Quotes of the Day:

“Someplace between apathy and anarchy is the stance of the thinking human being; he does embrace a cause, he does take a position, and he can't allow it to become business as usual. Humanity is our business.”

– Rod Serling.

“Putting people first has always been America’s secret weapon. It’s the way we’ve kept the spirit of our revolutions alive, a spirit that drives us to dream and dare, and take great risks for a greater good.”

– Ronald Reagan

"A sign of intelligence is an awareness of one's own ignorance."

– Niccolo Machiavelli

1. The obscure federal intelligence bureau that got Vietnam, Iraq, and Ukraine right

2. The International Criminal Court’s Appalling Misstep

3. Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, May 28, 2024

4. Israel–Hamas War (Iran) Update, May 28, 2024

5. Pentagon suspends aid deliveries via Gaza pier after repeated mishaps

6. Japan reports first sighting of new PLA combat drone over East China Sea

7. White House says Rafah strike does not violate Biden’s warnings to Israel

8. Putin warns West not to let Ukraine use its missiles to hit Russia

9. Sweden to donate $1.23 billion in military aid to Ukraine

10. Why NATO matters By Richard D. Hooker, Jr.

11. AFSOC Put 15 CV-22 Ospreys in Storage to Increase Mission Readiness for Rest of Fleet

12. Opinion - Do We Still Understand How Wars Are Won?

13. A new breakthrough could deepen US troops' dependence on Chinese batteries

14. Blacklisted Chinese Companies Rebrand as American to Dodge Crackdown

15. Across the Army, units lean into drone experimentation

16. Washington needs to tell China — attacking Taiwan means war with the US

17. Veterans should volunteer to train soldiers in Ukraine

18. America Needs More Predator Submarines to Stop China

19. Rare Earth Mining Taking Heavy Toll in Myanmar’s Kachin, Groups Say

20. Staging the Comeback of Mao in Xi Jinping's China

21. American Globalism Versus ‘America First’

22. Opinion - America’s Military Is Not Prepared for War — or Peace

23. Escaping the Zero-Sum Trap in Strategic Competition with China

24. How Ukraine Can Do More With Less

25. From the Shadows to the Social Sphere: Ukraine’s Strategy of Engagement

26. The 80th Anniversary of D-Day: An Opportunity to Seize

1. The obscure federal intelligence bureau that got Vietnam, Iraq, and Ukraine right

Another progeny of the OSS.

Excerpts:

INR began life as the research and analysis (R&A) section of the Office of Strategic Services, the US’s World War II-era spy agency. When its parent office was dissolved after the war, the R&A section was given to the State Department.

It was not an easy marriage at first. “They were distrusted by the [State] Department's regulars who considered the newcomers too liberal in their views and unable to offer anything that could not be provided through traditional diplomatic methods,” historian Lawrence Freedman wrote in 1977. The division was then disbanded in 1946, before being reconstituted in 1947 as the bureau that still exists today. INR vets note with pride that its founding predates that of the CIA.

“The unit is handicapped by its small size,” Freedman noted of INR, “and has only made an impact through the quality of its personnel.” Indeed, early in the Vietnam war there was only one analyst at INR for North Vietnam and another analyst for the South; by 1968, at the war's apex, that grew to four South Vietnam and two North Vietnam analysts. Six people, for a war that was tearing a whole region and, increasingly, American society itself, apart.

The obscure federal intelligence bureau that got Vietnam, Iraq, and Ukraine right

INR is “almost always right.” How come nobody has heard of it?

Vox · by Dylan Matthews · May 28, 2024

Every American knows what the CIA is. I would guess that maybe 1 in 1,000 have ever heard of INR — the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research, American diplomats’ in-house intelligence agency.

But if you do know about INR, you probably know two things:

1. It has gotten big stuff right when the CIA and others screwed up.
2. When it got that big stuff right, no one listened to it.

INR is the Cassandra of American intelligence, and it earned that reputation the hard way.

As early as 1961, INR analysts were warning that South Vietnam’s battle against the North and the Viet Cong insurgency was failing, and would ultimately fail because the Viet Cong had the support of villagers in the South. Their analyses prompted furious rebukes from the likes of then-Defense Secretary Robert McNamara. But they were right.

In 2002, it happened again. The CIA, the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), and the rest of the intelligence community had concluded that Iraq’s Saddam Hussein was trying to build nuclear weapons, which became one of the ostensible motivations for the US invasion. INR thought their evidence was nonsense. It was right.

In 2022, it happened again. The intelligence community predicted that Russia would win its war on Ukraine easily, cruising into Kyiv in a matter of days. INR dissented, arguing that Ukraine would put up a spirited fight and prevent Russia from getting anywhere near the capital. It was right. (Brett Holmgren, INR’s current chief, took pains to tell me that INR was not the only dissenter but confirmed that the bureau thought Ukraine would put up a strong fight.)

“You can get other intel agencies really upset about this when you point this out,” says Ellen McCarthy, who led the bureau from 2019 to 2021 after many years in other parts of the intelligence community. “But I've got to tell you, INR is almost always right.”

The bureau’s stellar track record seems, on paper, inexplicable. INR is tiny, with fewer than 500 employees total. The DIA has over 16,500, and while the CIA’s headcount is classified, it was 21,575 in 2013, when Edward Snowden leaked it.

You could fit over 47 INRs in the CIA, and even if you exclude the non-analysts on the CIA's payroll, Langley’s analytic headcount is far greater than INR’s. Tom Fingar, who led the bureau from 2000 to 2001 and 2004 to 2005, once told a reporter its budget was “decimal dust.” In 2023, it came to only $83.5 million, or 0.1 percent of overall US intelligence spending.

On top of that, INR has no spies abroad, no satellites in the sky, no bugs on any laptops. But it reads the same raw intel as everyone else, and in at least a few cases, was the only agency to get some key questions right.

Saying “INR does a better job than DIA or CIA,” as a general matter, would go too far, not least because making a judgment like that in a responsible way would require access to classified information that the press and public can’t read. But it clearly is doing something different, which in a few key cases has paid off. And at least some policymakers have noticed. Bill Clinton told the 9/11 Commission he found memos by INR more helpful than the President’s Daily Brief, then prepared by the CIA.

I spoke to 10 veterans of the bureau, including six former assistant secretaries who led it. While no single ingredient seems to explain its relative success, a few ingredients together might:

1. INR analysts are true experts. They are heavily recruited from PhD programs and even professorships, and have been on their subject matter (a set of countries, or a thematic specialty like trade flows or terrorism) for an average of 14 years. CIA analysts typically switch assignments every two to three years.
2. INR’s small size means that analyses are written by individuals, not by committee, and analysts have fewer editors and managers separating them from the policymakers they’re advising. That means less groupthink, and clearer individual perspectives.
3. INR staff work alongside State Department policymakers, meaning they get regular feedback on what kind of information is most useful to them.

Intelligence analysis is a notoriously difficult craft. Practitioners have to make predictions and assessments with limited information, under huge time pressure, on issues where the stakes involve millions of lives and the fates of nations. If this small bureau tucked in the State Department’s Foggy Bottom headquarters has figured out some tricks for doing it better, those insights may not just matter for intelligence, but for any job that requires making hard decisions under uncertainty.

The little bureau that could

INR began life as the research and analysis (R&A) section of the Office of Strategic Services, the US’s World War II-era spy agency. When its parent office was dissolved after the war, the R&A section was given to the State Department.

It was not an easy marriage at first. “They were distrusted by the [State] Department's regulars who considered the newcomers too liberal in their views and unable to offer anything that could not be provided through traditional diplomatic methods,” historian Lawrence Freedman wrote in 1977. The division was then disbanded in 1946, before being reconstituted in 1947 as the bureau that still exists today. INR vets note with pride that its founding predates that of the CIA.

“The unit is handicapped by its small size,” Freedman noted of INR, “and has only made an impact through the quality of its personnel.” Indeed, early in the Vietnam war there was only one analyst at INR for North Vietnam and another analyst for the South; by 1968, at the war's apex, that grew to four South Vietnam and two North Vietnam analysts. Six people, for a war that was tearing a whole region and, increasingly, American society itself, apart.

Luckily, the quality of that personnel was very high. The key analyst on North Vietnam was a woman named Dorothy Avery, a former CIA analyst who had a master’s degree in Far Eastern Studies from Harvard University. Fingar, the former INR chief, overlapped with Avery at the bureau when she was a senior presence, and he a very junior one. “We joked about Dottie Avery — she didn't like it — but that Dottie Avery started doing Vietnam when Ho Chi Minh wore short pants,” he recalls.

Almost as soon as Avery arrived at INR in 1962, she and her supervisor Allen Whiting proved their mettle by predicting that China and India would engage in border clashes, then pause, then resume hostilities, then halt. All of that happened.

But INR also had messages that the Kennedy and Johnson administrations of the time didn’t want to hear. In 1963, the bureau prepared a report of statistics on the war effort: the number of Viet Cong attacks and the number of prisoners, weapons, and defectors collected by the South. All of the trendlines were negative. The report prompted a furious protest from the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who argued that the South Vietnamese were succeeding. Defense Secretary McNamara echoed their protest.

Engineers from the 173rd Air Cavalry make their way through forest on Chu Phong mountain, in the Ida Drang Valley, Vietnam, in 1965.Corbis via Getty Images

But INR stayed pessimistic, and because of that, stayed accurate. Avery pushed back on the military's assessment that "the application of force would induce Hanoi to make concessions," arguing instead that "Hanoi felt it was on a roll and held the advantage in South Vietnam," historian John Prados writes. That led her and INR to "predict accurately that North Vietnam would up the ante in the South, increase its support to the NLF [the National Liberation Front, the political arm of the Viet Cong] and perhaps send its own troops to fight."

The bureau accurately predicted that in 1965, China would send thousands of troops to North Vietnam to support its ally; they insisted that bombing could not break North Vietnamese supply lines, and were right about that too.

In 1969, after over 30,000 American troops had died — along with hundreds of thousands, if not more, Vietnamese soldiers and civilians had died — INR commissioned an internal review by Avery and two colleagues documenting, in clinical detail, that they had seen this all coming.

Decades later, as the US began preparations for the Iraq war, INR would see arguably its finest moment. Its leader was Carl Ford, a veteran of the CIA and DIA who hadn’t previously served at INR. But he was fiercely loyal to his team, and his team had an unusual perspective on Saddam Hussein and nuclear weapons.

The evidence that Hussein was reconstituting Iraq’s nuclear program — a contention that fueled Bush administration officials’ arguments for war, like national security adviser Condoleezza Rice’s famous quip, “We don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud” — had two primary components. One was a finding that the Iraqi military had been purchasing a number of high-strength aluminum tubes, which the CIA and DIA thought could be used to build centrifuges for enriching uranium.

On September 6, 2001, five days before the 9/11 attacks, INR issued a report disagreeing with that finding. For one thing, scientists at the Department of Energy had looked into the matter and found that Iraq had already disclosed in the past that it used aluminum tubes of the same specifications to manufacture artillery rockets, going back over a decade. Moreover, the new tubes were to be “anodized,” a treatment that renders them much less usable for centrifuges.

“You can make a centrifuge out of these things, but no one in his right mind would,” as Ford explained to me.

The other major evidence offered for the claim that Iraq was pursuing nukes was an allegation that they had tried to buy “yellowcake” uranium from Niger; this is a partially processed form of mined uranium that could in theory be processed further and used for a bomb. When the claim first emerged in late 2001, INR was immediately skeptical, per an ensuing Senate investigation.

INR found the claim "highly suspect" because French businesses controlled the Nigerien uranium sector, and the French government was unlikely to actively assist Iraq in getting uranium. As more information came in, the CIA and DIA "were more impressed," while INR "continued to doubt the accuracy of the reporting" given that Iraq was "bound to be caught" if it followed through.

About a year later, an Italian journalist leaked to the US Embassy in Rome a purported Nigerien government document detailing the purchase. Fingar showed the document to an INR analyst who had served as a foreign service officer in Niger. “He looked at the putative document and he says, ‘That's a forgery. It's an obvious forgery,’” Fingar says. “How do you know it's an obvious forgery? ‘In Niger, when they sign, the line is on a diagonal. This is horizontal. It's obviously not an official document.’”

In 2004, a Senate committee reviewing the colossal intelligence failure behind the Iraq war concluded that "only INR disagreed with the assessment that Iraq had begun reconstituting its nuclear program." It was perhaps the biggest success in the bureau’s history, and it managed to become publicly known, winning the bureau glowing profiles from the Washington Monthly’s Justin Rood and the Washington Post’s David Ignatius.

A photograph presented by US Secretary of State Colin Powell to the UN Security Council on February 5, 2003, showing aluminum tubes that he argued were evidence of Iraq's nuclear program. His intelligence team disagreed.US STATE DEPARTMENT/AFP via Getty Images

For their part, INR veterans tend to be less triumphalist, preferring to say they were merely “less wrong” than other agencies. They agreed with other agencies that Iraq still had biological and chemical weapons, and they got that wrong.

And INR’s broader track record is far from spotless. To name one since-declassified example, a 1977 report on Iran predicting “the prospects are good that Iran will have relatively clear sailing until at least the mid-1980s” has not aged well, coming just two years before the Shah was deposed in a mass popular uprising and three years before the beginning of the devastating Iran-Iraq war. INR also got egg on its face in 2009 when longtime analyst Kendall Myers was revealed to have been spying for Cuba for decades (though INR was far from the only agency penetrated by spies).

But the successes appear to outweigh the misses. Even on Iran, INR was earlier than the CIA or DIA in warning amid 1978’s protests that there was a real chance the Shah would be forced out. In May 1973, INR analyst Roger Merrick argued that there was a “better than even bet” that Egypt would start a war with Israel “by autumn.” Egypt launched the Yom Kippur War in October.

Rood noted in 2000 and 2001, the CIA thought North Korea would soon test an intercontinental ballistic missile. INR doubted they'd get there in the next decade. As it happens, the first North Korea ICBM test was in 2017, sixteen years later.

Philip Goldberg, who ran INR from 2010 and 2013 and now serves as US ambassador to South Korea, recalls the bureau’s terrorism section being able to tell him, in real time, the ideological motivation behind the 2011 Norway massacres and the perpetrators of the 2012 attack on a US compound in Benghazi. In the former case, there was widespread speculation that al-Qaeda was responsible — but the INR team correctly identified it as a neo-Nazi attack.

Fingar told me yet another favorite win. "The specific issue was, would Argentina send troops to the multinational force in Haiti?" in 1994, as the US assembled a coalition of nations, under the banner of the UN, to invade and restore Haiti’s democratically elected president to office. "Our embassy had reported they'd be there. Argentine embassy in Washington: they'll be there. The State Department, the Argentine desk: they'll be there. [The CIA]: they'll be there.” But, “INR said, no, they won't.” The undersecretary running the meeting, Peter Tarnoff, asked which analyst at INR believed this. He was told it was Jim Buchanan.

At that point, as Fingar remembers it, Tarnoff ended the meeting, because Buchanan’s opinion settled the matter. That’s how good Buchanan’s, and INR’s, reputation was. And sure enough, Argentina backed out on its promise to send troops.

How INR works

INR veterans describe their bureau in glowing terms, and some outsiders tend to agree. In one essay, the veteran CIA analyst John A. Gentry went so far as to recommend as a reform measure for the rest of the intelligence community to “model strategic, all-source analysts after the stereotypical INR analyst.”

But the agency’s reputation as contrarian sticks out too. “Gadflies of the intelligence community” is how Stephen Coulthart, a professor at the University at Albany and one of the few academics to study INR, puts it. “We had this reputation of being kind of … I guess they called this the red-haired stepchild. Being kind of snitty,” recalls Bowman Miller, former Europe chief at INR.

They’re informal; one alum told me you’d “put your coat and tie on” if you had to meet with the Secretary of State, but not otherwise. They’re the only intelligence agency that does not require polygraph tests — which private sector employers are banned from using for the simple reason that they do not work at all — in hiring.

Rod Schoonover, who worked in the bureau analyzing climate change and related issues from 2009 to 2019, told me about a commemorative "challenge coin" made for INR that he received. It depicts a tiny numeral 1 in superscript above the R, designating a footnote.

In intelligence argot, "footnote" has another meaning: It means a dissent or a major disagreement with a broader assessment made by colleagues. INR dissented so much that it threw a joke about it onto its coin. “They’re proud of dissent and particularly proud of dissent when they get it right,” he recalls.

The INR challenge coin, complete with footnote.State Department / Coinable

The most important factor in building this culture, every veteran I spoke to stated, is the unusual way that INR selects and uses analysts. The CIA and DIA tend to favor generalists. Analysts rotate between roles every two to three years, often changing countries or even regions. At INR, the average analyst has been on their topic for over 14 years. “At most of the other intel organizations you rotate out of your portfolio every two to three years,” McCarthy says. “At INR, they die at their desks.”

INR, like the rest of the State Department, employs many foreign service officers, who do rotate between roles every three years. That helps the bureau stay current on particular countries’ cultures, enabling victories like their Niger analyst recognizing the yellowcake documents as a forgery. A past FSO working as a Russia analyst, John Evans, came to the role after a job at the US consulate in St. Petersburg in the 1990s, where he talked regularly with the office of mayor Anatoly Sobchak. His contact was Sobchak’s deputy, Vladimir Putin. Once Putin moved into a somewhat bigger job, that background came in handy.

Sixty-nine percent of INR employees are in the civil service, not the foreign service. That means no rotation. They are hired specifically for INR, and are meant to stay there for a long time. Many of them are recruited from academia. Miller came after earning his doctorate in Germanic languages and literatures at Georgetown. Tom Fingar was a political scientist at Stanford researching China when he joined. Schoonover was a tenured professor of chemistry at Cal Poly.

McCarthy notes that INR analysts tended to earn less than their CIA analogues, but Fingar argues that retention was no problem. “I asked my admin people, why do people leave? What’s the number one reason people leave? Retirement. Number two, death.”

Once hired, analysts enjoyed a quite flat organization. There weren’t many layers of hierarchy, and even managers made time to work on their own analyses. That could sort out some particularly ambitious people; Mark Stout, a former analyst, says he left for the CIA in part because there was little room for promotion and advancement within INR. It was a somewhat more staid place, whereas the CIA felt more fast-paced and dynamic. “The problem with [INR] bureaucratically is people don’t get promoted,” Miller says. Daniel Bennett Smith, who led the bureau from 2014 to 2018, told me he fought to create a new senior analyst role that would be paid at GS-15 scale (minimum $164,000 a year) rather than GS-13 (minimum $118,000), so longtimers had some means of promotion.

But the flat structure, combined with the agency’s tiny size, means analysts get a great deal of freedom. Vic Raphael, who retired in 2022 as INR’s deputy in charge of analysis, notes that analysts’ work “would only go through three or four layers before we released it. The analyst, his peers, the office director, the analytic review staff, I’d look at it, and boom it went.” Very little separates a rank-and-file analyst from their ultimate consumer, whether that’s an assistant secretary or even the secretary of state.

By contrast, CIA and DIA analysts have to deal not only with more hierarchy above them, but a greater number of fellow analysts working on their topic. They have to coordinate with their fellow analysts before moving forward. At INR, however, most countries have only one analyst assigned to them, and that analyst probably has other countries in their portfolio too. As a result, that analyst gets a lot of influence.

This helps explain why INR has sometimes been able to stake out positions at odds with the rest of the intelligence community: its writing process emphasizes individuality rather than groupthink.

The bureau also stands out as unusually embedded with policymakers. Analysts at other agencies aren’t working side by side with diplomats actually implementing foreign policy; INR analysts are in the same building as their colleagues in State Department bureaus managing policy toward specific countries, or on nonproliferation or drug trafficking, or on human rights and democracy. Goldberg, who led INR under Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, notes that “we could respond much more quickly than farming it out to another part of the intelligence community, because on a day-to-day basis, we had an idea of what was on her mind.”

INR has another key tool in its kit: polling. Its Office of Opinion Research (INR/OPN) conducts public polls of populations around the world to gauge public sentiment. Raphael notes that Pew Research Center has recruited from OPN because “it’s like Pew on steroids.”

INR’s successful call on the 2022 Ukraine invasion reportedly came because OPN’s polling found that residents of eastern Ukraine were more anti-Russian and more eager to fight an invasion than previously suspected. The polling, Assistant Secretary Brett Holmgren says, has “allowed us to observe consistently, quarter over quarter, overwhelming Ukrainian will to fight across the board and willingness to continue to defend their territory and to take up arms against Russian aggression.”

The future of INR

INR alums are incredibly proud of their history, of their record of dissent and vindication on Vietnam, Iraq, and so much more.

Assistant Secretary Ellen McCarthy (center in pink jacket) and INR staff pictured during cherry blossom season in DC in 2009.INR

But the bureau is also evolving. When McCarthy came in as assistant secretary in 2019, she recalls that the group had fallen behind on IT. “There was this thing called the internet,” she said. “And INR was not necessarily a big user of it.”

INR had also shrunk to a size where, as much as its nimbleness could be an asset, it was struggling “to keep up with requirements,” as McCarthy put it. She pushed to grow the bureau, and its staff of federal employees (excluding contractors) rose from 315 to 336 between 2019 and 2020.

“We were so used to getting onesies and twosies each year,” Raphael recalls, referring to hiring one or two more analysts. “With her we got maybe up to 10, and for us that was like, holy cow!”

Holmgren, who has led the bureau under President Biden and Secretary Antony Blinken, has invested heavily in IT improvements, and created a new product called the “Secretary’s Intelligence Brief,” modeled on the President’s Daily Brief but more targeted for what Blinken, or any future Secretary, needs to know. His vision is for the bureau to serve an analogous role for diplomats to that served by military intelligence for soldiers, a “diplomatic support agency” providing granular knowledge that ambassadors and foreign service officers need.

But he also wants the bureau to retain the spirit it’s had since 1947. “There's a handwritten note that is framed in INR's front office, from Secretary [Madeleine] Albright,” he says. “She wrote it on January 20th of 2001, her last day as secretary of state. I want to read you the quote because it's something that's resonated with me since I joined INR. It says, ‘This is my last summary from INR. And I cannot imagine how I will have any idea about what is really going on without you.’”

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Vox · by Dylan Matthews · May 28, 2024

2. The International Criminal Court’s Appalling Misstep

Excerpts:

Khan’s response to these warnings has been intemperate, designed to inflame rather than mollify his opponents. In a press release, the ICC prosecutor threatened members of Congress who promised a legislative response: ICC “independence and impartiality are undermined […]when individuals threaten to retaliate against the Court or against Court personnel should the Office, in fulfillment of its mandate, make decisions about investigations or cases falling within its jurisdiction. Such threats, even when not acted upon, may also constitute an offence against the administration of justice under Art. 70 of the Rome Statute.”

This was unwise.

What happens next? The ICC panel of judges must meet to consider Khan’s request. The prosecutor has worked hard to ensure that they will decide in his favor, skirting normal procedure to publicize “requested” arrest warrants (they are not usually public, let alone revealed on CNN), and accelerating normal court processes, thereby derailing an ICC investigation with which the Israelis were cooperating. (Indeed, investigators were reportedly scheduled to arrive in Israel to inquire into the government’s own investigation of military conduct and compliance with court directives on humanitarian aid and rules of engagement.)

However, should the indictments move forward notwithstanding warnings from the United States, the United Kingdom, and others, then arrest warrants will be issued for Israeli (and Hamas) leaders. These warrants supersede normal strictures that bow to national sovereignty, such as sovereign immunity, head of state immunity, or any other principle of international law. If the indictment is approved, all states parties to the Rome Statute are under legal obligation to arrest the individuals concerned. In an uncharacteristic bow to due process, the ICC does not allow defendants to be tried in absentia.

Will the ICC move forward? Will Congress act against it? We’ll know soon enough. But in the event of further ICC intransigence there is every chance that not only will Congress move to tie the ICC’s hands, replete with the authorization of U.S. arrest warrants for relevant ICC officials, it may well also move to punish parties that cooperate with the court. Well done, Mr. Khan. So much for international justice.

The International Criminal Court’s Appalling Misstep

Its requested indictments against Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant could be its undoing.

thedispatch.com · by Danielle Pletka · May 29, 2024

Last week, International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim Ahmad Khan used an appearance on CNN to unveil requested indictments against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and three senior Hamas officials, including leaders in both Gaza and Qatar. The bill of particulars includes accusations of intentional attacks against civilians, starvation as a method of warfare, wilfully killing and causing suffering, and other “inhumane acts.”

The Hamas language also name checks war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The requested indictments—procedurally, Khan’s request must go before a panel of ICC judges for approval—have been praised, excoriated, applauded, and rejected by the usual suspects, each retreating to his respective corner to prep for a well-rehearsed fight. But what acolytes and opponents fail to appreciate is that the hastily rolled-out hopes and dreams of Khan may well constitute the final nail in the coffin for an ill-conceived and fundamentally illegitimate court.

