WAR 02-01-2020-to-02-07-2020___****THE****WINDS****of****WAR****

[Housecarl]

(402) 01-11-2020-to-01-17-2020___****THE****WINDS****of****WAR****

WAR - 01-11-2020-to-01-17-2020___****THE****WINDS****of****WAR****

Sorry for the delay....HC (400) 12-28-2019 -to- 01-03-2020__****THE****WINDS****of****WAR**** WAR - 12-28-2019-to-01-03-2020___****THE****WINDS****of****WAR**** (401) 01-04-2020-to-01-10-2020___****THE****WINDS****of****WAR****...

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(403) 01-18-2020-to-01-24-2020___****THE****WINDS****of****WAR****

WAR - 01-18-2020-to-01-24-2020___****THE****WINDS****of****WAR****

Again, sorry for the delay....HC (401) 01-04-2020-to-01-10-2020___****THE****WINDS****of****WAR**** WAR - 01-04-2020-to-01-10-2020___****THE****WINDS****of****WAR**** (402) 01-11-2020-to-01-17-2020___****THE****WINDS****of****WAR****...

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(402) 01-11-2020-to-01-17-2020___****THE****WINDS****of****WAR**** http://xf.timebomb2000.com/xf/index.php?threads/01-11-2020-to-01-17-2020___-the-winds-of-war.566510/#post-7544881 (403) 01-18-2020-to-01-24-2020___****THE****WINDS****of****WAR****...

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Al Qaeda Leader Arrested In Arizona

• Thread starter Macgyver
• Start date 50 minutes ago

Al Qaeda Leader Arrested In Arizona

Federal agents have reportedly arrested an Al Qaeda leader on Thursday, Jan. 30, 2020 in Phoenix, Arizona. The terror group leader, Ali Yousif Ahmed

www.funker530.com

http://xf.timebomb2000.com/xf/index...eader-arrested-in-arizona.567544/post-7568150
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The Real Threat of a Nuclear Arms Race

Cipher Brief expert Joe DeTrani writes about the very real threat of a new nuclear arms race and what could lead to it in The Cipher Brief

www.thecipherbrief.com

The Real Threat of a Nuclear Arms Race
January 31, 2020 | Joseph DeTrani

Joseph DeTrani
Former Director of the National Counterproliferation Center
Cipher Brief Expert Ambassador Joseph R. DeTrani was the former Special Envoy for Negotiations with North Korea.
The 70th anniversary of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) will be celebrated this March 5 with the prospect that during this decade, there will be appreciably more nuclear weapons states than the five nuclear weapons states (China, France, Russia, United Kingdom and United States) that were grandfathered into the treaty on March 5, 1970.
The threat of a nuclear weapons arms race in East Asia and the Middle East is real. Currently, there are three countries that will incite this race: North Korea, Iran and Turkey.
It is likely North Korea will continue to defy the international community and continue to build nuclear weapons and, despite sanctions, refuse to denuclearize, assuming their demands are not accepted. Or, equally tragic, if the North is accepted by the international community as a nuclear weapons state, even assuming that they would be willing to cap the number of nuclear weapons they can retain.
North Korea, with nuclear weapons, will encourage other countries in the region to seek their own nuclear deterrence capabilities, regardless of U.S. extended nuclear deterrent commitments. A few former senior South Korean officials have publicly stated that South Korea should seek its own nuclear weapons if North Korea retains any number of nuclear weapons.
I’m confident that view is shared by others in the South. Yes, there is a nod to the United States for its offer of a nuclear umbrella, but realistically, many seem to believe that the South’s best defense is having its own nuclear deterrent.
Ongoing negotiations with the United States in regard to Seoul’s contribution to funding the 28,500 troops is one of a number of issues that contribute to the view that the South has to be more self-reliant, especially on issues dealing with its national security.
Japan is another country in the region that is concerned about North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs. In 1998, a North Korea long-range Taepodong 1 ballistic missile flew over Japan, with the missile’s second stage splashing into the Pacific Ocean, 60 kilometers past Japan. Recently, North Korea has launched a few short-range ballistic missiles that landed in Japan’s exclusive economic zone.
There is concern in Tokyo that recent U.S. negotiations with North Korea have focused more on the North’s intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) and not the short and middle-range Nodong missiles that are an immediate threat to Japan. That and upcoming financial burden sharing negotiations with the United States over the cost for stationing troops in Japan probably also convinced some in Tokyo that eventually Japan should consider having its own nuclear deterrent, despite the U.S. nuclear umbrella.
Other countries in the region may consider going nuclear, if North Korea is permitted to retain nuclear weapons. The overarching issue is that a nuclear North Korea will not contribute to security in the region. Conversely, a North Korea that is willing to denuclearize in a complete and verifiable manner, without conditioning its denuclearization on the United States removing its troops and defense commitments to South Korea and Japan, will contribute significantly to peace and prosperity in Northeast Asia.
Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani publicly announced that despite the nuclear agreement — the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) — Iran would increase the number of spinning centrifuges in its Fordow nuclear facility and enrich uranium from the 3.67 percent level to 5 percent, a step from 20 percent enrichment and significant movement toward the 90 percent enrichment needed for nuclear weapons.
Iran does not deny that prior to 2003 it was pursuing a nuclear weapons capability. The 2015 JCPOA clearly halted this effort, but recent pronouncements from Tehran that they are no longer obliged to comply with the JCPOA is an ominous indicator that Iran might once again pursue a nuclear weapons capability. Indeed, if that were to happen, countries like Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Turkey may decide that they, too, will need nuclear weapons for their own defense.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan made this point clearly when he stated that it was “unacceptable for nuclear armed states to forbid Ankara from obtaining its own nuclear weapons.” Mr. Erdogan shared a sentiment no doubt shared by other leaders in the region.
Working to ensure that we are successful in our negotiations with North Korea is a responsibility for all countries, not only the United States. China, an ally of North Korea, has significant influence with North Korea, given that over 90 percent of the North’s total trade is with China and 90 percent of the crude oil and petroleum products imported by the North are from China.
So, it is logical to ask that China do more to convince North Korea to return to working-level negotiations with the United States and comply with the agreement Kim Jong-un made at the June 2018 Singapore Summit with President Trump to, in return for normal bilateral relations and a peace treaty to end the Korean War, with concurrent security assurances and economic development assistance, comply with its Singapore Summit commitment to completely denuclearize.
It’s also important that the European Union, Russia and China get Iran to understand that threatening the region and Europe with ballistic missiles, while continuing to support to proxy organizations that use terrorist tactics to accomplish destabilizing goals, was not the transformation expected in 2015 when the JCPOA was signed. Complying with the JCPOA and enacting policies in line with a responsible state actor will help resolve issues and hopefully bring peace to the region.
Working harder to ensure that there is no nuclear arms race in East Asia and the Middle East is a goal all nations must pursue. Failure would bring us closer to nuclear conflict and annihilation.
This piece was first published in the Washington Times and the views are those of the author and do not represent any government agency or department.
Read more from Ambassador Joseph DeTrani in The Cipher Brief

 

[Housecarl]

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Three Huge Defense Threats For Which Washington Is Woefully Under-Prepared

If you think the U.S. is prepared to cope with any big threat that comes its way, guess again.

www.forbes.com

Editors' Pick3,085 views Jan 31, 2020, 12:04pm
Three Huge Defense Threats For Which Washington Is Woefully Under-Prepared






Loren Thompson Senior Contributor


Aerospace & Defense
I write about national security, especially its business dimensions.

The United States outspends every other nation on defense, and as a result has the best trained, best equipped military in the world. The joint force regularly undertakes missions that no other country’s military would be capable of executing.

However, there are existential defense threats for which the nation is not prepared—existential in the sense that they could make the continued functioning of democratic government within U.S. borders nearly impossible.

These threats get short shrift in national strategy, either because they have never occurred before or because there are no easy remedies. Unfortunately, the vulnerability of the U.S. to the threats could make them attractive options for America’s enemies in the future.

Here are three such threats.

Artificially engineered pandemics. Pandemics are epidemics that spread across vast areas, including potentially the whole world. There have been several in recent centuries that killed many millions of people. The 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic, which originated in Kansas, eventually spread throughout the world and killed 50-100 million. Life expectancy in the U.S. declined by ten years. Smallpox killed more human beings than all the wars of the 20th century combined.

These contagions, like the current coronavirus outbreak, were naturally occurring events that resulted from spontaneously occurring mutations—often allowing the disease to jump from animals to humans. Today, for the first time in history, it is possible to engineer such mutations in a laboratory, spawning microbes that combine the virulence of seasonal influenza with the lethality of smallpox.

A weaponized strain of influenza might combine the transmissibility of seasonal H1N1 with the ... [+]
Wikipedia

In fact, using synthetic biology, it is possible to fashion novel pathogens (disease-producing microorganisms) for which there is no previous experience. The technological tools and genetic material for conducting such experimentation are available for a few hundred dollars on the Internet, often with no questions asked, and millions of people around the world possess the skills to use them.
A bipartisan report on biodefense issued on the eve of President Trump’s inauguration warned that the U.S. was “woefully under-prepared” for coping with major incidents, whether naturally occurring or artificially engineered. The new administration acknowledged the danger when it issued a revised national security strategy, and put in place a whole-of-government framework for preparing. But the amount of money allocated was modest and a reorganization of the National Security Council staff eliminated personnel dedicated to the task.
If a truly novel pathogen were introduced into the U.S. population, either by a foreign nation or non-state actor, there might be little the government could do before vast numbers of people were killed. At the height of the 1918 flu pandemic, 4,597 people died in Philadelphia during a single week.
Undeterrable nuclear players. Nuclear weapons are the most destructive tools of war ever devised. A single Russian warhead delivered against a major U.S. city could kill hundreds of thousands and cause panic throughout the nation; Russia currently has over a thousand such warheads aimed at America.

A 23 kiloton nuclear detonation. Many warheads in the Russian strategic arsenal have 20 times this ... [+]
Wikipedia
The United States has no defense against a sizable attack from Russia or China. Instead, it relies upon the threat of assured retaliation to deter enemies from contemplating nuclear aggression. That’s why the U.S. maintains a diverse arsenal of nuclear weapons, but spends only a fraction of 1% of its defense budget on active defense of the homeland—mainly to counter a small North Korean attack.
The assumption among many experts is that it is not feasible to build effective defenses against large-scale nuclear attacks because each weapon is so destructive and the cost to an enemy for increasing its arsenal is a fraction of what it would cost to add to defenses. In other words, the “cost-exchange ratio” favors the attacker.
The problem with this reasoning is that not all nuclear powers will be led by rational actors. Some will be bad at calculating risks, some will have difficulty thinking clearly in a crisis, some will be accident-prone, and some will be downright crazy. The current U.S. nuclear posture offers few options for dealing with an adversary who is not deterred by threats of retaliation.
Offensively-based deterrence is arguably the best posture Washington can pursue until it comes up with viable defensive technologies, but at the moment little is being spent on trying to find a solution. Ronald Reagan thought the nuclear status quo was a catastrophe waiting to happen; he is the last president who embraced active defense of the homeland.
Collapsed power grids. When the U.S. Army Air Forces assembled the first air war plan in U.S. history during the summer of 1941, it designated Germany’s electrical power grid as the top-priority target. Planners recognized that if the electrical grid collapsed, other vital networks—communications, transport, healthcare, etc.—would soon follow.
The same remains true for every industrialized nation today, including the United States. However, a December 2018 report from the President’s National Infrastructure Advisory Council found that “existing national plans, response resources, and coordination strategies would be outmatched by a catastrophic power outage.” The council envisioned the possibility of a no-notice, long-duration outage involving tens of millions of Americans that could produce cascading failures in other networks across the nation.

Although the nation's electric grid contains 120,000 miles of high-voltage lines, it is not as ... [+]
Wikipedia
The report acknowledged that such an outage might originate in natural causes such as bad weather or solar disturbances, but it also noted that “the power grid is a prime target for attack by nation states.” Envisioning a scenario in which power might be cut off for months or even years due to a lack of capacity for quickly replacing damaged hardware, the council foresaw the possibility of severe social disruption.
This is not a fantasy. Foreign nations are known to be testing the cyber defenses of U.S. electrical utilities, and the grid is intrinsically vulnerable to physical attacks by even small numbers of operatives (including terrorists). Although the federal government has in place authorities for dealing with regional outages, they have never been tested over prolonged periods.
The report found there are no consistent criteria for building resilience into the grid, and detected a “lack of understanding of the cascading, cross-sector interdependencies” between various components of national infrastructure. In addition, preparedness for protracted outages is nearly non-existent at the individual household level, where loss of electricity for a few days is the worst problem most families have encountered with their power supply.
Causing a mass outage lasting months could be within the means of multiple malevolent actors, because as the Sandia National Laboratory has noted, “grid vulnerabilities can be easily discovered through open Internet research.” A severe power outage might be coupled by enemies with other actions aimed at hobbling Washington’s response to aggression. The infrastructure council’s warning was authoritative and alarming, but the response of official Washington has been muted.
Check out my website.

Loren Thompson
I focus on the strategic, economic and business implications of defense spending as the Chief Operating Officer of the non-profit Lexington Institute and Chief Executive Officer of Source Associates. Prior to holding my present positions, I was Deputy Director of the Security Studies Program at Georgetown University and taught graduate-level courses in strategy, technology and media affairs at Georgetown. I have also taught at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government. I hold doctoral and masters degrees in government from Georgetown University and a bachelor of science degree in political science from Northeastern University. Disclosure: The Lexington Institute receives funding from many of the nation’s leading defense contractors, including Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and United Technologies.

 

[Housecarl]

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Military Facing Tight Deadlines to Modernize Nuclear Triad

Military Facing Tight Deadlines to Modernize Nuclear Triad

www.nationaldefensemagazine.org

STRATEGIC WEAPONS

Military Facing Tight Deadlines to Modernize Nuclear Triad
1/31/2020
By Yasmin Tadjdeh

Photos: Defense Dept.

All three legs of the United States’ nuclear triad are rapidly approaching the end of their planned service lives. Officials from both the Air Force and Navy are racing against tight schedules to bring new platforms online to replace them.
The triad is made up of land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles, long-range bombers and ballistic missile submarines. Legacy systems are reaching retirement age at the same time over the next decade or so. That has officials scrambling to ensure there is no lapse in coverage, particularly as the United States faces threats abroad.
“We go to great lengths to ensure that every one of those weapons systems, regardless of how old they may be or how long they’ve been in service, will always, always get the job done if ever called upon to do so,” said Vice Adm. Dave Kriete, deputy commander of U.S. Strategic Command. “But we can’t maintain those standards with the current weapon systems forever.” Strategic Command, located at Offutt Air Force Base near Omaha, Nebraska, is in charge of the nation’s nuclear forces.
Kriete noted that because of previous decisions, the Defense Department currently finds itself trying to replace several components of its aging nuclear deterrent at the same time.
“We haven’t staggered them,” he said during a panel discussion at a nuclear modernization seminar hosted by MITRE Corp. and George Washington University. That has presented a challenge to the military.
“We have an accumulated level of risk and we acknowledge that,” he said in December.
The Navy is working to replace its Ohio-class submarines with new Columbia-class boomers. The Ohio originally had a service life of 30 years, but the sea service extended that to 42 years, which it will soon reach, said Vice Adm. Johnny Wolfe, director of strategic systems programs for the Navy.
The Columbia is the service’s No. 1 acquisition priority and it plans to get the lead boat on patrol by 2031, he said. The Navy plans to buy 12 submarines.
While the program is funded and going well, it is also “line-on-line,” he said.
“Every Ohio that we have to pull up, we will get a Columbia just in time,” he said. “We pushed that modernization program as far as we can push it.”
Wolfe declined to specify exactly how much slack the program has remaining but said there is still margin to get to first delivery on time.
In the meantime, the service must ensure that the Ohio-class is an effective nuclear deterrent.
“We continue to prove for Stratcom the reliability and the accuracy of that system,” he said. It does so by conducting periodic missile launches at least four times a year to prove that the system works. In 2019, the Navy launched five missiles to test its capability.
“All five of those flew exactly like we wanted them to fly,” Wolfe said. However, at least two of the missiles were the oldest the Ohio-class program has ever flown. “As these systems go to sea, we’ve got to start modernizing because we all know just from a materiel perspective, things will eventually age out.”
The Air Force has responsibility for two legs of the nuclear triad: long-range bombers and land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles. The service is currently working on a program called the ground-based strategic deterrent, or GBSD, to replace its Minuteman III systems.
The ICBM leg of the triad is the most prompt and responsive, said Lt. Gen. Richard Clark, the service’s deputy chief of staff for strategic deterrence and nuclear integration. The military has about 400 ICBMs that an adversary would have to take into account if it considered striking the United States.
“If you didn’t have those 400 ICBMs that are ready to go at a moment’s notice, you could actually cripple our nuclear enterprise with about 10 targets,” he said. “You could take out our two sub bases, our three bomber bases, Stratcom, the Pentagon and our three labs ... at Los Alamos, at Sandia and at [Lawrence] Livermore.”
However, the weapons are aging. The Minuteman III system is 39 years past its planned service life, he said.
“We’ve been able to sustain it and we’re going to be able to sustain it until we bring GBSD” online, but the margin is very slim, Clark added. “That acquisition is going very well right now … but we have a long way to go and we have to stay consistent. We have to continue to be committed to this. And given the current budgetary situation that we’re in, there’s always going to be risks to it.”
Both Boeing and Northrop Grumman were expected to compete for GBSD, but Boeing dropped out of the competition last year after indicating that it felt Northrop had an unfair advantage due to its better access to the solid rocket motor market through its acquisition of Orbital ATK, which could give it a cost advantage.
In December, the Air Force announced it had only received one bid for the program and would pursue a sole-source contract.
The Air Force is also working to refurbish its fleet of B-52 bombers that can carry nukes with new engines, radars and other systems, he added.
That will bring the platform into the 21st century and for some decades to come, he said. The bombers will also be coupled with the long-range standoff weapon, or LRSO, which will take the place of the air-launched cruise missile, or ALCM.
“ALCM is 25 years past its service life and we have issues with that from an availability [standpoint] as our stockpile drives down,” Clark said. “From a reliability standpoint, it’s very old and that reliability continues to go down, and from a survivability standpoint, the ALCM is losing some of that because our adversaries have developed air defenses that challenge” it.
The LRSO can also be coupled with a new bomber the Air Force is pursuing known as the B-21 Raider, which will replace the B-2, he said. The Air Force plans to buy more than 100 of the Northrop Grumman-built nuclear-capable platforms.
The first test flight of the B-21 is slated for the end of next year. The Air Force plans to bring the platform online in the mid-2020s.
The Raider will be a “delivery platform that not only will give us some standoff capability, but will also give us the ability to penetrate,” he said.
Meanwhile, plans to acquire sea-launched cruise missiles and submarine-launched ballistic missiles armed with low-yield nuclear weapons are moving forward, said John Rood, the undersecretary of defense for policy.
The controversial weapons — which many Democrats oppose — were called for in the Trump administration’s Nuclear Posture Review that was released in February 2018.
As part of the review, the administration said there needs to be an increased focus on refurbishing the nation’s nuclear triad and adding additional capabilities to the arsenal.
The ballistic missile effort — which utilizes an existing submarine-launched ballistic missile, the D5, and would feature an existing warhead that is modified to be low-yield — is “going well,” Rood noted during a meeting with reporters in December.
As for “the submarine-launched cruise missile, we are not as advanced in the development of that,” he said. “That’s still going through an analysis of alternatives and other work.”
The United States has had low-yield nuclear weapons in its arsenal for decades, but those systems were designed to be air delivered, he noted.
However, based on threats from great power competitors Russia and China, there is a need for more delivery options, Rood said.
Washington, Moscow and Beijing have been moving in opposite directions, he said. The United States has been reducing its reliance on nuclear weapons as well as the size of its nuclear stockpile.
At the same time, both Russia and China have been increasing their strategic reliance on nuclear weapons and modernizing their systems.
“The whole point of having a robust, capable nuclear arsenal is to deter behavior by others and aggressive action,” Rood said. “In order to restore deterrence where we thought it might be becoming weaker than we like, we have asked for these supplementary capabilities in order to send a signal that we have a variety of means that are more survivable than the existing low-yield nuclear weapons aboard aircraft.”
Strategic Command is also working on bolstering nuclear command, control and communications, or NC3.
Kriete said NC3 is so critical to the effectiveness of the nation’s nuclear deterrence it may be better to call the triad a quadriad.
Former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis “recognized that if we don’t apply a similar level of effort for recapitalizing our nuclear command, control and communication systems in the future, they will age out, they will become vulnerable, they will become ineffective at connecting our senior leadership with our operational forces, rendering our triad less effective than we need it to be,” Kriete said.
Stratcom has formed an NC3 enterprise center and brought on a skilled workforce for the effort, he said.
“They’re bringing the best talent and the best minds together to start to envision what NC3 should look like in the future,” he added.
The fielding of an upgraded nuclear command, control and communication system is a historic opportunity, he said.
“We have for the first time ever to ... envision and then design and ultimately field a system that will get the NC3 part of our nuclear mission done as one cohesive capability, vice what we have today which is essentially a patchwork of … over 150 different individual systems that have been fielded individually and put together over time to get the job done,” he said.
Kriete noted that while the current system is safe, secure and effective, it needs to be upgraded.
“We’ve worked hard on understanding and then maintaining and improving the readiness where we can, but … we can’t do that forever,” he said.
These efforts come as the United States faces a number of threats globally, Kriete said. Stratcom primarily focuses on Russia, China, North Korea and Iran.
“Looking at the threat is the first thing we do in the morning and it’s the last thing we do before we go home at night,” he said. “We watch everything from the most tactical movements, the long-term strategic maneuvers and plans [and] doctrine changes — the things that we can observe to best understand what threats we have to face so that we can then tailor our deterrent activities starting with modernization all the way through how we posture and train our forces to make sure that we stay ahead of those threats.”
Despite being part of the New START Treaty, Russia has continued to develop a whole range of nuclear weapon capabilities that fall outside the boundaries of the agreement, Kriete said.
“Our goal is not to keep up with Russia. It is not to engage in an arms race. It’s really just to field the right deterrent in terms of capabilities and numbers,” he said.
China, on the other hand, is not on the same level as Russia and the United States in terms of nuclear weapons capabilities or numbers. However, it is aggressively fielding a new triad, Kriete said.
“In fact, China has in many ways moved much faster than even the United States or Russia has in this area in recent years,” he said.
Meanwhile, North Korea has made headlines over the past several years as it builds up its nuclear capability and the United States works to forge a diplomatic path toward denuclearization.
In 2017, there was a steady drum beat of short-range, medium-range and long-range ballistic missile tests by Pyongyang, Kriete said.
“That was a very busy time for Stratcom,” he said. “The last year or so, not quite so much. And that’s actually a good thing because … we’ve kind of turned the tables on our relationship with North Korea, with an overarching goal of denuclearization. Our diplomats really have been in the lead and U.S. Stratcom still underpins all the work that they do in support of the denuclearization objective.”
Stratcom is also watching Iran closely, he said. The country does not currently have a nuclear weapon capability and the command is aware of indicators that would signal Tehran is planning to go down that path.
Tensions between the United States and Iran have been high in recent weeks following the death of Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, head of the country’s elite Quds Force, in January. The killing was the result of a U.S. drone strike in Iraq. Iran has since stated that it plans to restart its nuclear program.

 

[Pinecone]

Thank you, Housecarl!

 

[Housecarl]

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How kids are conscripted troops in the cartels’ war on the border

There is a surge of fake families crossing the southwestern border in recent years, straining U.S. generosity and subjecting children to horrific abuse.

www.washingtontimes.com

How kids are conscripted troops in the cartels' war on the border
Story TOpics

• Law_Crime
• Eliseo Camposeco-Montejo
• Camposeco-Montejo
• Barack Obama

Boys point an unloaded gun at the sky as they play in La Mora, Mexico, one day before the expected arrival of Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, Saturday, Jan. 11, 2020. Three women and six of their children from ... more >


By Stephen Dinan - The Washington Times - Saturday, February 1, 2020

There is a surge of fake families crossing the southwestern border in recent years, straining U.S. generosity and subjecting children to horrific abuse.

Case in point: Walfrie Eliseo Camposeco-Montejo’s pitch to the Guatemalan woman was simple. The gist: Let me use your son to get into the U.S., and I promise I’ll send him to American schools.

The ailing woman liked the idea. She gave her 12-year-old to Camposeco-Montejo, and they struck off for the U.S. in late 2016 just as another border crisis was developing. Arrested by Border Patrol agents, Camposeco-Montejo used a bogus birth certificate to claim he was the father of the boy and was given the catch-and-release treatment under the “family loophole” in U.S. policy.

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The boy never made it to school.

Instead, court documents say, Camposeco-Montejo forced him into work, 10 hours a day, six days a week, picking peppers or flowers at Florida farms. He was also pressed into the overnight cleaning shift at a movie theater. He got three hours of sleep a day, and Camposeco-Montejo confiscated most of his paycheck. He said the money was to pay off the $5,000 fee they had paid the cartels to be smuggled into the U.S.

The boy, who was identified in court documents only as Minor Victim 1, or MV1, eventually managed to escape and tell his story.

Camposeco-Montejo was arrested and was sentenced to eight years in prison this month.

His case is egregious but is by no means rare.

