki airfields.

The enemy continues shelling Ukrainian ports and coastal areas. On the night of October 15, the enemy again attacked Odesa and Mykolaiv with "Shahed-136" kamikaze drones. 50-80% of drones are shot down by air defense.

The deadline for the completion of the Crimean bridge repair is set for July 1, 2023. Due to the damage to the Crimean bridge, the logistics of supplying Russian troops in the Kherson Oblast and Crimea is very complicated

"Grain initiative": Seven ships of the grain caravan left Great Odesa ports on the morning of October 15. QUEEN SARA, BARON, GOLDEN SHARK, NEW LEVANT, MRC tankers HATICE ANA and LADY ELA followed dry cargo BEATRICE. A total of 341 ships have left the ports of Odesa since August 1. The total weight of Ukrainian food exported to the countries of Africa, Asia and Europe exceeded 7.5 million tons. Three dry cargo ships are moving to the Odesa coast; two of them will go to Chornomorsk, one to the port of Pivdenny.

Russian operational losses from 24.02 to 15.10

Personnel - almost 64,700 people (+400);

Tanks - 2,524 (+3);

Armored combat vehicles – 5,179 (+7);

Artillery systems – 1,582 (+16);

Multiple rocket launchers (MLRS) - 365 (+3);

Anti-aircraft warfare systems - 186 (0);

Vehicles and fuel tanks – 3,951 (+7);

Aircraft - 268 (0);

Helicopters – 242 (+2);

UAV operational and tactical level – 1,210 (+11);

Intercepted cruise missiles - 316 (0);

Boats / ships - 16 (0).

______________________________________________________________________________

International diplomatic aspect

The US security assistance reaches $18.3 billion with the new announcement of the package worth $725 million. It includes additional ammunition for HIMARS, various artillery rounds, including precision-guided and Remote Anti-Armor Mine ones, anti-tank weapons, HARMs missiles, and more than 200 HMMWVs. The UK will provide Ukraine with AMRAAM rockets and hundreds of additional advanced air defense missiles. The British package also includes hundreds of aerial drones and additional 18 howitzers. France will deliver radar and air defense systems to Ukraine in the coming weeks. Though the French President did not detail what type of system he would donate, it's said that it might be Crotale short-range anti-air missiles.

In the meantime, fourteen NATO members and Finland have agreed to develop the European Sky Shield Initiative. It's a multi-national led by Germany endeavor aimed at strengthening NATO's Integrated Air and Missile Defense. The decision is triggered by the Russian barbaric actions in Ukraine, indiscriminate and deliberate targeting of civilians, civilian and critical infrastructure. The European nations will jointly procure air defense systems and missiles composed of interoperable off-the-shelf solutions. "The new assets, fully interoperable and seamlessly integrated within the NATO air and missile defense, would significantly enhance our ability to defend the alliance from all air and missile threats," explained the idea NATO deputy secretary general Mircea Geoană.

Addressing the Congress of the Party of European Socialists, Olaf Scholz argued for a reform of the EU's treaties so that new members could join. "A united European Union of 27, 30, 36 states, with then more than 500 million free and equal citizens, can bring its weight to bear even more strongly in this world," the German Chancellor said. He also proposed changes to the unanimity principle when it comes to foreign affairs and tax policies. Both issues are important for Ukraine in the short and long run. The consensus principle allowed a state or a few ones to torpedo some crucial policies while weakening others. For instance, Hungary has been negatively influencing Russia's sanctions policies. The appetite for the EU expansion means that the area of freedom, peace, security, and prosperity might include the Balkan states, the remaining Eastern European nations, and Georgia.

Poland has handed over 150 Starlink terminals to Ukraine, and the Lithuanian Foreign Minister called to "form a coalition of Ukraine's allies to pay for Starlink, or find an alternative supplier." "Ukraine's internet connectivity is too important to be left in the hands of one private individual," twitted Gabrielius Landsbergis. "We understand the fragility in those communications, and it's important that not just command and control may remain intact on the battlefield but throughout (the country). We're assessing our options and trying to do what we can to help keep these, these satcoms remain for the Ukrainian forces," stated Deputy Press Secretary of the Department of Defense Sabrina Singh. Yet, Elon Musk, who had asked the Pentagon to take off the financial burden from SpaceX, changed his mind: "The hell with it … even though Starlink is still losing money & other companies are getting billions of taxpayer $, we'll just keep funding Ukraine govt for free."

Facing a new security challenge and on the occasion of the Defenders of Ukraine day, Ukrainian citizens donated $5.4 million in forty-eight hours for a private initiative to buy two "Shahedi Hunters," an anti [Iranian] drone system. Once again, Ukrainians showed that the defense of their country is a whole society undertaking, and the Russian ruthless missile attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure have failed to achieve its goal of breaking the will to resist.

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3. How Biden’s New National Security Strategy Gets China Wrong

The Quincy Institute's analysis of the NSS on China.

Excerpts:

Many of these countries have signaled loudly to Washington that they dread the possibility of being forced to choose between the two powers, and the NSS reflects the fact that the administration is listening to these concerns. As the document states, “We also want to avoid a world in which competition escalates into a world of rigid blocs.” This, together with the NSS’s renunciation of military force to remake other societies, marks a significant and welcome break with the Trump administration’s dangerous intimation that the United States intends to overthrow the Chinese Communist Party.

Yet the NSS’s characterization of Chinese motivations as malign and its unvarying criticism of Chinese behavior across the full range of statecraft both indicate clearly to Beijing that Washington regards Chinese success as unwelcome. The United States certainly should apply pressure and criticism—many Chinese practices are objectionable, and some are unacceptable. But if the pushback is not accompanied with an equally robust path for mutual adjustment, cooperation, and shared achievement, it will be very difficult to avoid the disastrous great power conflict that the NSS professes to eschew.

How Biden’s New National Security Strategy Gets China Wrong

It is hard to square a zero-sum characterization of the presumably dire threat that China poses to the world with the document’s assertion of a need to constructively engage Beijing.

by Michael D. Swaine Jake Werner

The National Interest · by Michael D. Swaine · October 13, 2022

The Biden administration’s new National Security Strategy (NSS) attempts to explain how the United States can win a global struggle for democracy over authoritarianism. In doing so, the document reveals a wide gulf between Washington’s ambitions and its capabilities—a gulf which threatens to drive America into years of dangerous, likely-futile attempts to decisively “shape” the global order and “win” the coming era of great power competition.

The Biden administration argues that America and the world are engaged in a critical struggle with “powers that layer authoritarian governance with a revisionist foreign policy.” The NSS states that Russia and China (“the largest autocracies”) threaten the interests of even non-democratic states by “…waging or preparing for wars of aggression, actively undermining the democratic political processes of other countries, leveraging technology and supply chains for coercion and repression, and exporting an illiberal model of international order.” The NSS suggests the adversarial elements of U.S. security policy are primarily aimed at only two powers; in other words, the core dynamic driving Washington’s grand strategy today is really great power competition, not ideology per se.

For the Biden administration, it appears the only relevant difference between Russia and China lies in their level of power, or ability to seriously threaten the United States, the West, and the world order. Both nations apparently pose dire threats, but China is “…the only competitor with both the intent to reshape the international order and, increasingly, the economic, diplomatic, military, and technological power to advance that objective.”

Despite the Biden administration’s avowed belief in a genuine and critical need to cooperate with China on common threats such as climate change, pandemics, and nonproliferation, the NSS reaffirms the Trump administration’s basic assessment that China and Russia have

…concluded that the success of a free and open rules-based international order posed a threat to their regimes and stifled their ambitions. In their own ways, they now seek to remake the international order to create a world conducive to their highly personalized and repressive type of autocracy.

It is hard to see how such a zero-sum characterization of the presumably dire threat that China (and Russia) poses to the world can be squared with the document’s assertion of a need to constructively engage with China in combating what it correctly calls the “existential” threat posed by climate change. China is unlikely to join U.S. efforts while Washington is working hard to limit Chinese development, as reflected in Commerce Department’s recent restrictions on Chinese companies’ access to advanced semiconductors and other cutting-edge technology. There is a tension between these aims that the NSS does not confront.

The document brings a polemical edge to defining Chinese interests. For example, it states that China seeks only to undermine “…the autonomy and rights of less powerful states…” while the United States seeks only to “…support every country, regardless of size or strength, in exercising the freedom to make choices that serve their interests.” In reality, neither nation is without fault in defending the autonomy and rights of smaller powers and upholding the rules of international regimes. But rather than acknowledging this fact and stating a commitment to work with China to reach mutually acceptable norms and rules, the NSS approaches the problem as a Manichean struggle over freedom in which China’s goals are virtually unmovable and threatening while the United States is the arbiter of what constitutes a just and free order. Such a zero-sum framing of the Sino-U.S. competition excludes the possibility that in many areas there might actually be room for U.S.-China agreement on needed reforms or, failing that, for genuine compromise.

The NSS also makes broad claims about how third countries view the great power contest, asserting that,

Across Europe, Asia, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America, countries are clear-eyed about the nature of the challenges that the PRC [People’s Republic of China] poses. Governments want sustainable public finances. Workers want to be treated with dignity and respect. Innovators want to be rewarded for their ingenuity, risk-taking, and persistent efforts. And enterprising businesses want open and free waters through which their products can be traded.

There are certainly important shortcomings and abuses in China’s record of overseas engagement, but the NSS ignores a similar history of U.S. shortcomings and abuses. More importantly, the one-sided characterization of China’s record as malicious in intent—rather than admitting the far more complex reality of contending interests that shape Chinese behavior—undermines the possibility of working with China to improve its practices. It also tends to offend the leaders of the many countries that maintain productive economic relationships with both China and the United States.

Many of these countries have signaled loudly to Washington that they dread the possibility of being forced to choose between the two powers, and the NSS reflects the fact that the administration is listening to these concerns. As the document states, “We also want to avoid a world in which competition escalates into a world of rigid blocs.” This, together with the NSS’s renunciation of military force to remake other societies, marks a significant and welcome break with the Trump administration’s dangerous intimation that the United States intends to overthrow the Chinese Communist Party.

Yet the NSS’s characterization of Chinese motivations as malign and its unvarying criticism of Chinese behavior across the full range of statecraft both indicate clearly to Beijing that Washington regards Chinese success as unwelcome. The United States certainly should apply pressure and criticism—many Chinese practices are objectionable, and some are unacceptable. But if the pushback is not accompanied with an equally robust path for mutual adjustment, cooperation, and shared achievement, it will be very difficult to avoid the disastrous great power conflict that the NSS professes to eschew.

Michael D. Swaine is director of the Quincy Institute’s East Asia program.

Jake Werner is a Research Fellow at the Quincy Institute.

Image: DVIDS.

The National Interest · by Michael D. Swaine · October 13, 2022

4. Iran plans to send missiles, drones to Russia for Ukraine war, officials say

If this report is accurate I would ask the missile experts to assess these missiles. Are they indigenously produced in Iran? Or are they originally of Soviet/Russian Design that have been modified and will now go back to Russia? Some irony if that is the case. Any connection to north Korea?

That most authoritative source (sarcasm) Wikipedia, appears to describe it as indigenously produced in Iran..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fateh-110

Iran plans to send missiles, drones to Russia for Ukraine war, officials say

Increased flow of weapons from Iran could help offset steep Russian weapons losses, rebuild supply of precision-guided munitions

By Joby Warrick, Ellen Nakashima and Shane Harris

October 16, 2022 at 2:30 a.m. EDT

The Washington Post · by Joby Warrick · October 16, 2022

Iran is strengthening its commitment to supply arms for Russia’s assault on Ukraine, according to U.S. and allied security officials, secretly agreeing to send not only attack drones but also what some officials described as the first Iranian-made surface-to-surface missiles intended for use against Ukrainian cities and troop positions.

The increased flow of weapons from Tehran could help offset what Biden administration officials say have been huge losses in Russian military equipment since Moscow invaded in February, and a rapidly dwindling supply of precision-guided munitions of the kind used in last week’s strikes against multiple Ukrainian cities.

Independent news outlets in recent days published photos of the remains of what appear to be Iranian-made drones used in strikes against Ukrainian targets, calling into question Iran’s repeated denials that it has supplied such weapons to its ally Russia. Pentagon officials also publicly confirmed the use of Iranian drones in Russian airstrikes, as well as Ukraine’s success in shooting some of the drones down.

In an apparent sign of Iran’s expanded role as a military supplier to Moscow, Tehran dispatched officials to Russia on Sept. 18 to finalize terms for additional weapons shipments, including two types of Iranian surface-to-surface missiles, according to officials from a U.S.-allied country that closely monitors Iran’s weapons activity.

An intelligence assessment shared in recent days with Ukrainian and U.S. officials contends that Iran’s armaments industry is preparing a first shipment of Fateh-110 and Zolfaghar missiles, two well-known Iranian short-range ballistic missiles capable of striking targets at distances of 300 and 700 kilometers, respectively, two officials briefed on the matter said. If carried out, it would be the first delivery of such missiles to Russia since the start of the war.

The officials spoke on the condition that their names and nationalities not be revealed because of the extreme sensitivities surrounding intelligence-collection efforts.

In August, the same officials identified specific Iranian drones, the Shahed series and the Mohajer-6, that Tehran was beginning to supply to Russia for use in Ukraine. The remains of both types have been recovered, analyzed and photographed by Ukrainian forces in recent weeks. Russia appears to have repainted the weapons and given them Russian names.

The officials briefed on the planned missiles shipment said Iran also is preparing new deliveries of unmanned aerial vehicles for Russia, including “dozens” of additional Mohajer-6s and a larger number of Shahed-136s. The latter, sometimes called “kamikaze” drones because they are designed to crash into their targets, are capable of delivering explosive payloads at distances of up to 1,500 miles. Iranian technical advisers have visited Russian-controlled areas in recent weeks to provide instructions on operating the drones, the officials said.

U.S. intelligence agencies declined to comment on the reports of pending Iranian shipments to Russia. Russian and Iranian officials did not respond to requests for comment on Saturday on reports of Russian-bound Iranian missiles.

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian said “the Islamic Republic of Iran has not and will not provide any weapon to be used in the war in Ukraine,” according to a Saturday readout of his call with his Portuguese counterpart. “We believe that the arming of each side of the crisis will prolong the war.”