Since the Nuremberg Trials, and possibly before, nations have sought a means of delivering “supranational justice” for so-called crimes against humanity. Indeed, it was at Nuremberg that the phrase was coined in service of describing the Holocaust and its perpetrators. Considering the challenge in that more Manichean context—we know who was right and who was wrong—it is easy to understand why a trial of Nazi engineers of the Final Solution could not be in German courts, should not be in France or England, but needed to belong to “the world.”

There are other reasons, too, why an international criminal court as an idea can be appealing. There are nations where crimes of unimaginable horror have taken place and where justice is unattainable: think Rwanda or Yugoslavia or Sudan. Perhaps the government in place perpetrated those crimes, or the system of government cannot deliver true justice. In such cases, even those for whom sovereignty is tantamount to a biblical commandment, the notion that something labeled “the international community” takes justice into its hands is not entirely anathema.

However, as with almost all such exercises of international cooperation and international justice—the International Court of Justice, the United Nations and its ever-expanding world of specialized agencies, etc.—the reality and the dream occupy different dimensions. And it is the reality of these institutions that has ratified the more paranoid predictions of their detractors.

Setting aside the sad cases of the World Health Organization, the United Nations Relief and Works Administration, the International Organization for Migration, and the poignant tale of the Food and Agriculture Organization’s now-defunct Committee on Soups and Broths, it is the ICC that, thanks to Karim Khan, is back in the crosshairs of American lawmakers.

The history of the ICC is instructive: The court was created in 1998 by a treaty called the Rome Statute. Though deliberations for the treaty took place in the halcyon “end of history” decade of the 1990s, congressional opposition meant that then-President Bill Clinton chose not to sign on to the statute. Truth be told, however, the Clinton team liked the idea. There were any number of wars ongoing, and special U.N. tribunals had already been created with the Clinton administration’s support to address new “crimes against humanity” in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. So in the waning days of his administration, Clinton signed the Rome Statute. Bizarrely, he did so at the same time stating he had no intention of submitting the treaty to the Senate for a vote of ratification. Recognizing Clinton’s pseudo-embrace as the empty posturing it was, George W. Bush “unsigned” the Rome Statute.

Were the International Criminal Court not the very institution its detractors described, Bush’s “unsignature” might have been the end of the story. Critics of the court—and the very notion of supranational justice, untethered to any system or rule of law—had always suspected that the powers of the ICC would be corrupted to attack the two bêtes noires of the “international system”—the United States and Israel. Indeed, in a 2002 article in the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz, then-Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Jesse Helms warned that, “The court will have an independent prosecutor answerable to no state or institution for his or her actions, who could one day issue criminal indictments against Israeli soldiers, military commanders, and government officials all the way up to the Prime Minister himself.” And so it was.

At the time of its conception and ever since, defenders of the court have insisted that it would be inconceivable for the ICC’s powers to be directed against democratic Israel or democratic America because neither the United States nor Israel are parties to the ICC, and both have robust judicial systems that, per the Rome Statute, preclude involvement by busybody international bureaucrats. The Rome Statute calls this “complementarity”—the idea that the ICC is bound to defer to the judicial processes of nations with robust and democratic systems of law, and rely on those nations to prosecute their own misdeeds. A pretty neologism, “complementarity” is to the ICC what the Loch Ness monster is to Scotland: a fun idea that draws in fans, even if no one is really sure Nessie is real.

How did this happen? In 2015, the ICC admitted a “State of Palestine.” What is the state of Palestine? An excellent question with an unclear answer. Per the U.N. General Assembly (see: sad cases, above), the “State of Palestine” is the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah, led by Mahmoud Abbas. What is Gaza, effectively led by Hamas? Unclear. It is this pretend “State of Palestine” that requested the intervention of the ICC in the Gaza war, accusing Israel of the crimes now parroted by Khan.

Lest anyone suspect that is the ICC was unable to see beyond the many shady happenings on the continent of Africa—see ICC investigations in Uganda, Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan, Central African Republic, Kenya, Libya, Cote d’Ivoire, Mali, Burundi—in 2020, the court opened an investigation into United States’ actions in Afghanistan.

The Trump administration took the news that the U.S. war in Afghanistan was under scrutiny by international bureaucrats with its characteristic aplomb and promptly imposed sanctions on ICC prosecutors. Those sanctions appeared to prompt a rethink by the court, which in effect proceeded to dump the case in the circular file. And so we come to Israel.

The requested indictments of Israel and, to Khan, its moral equivalent, the terror group Hamas, were badly received in Washington. President Joe Biden called the application for an arrest warrant for Netanyahu “outrageous” and insisted the United States will “always stand with Israel against threats to its security.” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, who had only weeks before taken to the Senate floor to denounce Netanyahu, labeled the charges “profoundly unfair” and “reprehensible.” Congressional Republicans echoed the Democrats’ rebukes, and promised action in response.

U.S. law—the American Servicemembers’ Protection Act—already authorizes the use of force to liberate any American or U.S. ally charged by the ICC (hence the nickname assigned to it by the law’s detractors, the “Hague Invasion Act”). But House Speaker Mike Johnson, Sen. Tom Cotton, and multiple others have warned that more legislation may be coming that will impose harsher penalties on the ICC for its extrajudicial pursuit of non-parties to the Rome Statute. Specifically, Cotton warned in a statement that, “Khan’s kangaroo court has no jurisdiction in Israel to pursue these antisemitic and politically motivated ‘charges,’” adding that he looks “forward to making sure neither Khan, his associates nor their families will ever set foot again in the United States.”

Other legislation currently being contemplated goes even further, potentially criminalizing the actions of ICC officials who indict Americans and allies that request similar protection, and providing a right of action—a legal means to sue —against ICC officials in such cases. The Biden administration, likely hoping to head off stronger measures, has told members of Congress that it is open to a response short of sanctions. However, should Donald Trump return to office in 2025, the possibility of actual criminal indictments of Khan and company are all too real.

Khan’s response to these warnings has been intemperate, designed to inflame rather than mollify his opponents. In a press release, the ICC prosecutor threatened members of Congress who promised a legislative response: ICC “independence and impartiality are undermined […]when individuals threaten to retaliate against the Court or against Court personnel should the Office, in fulfillment of its mandate, make decisions about investigations or cases falling within its jurisdiction. Such threats, even when not acted upon, may also constitute an offence against the administration of justice under Art. 70 of the Rome Statute.”

This was unwise.

What happens next? The ICC panel of judges must meet to consider Khan’s request. The prosecutor has worked hard to ensure that they will decide in his favor, skirting normal procedure to publicize “requested” arrest warrants (they are not usually public, let alone revealed on CNN), and accelerating normal court processes, thereby derailing an ICC investigation with which the Israelis were cooperating. (Indeed, investigators were reportedly scheduled to arrive in Israel to inquire into the government’s own investigation of military conduct and compliance with court directives on humanitarian aid and rules of engagement.)

However, should the indictments move forward notwithstanding warnings from the United States, the United Kingdom, and others, then arrest warrants will be issued for Israeli (and Hamas) leaders. These warrants supersede normal strictures that bow to national sovereignty, such as sovereign immunity, head of state immunity, or any other principle of international law. If the indictment is approved, all states parties to the Rome Statute are under legal obligation to arrest the individuals concerned. In an uncharacteristic bow to due process, the ICC does not allow defendants to be tried in absentia.

Will the ICC move forward? Will Congress act against it? We’ll know soon enough. But in the event of further ICC intransigence there is every chance that not only will Congress move to tie the ICC’s hands, replete with the authorization of U.S. arrest warrants for relevant ICC officials, it may well also move to punish parties that cooperate with the court. Well done, Mr. Khan. So much for international justice.

thedispatch.com · by Danielle Pletka · May 29, 2024

3. Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, May 28, 2024

https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-may-28-2024

Key Takeaways:

• Russian President Vladimir Putin grossly misrepresented the Ukrainian Constitution and Ukrainian domestic law on May 28 in order to further promote the Kremlin information operation claiming that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is no longer the legitimate president of Ukraine.
• Ukrainian Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada Ruslan Stefanchuk directly responded to Putin's deliberate misinterpretation of Ukrainian law and explicitly stated that the Ukrainian Constitution and laws stipulate that Zelensky remain in office until the end of martial law in Ukraine.
• Russian allegations about Zelensky's lack of legitimacy are a known Kremlin information operation that Kremlin officials have been promoting extensively in recent weeks, in part targeted at foreign audiences.
• The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE)'s Committee on Culture supported a resolution that recognizes Russia's deliberate erasure of Ukrainian culture as an element of Russia's genocidal campaign in occupied Ukraine, consistent with ISW's longstanding assessment that Russia is pursuing a broad occupation strategy premised on eradicating Ukraine's national identity and independence.
• Russian authorities are preparing to intensify the deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia throughout Summer 2024, further consolidating another component of Russia's genocidal campaign in Ukraine.
• Iran's continued support for Russia's defense industrial base (DIB) and provision of lethal aid to Russia is bolstering Russia's technological output and military capabilities on the battlefield in Ukraine.
• The Georgian Parliament overrode Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili's veto of Georgia's Russian-style "foreign agents" law in an 84-to-4 vote on May 28.
• A limited segment of the Russian ultranationalist information space has resumed its standard public criticisms of the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) and warned that new Defense Minister Andrei Belousov may not solve certain systemic issues within the Russian MoD and military.
• Portugal and Belgium both signed long-term bilateral security agreements with Ukraine on May 28.
• Russian President Vladimir Putin expressed support on May 28 for delisting the Taliban as a prohibited organization in Russia, indicating that Russia will likely do so soon.
• Ukrainian forces recently made confirmed advances near Lyptsi, and Russian forces recently made confirmed advances near Avdiivka and the Donetsk-Zaporizhia Oblast border area.
• The Russian military is reportedly intensifying efforts to recruit citizens from Central African countries to fight in Ukraine.

RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, MAY 28, 2024

May 28, 2024 - ISW Press

Download the PDF

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, May 28, 2024

Christina Harward, Grace Mappes, Nicole Wolkov, Karolina Hird, and Frederick W. Kagan

May 28, 2024, 7:45pm ET

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

Click here to see ISW’s 3D control of terrain topographic map of Ukraine. Use of a computer (not a mobile device) is strongly recommended for using this data-heavy tool.

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

Note: The data cut-off for this product was 1:00pm ET on May 28. ISW will cover subsequent reports in the May 29 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment.

4. Israel–Hamas War (Iran) Update, May 28, 2024

https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/iran-update-may-28-2024

Key Takeaways:

• Iran’s Nuclear Program: Iran has increased its stockpile of uranium enriched to near weapons-grade levels amid recent statements from Iranian officials about Iran’s ability to procure a nuclear weapon.
• Iranian Parliament: Iranian parliamentarians re-elected hardline politician Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf as parliament speaker, with Ghalibaf receiving 198 of 287 votes.
• Rafah: The IDF expanded operations into Western Rafah. IDF units moved deeper into Rafah along the Egypt-Gaza Strip border overnight on May 27 and 28. The IDF has so far identified ten smuggling tunnels that cross into Egypt from the Gaza Strip.
• Iraq: Nationalist Iraqi Shia cleric Moqtada al Sadr demanded that the Iraqi government expel US Ambassador to Iraq Alina Romanowski and close the US Embassy in Baghdad in retaliation for US support for Israel.
• Yemen: The Houthis damaged a Marshall Islands-flagged merchant vessel in the Red Sea.
• Ceasefire Negotiations: Israel submitted a new ceasefire proposal that offered “flexibility” on the number of living hostages to be released in the deal’s first phase. Hamas has not acknowledged the proposal as of the data cutoff.
• Russo-Iranian Cooperation: Iran's continued support for Russia's defense industrial base (DIB) and provision of lethal aid to Russia is bolstering Russia's technological output and military capabilities on the battlefield in Ukraine.

IRAN UPDATE, MAY 28, 2024

May 28, 2024 - ISW Press

Download the PDF

Iran Update, May 28, 2024

Annika Ganzeveld, Johanna Moore, Andie Parry, Kelly Campa, and Brian Carter

5. Pentagon suspends aid deliveries via Gaza pier after repeated mishaps

Obvious question: How well would logistics over the shore (LOTS) work in support of large scale combat operations? Of course it depends on weather, terrain/geography, and a host of factors

To be fair to the servicemembers, how much training were they able to conduct before this mission? Has this been a priority for training and readiness? I think probably not.

Pentagon suspends aid deliveries via Gaza pier after repeated mishaps

The gap in deliveries is likely to extend “at least” a week, said a Pentagon official, as the U.S. and Israeli militaries reassemble pieces of the damaged pier.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2024/05/28/gaza-pier-pentagon-weather-damage/?utm

By Dan Lamothe, Alex Horton and Kareem Fahim

Updated May 28, 2024 at 6:00 p.m. EDT|Published May 28, 2024 at 3:14 p.m. EDT

A U.S. Army landing craft is beached in Israel on Sunday after wind and currents swept it away from a temporary floating pier off the Gaza Strip. (Tsafrir Abayov/AP)

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The Pentagon said Tuesday that it has suspended the delivery of humanitarian aid to Gaza via its floating pier after separate mishaps in which four U.S. military vessels were beached, one U.S. service member was critically injured and sections of the structure were ripped free in bad weather.

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The damage will require the U.S. military, with Israeli assistance, to disassemble pieces of the pier attached to the Gazan shore, rebuild them in the nearby Israeli port of Ashdod, then transport them back to the Gazan shore and reconnect them, said Sabrina Singh, a Pentagon spokeswoman. That process will take at least a week, temporarily eliminating the pier as an option to deliver humanitarian assistance to civilians in Gaza as Israel continues its months-long military campaign against the militant group Hamas.

“The pier proved highly valuable in delivering aid to the people of Gaza,” Singh said. “Thus, upon completion of the pier repair and reassembly, the intention is to re-anchor the temporary pier to the coast of Gaza and resume humanitarian aid to the people who need it most.”

The project, announced by President Biden in March, is intended to provide an additional route to get aid to Gazan civilians, as land routes have been squeezed by Israeli officials and beset with looting and violence. While the U.S. military has been able to deliver more than 1,000 tons of aid over the pier this month, according to officials, its initial installation was delayed for days by bad weather, and it is unclear whether the refurbishment in Ashdod may render it less susceptible to storms.

Singh, asked whether the pier deployment, with an estimated cost of more than $300 million, is not viable under such conditions, said that heavy seas in recent days and a North African storm system had combined to create “not an optimal environment” to operate the pier.

“Look, I can’t predict the weather,” she said. “But we believe that given the time of year, we will be able to re-anchor this pier and it will be able to be operational, and hopefully weather conditions won’t hinder it anymore.”

National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said in a separate briefing that “Mother Nature has a say here” in how the pier operates and that the eastern Mediterranean Sea, “even in the summertime, can be a pretty tough place.” Considering recent weather and the multistep process required to move aid from ship to shore, he said, the operation has “an impressive record so far.”

The aid suspension, first reported by NBC News, came after the latest mishap Tuesday, in which a portion of the pier separated in heavy seas and began floating away, Singh said. The rest of the pier will be disassembled over the next two days and towed back to Ashdod for repairs.

On Saturday, rough seas broke four Army vessels from their moorings, said officials with U.S. Central Command, which oversees American military operations in the region. Two were beached near the pier off the coast of Gaza, while the other two ran aground near the Israeli city of Ashkelon. All service members were recovered from the vessels, a defense official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of ongoing operations.

As of Tuesday afternoon, one of the two vessels abandoned at sea had been recovered, and another was due to be soon. The Israeli navy will help push the remaining vessels back into the sea in the next day or two, Singh said.

Last week, three U.S. soldiers involved in pier operations were injured in a separate noncombat incidents at sea, Singh said. Two of those soldiers suffered minor injuries, while the third service member has been in critical condition for days. U.S. officials have declined to specify what occurred in that situation.

Last month, a fire broke out on a Navy cargo vessel associated with the pier mission that was transiting to the region, forcing it to return to Florida with one working engine. No injuries were reported, officials said.

The unpredictability of the U.S. pier has complicated humanitarian efforts by those looking to help Gazan civilians. Desperate people intercepted aid shipments soon after the operation began, prompting officials to pause the operation and plan for alternative routes into Gaza.

Amed Khan, a philanthropist who has been sending aid to Gaza, said he decided to try to send supplies to the enclave through the U.S. pier — on what is known as the Cyprus Maritime Corridor — because getting shipments in over land had become nearly impossible.

“One shipment took three months, another took two months — there is no rhyme or reason,” he said, adding that he currently has five trucks with food and medicine stuck in Egypt.

After the Rafah border crossing closed this month, “there’s really no other way to do this,” he said in a telephone interview, referring to the maritime corridor. He applied for, and quickly received, United Nations approval to send medicine and medical supplies to Gaza by sea, and he was waiting for Israeli approval when news came Tuesday that the United States had suspended the maritime route.

Stephane Dujarric, spokesperson for U.N. Secretary General António Guterres, said Tuesday that they are grateful that United States built the floating pier, but it “cannot replace” opening land crossings. While about 97 trucks of aid have come over the pier, Dujarric said, “it’s just a small add to what we actually need.”

Missy Ryan and Karen DeYoung contributed to this report.

6. Japan reports first sighting of new PLA combat drone over East China Sea

Japan reports first sighting of new PLA combat drone over East China Sea

• Japanese Ministry of Defence says it monitored the WZ-10 UAV flying near Okinawa within air defence zone
• The news comes on the same day Tokyo says Chinese ships have sailed near disputed Diaoyu Islands for a record 158 consecutive days

By Cyril Ip South China Morning Post2 min

May 28, 2024

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Japan said it spotted a new model of unmanned Chinese combat drone above waters near Okinawa in the East China Sea – the shallow expanse that Tokyo earlier claimed had been visited by Chinese ships every day this year.

Japan’s ministry of defence said on Monday that it had, for the first time, monitored a WZ-10 military drone from the Wing Loong-10 family over the East China Sea, north of Japan’s far southwestern prefecture of Okinawa.

The WZ-10 was reportedly flying eastwards from China, taking a northeasterly course before returning along the same route.

In a statement shared on X, formerly Twitter, Japan’s Joint Staff Office, which oversees the country’s maritime, ground and air self-defence forces, said fighter jets were sent from the Southwestern Air Command Support Flight – a unit of the air force based at the Naha Air Base in Okinawa.

“This was the first time that this aircraft was spotted in an airspace violation response by the Japanese Navy,” the post read, without naming the aircraft dispatched to monitor the drone.

The airspace where the drone was spotted lies beyond Japan’s territory but is within its air defence identification zone (ADIZ), where Tokyo tries to identify, locate, and control aircraft in the interest of national security.

The WZ-10 is an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) developed by the Chengdu Aircraft Industry Group for reconnaissance and precision strike missions. It entered service in November 2022.

The high-altitude, long-endurance aircraft can operate at altitudes of up to 15,000 metres (49,000 feet) with an endurance of 20 hours at a speed of 620km/h (385mph).

It is said to have a wingspan of around 20 metres, a length of about 9 metres, and a height of close to 4 metres (13 feet), according to the China Defence website.

China produces the streamlined model for the People’s Liberation Army air force as well as for export customers. Saudi Arabia in February bought the Wing Loong-10B export variant of the UAV during the World Defence Show 2024 in Riyadh.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida

Tokyo’s report came shortly after a top Japanese government spokesman said that Chinese ships sailed near disputed islands in the East China Sea for a record 158 consecutive days – surpassing the previous record of 157 days in 2021.

The Diaoyu Islands – also claimed by Japan, where they are known as the Senkaku Islands – have long been a sore point between the countries. About half of the remote archipelago overlaps with both China’s ADIZ and the Japanese ADIZ.

It also came days after Beijing wrapped up two days of military drills around Taiwan, which it said were aimed at “punishing” separatist forces, following the election of the island’s new leader William Lai Ching-te. Beijing has accused Lai of sending a “dangerous signal” on Taiwan independence during his inauguration speech.

Beijing hit out at Tokyo over the past week after it congratulated Lai on taking office.

7. White House says Rafah strike does not violate Biden’s warnings to Israel

White House says Rafah strike does not violate Biden’s warnings to Israel

As images circulate of the deadly Israeli strike on civilians, Biden confronts calls to make good on his threat to suspend offensive weapons.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/05/28/biden-rafah-gaza-civilian-deaths-israel-palestinians

By Yasmeen Abutaleb, John Hudson and Missy Ryan

May 28, 2024 at 7:19 p.m. EDT

A woman sits with a child as Palestinians flee Rafah to escape the Israeli military operation in southern Gaza. (Hatem Khaled/Reuters)

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The White House said Tuesday that Israel had not violated President Biden’s warnings on the conduct of its military campaign in Rafah after an airstrike there over the weekend killed at least 45 Palestinians and injured hundreds more, suggesting the United States would impose no consequences for the Israeli action.

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The airstrike on a makeshift tent encampment caused a fire to break out in the Tal al-Sultan neighborhood of Rafah, a city in southern Gaza, creating one of the most horrifying scenes of the war in the Palestinian enclave. Images of charred bodies and videos of parents burning alive as their children screamed for help ricocheted across social media, prompting renewed global outrage and growing calls for Israel to halt its offensive in Rafah.

Several Biden officials, including Vice President Harris, lamented the “heartbreaking” and “tragic” scenes and loss of life. But they said the mass-casualty event did not cross the “red line” Biden announced this month, when he said the United States would suspend delivery of offensive weapons to Israel if it went into “population centers” in Rafah.

White House spokesman John Kirby said Tuesday that Israel had not started a “major ground operation” in the city. State Department spokesman Matt Miller added that Israel had not launched the type of offensive that it carried out in the cities of Gaza City and Khan Younis, where airstrikes leveled entire buildings and hundreds of Palestinian civilians were killed a day.

“We still don’t believe that a major ground operation in Rafah is warranted. We still don’t want to see the Israelis, as we say, smash into Rafah with large units over large pieces of territory,” Kirby said. The weekend tragedy, he said, “speaks very clearly to the challenge of military airstrikes in densely populated areas of Gaza, including Rafah, because of the risk of civilian casualties, which of course happened terribly in this case, a horrible loss of life.”

Kirby: U.S. has seen no ‘major ground operation’ in Rafah

1:34

White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby took questions on May 28 about the U.S. stance on Israeli operations in Rafah. (Video: The Washington Post, Photo: Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)

He noted that Israel said it used 37-pound bombs in the attack, aimed at killing Hamas officials it said were holed up in the city. “A 37-pound bomb is not a big bomb,” he said. “If it is in fact what they used, it is indicative of an effort to be precise and targeted.”

Kirby and other officials pointed to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s comments on Monday that the civilian casualties were a “tragic mistake” and said they would wait for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to release the results of an investigation into what went wrong. The IDF said two Hamas militants were killed in the attack, including the commander of Hamas operations in the West Bank.

Some experts and Democratic lawmakers said Israel’s airstrike — along with reports of Israeli tanks rolling into the center of Rafah on Tuesday — had clearly crossed Biden’s red line and urged the president to respond accordingly.

“The escalating civilian death toll and deepening humanitarian catastrophe make clear that the Biden administration should pause additional offensive military assistance to the Netanyahu government until we know that all the president’s requests, including with respect to Rafah and the urgent delivery of humanitarian assistance, will be respected,” Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) said in a statement to The Washington Post.

He added, “A partnership should be a two-way street, not a one-way blank check.”

The Biden administration spent several weeks over the spring meeting with Israeli officials in an effort to convince the country to conduct targeted raids and strikes in Rafah rather than mounting a full-scale ground invasion. U.S. officials expressed concern about the consequences of conducting a major operation in Rafah when some 1.3 million Palestinians were sheltering there under Israeli orders, most of whom had relocated several times throughout the nearly eight-month war and were living in decrepit conditions.

As part of those discussions, U.S. officials told their Israeli counterparts that they could not simply relocate hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from Rafah to other parts of Gaza without setting up basic infrastructure, including tents, and providing such necessities as food and water. But since Israel started its military campaign in the city several weeks ago, about 1 million Palestinians have left Rafah without such provisions, while both Israel and Egypt have sharply limited aid coming into Gaza.

As the Israeli invasion of Rafah neared, Biden and his top aides were especially trying to avoid the images of mass death and destruction that have defined much of the war and ignited anger in many parts of the world as well as in the United States. The president has encountered increasing political challenges because of his staunch support of Israel and the growing Palestinian civilian death toll, and he now faces protesters at nearly all his public events.

Israel launched its assault in Gaza after Hamas militants broke through the Israel-Gaza border Oct. 7, killing about 1,200 people and taking some 250 others hostage. In response, Israel launched a ferocious military campaign in Gaza that has so far killed more than 35,000 Palestinians, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. An Israeli siege of the enclave has caused the health system to collapse and created a humanitarian catastrophe that has put nearly all its residents at risk of famine and disease.

Biden issued several sharp warnings to Israel as it prepared to go into Rafah to demolish what it said were remaining Hamas battalions. During an interview in March, when he was asked whether an invasion of Rafah would be a “red line” with his relationship with Netanyahu, Biden replied that it would but added, “I’m never going to leave Israel.”

In an interview with CNN this month, Biden said he would not supply the weapons — including controversial 2,000-pound bombs — that Israel had used in its military operations in key cities in Gaza.