“For every trafficker like the defendant who is convicted in court, there are dozens of others who continue to operate in broad daylight,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Gregory Schiller said as he pleaded with the federal judge in Florida for a stiffer sentence.

The surge of fake families migrating to the U.S. began during the Obama administration but exploded last year after smuggling cartels figured out how easy it was to pretend to be a family and earn what most illegal immigrants want: quick release into communities, where they disappear into the shadows.

Smugglers began matching children with single adults in Central America and sent them on the treacherous journey north together, armed with fake documents. Other times, as in the case of Camposeco-Montejo, parents “gifted” their children to a migrant.

In some of the most shocking cases, smuggling rings “recycled” children by sending them north with one migrant, returning them to Central America and then sending them with someone else.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement says it has prosecuted more than 700 cases, though rarely are the penalties as severe as Camposeco-Montejo‘s.

Francisco Paredes-Garcia, who tried to use a bogus birth certificate in March to claim a Guatemalan boy as his son, eventually admitted to the scam. He told investigators the real father “gifted” the boy to him.

He pleaded guilty to making false statements to the government and was sentenced to time served, or about 45 days.

Another man, Anibal Ralac-Ajtun, showed up at the border in April with a 16-year-old. Under questioning by ICE agents, he admitted the boy wasn’t related and was in fact “provided” by the smugglers he had paid in Guatemala. He pleaded guilty to illegal reentry into the U.S. and was sentenced to time served, about 29 days.

Flores family loophole

Department of Homeland Security officials and immigration analysts trace the surge of fake families to a 2015 ruling by a federal court in California.

Judge Dolly M. Gee, an Obama appointee, was asked to update the Flores agreement, a 1997 settlement that appeared to grant special protections to children who came to the U.S. without parents. Immigrant rights activists said the agreement should be expanded to include children who come with parents and should be released quickly from detention despite their illegal status.

The Obama administration opposed the idea and warned the courts that children would be “abducted” for people to falsely pose as families.

Judge Gee sided with the activists. She imposed a 20-day limit on child detention and said they should be released to their parents. That meant the parents also had to go free within 20 days.

Thus a loophole was born.

It took time for Central Americans to realize how they could exploit the loophole, but the families started showing up in greater numbers by late 2016. In the final three months of that year, the Border Patrol arrested nearly 45,000 parents and children traveling as families — a record at the time.

Camposeco-Montejo was part of that first wave, but the worst was yet to come.

By early last year, crisis had turned to catastrophe. The Border Patrol nabbed more than 200,000 people traveling as families in one three-month period.

The vast majority are real families, sometimes fleeing rough conditions back home. Among them are legitimate asylum cases, but most are simply seeking jobs or to reconnect with family already in the U.S. Bringing a child was their passport — a way to puncture laws designed to keep them out.

There is no way to determine how many of the families are fake.

Camposeco-Montejo arrived in 2016, but his scam wasn’t detected until much later, after the boy escaped from his control.

ICE last year created Operation Noble Guardian and sent agents to the border to investigate suspected cases of fake families. In 20% of the cases flagged for investigation, they found evidence to dispute an adult’s claims of parentage of the child they transported.

Some are relatives, such as an uncle or elder brother, but others are not.

In one recent case, agents grew suspicious of a woman who had a 2-month-old baby girl but wasn’t breastfeeding. They also spotted red flags in her documents, said Matt Albence, acting director at ICE.

The woman agreed to a DNA test of her and the child, but three cheek-swab samples in a row from the baby showed a mixture of two DNA types. Agents figured out that the woman was spitting into the baby’s mouth to try to fool the test.

Mr. Albence said ICE has identified some of the smuggling organizations involved and has dozens of active investigations.

“We didn’t realize the scope of it until we were down there with boots on the ground — the amount of children that was being recycled and utilized for the sole purpose of allowing an unrelated adult to pose as a family,” he said.

Time served

The increase in families crossing the border also meant more children dying from the journey.

The first deaths were just before Christmas in 2018, and more followed in 2019.

One woman lost her 8-year-old son when the boy’s father brought him on the journey. She told Reuters they watched others gain quick entry to the U.S. by bringing a child.

“Lots of them have gone with children and managed to cross, even if they’re held for a month or two. But they always manage to get across easily,” the mother told the news organization.

In the wake of the boy’s death, The Washington Times asked Judge Gee whether she bore responsibility for the situation, given the warnings the Obama administration delivered about abductions. Her courtroom deputy instructed The Times not to contact the judge’s chambers.

Compounding matters is the relatively light punishment for those who attempt to fake a family. Most of the cases The Times has tracked to completion ended with the culprits sentenced to time served, which amounted to weeks behind bars.

The federal prosecutor in the forced labor case told the court that Congress has “not truly recognized” the severity of those kinds of situations.

Officials said Congress has other options. It could close the Flores loophole, which would remove the incentive for adults to bring children on the trip.

“These family cases are something new,” said John F. Bash, the U.S. attorney for the Western District of Texas, the largest federal district on the southwestern border. “These family cases are all part of an effort to take advantage of that policy.”

He said officials generally see three types of cases. One involves two adults who show up, with one posing as a juvenile. A second involves an actual family group, such as a mother and child, along with someone else claiming to be part of the family — perhaps a husband and father.

The rarest situation, Mr. Bash said, are cases such as Camposeco-Montejo, in which the adult and child are completely unrelated.

Prosecutors have a few options. They can bring charges of fraud, charges of lying to an investigator, or smuggling charges, but that is only in the worst situations. The most common charge is illegal entry or reentry.

“It’s because the child is not really being, in a lot of these cases, smuggled or kidnapped. It’s a bunch of people lying about their age,” he said.

Yet in some cases it is kidnapping.

Guillermo Flores Jr., the court-appointed lawyer who represented Camposeco-Montejo, said his work on the forced labor case in Florida was eye-opening.

“For me, it was an example of just how important it is to have secure borders and how real the problems are occurring at the borders,” he said, adding that his client was “utilizing the system against itself.”

The boy, now 16, is living with a foster family, Mr. Flores said, and is seeking a victim visa that would earn him a path to stay in the U.S. He attended the sentencing.

Mr. Flores said Camposeco-Montejo was able to fool Border Patrol agents because it was easy to obtain a fraudulent birth certificate in Guatemala.

Mr. Flores said he was also struck that no employer questioned the age of the 12-year-old.

“Imagine the cases that we’re not getting an opportunity to see and rescue young people from,” he said. “How many are we truly missing?”



On the border, the news is better.

After struggling for solutions and suffering the embarrassment of the failed “zero tolerance” policy in 2018 that led to family separations, the administration settled on a set of solutions that are working.

Now a framework is in place to deal with the flow of migrants from Central America, officials say.

The chief goal was to deny them the foothold in the U.S. that quick release provided.

Key changes included expedited hearings, negotiating deals with Central American governments for faster deportations of those who lose their cases, and pushing tens of thousands back across the border to make them wait for their hearings in Mexico.

Mexico, under pressure from Mr. Trump, deployed tens of thousands of its own national guard troops to try to turn back some migrants before they reached the U.S.

The number of families has plummeted. In the final three months of 2019, the Border Patrol arrested fewer than 27,000 — an 87% reduction from the peak.

Officials say the number of fake families has declined with the overall flow and that cases they see increasingly involve migrants from far afield, such as Brazil or African nations.

In one incident this month, Patrick Joao de Conceicavo showed up at the border crossing in Brownsville, Texas, claiming to be from Angola and demanding asylum for himself and his supposed juvenile son.

But when officers talked to the son, he acknowledged his name was Abraham Abraham Nkom, he wasn’t related to Mr. Joao de Conceicavo and he was born in 1994, making him at least 25.

Mr. Joao de Conceicavo refused to concede but agreed to a DNA test. It showed the probability of a parent-child relationship was “0.00 percent,” according to court documents.

Mr. Joao de Conceicavo now faces smuggling and fraud charges.

 

[Housecarl]

Posted for fair use.....

Children in Mexico Are Joining a Self-Defense Militia in Response to Cartel Violence - HipLatina

Children in a remote, mountainous region in Mexico’s Guerrero state are training to defend their homes as part of their local volunteer police group. CNN&

hiplatina.com

Children in Mexico Are Joining a Self-Defense Militia in Response to Cartel Violence

News and Entertainment

Posted: January 31, 2020

Children in a remote, mountainous region in Mexico’s Guerrero state are training to defend their homes as part of their local volunteer police group. CNN’s Natalie Gallón reports that kids between the ages of 6-12 have begun training about two months ago as part of CRAC-PC (Regional Coordination of Community Authorities – Community Police). The group, which formed in 2014, has about 200 members and began recruiting minors about eight months ago.

2019 was the deadliest year for #Mexico as a whole since records began, with a staggering 35,588 murders. This small town in #Guerrero says the threats & violence leave them no choice but to train their children to protect themselves & their community -CNN Children are joining a self-defense militia in Mexico
— Natalie Gallón (@NGallonCNN) January 30, 2020

“I prefer that they had a notebook and pen, but the need forces us,” Elvia told CNN, she has two sons aged 14 and 17 who are part of CRAC-PC. Her husband and CRAC-PC member Jose added, “If there was an opportunity to for them to study — to become someone — that would be what we want most, but seeing the government do nothing to offer security to our communities, well now we rise up to defend our community.”
President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (known as AMLO) took office in 2018 and has maintained a “Hugs, Not Bullets” approach to drug cartel violence which has proven to be ineffective despite his insistence that you can’t end violence with more violence. Crime continues to rise with 2017 initially considered the deadliest year in Mexico with roughly 25, 339 murders however in 2018 that number rose by 33 percent with 33,341 murders. Now, according to CNN, 2019 is the deadliest year yet with 35,588 murders, according to the National Public Safety Secretariat.
In October of last year, there was a shootout between cartels and the police in Guerrero and Michoacán that left more than 30 people dead and Ayotzinapa, Guerrero is also where 43 students disappeared in 2014. So the indigenous community in Guerrero has taken steps toward combating the violence through social mobilization including identifying and shaming corrupt officers and judges who work with the cartels, according to The Conversation. Organizing and training a civilian police force is, therefore, another extension of their efforts and now the addition of children is meant to ensure the younger generation is equipped to protect the community.
CNN reports that so far the volunteers haven’t confronted criminals yet but now with the recruitment of children the local children’s rights organizations believe the Mexican government will take note of the extreme measures taken in the face of growing violence. “The ads for child recruitment in the CRAC’s are a desperate act to get the attention of the Mexican State,” Mexico’s Network for the Rights of Children told CNN.
Guerrero’s school system is so broken that elementary school teachers sometimes simply don’t show up and traveling to other cities or towns for educational purposes is difficult as traveling can be dangerous with criminal groups in the area. This means that spending all day – hours can go from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. – training doesn’t tend to come at the cost of schooling for many of the children involved.
Diego – a 12-year-old recruit Gallón spoke to – said he used to go to school but the teachers stopped coming and when he’s asked if he understands what it means to be armed he said, “If I carry a gun, it can be loaded and I might hurt someone.”

Virginia Isaad

Virginia Isaad is an L.A.-based journalist who has written for publications including Elite Daily, Hello Giggles and Upworthy. She’s also contributed to the Be Visible Latinx blog and worked as a staff writer for El Paso Times and assistant editor for lifestyle website Gayot.com. She was born in Argentina and raised in the San Fernando Valley...

 

[Housecarl]

Posted for fair use.....

Iran to launch observation satellite in 'coming days'

METATEXT

www.spacedaily.com

SPACE.WIRE
Iran to launch observation satellite in 'coming days'

Tehran, Feb 1 (AFP) Feb 01, 2020

Iran is preparing to launch a new scientific observation satellite in the "coming days", the head of the country's national space agency told AFP on Saturday.
Manufacture of the Zafar (Victory in Farsi) satellite "began three years ago with the participation of 80 Iranian scientists," said Morteza Berari, without giving a date for the launch.
The 113-kilogram satellite will be launched by a Simorgh rocket 530 kilometres (329 miles) above the Earth, where it will make 15 orbits daily, said Berari.
The satellite was designed to remain operational for "more than 18 months", he added.
Its "primary mission" will be collecting imagery, said Berari, who said Iran needed such data to study earthquakes, prevent natural disasters and develop its agriculture.
"It will be a new step for our country," said Berari, noting that Iran had previously managed to place a satellite into orbit 250 km (155 miles) above the Earth.
While the Islamic republic's satellite programme has concerned some Western countries, Berari said Iran advocates for the "peaceful use of outer space".
"All our activities in the domain of outer space are transparent," he said.
The Iranian Space Agency hopes to construct five more satellites before March 2021, Berari added.
In January 2019, Tehran announced that its Payam (Message in Farsi) satellite had failed to reach orbit, after authorities said they launched it to collect data on environmental change in Iran.
The launch of its carrier rocket was preceded by warnings from Washington, which described it as a "provocation" and a violation of a 2015 UN Security Council resolution which endorsed an international accord on curbing Tehran's nuclear programme.
Resolution 2231 called on Iran to refrain from any activity related to ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons.
Iran maintains it has no intention of acquiring nuclear weapons, and says its aerospace activities are peaceful and do not violate the security council resolution.

 

[Housecarl]

Hummm....Particularly when you consider the pedigree of the author.....

Posted for fair use.....

Nuclear deterrence: An outdated theory? - Khmer Times

‘Emergence of Mutually Assured Destruction mechanism is understandable’

www.khmertimeskh.com

Opinion
January 31, 2020
Nuclear deterrence: An outdated theory?
Chan Kung / Khmer Times Share:

Aerial photo after the second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, Aug 9, 1945. AFP

Since the conception of nuclear weapons, the theory of deterrence was quite well-received for a long period of time.

The basic strategy of the world’s nuclear states has been more or less affected by it. Therefore, such a theory has had a great impact on the world’s security environment.
The system content of nuclear deterrence theory is rather complicated, but its main ideological composition is not exactly that complex to understand.

It is generally believed that deterrence is achieved mainly through two aspects, be it through “punishment” or “denial”.
The former refers to the establishment of a force with sufficient destructive power, so that the other party will be forced to give up its offensive behaviour in consideration of its own losses.
This method is defensive in nature. The latter refers to deterrence by reducing the success rate of the other party’s offensive behaviour, and this method is offensive in a certain sense.
US military strategist Bernard Brodie’s view in 1959 was that a country with a reliable nuclear deterrent must always be ready to use nuclear weapons, but they must not already be used beforehand, else deterrence would be impossible.
US economist and professor of foreign policy, national security, nuclear policy and arms control Thomas Schelling’s 1966 classic Arms and Influence argues that the ability to inflict harm on another country is now used as a factor in preventing the country from doing something. He believes that the power of bargaining based on force makes the basis of the deterrence theory.

Naval Group CEO Herve Guillou poses during the official launch of the new French nuclear submarine Suffren in Cherbourg, France. AFP
Relative equilibrium

During the Cold War period, the world order was established beneath the nuclear protection umbrella of the US and Soviet Union.
This setup was possible because of the formation of a relative nuclear equilibrium.
Therefore, the deterrence theory had its own unique value, and hence it made sense that it was developed during this period.
A relatively weak but nuclear-holding force could use the extreme destructive power of nuclear weapons to stop another more powerful adversary.

As long as this particular relatively weak country could survive the first wave of sudden attacks, then it would have its voice in the new international world order system.
This view has prompted more countries to desire possessing nuclear power, and has actually promoted the development of nuclear weapons and nuclear technology.
Since the beginning of the new century, with the development of nuclear technology and the popularisation of nuclear weapons in the world, more and more countries have begun to come into possession of nuclear weapons and this has greatly questioned and challenged the existing value of nuclear deterrent theory.
In 2004, US political science professor Frank Zagare proposed that the theory of nuclear deterrence was logically inconsistent and empirically unreliable.
Geopolitical experts and scholars such as Henry Kissinger, Bill Perry, George Schultz and Sam Nunn also expressed similar views.
They believe that nuclear deterrence is far from making the world a safer place and that nuclear weapons have become an extreme risky element.
In China, having tracked the risk of nuclear warfare, Anbound has warned numerous times that since North Korea’s first nuclear test in 2006, because of the miniaturisation of nuclear weapons, especially the universalisation of nuclear states, the world is facing unprecedented risks of nuclear war.
In other words, Anbound’s main point of view is that the theory of nuclear deterrence is now outdated, and the use of nuclear weapons as a deterrent to prevent the outbreak of nuclear war is actually kind of self-numbing in nature.
As the world enters an era of nuclear confrontation, nuclear strategy is now a norm that is part of the greater scope of military strategy.

Barack Obama hugsShigeaki Mori, who survived Hiroshima. AFP
Alarming scale

In the current world, the countries with nuclear weapons have developed from the United States and the Soviet Union to the five permanent members of the United Nations.
All of them now have nuclear weapons, and now India, Pakistan, and North Korea have also joined the Nuclear Club.
This does not include Israel that presumably possesses nuclear weapons and South Africa that formerly possessed them.
If we look at the projection power of nuclear weapons, the scale of development is even more alarming.
About 20 countries in the world have various types of ballistic missiles and other projection vehicles. These countries with nuclear weapons have developed from two to five and further expanded to eight.
Moreover, the ideological differences between these countries are very huge and the strategies they have adopted are rather targeted as well. It is therefore unimaginable for these countries to strike a new form of nuclear equilibrium.
Therefore, the emergence of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) mechanism is entirely understandable.
This “all-in-one” military strategic move is actually a catastrophic scenario should it take place after the disillusionment of nuclear equilibrium.
If the world’s strategic theory of nuclear deterrence is obsolete, what kind of nuclear confrontation model will best take its place then?
The world’s few main forms of potential models of nuclear confrontation can be summed up as follows.

1. The Israeli-Iranian nuclear threat model that ensures the military geography superiority formed by the possession of nuclear weapons.
2. North Korea’s nuclear provocation model that ensures geopolitical bargaining power.
3. The India-Pakistan nuclear superiority model that ensures conventional military superiority.
4. The nuclear equilibrium model of the United States, Russia and China that ensures the nuclear order holds true among the major powers.

Among these nuclear confrontation models in the world, North Korea’s nuclear provocation model is the most unstable one.
This is mainly because of its concentrated strategic goals and geographical conditions that make it impossible for North Korea to withstand a nuclear strike and launch a revenge nuclear attack afterward.
Obviously, North Korea also understands its limitations in such limited geographical conditions.
Therefore, North Korea’s nuclear strategy tends to be pre-emptive, which is actually the cause of the long-standing denuclearisation disputes on the Korean peninsula.
Objectively speaking, we believe that any solution to the Korean peninsula issue without the goal of denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula is meaningless. It is far less realistic and feasible than maintaining the status quo.
The other great danger of world nuclear confrontation lies in its first application.
Today, it will have been 75 years since humans first launched nuclear weapons.
During this period, the development of nuclear weapons technology has been tremendous.

US President Barack Obama (C) delivers his speech next to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe (L) after laying wreaths at the cenotaph to offer a prayer for victims of the atomic bombing in 1945, at Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima on May 27, 2016. – Obama on May 27 paid moving tribute to victims of the world’s first nuclear attack. (Photo by KIMIMASA MAYAMA / POOL / AFP)
Greater strategic appeal

The emergence of precision guidance and GPS technology, the continuous development of rocket technology, the miniaturisation of nuclear weapons, multiple independently re-entry vehicle (MIRV) technology and the maturity of “clean” nuclear weapons technology all indicate that the tactical effectiveness of nuclear weapons have great strategic appeal.
Once the door is opened to the tactical use of nuclear weapons, there will be no turning back, and the world will certainly enter into an era of nuclear warfare.
In fact, the greatest danger in this regard would be the oceans. Anbound’s researchers have previously pointed out in research briefs that the world’s oceans have had a huge impact on the current structure of the world economy, but they have now become “nuclear oceans”, with a large number of nuclear weapons and their carriers floating in the ocean.
In addition, an unknown number of nuclear weapons are always in a ready state.
When it comes to the use of tactical nuclear weapons, oceans and navies would be among the first tactical options for countries.
This is undoubtedly a huge and serious area of risk to the globalisation of world markets, world trade and the global order that has so far never been taken seriously in the negotiation of a nuclear deal.
With the change of times, the dated model of nuclear deterrence that relied on “punishment” and “denial” simultaneously is disintegrating.
In the era of nuclear confrontation, the future nuclear forces and its related theory will gradually tilt toward the “denial” approach.
The operational objective of nuclear weapons will be to (quickly) transit from “counter value” to “counter force”.
The future of nuclear deterrence will be ever more aggressive.
This also means that the likelihood of nuclear weapons being used will be ever higher and the risk of a real nuclear war taking place in the world will be more shocking and confusing than ever before.
This is not only about the collapse and reconstruction of the global nuclear arms control system.
It is also about world peace and global development.
Founder of Anbound Think Tank in 1993, Chan Kung is now Anbound Chief researcher. He is one of China’s renowned experts in information analysis. Most of his outstanding academic research activities are in economic information analysis, particularly in the area of public policy.

 

[Housecarl]

Hummm.....

Posted for fair use.....

Russia to build military base in Somalia – media

Moscow's growing influence in Africa is worrying many in the West, the report says.

www.unian.info

Russia to build military base in Somalia – media 21:50, 30 January 2020

Moscow's growing influence in Africa is worrying many in the West, the report says.

REUTERS Russian officials are eyeing a port of Berbera as a location for their base on the coast of Somaliland, a self-declared state within Somalia on the Gulf of Aden, according to U.S. Defense Department officials. Both China and the United States, with military bases in Djibouti, share the same coastline as the potential Russian port.

Russia has also expressed interest in building a naval logistics center in Eritrea, but it is unclear how far along those negotiations are, American officials said, according to NYT.

About 1,500 miles south, down the eastern coast of Africa, Russian military transport planes landed last summer in Cabo Delgado Province in northern Mozambique and, according to American officials, deployed about 160 personnel belonging to the Wagner Group, a Russian private military contractor.

The Mozambique government hired the Russian mercenaries to help beleaguered local security forces combat an insurgency that claimed to be affiliated with the Islamic State. At least seven Russian personnel have been killed in operations, American officials say, underscoring the risks facing troops for hire.

Read also: Ergodan says 2,000 Russian mercenaries deployed in Libya

American officials, analyzing what they call great power competition, say they are alarmed by Russia's growing influence, as well as China's, as Washington struggles to exert its economic and security goals on the continent. This campaign for influence is playing out as U.S. Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper is weighing the potential withdrawal of hundreds of forces from West Africa to better counter threats from Russia and China closer to their borders. But Mr. Esper's review has drawn sharp criticism from influential congressional Republicans and Democrats who argue that cutting American forces in Africa would help only its rivals.


Read more on UNIAN: Russia to build military base in Somalia – media

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Turkey targets Somalia for oil drilling

ANKARA: Turkey is to drill for oil off the shores of Somalia after an invitation from the Horn of Africa nation to explore its seas, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said. Somalia adopted a new petroleum law last week to attract further foreign investment in the energy field, and opened up 15...

www.arabnews.com

Turkey targets Somalia for oil drilling

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. (AFP)
Short Url

Turkey targets Somalia for oil drilling

ANKARA: Turkey is to drill for oil off the shores of Somalia after an invitation from the Horn of Africa nation to explore its seas, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said. Somalia adopted a new petroleum law last week to attract further foreign investment in the energy field, and opened up 15...

arab.news

• Ankara has been increasing its footprint in the country since 2011

Updated 23 January 2020
MENEKSE TOKYAY
January 23, 2020 01:12
5932
Follow @arabnews
ANKARA: Turkey is to drill for oil off the shores of Somalia after an invitation from the Horn of Africa nation to explore its seas, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said.

Somalia adopted a new petroleum law last week to attract further foreign investment in the energy field, and opened up 15 blocks for oil companies that are willing to explore the country’s hydrocarbon potential.

Turkey has been increasing its footprint in Somalia, especially since 2011 when it began providing the country with humanitarian aid to tackle a famine problem, and is also signing energy and resource deals with African countries.

It will start exploring for gas in the eastern Mediterranean this year after signing a maritime agreement with Libya, and has a deal with Niger to carry out mineral research and exploration activities.

“There is a proposal from Somalia,” Erdogan said on Monday. “They are saying: ‘There is oil in our seas. You are carrying out these operations with Libya, but you can also do them here.’ This is very significant for us.” Turkish engineers are carrying out infrastructure work in Somalia, but contractors are increasingly being targeted in terror attacks.

Local forces have been trained by Turkish officers at a military base that was built by Turkey in the Somali capital Mogadishu.

Ibrahim Nassir, an Africa analyst from Ankara-based think tank Ankasam, said the Somali drilling offer might be payback for some of the reconstruction work and humanitarian aid. But he also suggested that Somalia might be using Turkey as a counterbalance against its regional rivals.

FASTFACT
Turkey has been increasing its footprint in Somalia, especially since 2011 when it began providing the country with humanitarian aid to tackle a famine problem, and is also signing energy and resource deals with African countries.

“The dispute over maritime territory in the Indian Ocean between Kenya and Somalia might result in security risks during drilling activities, and some armed groups may be used to prevent Ankara from proceeding with hydrocarbon exploitation,” he told Arab News.

Jędrzej Czerep, a senior analyst at the Polish Institute of International Affairs, said that Turkish oil extraction from Somalia could be presented as stealing national wealth.