On Oct. 3, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kan’ani repeated Iran’s persistent denials of any involvement with supplying drones to Russia. “The Islamic Republic of Iran considers reports about delivering drones to Russia for use in the Ukraine war ‘baseless’ and does not confirm them,” he said. Kan’ani reasserted Iran’s claim of neutrality in the conflict and stressed the need for the “two sides to solve their problems through political means free from violence.”

The Kyiv government has been briefed on the evidence behind the new intelligence, a Ukrainian official told The Washington Post. Ukraine has separately assessed that the majority of drones recently deployed by Russia in the southern Ukraine are Iranian-made.

Ukraine recently downgraded its diplomatic ties with Tehran in response to the appearance of Iranian-made drones over the battlefield. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky last week cited Russia’s recent airstrikes in urging NATO countries to supply his country with advanced air-defense systems.

“We need to protect our sky from the terror of Russia,” Zelensky said Thursday in a speech to the Council of Europe.

Like Iran, Russia has pushed back against Western reports about the shipment of Iranian weapons for its Ukrainian campaign, with Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov deriding such accounts as “bogus.”

But Iranian drones already have made their mark, destroying several Ukrainian tanks and damaging civilian infrastructure in repeated strikes in the past three weeks, Ukrainian officials say. Missiles experts say the arrival of surface-to-surface missiles could give Russia powerful new weapons at time when Kyiv’s forces are reclaiming captured territory across large swaths of southern and eastern Ukraine, successes that are due in part to Western-supplied artillery.

“The progression from drones to surface-to-surface missiles could give the Russians more options and a lot of punch,” said Farzin Nadimi, an expert on Iranian weapons at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a Washington think tank.

Iran possesses one of the largest and most diverse arsenals of short- and medium-range missiles in the Middle East. While Iranian weapons designers have struggled with reliability problems, the newest versions of the Fateh-110 and Zolfaghar are considered by experts to be both potent and reasonably accurate at relatively short distances, Nadimi said. Some models come with electrooptic guidance systems that allow missile operators to guide them in their final approach to the target.

Iran previously provided the same missiles to proxy militia groups in the Middle East, most notably Houthi fighters in Yemen. Houthi forces have displayed Iranian-designed missiles in military parades and used them in attacks against oil refineries and other civilian targets in neighboring Gulf countries.

Russia already possesses an array of unarmed aerial vehicles, or UAVs, which are used mainly for surveillance and artillery spotting. But Moscow has not invested in large fleets of armed drones of the type that U.S. forces have routinely used in military campaigns in Afghanistan and the Middle East.

Moscow did command a vast arsenal of precision-guided missiles and rockets at the outset of the Ukraine invasion, but U.S. officials say its stockpile has been dramatically reduced over the course of the war, now in its seventh month.

According to a presentation by a senior U.S. intelligence official on Friday, Russia’s growing reliance on countries like Iran and North Korea is evidence of the impact of sanctions and export controls imposed by Western countries in the wake of the Ukraine invasion.

According to the information presented by Deputy Director of National Intelligence Morgan Muir, Russia has lost more than 6,000 pieces of equipment since the start of the war, and was “expending munitions at an unsustainable rate.”

Blocked by sanctions from obtaining Western electronics, Russia is “turning to countries like Iran and North Korea for supplies and equipment,” including drones, artillery munitions and rockets, Muir said, addressing a group of top international finance officials at the Treasury Department.

Muir also noted that Russia’s defense industry depends heavily on imports for material such as microprocessors and optical and thermal imaging technology.

The Washington Post · by Joby Warrick · October 16, 2022

5. Is Taiwan’s Fate Really Tied to Ukraine?

Excerpts:

A peace that involves Ukrainian concessions to Russia will neither fatally undermine American deterrence in Europe, nor fatally undermine Ukrainian sovereignty. On the contrary, it will show the world that the United States can still balance solemn principles with strategic priorities. By contrast, pressing for total victory against a declining nuclear-armed power whose conventional forces are crumbling shows poor judgment. The Russian advance has been stymied, and NATO stands stronger and more united than at any time since its founding. Russia might have the desire to dominate it’s near abroad but it lacks the material means to do so. China, on the other hand, has both the will and the means to dominate East Asia and is marshaling its mounting economic and military might to achieve that aim. This is the gravest threat to the long-term security and prosperity of the United States.

American leaders would serve their country best by not sinking their limited resources into a conflict of secondary strategic importance. Two decades of fruitless fighting in the Middle East have sapped popular support for American intervention overseas. The United States faces deepening domestic divisions and challenges. Washington must conserve its limited resources, treasure, and national will for sustained strategic competition with China. That is the struggle upon which the course and contour of the next century will depend. We cannot be strong everywhere, but there is still time to be strong at the decisive point. In the words of Winston Churchill, “If we win the big battle in the decisive theater, we can put everything right afterwards.”

Is Taiwan’s Fate Really Tied to Ukraine?

The defense of Taiwan hinges on Washington pivoting to the Pacific, not doubling down in the Donbas.

by Joseph M. Donato

The National Interest · by Joseph M. Donato · October 7, 2022

Ukrainian momentum on the battlefield has inspired a surge of optimism in the West, but the war’s broader economic, political, and material metrics still portend an operational stalemate. As the fighting grinds on, Western commentators continue to underscore the connection between Ukraine and the fate of Taiwan. A recent article in The Hill claimed that Chinese president Xi Jinping “almost certainly sees the test of wills between Russia and the West over Ukraine as a proxy and predictor for the psychological showdown between China and the United States on Taiwan.” This logic implies that a lack of American resolve in Ukraine will embolden China to strike Taiwan. The persistent proponents of this position are thus pushing policymakers in Washington to deepen their commitment to Kyiv and press for total victory. Signals and statements from senior officials in the White House and the Pentagon indicate that the United States is indeed pursuing maximalist war aims in Ukraine.

This open-ended commitment, while morally commendable, is inimical to the grand strategic interests of the United States. Ukraine is important but the decisive flashpoint of great power competition in this century remains Taiwan, and the connection between the two states is the inverse of what many continue to assert. Rather than strengthening deterrence against a Chinese invasion of Taiwan, the deepening American commitment to Ukraine is weakening its deterrent posture in East Asia, increasing the threat to the imperiled island nation. President Joe Biden has resolved to fight for Taiwan, but the credibility of that commitment rests on the United States mustering forces capable of imposing intolerable losses on China. The defense of Taiwan, therefore, hinges on Washington pivoting to the Pacific, not doubling down in the Donbas.

Washington was wise to support Ukraine in the wake of the invasion. The preceding decade of American policy vis-à-vis Ukraine offers ample cause for criticism, but the decision to stand in solidarity with a fledgling democracy under assault will not be found wanting when weighed in the balance. Today, however, the situation is much different than it was in the opening weeks of the war. Then, the collapse of the Ukrainian state seemed imminent. Now, the people of Ukraine stand united in heroic resistance. Then the world held its breath as Russian tanks rolled toward Kyiv. Now it snickers and sneers as the Kremlin scrambles to fill its thinning ranks.

As winter approaches, the United States should capitalize on the favorable situation at the front to strike an agreement that frees up its forces and resources for deployment to the Indo-Pacific. The longer the United States remains entangled in eastern Europe, the less time it will have to mobilize the forces it needs to counter and deter China. The West must press for peace while the balance of power on the battlefield favors Ukraine. The culminating point of victory will not be known until the war is over, but that point may be approaching sooner than expected. Moreover, the assumption that a cornered autocrat will keep his sharpest sword sheathed while he is slowly strangled shows a lack of prudence and perspective. The time to de-escalate and negotiate is now.

The resources of the United States are limited, and those limits compel American policymakers to set strategic priorities. This does not mean the United States should denude its defenses in Europe, nor does it mean Washington should completely sever its support to Ukraine. It means the United States should set boundaries on its currently unbounded commitment to Kyiv. Six months of fighting have exposed weaknesses in the United States’ capacity to sustain an extended war, let alone fight on two fronts. Strategic retrenchment is not a matter of resolve, it’s a matter of resources. Some insist we can stand and fight the world over at once, but in the face of tightening budgets, mounting shortages, and supply chain stresses, this position seems increasingly untenable. Washington must concentrate its limited strength at the decisive point.

The American defense industrial base is already straining to sustain operations in Ukraine and critical munitions stockpiles are shrinking. Decades of deindustrialization have compounded logistical challenges and removed most of the slack in American war production. At the current rate of fire, the United States and its allies will struggle to feed Ukrainian guns through the winter. Meanwhile, the Taiwanese military is unprepared to repel a Chinese invasion, and promised American assistance is being delayed. In the absence of a significant expansion in production—which would take considerable time and investment—strategic priorities must be enforced. As American production sputters, China’s meticulous preparation for invasion proceeds. If Beijing’s timeline for invading Taiwan suddenly accelerates, the deindustrialized and depleted Arsenal of Democracy will find itself on the horns of a dilemma.

A peace that involves Ukrainian concessions to Russia will neither fatally undermine American deterrence in Europe, nor fatally undermine Ukrainian sovereignty. On the contrary, it will show the world that the United States can still balance solemn principles with strategic priorities. By contrast, pressing for total victory against a declining nuclear-armed power whose conventional forces are crumbling shows poor judgment. The Russian advance has been stymied, and NATO stands stronger and more united than at any time since its founding. Russia might have the desire to dominate it’s near abroad but it lacks the material means to do so. China, on the other hand, has both the will and the means to dominate East Asia and is marshaling its mounting economic and military might to achieve that aim. This is the gravest threat to the long-term security and prosperity of the United States.

American leaders would serve their country best by not sinking their limited resources into a conflict of secondary strategic importance. Two decades of fruitless fighting in the Middle East have sapped popular support for American intervention overseas. The United States faces deepening domestic divisions and challenges. Washington must conserve its limited resources, treasure, and national will for sustained strategic competition with China. That is the struggle upon which the course and contour of the next century will depend. We cannot be strong everywhere, but there is still time to be strong at the decisive point. In the words of Winston Churchill, “If we win the big battle in the decisive theater, we can put everything right afterwards.”

Joseph M. Donato currently serves as a military intelligence officer in the United States Army Reserve. He served as a political-military advisor to the commander of a combined joint task force in Iraq from 2018-19, and a John S. McCain Strategic Defense Fellow at the Department of Defense from 2020-21. He holds a BA in history from Seton Hall University and an MA in security studies from Georgetown University. He lives in Washington, DC.

Image: Reuters.

The National Interest · by Joseph M. Donato · October 7, 2022

6. Failure to Control Ukraine’s Skies Betrays Key Flaw in Russia’s War Strategy

This could be a useful "negative" example of the importance of air power. We in the US have been complacent about air superiority/supremacy because we have benefited from it in every war since WWII. But Russia shows us the importance of gaining and maintaining air superiority. We need to invest in the capabilities of our airpower to do this otherwise ground land and maritime operations cannot succeed. It's a joint world out there and we need the proper investment in all the capabilities to ensure we can dominate all domains in support of campaigns and strategy.

Failure to Control Ukraine’s Skies Betrays Key Flaw in Russia’s War Strategy

Without air supremacy, Moscow can’t stop Kyiv’s offensive or target precisely, relying on drones and missiles

https://www.wsj.com/articles/failure-to-control-ukraines-skies-betrays-key-flaw-in-russias-war-strategy-11665915386?utm_source=pocket_mylist

By Daniel MichaelsFollow

Oct. 16, 2022 6:16 am ET

Russia’s struggling invasion of Ukraine has faced problems from poor coordination to unmotivated soldiers, but overshadowing and aggravating all was a critical blunder in the war’s early days, say Western military officials: failure to win control of Ukraine’s skies.

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Without air superiority, Russia has been unable to stop Ukrainian attacks on its soldiers with U.S.-supplied M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, or Himars, and other weapons. Kyiv’s forces have capitalized on Russia’s limited ability to respond by retaking hundreds of square miles of territory from the invading army since early last month.

Russia has recently reacted to Ukraine’s battlefield successes by unleashing deadly attacks on civilian targets using missiles and drones. But even those strikes betray weakness in Moscow’s air strategy, Western military analysts say, because it must rely on remote aircraft rather than piloted planes, out of fear they will be shot down.

“Failure to achieve air supremacy is one of the decisive things that cost Russia their advantage in the war,” said Jakub Janovsky, a military analyst with Oryx, an open-source intelligence consulting firm that has tracked equipment losses throughout the war.

A Rare Look at Ukraine's Himars on the Front Lines

The U.S. Marine Corps Has a Choice: Transform or Die

If the Corps does not veer from its current course, it will lose the things that differentiate it from the Army and the special operations community.

defenseone.com · by Dakota Wood

At some point, the Senate will have to start deliberations on the 2023 National Defense Authorization Act. Part of that debate will determine the way forward for the Marine Corps.

There is no question the Corps is in poor shape to handle the security challenges of the near future. Gen. David H. Berger acknowledged this in 2019 when he became Commandant. His predecessor did as well.

Berger warned that the service risked becoming irrelevant if it did not change. He has pushed to shift the Corps’ focus back to what differentiates it from the U.S. Army: amphibious operations and land operations in support of a naval campaign. These functions not only define the Corps, they are required by law.

Yet a small but potentially influential cadre of retired Marine generals don’t want the Corps to move in this direction. They are actively lobbying lawmakers to block or overturn Berger’s initiatives.

War often demands that services do things that are not at the top of their prescribed set of responsibilities. None has been better at adjusting to this reality than the Corps. But its success as a “second land army” came at a severe cost: it lost touch with its seafaring roots.

During 20 years of combat in Afghanistan and Iraq, few Marines gained any experience in learning the complexities of amphibious operations. The Corps did, however, gain significant weight and logistical dependency.

The Marines up-armored everything. When units used amphibious ships to land their gear in Iraq, they found they were outweighing the ship before they out-cubed it. It’s never been unusual for units to run out of space for all of their boxes and equipment. But with heavily armored Humvees, blast-resistant vehicles, and even cargo trucks encased in protective glass and armored panels, units were weighing down the ships to the point of instability. This was not a good sign for a force that is supposed to be light, nimble, self-sustaining (at least initially), and able to conduct highly distributed operations in contested littoral waters.

Since the early 1990s, the Corps has recognized that amphibious operations are getting more challenging. The threat from long-range precision guided munitions, especially anti-ship cruise missiles, forces large, conventional amphibious warships to operate farther from shore. As a result, Marine forces must be less dependent on their sea-base for support. They must also be able to move around the battlefield in ways that attract less attention from the enemy.