“I’ve made it clear to Bibi and the [Israeli] war cabinet they’re not going to get our support if in fact they go into these population centers,” Biden said, using Netanyahu’s nickname. “We’re not walking away from Israel’s security — we’re walking away from Israel’s ability to wage war in those areas.”

Critics of Biden’s handling of the Gaza war, including some Democrats, however, said he has delivered inconsistent messages about the potential American response to Israel’s actions and has not imposed meaningful consequences on Netanyahu.

“Our response has apparently been to move the red line back so that anything short of the thousands of civilian deaths we saw in Khan Younis and Gaza City won’t cross it,” said Frank Lowenstein, a former State Department official who worked on the 2014 Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations.

Bruce Riedel, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who worked on Middle East issues in several administrations, noted that other nations are issuing growing calls for action against Israel, leaving the United States increasingly isolated.

Days before the deadly airstrike, the International Court of Justice, an arm of the United Nations, urged Israel to immediately halt its operations in Rafah — an order that is unenforceable but is supported by several U.S. allies.

French President Emmanuel Macron said that he was “outraged” by the airstrike in Rafah and that Israel’s operations “must stop,” adding that there needed to be “full respect for international law and an immediate cease-fire.”

Norway, Ireland and Spain last week announced formal recognition of a Palestinian state, an effort to send a signal of deep displeasure with Netanyahu’s conduct of the war.

“The red line has been crossed, and it’s being crossed again as we speak. Despite the horrific airstrike, which should have been a wake-up call to stop this offensive, it’s going forward,” Riedel said. “The U.S. is looking increasingly like it’s out of step with the rest of the world community, and that’s not a place where Joe Biden wants to be.”

To some detractors, Biden’s reluctance to impose consequences on Israel echoed President Barack Obama’s decision not to take more forceful action against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad during his country’s civil war. Obama warned Syria in 2012 that the use of chemical weapons would prompt a major U.S. reaction, but when evidence emerged Assad had used chemical weapons that killed about 1,500 people, he did not order a significant military response.

The White House’s message on the strike — that it was a tragedy but did not violate Biden’s warnings against a full-scale invasion of Rafah — was echoed elsewhere in the administration.

Miller, the State Department spokesman, said the United States was “deeply saddened by the tragic loss of life in Rafah” but that it would not prompt Biden to restrict military support for Israel. “Those images were heartbreaking, and I know the pain that those families are suffering through must be unimaginable, especially those who’ve lost children and those who have lost family members a repeated number of times,” Miller told reporters.

But he added, “With respect to Rafah, we do not want to see major military operations take place there … the way that we saw them take place in Khan Younis and in Gaza City. At this point, we have not seen a military operation on the scale of those previous operations.”

Sabrina Singh, a Defense Department spokesperson, said that Pentagon leaders were closely tracking the deadly incident and that U.S. officials had been speaking with their Israeli counterparts “to figure out and determine what exactly happened.” Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has seen the “devastating imagery” of the strike, she said, adding that she did not know whether Israel had used U.S.-provided munitions in its attack.

Tommy Vietor, co-host of “Pod Save America” and a former Obama official, said presidential administrations often become wrapped up in semantic debates over whether certain incidents constitute “major” military action. But he said the continued American defense of Israel in the face of rising global pressure gives adversaries, including Russia and China, an opening to accuse the United States of hypocrisy when Washington criticizes other countries’ human rights violations.

“At the end of the day, if civilians are getting killed in airstrikes and through fires and if people are getting displaced for the fifth, sixth, seventh time, what’s the difference?” Vietor said. “The human suffering doesn’t change based on how you describe it. I think sometimes those semantic debates miss the bigger point, which is that this war is a humanitarian catastrophe. Every single country in the world seems to recognize that except for us.”

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By Yasmeen Abutaleb

Yasmeen Abutaleb is a White House reporter for The Washington Post. She joined The Post in 2019 as a national health policy reporter. Yasmeen co-authored the New York Times No. 1 best seller, "Nightmare Scenario: Inside the Trump Administration Response to the Pandemic that Changed History." Twitter

By John Hudson

John Hudson is a reporter at The Washington Post covering the State Department and national security. He was part of the team that was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service for coverage of the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. He has reported from dozens of countries, including Ukraine, China, Afghanistan, India and Belarus. Twitter

By Missy Ryan

Missy Ryan writes about national security and defense for The Washington Post. She joined The Post in 2014 and has written about the Pentagon and the State Department. She has reported from Iraq, Ukraine, Egypt, Libya, Lebanon, Yemen, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Mexico, Peru, Argentina and Chile.

8. Putin warns West not to let Ukraine use its missiles to hit Russia

Obviously Putin is playing on our telegraphed fear of escalation. He knows our foreign policy and national security  "prime directive" is to prevent escalation.

Putin warns West not to let Ukraine use its missiles to hit Russia

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/putin-warns-west-not-let-ukraine-use-its-missiles-hit-russia-2024-05-28/?utm

By Vladimir Soldatkin and Guy Faulconbridge

May 29, 20242:35 AM EDTUpdated 4 hours ago

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Summary

• Putin hints at risk of global conflictPutin warns West over Ukrainian strikes inside RussiaPresident singles out European NATO members

MOSCOW, May 28 (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin warned the West on Tuesday that NATO members in Europe were playing with fire by proposing to let Ukraine use Western weapons to strike deep inside Russia, which he said could trigger a global conflict.

More than two years into the deadliest land war in Europe since World War Two, Putin has increasingly spoken of the risk of a much broader global conflict as the West grapples with what to do about the advance of Russian troops in Ukraine.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg told The Economist, opens new tab that alliance members should let Ukraine strike deep into Russia with Western weapons, a view supported by some NATO members but not by the United States.

"Constant escalation can lead to serious consequences," Putin told reporters in Tashkent. "If these serious consequences occur in Europe, how will the United States behave, bearing in mind our parity in the field of strategic weapons?"

"It's hard to say - do they want a global conflict?"

Putin said Ukrainian strikes on Russia with long-range weapons would need Western satellite, intelligence and military help - so the West would be directly involved. He said sending French troops to Ukraine would be a step towards a global conflict.

Speaking of NATO members in Europe, Putin said that small countries there "should be aware of what they are playing with", as they had small land areas and very dense populations.

"This is a factor that they should keep in mind before talking about striking deep into Russian territory," Putin said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks during a press conference in Tashkent, Uzbekistan May 28, 2024. Sputnik/Mikhail Metzel/Pool via REUTERS Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab

RUSSIAN ADVANCES TRIGGER DEBATE IN WEST

Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine touched off the worst breakdown in relations with the West for 60 years, and the crisis is escalating into what diplomats say is its most dangerous phase to date.

The invasion has caused the deaths of tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilians, driven millions to flee abroad, and reduced neighbourhoods and whole cities to rubble.

Russia, which controls 18% of Ukraine, is advancing and has opened a new front in the Kharkiv region, triggering a debate in the West about what else it can do after giving Kyiv hundreds of billions of dollars in aid, weapons and intelligence.

Western leaders and Ukraine have played down Russia's warnings about the risk of a broader war involving Russia, the world's biggest nuclear power, and NATO, the world's most powerful military alliance led by the United States.

Ukraine says it should be able to hit behind Russian lines, including against Russian sovereign territory, to fight back.

But Russian officials say Moscow's patience is wearing thin after repeated Ukrainian attacks on Russian cities, oil refineries, and, in recent days, even against elements of its nuclear early warning system.

Asked by Russian state television about the legitimacy of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, Putin said the only legitimate authority in Ukraine now was parliament, and that its head should be given power.

Zelenskiy has not faced an election despite the expiry of his term due to martial law which was imposed after the invasion.

Coming soon: Get the latest news and expert analysis about the state of the global economy with Reuters Econ World. Sign up here.

Writing by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by David Holmes

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab

Guy Faulconbridge

Thomson Reuters

As Moscow bureau chief, Guy runs coverage of Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States. Before Moscow, Guy ran Brexit coverage as London bureau chief (2012-2022). On the night of Brexit, his team delivered one of Reuters historic wins - reporting news of Brexit first to the world and the financial markets. Guy graduated from the London School of Economics and started his career as an intern at Bloomberg. He has spent over 14 years covering the former Soviet Union. He speaks fluent Russian.

9. Sweden to donate $1.23 billion in military aid to Ukraine

Sweden to donate $1.23 billion in military aid to Ukraine

AP · by Updated [hour]:[minute] [AMPM] [timezone], [monthFull] [day], [year] · May 29, 2024

FILE - A JAS 39 Gripen C/D takes off during military exercise Nordic Response at Luleå-Kallax Airport, near Luleå, Sweden, Monday, March 4, 2024. The Swedish government said Wednesday, May 29, 2024, that it will donate military aid to Ukraine worth 13 billion kronor ($1.23 billion) in the largest help package Sweden has so far donated.(Anders Wiklund/TT News Agency via AP, File)

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COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — The Swedish government said Wednesday that it will donate 13 billion kronor ($1.23 billion) in military aid to Ukraine, in the largest package of assistance Sweden has so far donated.

“It consists of equipment that is at the top of Ukraine’s priority list,” Deputy Prime Minister Ebba Busch said. It includes air defense, artillery ammunition and armored vehicles.

Swedish Defense Minister Pål Jonsson reiterated that the country has ruled out for now sending any Swedish-built JAS 39 Gripen jets to Ukraine, saying the focus on the Ukrainian side is on implementing a F-16 fighter jet program.

Several countries have said they want to donate F-16s. On Tuesday, Belgium pledged 30 F-16 jets to Ukraine.

Jonsson said Sweden “is still working on possibly being able to contribute with the Gripen system later.”

The donation also includes two Swedish-made SAAB ASCC airborne early warning and control airplanes, which Jonsson said would have the “greatest effect on the Ukrainian air defense” because it would complement and reinforce the promised donations of American F-16 fighter jets.

“You can identify incoming cruise missiles, you can identify drones and identify targets both on land and at sea,” he said.

“The overall assessment is that a donation of the ASCC 890 radar reconnaissance and command aircraft would be the most impactful for the Ukrainian Air Force right now,” Jonsson added.

The donation of the two airborne early warning and control airplanes means “a temporary decline in the Swedish defense capability,” Jonsson said.

The donation also includes a missile system that can be used both on aircraft and in ground-based air defense systems, he said. It will be donated to Ukraine through cooperation with the United States, Jonsson said.

The support package is the 16th from Sweden since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began.

AP · by Updated [hour]:[minute] [AMPM] [timezone], [monthFull] [day], [year] · May 29, 2024

10. Why NATO matters By Richard D. Hooker, Jr.

Dr. Hooker served on the National Security Staff in the Trump administration. A different (and positive) perspective toward NATO than other Trump administration officials (Colby and Miller) have toward the ROK/US alliance. I could take the four topics below and write the same things about the ROK/US and Japan/US alliances (changing "Russia is still a threat" to "China and north Korea are real threats"). I will be looking for the Atlantic Council experts to write similar articles about Asian alliances.

Topics covered:

Economic, political, and military benefits

Allies shoulder a fair share of the burden

The US military is still indispensable to transatlantic security

Russia is still a threat

Why NATO matters

By Richard D. Hooker, Jr.

atlanticcouncil.org · by dhojnacki · May 28, 2024

The 2024 US presidential election will be, among other things, a referendum on the United States’ continued role in NATO. With a combined population of more than nine hundred million people and $1.3 trillion dollars in defense spending, NATO is by far the largest, oldest, and most capable defensive alliance in the world. Increasingly, however, some argue that years of “underinvestment” in defense by NATO allies justify US disengagement or even withdrawal from the Alliance. Others see China as the “pacing” threat and argue that a wealthy and populous Europe should be left to provide for its own security. In this context, why does NATO still matter?

NATO matters to the United States because Europe does. Today, the European Union (EU) is the world’s largest trading bloc and largest trader of manufactured goods and services, ranking first in both inbound and outbound international investments. The European Union (EU) is the top trading partner for eighty countries, a statistic greatly magnified with the addition of the United Kingdom, Turkey, Norway, Switzerland, and other partners who are not EU members. (By comparison, the United States is the top trading partner for around twenty countries.) Except for energy, Europe imports more from developing countries than the United States, Canada, Japan, and China combined. Trade does not thrive amid war and instability, and NATO has been an indispensable component of international peace and the backbone of US national security since 1949. The Alliance is second only to nuclear deterrence as a guarantor of peace in Europe and a major force for global stability. Looking forward, however, NATO cannot stand on its past record. For the United States to continue as its leader and most important ally, the Alliance must be seen to serve US national interests in a direct and consequential way.

Economic, political, and military benefits

The US-Europe relationship is crucial to US prosperity. The EU and the United States, two of the three largest economies in the world, are each other’s largest trading partners in goods and services. The US-EU economic partnership is the largest bilateral trade relationship in the world, accounting for more than 4 percent of global gross domestic product (GDP), while US goods and services trade with the EU totaled an estimated $1.2 trillion in 2023, 25 percent more than US goods trade with China. The US-EU trade and investment relationship is the largest in the world, with four times more US foreign direct investment than with Asia-Pacific countries. According to the US Chamber of Commerce, “no two other regions in the world are as deeply integrated as the US and Europe.” The loss or disruption of these trade relations would have an immediate and drastic impact on the US and global economies.

The benefits of close transatlantic ties also play out politically. Nuclear powers France and the United Kingdom join the United States as permanent members of the United Nations (UN) Security Council to balance out China and Russia. And European support in the UN General Assembly and in international organizations, such as the Group of Seven (G7), the International Monetary Fund, and the World Bank, plays a critical role in advancing democracy and the rule of law. In the global competition between democratic and autocratic states, Europe is a vital player, often aligning with US interests and supporting US efforts to maintain a stable international system. As a community with a shared commitment to human rights, representative democracy, and the rule of law, the transatlantic region represents a bulwark against a rising tide of autocracy that threatens these ideals everywhere.

These shared values and close relationships have undergirded key European actors’ provision of materiel and assistance in numerous US-led operations, even when European interests were not directly affected. In the Gulf War in 1990, for example, NATO allies France, Italy, Canada, Turkey, and the United Kingdom each contributed in critical ways to the coalition. In humanitarian operations in Somalia in 1992 and 1993, initiated in the waning days of President George H. W. Bush’s administration, Italy, France, Belgium, and Canada provided large military contingents. The Afghanistan intervention following 9/11 was a NATO-led operation with the participation of nineteen NATO allies, which suffered more than one thousand troops killed in action. In Iraq beginning in 2003, seventeen NATO allies contributed troops and civilian aid workers, as well as financial assistance totaling in the billions of dollars. A total of twenty-three allies participated in the NATO Training Mission-Iraq from 2004 to 2011, while its successor, the NATO Mission Iraq, continues to this day. When the United States finds itself compelled to use force “out of area,” NATO allies often join in as important members of US-led coalitions.

Allies shoulder a fair share of the burden

Today, the Alliance includes thirty-one of the United States’ thirty-seven treaty allies (excluding Latin American states covered by the 1947 Rio Treaty). Japan, Australia, and South Korea are both NATO global partners and bilateral US allies. NATO allies and official partners together constitute almost 70 percent of the GDP and military power on the planet, far more than China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea combined. Although often criticized for lagging defense spending, European NATO allies are this year expected to spend $380 billion, or 2 percent of their collective GDP, on defense. (Even on a war footing, Russia spent $120 billion last year on defense). Since 2014, NATO’s European allies and Canada have spent more than six hundred billion dollars in increased defense spending over that year’s baseline military budgets. This includes an 11 percent increase in 2023 alone. While some readiness shortfalls persist, the “free rider” narrative has little basis in fact. The United States’ NATO allies are shouldering a fair share of the spending burden.

The ongoing conflict in Ukraine—the largest outbreak of major-theater war in Europe since 1945—also illustrates Europe’s actual and potential contributions to regional security and international stability. Since February 2022, the EU has contributed more than $101 billion in financial, military, humanitarian, and refugee assistance to Ukraine, with another $54 billion on the way. (Actual US assistance to date totals $107 billion). Non-EU members Britain and Norway added an additional $15.2 billion and $5.2 billion, respectively.

In the opening stages of the conflict, immediate assistance in the form of anti-tank and short-range air defense weapons, along with small arms and artillery ammunition, played a crucial role in helping Ukraine stave off the massive Russian invasion. Since then, European allies have provided main battle tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, howitzers, rocket artillery, high-altitude air defense, fighter aircraft, and secure communications systems to stiffen Ukraine’s defense against a much larger and stronger adversary. Intelligence sharing and “train the trainer” programs also represent major contributions. On a per capita basis, allies such as Poland, Norway, and the Baltic States have contributed significantly more than the United States, highlighting their resolve and commitment. NATO has been critical in coordinating allies’ aid to Ukraine.

The Alliance’s value as the principal security provider for the transatlantic community has only increased in recent months with the addition of Sweden and Finland. They bring with them effective and technologically advanced militaries, backed up by large reserve forces and comprehensive and resilient home defense. Both have increased defense spending dramatically in recent years: since 2020, Sweden has nearly doubled its defense budget, which will exceed 2 percent of its GDP this year. In the same time frame, Finnish defense spending has increased by 70 percent and is projected to reach 2.3 percent of its GDP in 2024. In geostrategic terms, NATO’s posture in the High North and in the Baltic Sea is materially enhanced by the accession of Sweden and Finland, which together with Norway and Denmark, constitute a strong regional bloc with a landmass larger than the rest of NATO’s European allies combined.

The US military is still indispensable to transatlantic security

Increases in European defense spending and new, powerful members encourage some critics to argue that Europe can stand alone without US presence and leadership. While European allies possess impressive capabilities in some categories, the US military remains indispensable to transatlantic security. Collective action across thirty-one parliaments and polities can be both fractious and ineffective without strong and consistent US leadership. In areas like strategic airlift and sealift, long-range fires, offensive cyber capacity, space-based communications and surveillance, amphibious assault platforms, tankers, nuclear-powered supercarriers and attack submarines, the United States remains by far the sole or dominant provider. Though the majority of US military power is focused away from Europe, in-place forces under US European Command or based on the eastern seaboard are formidable, contributing greatly to deterrence and defense.

The US contribution to European security is even greater in the nuclear realm. While US conventional capabilities are critical to transatlantic security, the US nuclear umbrella remains the most important guarantor of security and stability in the North Atlantic region. Should it be withdrawn, it is unlikely that European states could provide or develop credible alternatives. Russian nuclear forces dwarf those of France and the United Kingdom, which are unlikely to extend their limited nuclear assets to cover neighbors. Domestic opposition, long lead times, and the high costs involved, as well as Russian intimidation, suggest that developing nuclear weapons by nonnuclear states like Germany is also improbable. In short, without an assured US nuclear guarantee, a transatlantic security architecture is no longer viable and the prospects for renewed Russian aggression increase exponentially.

Russia is still a threat

Two years into its full-scale invasion of Ukraine and resulting Western sanctions, the Russian economy is actually expanding, while leaky international sanctions and support from China, Iran, and others continue to prop up Russian industry and economic performance. Despite heavy casualties, the Russian military continues to put growing numbers into uniform and into the field, while ramping up the production of military equipment and munitions. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s ambitions to restore Russian imperial greatness and recover lost Russian territories are well-documented, regularly communicated by his closest advisers, and apparently endorsed by a majority of Russians.

The threat of Russian aggression expanding to additional countries is real. As Mark Rutte, the current Dutch prime minister and likely next NATO secretary general, has said, “If we were to accept for one moment that Putin could be successful in Ukraine, that he would get Kyiv, that he would get the whole country, it won’t end there. History has taught us that.” Should the war in Ukraine subside into yet another frozen conflict, the Russian military will regroup and rebuild its forces. Across NATO, fear of a vengeful Russia, angry over Western support for Ukraine and determined to recover its former territories, is palpable—and with good reason. After Russian aggression in Georgia in 2008, in Crimea and the Donbas in 2014, and against all of Ukraine in 2022, the West cannot afford to assume that future Russian behavior will moderate.

Capable of coping with Russia and China

Important voices today also argue that the United States lacks the capacity to deal with both China and Russia and that Europe should therefore be left to itself. In fact, the US military presence in Europe in no way prevents the ability to deter or defend against Chinese aggression in the Indo-Pacific region. Only a small fraction of US forces is based in Europe, while the bulk of US military strength is available to deter or confront the threat from China. Should China seek to expand its territory through force, allies and partners such as India, South Korea, Vietnam, Japan, Australia, Thailand, and the Philippines together represent a powerful potential coalition to counter Chinese aggression. Wavering US commitment in Europe would send a worrying signal to these countries. There are few strategic outcomes from the Ukraine war that China would value more than the fracturing of transatlantic cohesion and the NATO Alliance. Working with allies and partners is the United States’ best route to coping with both China and Russia simultaneously.

In a challenging world, NATO provides real economic, political, and military strength that enables the United States to confront serious threats elsewhere, while still securing vital US interests in Europe. It does so at bargain rates, with only 5 percent of US defense spending going to Europe and NATO. These relationships confer a broad range of benefits on the United States, including basing and overflight rights; intelligence sharing, diplomatic, economic, and military support; and a united front in support of democratic values and the stability of the international system. The benefits to the United States are clear and unmistakable, while the risks of withdrawal are profound. And the US public agrees: A strong majority, 78 percent, of Americans said the United States should increase or maintain its commitment to NATO, according to a poll last year by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.

The United States supports and leads NATO not out of altruism, but because it is manifestly in its interest to do so. US national security and economic prosperity depend on it. To pull out from NATO would mean the end of the most successful alliance in history, alarming allies around the world and destabilizing an international order already under attack. Europe is experiencing its largest armed conflict since 1945, a war that directly affects the United States and the world. Now is no time to retreat.

Richard D. Hooker Jr. is a nonresident senior fellow with the Transatlantic Security Initiative in the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security.

NATO’s seventy-fifth anniversary is a milestone in a remarkable story of reinvention, adaptation, and unity. However, as the Alliance seeks to secure its future for the next seventy-five years, it faces the revanchism of old rivals, escalating strategic competition, and uncertainties over the future of the rules-based international order.

With partners and allies turning attention from celebrations to challenges, the Atlantic Council’s Transatlantic Security Initiative invited contributors to engage with the most pressing concerns ahead of the historic Washington summit and chart a path for the Alliance’s future. This series will feature seven essays focused on concrete issues that NATO must address at the Washington summit and five essays that examine longer-term challenges the Alliance must confront to ensure transatlantic security.

11. AFSOC Put 15 CV-22 Ospreys in Storage to Increase Mission Readiness for Rest of Fleet

AFSOC Put 15 CV-22 Ospreys in Storage to Increase Mission Readiness for Rest of Fleet

airandspaceforces.com · by Greg Hadley · May 24, 2024

May 24, 2024 | By Greg Hadley

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Air Force Special Operations Command has been rotating its CV-22 aircraft into “flyable storage” status at Cannon Air Force Base, N.M., as it works to upgrade components in the movable nacelles, the engine housings and transmission lines that give the aircraft its unique tiltrotor capabilities.

The work began in 2022 and will continue into 2026.

The previously unreported program is part of a larger effort to improve mission availability for the Osprey, but it won’t be clear until late 2025 if the changes are making enough of a difference to restore the full fleet to operational squadrons.

Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-Texas) raised the topic of CV-22 readiness during the House Armed Services Committee’s markup of the 2025 National Defense Authorization bill.

“The committee is aware of the force structure proposals for the fleet of CV-22 Osprey aircraft that are being considered by the Department of the Air Force and U.S. Special Operations Command,” Jackson wrote in language adopted by the committee. Today, he said, 15 of the 51 CV-22 Osprey aircraft in the Air Force inventory “are in flyable storage with the intent of returning to an operational squadron no earlier than fiscal year 2026.”

An AFSOC spokeswoman confirmed that the aircraft were in storage in response to a query from Air & Space Forces Magazine.

Flyable storage means the aircraft can be put back in the inventory if needed, but spreads the available operations and maintenance funds across fewer aircraft, enabling higher availability rates. The Air Force applied a similar strategy in recent years to the B-1B bomber fleet, retiring some of the bombers so it could focus sustainment funding on fewer aircraft.

“Air Force Special Operations Command placed 15 CV-22s in Flyable Storage at Cannon Air Force Base, N.M., in FY22 to better support modification lines for a number of aircraft improvements, most notably the Nacelle Improvement program designed to simplify maintenance actions and raise the fleet’s aircraft availability rate,” the spokeswoman said.

AFSOC’S Nacelle Improvement Program began in September 2021, with the Air Force contracting Osprey maker Bell Textron to do the work. In 2022, then-Lt. Col. Jonathan Ball said in a video that “60 percent of the maintenance occurs in the nacelles. So what this allows us to do is really address and improve on those reliability and sustainment issues that we’ve seen and learned from over the last decade, but still have the same amazing capability moving forward.”

About half the CV-22 fleet has received the upgrade so far.