“That would expose the Turks to greater risks both on the mainland and at sea where Al-Shabab is using motor ships. It could also divide the growing Somali diaspora in Istanbul or even radicalize some of its members,” he told Arab News.

An unstable political situation in Somalia could expose Turkey further, according to Atlantic Council senior associate Charles Ellinas. The third Turkey-Africa Partnership Summit is set to be held in April in Turkey.

“It is not just the short term one should be worried about,” he told Arab News. “It is also the longer term. It takes something like 20 years to recover the investment from an oilfield. And during that period oil sales must be maintained. As things stand, with a very unstable political environment, upheavals in Somalia over such a period are quite likely.”

 

[Housecarl]

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FBI investigates border wall gun battle that left two wounded in California

The incident, which has not been publicly disclosed, occurred on the night of July 1 east of the San Ysidro border crossing, when Mexican security guards came under fire while protecting materials and equipment for Texas-based Ultimate Concrete, according to a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers report.

www.stripes.com

FBI investigates border wall gun battle that left two wounded in California

• 
  A border barrier separates the United States and Mexico in the San Diego area.
  
  CAROLYN VAN HOUTEN/THE WASHINGTON POST
  
  By NICK MIROFF AND JOSH DAWSEY | The Washington Post | Published: February 1, 2020

A shootout at a border wall construction site near San Diego that wounded two Mexican security guards last summer is now under FBI investigation, according to private contractors and government documents obtained by The Washington Post.
The incident, which has not been publicly disclosed, occurred on the night of July 1 east of the San Ysidro border crossing, when Mexican security guards came under fire while protecting materials and equipment for Texas-based Ultimate Concrete, according to a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers report.
One of the guards was shot in the lower right buttock, and another suffered a light shoulder wound. The assailants were not identified, but security camera footage of the incident showed that a group of six or seven gunmen approached a job site where U.S. contractors had been installing steel barriers during the day.
"Three men in the vicinity of the border wall immediately opened fire" on the two security contractors, according to the Army Corps account. "Both men took immediate cover and began returning fire," repelling the assailants.
For U.S. authorities, the episode raised questions about use-of-force rules for the Mexican companies hired to protect southern access to worksites where U.S. crews are building Trump's wall. The report also describes concerns raised by U.S. Border Patrol agents who encountered Mexican security guards crossing back and forth across the international boundary without authorization.
SLS, the primary contractor that hired Ultimate Concrete, revised its security protocols after the incident to make sure its security personnel on both sides of the border have met U.S. screening standards, the report stated.
FBI agents made an unannounced visit to the San Diego area offices of SLS on Jan. 22, and executives from the company immediately sent a letter to the Army Corps expressing shock and concern that federal investigators had arrived to ask questions about the shooting.
SLS has been awarded contracts worth more than $1.5 billion for barrier construction at multiple locations, government records show.

Liz Rogers, a spokeswoman for SLS, said the company is cooperating with investigators. She declined to provide details because the investigation is ongoing.


"SLS fully complied with the FBI's requests and voluntarily answered all questions," said Rogers, who is the marketing director for the firm, which is based in Galveston, Texas. "The agents were very professional and the entirety of their visit was less than one hour."


The FBI also issued a subpoena to Jesse Guzman, who owns Ultimate Concrete, documents show. Reached by telephone, Guzman referred questions to the FBI.


Officials with the Army Corps referred questions to the FBI. The FBI and U.S. Customs and Border Protection did not respond to requests for comment on the incident or the investigation.


According to the Army Corps report, dated July 29, Ultimate Concrete hired the Pinkerton agency to provide security at the job site, but the two men injured in the shooting were working for another Mexico-based firm, NSSP.


The shooting victims received medical treatment and had "returned to full duty," the report states.


NSSP had not been vetted by the Army Corps or U.S. Customs and Border Protection to work at the job site, according to the report, a step considered unnecessary because the firm was hired to work on the south side of the border.


"When NSSP personnel were interviewed, they stated they were all prior Mexican National Army and had been trained on when to use deadly force," the report states.


The Mexican security guards would take snapshots of the worksite every evening when they came on duty to guard equipment and materials overnight, largely to show supervisors the following morning that nothing had been missing.


NSSP personnel communicated with a security manager for Ultimate Concrete via the WhatsApp messaging app but sometimes strayed north across the border onto the job site, according to the report.


U.S. border agents saw the Mexican security agents crossing into and out of the United States, making what appeared to be unauthorized entries into U.S. territory. At a job site that essentially straddled an open border, the crisscrossing Mexican security guards drew the attention of U.S. agents.


"The concern was that there were two Mexican nationals 'either posing as or working for Pinkerton on the north side of the border wall,' and that both the Ultimate Concrete and Pinkerton contractors on site denied any knowledge of additional security being hired," according to the report. "When confronted, the Mexican national security personnel again reiterated they were Pinkerton employees."


The report found that the Mexican security guards did not violate rules of engagement during the shootout, having come under attack from assailants before returning fire.


Construction progress on Trump's new "border wall system" is more advanced in the San Diego area than nearly anywhere else the government has added new fencing, resulting in the biggest and most elaborate barrier system along the entire 2,000-mile boundary with Mexico.


Across most of the San Diego border area, a "primary" steel bollard fence is backed by a "secondary" 30-foot barrier, with a road running between them that allows U.S. agents to corral smugglers and migrants in a dedicated "enforcement zone."


The Tijuana-San Diego area is the busiest and most lucrative drug trafficking corridor on the border, according to U.S. officials, and mafia violence on the Mexican side has surged in recent years. Border Patrol agents and other CBP personnel working in the area did not make changes to their security posture after the shooting incident, according to the report.


The Washington Post's Matt Zapotosky contributed to this report.

 

[jward]

'Jihadist attack' in Burkina Faso village kills nearly 20 civilians
Issued on: 02/02/2020 - 19:21Modified: 02/02/2020 - 19:21


Suspected jihadists killed nearly 20 civilians in an attack overnight on the northern Burkina Faso village of Bani, Seno province, security sources said Sunday.



“The attackers, heavily armed and on motorbikes, literally executed the local inhabitants,” the security source told AFP. The attackers left nearly 20 dead, the source added.
A local health official, speaking from the town of Dori in the north, said the chief nurse at the nearby village of Lamdamol was among the victims.
“There is panic in the village and the surrounding area,” the official added, saying local people were fleeing the area towards the centre-north of the country.
Another security source said that the attack had come as a reprisal after jihadists had told local people to leave the area a few days earlier.
The security forces worked day and night to make the zone safe, “but it is difficult to be everywhere at once”, said the source.
This latest attack comes a week after several similar attacks in the north of the country.
On January 25, an attack killed 39 civilians in the village of Silgadji, in the neighbouring province of Soum, northwest of Seno.
Burkina Faso borders Mali to the northwest and Niger to the east, both countries that are struggling to contain a wave of lethal jihadist attacks.
Burkina’s security forces, under-equipped and poorly trained, have not been able to counter the deadly raids in their territory, despite the help of foreign soldiers, notably French troops.
According to UN figures, the jihadist attacks in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso killed 4,000 people in 2019 and caused an unprecedented humanitarian crisis, having forced 600,000 to flee their homes.
(AFP)

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'Jihadist attack' in Burkina Faso village kills nearly 20 civilians

Suspected jihadists killed nearly 20 civilians in an attack overnight on the northern Burkina Faso village of Bani, Seno province, security sources said Sunday.

www.france24.com

 

[Housecarl]

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US to boost Egyptian air defenses despite congressional anger

The Trump administration plans to provide Egypt with excess military equipment even as members of Congress seek sanctions against the country over the death of a US citizen.

www.al-monitor.com

US to boost Egyptian air defenses despite congressional anger

Jack Detsch
January 31, 2020

Article Summary

The Trump administration plans to provide Egypt with excess military equipment even as members of Congress seek sanctions against the country over the death of a US citizen.

REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh
Egyptian air force planes parade during the inauguration ceremony of the new Suez Canal, in Ismailia, Egypt, Aug. 6, 2015.

The Donald Trump administration has OK’d a deal to supply Egypt with excess air defense units, even as several senators press the White House to sanction Cairo over the recent death of a US citizen.
As part of a recent deal, the United States will send the Egyptian military parts to maintain Chaparral fire units along the nation’s border through a Pentagon program that supplies American partners with excess weapons.
A State Department official told Al-Monitor. that the “transfer will provide the Egyptian military with parts to maintain its existing Chaparral fire units, which are deployed throughout the country in support of border security operations. This will help the Egyptian military maintain its operational capabilities and defend Egypt’s homeland.”
Transferring the tank-like Chaparral units will not adversely impact American military readiness, the official said, or hamper future US sales to Egypt, which receives $1.3 billion in American military aid each year.
Also read



UN chief calls for end to escalating conflict in NW Syria




The official did not disclose the value of the Chaparrals, which were designed during the Cold War to target Soviet aircraft. The Pentagon stopped using the weapons more than two decades ago, and finalized the deal to send the units to Egypt in December.
But the move comes as Congress is expressing increasing anger over the death of Mustafa Kassem in Egyptian custody, and the Trump administration is concerned that Egypt could be falling under Russian influence.
The former New York taxicab driver and dual US-Egyptian citizen was detained by authorities during the deadly 2013 Rabia al-Adawiya Square massacre in Cairo when military forces killed hundreds of protesters after military leader Abdel Fattah al-Sisi overthrew the Muslim Brotherhood-backed government. Sisi is now president.
Kassem was held without charges until last year, when he was convicted by a court on grounds that his lawyers indicated were bogus. In the wake of his death, Democratic Sens. Patrick Leahy of Vermont and Chris Van Hollen of Maryland have called for the Trump administration to sanction Egypt and slap top officials with visa bans.
The State and Defense Department floated potential sanctions against Egypt last year over a deal to buy Russian Sukhoi fighter jets, The Wall Street Journal reported, but no sanctions have been publicly reported. Egypt, which exited the US-led Middle East Strategic Alliance that the administration set up to counter Iranian military influence, also recently gave Russia overflight rights and has flirted with buying different weapons systems from Moscow.
The State Department official said the agency had no updates on a $1 billion sale of 24 Apache helicopters to Egypt that the United States OK’d in 2018. Egyptian forces using US-made rotorcraft mistakenly fired on a tour group in 2015, killing 12 tourists and wounding an American citizen the military believed to be terrorist plotters.

Found in: Human rights, Defense/Security cooperation




Jack Detsch is Al-Monitor’s Pentagon correspondent. Based in Washington, Detsch examines US-Middle East relations through the lens of the Defense Department. Detsch previously covered cybersecurity for Passcode, the Christian Science Monitor’s project on security and privacy in the Digital Age. Detsch also served as editorial assistant at The Diplomat Magazine and worked for NPR-affiliated stations in San Francisco. On Twitter: @JackDetsch_ALM, Email: jdetsch@al-monitor.com.

Read more: US to boost Egyptian air defenses despite congressional anger

 

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Moscow Reacts Warily to NATO’s Largest Military Exercise in 25 Years

Russia’s political-military leadership frequently criticizes the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) for its enlargement and for staging military exercises close to Russian borde

www.realcleardefense.com

Moscow Reacts Warily to NATO’s Largest Military Exercise in 25 Years

By Roger McDermott
February 03, 2020

​

U.S. Army Photo by SPC Cody Kellum

Russia’s political-military leadership frequently criticizes the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) for its enlargement and for staging military exercises close to Russian borders. This pattern has intensified since Russia’s intervention in Ukraine in 2014 and the subsequent downturn in its relations with the United States and its allies. Surprisingly, therefore, Moscow’s official reaction has been somewhat muted during the current run up to the active phases of NATO’s largest exercise in Europe in 25 years—though some Russian military experts have been making critical comments to the media. On January 23, the US Department of Defense confirmed that a redeployment of United States military personnel had commenced, transferring forces from the homeland to Europe as part of the NATO exercise Defender Europe 2020. The wide-spanning maneuvers will focus on the Baltic States, Poland and Georgia, involving more than 36,000 personnel from 11 countries (Lenta.ru, January 26, 2020).
Russian news outlets have highlighted that this year’s Defender Europe exercise scenario is based on a war breaking out on the continent in 2028, between NATO and an enemy close to its borders. Additional reports stressed the scale of the exercise, with 28,000 U.S. military personnel participating, including the deployment of 20,000 from the United States. Referring to the magnitude of the drills, Vadim Kozyulin, a professor at the Russian Academy of Military Sciences, compared them to the 1983 Able Archer, which resulted in Soviet forces being placed on alert. Despite the scale of Defender Europe 2020 not even coming close to Able Archer 1983, a number of the upcoming exercise’s features may well cause concern for the Russian defense establishment (Lenta.ru, January 26, 2020). Kozyulin asserted, “Such large-scale exercises will seriously aggravate the situation. Moreover, the main events will be held in Poland, Georgia and the Baltic countries, which not only border Russia, but also [exhibit] an unfriendly attitude toward our country” (Km.ru, January 27).

These reports also stressed a number of aspects of the exercise that may help explain the lack of an official response from Moscow thus far. Defender Europe will become an annual NATO exercise with a large-scale iteration planned for even-numbered years and smaller versions occurring in between. US military personnel will constitute the bulk of the force this year, with European allies collectively providing only 8,000 personnel. As Russian analysts expect, moving the forces, equipment and hardware will prove quite challenging to the North Atlantic Alliance forces. Moreover, Defender Europe 2020 is the first exercise of its kind, which may have persuaded Russia’s defense leadership to cautiously study the exercise in all its various elements before responding to it (Km.ru, January 27, 2020; Lenta.ru, January 26, 2020; Rusvesna.su, January 25, 2020).
In a detailed commentary in Izvestia, the Moscow-based military analyst Anton Lavrov assesses the implications of the exercise, and identifies areas that will be closely monitored by Russia. Lavrov notes that Defender Europe will work out how the Alliance will fight a “war of the future” by testing an experimental strategy and some of its latest military equipment, adding, “Almost 500 American tanks, self-propelled guns and heavy infantry fighting vehicles, hundreds of aircraft, [as well as] tens of thousands of wheeled vehicles will take part in the exercises.” The force buildup for the maneuvers will continue until April, and then NATO will conduct a series of drills forming part of the overall exercise. Crucially, this will provide an opportunity for the US to road-test its latest doctrinal development, namely “multi-domain battle,” which adds space and cyberspace to the traditional domains of land, sea and air. Lavrov states, “The concept will be tested in a series of command and staff exercises of the allied forces” (Izvestia, January 26, 2020). The exercise divides into three related elements: transferring 20,000 US troops from the homeland to Europe and back again, moving US personnel based in Europe, and conducting a series of smaller exercises alongside allied forces.
Lavrov also points to the fact that Defender Europe 2020 will rehearse both defensive and offensive operations. One feature of the offensive operational aspects relates to US airborne forces conducting three joint airborne assault landings. In each case, the leading role is assigned to US forces. In the drop into Latvia, they will be joined by forces from Spain and Italy; in Lithuania, they are aided by personnel from Poland; and an additional multilateral airdrop is planned for Georgia (Izvestia, January 26, 2020).
As noted, one key challenge relates to the logistical tasks of moving troops and equipment over such vast distances. US military personnel and equipment will land at airports across Europe and seaports in Antwerp (Belgium), Vlissingen (Netherlands), Bremerhaven (Germany) and Paldiski (Estonia). Russian military expert Vyacheslav Shurygin explained the nature of the challenge: “The transport infrastructure of Europe has not encountered such large-scale movements of military equipment for a long time.” Indeed, the redeployment of forces and hardware involved cannot be compared to standard US battle group rotations (Izvestia, January 26, 2020).
Clearly, one of the objectives of the exercise is to assess the efficiency of these deployments into a potential theater of military operations. Lavrov adds, “Even for the modern US Army, the transfer of heavy tank and infantry divisions from continent to continent is a difficult, lengthy and expensive task. Twenty thousand units of equipment that the Americans will use in the maneuvers will arrive from the US, and another 13,000 will be received by the military from storage bases on the spot. In Europe, there are now four large storages of American military equipment. Each one has everything, from tanks and artillery to trucks and medical vehicles, to equip a tank brigade. Another similar base is being built in Poland and will be commissioned in 2021” (Izvestia, January 26, 2020).
One commentary in the Russian media stressed not only that NATO was deploying forces for exercises close to Russia’s borders but pointedly also referenced Belarus, which fits with Moscow’s scenario planning for its Zapad series of strategic military exercises: “However, the fact that such a powerful group of US and NATO forces is practicing deployments near the borders of Belarus and Russia, against the background of a growing American military presence in Poland and the Baltic countries, is a matter of concern” (Rusvesna.su, January 25, 2020). It remains to be seen whether Russia’s political-military leadership will continue to be cautious about Defender Europe, restricting its criticism to public rhetoric, or if it will ultimately try to engage the Alliance in political or information warfare on this front.
Roger N. McDermott specializes in Russian and Central Asian defense and security issues and is a Senior Fellow in Eurasian Military Studies, The Jamestown Foundation, Washington DC, Senior International Research Fellow for the Foreign Military Studies Office (FMSO), Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, and Affiliated Senior Analyst, Danish Institute for International Studies, Copenhagen. McDermott is on the editorial board of Central Asia and the Caucasus and the scientific board of the Journal of Power Institutions in Post-Soviet Societies. He recently wrote The Reform of Russia’s Conventional Armed Forces: Problems, Challenges and Policy Implications (October 2011).
This article appeared originally at The Jamestown Foundation's Eurasia Daily Monitor.

 

[Housecarl]

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Commanders Push Back Against Efforts to Reduce US Troops in Africa, Latin America

Troop drawdowns in Africa and Latin America would go against vital U.S. national security interests, commanders said.

www.military.com

Commanders Push Back Against Efforts to Reduce US Troops in Africa, Latin America

U.S. Army Lt. Col. Eldridge Singleton, seated left, the security cooperation officer with U.S. Embassy Belize, and U.S. Marine Lt. Col. Erich Bergiel, seated right, the executive officer of the Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force – Southern Command (SPMAGTF-SC), interact with students before a project completion closing ceremony, Sept. 28, 2018, near Orange Walk, Belize. (Justin M. Smith/U.S. Marine Corps)

1 Feb 2020

Military.com | By Richard Sisk

Combatant commanders for Africa and Latin America made the case Thursday for more U.S. military, diplomatic and economic involvement in their regions, even as the Defense Department mulls troop drawdowns.
Army Gen. Stephen Townsend, head of U.S. Africa Command, and Adm. Craig Faller, head of U.S. Southern Command, received bipartisan support for their positions at a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Oklahoma, the committee's chairman and a close ally of President Donald Trump, said that AFRICOM and SOUTHCOM "have never been adequately resourced."
A drawdown in either region to free up more troops to counter Russia and China makes no sense when both Russia and China are aggressively expanding their influence in Africa and Central and South America, Inhofe said.
Related: Pentagon Eyes Guantanamo Bay Military Prison for Cuts to Personnel, Infrastructure
Sen. Jack Reed, D-Rhode Island, the committee's ranking member, made similar arguments at the hearing, pushing back against the possibility that an ongoing Pentagon review of the U.S. force posture worldwide might lead to withdrawals.
"While it is wise, and in fact necessary, to take a hard and methodical look at our investments and military activities around the globe, it would be strategically unwise to disengage from either Africa or Latin America in an effort to generate small, near-term budgetary gains," Reed said.
Defense Secretary Mark Esper has said repeatedly in recent weeks that the force posture review could result in withdrawals in some regions to either send troops home or reposition them as part of the National Defense Strategy to counter China and Russia.
He said in December that decisions would be made "in the coming weeks" on troop withdrawals from Afghanistan, but no announcements have been made.
While Townsend and Faller were testifying Thursday, Esper held a Pentagon news conference at which he skirted questions on which regions could face a drawdown.
"I know the inclination is whenever someone says 'review,' the word that automatically pops up in their head is 'reduction.' It is a rebalancing," Esper said.
"In some cases, we will increase; in some cases, we won't change; and in some cases, we will decrease," he said but gave no details.
In an unusually lengthy and detailed presentation to the committee, Townsend made the traditional request of all combatant commanders for more intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets and argued that small investments of troops and assistance go a long way on the continent.
He backed up his case with an 18-page prepared statement, presented graphics showing Russia and China's advances in Africa, and focused particularly on China's so-called "debt diplomacy," in which it puts African nations in hock with the promise of building roads, ports and infrastructure.
"I have learned that small investments in Africa go a long way," Townsend said in the prepared statement. "A few bucks and a few troops can make a significant difference and have proven to be the cornerstone of multinational efforts in the region.
"What U.S. Africa Command accomplishes with relatively few people and few dollars, on a continent 3.5 times the size of the continental United States, is a bargain for the American taxpayer," he said.
Townsend also appeared to be sending a message to the Pentagon that a drawdown in Africa would free up only a relatively small number of troops for repositioning to the Indo-Pacific region to counter China.
The troop estimate for AFRICOM has usually been given as 6,000, but Townsend, possibly for the first time in public, gave a breakdown. There are 5,100 US troops and about 1,000 Defense Department contractors in the region, he said.
Faller echoed Townsend in calling for more attention to the inroads made by Russia and China in Latin America, and called for more investments by the U.S. in addition to more assets for SOUTHCOM.
China and Russia are propping up Nicolas Maduro's dictatorship in Venezuela, where an estimated five million refugees have fled the regime to neighboring countries, he said.
The region has also been exploited by a "vicious circle of threats" from trans-national criminal organizations thriving on drug trafficking, said Faller, whose command has about 1,200 assigned military and civilian personnel and is bolstered by rotational troop and naval assets.
Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, noted that there were an estimated 67,000 deaths in the U.S. last year attributed to drugs, adding that SOUTHCOM has the capacity to detect only about 25% of the drug shipments coming to the U.S. from Latin America.
"We detect 25%," Faller said in response, but "we only interdict 9%" due to the lack of Navy and Coast Guard ships to intercept the drug runners.
King asked, "Who do we need to talk to get those assets? We are woefully falling down on this responsibility."
In his opening remarks and questions, Inhofe questioned how much would be contributed to the National Defense Strategy by withdrawing the relatively small number of troops now assigned to AFRICOM and SOUTHCOM.
"You're talking about two areas where there aren't enough people to reposition," he said.
Much of the hearing was devoted to examining China's efforts to build up debt and dependence across Africa through investments in infrastructure.
Townsend called China's investments "debt trap loans -- that is exactly what we're seeing. Most African leaders are wise to it," he said, but they are susceptible to money up front.
"They build not just debt but dependence," he said of the Chinese.
The Chinese policy in Africa was likened to "payday loans" by Katherine Zimmerman, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and Africa specialist, was referring to the high-interest instruments that trap many troops in mounting debt.
"African leaders are not stupid," she said in a phone interview. "They know what deals they're making" with the Chinese, but many are reluctantly willing to trade long-term dependence for immediate assistance.
She contrasted the Chinese approach to U.S. policy on assistance and aid, which often comes with requirements for long-term development plans and delays in delivery.
"When you're drowning, you accept any help," Zimmerman said.
-- Richard Sisk can be reached at Richard.Sisk@Military.com.
Read more: Trump Reverses Obama-Era Restrictions on Military Use of Land Mines

 

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A Russian "Inspector" Spacecraft Now Appears To Be Shadowing An American Spy Satellite

The Russian satellite recently moved into a new position where it has an especially good view of a US KH-11 spy satellite.

www.thedrive.com

A Russian "Inspector" Spacecraft Now Appears To Be Shadowing An American Spy Satellite
The Russian satellite recently moved into a new position where it has an especially good view of a US KH-11 spy satellite.

By Joseph Trevithick
January 30, 2020

• The War Zone

via @M_R_Thomp
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Publicly available data suggests that a Russian inspector satellite has shifted its position in orbit to bring it relatively close to a U.S. KH-11 spy satellite. Russia has a number of what it calls "space apparatus inspectors" in orbit, which the U.S. government and others warn the Kremlin could use to gather intelligence on other satellites or function as "killer satellites," using various means to damage, disable, or destroy those targets.
On Jan. 30, 2020, Michael Thompson, a graduate student at Purdue University focusing on astrodynamics, posted a detailed thread on Twitter about the Russian inspector satellite Cosmos 2542, also written Kosmos 2542, appearing to synchronize its orbit with a U.S. satellite known as USA 245, which is understood be one of the National Reconnaissance Office's KH-11 image gathering spy satellites. Russia launched this particular satellite from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome on Nov. 25, 2019, according to Space-Track.org, a U.S. government website that provides public data on space launches from the U.S. military's Combined Space Operations Center and the U.S.-Canadian North American Aerospace Defense Command. This is just one of a number of space apparatus inspectors and other curious satellites that the Kremlin has put into orbit over the past decade.




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"This is all circumstantial evidence, but there are a hell of a lot of circumstances that make it look like a known Russian inspection satellite is currently inspecting a known US spy satellite," Thompson wrote. "A pretty thorough look of the satellite catalog can't produce another potential target that looks as good as this in terms of the orbits and viewing geometry."

Starting on Jan. 20, 2020, Cosmos 2542 had conducted a series of maneuvers to change its position and timing to match USA 245's "orbital period." The Russian satellite had previously been circling the planet in the same plane as its American counterpart, Thompson explained, but in such a way that the two only came relatively close to each other once every 11 to 12 days.