For 30 years, there has been a lot of talk but very little action to solve this problem. Now, however—thanks to advances in unmanned systems, smaller guided weapons that are more mobile and accurate, improvements in the ability of units and platforms (like the F-35B) to share information about the battlespace, and new designs for naval mobility platforms—it is possible to do what could not be done in the past.

Enter Berger’s Force Design 2030, a rare transformational effort that would take maximum advantage of these realities. Force Design 2030 is based on these key facts:

* The primary mission of the Corps is “to provide forces…for service with the fleet in the seizure or defense of advanced naval bases and for the conduct of such land operations as may be essential to the prosecution of a naval campaign." Though the Corps does other things very well, they are secondary to its primary mission.

* All primary national security documents identify China as the most significant security challenge facing the U.S. If the U.S. cannot counter the Chinese threat and the set of modern challenges it represents, it will have to cede regions deemed essential to the long-term interests of the country.

* Defense budgets are always somewhat fungible, but the Corps is faced with limits that will not allow it to keep old capabilities, however useful in some settings, and add new capabilities of greater relevance to its primary mission.

* As currently postured, the Corps is unable to fulfill its primary mission against the primary archetype threat in the theater of greatest importance to the United States.

Faced with these facts, the Corps must decide whether to keep things that remain effective yet less relevant to its primary mission, or shift its investments to things more relevant to present and future challenges. Examples of the former include 80-ton tanks, large quantities of short-range tube artillery, heavy bridging, and some shorter-range attack aircraft that require land bases when removed from large amphibious assault ships. Examples of the latter include longer-range weapons that enable the Corps to support naval campaigns, like anti-ship cruise missiles and anti-air weapons (both of which deny the enemy the ability to freely operate against U.S. forces); amphibious ships and unmanned platforms that are harder to find than their older and much larger counterparts; and Marines equipped with sensors and intelligence-related tools that enable them to make the larger Joint Force more effective in the theaters of action of greatest importance to the United States.

Force Design 2030 embraces the latter approach to keep the Corps from plunging into irrelevance. Berger’s critics seemingly don’t understand how much the environment has changed, are too wedded to what they know has worked in the past, or think that there is enough money, time, and manpower to retain the old while also introducing the new.

Berger would not be the first commandant to reimagine the Corps. Lt. Gen. Thomas Holcomb, 17th Commandant, developed amphibious assault capabilities that proved essential to success in World War II. It meant profound changes in force design, equipping, concepts, and employment—and Holcomb could have refused to do it. But he had the foresight to see what was needed and the courage to make the necessary changes.

For years, the Corps has said it must be “most ready when the nation is least ready.” Where is the nation least ready today? In its ability to confront the most advanced threats since the early days of the Cold War. Force Design 2030 will deliver a Corps with new combined-arms formations organized for distributed operations against the most capable enemies, equipped to prevent an enemy from controlling key terrain on land, at sea, and in the air, and trained to project naval power and larger, Joint Force capabilities anywhere on the planet.

Some critics worry that the Corps is proceeding too quickly, that it does not yet have sufficient buy-in from the other services—especially the Navy, whose ships are an essential component to operations. There is some merit to this argument, but only some. If the Commandant waited until he got broad concurrence from all interested parties, until the Navy got its ship-building act together, until the Joint Force was fully on-board, until all applicable concepts were fully proved in a range of operational settings, until all processes and systems bearing upon the matter were perfected, then nothing would ever get done. His tour as Commandant would end with no progress made in any area.

The Corps’ bold approach shows progress and application in real-world settings. It demonstrates seriousness and practical utility. And it has strong support in Congress and among the regional combatant commanders.

If the Corps does not transform, it will die the death of irrelevance, useful only as an adjunct to the U.S. Army or for small, crisis-response missions like reinforcing an embassy, the type of task for which the U.S. military has other options. If the Corps does not transform, it will lose the things that differentiate it from the Army or the special operations community.

Transformation is part of the DNA of the Corps. This latest iteration merits the support of all Marines and those charged with the defense of our nation.

A 20-year veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps, Dakota L. Wood is the senior research fellow for defense programs at The Heritage Foundation.

defenseone.com · by Dakota Wood

8. Xi Jinping’s Quest for Control Over China Targets Even Old Friends

Excerpts:

Some political watchers thought the purges would ease once he settled into his role. Ten years into his tenure, his methods have only grown more sophisticated and pervasive.

Targets in the disciplinary crackdown include a retired member of the Communist Party’s top leadership and a sitting Politburo member. Party enforcers punished some 627,000 people for graft and other offenses last year, roughly four times the number in 2012, when Mr. Xi took charge, according to party data.

Mr. Xi now often uses subtler methods as well, such as taking down officials’ associates with disciplinary probes and replacing them with his own protégés, party insiders say. He also reassigns opponents to less important roles, or switches their portfolios to separate them from their power bases.

...

Mao undercut perceived opponents similarly in an approach known as “digging at the foot of a wall,” according to Joseph Torigian, an assistant professor at American University who wrote a book about power struggles in the Soviet Union and Communist China.

Like Mao and Deng, Mr. Xi might be thinking that “these people’s usefulness has passed, or are not intuiting what he wants correctly anymore, or he just wants more pliant people in certain positions,” Mr. Torigian said.

Party insiders say Mr. Xi appears to have used some of his subtler approaches against Meng Jianzhu, a former Politburo member and security chief who retired in 2017.

Mr. Meng was a well-regarded official who oversaw the abolishment of the notorious program that China called “re-education through labor,” which herded criminals and dissidents into work camps. Mr. Meng left office with his protégés holding key law-enforcement posts, leaving him with considerable influence over the party’s security apparatus.

Xi Jinping’s Quest for Control Over China Targets Even Old Friends

An expanding campaign of anticorruption purges has helped China’s leader tighten his grip on power

https://www.wsj.com/articles/xi-jinping-china-anticorruption-11665925166?utm_source=pocket_mylist

By Chun Han WongFollow

Oct. 16, 2022 9:01 am ET

Xi Jinping became China’s most formidable leader in decades through a campaign of anticorruption purges that sidelined opponents and suppressed any potential challenge, real or perceived, to his power.

Some political watchers thought the purges would ease once he settled into his role. Ten years into his tenure, his methods have only grown more sophisticated and pervasive.

Targets in the disciplinary crackdown include a retired member of the Communist Party’s top leadership and a sitting Politburo member. Party enforcers punished some 627,000 people for graft and other offenses last year, roughly four times the number in 2012, when Mr. Xi took charge, according to party data.

Mr. Xi now often uses subtler methods as well, such as taking down officials’ associates with disciplinary probes and replacing them with his own protégés, party insiders say. He also reassigns opponents to less important roles, or switches their portfolios to separate them from their power bases.

Few are beyond Mr. Xi’s reach. That includes one of his oldest friends, Wang Qishan, who became China’s vice president in 2018, a ceremonial sinecure widely seen as a reward conferred by Mr. Xi.

Mr. Wang himself had served as China’s anticorruption czar for five years, when he ran the withering crackdowns that helped Mr. Xi consolidate control in his earliest years in power. Over the past two years, antigraft enforcers have increasingly gone after people inside Mr. Wang’s political and personal circles.

The party purged two of his associates in 2020—an outspoken property mogul and a senior party functionary. Officials probing a bankrupt Chinese conglomerate took its chairman, a friend of Mr. Wang, into custody last year, then detained Mr. Wang’s nephew-in-law this spring, according to people familiar with the matter. In April, Beijing opened a corruption case against a veteran banker who had once worked closely with Mr. Wang.

Mr. Wang hasn’t been accused of wrongdoing and has continued appearing publicly at state events. He couldn’t be reached for comment.

China's Vice President Wang Qishan at the National People's Congress in March.

PHOTO: LEO RAMIREZ/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES

By scrutinizing people close to his longtime friend, party insiders say, Mr. Xi is sending a message that he’ll dismantle all potential power centers and intimidate opponents. But because the challenge is indirect, those targeted might not be so fearful that they’d organize resistance against him.

Mr. Xi’s tactics echo how Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping undermined even party colleagues who didn’t appear to pose serious threats or have ambitions of challenging the leader, historians say. The campaign has helped Mr. Xi alter the architecture of power in China—and made him seemingly untouchable for now as he looks set to claim a third term as party chief in the coming week, the party insiders say.

The Communist Party’s propaganda department and the Chinese government’s publicity arm, the State Council Information Office, didn’t respond to requests for comment.

A decade ago, Mr. Xi warned that the party faced an existential fight against corruption and ordered all-out efforts to combat the scourge. The highly popular crackdown surprised many within the party with its intensity and persistence. While declaring success in his antigraft efforts, Mr. Xi has continued to reinvent the campaign, directing party inspectors to police political loyalty and enforce Beijing’s policies.

Mr. Xi’s unrelenting purges could ultimately consume the party. They have antagonized members of the political elite and discouraged lower-level officials from making decisions for fear of running afoul of Beijing. Mr. Xi himself has complained that bureaucrats are failing to implement his directives as they focus on protecting their careers.

The purges also risk making China’s political system less resilient over time by leaving senior leaders less willing to challenge Mr. Xi and debate policies.

His technique has been honed over his years in power, according to people familiar with the practice. Mr. Xi asks trusted inspectors to quietly prepare hundreds of pages of evidence against a senior official that he wishes to neutralize, they said.

Mr. Xi would pinpoint the official’s weaknesses and build a case that can tar the official’s reputation within the party elite, particularly if the target has a reputation for being honest and competent, the people said.

Sometimes Mr. Xi authorizes investigations against a close associate of a high-ranking official under the pretext of demonstrating the associate’s honesty, thereby making it hard for the senior official to intervene, some of the people said.

If the investigation turns up evidence of corruption, Mr. Xi would raise the case in leadership meetings and the high-ranking official in question would find it difficult to speak against the probe, or would have to expend considerable political capital to do so, they said.

Mr. Xi at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing in 2019.

PHOTO: POOL/GETTY IMAGES

Mao undercut perceived opponents similarly in an approach known as “digging at the foot of a wall,” according to Joseph Torigian, an assistant professor at American University who wrote a book about power struggles in the Soviet Union and Communist China.

Like Mao and Deng, Mr. Xi might be thinking that “these people’s usefulness has passed, or are not intuiting what he wants correctly anymore, or he just wants more pliant people in certain positions,” Mr. Torigian said.

Party insiders say Mr. Xi appears to have used some of his subtler approaches against Meng Jianzhu, a former Politburo member and security chief who retired in 2017.

Mr. Meng was a well-regarded official who oversaw the abolishment of the notorious program that China called “re-education through labor,” which herded criminals and dissidents into work camps. Mr. Meng left office with his protégés holding key law-enforcement posts, leaving him with considerable influence over the party’s security apparatus.

Party investigators have since taken down some of his protégés, helping clear the way for Mr. Xi to put loyalists into key security roles. Efforts to reach Mr. Meng weren’t successful.

In 2018, Chinese authorities detained Meng Hongwei, a vice minister of public security who had worked closely with the elder Mr. Meng (no relation) and served as president of Interpol at the time. The younger Mr. Meng was sentenced to prison for 13½ years on corruption charges in January 2020. He couldn’t be reached. His wife has decried the case as trumped up and politically motivated.

In April 2020, the party announced a probe against Sun Lijun, a law-enforcement veteran and one of the elder Mr. Meng’s top protégés. During his policing career, Mr. Sun held roles overseeing political security before his promotion to vice minister of public security in 2018.

Mr. Sun allegedly received data collected by the WeChat social-media app from an executive at the app’s developer, Tencent Holdings Ltd., The Wall Street Journal reported last year. Mr. Sun was trying to use WeChat data to monitor conversations among relatives of senior Chinese officials, and glean information that could benefit himself and Mr. Meng, according to people familiar with the investigation.

Sun Lijun at a court sentencing on Sept. 23, in an image taken from video footage.

PHOTO: ASSOCIATED PRESS

The party expelled Mr. Sun in September 2021 and accused him of political and financial wrongdoing. State media identified key members of his alleged “political clique,” including a former justice minister, an erstwhile provincial security czar and three ex-regional police chiefs—all of whom recently received prison sentences ranging from 14 years to de facto life terms for corruption.

In September, Mr. Sun received a suspended death sentence—effectively a life term in prison—on charges of bribery, stock-market manipulation and illegal possession of firearms. He couldn’t be reached for comment.

Similar tactics were applied to Chen Yuan, the eldest son of Chinese revolutionary elder Chen Yun. The younger Chen—who led state-owned China Development Bank for 15 years, as governor and then chairman, before retiring in 2013—is widely seen as a leading figure among “princelings,” as descendants of current or former top officials are known. He was once considered more influential within the party elite than Mr. Xi, who is also a princeling.

Party inspectors have opened investigations against more than a dozen of Mr. Chen’s protégés, including at least three former secretaries, in recent years, according to people familiar with the matter. Efforts to reach Mr. Chen weren’t successful.

In the case of Vice President Wang, people familiar with him say he harbors no ambitions to challenge Mr. Xi. Five years senior to the 69-year-old Mr. Xi, Mr. Wang is considered too old to be a viable successor.

Mr. Wang still commands considerable clout independent of Mr. Xi, party insiders and political observers say, and therefore poses a latent threat.

Mr. Wang shook hands with Mr. Xi as he was elected China's vice president in 2018.

PHOTO: GREG BAKER/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES

The two have known each other since at least the 1966-1976 Cultural Revolution, when they were among millions of urban youth sent to work in the countryside at Mao’s behest.

Widely respected for his record as an economic-policy wonk, banker and politician, Mr. Wang earned the nickname of “fire brigade chief” for his record of troubleshooting political crises. He stepped in as Beijing mayor in 2003 as the capital roiled from the outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS. As anticorruption czar, he oversaw thousands of investigations and worked closely with Mr. Xi in managing purges.

Mr. Wang stepped down from the party leadership in 2017. He later became vice president, joined the party’s top foreign-policy commission and continued attending high-level meetings.

Signs of Mr. Wang’s ebbing clout emerged in 2020, when retired property tycoon Ren Zhiqiang, a friend of Mr. Wang, was purged after writing an online essay criticizing Mr. Xi’s handling of Covid-19. Authorities detained Mr. Ren, expelled him from the party, and sentenced him to 18 years in prison for corruption and other charges.