Safety issues have haunted the Osprey since early in its development. But advocates say the data does not support its reputation for safety incidents. The program has come under increasing scrutiny in recent years after a series of fatal crashes and two periods when AFSOC paused flight operations while investigating concerns related to the aircraft’s clutch system, in particular.

In November, a CV-22 crashed off the coast of Japan, killing all eight Airmen on board. Investigators blamed the crash on an unspecified material failure. A military-wide V-22 grounding that was lifted in March, but the aircraft’s operations are still limited.

“We are gaining better fidelity on the effectiveness of the nacelle improvements on fleet readiness,” the AFSOC spokeswoman said. “We believe we will have sufficient data by late 2025 to inform a decision whether to return the flyable storage aircraft to operational squadrons.”

Jackson’s amendment to the House version of the Authorization bill says Congress is “aware of and very concerned by recent proposals to move multiple CV-22 Osprey aircraft to a long-term preservation site.”

Asked if the Air Force has pending proposals or plans to change the Osprey’s force structure, the AFSOC spokeswoman responded: “There have been no further decisions on the CV-22 fleet status since those program changes in FY22.”

However, an April force structure report issued by the Pentagon indicates the Air Force is seeking to retire two CV-22s in 2025. However, the report notes that “two CV-22s will be delivered immediately prior to two divesting.” The report shows no other planned CV-22 retirements through 2029.

As part of the reporting language Jackson introduced into the NDAA, the Secretary of the Air Force and U.S. Special Operations Command commander would have to provide a briefing to lawmakers by December 2024 including:

• A detailed force structure and preservation plan for the CV-22
• A review of any manpower shortfalls over the last three years
• The impact of the Nacelle Improvement program
• Investments needed for “safety, reliability, survivability, and capability”
• Analysis of “any recent changes to the maintenance protocols over the last three years” for the CV-22
• Any funding that has been diverted away from the CV-22

Elsewhere in the House Armed Services Committee version of the NDAA, lawmakers authorized an extra $125 million for procuring V-22 safety enhancements. The additional funds still must be approved by the Senate and by appropriators in both chambers.

Air

Congress

airandspaceforces.com · by Greg Hadley · May 24, 2024

12. Opinion - Do We Still Understand How Wars Are Won?

Excerpts:

President Biden gave a moving Memorial Day speech at Arlington National Cemetery on Monday, honoring generations of soldiers who fought and fell “in battle between autocracy and democracy.” But the tragedy of America’s recent battle history is that thousands of those soldiers died in wars we lacked the will to win. They died for nothing, because Biden and other presidents belatedly decided we had better priorities.

That’s a luxury that safe and powerful countries like the United States can afford. Not so for Ukrainians and Israelis. The least we can do for them is understand that they have no choice to fight except in the way we once did — back when we knew what it takes to win.

Opinion - Do We Still Understand How Wars Are Won? - The New York Times

nytimes.com · by Bret Stephens · May 28, 2024

Bret Stephens

Do We Still Understand How Wars Are Won?

May 28, 2024, 7:00 p.m. ET

Allied soldiers navigating the ruins of Nuremberg, Germany, toward the end of World War II.

By Bret Stephens

Opinion Columnist

In the past 50 years, the United States has gotten good at losing wars.

We withdrew in humiliation from Saigon in 1975, Beirut in 1984, Mogadishu in 1993 and Kabul in 2021. We withdrew, after the tenuous victory of the surge, from Baghdad in 2011, only to return three years later after ISIS swept through northern Iraq and we had to stop it (which, with the help of Iraqis and Kurds, we did). We won limited victories against Saddam Hussein in 1991 and Muammar el-Qaddafi in 2011, only to fumble the endgames.

What’s left? Grenada, Panama, Kosovo: micro-wars that incurred minimal U.S. casualties and are barely remembered today.

If you’re on the left, you’d probably say that most if not all these wars were unnecessary, unwinnable or unworthy. If you’re on the right, you might say they were badly fought — with inadequate force, too many restrictions on the way force could be used or an overeagerness to withdraw before we had finished the job. Either way, none of these wars were about our very existence. Life in America would not have materially changed if, say, Kosovo were still a part of Serbia.

But what about wars that are existential?

We know how America fought such wars. During the siege of Vicksburg in 1863, hunger “yielded to starvation as dogs, cats, and even rats vanished from the city,” Ron Chernow noted in his biography of Ulysses Grant. The Union did not send food convoys to relieve the suffering of innocent Southerners.

In World War II, Allied bombers killed an estimated 10,000 civilians in the Netherlands, 60,000 in France, 60,000 in Italy and hundreds of thousands of Germans. All this was part of a declared Anglo-American policy to undermine “the morale of the German people to the point where their capacity for armed resistance is fatally weakened.” We pursued an identical policy against Japan, where bombardment killed, according to some estimates, nearly one million civilians.

Grant is on the $50 bill. Franklin Roosevelt’s portrait hangs in the Oval Office. The bravery of the American bomber crews is celebrated in shows like Apple TV+’s “Masters of the Air.” Nations, especially democracies, often have second thoughts about the means they use to win existential wars. But they also tend to canonize leaders who, faced with the awful choice of evils that every war presents, nonetheless chose morally compromised victories over morally pure defeats.

Today, Israel and Ukraine are engaged in the same kind of wars. We know that not because they say so but because their enemies do. Vladimir Putin believes that the Ukrainian state is a fiction. Hamas, Hezbollah and their patrons in Iran openly call for Israel to be wiped off the map. In response, both countries want to fight aggressively, with the view that they can achieve security only by destroying their enemies’ capability and will to wage war.

This often ends in tragedy, as it did on Sunday when an Israeli airstrike targeting Hamas leaders reportedly led to the deaths of at least 45 civilians in Rafah. This has always been the story of warfare. Terms like “precision weapons” can foster the notion that it’s possible for modern militaries to hit only intended targets. But that’s a fantasy, especially against enemies like Hamas, whose method is to fight and hide among the innocent so that it may be rescued from destruction by the world’s concern for the innocent.

It’s equally a fantasy to imagine that you can supply an ally like Ukraine with just enough weaponry of just the right kind to repel Russia’s attack but not so much as to provoke Russia into escalation. Wars are not porridge; there’s almost never a Goldilocks approach to getting it just right. Either you’re on the way to victory or on the way to defeat.

Right now, the Biden administration is trying to restrain Israel and aid Ukraine while operating under both illusions. It is asking them to fight their wars in roughly the same way that the United States has fought its own wars in recent decades — with limited means, a limited stomach for what it takes to win and an eye on the possibility of a negotiated settlement. How is it possible, for instance, that even now Ukraine does not have F-16s to defend its own skies?

In the short run, the Biden approach may help relieve humanitarian distress, allay angry constituencies or eliminate the possibility of sharp escalations. In the long run, it’s a recipe for compelling our allies to lose.

A “peace deal” with Moscow that leaves it in possession of vast areas of Ukrainian territory is an invitation for a third invasion once Russia recapitalizes its forces. A cease-fire with Hamas that leaves the group in control of Gaza means it will inevitably start another war, just as it has five times before. It also vindicates the strategy of using civilian populations as human shields — something Hezbollah will be sure to copy in its next full-scale war with Israel.

President Biden gave a moving Memorial Day speech at Arlington National Cemetery on Monday, honoring generations of soldiers who fought and fell “in battle between autocracy and democracy.” But the tragedy of America’s recent battle history is that thousands of those soldiers died in wars we lacked the will to win. They died for nothing, because Biden and other presidents belatedly decided we had better priorities.

That’s a luxury that safe and powerful countries like the United States can afford. Not so for Ukrainians and Israelis. The least we can do for them is understand that they have no choice to fight except in the way we once did — back when we knew what it takes to win.

The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.

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Bret Stephens is an Opinion columnist for The Times, writing about foreign policy, domestic politics and cultural issues. Facebook

nytimes.com · by Bret Stephens · May 28, 2024

13. A new breakthrough could deepen US troops' dependence on Chinese batteries

A new breakthrough could deepen US troops' dependence on Chinese batteries

The Qingdao Institute reports a new manufacturing technique that enables cells to charge quicker and age slower.

By THOMAS CORBETT and PETER W. SINGER

MAY 28, 2024 02:16 PM ET

defenseone.com · by Thomas Corbett

Many of the lithium-ion batteries that power much U.S. military gear are made in whole or in part in China. Now a Chinese lab is reporting a breakthrough that could increase Beijing’s control of the global market.

That’s a problem. During Operation Iraqi Freedom, for example, U.S. access to batteries for radios, night-vision goggles, small drones, and far more nearly faltered due to off-shoring and loss of U.S. production, according to a 2018 DOD assessment. The Pentagon’s need for batteries will only continue to grow; notably, the department plans to phase in vast numbers of electric vehicles over the next decade.

In March, the Qingdao Institute of Bioenergy and Bioprocess Technology, a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, announced a new manufacturing technique that enables a battery to charge more quickly and age more slowly, retaining its ability to hold a charge far longer. If China can further refine this technique and integrate it into standard lithium-ion battery manufacturing, this may improve the country’s substantial position in the critical field of advanced batteries, the global market for which is predicted to reach nearly a trillion dollars by 2028.

The Institute’s breakthrough was enabled by the PRC’s industrial and research policies, including funding directed to the battery project by the 14th Five-Year Plan’s National Key Research and Development Program (NKRDP) and the National Natural Science Foundation. The foundation, established in 1986, spends about $5 billion annually on scientific projects, including research into advanced battery performance.

The eight-year-old NKRDP funds joint research in strategic technologies in industry and academic organizations. Although the program is administered by the civilian Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, many of its projects have military applications—in line with China’s larger approach of civil-military fusion. Last year, for example, the NKRDP launched the “Key Materials and Technologies for High-Performance Energy Storage Batteries Under Extreme Conditions” project, which pulls together numerous universities with ties to the PLA such as Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Tsinghua University, Harbin Institute of Technology, and University of Science and Technology of China, as well as the aforementioned Qingdao Institute. Battery performance under rugged battlefield conditions is a key concern for the Pentagon, and also a focus of this Chinese project, which is interested in not only extreme hot and cold, but also “kinetic issues.” Project descriptions say battery life in extreme conditions is “instrumental for maintaining border stability” and that advanced battery research had “great strategic significance.”

China has taken this strategic significance to heart in the past decade and positioned itself throughout global lithium-ion battery supply chains. The latest payoff in performance research is only part of Beijing’s larger effort to dominate global lithium-ion battery supply chains, from mining to production.

The first of the two main raw materials needed for lithium-ion batteries is lithium. China has boosted its global share of the element’s production from 9.2 percent in 2018 to 17.8 percent in 2023, behind Chile’s 47 percent and Australia’s 24 percent. This was likely spurred by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology’s repeated calls to improve the PRC’s energy sector, including “securing key resources such as lithium” and “establishing full life-cycle traceability for lithium batteries.”

The next-most important is cobalt. Some 75 percent of the world’s supply comes from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which has massively increased production in the past 25 years. However, the most productive mines are directly owned by Chinese companies such as the MMG Group, Jinchuan Group International Resources, and CMOC Group, which alone accounts for nearly 30 percent of global output.

And yet, according to the International Energy Agency, China’s true strength lies in processing materials—some 60 to 70 percent of global lithium and cobalt processing occurs in the country—and manufacturing: the country produces nearly 80 percent of batteries. One single company, Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. (CATL), accounts for 35 percent of global lithium-ion battery production.

China’s production rose from 2.5 billion units in 2010 to 19 billion in 2020, roughly half of the total in the coastal, export-focused provinces of Guangdong, Jiangsu, and Fujian. A 2021 white paper on the advanced-battery market by the China Electronic Information Industry Development Research Institute found that CATL benefited as prices fell internationally and countries around the world pushed for green initiatives.

For its part, the U.S. government has begun to take the issue seriously. In 2021, the Department of Energy issued a National Blueprint for Lithium Batteries that called for securing U.S. access to raw materials, re-shoring lithium processing and battery production, supporting advanced battery R&D and training, and improving the nation’s battery recycling ecosystem.

This concern is echoed at the Pentagon. In 2021, Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks called lithium-ion batteries “essential to thousands of military systems” and said that “a healthy battery supply chain is essential to the military.” The Pentagon included supply chains for advanced batteries in its “Securing Defense-Critical Supply Chains” action plan in February 2022, which mainly called for de-risking its access to these critical components. Last September, the Pentagon began an effort to encourage the return of U.S. lithium mining with a $90 million investment to reopen a mine in Kings Mountain, N.C. And in January, Congress ordered the Pentagon to stop buying batteries from CATL and three other Chinese manufacturers in 2027.

However, China’s leadership position did not occur overnight. China has been focusing on advanced battery technology since at least 2014, dating back to the PRC State Council’s National Energy Development Strategic Action Plan. As a result, by 2022, the Chinese government was investing almost 12 times as much as the United States in electric vehicles and their associated technology. The result is a lead today that may have just been extended into tomorrow.

Thomas Corbett is a research analyst with BluePath Labs. His areas of focus include Chinese foreign relations, emerging technology, and Indo-Pacific security studies.

P.W. Singer is Strategist at New America and the author of multiple books on technology and security.

defenseone.com · by Thomas Corbett

14. Blacklisted Chinese Companies Rebrand as American to Dodge Crackdown

Example of the Chinese "three warfare?" Is this a form of media or public relations warfare as well as a form of legal warfare or lawfare?

Blacklisted Chinese Companies Rebrand as American to Dodge Crackdown

Firms tagged as military entities use new names and licensing deals to try to keep their businesses going in U.S.

https://www.wsj.com/politics/national-security/url-chinese-companies-rebrand-us-8a0c3872?mod=hp_lead_pos1&utm

By Heather Somerville

Follow

Updated May 29, 2024 12:03 am ET

China-based Hesai, viewed as a security concern by the U.S., makes lidar sensors that allow cars to recognize their surroundings. PHOTO: SMITH COLLECTION/GADO/GETTY IMAGES

In December, a new company registered in Michigan: American Lidar. Its planned home would be an easy drive from the big three U.S. automakers.

The company behind American Lidar, and not mentioned in its registration, is China-based lidar maker Hesai Group, which the U.S. has labeled a security concern. It is a familiar playbook: a company facing regulatory or reputational problems sets up a subsidiary or affiliate with a different name. 

Chinese firms trying to buffer themselves from Washington’s anti-China policies are rebranding and creating U.S.-domiciled businesses to sell their wares as the Biden administration expands the government entity lists that restrict Chinese companies’ business dealings in the U.S., say policymakers and national-security experts. The blacklisting has also created opportunities for American entrepreneurs who want to work with Chinese companies that are popular with U.S. consumers.

“Chinese firms take a blow but then adjust business strategy and are able to move in another direction,” said Derek Scissors, a former commissioner on the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission. 

What Banning TikTok in the U.S. Would Look Like

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The U.S. isn’t the first country to attempt a ban on TikTok, the Chinese-owned app used by millions of Americans daily. WSJ breaks down TikTok bans and how they work. Photo illustration: Annie Zhao

TikTok spent years trying to distance itself from its China-based parent, ByteDance, by establishing a U.S. headquarters and exploring ways to rebrand in America. Despite the moves, the video app faces a possible ban under a new law. TikTok has sued the U.S. government, accusing it of violating First Amendment rights.

Chinese companies’ efforts to shift production, rebrand as American or set up subsidiaries with new names are legal, lawyers say. Still, such moves irritate regulators who can’t enforce laws when it isn’t clear who is behind a company. 

California offices of China-based TikTok, the video app that faces a potential ban under a U.S. law. PHOTO: ALLISON DINNER/SHUTTERSTOCK

“As the U.S. government turns to blacklists as a means of identifying problematic Chinese companies and as a means for imposing restrictions, the shell game is going to intensify,” said a House of Representatives aide researching Chinese companies in the U.S.  

A Massachusetts affiliate of Chinese biotech company BGI Group recently rebranded, striking “BGI” from its name. SZ DJI Technology, the world’s largest drone maker, struck a deal with an American startup to sell drones in the U.S. ahead of a possible ban. Years ago, Chinese telecom company Huawei Technologies set up an American subsidiary, Futurewei, ahead of U.S. sanctions on the company.

Lidar debate

Lidar maker Hesai became a target in the U.S.-China tech trade war after allegations that its laser sensors, which are important to the U.S. auto industry and military, could be used to collect sensitive American data. Lidar allows cars to recognize their surrounding environment, enabling features such as lane keeping and automatic braking. 

A month after it set up American Lidar to be its manufacturing facility in the U.S. heartland, Hesai was added to the Defense Department list that designates companies as Chinese military entities operating in the U.S. Its stock fell 30% in a day after the list was published and hasn’t recovered. Almost one-fifth of Hesai’s revenue comes from the U.S.

The Pentagon’s designation prohibits the U.S. military from buying Hesai products. Automakers and other private companies can remain buyers. Hesai says its lidars don’t pose a threat because they can’t store or transmit images wirelessly.

A Hesai spokeswoman said the name American Lidar was a placeholder, but the company wanted to communicate that the products would be made and sold in the U.S. Hesai has since paused plans for the American Lidar facility, blaming the fallout from being labeled a Chinese military entity.

Hesai’s lidar sensors, such as these on a vehicle’s roof, are the subject of allegations that they could be used to collect sensitive American data. PHOTO: CASSIDY ARAIZA FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Hesai filed a lawsuit this month against the Defense Department, asserting it should be removed from the list because it has no affiliation with any military and isn’t controlled by the Chinese government.

BGI Genomics 300676 -0.13%decrease; red down pointing triangle, part of China’s BGI Group, was added to the Pentagon’s list of Chinese military companies in 2022. A year ago, one of its subsidiaries in Massachusetts changed its name to Innomics from BGI Americas.

BGI Genomics, which supplied Covid-testing gear to a Beijing lab in 2020, was placed on a Pentagon list of Chinese military companies in 2022. PHOTO: PENG ZIYANG/ZUMA PRESS

In an April statement, a congressional select committee said the name change was an attempt “to avoid regulatory scrutiny” and asked the Pentagon to add Innomics to its Chinese military-entity list.

BGI Group said it doesn’t do work for the military and its subsidiaries in the U.S. don’t have access to Americans’ personal data. Innomics said it doesn’t belong on the Pentagon’s list because it has no connection with the Chinese military and no operations in China.

National-security experts and lawyers say singling out individual Chinese companies invites rebranding and obfuscation. 

“You should not be sanctioning individual firms, you should be sanctioning technology sectors,” said Scissors, the former commissioner who is also a senior fellow at the think tank American Enterprise Institute, which advocates for assertive policies to deal with China.

A business opportunity

A new proposed ban from Congress targets Chinese drone maker DJI. The legislation is, in effect, a broad prohibition on the use of DJI drones by consumers as well as governments. The U.S. has warned that DJI might be sending data from its drones to Beijing and that its drones aid in human-rights abuses in China. 

DJI says these allegations are false. 

Proposed congressional legislation would prevent consumers and governments from using drones made by DJI, a Chinese company. PHOTO: JOHN MOORE/GETTY IMAGES

For Randall Warnas, the proposed bill presented an opportunity. 

Early last year, he struck a deal with DJI to license its technology for at least two drone models and sell them in the U.S. through a new startup, Anzu Robotics. Warnas is an American citizen and Utah resident who previously worked for DJI and Autel Robotics, another large Chinese drone maker.

Warnas said he got the blueprints from DJI for a licensing fee. He hired a manufacturer in Malaysia to assemble the drones. 

Anzu’s drones use DJI software. Warnas said his startup answers concerns about data-sharing with Beijing by storing data from the drones in the U.S.

“The whole intention was to comply with the United States’ request to not have Chinese drones operating in the U.S.,” he said.

Some in Washington are worried that DJI is using the deal to get around sanctions. Rep. Elise Stefanik (R., N.Y.), an architect of the bill to ban DJI drones, called it a “desperate attempt.” 

“DJI and all of its shell companies will be held accountable,” she said.

DJI said it gets frequent requests for collaboration, including licensing agreements, that allow it to continue making its drones widely available to users.

Rep. Elise Stefanik, a New York Republican, is among those in Washington who worry that DJI is using a licensing deal to get around sanctions. PHOTO: AL DRAGO/BLOOMBERG NEWS

Write to Heather Somerville at heather.somerville@wsj.com

​15. Across the Army, units lean into drone experimentation

This could be a "perfect storm" (in a positive way) for development of new technology and concepts of employment. Units with tech savvy young soldiers might be the best place for innovation.

Across the Army, units lean into drone experimentation

In division after division, soldiers are learning to use a rising wave of robots and other unmanned systems.

BY SAM SKOVE

STAFF WRITER

MAY 28, 2024 09:46 PM ET

defenseone.com · by Sam Skove

In speech after speech, Army leaders have made it clear that they want more drones in more units.

“We're going to see robotics inside the formation, on the ground and in the air,” Army Chief of Staff Randy George told Defense One in March.

Now a growing number of Army units, and particularly their junior officers and enlisted soldiers, are engaged in wide-ranging experiments to answer George’s call—and learn to train for, field, and operate their new systems.

“No longer is a drone just a safety net” for soldiers on patrol, said Capt. Adam Johnson, commander of Gainey Company, an experimental unit that serves as a hub for trying new technologies and tactics in the 82nd Airborne. “They have a purpose.”

Gainey’s Robotics and Autonomous Systems platoon is tasked with evaluating the technical aspects of commercially available small drones. Johnson said first-person-view, or FPV, drones have proven particularly useful, in part because their low cost means they’re easier to experiment with. The unit builds its own FPVs from scratch by assembling components from approved suppliers.

By contrast, experimenting with the costly commercially available drones from the military’s pre-approved Blue List can create “heartache” for soldiers, said the RAS platoon sergeant, who requested anonymity for personal security reasons. Blue UAS drones cost three to five times as much as equivalent Chinese drones, pushing their costs into the tens of thousands of dollars.

In addition to technical experimentation—with everything from drones to ground robots—the unit has grappled with the training and organization of drone operators.

Early iterations of Gainey Company included soldiers who had limited previous exposure to drones. The soldiers’ minimal expertise meant that this plan didn’t work well.

“We don't have the time to sit down and teach people in depth if they have no [drone] experience,” said Johnson. “It's hard to get them over that first six-foot wall.”

Consequently, the unit moved to staffing itself with permanently assigned drone operators with a high level of skill, including drone master trainers and even a former drone surveyor.

Johnson’s work has also led him to consider how best to organize small drone operators within the service. Ukraine’s use of dedicated drone units may be something the U.S. should copy, he said.

Doing so would create a “culture of competition,” he said, comparing the effect on training and performance to that in the Army’s medical platoons. Additionally, using dedicated small drone units could simplify the process of using them to coordinate artillery fire. Spreading drones out across a formation risks having soldiers “clawing to get targets prosecuted,” Johnson said.

Some units are already informally experimenting with grouping drone operators together, including a previous commander of Johnson’s who placed his drone operators under the scout platoon, he said.

Over at the 101st Airborne, the division’s own experimental unit is putting a version of that idea into practice by incorporating drones into its new Multi-Functional Reconnaissance Company, or MFRC.

The MFRC includes electronic warfare and small drone operators for identifying enemy units and then targeting them with indirect fire, Capt. Charles O'Hagan said in a video posted by the Army. O'Hagan says the intelligence gained via drones also prepares the infantry battalions to take on their objectives.

Earlier this month, 101st commander, Maj. Gen. Brett Sylvia told reporters that small drones could be integrated into infantry formations to look for enemy forces ahead.

Other units are honing skills through less formal initiatives aimed at improving soldiers’ drone-flying ability.

In the 3rd Infantry Division, soldiers are working to start up an FPV program, said Capt. Chris Flournoy, a former innovation officer who worked on the program. New Army guidance has made it possible for leaders at more levels to buy commercial drones and drone components.

The program, tentatively scheduled to begin this summer, is slated to last around two weeks, with classroom, virtual, and hands-on training on an indoor and outdoor course. The goal is for students who graduate from the course to be spread across the armored brigade combat teams to become the “drone guys,” Flournoy said.

The Army’s Maneuver Center of Excellence, meanwhile, launched its own drone competition course this month: the “Beehive Classic.”

The two-day event consisted of physical challenges—like sprints—alongside navigating drones in indoor and outdoor courses. Competitors operated in two-person teams to complete tasks such as investigating enemy positions and using the Army’s RQ-28 quadcopter to bomb vehicles with water balloons. The strikes were assessed for their ability to hit vulnerable points, said Sgt. Travis Smith, a competitor.

The Army hopes to launch an annual competition in September or October, which may include other government entities. Future iterations of the competition might include FPV events or using the drones to call for artillery fire, Smith said. Other events might include using drones against bunkers or trenches, he added.

Amid the service’s growing focus on drones, the Army should consider seeking out talented drone operators across its force, said Johnson of the 82nd.

“We need to start rebalancing our massive amount of human intelligence capital to meet” the demand for drones, he said.

defenseone.com · by Sam Skove

16. Washington needs to tell China — attacking Taiwan means war with the US

Excerpts:

President Biden has said four times that America will defend Taiwan; Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump each said it once. On all six occasions, however, the White House and State Department “clarified” that U.S. policy was unchanged. Biden needs to say it again, not as an ad lib answer to a reporter’s question but as a thoroughly vetted, official administration statement, carried out in accordance with the Taiwan Relations Act and the international doctrine of collective self-defense. If China responds by attacking U.S. assets, that would effectively constitute a declaration of war against the U.S. and put at risk all that the People’s Republic of China has achieved since its founding in 1949. 