Prior to its most recent set of maneuvers, it was still in the same plane as USA 245, but its period was offset such that there were only relatively close passes every 11-12 days.
— Michael Thompson (@M_R_Thomp) January 30, 2020​

"Note that any two satellites in the same plane with offset periods will have passes like this at some regular cadence," Thomspon added. "It's enough to raise suspicion, but not prove anything."
However, how Cosmos 2542 is orbiting now means that it now has a "consistent view" of USA 245. "As I'm typing this, that offset distance shifts between 150 and 300km depending on the location in the orbit," according to Thompson.

The periods are now less than 1 second apart, meaning that Cosmos 2542 is loitering around USA 245 in consistent view. As I'm typing this, that offset distance shifts between 150 and 300km depending on the location in the orbit. pic.twitter.com/C3fGKwfaLL
— Michael Thompson (@M_R_Thomp) January 30, 2020​

A spacing of 150 to 300 kilometers, or between 93 and just short of 186 and a half miles, may not seem "close" by terrestrial standards, but it is for objects circling Earth in the vacuum of space at speeds of thousands of miles per hour. "The relative orbit is actually pretty cleverly designed, where Cosmos 2542 can observe one side of the KH11 when both satellites first come into sunlight, and by the time they enter eclipse, it has migrated to the other side," Thompson Tweeted, meaning that the Russian satellite has the potential opportunity to observe both sides of USA 245.

The relative orbit is actually pretty cleverly designed, where Cosmos 2542 can observe one side of the KH11 when both satellites first come into sunlight, and by the time they enter eclipse, it has migrated to the other side. pic.twitter.com/zaEBZJhFaO
— Michael Thompson (@M_R_Thomp) January 30, 2020​

Cosmos 2542 had already been involved in other curious activities since its launch in November 2019. On Dec. 6, 2019, Russia announced that it had deployed another smaller satellite, dubbed Cosmos 2543, while in orbit. Nico Janssen, another satellite observer, noted that USA 245 had shifted its own orbit between Dec. 9 and Dec. 10, possibly to prevent a collision with Cosmos 2543, according to RussianSpaceWeb.com. Janssen had also noted that Cosmos 2542 had synchronized its orbit with the American spy satellite.
It's still unclear what, if anything, in particular, Cosmos 2542 might actually be doing in this new orbit. One possibility is that it could be using onboard systems, such as cameras or other sensors, to gather information about the KH-11, the capabilities of which are highly classified. The Russian Ministry of Defense has said that the satellites exact capabilities are classified, but Interfax reported that its cameras are also capable of Earth imaging, in addition to monitoring other satellites in the inspector role, according to RussianSpaceWeb.com.
Thompson questioned the intelligence value of visually observing the exterior of the American satellite, pointing out that publicly available information has already allowed for good estimates as to the basic imaging capabilities of these spy satellites, the first variations of which entered service in the 1970s. Of course, USA 245 was last of the most modern KH-11 Block IV satellites, also known as the Evolved Enhanced CRYSTAL System, to be launched and there may still be value in examining it externally. It may also be possible to gather electronic or signals intelligence data that could be of additional value.
Beyond that, the ability of Cosmos 2542 to get into this position at all is notable and is exactly the kind of orbital maneuvering that the U.S. government had pointed to in the past evidence of potential "killer satellites." A highly maneuverable, but small satellite could possibly get close enough to disrupt the operation of, disable, or destroy another object in space using a variety of means, ranging from electronic warfare jammers to directed energy weapons, such as a laser.
When it comes to spy satellites, it might be possible to just spray chemicals or other materials that blind or otherwise damage the lenses on their cameras. A low power laser could also blind optics persistantly if the attack satellite were to be able to get in a good position. A killer satellite could also just simply smash into its intended target to try to damage or destroy it.

DIA
A US Defense Intelligence Agency disagram showing the various means by which one satellite might attack another.
Russia insists that its inspector satellites are only in orbit for their ostensible mission of being available to get close to the country's other space-based systems and examine them if they break down or otherwise malfunction. However, Thompson notes that the only other satellites in this particular plane are Cosmos 2523, Cosmos 2543, and the Russian commercial remote sensing satellite Resurs-P1. Cosmos 2523 is another inspector satellite. Cosmos 2523 is also part of a group of Russian satellites that observers have previously watched perform various curious maneuvers back in 2018, as well.

While they are in the same plane, the passes are typical of any two satellites in the same plane: taking place at a distance of a few hundred km every few days. Not in consistent view, and the most recent maneuvers did nothing to improve the viewing geometry with any of these.
— Michael Thompson (@M_R_Thomp) January 30, 2020​

Whatever Cosmos 2542 is or isn't doing, its present position is clearly deliberate and it is hard to see how it would not be related in some way to the position of USA 245. It is worth noting that this is hardly the first time similar confluences in orbit have occurred and that observers have spotted U.S. satellites possibly examining foreign satellites in the past, as well.
Russia is known to be interested in anti-satellite capacities and has developed or is developing a number of terrestrial anti-satellite weapons, including ground-based and air-launched interceptors, too. China is pursuing similar developments, as well. The appearance of Cosmos 2542 in its new orbit also comes as the U.S. military is very publicly working to address concerns about the increasing vulnerability of various space-based systems that it relies on heavily.
These space-based capabilities range from space-based early-warning systems to intelligence gathering platforms such as the KH-11 to satellites supporting navigation and communications, all of which would absolutely critical in any potential future conflict. The most obvious expression of this recent push is the creation of U.S. Space Force, an entirely new branch of the U.S. military to focus on American military activities in and related to space, as well as the procurement of satellites and other related systems and infrastructure.

Russian Ministry of Defense
The Soyuz-2-1v/Volga space launch vehicle carrying Cosmos 2542 blasts off from Plesetsk Cosmodrome on Nov. 25, 2019.
One of Space Force's immediate tasks will be to simply craft an understanding of what a future war in space might actually look like, which is an ever-increasingly realistic prospect, as The War Zone has highlighted on numerous occasions in the past. Despite this reality, basic definitions of what a conflict in space might entail and how the U.S. might act in response, including possible shows of force or direct retaliation, significant issues that The War Zone has also previously examined in-depth.
"There may come a point where we demonstrate some of our capabilities so that our adversaries understand they cannot deny us the use of space without consequence," then-Secretary of the Air Force Heather Wilson had said at the Space Foundation’s 35th annual Space Symposium in 2019. It remains unclear exactly what she meant, but her comments certainly indicated an increasingly tense environment for the U.S. military in space.
"The central point is that we need a cadre of people who grow up and spend their whole careers learning and thinking: 'how we dogfight in space,'" Air Force Major General Clinton Crosier, the Deputy to the service's Deputy Chief of Staff for Strategy, Integration, and Requirements, said at RAND Corporation think tank event in 2019. "Our adversaries have things on orbit that are looking at ways to do harm to our systems."
U.S. military officials and politicians have also called for the declassification of more information about U.S. military space capabilities, which could potentially help explain what options may be available to deter or respond to potential threats in orbit. "In many cases in the Department [of Defense], we’re just so overclassified it’s ridiculous, just unbelievably ridiculous," U.S. Air Force General John Hyten, the present Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at a recent Air Force Association gathering, speaking broadly about classification issues, according to Defense News.
How to react to the activities of foreign satellites, such as Cosmos 2542, where it may not be clear what the threat is, or if there even is one, is exactly the kind of issue that the U.S. military, and the new Space Force, in particular, will only increasingly be faced with as time goes on.
Contact the author: joe@thedrive.com

 

[Housecarl]

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China and nuclear restraint | The Strategist

China increasingly finds itself depicted as the bête noire of nuclear arms control. The US government has said the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty collapsed because of Chinese actions outside the treaty and not merely Russian ...

www.aspistrategist.org.au

China and nuclear restraint

4 Feb 2020|Rod Lyon

China increasingly finds itself depicted as the bête noire of nuclear arms control. The US government has said the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty collapsed because of Chinese actions outside the treaty and not merely Russian violations inside it. Moreover, President Donald Trump has proposed transforming the current strategic nuclear arms agreement between the US and Russia—New START—into a trilateral agreement which covers China’s strategic nuclear forces as well.
On its face, arguing for a more energetic Chinese role in arms control is an easy task. Certainly, China’s conventional missile inventory has developed in leaps and bounds since 1987, when the INF Treaty first went into effect. And in broader geopolitical terms, today’s landscape looks considerably different to the one upon which the arms control regime was originally constructed. In the long run, arms control agreements will become less credible, and less strategically meaningful, if they can’t adapt to reflect the shifting power distribution of the international order.
Besides, arms control has upsides for its participants: it locks in power, rather than merely locking it down, and it reduces the risks of unregulated strategic competition. As Tong Zhao, a senior fellow at Carnegie, argues in the latest issue of Arms Control Today, ‘Over time, China’s own interest will align with arms control for several reasons … [T]he major-power competition between Washington and Beijing is going to be a long-term reality … t is in no one’s interest, including China’s, to allow this competition to become completely uncontrolled and unregulated.’
But that’s a minefield in which we should tread cautiously. A central issue at play concerns the form of controls and regulations, not simply their presence or absence. Western publics, and arms controllers themselves, are familiar with a certain sort of nuclear restraint. That’s the version where formal agreements are hammered out in painstaking—almost litigious—detail around a negotiating table before final signature by senior political figures. Such treaties are written with extraordinary care and have, over time, made an important contribution to nuclear strategic stability.
But that doesn’t leave much space for other forms of restraint. The Asian nuclear order, for example, typically relies on voluntary self-restraint. It doesn’t turn upon finely wrought treaties outlining strict numerical limits on particular weapon systems, counting rules, compliance schedules and verification provisions. Restraint is, instead, demonstrated by small arsenal sizes, slow development of a full nuclear triad (of land-based and sea-based missiles plus strategic bomber aircraft), and declaratory policies which emphasise a reluctance to cross the nuclear threshold.
China is a good example of that Asian model of nuclear order—hence its small nuclear arsenal, few nuclear tests, no-first-use commitment, tolerance of large numerical asymmetries vis-à-vis its possible nuclear rivals, and slow development of its nuclear triad. In a manner characteristic of that Asian order, Chinese nuclear weapons sit in the strategic background rather than the foreground.
What we’re witnessing, then, is the collision of two separate and distinct models of nuclear restraint: on one hand, what we might call the ‘Euro-litigious’ model; on the other, the model of voluntary self-restraint. China may have few runs on the board in relation to the first model, but it has plenty in relation to the second.
So why might China want to sit around the arms control table? Two possible reasons: process and outcomes. Let’s start with process. Sitting at the same table as the US and Russia as the world’s third major player would suggest American and Russian recognition of China as a nuclear peer. That’s a big step up for China—and one that’d throw a wrench into US alliance relationships in Asia. (Tokyo, in particular, would be upset by American recognition of China as a nuclear peer.) But those gains would come at a price, because buying into the Euro-litigious model would devalue China’s own approach. Worse, some would see it as evidence that Beijing might still be drawn into a gradual acceptance of Robert Zoellick’s ‘responsible stakeholder’ standard.
Let’s turn to outcomes. True, the outcomes of negotiations could both shape the nuclear arsenals that China’s potential rivals deploy and enhance strategic stability and predictability. But what might any ‘final agreement’ look like? SALT and START have really been about numbers, about capping and reducing large strategic-range nuclear arsenals—and China doesn’t have one to begin with. Would China be locked into a separate and smaller cap than the other two? Beijing would be sure to see any such outcome as merely one more form of ‘containment’ of China. China’s voluntary acceptance of numerical asymmetry is one thing; the codification of that asymmetry into a formal treaty would be quite another.
As Zhao suggests, it might be possible to devise an agreement based on asymmetrical strengths—regulating China’s land-based missiles and America’s air-based ones, for example—or, alternatively, an agreement that meshes INF-range capabilities alongside strategic ones. But all three countries would probably want to think more carefully about those options. China and Russia would, I think, be reluctant to sign an agreement legitimising deployment of US intermediate-range systems which could target their homelands when their own intermediate-range systems can’t reach the continental US.
And that’s before we even get to verification. Would China accept the sort of detailed, intrusive verification that would have to be part of any agreement, when its own nuclear arsenal is so weak in comparison to America’s and Russia’s? Weaker parties typically rely more on deception than do stronger parties.
Those who favour drawing China into the more formalised arms control model typically deploy an argument about timeliness. The development of MIRV-ed missiles and China’s SSBN force means we should expect some increase in the size of China’s nuclear arsenal in coming years. But analysts argue over how large that increase might be. The director of the US Defense Intelligence Agency said in May 2019 that we could well see a doubling of Chinese warhead numbers—from, roughly, 300 to 600—over the next decade. That’s possible, but earlier DIA estimates tended to err on the high side.
Moreover, what would the increase mean? By itself, it wouldn’t invalidate the concept of voluntary self-restraint—because modernisation, for all nuclear powers, is typically about being able to continue doing tomorrow what they were able to do yesterday. Much of China’s modernisation program fits that description—it’s about ensuring China’s second-strike survivability and its ability to target an adversary with stronger missile defences.
Still, an expanding Chinese arsenal does imply a certain malleability to the concept of self-restraint. China has not traditionally relied much upon nuclear weapons to coerce other players. Its conventional and paramilitary forces are well placed to serve in that mission. And, of course, Beijing is happy to ‘weaponise’ economic ties and Chinese indigenous communities when it needs to. In short, it already has such a range of coercive levers close to hand that an expanding nuclear arsenal—in and of itself, regardless of final size—would suggest a less self-restrained Beijing in future.
Where does that leave us? Nowhere comfortable. Arms control is a form of strategic competition. China knows it has done well in the past from sidestepping that competition. Drawing it in can only be a long-term project—and Beijing’s certainly in no hurry.

Author
Rod Lyon is a senior fellow at ASPI. Image: Xiao Lu Chu/Getty Images.

 

[Housecarl]

Posted for fair use.....

Is the U.S. Sleepwalking Into a Sino-Centric World Order?

While the U.S. is at a crossroads in navigating the most important foreign policy issue of the century, the U.S. public remains unengaged about the importance of getting U.S.-China relations right. A

www.realcleardefense.com

Is the U.S. Sleepwalking Into a Sino-Centric World Order?

By Lulio Vargas-Cohen
February 04, 2020

geralt - pixabay
While the U.S. is at a crossroads in navigating the most important foreign policy issue of the century, the U.S. public remains unengaged about the importance of getting U.S.-China relations right.
Americans have witnessed what happens in a Wuhan food market, a Xinjiang detention center, or a government compound in Beijing, ripples not only across China but the entire world. In China, we are observing a nation undertaking bold policies to move up the economic value chain, modernizing its military to project power beyond its borders, and building a global web of economic and political links. The U.S. is no less exposed to this evolution than many of China’s closest neighbors; indeed, the bilateral U.S.-Chinese relationship is now the world’s most consequential. We can expect it will remain so for the rest of our lives.
Despite this reality, the U.S. public has not been engaged in a broader discussion about the impact that a risen China will have on both global affairs, or the policy choices the country’s leaders will need to evaluate and navigate moving forward.

Americans do recognize China’s emergence—it is seen as the second most influential nation today, and deemed a "critical threat" by a plurality of the population. This is paired, however, with a muted interest in the issue. Asked by Gallup about the most important challenges facing the country, relations with China does not even register as a rounding error.
One of the consequences of this modest focus is the treatment U.S.-China relations have received from Democratic presidential aspirants. During more than 15 hours of debate airtime since September 2019, only two questions focused on China, addressing the demonstrations in Hong Kong and human rights issues. Reviewing the campaign websites of six leading candidates—Biden, Bloomberg, Buttigieg, Klobuchar, Sanders, and Warren—only one, as of late January, directly addresses engagement with the country. This is likely not an oversight by the campaigns; they are simply responding to the issues that most animate their constituents.
Several factors likely explain how we got here:

• China’s transformation represents a long-running trend, not a quickly-digested news bulletin. Although not always successful, China has demonstrated discipline in its public diplomacy, seeking to avoid the sort of catalyzing events that would inspire focused attention from foreign audiences. This differs from the Soviet Union, whose unexpected development of a nuclear weapon, role in the Korean war, and success in space with Sputnik elevated public awareness and urgency.
• More immediate concerns closer to home. The past decade has focused the country’s attention on the fallout of a major financial crisis and deepening economic inequality, tragic gun violence, America’s “forever wars,” and the election of Donald Trump.
• There are no easy answers about where the U.S. goes from here. This discussion will require a self-assessment of the role that the U.S. sees itself playing in the world moving forward: will it redouble its commitment to the international arrangements of the 20th century Pax Americana, or concede to a diminished role?

But why, exactly, does this issue matter so much relative to competing concerns? Ordinary Americans will increasingly be impacted by how U.S.-Chinese relations are managed. Whether its the prices Americans pay for goods and services following temporary trade wars or longer-lasting economic decoupling, the return on investment of R&D amidst I.P. misappropriation, or the effectiveness of finite tax dollars deployed across shifting defense and intelligence priorities, policy decisions by American leaders will be made with an eye towards the Pacific rim. Absent meaningful transparency and legal scrutiny, China is developing and deploying novel, ethically-questionable technologies, ranging from always-on surveillance tools to CRISPR gene editing. Rather than leading the world in examining the proper use of these systems, the country risks following China’s lead. Even the underappreciated instruments of U.S. soft power face a complex new normal, judging by the NBA’s contortions to negotiate two contrary positions following a team owner’s tweet in support of Hong Kong demonstrators.
Unlike the Soviet Union of the century past, the Chinese Community Party is not saddled by defunct ideological baggage and economic rot. It has, instead, engineered a form of authoritarian capitalism that represents a far more dynamic system of government than its forebears in Moscow.
The issue is made more acute by the treatment it has received thus far from the Trump Administration, whose opening salvo in navigating this strategic evolution was focused on renegotiating terms of trade. While this is a key facet of the relationship, the White House blundered by conflating security and economic issues, undercutting efforts to persuade partner countries not to adopt Huawei technology, which the U.S. government believes is susceptible to compromise (London recently announced they would allow Huawei systems on U.K. networks). This underscores the signal importance that alliance management will play as a prong of effective engagement with China.
Beyond ties with the European allies, Pacific partners have also noticed American diplomacy taking a step back. A recent survey of government and industry leaders in ASEAN countries found that 77% believe the U.S. is less engaged with the region than it was during the Obama Administration; only 35% express confidence in Washington, D.C. as a strategic partner and provider of regional security. These trends reflect a growing deficit of trust and influence, just as China is looking to grow new partnerships through the Belt and Road Initiative and other strategies. There is much work to be done to marshal meaningful engagement not only to the American public but with partner countries, as well.
Fortunately, the trends outlined above have energized a growing body of thinkers and policymakers to the acute need for clarity and fresh thinking in U.S.-China relations. Gone are obsolete notions, such as the belief that China would necessarily adopt liberal norms following WTO ascension. Instead, the race for big ideas is on. However, just as putting our heads in the sand will not diminish this reality the world now faces, conversations about strategy cannot be limited to the halls of think tanks and academia. Sustaining a broader discussion and communicating the need and wisdom of new approaches with the American people will be necessary—the stakes are too high to treat China as anything other than the strategic rival it is.
Lulio Vargas-Cohen is a business strategist working across the public and private sectors, focusing on the intersection of technology, business, policy, and security. Previously, Lulio worked at In-Q-Tel, the venture capital arm of the U.S. intelligence community, and at Booz Allen Hamilton. He holds an MBA from the University of Michigan, an MPP from the Harvard Kennedy School, and was a Fulbright scholar.

 

[Housecarl]

Posted for fair use.....

AFRICOM’s Assessment of U.S. Security Challenges in Africa

There has been some pushback at the suggestion that the United States might pull back some forces in Africa.

intpolicydigest.org

World News /03 Feb 2020

Yacqub Ismail
AFRICOM’s Assessment of U.S. Security Challenges in Africa

While there have been reports of a possible U.S. drawdown of forces in Africa as part of Defense Secretary Mark Esper’s review of U.S. force posture around the globe, the top U.S. general in Africa, General Stephen J. Townsend, presented his assessment to the U.S. Senate that: “A secure and stable Africa is an enduring American interest.”

In the 2018 U.S. National Defense Strategy, which serves as a guidance for the U.S. Department of Defense, the U.S. government prioritized addressing security challenges from China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea as well as violent extremist groups. AFRICOM’s new strategic approach to secure its interests on the continent are guided by the following: partner for success; compete to win; and, maintain pressure on non-state actors.

In AFRICOM’s area of responsibility, according to General Stephen Townsend, both China and Russia “recognized the strategic and economic importance” of the African continent and to address that, both countries are attempting to “expand their influence across the continent,” while violent extremist networks are “expanding in Africa at a rapid pace.” With China establishing its first military base overseas in Djibouti, just miles away from the largest U.S. military base on the continent, Camp Lemonnier, along with major investments in key infrastructures like seaports and airports that could be leveraged to “increase China’s geopolitical influence” throughout Africa.

Russia, on the other hand, uses a different strategy to leverage its influence, through arms sales as well as deploying private military companies (PMCs). In particular, the now-famous Wagner Group recently downed a U.S. drone aircraft in Libya. Russian PMCs have also been operating in other parts of Africa to combat the growing threat from ISIS in Mozambique, to train local forces in the Central African Republic, but it also agreed with Eritrea last year to a naval logistics center on the Red Sea.

General Townsend indicated that both China and Russia are “in a position of advantage” in both Central and Southern Africa, where both countries have heavily invested both economically and strategically. Both Russia and China along with South Africa conducted naval exercises last year near Cape Town with a Chinese guided-missile frigate Weifang as well as a Russian missile cruiser Marshal Ustinov, which indicates the growing desire of both Beijing and Moscow to augment their presence on the continent.

As the Pentagon is reassessing its force posture on the continent, major concerns have been raised about the possibility of a U.S. drawdown in the region, and how it could affect counterterrorism efforts in the region, in particular in the Sahel, where France is leading a multi-year counterterrorism campaign against multiple extremist organizations. U.S. assistance in areas like airlifting, air refueling for French aircraft, intelligence sharing, as well as training and assisting local forces serves a critical role for those operations, and a drawdown of U.S. forces is unwelcome, due to its impact on the effectiveness of those counterterrorism efforts.

France’s Minister of Armed Forces, Florence Parly, has already met with Secretary Esper and warned against a reduction of U.S. forces, which “would severely limit our effectiveness in our operations against terrorists.” Esper has hailed France’s position as a “great leader in the Sahel,” but pushed for more European assistance “that could offset whatever changes we make as we consider next steps in Africa.” But as General Townsend stated, the U.S. assistance of the French forces in the Sahel are both areas that other European countries could provide in the absence of U.S. presence, like airlifting or air refueling, but he indicated areas that European assistance will be limited like intelligence, reconnaissance, and surveillance.


Currently, France has over 4,000 troops deployed in the region as part of Operation Barkhane, focused on counterinsurgency in countries like Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger with American assistance, but senators like Jim Inhofe who chairs the powerful Armed Services Committee already called a potential drawdown “short-sighted” and harmful to U.S. security interests and other Republicans have already aired their protest against troop cuts in Africa. But so do Democrats. Senator Jack Reed, who serves as a ranking member on the Senate Armed Services Committee, called it “strategically unwise” to disengage from Africa.


In East Africa, a region that hosts several U.S. military bases, a Kenyan naval base that hosts American troops, was recently attacked by Al Shabaab, a terrorist organization that is based in Somalia, and is viewed by AFRICOM as “the most dangerous” threat to American interests in the region. But there are other potential security challenges in the region that have not been addressed by General Townsend’s testimony, including the inter-state competition in the region by several middle-powers from the Middle East. The likes of Qatar, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, and others, could further destabilize the region, especially in countries where government institutions are fragile like in Somalia, if their strategic interests collide.

In general, the security assessment of AFRICOM, especially threats from non-state actors along with the growing influence of China, is quite challenging for the United States. The U.S. needs a strategy that includes economic and political collaboration while maintaining close cooperation on security threats posed by terrorist groups. A new free trade agreement with Kenya expected to be announced soon could be a good start for a new strategy that competes with China, not only through military means, but also economic means.

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[Housecarl]

Posted for fair use.....

Between Confidentiality and Transparency: Arbitration and Arms Transfers

Global arms sales and transfers involves a heavy dose of secrecy.

intpolicydigest.org

World News /04 Feb 2020

Wilder Alejandro Sánchez and Lucia Scripcari
Between Confidentiality and Transparency: Arbitration and Arms Transfers

The sales of military equipment is a global industry known for its high degree of secrecy. After all, armed forces do not want potential adversaries to know what kind of equipment they are buying, the technical aspects of said systems, how many systems/platforms are being acquired and other details about military equipment that could jeopardize national security. Similarly, arbitration is meant to be confidential, that is what makes this legal process more attractive to clients than going to courts of law, which will make rulings public.

A 2018 WikiLeaks dump of thousands of sensitive documents, including many from the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), provided a glimpse of the amount of money that is involved in many defense agreements, and other sensitive information that is meant to be known only by the parties involved and the arbitrators of the case.

The war in Yemen

The arbitration case that we will focus on in this analysis was held at the ICC between GIAT Industries (now called Nexter Systems), a French defense company, and the Emirati businessman Abbas Ibrahim Yousef Al Yousef. This legal process was meant to remain confidential, but WikiLeaks had other plans.