Less than two weeks after Mr. Ren’s sentencing, the party announced a probe against Dong Hong, a close subordinate of Mr. Wang for much of the past three decades, who took a senior role in the anticorruption crackdown that Mr. Wang ran.

When a Chinese court convicted Mr. Dong for corruption and handed him a suspended death sentence in January, state media reports on the verdict cited Mr. Dong’s past positions working under Mr. Wang, in what party insiders saw as a pointed gesture toward the vice president.

In 2021, authorities detained another businessman close to Mr. Wang—Chen Feng, chairman and co-founder of HNA Group, a conglomerate based in the island province of Hainan, where Mr. Wang once served as party chief. Mr. Chen’s current whereabouts couldn’t be determined and he couldn’t be reached for comment.

During Lunar New Year festivities this year, party inspectors detained Mr. Wang’s nephew-in-law, Yao Qing, for investigations related to Mr. Yao’s connections with HNA, according to people familiar with the situation. HNA came to prominence with a string of big-ticket acquisitions from 2015 to 2017, including stakes in Deutsche Bank AG and hotel chain Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc., before falling into financial trouble that culminated in court-led bankruptcy proceedings last year.

People who know Mr. Yao believe the reasons behind his detention go beyond his HNA connections and serve as a warning to Mr. Wang.

Mr. Yao, who is also the grandson of former Vice Premier Yao Yilin, was released from custody several months later, the people said. It couldn’t be determined if authorities accused Mr. Yao of wrongdoing. He couldn’t be reached.

In April, party inspectors opened a probe against Tian Huiyu, a veteran banker who worked as an aide to Mr. Wang while the latter was the top official at state-run China Construction Bank in the 1990s. The party expelled Mr. Tian in October, accusing him of corruption, extravagance and misusing his powers for self-benefit. He couldn’t be reached.

Mr. Wang has continued discharging his duties as vice president. In September, he attended the funeral for Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II as a representative of Mr. Xi. Later that month, the party confirmed that Mr. Wang was elected a delegate to its national congress, now underway.

9. American Executives in Limbo at Chinese Chip Companies After U.S. Ban

Was this the nuclear option in the "chip war?" What will be the total effects of the "fallout?"

American Executives in Limbo at Chinese Chip Companies After U.S. Ban

At least 43 senior executives working with 16 listed Chinese semiconductor companies hold roles from CEO to vice president

https://www.wsj.com/articles/american-executives-in-limbo-at-chinese-chip-companies-after-u-s-ban-11665912757?utm_source=pocket_mylist

By Liza LinFollow

and Karen HaoFollow

Updated Oct. 16, 2022 10:20 am ET

SINGAPORE—American workers hold key positions throughout China’s domestic chip industry, helping manufacturers develop new chips to catch up with foreign rivals. Now, those workers are in limbo under new U.S. export control rules that prohibit U.S. citizens from supporting China’s advanced chip development.

At least 43 senior executives working with 16 publicly listed Chinese semiconductor companies are American citizens, according to an examination of company filings and official websites by The Wall Street Journal. Many of them hold C-suite titles, from chief executive to vice president and chairman.

Almost all of the executives moved to China’s chip industry after spending years working in Silicon Valley for U.S. chip makers or semiconductor equipment firms, according to the companies’ filings. Their work histories reflect the free flow of talent across companies and borders over the years. Some were drawn to China through initiatives including the country’s “Thousand Talents” program, which was introduced in 2008 by the Chinese government to boost research standards.

U.S. Companies Are Reshoring Jobs From China at Record Levels

Yoon's office on 24-hour standby against possible N.K. nuclear test | Yonhap News Agency

en.yna.co.kr · by 이해아 · October 16, 2022

SEOUL, Oct. 16 (Yonhap) -- The office of President Yoon Suk-yeol has been on 24-hour standby as North Korea has been expected to conduct its seventh nuclear test at any time, officials said Sunday.

North Korea's recent series of missile launches and other provocations are believed to be part of the regime's preparations for a seventh nuclear test, according to the officials.

"As North Korea's provocations have become more frequent, we're putting all of our effort into maintaining a readiness posture with a sense of alertness," one senior presidential official told reporters. "It's a 24-hour readiness regime."

Another official told Yonhap News Agency that the presidential office has been coming up with detailed plans to respond to a North Korean nuclear test.

"Everyone is in standby mode," the official said by phone.

North Korea has ratcheted up tensions in recent weeks by conducting a series of ballistic missile launches, including one over Japan, flying warplanes and firing artillery shells into maritime buffer zones off its east and west coasts.

Yoon had no public schedule this weekend but is known to have received briefings in real time on North Korea's movements.

On Saturday, the president visited a hotel restaurant in the U.S. military's Yongsan Garrison and took photos with troops in a demonstration of his commitment to strengthening the South Korea-U.S. alliance, the senior official said.

The National Intelligence Service has said the North could carry out its seventh nuclear test between Oct. 16 and Nov. 7, after the National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party and before the U.S. midterm elections.

hague@yna.co.kr

(END)

en.yna.co.kr · by 이해아 · October 16, 2022

11. The Man Who Said Ukraine Would Win

Still a little early to say "I told you so."

Excerpts:

Mr. Lévy speaks of the war with the authority of a man who has seen it up close—who has been in foxholes alongside troops as they exchanged fire with Russians. He has been pilloried for this on Twitter by half-wits who dwell not on the great risks he runs to report on the war firsthand, but on the suit he wears under his flak jacket.

...

The Ukrainians have “a determined army which takes its time and tightens its grip little by little.” Their superiority to the Russians on the battlefield is apparent. “The Ukrainian generals are the better strategists, not the Russians,” he says. “But the real reason Putin has not succeeded”—the reason Ukrainian morale has remained high even in the face of the most “stomach-churning” Russian atrocities against civilians—is that “they know why they fight.”

...

How will we know that Ukraine has won? “It’s very simple,” Mr. Lévy says. “We’ll be able to celebrate victory on the day that Putin will capitulate. Not just lose, but capitulate. Bring back his army to where it was before this long war.” Putin must “evacuate his war dogs from the territories he claims absurdly to have ‘annexed,’ and also, of course, from Crimea.” Mr. Lévy is adamant there is no other solution that will afford a durable peace. “And no other solution, also, if we wish to end the energy, nuclear and even terrorist blackmail that the Kremlin has inflicted on us.”

He likens the present day to early 1945, when victory in World War II was approaching. “Did the democracies negotiate with Hitler? Did they look for compromises? Or offer him an exit ramp? No. They demanded his capitulation with no conditions. Well, it is the same with Putin.” The people of Ukraine don’t want to negotiate. They want justice, “not revenge.” And justice, Mr. Lévy says, “must be quick, must be fair, and must be severe.”

The Man Who Said Ukraine Would Win

‘The real reason Putin has not succeeded,’ says Bernard-Henri Lévy, is that his opponents ‘know why they fight.’

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-man-who-said-ukraine-would-win-bernard-henri-levy-russia-putin-west-front-lines-america-strategy-paris-11665752884?utm_source=pocket_mylist

By Tunku Varadarajan

Oct. 14, 2022 3:14 pm ET

Paris

“Victory for the Ukrainians is coming very fast,” says Bernard-Henri Lévy. “And I was the first to predict it.” Mr. Lévy is on his fifth visit to the country since Vladimir Putin launched his invasion in late February; his first was in mid-March.

“I am in the east,” he tells me Wednesday by WhatsApp, the least unreliable way to communicate from the front lines. He’s in Kupyansk, a town “just liberated,” then to Izium, where “Ukrainian families are just beginning to return.” Two days earlier, the Russians had bombed the heart of Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, including a children’s playground. But he still feels “a strong wind of victory. A sad victory, of course. A victory in the midst of graves, but victory nonetheless.”

Mr. Lévy, 73, is conventionally billed as a “French philosopher.” That’s wholly inadequate to describe a man who’s also a journalist and filmmaker, a passionate crusader for democratic rights, and a freelance envoy of the Western world to war zones on almost every continent. We met last month, after his return from his fourth Ukraine visit, in Mr. Lévy’s exquisitely furnished and commodious apartment in the heart of Paris.

He leads a magnificent life and has no need to risk his neck in Ukraine or elsewhere. Yet he does. He is a wealthy man—heir to his father’s timber fortune and the author of several best-selling books—and he often pays his own way to these combat zones, setting himself the task of highlighting the plight and the needs of the people at war. “I have the means,” he says, “and the time.” He also feels “a duty, as an intellectual whose voice is heard, to ring the bell and warn the world.” He confesses to a kinship with the Ukrainian people. Ever since he visited Kyiv during Ukraine’s democratic Maidan Revolution in 2014, he’s regarded them as “the sentinels of the West,” on the front line with Russia.

We meet days after the Ukrainian armed forces liberated Lyman, a town in the east that the Russians had captured and ravaged. We sit at Mr. Lévy’s dining table, a large map of Ukraine spread out between us. He’s “not at all surprised” by the victory in Lyman. “I was there with the Ukrainians, a few kilometers from the city, a few days before the offensive,” he says. “One could feel the encirclement of the Russian forces, just as one could feel the solidity of the Ukrainian positions. One could see how they were, little by little, transforming from defensive positions into offensive ones.”

On the lookout in Raigorodok, facing Lyman.

PHOTO: MARC ROUSSEL

Mr. Lévy speaks of the war with the authority of a man who has seen it up close—who has been in foxholes alongside troops as they exchanged fire with Russians. He has been pilloried for this on Twitter by half-wits who dwell not on the great risks he runs to report on the war firsthand, but on the suit he wears under his flak jacket.

He says he dresses up for the battlefield for the same reason he does when he meets “a senator in D.C., a friend in New York, or my publisher in Paris”: “Few deserve more respect than those who risk their lives, buried in trenches, to defend our shared values.” He also wears a suit for our interview, late on a Friday evening. No one is around but us and his impeccable Sri Lankan butler, who has worked for Mr. Lévy for 32 years and still doesn’t speak a word of French.

The Ukrainian soldiers on the front, Mr. Lévy says, had “a sense of calm, a strength, and a steel morale.” Lyman was a “key hub for the Russians in the region. And they lost it. Their entire infrastructure in the region will be weakened, and even if they try a counterattack, we’ll be able to see further pushes, even stronger still, by the Ukrainian forces.”

The Ukrainians have “a determined army which takes its time and tightens its grip little by little.” Their superiority to the Russians on the battlefield is apparent. “The Ukrainian generals are the better strategists, not the Russians,” he says. “But the real reason Putin has not succeeded”—the reason Ukrainian morale has remained high even in the face of the most “stomach-churning” Russian atrocities against civilians—is that “they know why they fight.”

They fight not only for “their existence, their survival,” but also for “values which they believe are worth risking their lives for,” Mr. Lévy says. That’s what led him to conclude in March that the Ukrainians would win: “I said it very early on. And I never, absolutely never, doubted it.” Everyone around him was saying, “Putin will never accept this, the Kremlin will never accept that.” But Mr. Lévy has covered many wars, and he’s found “there’s a simple law”: The people, not only the generals, must embrace the fight. “It’s the poor civilians that are sent to face the machine guns and who, in an instant, accept or refuse to go. And in this situation, when you know why you are there—when you defend your city, your house, your children, and, even more important, a creed that is deep within you—you go.”

The Russians offer a vivid contrast: “When you don’t understand what you’re doing there, when you don’t know why you are fighting, when you understand that you were sent to your death to satisfy the whims of a crazy, belligerent tyrant—well then, no one, no Putin in the world, can push you to step up to fight.” It won’t be long, he forecasts, before “the Russian army will really collapse from inside.”

On the Ukrainian marine patrol boat Fastiv, watching for enemy vessels approaching Odessa.

PHOTO: MARC ROUSSEL

Already Mr. Putin has had to resort to conscription. Mr. Lévy invokes the “era of Soviet dissidents, like in Solzhenitsyn’s books, with men breaking their own arms not to be enlisted in the army.” When people are at this point, “I don’t see how you can build a real army. The dictator has to resort to calling for mercenaries, for gangsters taken out of jail, for hysterical Chechen Islamist militants, and for the blind shelling of cities.” When a dictator is “reduced to that, I don’t see how he can win.”

In his visits to Ukraine, Mr. Lévy has seen proof of the barbarism of the Russians, “who are weak in front of the strong and strong in front of the weak.” He calls this the “definition of cowardice,” the opposite of the Ukrainians’ “nobility” and “sophistication.” Is Mr. Lévy romanticizing the Ukrainians? He says no: “For the moment, I don’t romanticize. I believe that there is, between Russia and Ukraine, a clash of civilizations.” There are no perfect states, he allows, “and when peace comes, I’m sure there will be a necessary democratic push to be made in Ukraine. But if Putin wins the war, it would be a serious weakening of the West and of America. Ukraine is the rendezvous, the call to arms, of our times.”

America’s strength obsesses Mr. Lévy, who may be France’s most pro-American public figure. “Anti-Americanism,” he says, “is one of the very significant and dark benchmarks of the worst instinct in France, which is often fascism.” He describes Mr. Putin as “authentically a fascist” for whom “America is the devil and the West the embodiment of decay.” Western values are “what he attacks through the pretext of Ukraine,” Mr. Lévy says. Ukraine’s “great virtue”—its embrace of European and Western values, and of America—was “impossible for Putin to digest.” It is what drove him to rage, and to war.

Western public opinion on Ukraine has been more favorable than he expected: “I’m always surprised when the worst does not happen.” He expected trouble, “especially in America, which is in the middle of a political mess where you have the America-first people on one side—the Trumpers—and the woke people on the other, some of whom say that this is just a war between white people, so it’s not our affair.” In Europe, there’s “the Munich tradition, which runs really deep.” The first reflex on the Continent “is often the worst. ‘OK,’ they say, ‘we are not going to enter into this mess. We are going to appease.’ Appeasement!”

But stiffened by widespread public support for Ukraine, politicians on both sides of the Atlantic have thrown their weight behind the Ukrainian people and government. Mr. Lévy has special praise for former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and French President Emmanuel Macron. The latter “said from the very beginning that he wanted Ukraine to win. He said from the very beginning that the only ‘political solution’ is a military victory for Ukraine.”