Biden’s record of broken “red lines” as chief foreign policy architect for the Obama administration and as president require nothing less than strategic clarity on defending Taiwan. He must make clear that, directly contrary to China’s threat that “independence means war,” an unprovoked Chinese attack or blockade against Taiwan would bring America’s full diplomatic recognition of Taiwan — that is, “war means independence.”   

Washington needs to tell China — attacking Taiwan means war with the US

BY JOSEPH BOSCO, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR - 05/28/24 10:00 AM ET

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/4688802-the-us-will-defend-taiwan-against-china/

In 2024, as with all Taiwan’s elections for president since 1996, the Chinese Communist Party repeatedly warned the people of Taiwan not to elect a candidate unwilling to accept China’s goal of eventual political, economic and military control over Taiwan.

In six of the eight elections, including the last three, the people of Taiwan defied Beijing’s instructions, this time giving the ruling Democratic People’s Party an unprecedented third consecutive term.

To make matters worse, from Beijing’s expansionist perspective, Taiwan’s new president, Lai Ching-te, has described himself as a “pragmatic worker for Taiwan independence,” an outcome that China has declared a red line that would trigger war across the Taiwan Strait. 

Xi Jinping’s regime has labeled Lai a “troublemaker” and a “separatist.” His election may have been the last straw for Xi, who took power in 2012 declaring “the Taiwan question cannot be passed from one generation to another,” echoing Henry Kissinger’s 2007 warning to Taiwan that “China will not wait forever.” But, once again, the people of Taiwan had the temerity to ignore the Chinese Communists’ instructions. 

Beijing’s initial peeved reaction to this impudence was to object in diplomatic channels to those countries that congratulated Taiwan on another successful demonstration of its democratic vitality. It has been stewing since January over an appropriately strong measure of “punishment” to impose upon the Taiwanese themselves and to warn the new Lai administration that it is on a dangerous path.  

Beijing has now begun to manifest its displeasure with Taiwan by launching a new round of military exercises. China has encircled the island with a record 27 warships and 62 warplanes, 47 of which flew into Taiwan’s Air Defense Information Zone and practiced boarding runs — all actions that would be essential components of a Chinese blockade of Taiwan. 

Unlike preparation for a full-scale amphibious invasion, which would clearly be seen by the outside world as an act of aggression, a blockade or embargo would be a less dramatic operation and require less elaborate advance preparation. China’s steadily expanding exercises have normalized expectations and could readily morph into the real thing almost before Taiwan and its allies realize what is happening. China could also employ a pseudo-blockade exercise as a feint while taking one of Taiwan’s smaller islands, such as Quemoy (Kinmen) or Matsu. 

A blockade or embargo would also have the advantage of appearing as a quasi-passive operation, putting the onus for triggering conflict on any outside power seeking to break it. If a U.S. airlift were attempted and it erupted into conflict, it could be difficult to ascertain who fired the first shot and therefore which side bore the responsibility for starting a regional conflict. The potential ambiguity would inhibit third countries from taking sides. 

As always, the best way to avoid the unpredictable costs of war is to deter it in the first place. America’s policy of strategic ambiguity on whether it would directly intervene to defend Taiwan has prevented an actual attack so far. But it has not deterred China from massively building up its naval, air and missile capabilities and its escalating exercises in preparation for the day it feels ready to carry out its threats. As long as the U.S. keeps open the possibility that it will not intervene — “it would depend on the circumstances” — the danger for Taiwan, the region and the world keeps growing. 

President Biden has said four times that America will defend Taiwan; Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump each said it once. On all six occasions, however, the White House and State Department “clarified” that U.S. policy was unchanged. Biden needs to say it again, not as an ad lib answer to a reporter’s question but as a thoroughly vetted, official administration statement, carried out in accordance with the Taiwan Relations Act and the international doctrine of collective self-defense. If China responds by attacking U.S. assets, that would effectively constitute a declaration of war against the U.S. and put at risk all that the People’s Republic of China has achieved since its founding in 1949. 

Biden’s record of broken “red lines” as chief foreign policy architect for the Obama administration and as president require nothing less than strategic clarity on defending Taiwan. He must make clear that, directly contrary to China’s threat that “independence means war,” an unprovoked Chinese attack or blockade against Taiwan would bring America’s full diplomatic recognition of Taiwan — that is, “war means independence.”    

Joseph Bosco served as China country director for the secretary of Defense from 2005 to 2006 and as Asia-Pacific director of humanitarian assistance and disaster relief from 2009 to 2010. He is a nonresident fellow at the Institute for Corean-American Studies and a member of the advisory board of the Global Taiwan Institute.   

17. Veterans should volunteer to train soldiers in Ukraine

I know some veterans, particularly Ukrainian Americans, who are providing behind the scenes low visibility support trying to overcome shortfalls in many areas of equipment and logistics.

Veterans should volunteer to train soldiers in Ukraine

BY ADRIAN BONENBERGER, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR - 05/27/24 3:00 PM ET

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/4687446-veterans-should-volunteer-to-train-soldiers-in-ukraine/?utm

Ukraine’s mobilization law lowering conscription age from 27 to 25 took effect May 18. The embattled country’s military and political leadership hope that this will create enough manpower to fill gaps and continue to hold the Russian hordes at bay. Bolstered by new equipment and ammunition from the West, the country fights on.

What’s the best way to help? Bodying up — volunteering. That comes with many costs, though, particularly for foreigners: Pay is low, there are complicated laws to navigate and this isn’t simply a war of self-defense, but a very dangerous conflict in which the odds of being badly hurt or killed are high.

Americans and Europeans who feel satisfied lobbying for aid from afar may feel content knowing that ammunition, weapons and vehicles are en route from their nations. And it is certain that those items have done much to preserve lives in most of Ukraine. Russia began its invasion in 2022 hoping to plant its flag in Kyiv and Odesa, and at present is being halted again north of Kharkiv.

Some countries have begun openly considering returning soldiers withdrawn from Ukrainian territory when the invasion began, in order to make training recently mobilized citizens as easy and straightforward as possible.

There is another way to help. Experienced military veterans from countries such as America, Germany, the United Kingdom and France can provide expertise and training, as volunteers.

Training is the thing that gets talked and thought about least by people interested in military affairs. It’s not sexy like the advanced technology packed into an F-22; it’s not breathtaking like the maneuvers of tens of thousands of troops on the battlefield or awe-inspiring like an aircraft carrier. Done properly, it’s tedious, dirty and exhausting. But done properly, it wins wars.

Some may object that at this point, even very experienced veterans of the U.S., British, German and French militaries have little to offer Ukraine in its war of self-defense. Training in the West does not anticipate the tactical considerations facing soldiers looking up for drones and assaulting from trench to trench, fighting defensively from fixed positions or from buildings. This is a fair objection; the only veterans capable of training Ukraine fully at this point are Ukrainian veterans of this war. Specifically, veterans of the last year, during which time Russian drones and trench warfare has proliferated.

But “full training” isn’t necessary here. The foundation of successful military action, of war, is small-unit tactics and small-unit leadership, and those have not changed substantially for 100 years. Zooming out a little, and blurring the details, one could even stand by generalizations as broad as: The fundamentals of waging war successfully have not changed for thousands of years.

What are those fundamentals? Teamwork, maneuvering as a group and empowering people to lead ever-larger groups. The insights and technological developments of the last 100 years have led to increased decentralization. So training that focuses on preparing squad leaders to maneuver two to three teams of three to five people each is also preparing platoon leaders to maneuver three to four platoons of 20 to 40 people each. And that is the base on which all other modern warfare rests.

There is no military that does small-unit tactics and leadership better than the militaries of the U.S. and other nations that have embraced the egalitarian and meritocratic principles of the enlightenment, and the humanism on which those principles rest. Training unlocks the potential of those insights, and spreads it around a force, animating it.

The very ideals on which the U.S. military and allied formations are founded happen to be the ideals for which Ukrainians are fighting. This makes their military and citizens very receptive to this type of training.

To a great degree, Ukraine’s revolution against Russian dominance is a revolution for decentralization, and for the last 10 years that revolution has happened fastest and most effectively in Ukraine’s military, out of necessity. If it had not occurred there, Ukraine would have been vanquished by Russia already. The extent to which Russia has had military success is the extent to which it has fought against itself — the Russian colonels and generals who trained alongside Ukrainian colonels and generals decades ago as part of the Soviet military. The extent to which Ukraine has been able to frustrate and confound Russia is the extent to which it has empowered and elevated its junior officers of a decade ago. Meritocracy in action.

All of this makes Ukraine’s culture and military very fertile for the type of thinking and action for which Western militaries train. The people take quickly to the type of small-unit tactics and small-unit leadership that wins battles at the squad and platoon level. I and others saw this during two trips to train Ukrainian citizens and soldiers in 2022-23, and it is a large reason why combat veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan and I co-founded Citizens to Soldiers, International — a group that seeks to facilitate volunteers to help with training.

We weren’t alone — many other veterans organized training protocols and traveled to help train Ukrainians in those early days. Supporting those initiatives then was useful, and organizing and supporting them now would be, too.

The weapons and ammunition the West sends Ukraine are badly needed, and good; free countries must keep them coming. But Ukraine needs more than weapons — as it gears up another wave of mobilization, it also needs experienced veterans to help train those soldiers on the foundational tactics and leadership ideas that have been a key component of every great military.

Ukrainians are temperamentally suited for this type of fighting. Let’s give them the help they need to defend their families, and reinforce their instincts to adopt them in war. They’ll be very helpful combatting the Russian-style corruption against which Ukrainian citizens are fighting in their own country after the war, too. And veterans of the fighting against Russia will be poised to usher in a new age of justice, innovation, cooperation and good governance.

Adrian Bonenberger is a writer and a veteran of the U.S. Army. He is a co-founder of American Veterans for Ukraine.

18. America Needs More Predator Submarines to Stop China

Conclusion:

War is unpredictable, but one thing is certain: To win — or even better, to deter China before the shooting starts — the US needs a robust submarine force and the shipyards to keep it in the fight. I’m an old destroyer admiral, so my heart wants me to think we can handle Beijing’s fleet with our surface ships. But my head tells me that more and better-maintained submarines will be the linchpin of a maritime war with China.

America Needs More Predator Submarines to Stop China

The Pentagon says budget constraints are forcing it to buy only one Virginia class attack boat per year. 

May 28, 2024 at 7:30 AM EDT

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2024-05-28/america-needs-more-attack-submarines-to-stop-china?srnd=opinion-politics-and-policy&sref=hhjZtX76

By James Stavridis

James Stavridis is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist, a retired US Navy admiral, former supreme allied commander of NATO, and dean emeritus of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University.

My first job after graduating from the US Naval Academy in the late 1970s was as the anti-submarine warfare officer on a new Spruance class destroyer. The ship was bristling with equipment to hunt and kill submarines, including an advanced sonar suite to locate the thousands of tons of steel in the hull of a sub.

But here is the truth: A destroyer on the surface is essentially little more than a target for a cutting-edge nuclear-powered attack submarine. Without a great deal of help from carrier-based anti-submarine aircraft or land-based maritime patrol planes like the P-3 Orion, destroyers are going to lose a fight with a sub.

Which is why a powerful and numerous force of the Navy’s new Virginia class attack submarines, the apex predator of the oceans, is crucial for US national security.

China’s Military Budget

Beijing’s defense spending as a percentage of GDP has been rising since 2020

Source: China’s Ministry of Finance via Bloomberg

Note: 2024 is a projection.

So we should be alarmed that the Navy, in order to comply with congressional budget caps, says it will fund the purchase of only one Virginia class submarine in its 2025 budget, as opposed to the usual two per year. The Navy is requesting over $7 billion for subs, but it will buy only one boat, for around $3.7 billion, and lay out the remainder on advanced procurement of parts for a second.

This decision resulted in a very contentious hearing at the House Armed Services committee, in which several representatives took Navy leadership to task. One was Representative Joe Courtney, a Democrat from Connecticut, home to the Virginia class’s contractor, General Dynamics Electric Boat. He warned that the advanced procurement mechanism would create uncertainty for the defense industrial base in terms of supply chains and workforces.

Deciding how many attack subs to build is just part of a larger problem facing the Navy. In a recent article, retired Captain Jerry Hendrix (a good friend) lays out a challenging case for the service’s leaders. He points to the atrophying of the domestic shipyards and drydocks needed to maintain even the Navy’s relatively small force of around 70 nuclear subs. At the height of the Cold War, the US had 140 nuclear boats. (In the US Navy, submariners affectionately refer to their submarines as “boats,” while large surface vessels are always called “ships.”)

According to Hendrix, at least 16 of the current hunter-killer subs, nearly a third of the force, are undergoing extended maintenance or dry docking. This is going to be further strained by the planned AUKUS program, which will provide nuclear attack boats to Australia in a deal with the US and UK.

The already tight chokepoints of both construction and maintenance are going to constrict further just as Chinese production increases. Beijing is building many more ships annually than the US: Its front-line combatants outnumber the US Navy by roughly 350 to 290.

How serious is the threat of war? The chances of an overt conflict at sea in the next three to five years are low — Chinese President Xi Jinping is cautious and knows his force is not fully capable of taking on the US and its regional allies. But over the longer term, we should worry about war at sea with China — likely beginning in the South China Sea and fought along the so-called “first island chain,” running north-south from Japan to the Philippines to Indonesia to the Malay Peninsula. If the Chinese Navy were to breach that line of islands, US forces would be pressured eastward toward Guam or north to bases in Japan. Attack subs, which can hunt enemy subs as well as surface ships, could be decisive.

Territorial Claims Overlap in South China Sea

Sources: Mainland China’s Ministry of Natural Resources (10-dash line); Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (11-dash line); CSIS Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, Philippines)

It took decades to dig the hole in which the Navy finds itself, and it will take time and resources to get out of it. The keys will be finding the money for an absolute minimum of two — and better yet three — nuclear attack boats annually; adding at least three large and two smaller dry docks to the Navy’s infrastructure; and consideration of adding additional shipyard capacity, perhaps by bringing back facilities at Mare Island north of San Francisco or building a new yard altogether.

War is unpredictable, but one thing is certain: To win — or even better, to deter China before the shooting starts — the US needs a robust submarine force and the shipyards to keep it in the fight. I’m an old destroyer admiral, so my heart wants me to think we can handle Beijing’s fleet with our surface ships. But my head tells me that more and better-maintained submarines will be the linchpin of a maritime war with China.

Stavridis is also vice chairman of global affairs at the Carlyle Group. He is on the boards of Fortinet and Ankura Consulting Group, and has advised Shield Capital, a firm that invests in the cybersecurity sector.

More by James Stavridis From Bloomberg Opinion:

• China Has 350 Warships. The US Has 290. That’s a Problem.
• Putin’s Next Target May Be the ‘NATO Lake’
• Ukraine Just Got $61 Billion. Here’s What It Should Buy

Want more Bloomberg Opinion? Terminal readers head to OPIN . Or you can subscribe to our daily newsletter.

19. Rare Earth Mining Taking Heavy Toll in Myanmar’s Kachin, Groups Say

Excerpts:

According to Alice, “There have been no proper regulatory or monitoring processes implemented by a legitimate government and lawmakers since the coup. The miners and the military rulers are escalating their heavy extraction activities and that’s why the situation is now becoming very concerning.”

To operate the plots, the miners, mostly Chinese, make deals with the junta’s military and militia group leaders in Chipwi and Pang War, a town in Chipwi Township.

Environmental experts said land that has been mined for rare earths cannot be utilized for any other activities—including cultivation of any plants—for at least 17 years after mining ceases, due to possible radioactive waste created by the rare earth extraction process.

As Myanmar has no experience implementing systematic regulations concerning radioactive byproducts of rare earth extraction, environmentalists are highly concerned about the impacts of the mining projects.

Rare Earth Mining Taking Heavy Toll in Myanmar’s Kachin, Groups Say

By Hein Htoo Zan  May 27, 2024 in Burma Reading Time: 3 mins read

irrawaddy.com · by Hein Htoo Zan · May 27, 2024

Kachin-based environmentalists are sounding the alarm over the rapid growth of rare earth mining in conflict-affected Kachin State, fueled by high global demand for the elements, with a UK-based campaign group amplifying their concerns in a new report.

In its report released on Thursday, Global Witness revealed an alarming expansion of heavy rare earth mining in Myanmar. It said the world’s dependence on heavy rare earths from Kachin has rapidly increased and is having devastating impacts on communities and the environment.

The UK-based campaign group said Myanmar is now the single largest source of heavy rare earth elements globally. Currently in demand as part of the global energy transition, heavy rare earths are vital ingredients for permanent magnets that are used in electric vehicles and wind turbines.

In Myanmar, most rare earth mining operations are located in Kachin State and the Wa Self-Administrative Region in Shan State.

In Kachin State, the operations are centered on Myanmar military-controlled Chipwi Township in a remote northeastern corner of the state, and in Mai Ja Yang town controlled by the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) in Momauk Township in the state’s southeast.

In Kachin State’s Special Region 1, controlled by militias aligned with the junta’s military, the number of mining sites increased by more than 40 percent between 2021 and 2023, according to Global Witness’s report.

Locations of rare earth mining sites in Kachin State / Global Witness

“Mine workers and local community members have reported and documented numerous health issues—including two deaths attributed to chemicals used in rare earth mining,” the group said.

Two environmentalists based in Kachin State told The Irrawaddy that though there are some rare earth plots in areas close to Mai Ja Yang, the KIA stopped issuing new licenses to operate new plots in and around that area in 2023 thanks to advocacy work by environmental groups.

Many Western consumers could be unknowingly buying or using electric vehicles that contain heavy rare earths extracted from often unregulated mines in Myanmar, with a potentially devastating environmental and social footprint, according to the Global Witness report.

In its recent investigation, Global Witness found that much of Myanmar’s heavy rare earth output is used to manufacture permanent magnets, which are in demand from a range of US, European and Asian electric vehicle and wind turbine brands.

China remains the largest buyer of rare earths from Myanmar—its imports have more than doubled in the past two years. In 2021, China imported 19,500 tons (17,699 tonnes) of heavy rare earth oxides; in 2023 the amount reached 41,700 tonnes, according to the report.

A rare earth mining site is seen in Kachin State in 2022. / Global Witness

“Wind power and electric vehicles have a huge role to play in combatting the climate crisis. But they cannot be allowed to fuel toxic and lawless mining. It seems that communities in Myanmar and their lands are increasingly being sacrificed to fuel the world’s hunger for heavy rare earths,” said Colin Robertson, a senior investigator at Global Witness.

Due to the massive extraction of rare earths in Chipwi without any proper environmental safeguards in place, and the excessive use of water in the mining process, landslides are frequent in the township. At least three landslides occurred in that area alone in 2023, said Kachin-based environmentalist Alice (a pseudonym used for safety reasons).

Global Witness said water sampling data revealed that streams in Kachin Special Region 1 are highly acidic and contain elevated levels of arsenic. “Pollution is threatening to lay waste to a region regarded as a global biodiversity hotspot,” it said.

According to the report, Myanmar’s lucrative trade in heavy rare earths was worth US$1.4 billion in 2023 and “risks financing conflict and destruction in a highly volatile region.” The group added that “Since the military coup in 2021, extraction has continued in the context of a ruthless dictatorship and widening civil conflict.”

Source: General Administration of Customs of the People’s Republic of China

According to Alice, “There have been no proper regulatory or monitoring processes implemented by a legitimate government and lawmakers since the coup. The miners and the military rulers are escalating their heavy extraction activities and that’s why the situation is now becoming very concerning.”

To operate the plots, the miners, mostly Chinese, make deals with the junta’s military and militia group leaders in Chipwi and Pang War, a town in Chipwi Township.

Environmental experts said land that has been mined for rare earths cannot be utilized for any other activities—including cultivation of any plants—for at least 17 years after mining ceases, due to possible radioactive waste created by the rare earth extraction process.

As Myanmar has no experience implementing systematic regulations concerning radioactive byproducts of rare earth extraction, environmentalists are highly concerned about the impacts of the mining projects.

irrawaddy.com · by Hein Htoo Zan · May 27, 2024

20. Staging the Comeback of Mao in Xi Jinping's China

Staging the Comeback of Mao in Xi Jinping's China

A new essay recalls Mao Zedong's "Five-Antis," explaining the CCP's concerted bid to tighten Xi Jinping's control of the country.

Published 2 days ago on May 27, 2024

By Tomo Kuwamura

japan-forward.com · by Tomo Kuwamura · May 27, 2024

China's Ministry of State Security has announced a new campaign against "Five-Antis," including "anti-espionage" and "anti-separatism." That immediately brings to mind the "Three-Anti" (1951) and "Five-Anti" campaigns (1952) that swept China under the dictator Mao Zedong. These sanfan, wufan social reformation movements were launched shortly after the founding of the People's Republic of China to wipe out all thinking that was considered an obstacle to the establishment of socialism.

The current regime headed by Xi Jinping, is faced with vexing domestic and external problems. As it stands, there is a slumping economy and protracted confrontation with the United States. To retain power, it appears determined to restore the strongarmed dictatorship style of the Mao era.

The new "Five-Anti" struggle campaign was launched on April 29 with a front-page essay carried in the Study Times (Xuexi Shibao), an official publication of the Party School of the Chinese Communist Party aimed at the training of Party cadres. Entitled "Unwavering Safeguarding of National Security," it was authored by Chen Yixin, Minister of State Security (MSS).

In his essay, Chen lauds CCP General Secretary Xi's "Socialist Thought with Chinese Characteristics for the New Era." He also calls for a thoroughgoing implementation of the "Five-Antis struggle campaign" to "construct a formidable national security wall."

Delegates leave after the closing ceremony of China's National People's Congress on March 11 in Beijing (ⓒKyodo)

'Impregnable Great Wall'

The new "Five-Antis" are: "anti-regime change," "anti-hegemony," "anti-separatism," "anti-terror" and "anti-espionage."

"Anti-regime change" is explained in terms of building an "Impregnable Great Wall" against the outside world to control anti-China forces. Meanwhile, domestically it calls for eradicating from Chinese soil anything that might impact political security. Chen declares absolutely that China's Internet and schools will be protected from incorrect ideological trends.

In the essay section covering "anti-espionage," Chen vows that the 2023 "revised anti-espionage law" will be thoroughly implemented.

He added, "We must adopt a resolute stance and dig out the "nails" (that become an obstacle to the State)." He also mentioned the need to continue the anti-espionage campaign and promote systems for reporting to the authorities.

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Exiled Hong Kong activist Henry Tong protests Hong Kong's Article 23 national security law from Taipei. March 23, 2024. (ⓒReuters/Ann Wang)

Mao's Purge of Counterrevolutionaries

The new "Five-Antis" campaign is an obvious nod to the "Three-Anti" and "Five-Anti" campaigns of the early 1950s.

After the founding of the PRC, Kuomintang remnants and various other forces of resistance remained opposed to the new CCP regime. Bureaucratic fraud and corruption among capitalist elements were also rampant. To deal with these problems, the CCP launched the "Three-Anti" campaign to wipe out corruption, waste, and bureaucratism. And in the "Five-Anti" campaign, it targeted "bribery, tax evasion, theft of State property, cheating on government contracts and divulging State economic intelligence."

As a result of these reform movements, the ideology of the old society was wiped out and domestic control was strengthened. Meanwhile, capitalists were clearly subordinated to the Party and the State. Thus, the foundations for socialism were consolidated.

However, during these campaigns, many people were arrested, tortured, and even executed. Among them were "counterrevolutionaries" who had expressed dissatisfaction with the Party. There is no denying that excesses during these campaigns caused social chaos and invited economic stagnation. It is also widely believed that they generated severe tensions in Chinese society.

Chen Yixin, State Minister for Public Security, China. (© Radio Free Asia: Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)

Expanded Authority for the MSS

Xi Jinping began his third term as undisputed leader of the CCP in 2022. Ever since, the regime has stepped up discipline inspections within the Party. Likewise, it has clamped down on domestic opposition and turned the screws on foreigners and companies by making use of anti-espionage legislation and other laws.

Individuals viewed as possible threats to the State have been tightly monitored and managed in the name of "national security." In his essay, Chen signaled his intent to indefatigably continue pursuing this line.

Dr Xiaogang Lai is an adjunct assistant professor at Queen's University in Canada. He discussed the topic with the US government-operated Voice of America. He pointed out that the announcement of the "new Five-Antis" presaged a "return to the era of Mao Zedong."

Since the start of Xi's tenure, the Chinese economy has stagnated. At the same time, Western countries have begun "decoupling" from the Chinese economy. Moreover, other problems have arisen to plague China. According to Dr Lai, Xi might have no option but to return to the dictatorial system of the Mao era. As is well known, when in power Mao launched any number of political movements designed to consolidate his authority.