In order to understand how we got here, let us briefly summarize the situation. The Yemeni military commenced a new offensive against Houthi rebels in 2009, in the Northern Saada province; two years later, long-time President Ali Abdallah Saleh relinquished power in favor of his deputy, Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi after months of protests. The Houthi-government conflict intensified in 2015, when the Islamic State increased its presence in the country, “two suicide bombings targeting Shia mosques in Sanaa, in which 137 people [were] killed,” explains the BBC. In response to the growing violence in another of its neighbors, Saudi Arabia created a coalition of Gulf states and other allies to crack down on Houthi rebels. Airstrikes and other operations carried out by the coalition have killed not only rebels, but also civilians, exacerbating the crisis in Yemen.

This is where GIAT/Nexter comes into the scene. Back in the 1990s, GIAT sold its Leclerc tanks to the UAE military, and the aforementioned Al Yousef was involved in this transaction – we will summarize the case in the next section. Photos posted in social media, as well as videos (in this video a Leclerc tank is confused for an Abraham M1 Abrams tank), show what appear to be Leclerc tanks operating in Yemen in 2015.

<span data-mce-type="bookmark" style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" class="mce_SELRES_start"></span>

The fact that the systems in question were utilized in controversial Yemeni conflict made the GIAT-Al Yousef dealings even more newsworthy.

Summary of the case

As for the ICC case, the 2009 dispute involved an agreement between Kenoza, a company owned by Al Yousef, and GIAT, whereby Kenoza was tasked to market and sell to the UAE government a total of 388 Leclerc combat tanks, spare parts, and ammunition produced by the French arms manufacturer for a commission of 6.5% ($235 million ) of the $3.6 billion contract price.

The GIAT successfully concluded a contract with Abu Dhabi for the supply of the aforementioned equipment, the French entity paid a total of $195 million to Al Yousef by 2000 but did not pay the remaining $39,755,339 million of the commission, alleging that the amount was too excessive. Moreover, the Respondent (the French entity) claimed that the ‘surprisingly short’ time period in which the Agent [Al Yousef] facilitated the conclusion of sales agreement suggests that the money was used for bribing the officials of the UAE government. Thus, the Respondent ceased the payment as such a contract had an ‘illicit cause’ and was contrary to public morality.

In justifying the excessive price of the commission, the Agent (Al Yousef) explained that “by that time the Leclerc tank was a new concept ‘effectively a paper project’” and it was a challenge “selling something that existed only on paper.” Moreover, in his witness statement, he mentioned that what made the Leclerc tanks more competitive than those of other competitors was its German-made engine. However, at that time (the 1990s) Germany had imposed a ban on arms sales to the Middle East; hence Al Yousef argues that he “undertook the lobbying of the German authorities and was instrumental in ensuring that the necessary approval or waiver was obtained, a process which involved decision-makers at the highest levels in both France and Germany.”

With regard to corruption allegations, the ICC Tribunal noted that although it does not exclude the possibility that the commission payments were utilized for corrupt or other illicit purposes, there is not enough evidence to make such a far-reaching conclusion merely on the basis of the size of the agreed remuneration. Hence, the Tribunal left that dispute undecided.

On the other hand, the Tribunal did rule that the contract price is indeed “excessive by the standard which Mr. Al Yousef himself set and by any standard which was raised in this arbitration.” Moreover, the Tribunal noted that in proportion to the services rendered and the risk that Mr. Al Yousef undertook the reasonable remuneration earned by the Claimant is well below the contractual amount.

Therefore the Tribunal decided that the Claimant’s (Al Yousef) compensation must be reduced to an undetermined amount below $195 million and that the claims for further payments must be dismissed in all of its variants.

The Expensive Global Weapons Market

To those of us who work in the defense business, the GIAT-Yousef-UAE deal is not surprising. Case in point, the Stockholm International Peace and Research Institute (SIPRI) reported in an April 2019 Fact Sheet that “global military expenditure was $1,822 billion in 2018, an increase of 2.6 percent from 2017 in real terms,” and that “total military spending accounted for 2.1 percent of global gross domestic product in 2018.” In other words, the amounts of money that are exchanged in these deals are tremendous.

The world’s top five biggest spenders in 2018 were the United States, China, Saudi Arabia, India, and France. Since the GIAT case involves the UAE, this is what SIPRI says about this country’s defense expenses, “the most recent available estimate for military spending by the UAE is $22.8 billion (current US dollars) in 2014. Considering its ongoing military operations abroad and large arms procurement projects, it can be assumed that its spending remains at or above the 2014 level.” In fact, the country has continued to acquire and upgrade equipment in recent years. For example, in November 2019, Jane’s reported that “the United Arab Emirates’ (UAE’s) Pantsir-S1 air defence systems are being upgraded.”

The war in Yemen is largely a proxy war being powered by foreign arms. (Dmitry Chulov/Shutterstock)

As for France, the European nation is a well-known producer of military technology. Just to name one example, Naval Group (formerly known as DCNS) is helping Brazil manufactured Scorpene-class diesel-electric attack submarines for the Brazilian Navy. The shipyard is also in the process of delivering four offshore patrol vessels to Argentina.

For the record, Nexter (formerly GIAT) is also a well-established supplier of defense equipment. For example, Jane’s reported in January that the company, in association with ECA, are delivering Nerva LG unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs) for France’s Scorpion program. The company is currently also competing for a contract for 150 new wheeled infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs) for the Bulgarian armed forces. Even more, the company is teaming up with another global powerhouse of the defense industry, Thales, to “develop a new multi-role weapon system, called RAPIDFireNaval, to meet potential French Navy requirements and are eyeing DGA funding in the first half of 2020.” In other words, the WikiLeaks revelations have not damaged Nexter’s image.

Confidentiality v. transparency in the weapons trade

An eternal debate when it comes to weapons transfers has to do with how much information should be made public about such deals; to put it another way, the key is figuring out how to strike a balance between confidentiality and transparency. Defense ministries and armed forces tend not to disclose many details about agreements and the specific characteristics of the equipment in question. After all, the armed forces of country X do not want to alert the armed forces of country Y (or criminal entity Z) what kind of equipment X is getting, particularly if it will be used against Y or Z. Therefore, the confidentiality of the systems that will be transferred is quite important.

Similarly important is the secrecy of the cost of the contract. While an agreement may have a good price, from the buyer’s perspective, such information can also be misinterpreted or misused. It is very common, for example, that opposition politicians will criticize an incumbent government’s arms transfers, labeling them as an unnecessary waste of money that could be utilized to build roads, schools or other infrastructure.

On the other hand, the citizens of a state have the right to know how their government is utilizing state funds. Hence transparency is necessary in order to fight corruption and other illegal practices, and to generally better understand what civilian policymakers and military leaders regard as a country’s major defense and security threats, and what are they doing to combat them. To be fair, many states do strive to promote transparency when it comes to being open about bids for new equipment, which providers are competing for a contract, and how the equipment will be utilized. For example, the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency publishes contracts regarding major sales to US allies and partners.


Moreover, several non-governmental entities are devoted to shedding light to weapons transfers, such as the aforementioned SIPRI, the Small Arms Survey (which has done great work on the export of light weapons) and the Forum on the Arms Trade, a “network of civil society experts and a point of contact for strengthening public efforts to address the humanitarian, economic and other implications of arms transfers, security assistance, and weapons use.”

A final factor to keep in mind is the problem of human rights, and ensuring that weapons transferred from entity X (a government or company) to client Y will not be utilized to commit human rights violations – one obvious example are attempts to stop the sale of U.S. weapons to Saudi Arabia and the UAE, which could be utilized to kill civilians in Yemen.

It is beyond the scope of this analysis to figure out how much transparency should there be when it comes to weapons transfers, and how much information should remain confidential as it may affect a country’s national security. The point here is that this is a source of continuous debate and concern. Hence, arbitration has become a popular legal framework where parties can find a resolution for weapons transfers-related disputes, as it provides the confidentiality that parties, particularly those in the defense field (armed forces, state officials and industry) prefer.

Transparency in the ICC’s Arbitration Procedures

In 1995 Stephen R. Bond, the former secretary-general of the Court of International Arbitration, part of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), stated that “indeed it became quickly apparent to me that should the ICC adopt a publication policy or any other policy, which would mitigate or diminish the strict insistence on confidentiality by the ICC, this would constitute a significant deterrent to the use of ICC arbitration.”

While it is true that parties choose arbitration because they seek confidentiality and privacy, recent developments show that international institutions acknowledge the need for more transparency. Case in point, the ICC announced that as of January 2019 the International Arbitration Court’s awards will be published. Although they did not come as an amendment to the ICC Arbitration Rules but via a Note To Parties And Arbitral Tribunals On The Conduct Of The Arbitration Under The ICC Rules Of Arbitration, the new changes state that unless parties opt-out from publication, the default rule is that the awards will be published two years after their notification to the parties.

Furthermore, where there is a confidentiality agreement between the parties, the publication will be subject to the parties’ consent. Yet even absent such an agreement, parties may easily object before the publication without any obligation to state the reasons. Moreover, pursuant to the Note, the Secretariat reserves the right to have the discretion to publish awards that contain sensitive information.

Therefore, the IC has acknowledged that the International Court of Arbitration aims to achieve more transparency in its practices In this sense, the pro-publication approach serves as an instrument to achieve this objective. However, the success of said objective will continue to depend on the parties’ discretion.

It is expected that in matters such as weapons transfers and other defense issues, parties, in particular, state entities, will be more prudent and will opt for confidentiality. Hence, it should come as no surprise that these parties will either conclude a confidentiality agreement or will object to the publication of the award.

Why is the confidentiality v. transparency issue of public interest?

ICC arbitration is often utilized by states and state entities. According to a 2015 report, approximately 10 percent of ICC arbitrations involve a state or a state entity. The issue of confidentiality plays a great role when both parties of the dispute are commercial entities that care about their reputation, privacy, business strategy, and business partners. However, when one of the disputing parties is a state entity, the dispute becomes of a public nature, involving public interest and therefore may require more openness and transparency.

To mimic the previous section regarding weapons transfers, it is indisputable that citizens have the right to be informed about the disputes in which their respective government is involved. In this situation, the state may have a duty to disclose to a certain extent, information about the dispute.

The problem is, however, when the arbitration agreement between a state entity and a private contractual counterparty includes a confidentiality clause or when parties conclude a separate confidentiality agreement. In this scenario, how will citizens, public interest groups and/or NGOs find out about the existence of any disputes?

Ultimately, transparency must be consensual since, even if the state agrees that any matter will be open to the public domain, it is possible the private contractual counterparty may oppose it.

Conclusions

This analysis has discussed the issue of transparency versus confidentiality in two major industries, arms transfers, and arbitration: the two generally prefer the latter over the former. Even though many governments and militaries are striving for greater transparency when it comes to acquiring new equipment, details of several transfers remain confidential in the name of national security. Likewise, secrecy is a key reason why arbitration is preferred over litigation, though, as we have discussed, there is an ongoing intention to bring more transparency, within certain parameters, to arbitration via the publication, to a certain extent, of the arbitral awards.


The revelations of the GIAT-Al Yousef-UAE deal and arbitration process via the 2018 WikiLeaks dump was an event of force majeure that shone unexpected light to arbitration proceedings in defense issues. The question is, how much more transparent can these industries become in the new decade while maintaining an efficient degree of confidentiality.

The views expressed in this article are those of the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect those of any institutions with which the authors are associated

 

[Housecarl]

Posted for fair use.....(I guess eveyone in the MSM "top tier" is catching up...HC)

U.S. Deploys New, Less Destructive Nuclear Warhead

The Pentagon has added a new warhead to its nuclear arsenal to counter what it says is the threat posed by Russia.

www.wsj.com

U.S. Deploys New, Less Destructive Nuclear Warhead
Weapon would be mounted on submarine-launched missile

An unarmed Trident missile was test-launched in 2018 from a U.S. Navy submarine. Photo: handout/Reuters

By
Gordon Lubold
Updated Feb. 4, 2020 6:30 pm ET

LONDON—The Pentagon has added a new warhead to its nuclear arsenal, the first in decades, to counter what it says is the threat posed by Russia.

The Defense Department said Tuesday it had deployed a new warhead to fit on the top of existing submarine-borne Trident ballistic missiles.

The warhead, known as the W76-2, carries less than one-third of the destructive power of other U.S. nuclear weapons.

Advocates have said such a low-yield weapon is needed as deterrence against low-yield Russian nuclear warheads without employing more powerful U.S. strategic nuclear weapons, which the Kremlin may calculate Washington would be reluctant to use for fear of unleashing an all-out nuclear war.

The new warhead “clearly creates a deterrent message and a deterrent capability for the Russians, which is the whole purpose of deterrence, to make sure they never get used,” said Air Force Gen. John Hyten, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who is visiting the United Kingdom.

Critics have countered that the low-yield weapon may lower the threshold for nuclear war because they are less powerful and therefore seem more usable.

The warhead’s deployment “remains a misguided and dangerous one” and “does nothing to make Americans safer,” said Rep. Adam Smith (D., Wash.), the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, who had fought the move.

“Instead,” he said in a statement issued Tuesday, “this destabilizing deployment further increases the potential for miscalculation during a crisis. Validating the utility of so-called ‘low yield’ nuclear weapons in ‘winning’ a nuclear war adds to the growing pressures of a nuclear arms race.”

The new warhead is intended to replace a small number of the Trident’s more powerful weapons. Other sub-launched missiles maintain the larger-yield warheads.


Pentagon officials said Tuesday that the new warheads had been deployed, but wouldn’t say when or specify where, calling the information classified. The Associated Press reported the deployment earlier Tuesday.

U.S. warheads mounted on submarine-launched missiles constitute one leg of the nation’s nuclear “triad.” Others are Air Force nuclear bombers and land-based nuclear ballistic missiles.

The Trump administration in 2018 called for upgrading the nuclear arsenal, which has remained essentially the same as it was at the end of the Cold War in the early 1990s. President Obama began a $1 trillion modernization n 2010 as part of an agreement with lawmakers to ratify an arms- reduction treaty with Russia.

The Trump administration’s 2018 Nuclear Posture Review identified new requirements for the nuclear arsenal, including a small number of the low-yield warheads for submarine-launched missiles.

The move announced Tuesday is to address “the conclusion that potential adversaries, like Russia, believe that employment of low-yield nuclear weapons will give them an advantage over the United States and its allies,” said John Rood, the Pentagon’s top policy official, in a statement.

Thomas Karako, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said the deployment of the weapon was an “important and measured” step that improved the flexibility and diversity of the options the president could consider in the kind of extraordinary circumstances a crisis demands.

“This does not lower the threshold for U.S. nuclear employment, which consistent with longstanding policy rightfully remains very high,” he said. “On the contrary, fielding the W76-2 both improves deterrence and contributes to raising the threshold for an adversary to employ nuclear weapons on the misbegotten idea that nuclear first use might benefit them or their goals of aggression.”

Write to Gordon Lubold at Gordon.Lubold@wsj.com

 

[jward]

Krulak Revisited: The Three-Block War, Strategic Corporals, and the Future Battlefield


Franklin Annis | February 3, 2020



In the 1990s, Commandant of the US Marine Corps Gen. Charles C. Krulak advanced the idea of what he called a “three-block war” to explain battlefield realities in an era of failed and failing nation-states. Not only was the Marine Corps operating in complex environments and executing a range of missions—including humanitarian aid and peacekeeping, alongside mid-intensity conflict—it was also operating in an atmosphere of pervasive media coverage. With the rise of the internet and cheap video equipment, the actions—or mis-actions—of Marines could spread quickly around the world. Krulak perceived the need to invest heavily in the human dimension of warfare. This was done to ensure that even the lowest-level Marine leaders were fully developed and prepared to operate effectively to contribute to the achievement of strategic objectives in this environment of ever-increasing scrutiny.


Many readers will be familiar with Krulak’s three-block war and his notion of the “strategic corporal.” Certainly military leaders at all levels who have been involved in America’s post-9/11 wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will have encountered these ideas. And yet, the nuances of Krulak’s thinking have largely been abandoned outside the Marine Corps, if they were ever truly appreciated.


To understand why requires the three-block war to be revisited, more than twenty years after Krulak originally explained the framework. In doing so, the tendency for “block inflation” becomes apparent, as does the rise of the “toxic” strategic corporal myth. By recognizing how Krulak’s ideas have been distorted, we can begin to chart the ways in which the strategic-corporal developmental philosophy is still relevant on the modern battlefield as a means of addressing war’s increasing complexity.


The “Three Block War,” as Gen. Krulak Imagined It


In the January 1999 edition of Marines Magazine, Krulak described “the Three Block War” utilizing a fictional story of Cpl. Hernandez, who finds himself in a failed and famished central African state, leading a squad, and providing humanitarian aid. Alongside that humanitarian aid effort, peacekeeping missions are being conducted and mid-intensity conflict is occurring in different blocks of the city he is operating in. Cpl. Hernandez’s challenge is to correctly identify which “block” (and related operation) of the city he is in and respond with the appropriate amount of force required to achieve tactical goals while supporting strategic objectives. This environment requires junior leaders, like Cpl. Hernandez, to “confidently make well-reasoned and independent decisions under extreme stress.” And in today’s super-connected world, Krulak continues, where internet connectivity and video equipment abound, junior leaders’ decisions and actions will likely be captured by the media and every action will meet with the scrutiny of the “court of public opinion.”


This gives the actions of even the most junior leaders a degree of strategic impact that no previous battlefield did. To develop strategic corporals, Krulak stressed three developmental priorities. The first is the instillment of the Marine Corps’ enduring ethos. By educating Marines in the virtues of the Corps with an emphasis on building character, they are enabled to appropriately address what Krulak describes as the “moral quandaries” common on the battlefield. The second priority is providing quality professional military education, which “sustain the growth of technical and tactical proficiency and mental and physical toughness.” Finally, Krulak emphasized, the Marine Corps must provide examples of quality leadership to inspire Marines to “rise to the same great heights” as those who “who have set the highest standard of combat leadership” throughout the Marine Corps’ history.


Krulak presented an encouraging image of a strategic corporal who positively supported strategic objectives throughout his or her mission. In Krulak’s story, Cpl. Hernandez utilized his training and education, the latest equipment, his grounding in the Marine Corps ethos, and quality leadership role models to appropriately lead his squad. He represented a fully empowered noncommissioned officer, agile enough to stay ahead of an enemy in an environment that was “increasingly hostile, lethal, and chaotic.”


Krulak emphasized that the expected era of peace at the end of the Cold War never arrived; instead, what followed has been “an age characterized by global disorder, pervasive crisis, and constant threat of chaos.” It was in this chaotic global disorder, and in Krulak’s observations of Somalia, Bosnia, Albania, Kosovo, Macedonia, Haiti, Liberia, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone, that the three-block war metaphor was forged. Krulak never felt that the next war would be the “son of Desert Storm” but rather the “stepchild of Chechnya.” While he wrote his Marines Magazine article prior to America’s post-9/11 wars, the metaphor served as a useful guide in Iraq and Afghanistan, as it succinctly captures the complex multidimensional nature of modern warfare.


Block Inflation


Several attempts were made to build upon Krulak’s three-block war metaphor. Observers have noted a natural tendency for “block inflation” as new missions or domains of warfare were introduced. This attempted to make the metaphor more accurate to current battlefield conditions. However, block inflation didn’t also positively impact the strategic-corporal developmental philosophy, and as a result, attempts to update the metaphor may have severely weakened the critical developmental philosophy the metaphor contained.


In 2005, then Lt. Gen. James Mattis and Lt. Col. Frank Hoffman proposed “Four Block War” in their article, “Future Warfare: The Rise of Hybrid Wars.” The fourth block they proposed was “psychological or information operations.” While Mattis and Hoffman where correct in adding emphasis to this dimension, referring to it as a “block” isn’t wholly compatible with Krulak’s original metaphor. His three blocks symbolized different types of operations in different spaces (humanitarian assistance, peacekeeping, and mid-intensity conflict). This new task (“psychological or information operations”) could occur in a separate block, but is really something that can and often must accompany operations in every block of the original metaphor.


The most devastating adaptation of Krulak’s metaphor was the Canadian military’s attempt to apply it as strategy, which failed for several reasons. First, Chief of Defense Staff Gen. Rick Hillier made significant alterations of the three-block war metaphor. The blocks as defined by the Canadian military—high-intensity conflict, counterinsurgency, humanitarian aid—were incapable of being performed simultaneously (which perhaps explains why Krulak deliberately chose “mid-intensity” conflict for his vignette). For example, it would be impossible to engage in city reconstruction with active high-intensity conflict also occurring within the city. When Canadian forces applied this theory in Afghanistan’s Kandahar province in 2006-2007, they suffered a fatality rate among their soldiers that was twice that of either US or UK forces in the country. Moreover, while this metaphor, describing an urban combat environment, seemed easy to adapt for use as strategy for Canadian ground forces, there was no clear direction on how it should integrate with naval or air forces. Finally, the cost of using soldiers to perform humanitarian missions was significantly larger than that of civilian-led efforts and the presence of military forces integrated with aid workers threatened the perception of “neutrality” that humanitarian assistance seeks to foster. As it’s nearly impossible to apply Krulak’s metaphor at the operational and strategic level, the Canadian abandonment of the metaphor as a strategy “is not to be mourned.”


Toxic Strategic Corporal


Krulak’s metaphor, in certain ways, became corrupted and, as Col. Thomas Feltey has written, “forever associated with negative consequences.” Instead of acting as a catalyst for the investment in the development of junior leaders and empowering them with authority to take appropriate tactical actions, strategic leaders became overly concerned with the strategic impacts of tactical operations. This fear of strategic “mission failure” due to the actions of junior leaders caused vast degradation in the practice of mission command and eroded critical trust between leaders at various levels.


Feltey explored the history of the notion of the strategic corporal to find “its trajectory from its positive intent to its doppelganger, doomsayer variant.” He noted that the first appearance of language resembling a strategic corporal was found in the 1995 Joint Publication 3-07, Military Operations other than War. This publication underscored the need to understand political objectives “at every level from strategic to tactical,” warning of the negative consequences caused by incorrect actions of junior leaders. As Feltey reports, “this marked the first time doctrine linked policy directly to the actions of junior leaders conducting tactical engagements.” In the 2004 British Joint Warfare Publication 3-50, the strategic corporal had evolved, as Feltey described, from a positive actor to a “corporal who uncomprehendingly straddles the tactical, operational, and strategic levels of war.” The strategic corporal was seen as both an opportunity and a liability with the publishing of the 2006 US Army and Marine Corps counterinsurgency manual, but the balance would soon shift overwhelmingly to the latter. As Feltey tragically reported, “The strategic corporal moved from a 1997 idea to support an emphasis in developing leaders adaptable to new environments to . . . the 2010 version of the deleterious strategic corporal with the emphasis on commanders requiring a close overwatch of subordinates who can influence strategic outcomes directly through tactical actions.”

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In the 1990s, Commandant of the US Marine Corps Gen. Charles C. Krulak advanced the idea of what he called a “three-block war” to explain battlefield realities in an era […]

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[jward]

(continued)
Krulak Revisited: The Three-Block War, Strategic Corporals, and the Future Battlefield
Franklin Annis | February 3, 2020

To test the theory of the negative impacts of a “toxic” strategic corporal, Feltey examined four of the most negative events in recent wars: the My Lai massacre, Abu Ghraib prison torture, the Blackhearts rape and murder case, and the Panjwai massacre. Two of these events took place in Iraq, and indeed Operation Iraqi Freedom should have been the proving ground for the dangerous toxic strategic corporal if these risks were significant. The availability of cheap video recording systems and internet access allowed for rapid worldwide transmission of battlefield footage. The Iraqi insurgency used significant amounts of recordings of successful attacks against coalition forces for propaganda purposes. Yet with the expansion of video evidence on the battlefield, there were remarkably few incidents with strategic impacts.


The one incident of the four Feltey examined that had a significant strategic impact, which likely poisoned the concept of the strategic corporal, was the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuses. Feltey reports, “If any battlefield event of the early 21st century had strategic influence it was Abu Ghraib—and the strategic corporal was seemed [sic] to bear the whole of responsibility.” The abuses were not just violations of the Law of Land Warfare but were offensive to the Islamic faith. The result of this single incident of “misconstrued understanding of command guidance” was significant—so significant in the minds of combat commanders that their attitudes toward junior leaders and their perceptions of the strategic corporal changed. It is important to note that Abu Ghraib was caused by members of an Army unit without the advanced development recommended by Krulak. In this regard, Abu Ghraib serves as a warning of what can occur when junior leaders aren’t developed into the strategic corporals Krulak intended.


Feltey concludes by asserting that “senior commanders and doctrinal manuals must replace the idea of the strategic corporal with the idea of junior leaders operating within an empowering environment of trust.” This relabeling of Krulak’s concept is aimed at removing negative connotations inserted by others. Instead of repackaging the concept into a new term, it would be far better to return to the positive notions of the strategic corporal by re-educating leaders about Krulak’s original concept.


The fixation on only the most negative manifestation of the strategic corporal is, as Feltey pointed out, a major risk to successful mission command. Trust is required in order to “empower agile and adaptive leaders,” which Army doctrine identifies as an essential element of mission command. Strategic leaders fearful of potential negative strategic impacts of tactical decisions made by junior leaders are unlikely to invest the full measure of trust required to maximize the advantages of mission command. Fearful of the toxic strategic corporal, strategic leaders have limited operations causing various levels of commanders to only add to these restrictions in an ongoing cascade of fear This is simply not an effective way to fight a war against a highly adaptive enemy.