China's Semiconductor Industry 'Decapitated Overnight': What 'Annihilation Looks Like' - Applied Materials (NASDAQ:AMAT), ASML Holding (NASDAQ:ASML)

benzinga.com · by AJ Fabino

The Biden administration unveiled a comprehensive strategy last week to move the U.S. forward and hold China back in the production of advanced semiconductors, virtually eliminating China's semi industry overnight, escalating the high-tech battle with Beijing.

“Every American executive and engineer working in China’s semiconductor manufacturing industry resigned yesterday, paralyzing Chinese manufacturing overnight,” wrote Twitter user @lidangzzz, translated by Rhodium Group analyst Jordan Schneider.

“One round of sanctions from Biden did more damage than all four years of performative sanctioning under Trump.”

What happened: Yangtze Memory Technologies Co, a company owned by China, and 30 other semiconductor companies in China have been put to the Unverified List by the Bureau of Industry and Security, a division of the U.S. Department of Commerce.

Sanctions imposed by the Biden administration also prevent businesses from sending the cutting-edge processors required to run or train the most efficient AI algorithms to China.

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The extensive new regulations are intended to keep China's AI industry in the stone age as the U.S. and other Western nations advance.

The limitations also prohibit the export of chip manufacturing tools and design software and forbid the top silicon fabs in the world, such as Taiwan Semiconductor Mfg. Co. Ltd. (NYSE:TSM) and Samsung, from producing cutting-edge chips for Chinese businesses.

Why Did American Execs Resign? One of the provisions of President Joe Biden's executive order is that any U.S. citizen or green card holder working in China cannot work in the Chinese semiconductor industry or risk of losing American citizenship.

According to the @lidangzzz thread, it is not just affecting Americans.

“Everyone from Lam Research Corporation (NASDAQ:LRCX) at Yangtze Memory left today, and on the 12th the Applied Materials, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMAT) folks will leave as well — not just Yangtze, but also HLMC [Shanghai Huali Microelectronics], ICRD’s [Shanghai Integrated Circuit R&D Center Co], Jiading fab, [and] Hefei’s CXMT DRAM fab.”

ASML Holding NV (NASDAQ:ASML), one of the world’s most important semiconductor toolmakers, told U.S. employees to stop servicing Chinese customers.

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“The starting point for this round of sanctions is to go all the way up the food chain and ensure the elimination of all American products and technologies from the entire ecosystem,” the thread reads.

Why It Matters: Taiwan Semi reduced its forecasts for capital expenditures and Applied Materials cut its outlook for revenue and profit following the sanctions. Both businesses said the demand for semiconductor products would decline.

Chinese officials described the U.S. limitations as a significant step intended to thwart the development of the nation. The decision might have wide-ranging effects, such as restricting the development of artificial intelligence that underpins algorithms for driverless vehicles, and other risks.

"This is what annihilation looks like: China’s semiconductor manufacturing industry was reduced to zero overnight. Complete collapse. No chance of survival," the thread continued.

Benzinga's Take: While the new sanctions are a sharp blow to China's semi industry, U.S. leverage could fade eventually as Shenzhen, China's innovation powerhouse, intensified efforts to develop its domestic chip sector by giving significant subsidies and financial incentives to semiconductor companies registered in the city.

Stay up to date on U.S. sanctions here.

Photo via Shutterstock.

benzinga.com · by AJ Fabino

13. Russia Not About To Become An Iran Or A North Korea – OpEd

No one can be like north Korea.

Russia Not About To Become An Iran Or A North Korea – OpEd

eurasiareview.com · by Paul Goble · October 16, 2022

It has become a commonplace among many liberal critics of the Putin regime that the current Kremlin leader is promoting the transformation of Russia into something like Iran or North Korea, ideocratic states isolated from the rest of the world, Andrey Nikulin says. But there are compelling reasons why if he tries, he will fail.

With all its problems, the Russian commentator says, Russia remains far more integrated with the rest of the world than either of those countries were even when their current regimes began the process of cutting them off from the world. Even now, Russians are unwilling to be as isolated as some in the regime would like (kasparov.ru/material.php?id=6346404A051AA).

No Kremlin propaganda will be able to eliminate from Russian mindsets “the conditioned reflect to go to Wikipedia in search of answers to questions” or completely eliminate “the understandings of decency and the beginnings of humanism that Russians have taken from Western culture,” Nikulin says.

The historical complexity of Russian society and its integration with the West which has shaped the current economic reality of the country makes Russia a very poor candidate to follow the course of Iran and North Korea, and developments in the former show that even if efforts are made to isolate a country they will be opposed and resisted.

Consequently, the commentator concludes, any effort to move in that direction will “either finish off both society and the country itself” before it gets half way to the Iranian or North Korean ideal and that once those threats become obvious, Russians will turn around out of “a sense of self-preservation and wander back to a dull future lit by Western suns.”

eurasiareview.com · by Paul Goble · October 16, 2022

14. 3 events that shaped Xi Jinping’s worldview

Excerpts:

The crack-up of the Soviet Union, America’s war on terror, and the fall of autocratic regimes elsewhere are certainly instructive for Xi.

But John Delury, a historian at Yonsei University Graduate School of International Studies in Seoul, emphasized that Xi’s main references come from within China. He did take the core members of his party to the history museum, after all.

3 events that shaped Xi Jinping’s worldview

What Xi learned from the Soviet Union, the US, and the Arab Spring.

Vox · by Jonathan Guyer · October 15, 2022

Xi Jinping delivers a speech at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, in 2012.

Feng Li/Getty Images

When Xi Jinping was elected general secretary of the Chinese Community Party in 2012, one of the first things he did was take his senior colleagues to the National Museum in Tiananmen Square.

The seven new top leaders of China walked through the “Road to Revival” exhibition, a fairly straightforward nationalist history of the country, from the first Opium War in 1840 through the present.

There, Xi delivered a speech about the Chinese dream in which he set forward the goal of “achieving the great revival of the Chinese nation.”

As Xi is poised to take on a third term as China’s president this week at the 20th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party, the highly symbolic museum stroll is worth recalling: it shows how much Xi is shaped by history.

Xi has become increasingly authoritarian — consolidating power, imprisoning dissenters, and now taking a third term, unprecedented since Mao Zedong.

Many of the most aggressive voices about China in the US have painted Xi as inflexible. Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has called him a totalitarian, and Trump’s National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien likened Xi to Stalin. Even those who have worked closely with Xi have come to see him driven by ideology. This week, former Australian prime minister and China expert Kevin Rudd described Xi as a “true believer.”

We may risk misunderstanding Xi, however, if we don’t consider the evidence that he is a pragmatist, who is drawing on the centralized power of the state to apply clear lessons from home and abroad. China’s own modern history and Xi’s experiences living through it likely present the major referents of Xi’s worldview and his priorities, but there are three other moments that have come to inform his worldview as president.

Three historical moments

No historical event haunts Xi and the Chinese leadership more than the Soviet Union’s collapse. “It’s hard to overstate how obsessed they are with the Soviet Union,” historian David Shambaugh has said.

A month into his first term in December 2012, Xi delivered a private speech to party leaders in Guangdong province with “deeply profound” learnings from the USSR’s downfall, with a focus on Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev’s missteps. A summary of those remarks was later circulated. “Why did the Soviet Union disintegrate? Why did the Soviet Communist Party collapse? An important reason was that their ideals and convictions wavered,” Xi said, according to the summary. The lessons he took from the collapse: Retain tight control of the military, don’t make reforms that undermine the party’s power, and make no unforced errors.

“Finally, all it took was one quiet word from Gorbachev to declare the dissolution of the Soviet Communist Party, and a great party was gone,” Xi reportedly said. “In the end, nobody was a real man, nobody came out to resist.”

Performers in the role of rescue workers gather around a Communist Party flag during a gala show ahead of the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party in Beijing on June 28, 2021.

Ng Han Guan/AP

Another major historical moment that has informed Xi’s thinking is the United States’ war on terror that was launched in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.

Xi perhaps saw the ease with which the US perpetuated bad policies worldwide and at home. The US did face a credible terrorism threat, but Washington’s response was a massive overextension of power: invading and occupying Iraq and Afghanistan; deepening extrajudicial policies that meant close collaboration with autocratic Arab and Muslim countries; and advancing surveillance policies, including a misguided dragnet of Muslims, Arabs, and other minorities inside the US and long-term detentions in Guantanamo Bay.

The lesson Xi apparently took from America’s global war on terror wasn’t that overextension and hubris would lead to decline. Xi, instead, has seemed to grasp that he could get away with brazen expressions of power, so long as they were framed as counterterrorism.

China, before Xi ascended to the top of the party, took on many of the worst tenets of the war on terror, its rhetoric and policies, to clamp down on the country’s Muslim communities in the province of Xinjiang. The mass detention and relocation of Uyghurs in Xinjiang has been called a genocide.

Though these policies began in the early 2000s, Xi has accelerated them and come to be associated with them. As Gulzira Auelkhan, a Uyghur who survived the camps, has said, “In the camp, guards openly said it was Xi Jinping’s policy. … We had to publicly thank him for everything.” Or as Xi has put it, “The facts have abundantly demonstrated that our national minority work has been a success.”

Third, recent political uprisings have informed Xi’s thinking. Top of mind are the color revolutions in Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan (former Soviet states) in the early 2000s and the Arab revolutions in 2011 that spread across the Middle East and North Africa and toppled dictators.

It’s led to a major emphasis on the Chinese state’s stability.

One way to ensure that is to eliminate the corruption within the party and the Chinese government — for Xi, the rot at the top of the undemocratic regimes exposed their own vulnerability to citizens. Anti-corruption campaigns have been a key component of Xi’s rule, and a way to avoid the fate of leaders like Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who over his 29 years in office was known for his expensive tailored suits and decadent lifestyle that appeared at the expense of his increasingly impoverished nation.

The Arab Spring occurred before Xi took office, but its ongoing protests and counterrevolution were still present in 2012 and may have informed the crackdown on Chinese party corruption, including the fall from grace of party honcho Bo Xilai.

Learning from China’s history

The crack-up of the Soviet Union, America’s war on terror, and the fall of autocratic regimes elsewhere are certainly instructive for Xi.

But John Delury, a historian at Yonsei University Graduate School of International Studies in Seoul, emphasized that Xi’s main references come from within China. He did take the core members of his party to the history museum, after all.

The museum itself offers important clues for how Xi thinks. “It’s an orthodox lesson of essentially modern Chinese history, which is the century of humiliation,” Delury told me. The museum tells the story of the Qing Dynasty — “China let itself become weak, the system became weak. And ‘We got whooped by these European powers and then by the Japanese. And we can never let that happen again,’” he said.

That account is well-known in China, but, Delury says, “It does tell us a little bit about Xi’s instincts.”

It’s less clear what Xi has gathered about the histories of succession among China’s leaders. There is much speculation but little clarity about who might follow Xi as president after his third term — or perhaps even another. The party is changing the constitution to extend his presidency, and we don’t yet know when that term will end or what comes next.

“From the beginning, from 1921 when the CCP was founded, there are very few examples of a smooth, orderly transition of supreme power,” Delury said. “It’s a mess.”

As Delury put it, “Xi Jinping would know this history.”

Next Up In World

Vox · by Jonathan Guyer · October 15, 2022

15. It's time for the US to revoke China's 'normal trade' status

Excerpts:

What has been less clear is the strategic opportunity that revoking China’s PNTR status presents. Existing US tools of economic competition are inadequate to address Beijing’s threat: constrained by unwieldy bureaucracies, political pathologies, and regulatory limitations, they permit, at best, a half-hearted “whack-a-mole” defense. Addressing China’s PNTR status could leapfrog these constraints. It could open the door to strategic action to reset the foundational structure of US-China economic relations.

It could send a clear signal to market actors about the end of the foolish assumption that economic integration would liberalize the communists in Beijing. It would also allow the United States to reclaim the moral high ground of refusing to permit permanent trade with non-market authoritarian regimes that abuse their own people.

And here’s the kicker: the American public supports this. The immediate, conventional response to any proposal to revoke China’s PNTR status is simple. It would be too expensive, the economies are too intertwined, and the American consumer wouldn’t stand for it. But a poll conducted in July 2022 — when gas sat north of $5 a gallon — found that was not the case. It found that the plurality of likely voters supported revoking China’s PNTR status, even if that risked exacerbating inflation supply chain pressures. Only 35 percent were opposed, and 26 percent among Republicans.

Here is an issue that has public and bipartisan support and both immediate and historical precedent. Here is a strategic opportunity and national obligation. Here is an opportunity for the US to come together not only to defeat Putin but to begin to seriously correct China’s non-market distortion of the global, free trading system.

It's time for the US to revoke China's 'normal trade' status

It’s an economic adversary and we should treat it as such

October 14, 2022 | 12:10 pm

spectatorworld.com

In April 2022, six weeks after Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, President Biden signed legislation to suspend Russia’s Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) status. “Revoking PNTR from Russia,” he said, “is going to make it harder for Russia to do business with the United States… The free world is coming together to defeat Putin.”

PNTR status, also known as Most Favored Nation (MFN) status, is a designation granted among World Trade Organization members. Receiving nations are awarded all trade advantages that any other nation receives.

Revoking PNTR status from Russia was a strategic move. It opened the door...

Revoking PNTR status from Russia was a strategic move. It opened the door to deliver comprehensive economic strikes against Moscow and sent a clear signal to markets. But five months later, Russia continues its offensive against Ukraine, with the Chinese Communist Party serving as Moscow’s primary international backer. This demands attention. The Russia PNTR move was reactive. It did not deter Putin’s ambition or impose costs on his chief ally, now eyeing further international aggression. Might a proactive move to rescind China’s permanent trading status have strategic value at this stage?

The real threat facing the international system is not simply Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. It is not Russia’s assault on international norms. It is a rising axis of authoritarian aggressors — led by China with Russia — intent on strangling the international system by weaponizing economic interdependence.

The answer, then, is not simply to push back on Russia’s aggression, just as it is not simply to throw a whack-a-mole jumble of sanctions and tariffs at China. The answer is strategic economic competition with Beijing that builds on the recent precedent of actions taken against Russia. Revoking China’s PNTR status is a step toward seriously defending the international order and the free-market ideals that non-market Beijing has distorted over the past 20 years.