Lai also points out that in days past the CCP considered secret police organizations such as the Cheka in the Soviet Union, the forerunner of the KGB, to be a crucial tool for maintaining a dictatorial system.

The MSS has been expanding its authority, especially since the start of Xi's third term. Now, among other things, it is calling for average Chinese citizens to become involved in anti-espionage activities.

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This only further increases concern of a "return" to the Mao era, when informing and purges were prevalent in China.

RELATED:

• EDITORIAL | China People's Congress Seals Xi Jinping's Dictatorship
• Vague and Draconian, Hong Kong Gets New National Security Law
• Is the CCP Deliberately Undermining China's Economy?
• 
  

japan-forward.com · by Tomo Kuwamura · May 27, 2024

21. American Globalism Versus ‘America First’

A response to Hal Brands' recent Foreign Affairs essay.

Excerpts:

The “American Globalism” supported by Brands fails to account for the limits of American power. Policymakers should continue to read Mackinder, Spykman and Burnham, but should also read Kennan and Lippmann who counseled prioritizing threats in the context of limited resources. Yet Brands still wants America to engage in democracy and human rights promotion and protect “intangible norms such as non-aggression.” He worries that a second Trump administration would “deglobalize” our defense, perhaps by withdrawing our nuclear umbrella from Europe and parts of Asia. He fears that Trump would no longer use American power to defend “distant states.” He expresses concern that Trump would not view our current alliances as “sacred.” He suggests that Trump would settle for a Western Hemispheric defense. He sides with the critics of “America First” who claim that a more restrained foreign policy “would be devastating to global stability.”

...

The American foreign policy tradition has much deeper roots that the post-Second World War order. It reaches back to George Washington and the wise counsel of his Farewell Address that warned against permanent alliances with, and passionate attachments to, other nations, while allowing for temporary alliances that serve our nation’s interests. Time and circumstances have not rendered the wisdom of Washington’s words obsolete.

American Globalism Versus ‘America First’

By Francis P. Sempa

May 29, 2024

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2024/05/29/american_globalism_versus_america_first_1034518.htm

Hal Brands, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, has laid out in an essay in Foreign Affairs the key differences between what he rightly calls “American Globalism” and what has been called the “America First” approach to global affairs. Brands clearly is in the “American Globalist” camp, but unlike other supporters of the “liberal international order,” he does not label “America First” as isolationist. Instead, he lauds the global benefits to the post-1945 world order and worries that they will eventually disappear if Donald Trump regains the presidency. Brands doesn’t want the United States to be a “normal” country that only looks after its own national interests. What he fails to appreciate, however, is that the post-1945 world order he supports is already gone.

The geopolitics of 1945-1991 disappeared with the collapse of the Soviet Union. The war in Ukraine, despite the claims of many globalists, has not recreated the Soviet threat to Europe. If Ukraine, or parts of Ukraine, remain under Russian control, U.S. national security will not be endangered. Nor will Europe’s. NATO has doubled in size since 1991. Russia in relative power is considerably weaker than the Soviet Union was throughout the Cold War, and its ruling class no longer has a revolutionary ideology that legitimizes its continued rule and motivates international aggression. Of course, Russian imperialism has not disappeared from Russia’s foreign policy DNA, but the Russian empire of the Czars was never considered to be an existential threat to the United States (although the Monroe Doctrine included Russia in its restrictive warning), even when it occupied Alaska and parts of California in the 19^th century. And today’s Russia is having difficulty holding on to the eastern provinces of Ukraine, and has once again sent out feelers for a ceasefire to end the war.

The architects of American foreign policy after the Second World War formed alliances and built-up U.S. military power to protect our national interests which were threatened by Stalin’s Soviet Union. They understood that American security depended on the geopolitical pluralism of Eurasia. Our policymakers at the time had read their Mackinder, Spykman, and Burnham. Brands has read them, too, and has written insightfully about their geopolitical wisdom. The geopolitical pluralism of Eurasia continues to be important to U.S. security, but the primary threat has shifted from Europe to the Indo-Pacific--from Russia to China. Those who Brands labels as “America Firsters,” including Donald Trump, have recognized this. Indeed, it was in the Trump administration that the real “pivot” to Asia began to occur, led by key national security officials like Elbridge Colby, Matthew Pottinger, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien. This shift was described in Josh Rogin’s magnificent book Chaos Under Heaven. 

American Cold War foreign policy was not based on a selfless commitment to globalism. What Brands calls “American Globalism” was undertaken to protect U.S. national interests. Brands quotes Dean Acheson in 1952 to the effect that the post-World War II situation required the United States to broaden its view of our national interests. And so, it did. But the post-World War II world is gone. The Soviet threat that inspired our commitment to American Globalism is gone. It has been replaced by the Chinese threat which requires a shift in our commitments given the limits of American power.

The “American Globalism” supported by Brands fails to account for the limits of American power. Policymakers should continue to read Mackinder, Spykman and Burnham, but should also read Kennan and Lippmann who counseled prioritizing threats in the context of limited resources. Yet Brands still wants America to engage in democracy and human rights promotion and protect “intangible norms such as non-aggression.” He worries that a second Trump administration would “deglobalize” our defense, perhaps by withdrawing our nuclear umbrella from Europe and parts of Asia. He fears that Trump would no longer use American power to defend “distant states.” He expresses concern that Trump would not view our current alliances as “sacred.” He suggests that Trump would settle for a Western Hemispheric defense. He sides with the critics of “America First” who claim that a more restrained foreign policy “would be devastating to global stability.”

The “American Globalism” touted by Brands has not been an unvarnished success. It has made the nations of an entire continent content with resting their security on the United States and imposed an unnecessary burden on American taxpayers to provide for Europe’s common defense. It has led to an inconclusive war on the Korean peninsula that cost the lives of nearly 40,000 U.S. military personnel, a humiliating military defeat in Vietnam that cost the lives of nearly 60,000 U.S. military personnel, and more recent “endless wars” in Iraq and Afghanistan that resulted the deaths of more than 7,000 U.S. military personnel for no appreciable gain. It has led to the establishment of a national security state and what President Eisenhower called the “military-industrial complex” that impinges on the liberties of American citizens and profits from wars.

The American foreign policy tradition has much deeper roots that the post-Second World War order. It reaches back to George Washington and the wise counsel of his Farewell Address that warned against permanent alliances with, and passionate attachments to, other nations, while allowing for temporary alliances that serve our nation’s interests. Time and circumstances have not rendered the wisdom of Washington’s words obsolete.

Francis P. Sempa is the author of “Geopolitics: From the Cold War to the 21st Century” and “America’s Global Role.” Francis is also writes the montly Best Defense column for RealClearDefense. Read his latest: Ukraine and the Pity of War.

22. Opinion - America’s Military Is Not Prepared for War — or Peace

Excerpts:

That theoretical future could come faster than most Americans think. We may find ourselves in a state of extreme vulnerability in a matter of a few years, according to a growing consensus of experts. Our military readiness could be at its lowest point in decades just as China’s military in particular hits its stride. The U.S. Indo-Pacific commander released what I believe to be the largest list of unfunded items ever for services and combatant commands for next year’s budget, amounting to $11 billion. It requested funding for a raft of infrastructure, missile defense and targeting programs that would prove vital in a Pacific fight. China, on the other hand, has no such problems, as it accumulates the world’s leading hypersonic arsenal with a mix of other lethal cruise and attack missiles.

Our military leaders are being forced to make impossible choices. The Navy is struggling to adequately fund new ships, routine maintenance and munition procurement; it is unable to effectively address all three. We recently signed a deal to sell submarines to Australia, but we’ve failed to sufficiently fund our own submarine industrial base, leaving an aging fleet unprepared to respond to threats. Two of the three most important nuclear modernization programs are underfunded and are at risk of delays. The military faces a backlog of at least $180 billion for basic maintenance, from barracks to training ranges. This projects weakness to our adversaries as we send service members abroad with diminished ability to respond to crises.

...

Our ability to deter our adversaries can be regained because we have done it before. At the 50th anniversary of Pearl Harbor, in the twilight of the Soviet Union, George H.W. Bush reflected on the lessons of Pearl Harbor. Though the conflict was long gone, it taught him an enduring lesson: “When it comes to national defense,” he said, “finishing second means finishing last.”

Regaining American strength will be expensive. But fighting a war — and worse, losing one — is far more costly. We need to begin a national conversation today on how we achieve a peaceful, prosperous and American-led 21st century. The first step is a generational investment in the U.S. military.

Opinion - America’s Military Is Not Prepared for War — or Peace - The New York Times

nytimes.com · by Roger Wicker · May 29, 2024

Guest Essay

America’s Military Is Not Prepared for War — or Peace

May 29, 2024, 5:05 a.m. ET

Credit…Yara Nardi/Reuters

By Roger Wicker

Mr. Wicker, a Republican, is the ranking member of the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee.

“To be prepared for war,” George Washington said, “is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.” President Ronald Reagan agreed with his forebear’s words, and peace through strength became a theme of his administration. In the past four decades, the American arsenal helped secure that peace, but political neglect has led to its atrophy as other nations’ war machines have kicked into high gear. Most Americans do not realize the specter of great power conflict has risen again.

It is far past time to rebuild America’s military. We can avoid war by preparing for it.

When America’s senior military leaders testify before my colleagues and me on the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee behind closed doors, they have said that we face some of the most dangerous global threat environments since World War II. Then, they darken that already unsettling picture by explaining that our armed forces are at risk of being underequipped and outgunned. We struggle to build and maintain ships, our fighter jet fleet is dangerously small, and our military infrastructure is outdated. Meanwhile, America’s adversaries are growing their militaries and getting more aggressive.

In China, the country’s leader, Xi Jinping, has orchestrated a historic military modernization intended to exploit the U.S. military’s weaknesses. He has overtaken the U.S. Navy in fleet size, built one of the world’s largest missile stockpile s and made big advances in space. President Vladimir Putin of Russia has thrown Europe into war and mobilized his society for long-term conflict. Iran and its proxy groups have escalated their shadow war against Israel and increased attacks on U.S. ships and soldiers. And North Korea has disregarded efforts toward arms control negotiations and moved toward wartime readiness.

Worse yet, these governments are materially helping one another, cooperating in new ways to prevent an American-led 21st century. Iran has provided Russia with battlefield drones, and China is sending technical and logistical help to aid Mr. Putin’s war. They are also helping one another prepare for future fights by increasing weapons transfers and to evade sanctions. Their unprecedented coordination makes new global conflict increasingly possible.

That theoretical future could come faster than most Americans think. We may find ourselves in a state of extreme vulnerability in a matter of a few years, according to a growing consensus of experts. Our military readiness could be at its lowest point in decades just as China’s military in particular hits its stride. The U.S. Indo-Pacific commander released what I believe to be the largest list of unfunded items ever for services and combatant commands for next year’s budget, amounting to $11 billion. It requested funding for a raft of infrastructure, missile defense and targeting programs that would prove vital in a Pacific fight. China, on the other hand, has no such problems, as it accumulates the world’s leading hypersonic arsenal with a mix of other lethal cruise and attack missiles.

Our military leaders are being forced to make impossible choices. The Navy is struggling to adequately fund new ships, routine maintenance and munition procurement; it is unable to effectively address all three. We recently signed a deal to sell submarines to Australia, but we’ve failed to sufficiently fund our own submarine industrial base, leaving an aging fleet unprepared to respond to threats. Two of the three most important nuclear modernization programs are underfunded and are at risk of delays. The military faces a backlog of at least $180 billion for basic maintenance, from barracks to training ranges. This projects weakness to our adversaries as we send service members abroad with diminished ability to respond to crises.

Fortunately, we can change course. We can avoid that extreme vulnerability and resurrect American military might.

On Wednesday I am publishing a plan that includes a series of detailed proposals to address this reality head-on. We have been living off the Reagan military buildup for too long; it is time for updates and upgrades. My plan outlines why and how the United States should aim to spend an additional $55 billion on the military in the 2025 fiscal year and grow military spending from a projected 2.9 percent of our national gross domestic product this year to 5 percent over the next five to seven years.

It would be a significant investment that would start a reckoning over our nation’s spending priorities. There will be conversations ahead about all manner of budget questions. We do not need to spend this much indefinitely — but we do need a short-term generational investment to help us prevent another world war.

My blueprint would grow the Navy to 357 ships by 2035 and halt our shrinking Air Force fleet by producing at least 340 additional fighters in five years. This will help patch near-term holes and put each fleet on a sustainable trajectory. The plan would also replenish the Air Force tanker and training fleets, accelerate the modernization of the Army and Marine Corps, and invest in joint capabilities that are all too often forgotten, including logistics and munitions.

The proposal would build on the $3.3 billion in submarine industrial base funding included in the national security supplemental passed in April, so we can bolster our defense and that of our allies. It would also rapidly equip service members all over the world with innovative technologies at scale, from the seabed to the stars.

We should pair increased investment with wiser spending. Combining this crucial investment with fiscal responsibility would funnel resources to the most strategic ends. Emerging technology must play an essential role, and we can build and deploy much of it in less than five years. My road map would also help make improvements to the military procurement system and increase accountability for bureaucrats and companies that fail to perform on vital national security projects.

This whole endeavor would shake our status quo but be far less disruptive and expensive than the alternative. Should China decide to wage war with the United States, the global economy could immediately fall into a depression. Americans have grown far too comfortable under the decades-old presumption of overwhelming military superiority. And that false sense of security has led us to ignore necessary maintenance and made us vulnerable.

Our ability to deter our adversaries can be regained because we have done it before. At the 50th anniversary of Pearl Harbor, in the twilight of the Soviet Union, George H.W. Bush reflected on the lessons of Pearl Harbor. Though the conflict was long gone, it taught him an enduring lesson: “When it comes to national defense,” he said, “finishing second means finishing last.”

Regaining American strength will be expensive. But fighting a war — and worse, losing one — is far more costly. We need to begin a national conversation today on how we achieve a peaceful, prosperous and American-led 21st century. The first step is a generational investment in the U.S. military.

Roger Wicker is the senior U.S. senator from Mississippi and the ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.

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nytimes.com · by Roger Wicker · May 29, 2024

23. Escaping the Zero-Sum Trap in Strategic Competition with China

"Train for certainty, educate for uncertainty." – General Peter Schoomaker former CINCSOC and CSA

Excerpts;

Education of today’s and tomorrow’s leaders is key. Professional military education needs to be adjusted to improve understanding as to how security and economic well-being are meshed together in the current environment. Military professionals need to be schooled on how deterring and campaigning in the security realm may have real and significant impacts in the economic realm, and how costs, risks, and benefits should be weighed. They should become better educated on the workings of the interagency enterprise and how actors with different authorities and responsibilities should act in concert to form coherent grand strategic efforts. Tomorrow’s leaders can be impacted through the normal cycle of professional military education; today’s leaders could benefit from tailored executive short courses.

Processes should be altered to improve the ideation and collaboration among planners and strategists at all levels. As globally distributed planners and strategists (across the geographic combatant command staffs, for example) interact with themselves, with each other, and with higher authorities at home, the language and concepts they employ should be guided toward the appropriate frames and assumptions of a mixed-motives mindset. This should be designed within existing reporting and coordination efforts in and across organizations to generate efficiency, bolster efficacy, and create a shared mindset across the global enterprise.

Changing mindsets at this scale is a tall order, but it is critical to secure our nation’s interests in this challenging time. A collective cognitive reframing to accommodate indefinite coexistence with a competitor while engaging in conflict and cooperation across multiple dimensions is the key to doing so.

Escaping the Zero-Sum Trap in Strategic Competition with China - Modern War Institute

mwi.westpoint.edu · by Leo Blanken, Jason Lepore, Christopher Boss · May 29, 2024

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Should we confine ourselves to the zero-sum context, where the answers are comparatively easy, evading the more interesting contexts where the answers may be harder?

Consider gangs coexisting within a prison. These rival organizations will fight over some issues but are driven to collaborate on others. Peace is maintained and mutually beneficial business (drug dealing, for example) is conducted—both inside and outside the prison—within a delicately balanced equilibrium. One side eradicating the other is highly improbable and unnecessary violence to that end serves to only degrade outcomes for both sides. Instead, threats, violence, alliances, deconfliction, and even cooperation are all used deftly for the purpose of maintaining balance and accruing gains to each side. At the end of the day, these gangs are stuck with each other and need to learn how to coexist.

Though some may balk at the analogy, strategic competition between the United States and China shares many attributes with these prison gangs. And given the substantial intellectual shift required in the US national security enterprise to best manage the dynamics—and risks—of that competition, the jarring tone of this comparison may, in fact, be useful here.

The United States is still struggling cognitively to come to terms with the rise of China. More specifically, the US national security community is not well prepared to contend with a peer rival who seeks to contest American hegemony, but with whom our economy is critically interdependent. What is required, therefore, is significant cognitive reorientation for competition: from our foundational models of how we understand the functioning of the international system, to policy analysis, to the formation of strategy, to that strategy’s execution. In other words, there must be a shift in mindset—the structure of shared assumptions, causal reasoning, language, and framing that allows a group of actors to fruitfully proceed with collective problem-solving, planning, and execution. The rise of China is creating an implicit zero-sum mindset among planners and practitioners; we see this as ill-fitting and, frankly, dangerous. We offer an alternative—a mixed-motives mindset—that would serve as an appropriate framing for strategic competition with China.

The Need for an Appropriate Shared Mindset

This is a critical time for the national security apparatus to adopt an appropriate mindset for competing, as the interactions between the United States and China are meshing together multiple realms of policy and strategy—namely security and economics—that have been treated separately in recent decades. This spans both the challenges of deterrence and steady-state campaigning, as efforts in both of these tasks will need to be sensitive to the growing interrelationship among these realms. Given that these topic areas span a wide purview of responsibilities, authorities, and expertise across the interagency enterprise, it is critical to establish a cognitive baseline—an appropriate shared mindset—for framing the challenge to ease collaboration.

Mindset is an expansive term, encompassing the collective beliefs and habitual choices of an institution. For a large bureaucracy, such as the Department of Defense, this can range from goals and prioritizations to causal models, norms, as well as the default habits of day-to-day action. On the one hand, actors in such organizations engage in critical thinking and active problem-solving in their work. On the other hand, however, actors often tend to fall back on habitual routine to operate day-to-day. As international relations scholar Ted Hopf argues, “Habits both evoke and suppress actions. They imply actions by giving us ready-made responses to the world that we execute without thinking.” Applied across organizations, mindset encompasses all of this shared understanding and regularized behaviors. In fact, complex bureaucracies could not function without a shared mindset becoming concretized across its membership through standard operating procedures. The key, then, is implementing and sustaining a shared mindset best suited for the challenges that the organization faces in its environment. Getting the mindset right, therefore, is critical.

The Zero-Sum Mindset’s Origins

Put simply, a zero-sum game is a situation in which the winner’s winnings exactly equal the loser’s losses. An immediate implication of this is that the only way for one player to be better off is to make the other player worse off. In such a game, the strategic consideration of a player can be reduced to taking the actions that are most hurtful to the other player. The division of a fixed pie fits this model, as any morsel of pie that one side acquires comes at the cost of the adversary’s share. This is the purest expression of relative gains, in which one actor values her gains in relation to the results for the other actor. In such scenarios, therefore, simply imposing costs becomes a reliable strategic concept for selecting strategies as one’s interests are diametrically opposed to the rival’s.

Abstract models only have utility to the degree that they provide useful insight into aspects of the real world: all models are wrong, some are just more useful than others. Zero-sum, two-actor games are the easiest class of games to analyze and given that game theory was essentially birthed and nurtured at the beginning of the Cold War, it is not surprising that these games were given more credence than they deserve. They rely on extraordinarily restrictive assumptions of pure conflict, in which actors have literally no shared interests. Given the stark ideological divide, lack of economic interdependence, and looming threat of catastrophic global war between the United States and the Soviet Union, these games were deemed useful tools for framing that particular contest.

These wildly stylized models of the zero-sum variety, unfortunately, share almost no relationship to the social world. Many writers have already explored crude zero-sum thinking bleeding into social relations, domestic politics, as well as the international system with deleterious effects. Intellectual giants of the early Cold War, such as Thomas Schelling and Anatol Rapoport, had significant reservations about the impact of zero-sum game theoretic models leading to unhelpful mindsets within the context of US-Soviet competition, as even the strategy of deterrence hinged on the shared interest of the mutual non-use of nuclear weapons. Steady-state competition under the shadow of mutual assured destruction, therefore, became a bargaining problem: “Strategy thus reflected the judgement that ideas of . . . victory could be anathema even in limited conflicts during the nuclear age, and that all parties thus had a common interest in stabilising crises and conflicts before mutual disaster struck. This encouraged notions that the superpowers were engaged in processes of bargaining rather than battlefield contests for supremacy.”

In the wake of the Cold War, the zero-sum mindset was given a brief reprieve with America’s push for a globalized liberal hegemony, but this hiatus only lasted for a decade. With the falling of the Twin Towers in September 2001, the Global War on Terrorism introduced an even more simplistic and unhelpful version of zero-sum thinking within national security circles. Not only were the enemies of in this conflict characterized by ideologies that were incompatible with those of the United States; they were also deemed illegitimate entities due to their nonstate status. This illegitimacy precluded coercive bargaining as a strategy and eradication, therefore, was deemed the only solution: “[given] the perceived illegitimacy of terrorist groups . . . [such operations] do not fall within the Westphalian tradition of international relations among legitimized entities, but rather smack of ‘pest control’ within the liberal world order. . . . The diplomacy required for beginning and ending a state of war was moot.” The Global War on Terrorism, therefore, solidified an even stronger form of zero-sum thinking that not only assumed no overlapping interests with adversaries but also assumed away bargaining as a tool.

Among the negative implications of an entrenched zero-sum mindset, three stand out. First, in a zero-sum world, conflict is an incessant feature of the environment. Though active fighting may not always be observed, the goals of actors are diametrically opposed, and coexistence occurs under a constant cloud. This is the purest expression of Thomas Hobbes’s characterization of a system in which it can be always raining (war) or cloudy (preparing for war), but never truly sunny. We can unfortunately begin to see this assumed conflict mindset within American national security institutions, in which conflict with China is not simply being prepared for but is being treated as a near inevitability.

Second, in a zero-sum world there is the problem of static, cost-imposition strategies. This refers to the conditions under which a single strategic choice, used over and over, is the best response to every situation. Falling into the zero-sum mindset, therefore, limits flexible and creative strategic thinking; it conditions actors to frame all challenges in the same manner and induces a uniform strategic response. As we see the United States waking up to the challenge of a rising China, this type of thinking has unfortunately taken hold and runs the risk of being seen as a default (dominant) strategy. When terms like “impose costs” or “throw sand in the gears” of the opponent’s foreign policy are treated as cognitive shortcuts for planners, we see a zero-sum mindset taking hold. To be clear, these concepts may play a limited role within a nuanced strategy but cannot be treated as across-the-board justification for any proposed activity.

Third, the construct of zero-sum contest implies an outcome of winning or losing. Coexisting with an enemy with whom you have no overlapping interests, and with whom you are induced into an incessant conflict of cost imposition, makes the removal of that enemy an attractive goal. The zero-sum mindset, as applied to strategic competition with China, suggests an ontological framing in which the goal for the United States would be the removal of the adversary. Holding such a mindset would, therefore, generate such strategic goals as significantly degrading China’s economy, seeking the precipitous removal of the Chinese Communist Party, or fully decoupling the two countries’ economies. Precipitating such a jarring outcome with the second most significant economic actor in the world, who is also the United States’ largest trading partner, would be disastrous.

These three aspects of zero-sum are dangerous and our impression of the current cognitive landscape of US national security finds that they may be taking hold. Military strategists, planners and warfighters, who are frustrated with China’s rise and who are imbued with a bias toward action, often fail to appreciate the large overlapping interests and inescapable interdependencies that bind the two nations. This is coupled with a tendency by many national security hawks to decry any discussion of cooperation with China as naivete or acquiescence to America’s relative decline. There is, however, a way forward. A mixed-motives mindset would provide a foundation that allows US national security professionals to frame the strategic competition space more appropriately; it would enable the development of hard-nosed and self-interested—yet nuanced and dynamic—strategies in the nation’s best interest.

The Benefits of Shifting to a Dynamic Mixed-Motives Mindset

In dynamic mixed-motives games, actors share some interests and clash over others, as their interests are neither perfectly aligned nor perfectly misaligned (as in the zero-sum case). Since interaction happens over time this is a setting in which actors can improve their well-being by using dynamic strategies: the optimal strategic response can change over time.

To maintain an equilibrium better for the United States than static zero-sum strategies can produce, dynamic strategies are important. This dynamism, defined as applying multiple types of strategic actions over time to maintain stability, is needed when exogenous shocks, mistakes, or transgressions by the other actor threaten to disrupt the equilibrium. More concretely, these strategies require that actors should signal intentions when beneficial, reward the other actor for productive behavior and punish the other actor for transgressive behavior. Strategies using positive reinforcements (carrots) and short-term, discrete punishments (sticks) can shape behavior in ways that promote productive coexistence. Fundamental to such strategies is communication between actors in terms of nonverbal yet comprehendible “costly signaling” as well as overt communication via “cheap talk.” In contrast, if an actor employs the zero-sum strategy focused on imposing costs, the other actor’s behavior cannot be shaped over time. This balanced set of strategies is, unlike the uniform punishing of a zero-sum mindset, stabilizing rather than escalatory as it allows for coherently dialing the level of conflict up or down.