Strategic-Corporal Developmental Philosophy


While the idea that forces would be able to conduct too wide an array of missions within a very limited geographic space in a dense city is a weakness of the three-block war as a concept, the need for highly developed junior leaders on the modern battlefield is beyond question. Krulak’s solutions to the problem of complex operational environments and pervasive media coverage was firmly rooted in the human dimension of warfare. All three of Krulak’s proposed lines of effort to empower the strategic corporal were aimed at the development of the individual Marine. By improving each Marine with education, training, and quality leadership examples, the Marine Corps would be better prepared to deal with twenty-first-century complex operational environments.


The focus on the human dimension is connected directly with Krulak’s personal experiences as a junior officer. Krulak commissioned in 1964 and served two tours as a company-grade officer in Vietnam. He would have witnessed in the mid-1960s both widespread drug abuse and racial tensions. Reflecting on this period, Krulak would report it as a “bad, bad time for the Corps.” Krulak welcomed a call for Marine Corps “exceptionalism” made by Marine Commandant Gen. Leonard F. Chapman Jr., and he would re-enforce this call throughout his own career.


Krulak’s emphasis on the human dimension was apparent when he asserted a philosophy of “equip the man” instead of “man the equipment.” Given his Vietnam service, he saw firsthand the disastrous results of Project 100,000, which allowed the recruitment of citizens of low intelligence who were otherwise prevented from joining the military. Project 100,000 participants required significantly more training resources, were more likely to be arrested, and, because they were disproportionately assigned as infantry soldiers, were more than twice as likely to die in combat. The disastrous program ran from 1966 to 1971 until it was abandoned for offering no tangible advantage to the US military. Knowing firsthand the importance of intelligent and educated Marines, Krulak required 95 percent of new recruits to be high school graduates, raising the standard from 90 percent. The increased focus on what Krulak described as “going after the elite of the elite” ensured Marines who were better able to adapt to the constantly evolving battlefield.


Krulak’s addition of a “crucible” at recruit training is still used to this day. This capstone event consists of a fifty-four-hour exercise where recruits march over forty miles and face a series of challenges including a leader-reaction course and a combat-assault course. With only two Meals Ready to Eat and a total of six hours of sleep during this period, this “crucible” is a character-building event that drives home the concept of Marine Corps “transformation.” When combined with constant reinforcement of the Corps’ enduring ethos of “honor, courage, and commitment” throughout their career, Marines are well-prepared to act acceptably when facing battlefield “moral quandaries.” By calling on Marines to live by the Corps’ values 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, this constant call to virtue can drastically reduce the risk of unacceptable behavior as Marines display their consummate commitment to their Corps.


The skills required of junior leaders have only increased since Krulak’s introduction of the three-block war metaphor. In 2006, as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were grinding on, Marine Maj. T.M. Scott wrote that in such complex operating environments servicemembers required additional training and education in “cultural sensitivity, media awareness, mediation skills, linguistic competence, mastery of sophisticated weapons and sensors, and the capacity for small group operations.” In an era of renewed great-power competition, even more will be required of junior leaders, and it is increasingly likely they will arrive on the battlefield without the required training and education for all the problems they may encounter. A logical solution for this problem is to prioritize the art of learning as a critical skill for strategic corporals. This would include supporting the essential practice of self-development.





While there are limitations in the three-block war as a metaphor, Krulak was correct in identifying leader development as the critical requirement for junior military leaders on the modern battlefield. Empowered and developed strategic corporals have demonstrated their value repeatedly during America’s post-9/11 wars. The strategic-corporal developmental philosophy produced junior leaders in the Marines who were fully developed and empowered through professional military education, provided with quality leadership examples, and constantly called to live the ethos of their Corps. These individuals possessed a greater understanding and mastery of the spectrum of force that could be applied to achieve mission goals. With superior development and greater abilities to find alternate solutions and select the most appropriate levels of force for a given situation, these leaders could achieve mission success while vastly reducing the risk of negative events that could adversely shift public opinion.


It is unfortunate that the underlying call for junior-leader development within the three-block war metaphor was and remains misunderstood outside the context of the Marine Corps. Krulak’s positive message was misinterpreted as a warning of tactical blunders leading to strategic defeat. As this negative misinterpretation of the strategic corporal grew, the concept became associated with only the toxic aspects and the leader-development components of Krulak’s metaphor were largely ignored. The legacy of the three-block war has been forever marred by events like Abu Ghraib and the soldiers responsible, who had not been prepared in accordance with Krulak’s vision of strategic corporals. While Krulak’s metaphor presented an intelligent junior leader, fully developed and optimized by mission command, the misinterpretations of his theory resulted in micromanagement of junior leaders out of fear of the “toxic” strategic corporal.


The operational focus of the military has now shifted to multi-domain operations, and while this concept revolves around a vision of the future battlefield that is starkly different from the landscape painted in Krulak’s three-block war, there remains a need for a solid developmental philosophy to create junior leaders capable of operating in complex environments and maximizing the use of mission command. The abandonment of the strategic-corporal developmental philosophy is tragic and has left a critical void in how other military branches approach the development of the human dimension in its members and leaders. All US military branches still need servicemembers who have been developed through high-quality professional military education, are virtue-driven, and have exceptional examples of battlefield leadership to emulate. It is time to re-educate our force on the original intent of Krulak’s strategic-corporal developmental philosophy and to best prepare for the twenty-first-century battlefield.





Dr. Franklin C. Annis is a National Guard officer and veteran of the Iraq War. He holds a doctorate in education in curriculum and teaching from Northcentral University. Dr. Annis hosts the Evolving Warfighter YouTube channel where he shares his research on military self-development.


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

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Krulak Revisited: The Three-Block War, Strategic Corporals, and the Future Battlefield - Modern War Institute

In the 1990s, Commandant of the US Marine Corps Gen. Charles C. Krulak advanced the idea of what he called a “three-block war” to explain battlefield realities in an era […]

mwi.usma.edu

 

[jward]

Why Maximum Pressure Fails, but Coercive De-Escalation Can Succeed

By Iain King
February 04, 2020


Decades from now, when historians seek to define the diplomacy of our age, the phrase “maximum pressure” will feature strongly. But how many of those historians will describe it as a success?
Maximum pressure is not the Trump doctrine—at least, not yet—but it has become a common approach to some of America’s most complicated international security challenges. And, as such, it is not delivering to expectations.

Consider Iran. The killing of Qassem Soleimani is a recent move to curb Iran’s malign influence in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen. Maximum pressure on Iran has now gone well beyond America’s departure from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action in May 2018. The U.S. has recently deployed the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group into the Arabian Gulf, used banks and businesses to exert economic pressure on Iran, and applied the full weight of the U.S. Treasury’s sanctions machinery. European allies and NATO have been asked to do more, and there have even been travel restrictions placed on Iran’s Foreign Minister, Mohammed Javad Zarif.

Despite all this, Iran is becoming more of a menace, not less. Tehran’s nuclear program has restarted, and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps continues to hound oil tankers off the Straits of Hormuz, while Iranian influence across the region still festers. Iran was even able to fire twenty-two missiles at U.S. sites in Iraq with impunity.
Or consider China. The U.S. has branded the rising superpower a currency manipulator, issued multiple rounds of tariffs against Chinese products, and blacklisted numerous Chinese technology companies, to include the giant corporation Huawei. Although not yet maximum pressure, the trajectory of the U.S. approach to China is clear. And the results? A U.S.-China trade deal that leaves the United States worse off, while China continues to steal intellectual property, tightens its grip over Hong Kong and meddles even more in Taiwan.

Kim Jong Un listens as U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during the one-on-one bilateral meeting at the second North Korea-U.S. summit in Hanoi, Vietnam. (Leah Millis/Reuters)
The original maximum pressure campaign was against North Korea, as a response to Kim Jung-Un’s provocative development and testing of rockets and nuclear weapons. New economic sanctions were imposed, and older ones applied more rigorously than before. Military assets were assembled, ready to strike. Even China was brought alongside. And in a speech at the United Nations in 2017, President Trump spoke ominously of ‘fire and fury like the world has never seen’ on the Korean peninsula.
The result? Maximum pressure led to a partial change in Kim Jung-Un’s tone, and summits with President Trump, but no real reversal to DPRK’s nuclear program. The East Asian dictatorship is still developing missiles on the peninsula.
And even consider Venezuela. Maximalist U.S. pressure to end Nicholas Maduro’s disastrous rule, which looked promising at the start of 2019, has fizzled. After a stalemate, Maduro was able to consolidate his control, and then extend it into the National Assembly. Once more, a minor despot has been able to defy the superpower’s will—maximum pressure has been blunted.
These outcomes may seem odd. After all, if the United States—still the world’s greatest superpower by far—applies its maximum pressure, how can it not succeed?
The Limits of Maximum Pressure
Part of the answer is in the approach itself: maximum pressure invites defiance. This is because the doctrine is almost always applied to regimes mostly concerned with maintaining power in their own country. Being tough with America plays well in Tehran, Caracas, Pyongyang, and Beijing. To the main audience of Iranian State TV, for example, if Hassan Rouhani can just hold out a little, Iran will have won a sort of victory. Like an amateur boxer in a title fight, just surviving into the fourth round is enough to delight hometown fans. They do not have to beat the world champion; they must only beat expectations.
Also, as academic Todd Sechser has shown, when a strong nation tries to coerce a weaker one, the state with less power will demonstrably resist in a bid to develop its reputation. The stronger the power that tries to compel, and the greater their demands, the more incentive there is on the smaller country to resist. So, when the world’s mightiest country applies maximum pressure, the urge to defy them is as great as it can be.
If a rogue dictator can hold out permanently, they present the U.S. with a grim dilemma: concede that even America’s maximum pressure is impotent to force events, or turn the dial up to eleven—an admission that the previous pressure was not really maximum after all.

A further problem with maximum pressure is that the U.S. shows its hand and removes any mystery about the potential impact of American power. A credible threat may be more effective at compelling a change of course, when delivered with a time limit and in private. Although, a private threat would not signal resolve to American-based foreign policy hawks—an audience maximum pressure can assuage.
In practice, maximum pressure has often been poorly conveyed to adversaries. Inconsistent messaging has meant two-thirds of the U.S. deterrence strategy—capability and credibility—have been undermined by the third—communication. For example, Beijing has been presented with moving goalposts on trade, making it hard for them to comply, while Secretary Pompeo’s twelve demands of Iran were not heard in Tehran as a realistic way forward.

General Qassem Soleimani attends a meeting with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khameneiand Revolutionary Guard commanders on September 18, 2016 (AP)

The Iran case shows how maximum pressure can even diminish U.S. power. American leadership among its allies was degraded by the unilateral American withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. By adopting maximum pressure, the U.S. isolated itself, and split the coalition of generally sympathetic allies, increasing Tehran’s capacity to make mischief. This was made even clearer after the death of Soleimani, when European leaders united around a line that diverged from Washington’s.
But there is something more fundamental at fault with maximum pressure. America usually confronts an adversary’s essential interests—a matter of existential importance to the renegade regime, and one where they have much more invested than the United States. This encourages the adversary to raise the stakes, hoping America will fold. Some, like Nicholas Maduro, have little to lose by betting their whole country’s livelihoods on their own survival. On the other hand, America’s overwhelming power advantage is handcuffed when it cannot match a rogue who goes all in.

The U.S. cannot drive events with maximum pressure if it lacks more will than its adversary.
The divergence between a rogue actor having greater interests at stake and the U.S. having greater capabilities leads to instability. In these scenarios, both sides think they can dominate—one through its superior capabilities and the other through its immovable will. It is the two combined—capabilities and the resolve to use them—that generates the credibility to compel. The U.S. cannot drive events with maximum pressure if it lacks more will than its adversary.

Iain King CBE is the U.K. Visiting Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). The views expressed are the author’s alone.

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Why Maximum Pressure Fails, but Coercive De-Escalation Can Succeed

Decades from now, when historians seek to define the diplomacy of our age, the phrase “maximum pressure” will feature strongly. But how many of those historians will describe it as a suc

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[jward]

(continued)
Why Maximum Pressure Fails, but Coercive De-Escalation Can Succeed


By Iain King
February 04, 2020

Coercive De-escalation
So, what can succeed where maximum pressure fails? The answer is perhaps best described as coercive de-escalation. Coercive de-escalation is about compelling an adversary to rein in their provocative behavior, usually by compelling them to either accept a deal or a tacit understanding, though it may not be in their immediate interests to do so.
There are two ways to do this, and they are strongest when combined. The first route is to degrade the adversary’s interests in maintaining their current behavior—ideally, so their will to persist falls below the level of U.S. resolve. This restores deterrence in America’s favor by re-aligning capability with will.
How does one reduce an actor’s resolve? It is about reducing their stakes, so the outcomes matter less. Rhetoric needs to shift from all-or-nothing and zero sum to win-win. At the same time, setting the U.S. position within a framework of internationally understood principles helps the adversary understand the American mindset, and invites them to contemplate a place within the international community if they comply.
This first route can be assisted by deft diplomacy, making it easier for an adversary to save face when they volte face and quelling risks that may provoke at a crucial moment. The U.S. can emphasize a new element of the relationship, and make clear it is on offer only if the adversary complies. American deterrent thresholds should be described qualitatively, not quantitatively, and pinned to appropriate international principles, thus reducing an adversary’s temptation to try their luck. When the U.S. is forced to act against a rogue regime, it should sanction them with reversible measures to maximize the adversary’s interests in a return to compliance.

Martial law in 20

For an example, consider President Reagan’s approach to communist Poland in the early 1980s. After Warsaw imposed martial law in December 1981, the White House enacted an array of sanctions to show their strong disapproval. By 1984 Reagan was able to reverse these measures to reward a partial change of behavior from the Polish leadership. Also, he could leverage membership of international institutions, including the International Monetary Fund, to encourage further improvements. Reagan was careful to frame his position not as maximum pressure, but as one grounded in high principles—both to signal American resolve, and to offer a route for Warsaw to acquiesce in a satisfactory resolution.
The second route for coercive de-escalation is to focus not on the substance of the confrontation, but the barter about how it will be resolved—what might be described as the meta-negotiation. It is in this meta-negotiation the coercive element of the approach comes in, because here the U.S. needs to be tough––it can apply an escalating portfolio of pressure, potentially up to maximum pressure, which its adversary will be unable to match.

The meta-negotiation differs from the negotiation itself because here the U.S. has broader interests than the adversary. The U.S. interest is that there is a deal, or at least a tacit understanding, just as the U.S. has an accommodation with almost every country in the world. And the U.S. can bring its overwhelming strength to bear, thus re-aligning will and capabilities. Hence, America can dominate the meta-negotiation far more easily than it can dominate the negotiation itself.
Through this second route for coercive de-escalation, the U.S. can deploy its unrivalled diplomatic capabilities to rally allies and cajole neutrals, bringing the international community together around the proposition that there must be an accommodation. Hardliners within a regime who advocate defiance of the American overture will face an overwhelming strategic communications campaign portraying their opposition as a foolhardy errand. America can up the stakes in this meta-negotiation by explaining how global principles are at stake in the localized stand-off. Presidential rhetoric can emote on the importance of coming to the table, enforced by a whip-handed message from the U.S. national security machine: the adversary cannot outmatch the U.S. will for a deal, nor its capabilities to make it happen, so it should not try.
In this meta-negotiation, the U.S. can coerce their opponent towards a win-win outcome, and one which is particularly favorable to the U.S. If the adversary is still intent on escalating, then the U.S. is obliged to follow through on its deterrence threats, to negate any benefit the adversary may derive from their refusal to reach an accommodation.

Coercive De-escalation in Practice
Consider the resolution of the Kosovo crisis in Spring 1999, in which the U.S. had initially tried to apply maximum pressure. Yugoslav President Milosevic refused to withdraw his troops from the southern Serbian Province, where they had been committing atrocities. After American led diplomacy failed, from 23 March until the end of May, NATO missiles and warplanes bombed targets in and around Belgrade. But Milosevic resisted, and—just like Iran and North Korea—found almost gleeful pride, and increased domestic support, as he faced down the international community.

President Clinton talking with Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic (CIA/Wikimedia)
Then President Clinton switched to coercive de-escalation. Instead of trying to force Milosevic to withdraw his troops, he moved to force him to restart talks. The shift to the meta-negotiation brought Russia along, depriving Milosevic of a key ally. It meant the United Nations, not NATO, would oversee any resolution of the crisis, depriving Milosevic of moral authority. And the shift gave Clinton license to contemplate ground troops: its stakes had risen to match its capabilities. Finally, on 9 June 1999, Milosevic agreed to terms.

Conclusion
So, how does coercive de-escalation play out with North Korea, the original international security challenge for which the maximum pressure approach was developed? It would mean compelling Kim Jong-Un back to a meaningful dialogue—talks in which he sincerely accedes to follow through on commitments he made. These commitments are likely to span his nuclear portfolio, the recent missile tests, and regional security in general. The exact nature of the commitments is for the talks themselves to determine, but the U.S. will be in a position to ensure its key concerns are addressed. Most importantly, through coercive de-escalation, the U.S. can make sure the negotiation happens.
Similarly, coercive de-escalation applied to Iran would mean deploying a credible threat to force the regime towards a new bargain—a bargain that would inevitably benefit the United States. The spike in tensions after the Soleimani killing suggests this may mean American allies in Europe, or the United Nations should convene the talks, and the ultimate outcome is likely to be one which allows Tehran to save face. But, the Iranian regime should be left in no doubt they will not be allowed to save face if they refuse to negotiate, and they should be forced to understand this point before they take such a fateful decision.

Coercive de-escalation is no less firm than maximum pressure, and certainly does not indicate a lack of resolve or interest. It is the opposite: it is about shifting the U.S. focus from an issue of substance where the adversary has a greater, potentially existential stake; and reapplying that pressure to force a negotiation––a negotiation in which the U.S. has at least as much interest as the adversary, thereby re-combining interest and capability in America’s favor. Unlike maximum pressure, coercive deterrence applies leverage at the meta-negotiation level. Coercive de-escalation compels an adversary to accept a win-win outcome which delivers fundamental U.S. interests.

By restoring U.S. leadership among allies, coercive de-escalation can muster the whole international community around an American position far better than maximum pressure. This refreshes America’s asymmetric advantage and enables it to focus more power onto a security challenge. By activating allies and partners, coercive de-escalation applies more pressure than maximum pressure ever can.
Decades from now, when historians come to write about the diplomacy of our time, it is just possible they will detect a change in how maximum pressure was applied—one which, finally, generated satisfactory outcomes to some of America’s most intractable international security issues, and where adversaries of the U.S. were compelled to end their most egregious behaviors.

Why Maximum Pressure Fails, but Coercive De-Escalation Can Succeed

Decades from now, when historians seek to define the diplomacy of our age, the phrase “maximum pressure” will feature strongly. But how many of those historians will describe it as a suc

www.realcleardefense.com

 

[Housecarl]

Posted for fair use.....

US Army wants to expand pre-positioned stock in Pacific

As operations increase in the Indo-Pacific region, the Army's pre-positioned stocks will grow.

www.defensenews.com

Land
US Army wants to expand pre-positioned stock in Pacific

By: Jen Judson   1 day ago

U.S soldiers from 1-27 Infantry Regiment, Wolfhounds, 2nd Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division participate in live-fire drills at Puslatpur Marine Base, Indonesia. (Maj. Leah Ganoni/U.S. Army)



WASHINGTON — The U.S. Army wants to expand its pre-positioned equipment in the Indo-Pacific region, Gen. Gus Perna, the head of Army Materiel Command, told reporters during a Feb. 4 Defense Writers Group event in Washington.

While the service believes the Army pre-positioned stock — or APS — is adequate in Europe as it heads into a major division-level exercise there this year, the service is “already working on ways to expand APS out in the Pacific,” he said.

Both the Defender Europe and Defender Pacific series of exercises this year will help determine if the APS stock in each theater is right-sized and correctly based.



Does the US Army have enough weapons to defend Europe? Exercise Defender 2020 will reveal all.
The Army's pre-positioned stock in Europe will be put to the test during Defender 2020, as will the service's entire supply chain and ability to rapidly move soldiers and equipment.

By: Jen Judson

After his predecessor laid some groundwork, the new U.S. Army Pacific Command chief Gen. Paul LaCamera, who assumed the positioned in November 2019, is working through a strategy, Perna said — “in combination, of course, with support of the [combatant command] commander out there.”

Once the leaders in the Pacific have a plan, they will brief the Army secretary and chief on courses of action and then decide the path forward. Next, Perna said, his command will execute the establishment and expansion of APS in the Pacific as directed.

AMC is also figuring out how to tackle Defender Pacific, which will run at a smaller scale to its companion exercise in Europe, but will expand in fiscal 2021 as the European version scales back.

“Defender Pacific will have added challenges due to the sheer difference in timing and distances, as well as terrain,” Perna told Defense News in December. “We will have to move troops and equipment much farther than in the European theater, which means it will take more time to get there.”

For logisticians and maintainers, that means predicting requirements further into the future, he added.

Additionally, communications will be a challenge with a 14-hour time difference. “The exercise will put to the test our 24-hour operations center and support systems,” he said.

The Pacific also requires different weapon systems and combat enablers in its APS. And unique to the Pacific will be a chance to test the Army’s sealift capabilities as opposed to the rails and roads in Europe.

Perna also stressed one thing neither theater will likely see again any time soon: the “activity sets” the Army experimented with in Europe and South Korea as operations ramped up in both regions.

The service ditched activity sets in 2017, as they were only intended to serve as a bridging strategy where soldiers deployed from the continental United States to a combatant command area of operations, and could then draw the equipment out of storage for training.

“In my opinion, that was an efficiency drill and I was 100 percent against them,” Perna said. “Activity sets and APS are two different things. Army pre-positioned stocks serve a primary purpose to allow the president of the United States to make decisions and us to execute rapidly. And in that light, the equipment will be ready and it will be capable of going out and executing its mission.

When it comes to current APS, “it is ready. Every piece of equipment works,” Perna said.

“We have gone to great length to make sure that a unit can get on a plane and fly over and draw that equipment rapidly. It’s not going to be hindered with bureaucracy, and it’s going to have all of its capability so that it can get to where it needs to be immediately,” he added.


About
this
Author

About Jen Judson
Jen Judson is the land warfare reporter for Defense News. She has covered defense in the Washington area for eight years. She was previously a reporter at Politico Pro Defense and Inside Defense. She won the National Press Club's best analytical reporting award in 2014 and was named the Defense Media Awards' best young defense journalist in 2018.



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[Housecarl]

Posted for fair use.....

U.S. Missile Defense Woefully Prepared for 21st Century Threats

There’s a memorable scene in the first “Iron Man” movie where a naïve but well-meaning liberal journalist confronts Tony Stark with the nickname “Merchant of Death”

www.realcleardefense.com

U.S. Missile Defense Woefully Prepared for 21st Century Threats

By Jared Whitley
February 05, 2020

Missile Defense Agency photo by SrA Robert Volio

There’s a memorable scene in the first “Iron Man” movie where a naïve but well-meaning liberal journalist confronts Tony Stark with the nickname “Merchant of Death” and accuses him of war profiteering. Tony coolly responds, “It's an imperfect world, but it's the only one we've got. I guarantee you the day weapons are no longer needed to keep the peace; we'll start making bricks and beams for baby hospitals." The journalist has no comeback, surrendering to Tony’s reason (and his charm).

Although that scene was written to be funny, its basic premise is true and the reasoning inarguable: we live in an extremely dangerous world, populated by bad actors with no reservation of using weapons of mass destruction against civilian populations. Meanwhile, our nuclear superiority is decaying. The same year "Iron Man" came out, way back in 2008, Defense Secretary Robert Gates warned that, “No one has designed a new nuclear weapon in the United States since the 1980s, and no one has built a new one since the early 1990s. … At a certain point, it will become impossible to keep extending the life of our arsenal.”