The US granted China PNTR status in 2000 as part of Beijing’s World Trade Organization accession. Then-president Bill Clinton led the charge. He promised that the move would make the United States richer, China freer, and the world more peaceful.

The opposite proved true.

China’s PNTR designation facilitated outsourcing to China, and with it the hollowing out of American industry. Instead of espousing freedom, a richer Chinese Communist Party tightened control of its domestic economy and implemented a genocide against its people. As for the promised global peace, President Zelensky might have something to say about that.

Moreover, Beijing has violated the obligations that come with PNTR status. Receiving governments must not restrict emigration of their people. China not only controls — and prohibits — that of its minorities, but also, according to the United Nations, monitors their communications with people abroad and their movements within China.

China is a national security adversary and source of global economic distortions. It is also a human rights abuser.

These realities have been clear for decades. Senator Bernie Sanders in 2005 introduced a bill to repeal China’s PNTR status, saying, “Anyone who takes an objective look at our trade policy with China must conclude that it is an absolute failure and needs to be fundamentally overhauled.” More recently, in 2021, Republican Senators Tom Cotton, Jim Inhofe, and Rick Scott introduced a bill to end China’s PNTR status.

What has been less clear is the strategic opportunity that revoking China’s PNTR status presents. Existing US tools of economic competition are inadequate to address Beijing’s threat: constrained by unwieldy bureaucracies, political pathologies, and regulatory limitations, they permit, at best, a half-hearted “whack-a-mole” defense. Addressing China’s PNTR status could leapfrog these constraints. It could open the door to strategic action to reset the foundational structure of US-China economic relations.

It could send a clear signal to market actors about the end of the foolish assumption that economic integration would liberalize the communists in Beijing. It would also allow the United States to reclaim the moral high ground of refusing to permit permanent trade with non-market authoritarian regimes that abuse their own people.

And here’s the kicker: the American public supports this. The immediate, conventional response to any proposal to revoke China’s PNTR status is simple. It would be too expensive, the economies are too intertwined, and the American consumer wouldn’t stand for it. But a poll conducted in July 2022 — when gas sat north of $5 a gallon — found that was not the case. It found that the plurality of likely voters supported revoking China’s PNTR status, even if that risked exacerbating inflation supply chain pressures. Only 35 percent were opposed, and 26 percent among Republicans.

Here is an issue that has public and bipartisan support and both immediate and historical precedent. Here is a strategic opportunity and national obligation. Here is an opportunity for the US to come together not only to defeat Putin but to begin to seriously correct China’s non-market distortion of the global, free trading system.

Nathan Picarsic and Emily de La Bruyere are senior fellows at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and co-founders of Horizon Advisory

by Nathan Picarsic and Emily de La Bruyere

By Nathan Picarsic and Emily de La Bruyere

spectatorworld.com

16. Fire, gunshots at Tehran jail holding political prisoners, dual nationals

Are we observing a revolution in progress?

Fire, gunshots at Tehran jail holding political prisoners, dual nationals

Reuters · by Parisa Hafezi

DUBAI, Oct 15 (Reuters) - A fire broke out on Saturday in Tehran's Evin prison, where many of Iran's political and dual-national detainees are held, and witnesses reported hearing gunfire.

State news agency IRNA said eight people were injured in the unrest, which erupted after nearly a month of protests across Iran over the death in detention of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Kurdish Iranian woman.

The protests have posed one of the most serious challenges to the Islamic Republic since the 1979 revolution, with demonstrations spreading across the country and some people chanting for the death of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

An Iranian judiciary statement said a prison workshop was set on fire "after a fight among a number of prisoners convicted of financial crimes and theft". Tehran's fire department told state media the cause of the incident was under investigation.

The prison, located in the foothills at the northern edge of the Iranian capital, holds criminal convicts as well as political detainees.

"Roads leading to Evin prison have been closed to traffic. There are lots of ambulances here," said a witness contacted by Reuters. "Still, we can hear gunshots."

Another witness said families of prisoners had gathered in front of the main prison entrance. "I can see fire and smoke. Lots of special forces," the witness said.

A security official said calm had been restored at the prison, but the first witness said ambulance sirens could be heard and smoke still rose over the prison.

"People from nearby buildings are chanting 'Death to Khamenei' from their windows," the witness said.

Early on Sunday, IRNA carried a video it said showed prison areas damaged by fire. Firemen were seen dousing the debris with water, apparently to prevent the blaze from re-igniting.

The prison mostly holds detainees facing security charges, including Iranians with dual nationality. It has long been criticised by Western rights groups and was blacklisted by the U.S. government in 2018 for "serious human rights abuses".

Siamak Namazi, an Iranian American imprisoned for nearly seven years on espionage-related charges rejected by Washington as baseless, returned to Evin on Wednesday after being granted a brief furlough, his lawyer said.

Other U.S. citizens held in Evin include environmentalist Morad Tahbaz, who also has British nationality, and businessman Emad Shargi, according to human rights lawyer Saeid Dehghan.

He added that several other dual nationals are held at Evin, including French-Iranian academic Fariba Adelkhah and Iranian-Swedish Ahmadreza Djalali, a disaster medicine doctor.

Asked about the prison fire, U.S. President Joe Biden told reporters during a campaign trip to Portland, Oregon: "The Iranian government is so oppressive."

1/6

A view of smoke rising from Evin Prison in Tehran, Iran, October 15, 2022 in this still image take from a video obtained by Reuters.

He said he was surprised by "the courage of people and women taking (to) the street" in the recent protests and had enormous respect for them. "It's been really amazing," he added. "They're not a good group, in the government."

U.S. State Department Spokesman Ned Price tweeted, "we are following reports from Evin Prison with urgency. We are in contact with the Swiss as our protecting power. Iran is fully responsible for the safety of our wrongfully detained citizens, who should be released immediately."

Human Rights Watch has accused authorities at the prison of using threats of torture and of indefinite imprisonment, as well as lengthy interrogations and denial of medical care for detainees.

"No security (political) prisoner was involved in today's clash between prisoners, and basically the ward for security prisoners is separate and far from the wards for thieves and those convicted of financial crimes," an unnamed official told the Tasnim news agency.

'CLERICS GET LOST'

The unrest at Evin prison occurred after nearly a month of protests across Iran since Amini - a 22-year-old woman from the country's Kurdish region - died on Sept. 16 while being held for "inappropriate attire".

Although the unrest does not appear close to toppling the system, the protests have widened into strikes that have closed shops and businesses, touched the vital energy sector and inspired brazen acts of dissent against Iran's religious rule.

On Saturday protesters across Iran chanted in the streets and in universities against the country's clerical leaders.

A video posted by the Norway-based organisation Iran Human Rights purported to show protests in the northeastern city of Mashhad, Iran's second-most populous city, with demonstrators chanting "Clerics get lost" and drivers honking their horns.

Videos posted by the group showed a strike by shopkeepers in the northwestern Kurdish city of Saqez - Amini's home town. Another video on social media showed female high school students chanting "Woman, Life, Freedom" on the streets of Sanandaj, the capital of Kurdistan province.

Reuters could not independently verify the videos. Phone and internet services in Iran have been frequently disrupted over the last month and internet watchdog NetBlocks reported "a new major disruption" shortly before Saturday's protests began.

The Iranian activist news agency HRANA said in a posting online that 240 protesters had been killed in the unrest, including 32 minors. It said 26 members of the security forces were killed and nearly 8,000 people had been arrested in protests in 111 cities and towns and some 73 universities.

Among the casualties have been teenage girls whose deaths have become a rallying cry for more demonstrations demanding the downfall of the Islamic Republic.

Protesters called on Saturday for demonstrations in the northwestern city of Ardabil over the death of Asra Panahi, a teenager from the Azeri ethnic minority who activists alleged was beaten to death by security forces.

Officials denied the report and news agencies close to the Revolutionary Guards quoted her uncle as saying the high school student had died of a heart problem.

Reporting by Dubai bureau, additional reporting by Lucia Mutikani, Mike Stone and Jeff Mason in Washington, Writing by Dominic Evans Editing by Helen Popper, William Maclean, Paul Simao and Diane Craft

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Reuters · by Parisa Hafezi

17. Tajik President's Demand For 'Respect' From Putin Viewed Millions Of Times On YouTube

Excellent reporting RFERL.

Tajik President's Demand For 'Respect' From Putin Viewed Millions Of Times On YouTube

By RFE/RL's Tajik Service

rferl.org

October 15, 2022

Russian President Vladimir Putin (left) and Tajik President Emomali Rahmon in Astana on October 14.

A video of Tajik President Emomali Rahmon complaining to Russian President Vladimir Putin about his lack of respect for the countries of Central Asia that were once part of the Soviet Union has struck a nerve on social media, where it has been viewed millions of times.

Rahmon, addressing Putin directly, said that Tajikistan and other countries in the vast region have been treated like outsiders and indicates that the region deserves more investment from Moscow.

Rahmon made the comments on October 14 at a summit of leaders from the former Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in Kazakhstan's capital, Astana.

Putin appears uncomfortable in the seven-minute video posted on YouTube, where it has been viewed around 4 million times. The video also also shows the leaders of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan looking on silently.

“We have always respected the interests of our main strategic partner,” Rahmon said, referring to Russia. “We want respect, too."

At one point, Kazakh President Qasym-Zhomart Toqaev asks him to stop, but Rahmon refuses, saying, "We came to talk."

Touching on a subject that Putin himself has cited, Rahmon said both he and Putin witnessed the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.

“I was there in those meetings in the room when the Soviet Union collapsed,” he said. “Then like now -- and you have to forgive me for saying this -- not enough attention was paid to the small republics, the small nations.”

Putin has called the collapse of the Soviet Union "the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the [20th] century."

Rahmon said the neglect of Tajikistan and the other countries of Central Asia, which he said were only used for their raw materials during the Soviet era, was one of the reasons for the collapse.

Putin’s response, according to TASS, was that during the Soviet era books were published in national languages, theaters were opened, and culture and the economy were developed.

Rahmon said Central Asian countries are not asking for many investments, adding that Russia should invest and that even billions invested “can be recouped in a very short period.” He suggested this would be reasonable in light of the Central Asians who travel to Russia to work.

Some of the YouTube users who commented on Rahmon’s statement congratulated him for speaking the truth to Putin. But others criticized Rahmon, who has ruled the tightly controlled former Soviet republic for three decades. Many said if he had provided decent living and working conditions for Tajiks, his relationship with his people would be different and Tajiks would not have to leave the country to find work.

Rahmon is one of Putin’s main allies, and Putin in June made his first public foreign trip since Russia's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine to Dushanbe for talks with Rahmon.

All Of The Latest News

October 16, 2022

By RFE/RL

18. Before Ukraine Blew Up Kerch Bridge, British Spies Plotted It

I have not seen any other reporting on this.

From a friend retired from the IC:

Someone I know still 'inside the tent,' said this is total BS and Putin propaganda. FYI

Before Ukraine Blew Up Kerch Bridge, British Spies Plotted It | ZeroHedge

BY TYLER DURDEN

SATURDAY, OCT 15, 2022 - 01:00 AM

ZeroHedge

Authored by Kit Klarenberg via TheGrayZone.com,

The secret British intelligence plot to blow up Crimea’s Kerch Bridge is revealed in internal documents and correspondence obtained exclusively by The Grayzone...

The Grayzone has obtained an April 2022 presentation drawn up for senior British intelligence officers hashing out an elaborate scheme to blow up Crimea’s Kerch Bridge with the involvement of specially trained Ukrainian soldiers. Almost six months after the plan was circulated, Kerch Bridge was attacked in an October 8th suicide bombing apparently overseen by Ukraine’s SBU intelligence services.

Detailed proposals for providing “audacious” support to Kiev’s “maritime raiding operations” were drafted at the request of Chris Donnelly, a senior British Army intelligence operative and veteran high ranking NATO advisor. The wide-ranging plan’s core component was “destruction of the bridge over the Kerch Strait.”

Documents and correspondence plotting the operation were provided to The Grayzone by an anonymous source.

The truck bombing of the Kerch Bridge differed operationally from the plot sketched therein. Yet, Britain’s evident interest in planning such an attack underscores the deep involvement of NATO powers in the Ukraine proxy war. At almost precisely the time that London reportedly sabotaged peace talks between Kiev and Moscow in April this year, British military intelligence operatives were drawing up blueprints to destroy a major Russian bridge crossed by thousands of civilians per day.

The roadmap was produced by Hugh Ward, a British military veteran. A number of strategies for helping Ukraine “pose a threat to Russian naval forces” in the Black Sea are outlined. The overriding objectives are stated as aiming to “degrade” Russia’s ability to blockade Kiev, “erode” Moscow’s “warfighting capability”, and isolate Russian land and maritime forces in Crimea by “denying resupply by sea and overland via Kerch bridge.”

Read the complete blueprint: Support for Maritime Raiding Operations – Proposal

In an email, Ward asked Donnelly to “please protect this document,” and it’s easy to see why. Of these assorted plans, only the “Kerch Bridge Raid CONOPS [concept of operation]” is subject to a dedicated annex at the conclusion of Ward’s report, underlining its significance.

The content amounts to direct, detailed advocacy for the commission of what could constitute a grave war crime. Markedly, in plotting ways to destroy a major passenger bridge, there is no reference to avoiding civilian casualties.

Across three separate pages, alongside diagrams, the author spells out the terms of the “mission” – “[disabling] the Kerch Bridge in a way that is audacious, disrupts road and rail access to Crimea and maritime access to the Sea of Azov.”

Ward suggests that destroying the bridge “would require a cruise missile battery to hit the two concrete pillars either side of the central steel arch, which will cause a complete structural failure,” and “prevent any road re-supply from the Russian mainland to Crimea and temporally [sic] disrupt the shipping lane.”

An alternative “scheme” entails a “team of attack divers or UUVs [unmanned underwater vehicles] equipped with limpet mines and linear cutting charges” targeting a “key weakness” and “design flaw” in the bridge’s pillars.

This “flaw” is “several thin pylons used to support the main span,” which were intended to allow strong currents to flow underneath the Bridge with minimal friction. Ward pinpoints a particular area in which the depth of water around a set of pillars was just 10 meters, making it the “weakest part” of the structure.

In related emails obtained by The Grayzone, Chris Donnelly, the senior British army intelligence operative and former NATO advisor, declared the proposals to be “very impressive indeed.”