In a mixed-motive mindset, the only focal goal is to maximize one’s absolute welfare within the realm of the subset of strategies that maintain security. This is because the perfect negative correlation of interests with the other actor does not hold, as it would within a zero-sum game. Therefore, focusing on relative gains will neglect opportunities for making oneself better off. Recognizing that the true aim of policy and strategy is to ensure your own nation’s long-term expected benefit (not to impose cost for its own sake) is a fundamental mindset shift.

This wider, more nuanced, aperture is much more appropriate for the current era of strategic competition with China. Consider private-sector firms colluding to fix prices. In this case, antagonistic actors coexist in a market while attempting to maximize profits in the face of rival firms and regulatory agencies. Though they cannot overtly negotiate and bind themselves to inflate prices, they can tacitly find and maintain such an outcome. They can do so by identifying places where gains are accrued while competition is maintained. In an anarchic international system that is decreasingly being seen as having a robust rules-based order, such a mindset for interdependent great powers is appropriate. Finally, such outcomes are focused on stability, as opposed to escalation and disruption. Given these features, instantiating such a mindset across the national security enterprise would provide a more mature basis upon which to build specific deterrence and competition strategies.

What if the opponent is operating in a zero-sum mindset? If the rival nation is using zero-sum strategies, then it is a best response to do the same in the short term. But this does not preclude a switch in strategic thinking and hence equilibrium. This is akin to a price war between two rival firms. The price war is destructive for both firms as it lowers profits without any substantive positive benefits (much like a tariff-based trade war between nations). Firms can get out of price wars as long as they are sufficiently forward thinking and open to cheap talk communication (often tacit) to map the pathway to equilibria that could be sustained by dynamic strategies. This is because collusive firms would be made better off (higher profits) by jointly increasing prices. This move away from the myopic zero-sum price war mentality does not mean that the firms stop competing in other ways. Firms will still put substantial effort into protecting their intellectual property and put money into research and development for innovation to gain more customers and profits. Thus, they compete in certain areas that are important for their long-term security while avoiding damaging competition.

A dynamic mixed-motives mindset for national security professionals would include several components:

• Competitive coexistence: This component recognizes that the United States and China have significant overlapping and shifting interests across dimensions of interaction.
• Time horizon: The time horizon is indefinite. Language and concepts that revolve around “defeating” China in strategic competition are a poor fit.
• Stability: Strategic disruption is most likely a dangerous and escalatory pathway. Strategies to identify and maintain favorable equilibria should be prioritized.
• Dynamic strategies: Thoughtful agility is key. If cost imposition is used, it should be done sparingly and turned off when the effect is achieved. One should be comfortable with fluid switching between cooperative and competitive behaviors.
• Thinking positive (not negative): Success should be measured in securing gains for the United States. Cost imposition on the competitor should be a strategic tool, not a default setting.

How to Change a Collective Mindset

In the epigraph that opens this article, Schelling warns us about the dangers of zero-sum thinking; it is both comforting and (perhaps to the warfighter spirit) appealing in its Manichean simplicity. He challenges us, however, to do better as competitive coexistence among great powers is a complex and fraught state of affairs. If our arguments above about the dangers of an existing zero-sum mindset and attractiveness of moving to a dynamic mixed-motive mindset are compelling, what can be done? Mindsets, by definition, are sticky, amorphous, and notoriously difficult to shift. The American national security mindset may evolve by itself eventually, but catastrophe may occur in the intervening period. Therefore, we offer three actionable ways forward.

New foundational models of political competition coupled with economic interdependence need to be created. The absence of economic interdependence between the Soviet Union and the United States allowed the study of economics and security to drift apart; they now need to be knitted together. This requires a tailored demand signal and appropriate resourcing to mobilize the academy to make up for the decades of neglect in modeling the political economy of strategic competition under the condition of interdependence.

Education of today’s and tomorrow’s leaders is key. Professional military education needs to be adjusted to improve understanding as to how security and economic well-being are meshed together in the current environment. Military professionals need to be schooled on how deterring and campaigning in the security realm may have real and significant impacts in the economic realm, and how costs, risks, and benefits should be weighed. They should become better educated on the workings of the interagency enterprise and how actors with different authorities and responsibilities should act in concert to form coherent grand strategic efforts. Tomorrow’s leaders can be impacted through the normal cycle of professional military education; today’s leaders could benefit from tailored executive short courses.

Processes should be altered to improve the ideation and collaboration among planners and strategists at all levels. As globally distributed planners and strategists (across the geographic combatant command staffs, for example) interact with themselves, with each other, and with higher authorities at home, the language and concepts they employ should be guided toward the appropriate frames and assumptions of a mixed-motives mindset. This should be designed within existing reporting and coordination efforts in and across organizations to generate efficiency, bolster efficacy, and create a shared mindset across the global enterprise.

Changing mindsets at this scale is a tall order, but it is critical to secure our nation’s interests in this challenging time. A collective cognitive reframing to accommodate indefinite coexistence with a competitor while engaging in conflict and cooperation across multiple dimensions is the key to doing so.

Leo Blanken is an associate professor in the Defense Analysis Department at the Naval Postgraduate School. He is the author of Rational Empires: Institutional Incentives and Imperial Expansion and coeditor of Assessing War: The Challenge of Measuring Success and Failure. He also collects and DJs rare soul and funk records from the 1960s.

Jason Lepore is professor and chair of the Economics Department of the Orfalea College of Business at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. His research has been published in the Journal of Economic Theory, the Journal of Mathematical Economics, and the International Journal of Industrial Organization. He is coeditor of Assessing War: The Challenge of Measuring Success and Failure.

Major Christopher Bossisa 1st Special Forces Group (Airborne) officer. Previously, he taught at Western Michigan University and the United States Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School. Major Boss has had several conventional and special operations deployments to Africa, most recently as a Special Forces detachment commander. He holds two master’s degrees, one in philosophy and the other in applied design for innovation.

The views expressed are those of the authors and do not reflect the official position of the United States Military Academy, Department of the Army, or Department of Defense.

Image credit: Sgt. Mikki L. Sprenkle, US Army

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mwi.westpoint.edu · by Leo Blanken, Jason Lepore, Christopher Boss · May 29, 2024

24. How Ukraine Can Do More With Less

Excerpts:

Russia is sure to attempt further incursions, and Ukraine will need to prepare its defense. In a war of exhaustion, Ukraine would need to be willing to temporarily cede some territory in order to preserve its forces and buy time. But as Russian troops advance, Ukrainian forces should focus on inflicting casualties and destroying equipment. They can achieve these aims using portable weapons distributed among the small infiltration and guerrilla teams: Ukrainian troops already have expertise with drones, and they can continue to use them to identify targets and provide real-time intelligence; the shoulder-launched Javelins and other easily carried weapons can target larger Russian military equipment and installations; and larger artillery can be used in a more limited way to support the operations of the small groups. As Ukraine transitions to unconventional warfare, the U.S. Army Special Forces would be the ideal advisers to give Ukrainian troops a competitive edge. These U.S. forces specialize in providing instruction that integrates new technology, and they could train Ukrainian soldiers in guerrilla tactics and infiltration operations.

To adopt this strategy, Ukraine would have to embrace a different concept of victory—one based on staying in the fight and resisting Russian aggression, instead of routing all Russian forces from Ukrainian territory. Once Russia’s equipment and political appetite for war wear down, Ukraine can resume a direct confrontation designed to drive out Russian forces. For Ukrainians, who remain committed to liberating every inch of occupied land, this will be a bitter pill. But their current objectives are simply unattainable while Putin remains in power. Kyiv, then, has no choice but to shift.

Ukraine’s partners, in turn, have an obligation to keep helping the country; this change in strategy does not let them off the hook. In addition to training, the United States and other countries would need to continue providing arms to Ukraine, although the tactical shift should mean that Ukrainian troops go through weapons more slowly. Ukraine’s international partners must also help wear down Russia by enforcing economic sanctions and communicating clearly that these measures would be lifted if Russia were to retreat. Most important, Kyiv must have support after the eventual end of the fighting. Waging a war of exhaustion will decimate Ukraine, and its people need to know that they will not be left on their own to rebuild. Ukraine’s partners owe the country that assurance for its sacrifice.

How Ukraine Can Do More With Less

A Military Strategy to Outlast Russia

By Keith L. Carter, Jennifer Spindel, and Matthew McClary

May 29, 2024

Foreign Affairs · by Keith L. Carter, Jennifer Spindel, and Matthew McClary · May 29, 2024

As the war in Ukraine enters its third spring, leaders from Brazil, China, the Vatican, and elsewhere have urged Ukraine to negotiate with Russia. Ukrainian forces are unlikely to break through fortified Russian lines, the argument goes, and Kyiv should recognize the reality of Russia’s territorial annexation. Ukraine has successfully used drones to both surveil and attack Russian targets, but drones alone cannot win the war. And so, hampered by weapon and personnel shortages, Ukraine will not be able to reclaim territory. Russia has successfully turned this fight into an attritional struggle in which Moscow holds several advantages: a larger population, greater defense industrial capacity, and well-prepared defenses in the Donbas, Kherson, and especially Crimea. Given the fatigue among its Western supporters and the inconsistency of their material support, this is a type of war Ukraine simply cannot win.

It is true that going toe-to-toe, shell-for-shell with Russia is no longer a viable strategy for Ukraine. But Kyiv does not need to give up; instead, it needs a new approach. A better strategy would economize on the use of Ukrainian forces and conserve the limited material they receive from the United States and European partners. Ukraine must adjust the way it organizes, equips, and thinks about the war, switching out head-on confrontation with Russian forces for an asymmetric, guerrilla-style approach. Doing so will no doubt prolong the fighting, but a pivot to unconventional warfare offers the best chance for Ukraine to chip away at Russian resolve, both on the frontlines and at home.

A DOOMED OFFENSIVE

Until the summer of 2023, it looked as though the Ukrainian military, heroically punching above its weight, could defeat the Russian army. Russia’s invasion in February 2022 quickly revealed the vulnerability of its tanks and other vehicles to Ukraine’s U.S.-made munitions. Ukrainian determination and tactical innovation, American equipment, and Russia’s poor management led to massive losses on the Russian side and even to whispers of domestic discontent. Russia was losing on the strategic front, too. A U.S.-led coalition imposed strict sanctions that choked the Russian economy, Finland and Sweden joined NATO, and European countries started to reduce their dependence on Russian energy. Russian President Vladimir Putin had underestimated both the Ukrainian people’s commitment and ability to resist aggression and President Volodymyr Zelensky’s resolve as a wartime leader. Likely because of the milquetoast international response to Russia’s 2008 invasion of Georgia and 2014 annexation of Crimea, Putin did not anticipate the depth of Western intelligence sharing with Kyiv or the flood of munitions into Ukraine, either.

By the spring of 2023, the West was optimistic that the Ukrainian military could retake the land occupied by Russian forces along the Dnieper River. To that end, U.S. military advisers worked with Ukrainian forces to plan a counteroffensive in summer 2023. But Ukraine’s offensive momentum stalled, and the military grew concerned that it lacked the appropriate weapons for a major land operation. While Ukraine waited for Western supplies, Russia reinforced its defenses. By the time the campaign began, even the better-equipped and more experienced U.S. military would have taken heavy casualties breaking through Russia’s lines.

Ukraine must adjust the way it organizes, equips, and thinks about the war.

To seize Russian-held territory and destroy the forces operating there, the Ukrainian army needed to mass its own forces and conduct a large-scale combined arms maneuver. That would have entailed sending multiple divisions of up to 50,000 troops, tanks, and armored fighting vehicles, supported by artillery fire and airstrikes, to attack Russian positions, while air-defense systems protected Ukrainian ones. If done right, such an operation could have allowed Ukraine to penetrate and ultimately destroy Russia’s fortifications. It could have strengthened Ukraine’s negotiating position and even forced Russia to choose between further conscription or backing down from the fight. But Ukraine lacked the training, weapons availability, and institutional support necessary to pull off the campaign.

Crucially, Ukrainian forces needed different types of weapons than they received. Instead of the midrange arms that constitute most of Kyiv’s Western support, the counteroffensive called for more sophisticated Abrams tanks, F-16 fighter jets, HIMARS rocket launchers, and Patriot missiles. Ukraine requested these weapons systems ahead of the operation, and if it had received them in sufficient quantity, the counteroffensive might have been successful. But without them, it was doomed. The United States and other partners initially withheld these arms out of fear of escalation, and by the time they greenlit shipments, it was too little too late to make a difference in the summer campaign.

While Ukraine spent the summer waiting for weapons, Russia fortified its defensive lines, mobilized a prisoner conscript army, and revitalized its defense industrial base. Moscow had learned from its early failures and adapted. The Kremlin successfully baited Ukraine into fighting a war of attrition. In Bakhmut, for example, Ukraine fully committed to holding the city even when it was nearly surrounded by Russian forces and taking heavy casualties. This battle, the bloodiest in Europe since World War II, resulted in Russia holding most of the ground and claiming victory in May 2023.

A NEW STRATEGY

There is little Ukraine can do to match Russia’s material and personnel advantages. Russia simply has a bigger economy and, critically, a larger population. It has been able to steadily increase the size of its forces operating in Ukraine, even after the collapse of the Wagner mercenary group, by mobilizing ever more state-controlled forces. Ukraine, on the other hand, faces manpower shortages. Its recent decision to lower the draft age from 27 to 25 and to start conscripting some convicts will barely shift the current imbalance.

Although the recent U.S. aid package will alleviate Ukraine’s immediate weapons shortfall, tit-for-tat artillery duels and attempts to retake ground where the Russian army has built defensive fortifications will quickly deplete Ukraine’s still-limited supplies. Ukrainian officials may hope that Washington will open the floodgates, alleviating their material constraints. But aid to Ukraine has become increasingly politicized in the United States, and with the U.S. election coming up, it would be unwise for Kyiv to hinge its strategy on continued and timely American assistance.

Ukraine must now find a way to do more with less. It must avoid attritional battles, conserving manpower and material to be able to respond to changing conditions. Defeating Russia will require organizing Ukrainian forces to fight a longer war of exhaustion using asymmetric guerrilla tactics.

While Ukraine waited for weapons, Russia fortified its defensive lines.

This may not be the war Ukraine wants to fight: a war of exhaustion, by design, sacrifices territory to preserve forces and to extend the time horizon of the conflict. It lacks the assuredness and speed of a direct confrontation that would destroy Russian positions. When it looked like a decisive counterattack was possible in the spring and summer of 2023, it would have been foolish for Kyiv to adopt an asymmetric strategy and prolong the war. Now, facing manpower shortages and material uncertainty, it is foolish not to. A war of exhaustion allows Ukraine to play to its advantages. Ukrainian forces are fighting on their own territory, and their greater familiarity with the terrain gives them an intelligence edge over Russia. Whenever possible, they would avoid facing Russian forces head on and conserve soldiers and munitions rather than retake lost ground. If Russia were to launch a direct assault on Kyiv, Ukraine would have no choice but to meet Russian troops on the battlefield. But even in this scenario, Ukrainian fighters should focus on maximizing Russian casualties and, if the time comes, be willing to withdraw from Kyiv. Capital cities are important, but they are not vital for opposing an occupier: the French resistance successfully fought the Germans after losing Paris during World War II, and the Iraqi insurgency continued to fight the Americans after losing Baghdad. If they had to, the Ukrainians could continue an asymmetric war with Russia in control of Kyiv.

This pivot would require a tactical shift. A reorganized Ukrainian military would be structured around small, independent groups rather than large brigades. These irregular forces would be distributed throughout the country instead of being focused in one or two central areas. Supported by Ukrainian and Western intelligence, the groups would identify and attack vulnerable Russian targets before fading back into the population and the terrain—where it would be difficult for Russian forces to target them—to limit the loss of personnel and equipment. The groups would also help build a resistance force in contested territories. This sort of asymmetric warfare is a proven strategy for a weaker opponent to gradually defeat a more powerful adversary. At minimum, it buys time for the weaker side to reconstitute and hold out for more favorable political or operational conditions, such as broadened international support or domestic turmoil in the stronger state. As the United States learned fighting asymmetric forces in Afghanistan and Vietnam, this approach is effective—and demoralizing. But it is also slow; both conflicts lasted nearly 20 years.

The aim is not to defend every piece of ground to the last man. Instead, as Russian troops take and occupy territory, Ukrainian fighters would use hit-and-run tactics to target their supply lines and poorly held positions. If Russia were to continue to advance, its military would necessarily be spreading its forces out and extending its supply lines and lines of communication. In the logic of an irregular campaign, the deeper the Russian army penetrates into Ukrainian territory, the more vulnerable it will be to Ukrainian ambushes and raids against targets of opportunity.

Ukraine will also need to bring the fight to Russia. After training special operations forces—perhaps with U.S. and NATO support—Ukraine can send small units on cross-border raids to destroy logistics hubs, training areas, and infrastructure that support Russia’s war effort. Largely because of Putin’s nuclear saber rattling, Western leaders have warned [OK?] that cross-border operations would be unnecessarily escalatory. But Russian attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure and civilian population centers have already escalated the war. At this point in the conflict, cross-border raids that directly target Russia’s war machine are a calculated risk. Avoiding them merely gives Russia a safe space from which to attack Ukraine. If Kyiv’s Western partners prohibit such strikes within Russia, they are consigning Ukraine to defeat.

The aim is not to defend every piece of ground to the last man.

To complement cross-border raids, Ukrainian cyber forces should continue to engage in the digital information war. The goal of cyber operations would be to wear down the Russian population’s support for the war and counter Russian narratives about the conflict. Specifically, Ukraine should highlight the tactical successes of the Ukrainian resistance and the incompetence of the Russian military. An information campaign aimed at undermining Russian civilians’ resolve is thus part of a broader slow-erosion strategy.

Russia is sure to attempt further incursions, and Ukraine will need to prepare its defense. In a war of exhaustion, Ukraine would need to be willing to temporarily cede some territory in order to preserve its forces and buy time. But as Russian troops advance, Ukrainian forces should focus on inflicting casualties and destroying equipment. They can achieve these aims using portable weapons distributed among the small infiltration and guerrilla teams: Ukrainian troops already have expertise with drones, and they can continue to use them to identify targets and provide real-time intelligence; the shoulder-launched Javelins and other easily carried weapons can target larger Russian military equipment and installations; and larger artillery can be used in a more limited way to support the operations of the small groups. As Ukraine transitions to unconventional warfare, the U.S. Army Special Forces would be the ideal advisers to give Ukrainian troops a competitive edge. These U.S. forces specialize in providing instruction that integrates new technology, and they could train Ukrainian soldiers in guerrilla tactics and infiltration operations.

To adopt this strategy, Ukraine would have to embrace a different concept of victory—one based on staying in the fight and resisting Russian aggression, instead of routing all Russian forces from Ukrainian territory. Once Russia’s equipment and political appetite for war wear down, Ukraine can resume a direct confrontation designed to drive out Russian forces. For Ukrainians, who remain committed to liberating every inch of occupied land, this will be a bitter pill. But their current objectives are simply unattainable while Putin remains in power. Kyiv, then, has no choice but to shift.

Ukraine’s partners, in turn, have an obligation to keep helping the country; this change in strategy does not let them off the hook. In addition to training, the United States and other countries would need to continue providing arms to Ukraine, although the tactical shift should mean that Ukrainian troops go through weapons more slowly. Ukraine’s international partners must also help wear down Russia by enforcing economic sanctions and communicating clearly that these measures would be lifted if Russia were to retreat. Most important, Kyiv must have support after the eventual end of the fighting. Waging a war of exhaustion will decimate Ukraine, and its people need to know that they will not be left on their own to rebuild. Ukraine’s partners owe the country that assurance for its sacrifice.

• KEITH L. CARTER is an Associate Professor in the U.S. Naval War College at the Naval Postgraduate School. The views expressed here are his own.
• JENNIFER SPINDEL is Assistant Professor of Political Science and Director of International Affairs at the University of New Hampshire.
• MATTHEW MCCLARY is an active-duty U.S. Army Special Forces officer. The views expressed here are his own.

Foreign Affairs · by Keith L. Carter, Jennifer Spindel, and Matthew McClary · May 29, 2024

25. From the Shadows to the Social Sphere: Ukraine’s Strategy of Engagement

Graphic at the link: https://irregularwarfare.org/articles/from-the-shadows-to-the-social-sphere-ukraines-strategy-of-engagement/https://irregularwarfare.org/articles/from-the-shadows-to-the-social-sphere-ukraines-strategy-of-engagement/

Excerpt:

The HUR engages with civil society through a multifaceted approach that incorporates social media, collaboration with crowdsourcing organizations, and the public profile of its commander, Lieutenant General Kyrylo Budanov. This strategy aligns with Gregory Asmolov’s recent insights regarding the role of digital media in modern conflicts. Social media platforms can extend participation beyond traditional military roles. Even amidst the hardships of war, the Ukrainian people have demonstrated remarkable resilience and an eagerness to support their nation’s defense, through diverse acts of civil resistance and the backing of their military forces. The HUR’s use of social media for information dissemination, narrative construction, and public engagement, along with its interactions with crowdsourcing initiatives, reflects an adaptation to contemporary warfare. Moreover, Lieutenant General Budanov demonstrates how leadership plays a significant role in shaping public perception and mobilization that transcends more conventional forms of intelligence .The HUR engages with civil society through a multifaceted approach that incorporates social media, collaboration with crowdsourcing organizations, and the public profile of its commander, Lieutenant General Kyrylo Budanov. This strategy aligns with Gregory Asmolov’s recent insights regarding the role of digital media in modern conflicts. Social media platforms can extend participation beyond traditional military roles. Even amidst the hardships of war, the Ukrainian people have demonstrated remarkable resilience and an eagerness to support their nation’s defense, through diverse acts of civil resistance and the backing of their military forces. The HUR’s use of social media for information dissemination, narrative construction, and public engagement, along with its interactions with crowdsourcing initiatives, reflects an adaptation to contemporary warfare. Moreover, Lieutenant General Budanov demonstrates how leadership plays a significant role in shaping public perception and mobilization that transcends more conventional forms of intelligence .

From the Shadows to the Social Sphere: Ukraine’s Strategy of Engagement - Irregular Warfare Initiative

irregularwarfare.org · by Peter Schrijver · May 28, 2024

Conventional wisdom suggests intelligence services should maintain a discreet profile to avoid drawing undue attention to the secretive nature of their work. However, ‘Intelligence Laboratory Express,’ a Russian journal focused on intelligence studies, recently spotlighted Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate (HUR) as an exception. It portrayed HUR as “notably visible in the media,” alleging that its operations are “primarily aimed at achieving media success” with “evident propaganda elements.”

Despite the Russian narrative aiming to disparage HUR, the Ukrainian agency’s actions reveal a nuanced truth. Diverging markedly from traditional intelligence practices, HUR has not only stepped out of the shadows but has also embraced transparency through active engagement on social media platforms like Facebook, X, Telegram, and Viber. Under the leadership of Lieutenant General Kyrylo Budanov, who enjoys “an almost cult status” among Ukrainians, HUR has adeptly used its public presence to personalize the conflict, highlight humanitarian operations, and effectively crowdsource support for defense initiatives against the Russian invasion.

Intelligence agencies considering a more transparent, public-facing approach like Ukraine’s HUR must evaluate their specific operational environments, organizational cultures, and target audience dynamics. The HUR’s tactics have been successful in Ukraine’s existential conflict, boosting public support and morale under Budanov’s charismatic leadership. However, this approach may not suit less acute or covert operations, where it could compromise sensitive activities. The agency’s leadership and culture must support transparency, and the public must be receptive to such outreach. In societies with low institutional trust, these tactics could backfire, being seen as propaganda rather than genuine engagement. Examining the HUR’s forward-leaning methods will provide deeper insights into their potential applications and limitations during times of war.

Social Media and Public Engagement: From Facebook to MMA Fights

The evolution and operational dynamics of HUR reflect its strategic adaptation and involvement in both conventional and irregular warfare. Following Ukraine’s independence in 1991, the HUR was officially integrated into the Ministry of Defense in 1993 after the unification of the Military Strategic Intelligence Directorate and the Intelligence Directorate. This signaled the start of a comprehensive approach to national defense and intelligence operations, mirroring the wider post-Soviet shift in Ukraine’s defense policy. The HUR consequently exemplifies a fusion of intelligence-gathering and special forces capabilities that enables it to play an extensive role in the country’s defense architecture.

Since 2015, the HUR’s role within Ukrainian society has notably intensified, propelled by its deployment of extensive social media campaigns on six different platforms (see Figure 1). These initiatives go beyond mere information dissemination: they are concerted efforts to counter adversarial narratives and keep the Ukrainian public informed about ongoing developments in territories under Russian occupation.