Terrorists and tyrants will never thank us for playing nice and disarming. In power until he dies, Vladimir Putin didn’t get the memo that the Cold War is over. Xi Jinping knows a strong America is the only thing between him and world domination.
Nuclear attack is the biggest military threat the United States and our allies. A single megaton-size nuclear warhead aimed at a major American city could kill or irradiate millions, with incalculable economic repercussions. If aimed at the American heartland, once-fertile farmland could cripple our agricultural capabilities and leave millions to starve.
Whereas mutually assured destruction kept the world relatively safe during the Cold War, the proliferation of nuclear capabilities has turned Planet Earth into a ticking, radioactive timebomb. While the last world war ended because just one country became a nuclear power, the next world war will start with nine nuclear powers – not including the risk of non-state actors getting their hands on nuclear materials.
But before we all move to rural Montana or New Zealand, there is a solution to help keep the American homeland as secure as possible: a robust, domestic missile-defense plan. The previous Administration inexplicably gutted it, and Pentagon bureaucrats are continuing to underfund it, but it can be brought back online.
This matter of America’s ongoing nuclear superiority is at the heart of a contentious funding dispute between the White House and Congress, with the final 2021 federal budget expected by Feb. 11. The appropriation of billions for the right nuclear defense will save us countless cents we’d have to pay to tribute to the villains who want to overtake us.
The best technology for protecting the homeland from intercontinental ballistic missile attack is the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) program. The GMD element of the Ballistic Missile Defense System can engage and destroy limited intermediate- and long-range missile threats in space. The no-nonsense Exo-atmospheric Kill Vehicle (EKV) is a sensor/propulsion package that uses the kinetic energy from a direct hit to destroy the incoming target vehicle. It is vital for Congress and the Pentagon to support further deployment of these defenses now with the threats of the 21st Century.
One of the first acts of the previous Administration was to slash GMD funding, shifting defense programs to protect our under-paying NATO allies in Europe rather than the US homeland. President Obama deployed Aegis Ashore and Standard Missile 3s in Romania and Poland – which is good, no one wants to see them re-invaded by Russia. Still, the President's first and highest duty is to defend the United States.
Many pre-Trump leftover appointees continue to jeopardize national security. Moreover, career bureaucrats in the Pentagon are undermining missile defense. Dr. Michael Griffin, the otherwise reasonable undersecretary of defense for research and engineering, issued a stop-work order to Boeing on the development of a Redesigned Kill Vehicle (or RKV) in 2018. In the latest NDAA, conservatives in Congress “took a whack” at Griffin, whose behind-the-scenes power struggle with Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment Ellen Lord is doing nothing to keep us safe.
Furthermore, the Pentagon hit the pause button on a troubled effort to redesign the EKV on the Ground-Based Midcourse Defense system’s interceptors after a two-year delay already postponed its deployment.
But there is hope. Last month, Boeing won a $265 million contract modification for the Ground-based Midcourse Defense anti-ballistic missile system, and Raytheon has announced it can fix some of the shortcomings of the RKV design. These are positive developments if the Pentagon sticks with the program.
China and Russia like to shake their fists when the United States provides missile defense for its homeland and its allies, and outrage from Moscow and Beijing is usually a sign we are on the right track. Hypersonics will throw a wrench at missile defense, but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be pursued. Combined with left-of-launch strategies, we must have a more robust approach to missile defense. If we do, we won’t even need Iron Man to protect us.
Jared Whitley is a long-time DC politico, having worked in the US Senate, the Bush White House, and the defense industry. He is a graduate of Hult International Business School in Dubai.

 

[jward]

The Kurdish Tragedy: What America Can Learn From Its Foreign Policy Fumbles in Iraq

As bitter of a pill it is to swallow in watching a good and reliable partner fall under the thumb of hostile actors, policymakers and foreign policy experts can avoid future calamities by developing realistic and deliberative long-term strategies that support America’s diplomats and armed forces serving as the instruments of that policy.


by Ryan Gardiner

Although the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) proved a vital partner in fighting the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, and its territory has served as a rare oasis of stability in a war-torn country, the October 2019 American pullout from the northern Syrian border region brought to bear the unrealistic notion of an enduring American partnership with the SDF and the unclear nature of the U.S. presence. Given what we already know, it is surprising that America’s military and political leadership did not foresee this eventuality.

The Turkish army’s invasion into Kurdish-dominated SDF territory has resulted in over one hundred thousand internally-displaced persons and accusations of war crimes committed by Turkey and its militias. The invasion and the behavior of the invading forces have resulted in a widespread outcry from Western media sources, American politicians, and many of America’s allies. Despite this, the Syrian pullout should not have surprised anyone due to Turkey’s growing security concern of an empowered Syrian Kurdish enclave, the nature of the American-Turkish relationship, and America’s unclear policy regarding its long-term presence in Syria.

From the outset of the U.S.-Syrian Kurdish partnership, marked by the 2014 battle of Kobani, where the United States first provided Kurdish ground forces with air support, Turkey’s opposition and hostility to the arrangement should have signaled the political dilemma that would follow. The battle of Kobani marked not only the beginning of a U.S.-led effort to actively assist the Syrian Kurdish forces on the ground, the People’s Protection Units (YPG), but it also laid bare Turkey’s priority of curbing more nuanced Kurdish ambitions rather than combatting the obvious threat of a brutal ISIL that had abutted its southern flank.
Turkey’s rationale, that the YPG served as a Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) offshoot was not without merit, and seeing as the United States recognized the PKK as a terrorist group this should have raised red flags at the very beginning for decisionmakers in Washington. However, this real concern was ignored by American officials, and continued gains by the YPG, then merging into the SDF, only exacerbated Turkey’s concerns. As a strategic NATO partner, albeit a noncooperative and often hostile one, Turkish concerns were always going to trump U.S. support for a tactical ally.
A lack of clarity in America’s goals and objectives in Syria past ISIS’s defeat also set the stage for a rapidly decreased presence. As SDF forces cleared ISIS out of the larger cities of Raqqa and Deir El-Zor in 2017, it became evident that ISIS’s future as a territory-holding force was coming to an end. For all the rightfully positive attention paid to the SDF for participation in the anti-ISIS campaign, there was no clear messaging from the U.S. Departments of State and Defense on how long U.S. forces would continue to support the SDF. There was also a lack of clarity about what a continued American presence hoped to achieve beyond the defeat of ISIS. The empowerment of Syrian Kurdish democratization efforts was less pronounced and unlikely to convince the Trump administration to maintain an American presence.

Furthermore, President Donald Trump publicly pronounced his dissatisfaction with keeping troops on the ground in Syria, threatening a complete pullout in 2018. At this point, warning bells should have sounded in the foreign policy and defense establishments that America’s future involvement in the Syrian conflict was in doubt. Furthermore, it should have been the signal for American leaders who wished to continue supporting the Syrian Kurds to develop plans for a smooth exit of U.S. forces with protective measures put in place for our Kurdish allies. Yet between Trump’s December 2018 announcement and his final decision to remove U.S. forces from the Northern Syrian border areas, there was a marked lack of preparation for such an eventuality, as it seemed many lawmakers and cabinet officials were caught off-guard, as evidenced by the rushed and chaotic American pullout.
Perhaps most representative of the uphill battle faced by the Syrian Kurds was how their lobbying efforts to maintain U.S. support were dwarfed in comparison to their Turkish adversaries. On Capitol Hill, money talks and Turkey has learned this lesson from its years of lobbying American legislators from issues such as not recognizing the Armenian Genocide to countering Greek interests in Cyprus.

The political wing of the SDF has gained sympathetic and supportive ears throughout the American foreign policy establishment. They managed to retain full access to American law-makers such as Sens. Marco Rubio (R-FL), Tim Kaine (D-Va.), and Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), all members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and SDF leader Mazloum Abdi recently spoke with Trump. Kurdish advocacy has also been prominent in think tanks and American news outlets throughout the anti-ISIS campaign and on the heels of Turkey’s latest actions.
However, lobbying its interests to American lawmakers is nothing new to Turkey, as evidenced by $1.7 million spent as early as 2009. In 2018 alone, Turkey spent roughly $6.6 million in lobbying as compared to $120,000 by the Syrian Democratic Council. Furthermore, a long list of prominent Americans have officially lobbied on behalf of Turkey, including former CIA director Porter Gross, former Democratic Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, Trump’s former national security advisor, retired Lt. Gen. Mike Flynn, and others. How this fact and others escaped some of the more prominent members of Congress who vocally decried the U.S. pullout is surprising at the very least. Turkey’s entrenched position in Washington as a sixty-five-year NATO bulwark has undoubtedly provided it with financial and political advantages, but those who should have been most aware of this were the blindest.

It was always unrealistic to believe that a long-term strategy favoring the Syrian Kurds over a historic NATO partner would ever be possible, despite Turkey’s adversarial behavior. The heroic and costly efforts undertaken by the Syrian Kurds fighting ISIL have undoubtedly pulled at the heartstrings of the Western conscience, but this obscured the harsh realities.
The Obama administration, while recognizing the effectiveness of the Syrian Kurdish YPG in combating ISIS, seemingly ignored the concerns of a major NATO member for a short-term gain in defeating a threat that was barbarous but arguably contained in swaths of Syria and Iraq. Whether Trump believed this to be the case or not, his intention to pull out American troops from the border area was communicated well in advance of the events that took place in October 2019 and under no circumstances should U.S. policymakers and military leaders have been caught flat-footed.

Furthermore, six decades worth of ties with the United States provided Turkey with the know-how needed to navigate the circles of power in Washington. As bitter of a pill it is to swallow in watching a good and reliable partner fall under the thumb of hostile actors, policymakers and foreign policy experts can avoid future calamities by developing realistic and deliberative long-term strategies that support America’s diplomats and armed forces serving as the instruments of that policy. Instead, images of angry Syrian Kurds hurling vegetables at fleeing U.S. military convoys and Russian forces moving into the confines of recently-held American bases have been seared into our minds, the results of a short-sighted and unclear U.S. involvement in Syria.

Ryan Gardiner is currently an assistant managing editor for Young Professionals in Foreign Policy and previously served as an assistant managing editor for the Harvard Kennedy School's Journal of Middle Eastern Politics and Policy. A graduate of Tufts University's Fletcher School and Navy veteran, Ryan was a Class of 2016 Presidential Management Fellow and currently works as an analyst in the Department of Homeland Security.

posted for fair use

The Kurdish Tragedy: What America Can Learn From Its Foreign Policy Fumbles in Iraq

As bitter of a pill it is to swallow in watching a good and reliable partner fall under the thumb of hostile actors, policymakers and foreign policy experts can avoid future calamities by developing realistic and deliberative long-term strategies that support America’s diplomats and armed forces...

nationalinterest.org

 

[Housecarl]

Hummm.....
Posted for fair use.....

Greece Is Sending Patriot Missiles To Saudi Arabia To Guard "Critical Energy Infrastructure"

The impending deployment comes as the U.S. military is looking to send its own Patriots to Iraq, possibly drawing on units it has now in Saudi Arabia.

www.thedrive.com

Greece Is Sending Patriot Missiles To Saudi Arabia To Guard "Critical Energy Infrastructure"
The impending deployment comes as the U.S. military is looking to send its own Patriots to Iraq, possibly drawing on units it has now in Saudi Arabia.
By Joseph Trevithick
February 5, 2020

• The War Zone

US Army
SHARE
Greece says it is preparing to deploy a Patriot surface-to-air missile system unit to Saudi Arabia to help protect the Kingdom's oil infrastructure. This news comes amid reports that the U.S. military is trying to get approval from Iraqi authorities to send Patriots there in the wake of unprecedented Iranian ballistic missile strikes aimed at American personnel in that country last month. That plan could involve moving U.S. Army Patriot units presently in Saudi Arabia into Iraq.
Stelios Petsas, a spokesperson for the Greek government, announced the impending Patriot deployment in an interview on Feb. 3, 2020. He did not say how large the air defense contingent would be or when would actually arrive in Saudi Arabia, but said that the government in Riyadh was underwriting operation, which is "to protect critical energy infrastructure." The Greek military has six squadrons of Patriot PAC-3 surface-to-air missile systems, all of which are assigned to the Hellenic Air Force's 350 Guided Missile Wing.

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President Erdogan Says Intel Operatives Are In Libya Ahead Of Turkish Troop DeploymentBy Joseph Trevithick Posted in The War Zone
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"The deployment contributes to energy security, promotes our country as a factor of regional stability and strengthens our ties to Saudi Arabia," Petsas said. “As a defensive system, this constitutes no threat to other countries in the area."

Hellenic Air Force
A Hellenic Air Force Patriot surface-to-air missile launch station.
Petsas added that discussions about sending Greek Patriots to Saudi Arabia first began in October 2019, which is not surprising. The month before, unprecedented suicide drone and cruise missile strikes had caused significant damage to Saudi oil infrastructure.
The Kingdom subsequently said that it believed the strikes were at least "sponsored by Iran," while the United States accused Iran of directly carrying out the operation. U.S. authorities quickly pledged to help bolster Saudi air and missile defenses and called on its allies and partners to do the same. Petsas said in his interview that France and the United Kingdom were also be planning to send forces to Saudi Arabia and that Italy might be looking to do the same in the future.






Though the Greek deployment has been in the works for months, it could be especially beneficial for the United States now, which is looking to deploy Patriot units to Iraq in the aftermath of the Iranian ballistic missile strikes on facilities where U.S. troops are situated in that country on Jan. 7. Those strikes were in retaliation for the U.S. decision to kill Iranian Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani outside Baghdad International Airport just days earlier.
The U.S. military did not have Patriots or any other robust air or missile defenses in place in Iraq at the time. This, in turn, has prompted public criticism of this lack of preparedness, especially given the deployment of Patriot units in Saudi Arabia last year.
Given the relatively small size of the U.S. Army's overall Patriot force, some or all of the four batteries of these surface-to-air missile systems that are present in the Kingdom, which are also tasked with defending "critical military and civilian infrastructure," may now reportedly get re-deployed into Iraq, if authorities in Baghdad approval the plan. However, Iraqi officials, who were incensed by the unilateral U.S. decision to kill Soleimani on their soil, are still withholding approval for the American air defense deployment. You can read more in detail about why there are still no American Patriot systems in Iraq in this recent War Zone piece.

US Army
US Army personnel train on the Patriot surface-to-air missile system in Qatar.
In addition, Pestas, the government spokesperson, said that Greece's decision to send its own Patriots to Saudi Arabia is also wrapped up in an array of other geopolitical concerns, most of which are linked to its long-standing rivalry with neighboring Turkey, which has been pursuing a steadily more assertive foreign policy under the administration of the increasingly authoritarian President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in recent years. He explained that the Greek government was "trying to re-energize" its relations with Gulf Arab states, broadly, specifically to a challenge to Turkey's overseas moves. Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis is presently in the Middle East on a tour that will take him to both Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
The Saudis and Emiratis, among others, also continue to enforce a blockade of neighboring Qatar as part of a bitter political dispute that first erupted in 2017. Since then, the government in Doha has embraced Turkish support, including the deployment of Turkish troops.
At the same time, Turkey has increased its involvement in the civil conflict in Libya and leveraged its relationship with the internationally recognized government in Tripoli to assert claims over significant parts of the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. This Turkish-Libyan agreement on maritime boundaries has prompted a new spat with Greece, along with Egypt, Cyprus, and Israel, among others, all of whom have categorically rejected Ankara's claims.
Greece and Turkey have other long-standing border disputes and the overall increase in tensions between the two countries has led to an increase in Turkish combat jets reportedly violating Greek airspace. These types of incidents have occurred on and off for decades and have led to reported shootdowns in the past. There have been reports of mock dogfights between Greek and Turkish fighters In some of the more recent cases, as well.

Hellenic Air Force
A Hellenic Air Force F-16C Viper fighter jet, which the service commonly scrambles in response to Turkish combat jets getting close to or violating Greek airspace.
All of this comes as Turkey's relations with its NATO allies, including Greece, as well as the United States, are at a recent low over various issues, including Ankara's decision to buy Russian S-400 surface-to-air missile systems, a saga you can read more about here and here. Ankara's unilateral military intervention into northern Syrian last year, aimed at ejecting U.S.-backed predominantly Kurdish forces from a wide swath of that country, has also strained its relationship with Washington. There have been reports that the United States is finally considering removing its stockpiles of B61 nuclear gravity bombs from Incirlik Air Base in Turkey as a result of the worsening ties between the two countries.
The Turkish government's subsequent decision to cut a deal with its counterparts in Moscow to patrol a buffer zone in Syria, and to move closer toward the Russian sphere of influence in general, has only compounded these issues. Of course, it is worth noting that, Turkish-Russian relations are now themselves increasingly strained over the Kremlin's unwillingness or inability to curtail a new Syrian government offensive into areas under the control of Turkish-backed Syrian rebels.
It remains to be seen how Turkey may or may not respond to Greece's upcoming deployment Patriots to Saudi Arabia and its efforts to reinvigorate ties with the Kingdom, in general. Regardless, it is a clear indication that Turkey's grand ambitions under Erdogan, especially in the realm of foreign policy, are having complex and far-reaching impacts.
In the meantime, the more immediate impact of the Greek Patriots heading to the Kingdom may be to help the U.S. military free up its own air defense assets for deployment into Iraq.
Contact the author: joe@thedrive.com

 

[Housecarl]

Posted for fair use.....

Admiral Warns America's East Coast Is No Longer A "Safe Haven" Thanks To Russian Subs

Increased Russian sub activity means that the Navy no longer views sailing off the East Coast or across the Atlantic to be "uncontested" movements.

www.thedrive.com

Admiral Warns America's East Coast Is No Longer A "Safe Haven" Thanks To Russian Subs
Increased Russian sub activity means that the Navy no longer views sailing off the East Coast or across the Atlantic to be "uncontested" movements.
By Joseph Trevithick
February 4, 2020

• The War Zone

Russian Ministry of Defense
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A senior U.S. Navy officer says that his service no longer considers the East Coast of the United States as an "uncontested" area or an automatic "safe haven" for its ships and submarines. This is a product of steadily increased Russian submarine activity in the Atlantic Ocean, including the deployment of more advanced and quieter types that can better evade detection.
U.S. Navy Vice Admiral Andrew "Woody" Lewis made these comments at a gathering the U.S. Naval Institute and the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank jointly hosted on Feb. 4, 2020. Lewis is the commander of the Navy's 2nd Fleet, which the service reactivated in 2018 specifically to address the surge in Russia's submarine operations in the Atlantic. This fleet, headquartered at Naval Support Activity Hampton Roads in Virginia, reached full operational capability in December 2019.




Russia Sends Ten Subs Into North Atlantic In Drill Unprecedented In Size Since Cold WarBy Tyler Rogoway Posted in The War Zone
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NATO Unfazed By Russia Plans To Fire Missiles Near Its Massive Exercise Off Norway (Updated)By Joseph Trevithick Posted in The War Zone
Video Takes You Inside Russia's 'Beast' Division Of Akula Class Nuclear Fast Attack SubsBy Tyler Rogoway Posted in The War Zone
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"Our new reality is that when our sailors toss the lines over and set sail, they can expect to be operating in a contested space once they leave Norfolk," Lewis said. "Our ships can no longer expect to operate in a safe haven on the East Coast or merely cross the Atlantic unhindered to operate in another location."

"We have seen an ever-increasing number of Russian submarines deployed in the Atlantic, and these submarines are more capable than ever, deploying for longer periods of time, with more lethal weapons systems," he continued. "Our sailors have the mindset that they are no longer uncontested and to expect to operate alongside our competitors each and every underway."

USN
US Navy Vice Admiral Andrew "Woody" Lewis, head of 2nd Fleet, speaks at a conference during Exercise Baltic Operations 19 (BALTOPS 19).
Lewis did not offer any specific details on the total number of Russian submarines the U.S. military believes are on patrol in the Atlantic at any given time compared to previous years. There has been significant debate about the exact scale of Russia's undersea activities, especially compared to peaks in the Soviet Navy's operations at the height of the Cold War, and whether the Kremlin has only been able to generate the additional deployments by pulling resources from the Pacific region.

Russian subs are coming. “We're talking about more (activity) than we've seen in 25 years,” US sub chief says. https://t.co/6j9ZELOKi2

That’s easy: 25 years ago they didn’t sail much. Russian Strategic Submarine Patrols Rebound But a few years ago, US Navy started to classify patrol data. Why? pic.twitter.com/eUAvgzqQlS
— Hans Kristensen (@nukestrat) August 7, 2018​

New article uses #OSINT to explore claims that #Russia #Submarine activity is at much higher levels in last couple of years. Crunched some public data against my submarine database. Average submarine has similar at-sea days to Cold War H I Sutton - Covert Shores pic.twitter.com/aNMFHsdtMr
— H I Sutton (@CovertShores) May 23, 2018​

However, it's undeniable there has been at least a relative spike in Russia's submarine activity in the Atlantic in recent years. In October 2019, Norweigan state broadcaster NRK reported that the country's top military intelligence agency, the Norwegian Intelligence Service (NIS), also known as the Etterretningstjenesten or E-tjenesten, was monitoring the largest single Russian submarine exercise since the end of the Cold war, involving at least 10 submarines, eight of which were nuclear-powered types, including two nuclear-powered attack submarines from the Project 945A Kondor class, also known as the Sierra II class.

Pskov.ru
The Russian Sierra II class submarine Pskov.
NRK's report also said that the E-tjenesten believed that the goal of the exercise was to demonstrate the Russian Navy's continued ability to deploy a large number of submarines far into the Atlantic while remaining largely undetected. This, in turn, showed the ability of that force, which might have included ballistic missile and guided-missile submarines, the latter of which may be able to carry Zircon hypersonic cruise missiles in the future, to hold targets on the East Coast of the United States at risk.
As The War Zone noted at the time, the exercise could also give Russian submarines an opportunity to train on flooding the so-called GIUK Gap – standing for Greenland, Iceland, and the United Kingdom – which refers to paths between the Norweigan Sea and the North Atlantic Ocean. It could also demonstrate their ability to maintain a defensive posture off the shores of Norway to present a threat to NATO members and protect Russia's own assets in the far north, including its naval bases in the northwest region of the country and ballistic missile subs sailing hidden under the Polar ice cap.

CIA
"The Kalibr-class cruise missile, for example, has been launched from coastal-defense systems, long-range aircraft, and submarines off the coast of Syria," U.S. Admiral James Foggo, the commander of U.S. Naval Forces in Europe and Africa, had said in 2018. "They've shown the capability to be able to reach pretty much all the capitals in Europe from any of the bodies of water that surround Europe."
Though last year's exercise was a particularly large demonstration of Russia's submarine capabilities, it does appear to be indicative of the kind of increasing challenges the Navy is seeing in the Atlantic, as a whole. Despite limited defense budgets, the Kremlin continues to invest heavily in the development and fielding of newer and more advanced submarines that are better able to elude U.S., as well as NATO, forces.
One of the War Zone's sources said that a large number of Navy submarines, ships, and maritime patrol aircraft spent weeks in the fall of 2019 attempted, without success, to locate the Project 885 Yasen class guided missile submarine Severodvinsk after it reportedly deployed into the North Atlantic. The type, which can carry up to 40 Kalibr missiles, among other weapons, is known for having an especially low acoustic signature.
Russia has two further improved Project 885M Yasen-M class subs under construction now and plans to eventually build at least six of these upgraded versions, in total. The Yasen-M notably includes a new reactor that features an updated cooling system that reportedly further reduces the noise the submarine generates.

The Russian Navy also launched a new special mission submarine, the K-139 Belgorod, a modified Oscar II class guided-missile submarine, last year. You can read the War Zone's complete analysis of this boat here, but suffice to say it appears to have significant intelligence-gathering capabilities and will also reportedly be able to carry Russia's new and controversial Poseidon long-range nuclear-powered and nuclear-armed 'doomsday' torpedo.
Belgorod is just one of Russia's fleet of special-purpose submarines, which also includes the unique Project 10831 Losharik spy submarine. This boat was heavily damaged in a fire on July 1, 2019, but the Russian Navy plans to repair it and return it to service.
Russia's more advanced submarine fleets also include diesel-electric types, including the Project 636 Varshavyanka class, or Improved Kilo class, and the Project 677 Lada class, both of which are attack submarine types. The latter of these features an air-independent propulsion system, which makes it especially quiet.

Морозов Л.Н. via Wikimedia
Russia's only Lada class submarine, though the country is in the process of building two more and has two more on order.
Increased Russian naval activity in the North Atlantic is also not entirely limited to submarines. Vice Admiral Lewis highlighted how the USS Mahan, an Arleigh Burke class destroyer, was in the middle of training when it was tasked with monitoring the Vishnya class spy ship Viktor Leonov, in December 2019. The Viktor Leonov caused something of a stir when the U.S. Coast Guard announced that it had received reports that the ship was sailing in an "unsafe manner" off the coasts of South Carolina and Georiga. It also operated offer the coast of Florida for a time.
There was never any indication that the Coast Guard had corroborated those reports and it was unclear where the originated from in the first place. The Russian ship, which has made numerous trips to the Western Hemisphere over the years, left waters off the East Coast of the United States before the end of the year. It then returned for a time to the waters off Florida in January 2020.
Earlier in 2019, the Navy had also notably shadowed Russia's first-in-class Project 22350 frigate Admiral Gorshkov as it sailed in the Caribbean as part of world tour following its commissioning. This warship is the Russian Navy's most modern vessel to date.

Alexander Galperin / Sputnik via AP
The Project 22350 frigate Admiral Gorshkov.
Lewis said that all of this has impacted how the Navy prepares ships and submarines and their crews for deployments, with a greater focus on high-end operations during pre-deployment exercises and a greater emphasis on operational security in case someone is watching. 2nd Fleet, which does not technically have any ships assigned to it and shares administrative space with U.S. Fleet Forces Command at Hampton Roads, is primarily responsible for overseeing these preparations.
"Each one of these certification events gets more and more complex, more and more what we would call high end," Lewis explained. Recent composite unit training exercises that the 2nd Fleet has overseen, which are capstone events for the deployment of larger groups of warships, such as carrier strike groups and expeditionary strike groups, “are the best and most challenging operating I’ve ever done in my time in the Navy," he continued.
The U.S. Navy had also announced in 2018 that it planned to eventually create a submarine "aggressor" unit that could help train ship and submarine crews, as well as those on maritime patrol aircraft, to respond to the growing submarine threat in the Atlantic, as well as that of Chinese submarines in the Pacific. It could also help in the development of new tactics, techniques, and procedures for both submarine and anti-submarine warfare.
“We talk about how we fight,” Vice Admiral Lewis said. "We have to tie that to how we train, because we’re never going to be better than how we train."
From his description of the situation in the North Atlantic, it sounds like Navy ships, submarines, and aircraft have increasing opportunities now to put that training to the test in what might he been considered routine transits a decade ago.
Contact the author: joe@thedrive.com

 

[Housecarl]

Hummm.....