Reached by phone, Hugh Ward did not deny that he had prepared the Kerch Bridge destruction blueprint for Chris Donnelly.

“I’m going to have a chat with Chris [Donnelly] and confirm with him what he’s prepared for me to release,” Ward told The Grayzone, when asked directly if he drafted the “audacious” plan.

Asked again to confirm his role in the blueprint, Ward paused, then said: “I can not confirm that. I’ll have a chat with Chris first.”

A suicide attack on a $4 billion transportation artery

At dawn on October 8th, an incendiary attack damaged the Kerch Bridge. A truck exploded, setting two oil tankers ablaze, causing two Crimea-bound spans of the roadway to collapse into the sea below, and killing three.

While the affected section was quickly repaired and traffic resumed the next day, Western media has celebrated the incident as the latest Russian embarrassment and failure in the conflict with Ukraine. In some cases, journalists openly cheered and joked about what could plausibly be categorized as a war crime that claimed civilian lives.

The suicide strike targeted a connecting structure between Crimea and mainland Russia constructed at a cost of $4 billion, and whose opening provided a major public relations victory for the Kremlin, reinforcing Moscow’s renewed control of the majority Russian-speaking territory.

Upon its unveiling in May 2018, Russian President Vladimir Putin remarked:

“In different historical epochs, even under the tsar priests, people dreamed of building this bridge. Then they returned to this in the 1930s, the 40s, the 50s. And finally, thanks to your work and your talent, the miracle has happened.”

The Bridge has been heavily defended since February 24th, not least because it serves as a major transport route for military equipment to Russian soldiers in Ukraine. Russia has previously promised major reprisals in response to any strike on the structure.

Following the attack, widespread euphoria erupted among Ukrainians, Ukrainian authorities, and Ukraine supporters on social media. Oleksiy Danilov, head of Ukraine’s national security and defense council, posted a video of the burning bridge alongside a black-and-white clip of Marilyn Monroe singing Happy Birthday, Mr. President — a reference to Putin turning 70 the same day.

Furthermore, Ukrainian media has reported via an anonymous source “in law enforcement agencies” that the attack was carried out by the Security Service of Ukraine. Yet, high-ranking Ukrainian officials, including chief presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak, are now backtracking, claiming instead that the incident was a Russian false flag.

Such allegations have become commonplace in the wake of incidents in which Ukrainian – or Western – culpability seems likely or indeed certain, such as the Nord Stream pipeline explosions.

Lithuanian ex-Minister of Defense Audrius Butkevičius was involved in secret British intelligence plans to destroy Kerch Bridge.

Laying the foundations of World War III

While the attack on Kerch Bridge did not involve specialist divers, underwater drones or cruise missiles, there are indications that Ward’s plans were shared with the Ukrainian government at the highest levels. In fact, Chris Donnelly forwarded them to former Lithuanian Minister of Defense Audrius Butkevičius, before introducing the pair by email.

A leading figure in Lithuania’s anti-Communist movement, Butkevičius has admitted to deliberately leading pro-independence fighters into Soviet snipers’ line of fire on January 13th 1991. This incident is sometimes referred to as Vilnius’ “Bloody Sunday,” and is officially observed as the Day of the Defenders of Freedom. Butkevičius and his confederates knew the maneuver would provoke mass casualties, further inflaming the local population against Soviet leadership and encourage regime change, which is why they orchestrated it.

More recently, Butkevičius co-owned Bulcommerce KS, a company that served as “the main intermediary in the supply of Bulgarian weapons and ammunition to Ukraine through third countries,” for use in the civil war in Donbas.

Butkevičius has been credibly accused of working for British intelligence. Email exchanges with Donnelly confirm he is in contact with Guy Spindler, a long-time MI6 officer who was posted in London’s Moscow Embassy concurrently with the infamous Trump-Russia “dossier” author Christopher Steele.

Reached by phone and asked if he reviewed the “Audacious” plan to destroy Kerch Bridge, Spindler told The Grayzone: “I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about.”

Contemporary accounts suggest Spindler directly coordinated with Boris Yeltsin at the time of a failed coup against Mikhail Gorbachev in August 1991.

Butkevičius was also for many years a “senior fellow” at the Institute for Statecraft, a shadowy “charity” founded by Donnelly that manages a number of arm’s length military and intelligence operations on behalf of the British state and NATO, including the now notorious Foreign Office black propaganda unit, the Integrity Initiative.

Leaked Initiative files name Butkevičius as the organization’s key contact in Ukraine at the time of the country’s 2019 election. Three years earlier, he was one of the “escorting personnel” for five Ukrainian intelligence operatives whisked to London by the Institute for Statecraft in order to brief the British military on Russian “hybrid warfare” techniques. Alongside him was Vidmantas Eitutis, who at the time trained Ukraine’s army to conduct “active counterintelligence operations” in Luhansk.

In the Kerch Bridge sabotage proposal commissioned by Donnelly, Ward asks whether the Russian military knew how vulnerable the bridge supposedly was, and “what countermeasures could be expected” in response to its destruction (see image above).

The blitz of retaliatory missile strikes on Ukraine on October 10th provides a likely answer. It is also probable that if Ward’s outline was followed, Moscow’s reprisal would have been even more deadly, putting the lives of countless Ukrainians – and Russians – at significant risk.

Donnelly was clearly unmoved by such concerns, declaring the plans to be “very impressive indeed.”

A similar disregard for catastrophic consequences was evident in a private memo authored by Donnelly in March 2014, outlining “military measures” that Ukraine should take following Moscow’s seizure of Crimea.

Stating that, “if I were in charge I would get the following implemented,” Donnelly advocated mining Sevastopol harbor using a “car ferry,” destroying fighter jets on Crimean airfields “as a gesture that they are serious,” using a “big microwave anti-satellite weapon” to take down Russian space installations, and turning to the West for oil and gas supplies.

“I am trying to get this message across,” he concluded. These prescriptions have yet to be implemented, perhaps because they risk triggering an apocalyptic situation. Indeed, such “gestures” would amount to brazen provocations against a nuclear power, from which Ukraine’s oil and gas network was and remains exclusively designed to receive energy.

Yet it appears Donnelly and those around him would be content to see World War III erupt over Crimea. In fact, as the leaked documents obtained by The Grayzone will continue to demonstrate, provoking conflict between the West and Russia has long-been one of his ultimate objectives.

ZeroHedge

19. 'Threshold of revolution': Why Iran's protests are different this time

Again, are we observing the revolution in progress?

'Threshold of revolution': Why Iran's protests are different this time

euronews.com · October 14, 2022

What sparked the Iran protests?

Iran has been rocked by the biggest protests in years following the death of Masha Amini on 16 September.

The country's morality police -- tasked with enforcing strict codes around dress and behaviour -- had arrested the 22-year-old for not wearing her hijab correctly and sporting skinny jeans.

Her family say Amini was beaten and her head struck several times. The government and police have denied the accusations.

Iran's Forensic Organisation said her death was due to an "underlying disease" and not as a cause of blows to the head or vital organs.

Who is protesting?

Demonstrators reject this official line and protests are now in their fourth week, showing no sign of abating.

Iranians of all ages, ethnicities and genders have joined in the demonstrations but it is mainly younger generations that have taken to the streets.

“Women started this wave of protest,” says Ramyar Hassani, spokesman for the Hengaw Organisation for Human Rights.

“But everyone else joined. Women and men are shoulder-to-shoulder. All of Iran is united.”

"For the first time in the history of Iran since the Islamic Revolution, there is this unique unity between the ethnicities. Everyone is chanting the same slogan. Their demand is the same."

What form have the protests taken?

Nearly every type of “peaceful, non-violent” protest has been used in Iran, says Hassani.

In large street demonstrations, which have been happening in all of Iran's major cities and many small towns, women have burnt their hijabs, often dancing at the same time, while others have cut off their hair. Strikes have been reported in schools, universities and the country’s vital oil sector.

Violent clashes have at times broken out, with protestors torching buildings of the security forces.

The demonstrations have also spread to Europe. Women from Stockholm to Athens have been lopping off their locks to show solidarity.

Demonstrators cut their hair in Stockholm, Sweden, September 2022.Credit: AFP

How has the regime responded?

Security forces cracked down on protestors "very violently" from the beginning, especially in areas where ethnic minorities live, such as Kurdistan and Balochistan, says Hassani.

People have been shot for honking their car horns in support of protestors, with swathes of journalists (including those who first reported Amini’s death), lawyers, celebrities, sports stars and civil society groups arrested, reports IranWire.

At least 201 people, including 24 children, have been killed and hundreds injured, according to Hengaw, though these figures are likely to be much higher as much goes unreported. The government says more than 20 members of the security forces have been killed.

In some areas, Hassani claims security forces have killed protestors indiscriminately with "multiple battle rifles, such as AK 47s", adding that warehouses are being used to detain people as jails are now full.

He also has received evidence that 50 calibre machine guns have been fired on civilians in parts of Kurdistan.

This type of weapon is typically used in wars and combat zones, with bullets measuring 138mm from top to bottom.

The regime has accused foreign states, such as the US (which it calls the “Great Satan '') and Israel, of stirring up dissent, though there is no evidence of this.

Iran's top judge on Thursday called for the "main elements of riots" to be given harsh sentences, saying now was the time to "avoid showing unnecessary sympathy".

What's the context?

There is deep-seated anger in Iran over the government’s Islamic policies, especially those around dress codes. Even when the hijab was made compulsory in 1983 there were protests, which have continued ever since.

Frustrations have worsened since hardliner Ebrahim Raisi became president in 2021 and began ramping up policing of women’s dress code, says Roulla, an Iranian political activist and researcher, who wanted to protect his identity for security reasons.

Yet protests are also about the failure of reform.

“For decades, Iranians invested heavily in the idea promised by reformist leaders that things would change,” says Shadi Shar, an Iranian human rights lawyer.

“But nothing happened ... The message now is loud and clear, the Islamic Republic itself must go.”

Former presidents Hassan Rouhani and Mohammad Khatami tried in the past to bring Iran closer to the West, lessen social restrictions and bring more democratic freedoms, though these efforts largely failed.

Iran still has the death penalty. This photo was taken in 2011, in the city of Qazvin, near Tehran the Iranian capital.Credit: Hamideh Shafieeha/AP

Adding insult to injury Iran’s economy has collapsed in recent years, while inequality has spiked. “Young people on the streets see the sons and daughters of those in power having a luxurious life as their parents loot the people’s wealth, while normal Iranians see no future,” says Hassani.

After then US President Donald Trump pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal -- aimed at stopping Tehran develop a nuclear weapon -- in 2018, international sanctions were slapped on Iran and its currency went into freefall, with ordinary Iranians bearing the brunt of these economic blows.

What role is Iran’s Generation Z playing in the unrest?

Many protestors are young women and men – or those known as Generation Z.

According to Roulla, globalisation and the internet have led this group to protest by destroying "cultural differences between young people in the Middle East and Europe".

“When a young girl in Iran sees on social media that at the same time she has to go to a mandatory religious class, while people elsewhere are having a pool party … it's a comparison that cannot be unseen.”

In Iran, students must attend compulsory classes on Islam, with strict Islamic dress codes and gender segregation applied in schools and universities.

Why are these protests different from previous ones?

What is unique about today’s protests -- much larger than those in 2019 -- is that they have united nearly every section of society.

Roulla says that in 2019 poorer sections of society protested fuel price rises, while unrest in 2009 centred on more middle-class issues of vote rigging.

The “simple reason” why there is more unity now, he claims, is that Amini was an “ordinary girl”. “She was not from a big city or an activist. She was taken from her family … it's much easier to sympathise with that.”

Something else that sets these protests apart from those in the past is that they show the Islamic Republic has “lost legitimacy among its core supporters”, says Sadr, believing this is due to the “horrific violence” inflicted upon past protestors.

“It's like internal bleeding inside the regime that is getting worse and worse.”

For the first time in recent years, anti-government demonstrations have taken place in more traditional and conservative cities, such as Qom and Mashhad.

A pro-government rally in October, 2022. These protests are typically organised by the government where "protestors" are paid to attend.-/AFP or licensors

Is there anything Europe can do?

Calls have been raised by European officials to sanction Iranian leaders and cut off diplomatic ties in an attempt to increase political pressure on the government.

While she hated to compare these “horrible situations”, Sadr said Iran needed the same action from the West that it had shown towards Russia over the invasion of Ukraine.

“Elites cannot continue to enjoy their normal life,” she said.

Iran is already one of the most sanctioned countries in the world. Exports of many goods, such as certain medicines and aeroplane parts, are blocked, while the country is frozen out of the world banking system.

According to Roulla, such sanctioning of "essential goods" had increased the power of an "aristocratic elite" by "making people completely dependent .. and allowing them to weaponise food and medicine".

"It's counterproductive," he added.

The impact of sanctions is debatable. Many argue they are an effective tool for putting political pressure on governments and changing their behaviour.

Could the protests topple the regime?

Observers are divided on whether the unrest could topple the regime. Despite the violent crackdown, protests are continuing in what is now one of the biggest challenges it has faced since the 1979 revolution.

One important factor says Roulla will be if the regime stays united and parts of security forces do not defect.

Iran’s last King fell in 1979 after mass defections from the army.

Videos have surfaced on social media of riot police joining protests, though this appears to be an isolated event, while Roulla claims the regime is more divided than it seems with reports of tensions over how to deal with protestors.

"Even if on the surface the regime will be able to crack down for a while,” says Hassani. “This is not going to be over."

"We have crossed the threshold of revolution."

euronews.com · October 14, 2022

20. A tale of three generals — how the Ukrainian military turned the tide

Some unique insights from a well informed expert, Major General Mick Ryan.

So far, the Russian Army does not appear to have an answer to what the Ukrainians have achieved in the past three months. The recent missile strikes across Ukraine in the wake of the Kerch bridge attack will have almost no impact on the military campaign. The Ukrainians have answered the questions of earlier this year about whether they could conduct offensives as well as they could defend. They have done so in the most resounding of ways. Ukraine is smashing the Russian Army and has developed a mastery of modern war that many will seek to emulate.