Figure 1: The number of HUR account followers on social media platforms.

An innovative facet of the HUR’s engagement strategy via social media is the deployment of the ‘Main Intelligence Bot,’ a Telegram bot conceived to leverage the vigilance of the Ukrainian populace for intelligence-gathering efforts. This initiative converts ordinary citizens into active participants, empowering them to contribute actionable intelligence directly. The HUR reports that over the past two years since the full-scale invasion, the bot has yielded significant operational success. Contributions from Ukrainians have led to the destruction of enemy warehouses, equipment, and naval assets, and have provided critical information on the whereabouts of high-ranking officials and collaborators.

A significant portion of HUR’s social media content highlights successful operations against Russian forces, especially the exploits of various special forces units operating under HUR command like Group 13, Artan, and Timur. These units have garnered attention for their achievements, such as Group 13’s recent destruction of three Russian naval vessels in the Black Sea: the corvette Ivanovets on February 1, 2024, the amphibious landing ship Tzezar Kunikov on February 14, and the patrol ship Sergei Kotov on March 5. The HUR publicized all three attacks on its social media channels, in which Group 13 used Magura V maritime drones. It also shared footage from the onboard cameras of the attacking Unmanned Surface Vehicles (USVs). Exacerbating the situation for the Russians, the attacks on these ships were not only filmed and subsequently posted online, but the HUR also managed to confirm its success by intercepting and publicly sharing communications of Russian navy personnel discussing the sinking of these ships. hesitation, the HUR posted these sensitive intercepts online and, in doing so, has challenged traditional views that intelligence services should prioritize the protection of their collection assets.

In addition to posting operational reports on social media, the HUR also commemorates fallen personnel with the hashtag #ГУРпамятає (#HURremembers) to underscore their bravery, resilience, and perseverance. One poignant example from November 2023 is a eulogy for Andriy ‘Yankee’ Yaremchuk, whose ultimate sacrifice “in the battle for his country’s freedom exemplifies the utmost patriotism and courageous leadership. His commitment, reflected in his return from the French Legion to defend Ukraine, inspires a legacy of bravery and selflessness.” Over a two-year period, the HUR posted messages with the hashtag #HURremembers 26 times, often highlighting the deep connection between the fallen and their local communities. These messages not only commemorate the past deeds of fallen HUR soldiers but also acknowledge the support they received from their families while serving in the HUR.

This theme of civil society support is frequently addressed in the HUR’s social media messaging. This includes posts about renowned Ukrainian music groups creating tributes to the military intelligence service. For instance, Monoton Music Label produced an uplifting song, “to the heroes from the HUR MO,” expressing gratitude for their valor. Additionally, to demonstrate its approachability and desire to foster connections with the public, the HUR organized a drawing contest for Ukrainian children coinciding with the organization’s 31st anniversary. The contest aimed to nurture artistic talents, provide an outlet for children’s creative capacities, and instill patriotism—a sentiment the HUR echoed on its social platforms with pictures of the children’s artistic contributions.

Moreover, the HUR actively hosts and participates in events such as mixed martial arts competitions, which bolster its visibility and aid in recruiting for its special forces. It also marks its presence at key cultural occasions like the Frankfurt Book Fair. At the 2023 fair, author Artem Shevchenko showcased his work Military Intelligence of Ukraine: In the Sky, On the Sea, On the Ground, which chronicles the HUR’s special missions. The book, which has drawn interest from German media, literary critics, and security experts, is published in both Ukrainian and English. It provides a deep dive into the strategic planning and implementation of missions, along with firsthand accounts from those involved, underscoring the HUR’s resistance against the Russian invasion.

The HUR’s outreach extends beyond cultural contributions to include humanitarian acts. One of the HUR’s special forces units known as Kraken has collaborated multiple times with the Humanitarian Center of Kharkiv Oblast relief missions (see Figure 2).

Figure 2: Volunteers and operators of the HUR’s Kraken special forces unit deliver supplies to civilians. The photo is a screenshot from the HUR’s Telegram channel.

The HUR reported on its social media channels that during the final months of 2023 these joint efforts led to the distribution of humanitarian aid to approximately 2,000 inhabitants of several liberated villages within the Kharkiv and Donetsk regions. Essential provisions such as food kits, medicines, and medical supplies were disseminated, targeting specifically a medical center and hospital in the noted areas. This initiative is just one of many instances where HUR units have directly assisted the civilian population with their needs.

Crowdsourcing Equipment

Despite actively participating in humanitarian relief efforts, HUR units depend on the public for crowdsourcing their specialized equipment. Since the full-scale Russian invasion in February 2022, the HUR has been bolstered by substantial financial contributions and material donations that have been vital for their sustained operations and for the families of fallen soldiers.

This relationship is illustrated by the musicians of Dance on the Congo Square, who raised over 1.8 million hryvnias (approximately $46,000 USD) to support the children of fallen intelligence officers. The initiative, as part of a larger charity tour across 22 European cities, also raised funds for FPV drones that enhance the capabilities of the HUR’s Shaman special forces unit on the battlefield. Similarly, the band Botashe collected 306 thousand hryvnias (approximately $7,815 USD) during the Lviv music festival. These funds were earmarked for the care of injured members of the Timur special unit and the Special Operations Center Alfa Group of the internal security service SBU. These acts of philanthropy extend to tangible goods, with the members of Antitila providing five thousand tactical NATO-standard first aid kits to frontline soldiers.

The HUR has also improved its operational capabilities through substantial donations and support, which have included both financial contributions and specialized equipment. These contributions have come from various semi-professional crowdfunding organizations and initiatives, reflecting a robust partnership between the military and civil society designed to bolster Ukraine’s defense against Russian aggression. For example, the Come Back Alive fund provided HUR scouts with thirteen new pickup trucks worth 15 million hryvnias ($353,000 USD). Additionally, the Polish volunteer initiative, Zbroimy Ukraine (Arm Ukraine), donated a medevac helicopter equipped with modern medical tools, allowing the HUR to offer rapid medical assistance to evacuees from the frontline.

Further illustrating this collaboration, a charity auction in Dnipro organized by the non-governmental organization Strength of Hearts, raised 11 million hryvnias ($281,000 USD approximately) for combat vehicles. Similarly, the Serhiy Prytula Foundation donated two tactical UAVs, purchased for about 11,6 million hryvnias (approximately $294,000 USD), enhancing the HUR’s reconnaissance capabilities. These examples underscore the crucial role of both civilian and international support in augmenting the HUR’s capabilities and showcase the close collaboration between Ukraine’s military intelligence service and the civilian community.

Budanov: Bridging the HUR-Civil Society Divide

Lastly, the personal influence of HUR commander Budanov is a significant factor in the interplay between the HUR and civil society. Budanov leads with a philosophy that a spy boss cannot merely operate from the shadows. This approach was on display in mid-February 2024, when under Budanov’s direction, the HUR released a video that merged digital culture with military recruitment. The video features a young person in a hoodie immersed in a first-person shooter game. During the game, a user named Kyrylo86 contacts him via an on-screen chat. The young player is then shown footage of spectacular attacks by the HUR against Russian targets. The climax of the video occurs when Kyrylo86 types: “we need your skills,” offering the young man a position at the HUR. As the camera zooms out, the viewer is presented with a scene of @ChiefDI_Ukraine Budanov sitting behind his desk, personally recruiting much-needed IT-savvy personnel.

This creative strategy underlines Budanov’s cult status among Ukrainians, as evidenced by the widespread sharing of memes featuring his likeness, especially following military setbacks in Russia or Russian-controlled regions. The HUR’s engaging and adept use of social media starkly contrasts with the Russian Federation’s less effective propaganda, which is often seen as heavy-handed and less trustworthy. This contrast not only highlights the HUR’s successful engagement with the digital generation but also amplifies Budanov’s popularity and the broader cultural resonance of the HUR’s digital outreach efforts.

After polling both experts and readers in October 2022, The New Voice of Ukraine newspaper identified Kyrylo Budanov as one of the most influential military leaders in Ukraine. Due to the war, the site clarified that its list of personalities was not arranged in order of popularity. Nonetheless, The New Voice placed Budanov—referred to as the man without a smile—at the forefront of its list, ahead of former Commander-in-Chief General Valery Zaluzhnyi and former Minister of Defense Oleksiy Reznikov. This recognition signifies Budanov’s broad influence within not just the military domain but also civilian and government circles, and in doing so, presents him as a central figure in Ukraine’s defense. His visibility and acclaim underscore a unique relationship where public sentiment and military leadership intertwine.

The HUR and Participatory Warfare

The HUR’s approach to social media engagement, in which it builds relations with civil society initiatives and supports Lieutenant-General Budanov’s leadership, transcends the traditional bounds of a military intelligence service and therefore challenges conservative views on public engagement.

A 2022 article by Gregory Asmolov explores the role of digital media in contemporary conflicts, with a particular emphasis on the Russo-Ukrainian war. Asmolov analyzes the ways in which digital platforms have introduced new avenues for participatory warfare, enabling a broader spectrum of individuals to become involved in the conflict. His analysis highlights the crucial role of narratives in mobilizing support and shaping public perception.

Asmolov argues that Ukraine’s population is aware of Ukraine’s limited statehood and acknowledges the need for full societal mobilization to counter Russia’s invasion. As a result, Asmolov’s work offers a valuable perspective on the HUR’s innovative strategies, underscoring the significance of digital mobilization and narrative construction in influencing the outcomes of modern conflicts.

Nevertheless, the approach of the HUR is not without controversy. Specifically, the active involvement of civilians in wartime intelligence collection on enemy troops is the subject of heated debate within Western military institutions. Critics argue that it may infringe upon the humanitarian rules of war by blurring the lines between combatants and non-combatants. Despite these debates, the communication between the HUR and the Ukrainian public continues unabated, at least for the foreseeable future.

Concluding Remarks

The HUR engages with civil society through a multifaceted approach that incorporates social media, collaboration with crowdsourcing organizations, and the public profile of its commander, Lieutenant General Kyrylo Budanov. This strategy aligns with Gregory Asmolov’s recent insights regarding the role of digital media in modern conflicts. Social media platforms can extend participation beyond traditional military roles. Even amidst the hardships of war, the Ukrainian people have demonstrated remarkable resilience and an eagerness to support their nation’s defense, through diverse acts of civil resistance and the backing of their military forces. The HUR’s use of social media for information dissemination, narrative construction, and public engagement, along with its interactions with crowdsourcing initiatives, reflects an adaptation to contemporary warfare. Moreover, Lieutenant General Budanov demonstrates how leadership plays a significant role in shaping public perception and mobilization that transcends more conventional forms of intelligence .

Peter Schrijver is a Ph.D. researcher affiliated with the Netherlands Defence Academy. His academic interests focus on Ukraine’s operations in the information environment.

Main Image: Kyrylo Budanov in his office. (Ukrainian government via Wikimedia)

Views expressed in this article solely reflect those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Irregular Warfare Initiative, Princeton University’s Empirical Studies of Conflict Project, the Modern War Institute at West Point, or the United States Government.

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26. The 80th Anniversary of D-Day: An Opportunity to Seize

The 80th Anniversary of D-Day: An Opportunity to Seize - War on the Rocks

warontherocks.com · by Sam Edwards · May 29, 2024

“Ike Returns to Normandy, Tells Reds: Remember Hitler.”

With this June 1948 headline, the Washington Post left readers in no doubt about the present politics that often underpin D-Day commemorations. When Western heads of state, including President Joe Biden, visit Normandy next week to mark the 80th anniversary of Operation Overlord, the concerns of today will similarly impose themselves.

While full details of all the commemorative events have not yet been released, early indications are that there will be high-profile ceremonies in Normandy itself, including an international commemoration at Omaha Beach. There will also be significant events elsewhere. In the United States, both the National D-Day Memorial (Bedford, Virginia) and the National World War II Museum (New Orleans) are hosting ceremonies, whilst in the United Kingdom the anniversary is centered on Portsmouth, once a key staging point for the invasion force and now the home of Britain’s D-Day museum.

In its essentials, therefore, D-Day 80 will look very familiar to anyone who has witnessed some of the previous major anniversaries, such as the 75th (2019), the 60th (2004), or indeed the 50th (1994).

But for all these similarities there is also an important difference, with D-Day 80 unfolding amidst an increasingly tense international political scene. For those dignitaries gathering in Normandy next week one current event is likely to loom especially large: the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, which began in February 2022 and which has returned war to Europe and brought East-West rivalry back to the fore.

How might those attending the anniversary events pay homage to the past while keeping an eye on the present? A look at how D-Day was commemorated amidst a previous era of East-West tensions — the Cold War — is instructive. Just like D-Day commemorations during the 1950s and 1960s, D-Day 80 offers a highly visible forum at which to deliver a powerful reminder of what a unified alliance, resolute in purpose, can achieve. Here is a chance to declare — publicly and unapologetically — that democracy can vanquish dictatorship. Seen like this, D-Day 80 is an occasion peculiarly well-placed for the challenges of this moment, and for Biden it offers an invaluable opportunity to seize.

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D-Day in the Cold War

D-Day was commemorated for the first time in June 1945, just a month after the Allied victory against Nazi Germany. But with the conflict against Japan nearing its crescendo it was a rather muted occasion. It was not until 1950s, then, that the now familiar outlines of a modern D-Day anniversary began to emerge. This was a development inextricably connected to the rising tensions of the early Cold War.

In June 1947, on the eve of the third anniversary of the Allied landings, U.S. Secretary of State George C. Marshall announced a plan for European economic recovery.

A year later, East-West tensions ramped up further — the Soviet decision to cut off access to West Berlin led the United States and United Kingdom to launch a massive resupply effort by air.

And then in June 1950 the Cold War went hot: The North Korean military invaded South Korea, with an American-led U.N. force duly intervening in September.

In this increasingly tense geopolitical context, D-Day anniversaries quickly drew attention from high-profile figures. In June 1948, none other than Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower — the man who led Operation Overlord and who would shortly become NATO’s first Supreme Commander (1950–52) — made a visit to Normandy during which he declared that “the whole of western Europe must be defended against tyranny.” The result was the Washington Post headline quoted above.

The same sentiment was expressed during the first widely commemorated anniversary of D-Day, the 10th, marked in 1954. This was also the moment that the annual commemorations started to develop their now familiar form. There were ceremonies along the beaches, veterans paid homage at memorials, and dignitaries delivered speeches.

President René Coty of France, for instance, spoke at Omaha Beach — site of amongst the bloodiest fighting on D-Day — and remarked that “the task of the free nations is now to maintain and develop a solid, constructive, and organic cooperation in all fields.” Among his audience was Gen. Alfred Gruenther, recently arrived as the NATO Commander in Europe (1953–56). Similar appeals for Western solidarity were heard at several of the other gatherings that June.

Drawing attention to such appeals is not to accuse those involved of cynical political appropriation (though this may well have been a factor). Rather, it is to acknowledge that commemoration is an inescapably political act and thus something that is always as much about the concerns of the present as it is about honoring the past. And given the history at the very heart of D-Day, its commemoration offered a clear opportunity to rehearse the ideologically freighted language of contemporary Cold War geopolitics. After all, where better than Normandy — where a massive multinational Allied army began the liberation of Nazi-oppressed Europe — to rally the free world in its ongoing battle against totalitarian tyranny?

The close connections between D-Day and contemporary Cold War politics were only further accentuated by the various memorial construction projects of the early 1950s. In 1952, the Imperial (now Commonwealth) War Graves Commission completed its cemetery at Bayeux (the largest of its kind in Normandy); in 1954, a museum commemorating the landings was opened in Arromanches (close to where the American and British invasion sectors met); and in 1956, the American Battle Monuments Commission unveiled its cemetery on the bluffs overlooking Omaha Beach.

As a result, by the end of the 1950s a basic framework for marking D-Day anniversaries had started to emerge. These were often solemn occasions for sober remembrance, unfolding within recently established (and beautifully maintained) sacred spaces and frequently involving Allied veterans. But they were also high-profile forums for Cold War politics, pronouncements, and at times even polemic.

D-Day and NATO

This was particularly apparent during the 20th anniversary, in 1964. Indeed, where the 10th anniversary took place just as Cold War tensions drew the Western allies closer together, the 20th anniversary occurred, in contrast, just as trans-Atlantic relations were souring.

A key factor was the growing American military commitment to Vietnam (the Gulf of Tonkin incident, central to Washington’s decision to deploy regular U.S. ground troops to the region, occurred in August 1964). This American commitment drew criticism in European capitals, with even the British government declining to send troops in support of their ally. In France, meanwhile, whose military had been forcibly evicted from Vietnam in 1954, the 1960s witnessed a new era of increasingly assertive national politics, with wartime hero President Charles de Gaulle — in office from 1959 to 1969 — especially keen to chart a distinct line in international affairs. Two developments are of note here. One was the establishment of an independent French nuclear deterrent: An atomic bomb was successfully tested in French Algeria in 1960. The second was de Gaulle’s 1966 decision to withdraw the French military from NATO’s integrated command structure, a decision accompanied by the demand that all NATO troops leave French soil (and the vast majority of these troops were of course American). Within a year NATO’s headquarters was moved from Paris to Brussels.

D-Day 20, commemorated in June 1964, took place in the very midst of these tensions internal to the Western alliance, something powerfully exemplified by the fact that de Gaulle refused to attend the proceedings in Normandy. Two days after the anniversary, the London Times pondered the “political implications” of his “absence,” particularly given that “exhortations to allied unity … have been more than a pious theme of D-Day.” From Washington, meanwhile, President Lyndon B. Johnson (also not attending in person) dispatched a message to the “peoples of Europe.” Read out in a ceremony at the Normandy American Cemetery, Johnson reminded European allies that as “unity wrested back your freedom, unity has brought and will always bring us fulfilment of freedom’s promise.” The same theme featured in the personal message Johnson gave to his official D-Day 20 delegation. As he explained: “the central force for progress has been, and continues to be, the unity and the strength of all nations of the Atlantic Alliance.”

Yet despite all the handwringing, the simmering trans-Atlantic tensions of 1964 actually made the anniversary’s Cold War optics still more important. Put differently, now was precisely the time to make clear that for all the occasional differences between Washington, London, and Paris, when it really mattered the wartime allies remained united. On the eve of D-Day, the Washington Post declared that de Gaulle’s absence from the 1964 commemorations was entirely “understandable,” whilst from Paris one American general loudly celebrated the Franco-American bond “forged” in the “fury and fire of battle.” He concluded that “our greatest strength is the spirit of our unity.”

A very similar message was apparent two decades later, during the 40th anniversary of the Allied landings in June 1984. With the United States and the Soviet Union embarked upon a new round of bitter nuclear rivalry (the so-called New Cold War of 1979–85), the Cold War geopolitics underpinning the D-Day 40 commemorations were again especially apparent.

As historian Douglas Brinkley has discussed, the figure who most skillfully exploited this fact was President Ronald Reagan, among the foremost political communicators of the era. Crucially, it was Reagan — or, more accurately, his speechwriter Peggy Noonan — who realized the full potential of a D-Day anniversary to accommodate a powerful and pointed story for the moment, one that could “work” for both a domestic and international audience.

Reagan’s key performance took place during a special commemorative ceremony at Pointe du Hoc — a Normandy battlefield made scared by the D-Day heroics of American Rangers. His speech was carefully planned, and carefully choreographed. He began by celebrating the “boys of Pointe du Hoc,” the heroes who “fought for all humanity.” But as the speech progressed Reagan turned his attention to the tyranny that still threatened Europe from beyond the Urals. He concluded with a powerful renewal of the American commitment to Europe: “We were with you then; we are with you now. Your hopes are our hopes, your destiny is our destiny.”

Clearly reminiscent of what Eisenhower had said back in 1948, and similarly in tune with many of the sentiments articulated in both 1954 and 1964, Reagan nonetheless claimed the occasion as his own. European allies, concerned by Reagan’s “trigger-happy” approach to international politics (at least according to the New York Times in the days before the anniversary) were reassured, and audiences back home were impressed. Reflecting on the anniversary a few days later, Haynes Johnson remarked (in a piece for the Washington Post) that Reagan had “demonstrated to millions why he is the perfect ceremonial president.” Other commentators even suggested that the Pointe du Hoc speech was a crucial factor in Reagan’s victory in the presidential election that fall.

Indeed, as historian Michael Dolski has shown, Reagan’s performances during the 40th anniversary played an important role in the complex processes through which D-Day secured an increasingly “mythic” status in late 20th-century American culture (powerful cultural texts, like Stephen Spielberg’s 1998 film Saving Private Ryan, were also influential). Hardly surprising that all subsequent presidents, from Bill Clinton to Donald Trump, have attempted to replicate his success.

D-Day 50 to D-Day 80

The key challenge for these imitators has been that the D-Day anniversaries of the last 30 years have unfolded in a markedly different geopolitical landscape, one profoundly reshaped by the end of the Cold War. That is not to say that recent commemorations have avoided grappling with the pressing concerns of the moment. In 1994, Clinton’s 50th anniversary speech celebrated the fact that “the Soviet Empire is gone” whilst also noting — with an eye on the violent breakup of Yugoslavia — that “our work is far from done.” In 2009, President Barack Obama saw in the 65th anniversary an opportunity to rebuild Franco-American relations recently strained by disagreements linked to the American-led invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.

But from the perspective of the White House these concerns, whilst often challenging, were not existential. The same cannot be said of D-Day 80, which will unfold amidst a new era of East-West antagonism linked to the Russian invasion of Ukraine and at the very moment the trans-Atlantic relationship is being strained by European concerns about a potential second presidential term for Trump. As such, for those diplomats, dignitaries, and speechwriters currently readying for next month’s commemorations, D-Day 80 offers a challenge to negotiate but also an opportunity to exploit.

This is a point revealed by the guest list. Notably, Vladimir Putin was invited to the Normandy commemorations in 2004, and again in 2014 (that is, after the Russian annexation of Crimea), though he cut a rather isolated figure at the latter. But there was no such invitation in 2019, and nor will there be this June. Putin will no doubt declare indifference and redouble his commitment to celebrating Soviet victory in the Great Patriotic War, a recurrent feature of his domestic policy, as Jade McGlynn has explained.

But in Putin’s absence, and in light of his current foreign policy, those planning D-Day 80 can find inspiration in the commemorative precedents laid down in the 1950s and 1960s. Here is a chance for Western heads of state to gather on the Normandy beaches and once again assert their unity. Here is the chance, in the very year that NATO also celebrates its 75th birthday, for the wartime allies to declare their continued faith and fidelity. Just as Putin’s Russia is currently mobilizing World War II memory for political ends, D-Day 80 will offer an arresting spectacle within which Western leaders should stake their own claim to the past and present.

Seizing this opportunity is the challenge for all those involved, but especially for Biden. Increasingly criticized for his handling of the war in Gaza, locked into a fierce electoral contest, and battling to sustain domestic support for Ukraine, D-Day 80 presents an invaluable — but difficult — opportunity to deliver a speech for the ages. What might this speech look like? And what message should Biden deliver?

The Challenge — and Opportunity — for Biden

At various points in his presidency Biden has invoked the memory of Franklin D. Roosevelt, with economic and military assistance to Ukraine “sold” with reference to the nation’s celebrated World War II role as the “arsenal of democracy.” The upcoming commemorations in Normandy offer Biden the chance once again to assume this Rooseveltian persona.

But Biden and his team can — and should — also take inspiration from Reagan’s much-celebrated Normandy performance, especially because several of the challenges he faces today are so very similar to those of the 1980s. Like Reagan, Biden should deliver a speech that works both at home and abroad. He should reassure European allies unsettled by Trumpism that the United States remains firmly committed to upholding their sovereignty and security. He should deliver a firm and unequivocal message to Moscow regarding the unbreakable unity of NATO. And he should make clear to Americans that providing support for embattled overseas democracies is the true way to honor the memory of those momentous events 80 years ago.

In short, Biden has the chance this June 6 to claim the mantle of both Roosevelt and Reagan. And for the current occupant of the Oval Office, this is something to embrace. Not since 1984 has a major D-Day anniversary taken place amidst the sort of resurgent East-West geopolitical rivalry apparent today. But as the response to Reagan’s speech 40 years ago makes clear, when the stakes are high, so too can be the rewards.

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Dr. Sam Edwards is a reader (associate professor) in modern political history at Loughborough University. He is a fellow of the Royal Historical Society, a former Fulbright Scholar (Pitt, 2010), and author of Allies in Memory: World War II and the Politics of Transatlantic Commemoration, c. 1941–2001 (Cambridge University Press, 2015) and co-editor of D-Day in History and Memory: The Normandy Landings in International Remembrance and Commemoration (University of North Texas Press, 2014). He has previously written for the Washington Post, the Independent, the BBC, History and Policy, and The Conversation. The views expressed here are solely his own. You can find him on Twitter @Historian_Sam.

Image: Erin Rohn

Commentary

warontherocks.com · by Sam Edwards · May 29, 2024

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Vice President, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Phone: 202-573-8647

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com