A tale of three generals — how the Ukrainian military turned the tide

Mick Ryan

Over the past three months the wider world has watched Ukrainian army offensives with amazement. While impressive, their successes are not miracles and can be explained by superb leadership, excellent operational planning and its decentralised chain of command.

engelsbergideas.com · by Mick Ryan · October 14, 2022

When histories of the war in Ukraine are written, the month of September 2022 will probably represent a significant milestone in the conflict. On 21 September, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced his decision to ‘support the proposal of the Defence Ministry and the General Staff on partial mobilization’. His speech paved the way for the mobilization of hundreds of thousands of additional Russian troops for the war in Ukraine. And in its wording, also set up senior Russian military leaders to take responsibility for failures in the war.

Putin would have clearly felt pressure from the military to initiate this call up. Russian Army leaders have watched their army slowly but surely disappear. Russia has lost huge numbers of personnel killed, wounded and captured. Those fighting in Ukraine have been in combat for nearly 8 months. It is now a hollow and exhausted force which needs rotation, an impossible task without mobilization.

On 30 September, Putin announced the annexation of four Ukrainian provinces. Full of vitriol, nuclear threats and anti-West fury, the main audience for Putin’s speech was his domestic constituents. Putin also used the speech as a war update, with the message that Russian progress so far is significant.

These two announcements were designed to check Ukrainian momentum in this war. Over the last several months, Ukrainian influence operations has secured more western assistance including the important HIMARS rocket system. Russian troops have failed to achieve significant progress, and Russia has suffered several strategic setbacks including the loss of the ship Moskva, as well as the attacks on its Saki Naval Aviation base in Crimea and the Kerch bridge.

But it is in Kharkiv and Kherson where any remaining Russian momentum in this war was lost, however. September and beginning of October is very much the story of two Ukrainian campaigns, as well as that of the two senior Ukrainian military commanders who led these campaigns. My aim is to assess the importance of the Kharkiv and Kherson campaigns in the overall context of the war, while also highlighting the importance of the leadership that has overseen the planning and execution of these military activities. But, before exploring the campaigns in these two regions, a brief review of the broader Ukrainian military strategy is required.

Ukraine’s Military Strategy

Since the beginning of their invasion, Russia’s military has been forced by the Ukrainians to continually re-assess their strategic objectives. This is not unusual in warfare. While political objectives shape how war is conducted and what battles are fought, so too do battles reshape political objectives. The Ukrainian resistance, and their defeat of the Russians in the north of the country early in the war, have unhinged the Russian overall campaign for Ukraine.

This has been the result of well-considered Ukrainian military strategy. I have previously described this approach as a strategy of corrosion. The Ukrainians, through a variety of indirect attacks, information operations, destruction of Russian logistics and commanders, and tough close combat, have embraced the corrosion of the Russian physical, moral, and intellectual capacity to fight.

British military historian and theorist, Basil Liddell Hart described this as the indirect approach. He wrote about how ‘effective results in war have rarely been attained unless the approach has had such indirectness as to ensure the opponents unreadiness to meet it.’

The Ukrainians have clearly studied this approach closely. They have attacked the weakest physical support systems of the Russian army in Ukraine — communications networks, logistic supply routes, rear areas, artillery and senior commanders in their command posts. In the initial Battles for Kyiv and Kharkiv, the Ukrainians were able to fight the Russians to a standstill because they were able to penetrate Russian rear areas and destroy parts of their logistic support. All of this also had a significant impact on Russian morale. The Ukrainians corroded the northern Russian expedition physical and morally from within and forced its withdrawal from Ukraine.

From the start of the war, leading this effort has been General Valeriy Zaluzhnyi. Appointed by President Zelensky to usher in a new generation of military leaders, Zaluzhnyi has proved to be a decisive yet innovative leader of the kind required when a smaller nation must fight off a larger predator. He has also shown a talent for appointing talented subordinate generals, providing them with guidance and then allowing them to get on with the job. It is this command philosophy from the top, combined with the military strategy of corrosion, that has provided the sure foundations of operational success in Kherson and Kharkiv.

Kherson

The Kherson region fell to the Russian invaders during a short, sharp campaign in late February and early March 2022. Led by the Russian 58th Combined Arms Army, by 2 March the Russians were able to secure Kherson city. It was the first major Ukrainian city in the south captured by the Russians.

The Kherson region was always destined to be a key battleground in this war. This is because southern Ukraine is a significant source of Ukrainian GDP as well as the location of the ports through which goods are dispatched that represent over half of Ukraine’s export earnings. From a Russian perspective, capturing and retaining the south denies Ukraine vital revenue and helps choke the country economically. For the Ukrainians therefore, the south is the most decisive theatre of the war. They must recapture it if they are to remain a sovereign nation and able to export their goods — including steel and grain — to the world market.

Another political dimension of the south is that it is an area where Putin needs to demonstrate some success. After the failures of the Russian military before Kyiv and Kharkiv, losing the south would be a significant blow. He therefore included the Kherson region in his September annexation declaration, and for months has been forcing a rapid Russification of the region.

Beyond its political importance, Kherson is an important military objective. It provides a buffer for Russia if it is to retain Crimea, as well as a launch pad for any subsequent Russian advance on Odesa. For the Ukrainians, retaking Kherson stops any advance on Odesa dead, and provides ground for subsequent operations to recapture Crimea from Russia. Kherson also contains important transportation hubs that enable these operations.

After its capture, a series of small back and forth battles occurred in Kherson without having a decisive impact on the war. However, from July this year, it became clear that the Ukrainians were slowly but deliberately undertaking small scale attacks across the Kherson frontline to gain intelligence on Russian dispositions, attack Russian logistics and kill senior Russian leaders. These military operations by the Ukrainians were supported by partisan activities in Kherson city.

The arrival of HIMARS in late June allowed the Ukrainians to expand its campaign against Russian forces in the south. Ukrainian government statements, including from President Zelensky, made clear that Ukraine would be recapturing southern Ukraine. Perceiving a weakness in its position in the south, particularly with the Ukrainian campaign to destroy bridges and other transport hubs, the Russian Army rushed in reinforcements throughout August 2022.

Leading this campaign on the Ukrainian side has been General Kovalchuk. A former chief of staff of the Ukrainian Air Assault Forces, he is a Hero of Ukraine for leadership in the earlier phase of this war against Russia. Now commanding upwards of 100,000 Ukrainian troops organised into scores of Brigades, he has demonstrated the ability to cleverly sequence attacks deep behind Russian lines, deception activities and the capacity to identify weaknesses in Russian lines for attacks by ground forces. And as the southern counter offensive gained momentum in late August, he orchestrated the campaign to isolate thousands of Russian troops on the west bank of Dnipro.

Official reports from the south over this period were scant. The Ukrainian military, which has demonstrated a great talent for operational security in this war, releases little official information about progress or otherwise in the south. But there was a sense in July and August, among military professionals and commentators, that this region might fall into some form of extended and attritional stalemate like what had been witnessed in the Donbas.

General Kovalchuk had other ideas. And while he watched and waited for opportunities, events elsewhere would stun the Russians.

Kharkiv

Just before the Russian invasion in February, Ukrainian Colonel-General Oleksandr Syrskiy found himself responsible for the defence of Kyiv. Described in one profile as ‘the kind of military officer who plans for all contingencies’, Syrskiy undertook a careful appreciation of the ground north of Kyiv and the approaches that the Russians might employ. He then dispersed his forces from their normal barracks to prevent targeting by the Russians. Through the close-run battle that was Hostamel, through to the eventual defeat of the Russians attempting to encircle Kyiv, Syrskiy was at the heart of the successful defence of the Ukrainian capital.

He proved to be innovative and adaptive, having to respond to circumstances that surprised even him in the early hours of the war. ‘To think the leadership of Russia would unleash such brazen, large-scale aggression, honestly speaking, I could not even imagine it,’ Syrskiy told the Washington Post months later. ‘It seemed to me that if active hostilities were to start, they would most likely start in the east, around or within the borders of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.’

In early September, Syrskiy was occupying another military appointment. He was now in the Kharkiv region. As commander of land forces and the eastern front, he was about to launch an audacious military assault that would surprise the Russians, delight Ukraine’s people and force the west to reassess its views of the Ukrainian armed forces.

The Kharkiv region had been the scene of bitter fighting since the beginning of the Russian invasion. Proximate to the Russian city of Belgorod across the border, Kharkiv was an important political and military objective for the Russians. It came under intense bombardment in February, March and April, and the Russians almost succeeded in encircling it. Almost. In May, the Ukrainians conducted a counter offensive in the Kharkiv region which pushed the Russians out of artillery range of Kharkiv city, and back to the Russian border. By mid-May, the battle for Kharkiv was over. The Ukrainians had secured their second largest city.

From then, sporadic battles and skirmishes occurred north and east of the city. Small parts of territory were exchanged at times, but rarely were these battles decisive. But while all this was occurring, a larger operational design was being developed by the Ukrainians that would feature a series of offensives across the country against the spread out and weakening Russian military.

Operational design is an important component of the military profession. It is through good operational design that military commanders and their staffs’ sequence and orchestrate the tactical goals and actions of military forces in the field to meet desired strategic and political outcomes. It is an extraordinarily complicated process, demanding years of development in the experts that plan and lead such activities. It also demands clear prioritisation of limited assets like HIMARS, air support, engineers and electronic warfare, and massive stockpiling of logistic support. And to complicate matters, these activities should be conducted in secret to prevent the enemy knowing where offensives might occur. Surprise and deception are critical.

On 6 September, the Ukrainians burst out of their assembly areas and broke into the Russian defensive lines in Kharkiv. Over a six-day period, the forces led by General Syrskiy recaptured dozens of Ukrainians settlements and forced the Russians to retreat behind the barrier that was the Oskil River. Masses of Russian equipment and munitions were also captured that would be repurposed for the next phase of this offensive.

From 13 September, the Ukrainians then began their crossings of the Oskil River and the continued exploitation of disorganised Russian defences in northern Luhansk. Thousands of square kilometres of Ukrainian territory were recovered.

Returning from a visit to Ukrainian soldiers in north-eastern Ukraine in mid-September, President Zelensky stated that: ‘I am grateful to Colonel-General Oleksandr Syrskiy and the officers of his staff — everyone who planned and successfully conducted the military operation to liberate the Kharkiv region. Ukrainians once again managed to do what many considered impossible.’

But the Ukrainians had yet another trick up their sleeve.

Movement on the Kherson Front

As the month of October dawned, it was a grim time for the Russian Army. They were on the backfoot in north-eastern Ukraine, losing ground, equipment and soldiers to the rapidly advancing Ukrainians. In the south, thousands of Russian soldiers were trapped west of the Dnipro River. At home, tens of thousands of young Russians were voting with their feet in the wake of Putin’s ‘partial’ mobilisation decree. Mobilisation in Russia was also chaotic with limited instructors — or equipment — for thousands of newly conscripted Russians.

On 2 October, the situation got even worse for Russia. Ukrainian General Kovalchuk’s forces, having identified weaknesses in the Russian defences in northern Kherson, launched a sudden offensive that rapidly broke through the northern Kherson Russian defences. Ukrainian ground combat forces rapidly advanced as far south as Dudchany and recaptured over 2,400 square kilometres of Ukrainian territory from the Russians.

The Ukrainians and Russians are engaged in a brutal effort to control the south. Both sides understand its importance to the future of the Ukrainian state. While close combat continues across the region, Ukrainian deep strikes are also destroying Russian logistics. The Russians continue to provide reinforcements into the south, as well as build pontoon bridges across the Dnipro to resupply and reinforce their troops on the western bank. While the Ukrainians now have the upper hand, this is a campaign that has some way to run yet.

The Ukrainian southern and north-eastern campaigns continue to evolve. While these may appear to be ‘sudden’ breakthroughs, they are actually the result of a long series of orchestrated actions in the south and northeast of Ukraine, as well as in the strategic information domain. They are mutually reinforcing military operations that are part of a broader operational design.

The Ukrainians, probably from very early in the war, had a broad overall operational design featuring potential operations in the south, northeast — and elsewhere. However, launching these was not only based on time, but also about when opportunities presented themselves. Once they had dealt with the immediate threat to their capital and the survival of their country in February and March, they were able to begin planning a longer-term campaign to take back their nation from the Russian invaders.

In doing so, the Ukrainians slowly assembled reserves that they allocated for planned offensives – and for exploiting opportunities. Creating these required a good appreciation of risk, deception, operational security and logistic stockpiling.

Ukrainian reconnaissance in both regions began months ago. A reconnaissance battle aimed to gain intelligence while denying information to Russian reconnaissance elements. This reconnaissance battle, undertaken by ground, air and electronic warfare units, paints a picture of the ground, enemy dispositions, reserves, key transport routes and logistics. These early actions shaped the likely future battlefield and placed the Russians in a dilemma about where to deploy their scarce reinforcements. Winning this reconnaissance battle in the lead up to a campaign is an essential part of preventing surprise and recognising enemy weaknesses to exploit.

After eight months of operations (and eight years since Russia started this war), Ukraine has several senior commanders who are seasoned strategists and operational artists. They clearly know their enemy well and know how to balance strategic risk and opportunity. These commanders, including Generals Zaluzhnyi, Syrskiy and Kovalchuk, are skilled in providing intent and guiding their staffs and subordinate commanders through the planning and execution of large-scale military operations. This is a rare skill that few military institutions master.

Finally, the north-eastern and southern Ukrainian campaigns have highlighted a significant asymmetry in command philosophies between Ukraine and Russia. Russia centrally controls operations; Ukraine allows its subordinate leaders more freedom to exploit opportunities through mission command. In rapidly moving military activities, military leaders who do not have to constantly refer to higher headquarters can set and dominate operational tempo, ultimately seizing the initiative. The Ukrainians have done this, and the Russians have not.

So far, the Russian Army does not appear to have an answer to what the Ukrainians have achieved in the past three months. The recent missile strikes across Ukraine in the wake of the Kerch bridge attack will have almost no impact on the military campaign. The Ukrainians have answered the questions of earlier this year about whether they could conduct offensives as well as they could defend. They have done so in the most resounding of ways. Ukraine is smashing the Russian Army and has developed a mastery of modern war that many will seek to emulate.

Mick Ryan

Mick Ryan is a recently retired Australian Army Major General. He is currently an adjunct fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and is the author of War Transformed, a book on future war published February 15, 2022, by U.S. Naval Institute Books.

engelsbergideas.com · by Mick Ryan · October 14, 2022

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

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V/R

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If you do not read anything else in the 2017 National Security Strategy read this on page 14:

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