Posted for fair use.....

US to start negotiating with Russia on nuclear arms control soon | CNN Politics

The Trump administration will soon start nuclear negotiations with Russia, US national security adviser Robert O'Brien said Wednesday, speaking exactly one year before the last remaining US nuclear arms pact with Moscow is set to expire.

www.cnn.com

US to start negotiating with Russia on nuclear arms control soon

By Nicole Gaouette, CNN

Updated 6:01 PM ET, Wed February 5, 2020

Washington (CNN)The Trump administration will soon start nuclear negotiations with Russia, US national security adviser Robert O'Brien said Wednesday, speaking exactly one year before the last remaining US nuclear arms pact with Moscow is set to expire.
"We are going to confront the Russians where we need to, but at the same time I think we'll negotiate, we'll start negotiations soon on arms control, on the nuclear issue which is, you know, important to the safety of the world, not just the US and Russia," O'Brien said in a speech at the at the Meridian International Center in Washington to ambassadors from around the world.
O'Brien spoke as the US and Russia hit the one-year deadline to extend the New START Treaty, the last legally binding agreement limiting their nuclear arsenals -- the world's largest. For arms control experts who stress that nuclear diplomacy takes time, the delay in launching significant talks has raised concerns about the Trump administration's interest in remaining in the treaty or, more broadly, in adhering to the limits of arms control pacts at all.
A potential poison pill


They point to President Donald Trump's past criticism of New START as a "bad deal" and the role of former national security adviser John Bolton -- a longstanding critic of arms control agreements that he believed constrained American power. They flag the administration's pattern of rejecting international agreements, including two other nuclear pacts, the Intermediate Range Forces Treaty and the Iran nuclear deal.
Renewing New START would be a simple bureaucratic step that Russian officials have stressed they are ready to take, but Trump and administration officials have suggested that they are interested in negotiating a new pact that includes China and perhaps other countries instead.


US military deploys new type of nuclear weapon seen as key to countering Russia
While administration officials say the President is simply interested in overhauling an out of date treaty, some arms control experts see the suggestion of adding China as a poison pill. With a much smaller nuclear arsenal than either Moscow or Washington, Beijing has little incentive to sign on to a pact that curbs its arsenal at levels far below its chief geopolitical rivals.
New START treaty limits both nations to deploying 1,550 nuclear warheads over 700 delivery systems, including intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarine-launched ballistic missiles, and bombers. It also allows for 18 on-site inspections every year that allow each side to keep a close eye on the others' capabilities.
The treaty is set to expire in 2021 but could be extended for up to five years if both sides agree.
The cost of not failing to extend New START will be a large step backward, said Richard Burt, former US ambassador to Germany and the chief negotiator of START-I, a predecessor treaty to New START.
"The US and Russia hold over 90% of the world's nuclear arsenals," Burt said. If the New START Treaty is allowed to expire, "then we're living in a world where there's no longer any real transparency or predictability in the US -- Russia nuclear competition, there will be no more guard rails in the nuclear arms race and we will be back where we were, way back in the 1960s, because ... they will be gone."


Pentagon officials stunned by White House decision to block Ukraine aid, new emails show
In April, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told lawmakers that the US was at the "very beginning of conversations about renewing" the treaty. O'Brien's comments 10 months later suggest the talks still have not launched seriously.
"History suggests new negotiations will take time, so it's important to get started on defining the parameters of a new negotiation while preserving the security benefits for the American people of maintaining New START in place," said Lynn Rusten, a vice president at the Nuclear Threat Initiative.
O'Brien noted in his remarks that Russia is "an important country ... because, you know, they have over 1,400 nuclear missiles, many with multiple range vehicles on them and they are modern. President [Vladimir] Putin has put a lot of money into his military over the past several years to re-assert Russian power."
The US has also been modernizing its military. The Pentagon announced Tuesday that it had deployed a new submarine-launched low-yield nuclear weapon, something it sees as critical to countering the threat posed by Russia's arsenal of smaller tactical nukes.
Several former high-ranking administration officials, however, have said the weapons increase the potential for nuclear conflict.
The ball is in America's court
Russia's foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, said during a December visit to Washington that Putin has emphasized "Russia's preparedness to right now agree on [New START's] extension in order to alleviate the tension for global community, considering that the last instrument of arms control between the US and the Russian Federation will be -- well, not destroyed, but it will just not be in force anymore. And we are prepared to do that even today, and the ball is in our American partner's court."
Asked at the same State Department press conference if the US would be open to renewing New START without the Chinese, Pompeo didn't say an outright "no," but made clear that's not what the administration wants.
"As weapon systems move and advance, as new countries develop these capabilities, there is real risk that there is a reduction in strategic stability just staying right we are today so that it -- the reason that we're asking for other countries to participate -- and Foreign Minister Lavrov suggested France and the United Kingdom join as well, happy to consider that too, the cumulative mission set has to be global strategic stability, and we will continue to engage in conversations with the Russians and others with the aim of achieving that," Pompeo said.
Rusten, a former arms control and non-proliferation official who has served at the White House and State Department, was among several arms control experts who said that since the US has also been working to modernize its nuclear arsenal, the best approach would be to "extend New START now and jointly announce US-Russian principles to guide negotiation of a future agreement to build on the foundation of New START and further reduce and address additional categories of nuclear weapons."
CNN's Ryan Browne contributed to this report

 

[jward]

North Korea: Risks of Escalation
Vipin Narang & Ankit Panda

Pages 47-54 | Published online: 04 Feb 2020


Abstract
The most effective allied framework would employ deterrence by punishment at the nuclear level, and deterrence by denial at the conventional level.

The most effective allied framework would employ deterrence by punishment at the nuclear level, and deterrence by denial at the conventional level.
In 2017, North Korea conducted three flight tests of two different intercontinental-ballistic-missile (ICBM) designs. Technical experts largely assess that the reliability of these missiles is low. Nevertheless, American war planners must assume that Pyongyang can hold US cities at risk, as noted in 2017 by senior US officials, including then-chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Joseph F. Dunford and former US Strategic Command chief General John Hyten.1 That is, American planners must consider a North Korean thermonuclear weapon successfully detonating in the contiguous United States a genuine possibility. This new risk has implications for both conventional and nuclear deterrence vis-à-vis North Korea.

The allied deterrence posture that best manages it is one that seeks to dissuade Kim Jong-un from initiating a potentially unlimited war through nuclear first use by assuring him that any employment of nuclear weapons would result in the end of his regime by any means necessary – including nuclear weapons. This posture is also most likely to have the salutary effect of assuring South Korea and Japan that US extended-deterrence commitments remain robust despite the rapid advances in North Korean capabilities. In peacetime, however, US declaratory policy should be to abjure regime change or disarming North Korea by force.

The rub is that acknowledging Kim’s fresh nuclear capabilities could embolden the Korean People’s Army to engage in conventional brinkmanship.2 Accordingly, the alliance should maintain a robust level of readiness – including a substantial US military presence on the peninsula – to assure North Korea that the costs of an incursion across the Military Demarcation Line would be high and the odds of success low. South Korea’s independent military capabilities will play an important role in buttressing this posture. For instance, Seoul should continue to develop the so-called K3 suite of capabilities: Kill Chain, Korea Air and Missile Defense (KAMD) and Korea Massive Punishment and Retaliation (KMPR). That is, we propose a punishment–denial deterrence framework: one that employs deterrence by punishment at the nuclear level, and deterrence by denial at the conventional level, to most effectively deter North Korea while minimising unintentional escalation risks.

Permanent brinkmanship
The importance of establishing the aforementioned punishment–denial framework for deterrence stems from North Korean leader Kim’s fear of a conventional attack, decapitation strikes, and a surprise conventional or nuclear counterforce attack by the United States and its allies. Managing a nuclear North Korea – a reality likely to persist for the foreseeable future – requires managing the associated risks of escalation.
North Korea’s growing suite of short-, medium-, intermediate- and longrange nuclear-weapons capabilities flesh out a North Korean nuclear strategy premised on asymmetrically escalating in a conflict, enabled by a two-tier strategic nuclear force. Kim wants first and foremost to preserve his regime. Accordingly, he seeks to deter any major conventional aggression against his territory. The first tier of North Korea’s nuclear forces – consisting of short-, medium- and intermediate-range ballistic missiles and submarine-launched missiles – would hold at risk US and allied military assets in theatre, including Japan, South Korea and Guam. North Korean statements have suggested that the transgression of some unspecified military threshold would result in Pyongyang’s pre-emptive employment of nuclear weapons to degrade the alliance’s ability to initiate and sustain a conventional invasion.

Kim would then expect to survive North Korea’s nuclear first use by posturing his conventional force and keeping his nuclear ICBMs in reserve, holding US territory at risk and thereby deterring American nuclear retaliation for North Korea’s first use of nuclear weapons.3 At this point, further escalation by the United States to defend South Korea and Japan would potentially expose an American city to nuclear devastation. But the United States’ standing down would ostensibly terminate a conflict on terms favourable to Kim.
Thus, North Korea seems prepared to deliberately dance at the edge of the nuclear cliff both in peacetime and during crisis. Kim’s strategy is predicated on a permanent state of brinkmanship on the Korean Peninsula, making a stability-seeking approach to deterrence highly fraught. He calculates that a conventional invasion or a surprise attack would be unthinkable by the United States and its allies given the risks of uncontrollable escalation past the nuclear threshold.

 

[jward]

(continued)
Colloquium: Deterring a Nuclear North Korea
North Korea: Risks of Escalation
Vipin Narang & Ankit Panda

Pages 47-54 | Published online: 04 Feb 2020

• Download citation
• https://doi.org/10.1080/00396338.2020.1715064

Inadvertent escalation
Given North Korea’s risk-courting strategy, mechanisms of inadvertent escalation on and around the Korean Peninsula deserve serious consideration. Some inadvertent escalation risks involve misperception, and arise when action taken by one party, presumed to be mundane and non-escalatory, is perceived by the other to be highly threatening. These risks exist in peacetime, in a crisis and during war. Since North Korea’s stated threshold for nuclear use is in-theatre signalling of an impending conventional invasion of its territory or a bolt-out-of-the-blue decapitation strike, these risks are particularly acute.

The indicators of a forthcoming attack could be indistinguishable from bolstering conventional defences. Actions taken by the United States, South Korea and Japan in peacetime or in a crisis to better posture conventional forces for rapid reaction to any North Korean provocation, for instance, might be interpreted by Kim’s regime as escalatory, or as a prelude to an attack. Considering the quantitatively lean nature of Kim’s nuclear forces, and the concern that they may not survive an attack (or that he will be unable to maintain command and control over them during an attack), use-or-lose pressures will weigh heavily, making North Korea more inclined to go nuclear early in a crisis.

To deter North Korea from introducing nuclear weapons into a crisis prematurely or as a result of misperception, allied decapitation threats need to be diffuse in peacetime and acute in a crisis. US nuclear declaratory policy toward Pyongyang should make clear that under no circumstances can Kim employ nuclear weapons and expect to survive. As of the 2018 Nuclear Posture Review, this was America’s declared policy. In an extended-deterrence context, to reassure US allies, Washington should proclaim that any nuclear attack on the territory of South Korea or Japan will be met with requisite retaliation. The United States should abandon any notion of a bolt-out-of-the-blue attack to disarm North Korea by force.4 The US should make clear that any credible indications that North Korea is preparing to use nuclear weapons will be met with a pre-emptive conventional counterforce strike. (A more robust US military presence on the Korean Peninsula would improve the odds of a successful conventional counterforce campaign.) Previous US declaratory statements promising North Korea an ‘effective and overwhelming’ response appear sufficient for this purpose.

Beyond Kim’s misperceiving American conventional movements or exercises as a prelude to a major conventional attack, two additional potential triggers of inadvertent escalation should guide allied planning. The first is Kim’s fear of a surprise decapitation attack that attempts to kill him. Indicators of such a strike could be much lighter than those of a major conventional attack. A limited stand-off air package, for instance, could do the job if the US were aware of his location in real time, and therefore could prompt the inference. In an atmosphere of heightened tensions, only a couple of B-1 bombers headed his way, even if intended only to desensitise North Korean air defences, could spook him. Kim might order a pre-emptive nuclear attack on the air bases the regime assesses to be involved, or put in place a dead-hand procedure whereby if he is killed or believed to be dead a standing order would require North Korean forces to launch nuclear weapons in revenge, ensuring that his nuclear forces ‘fail deadly’. The latter scenario, while perhaps unlikely, cannot be ruled out.

Finally, Kim could become convinced that the United States was attempting a surprise conventional (or, he may fear, nuclear) counterforce attack to disarm him by force. If the diplomatic process stalls or goes into a deep coma, and hardliners in the United States increasingly call for military action, Kim’s fears of such an attack are likely to grow. There would be few if any indications of a US surprise counterforce attack, especially one from the air or sea. US deployment of ballistic missiles with short flight times to Pyongyang after the expiration of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty may contribute to these fears.5 The use-them-or-lose-them mentality could take hold, and Kim could be incentivised to pre-emptively launch his nuclear weapons.

Structurally, the United States’ overwhelming conventional and nuclear superiority imposes heavy pressure on North Korea’s nuclear forces and command and control in a conflict or decapitation scenario. This is unavoidable. What is avoidable is creating the circumstances for misperceptions in which Kim would fear that the United States was about to attack North Korea or him, and give him an itchy trigger finger. The US and South Korea can forestall such a situation by avoiding any sudden moves that could amplify pre-crisis and intra-crisis inadvertent escalation risks while sustaining a robust and credible posture that promises to punish any moves by North Korea that would initiate an unlimited war and deny Pyongyang space for manoeuvre in a limited conflict.

Confidence-building measures and risk reduction
At the declaratory level, US policy should coalesce around reducing incentives for early, massive nuclear use by North Korea in a crisis. In particular, Washington should forswear decapitation, a surprise disarming counterforce attack or regime change during peacetime. While North Korea is unlikely to completely trust such declarations, certain steps can be taken to render US intentions clearer and more credible. The paucity of high-quality air-defence and early-warning systems in North Korea has left Pyongyang particularly sensitive to local strategic-bomber operations. Accordingly, the United States, in consultation with allies, should declare an end to peacetime bomber assurance and deterrence (BAAD) operations on the Korean Peninsula. (Pyongyang assumes the non-nuclear B-1B to benuclear-capable.) In a crisis, private assurances among allies concerning bomber movements would make sense to facilitate force-posture adjustments for potential retaliation, but public statements concerning bomber movements should be avoided.

Similarly, the US should declare that it will not use offensive cyber capabilities to disrupt North Korean nuclear command-and-control systems in peacetime. Kim no doubt expects kinetic and non-kinetic attempts to sever his ability to command and communicate with his nuclear-weapons operators in a conflict, but if those fears arise in peacetime, he is more likely to favour positive controls over his nuclear weapons and consider use predelegation, which would increase the risk of nuclear-weapons use in a crisis.6 Finally, to better understand North Korea’s thinking on the role of nuclear weapons in its national-defence strategy, the United States should approach representatives of the Korean People’s Army Strategic Force about engaging in exploratory, open-ended dialogue. These efforts should be paired with inter-Korean and US/United Nations Command–North Korea conventional confidence-building measures.

Given the existing escalation challenges on the Korean Peninsula, the United States must accompany these efforts with a parallel process of arms control, focused on verifiably capping the qualitative and quantitative growth of North Korea’s arsenal.8 A larger, more survivable arsenal may prove stabilising with respect to use-or-lose pressures, reducing inadvertent escalation risks, but it would contribute to the coercive leverage of North Korea’s weapons in a crisis. The pursuit of damage limitation and conventional counterforce capabilities by the United States and allies should be weighed against the negative effects they may have on arms-control efforts. North Korea is less likely to enter into talks on verifiably capping its arsenal or other arms-control measures if it perceives itself to be vulnerable to a disarming first strike.
*  *  *
Deterrence by punishment is the most favourable and least risky way to deter nuclear use on the Korean Peninsula, while conventional deterrence by denial is the only responsible way of managing instability that may arise as a result of North Korea’s conventional brinkmanship. Both forms of deterrence would benefit from heightened trilateral coordination among the US, South Korea and Japan. More broadly, ongoing US diplomacy and strategic communication remain essential to stability on the Korean Peninsula.

posted for fair use

https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/3CYAXIRDCET9U7ZIHGHR/full?target=10.1080%2F00396338.2020.1715064&

 

[jward]

(continued)

Notes
1 See Phil Stewart, ‘US Nuclear Commander Says Assuming North Korea Tested Hydrogen Bomb’, Reuters, 15 September 2017, U.S. nuclear commander says assuming North Korea tested hydrogen bomb.
2 See S. Paul Kapur, Dangerous Deterrent: Nuclear Weapons Proliferation and Conflict in South Asia (Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press, 2007); and Mark S. Bell, ‘Beyond Emboldenment: How Acquiring Nuclear Weapons Can Change Foreign Policy’, International Security, vol. 40, no. 1, Summer 2015, pp. 87–119.
3 See Vipin Narang, Nuclear Strategy in the Modern Era: Regional Powers and International Conflict (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2014), pp. 19–20.
4 Some prominent figures, of course, have not done so. See, for example, John Bolton, ‘The Legal Case for Striking North Korea First’, Wall Street Journal, 28 February 2018.
5 See Ankit Panda, ‘New U.S. Missiles in Asia Could Increase the North Korean Nuclear Threat’, Foreign Policy, 14 November 2019, https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/11/14/us-missiles-asia-infnorth-korea-nuclear-threat-grow/.
6 See Ankit Panda, ‘The Right Way to Manage a Nuclear North Korea’, Foreign Affairs, 6 December 2018, The Right Way to Manage a Nuclear North Korea.
7 See Van Jackson, ‘Risk Realism’, Center for a New American Security, 24 September 2019, Risk Realism.
8 See John K. Warden and Ankit Panda, ‘Goals for Any Arms Control Proposal with North Korea’, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (blog), 13 February 2019, Goals for any arms control proposal with North Korea - Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

Additional information
Author information
Vipin Narang

Vipin Narang is an associate professor of political science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and a member of MIT’s Security Studies Program.
Ankit Panda

Ankit Panda is an adjunct senior fellow in the Defense Posture Project at the Federation of American Scientists and author of the forthcoming Kim Jong Un and the Bomb (Hurst, 2020).

 

[jward]

Yemen Al-Qaeda leader al-Raymi killed by US strike


The United States has killed the leader of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), President Donald Trump said.
Qasim al-Raymi, who has led the jihadist group since 2015, was killed in a US operation in Yemen, the White House said.
The jihadist leader had been linked to a series of attacks on Western interests in the 2000s.
He took over the leadership after his predecessor was killed by a US drone strike.

AQAP was formed in 2009 from two regional offshoots of Al-Qaeda in Yemen in Saudi Arabia, with the goal of toppling US-backed governments and eliminating all Western influence in the region. It has had most of its success in Yemen, prospering in the political instability that has plagued the country for years.
Rumours of al-Raymi's death in a US drone strike began circulating in late January. In response, AQAP released an audio message with al-Raymi's voice on 2 February, which may have been recorded earlier.

• Profile: Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula
• Does killing militant leaders work?

But the statement from the White House has now confirmed al-Raymi's death but did not say when he was killed.
"His death further degrades AQAP and the global al-Qa'ida movement, and it brings us closer to eliminating the threats these groups pose to our national security," the statement read.
"The United States, our interests, and our allies are safer as a result of his death."

posted for fair use

Yemen Al-Qaeda leader al-Raymi killed by US strike

Qasim al-Raymi, who has led Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) since 2015, is killed in Yemen.

www.bbc.com

 

[Housecarl]

Posted for fair use.....

Iranian Missiles and Americans Exposed

President Trump boasted the military in his State of the Union address Wednesday night. Trump is right that the military has received significant investments during his tenure. But recent events also

www.realcleardefense.com

Iranian Missiles and Americans Exposed

By Rebeccah L. Heinrichs
February 07, 2020

(AP Photo/Qassim Abdul-Zahra)
President Trump boasted in military in his State of the Union address Wednesday night. Trump is right that the military has received significant investments during his tenure. But recent events also reveal where there are vulnerabilities. Iran's missile attack against bases in Iraq last month wreaked havoc, although mercifully not resulting in the deaths of Americans. But the attacks showcased the formidability of the Iranian missile force and provided a glimpse of what a missile attack could do to the United States homeland if we are insufficiently defended.

President Trump has repeatedly called for specific initiatives to greatly improve U.S. missile defenses of the homeland to stay ahead of the pressing missile threats, but those initiatives have not materialized.

When Trump introduced his administration’s missile defense strategy at the Pentagon in January 2019, he said the U.S. sought the ability to "detect and destroy any missile launched against the United States anywhere, anytime, anyplace." With only one last budget left in the term, which the administration will soon release, his vision remains unfulfilled. There have been no serious changes to the missile defense architecture Trump inherited from Obama—yet.

The survival of U.S. forces stationed at the bases in Iraq is not due to missile defense systems intercepting missiles. There are no missile defenses in Iraq. There are limited numbers of those systems, but Mark Esper, the Secretary of Defense, and General Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently told reporters that an obstacle for moving in a Patriot battalion to protect Americans in Iraq, is the need to get permission from the Iraqi government.
Astonishingly, the Iraqi government, perhaps under pressure from the Iranian government, has not granted the United States permission to deploy defenses.

This makes Iran’s Foreign Minister Javad Zarif's boasts even more galling. "The damage we have done to the U.S. is extensive because, with all its military might, it could not prevent the missiles from hitting its base. It shows how vulnerable the U.S. is." He’s mocking to rally and inspire his domestic audience in the hopes it could calm the swell of protesters, furious and fed up with the regime's abuses. But the Islamic Republic’s missile attack should prompt the United States to make major adjustments to our missile defense architecture abroad but especially at home because with all our “military might” and with the world’s strongest economy, we can, and we must.

The Ain al-Asad attack leveled concrete blast walls and incinerated buildings. Although nearly a dozen U.S. service members are being evaluated due to concussion symptoms, the attack did not cause casualties. That appears to be due to a combination of intelligence obtained hours before the attack that informed the U.S. about where and what was coming, the quick rearranging of the placement of U.S. forces and servicemembers taking cover in bunkers, and the Iranian regime choosing targets that seem to have intended to avoid loss of life. Still, even these non-nuclear missiles that did not hit Americans wreaked havoc, and the lasting health effects are still unclear.

Now imagine instead of American warriors hunkered down in Hussein’s bunkers, it was teachers, mailmen, bankers, or children huddled in bathtubs or basements throughout the United States.

Supporters of Obama's Iran deal bemoan Trump's withdrawal and are quick to blame Iran's aggression on his decision to leave it. But there is no evidence that the Iran deal moderated the regime's malign activities, including its support for terrorism and the development and proliferation of illicit weapons and missiles. Additionally, the Iran deal did not include restrictions on Iran's missile force, and UNSCR 2231, passed in tandem with the Iran deal, weakened the language on missiles and merely calls upon Iran to refrain from testing missiles capable of carrying nuclear weapons.

Let us not forget that Iran and North Korea have a history of cooperating on their missile programs, and despite Trump's efforts to negotiate with the Kim regime and the Kim regime's pause on long-range missile testing, Secretary of Defense Esper confirmed on a Fox News interview on January 25th what nobody really doubted, and that is that North Korea's nuclear missile program is still active.

While the United States tightens sanctions against North Korea and Iran in an effort to punish the regimes for their malign activities and to dry up their funds in an effort to hobble those same malign activities, Washington must seize the opportunity to better defend the U.S. homeland and vital interests. Having credible, robust defenses strengthens diplomacy, increases the credibility of deterrence, and if deterrence breaks down, provides defenses of critical offensive capabilities so that the United States has maximum options for a retaliatory response.

The Obama administration significantly cut funding to homeland missile defense in its first year in office, setting homeland defense backward. But in response to North Korean provocations in 2014, President Obama reversed his cancellation of a Bush initiative to field more ground-based interceptors (GBIs) to the current homeland defense system. He called for the deployment of 14 more, bringing the total of GBIs or “bullets” to shoot at incoming intercontinental ballistic missiles, to 44. But that was 2014, and the number and kind of missiles that can reach the U.S. homeland has increased in number and have improved, and so must homeland missile defense.

When North Korea was testing longer-range ballistic missiles in the first part of his administration, Trump personally intervened and requested supplemental funding for the defense budget, including for theater missile defense that we need abroad and for 20 additional GBIs to protect Americans at home.

That was two years ago, and the President’s additional GBIs are not in the ground providing protection of Americans.

Pentagon leaders opted to stop the initiative to deploy those 20 interceptors due to legitimate concerns with the part of the system intended to separate from the GBIs and collide with the enemy warhead. Instead, the Pentagon seeks to invest in improvements to have a "next-generation" system in the ground by the end of the decade.

Dramatic improvements to the homeland defense system deserve bi-partisan support, especially if they are intended to give the system the ability to intercept increasingly complicated missile threats that China and Russia can and will realistically pose. But the threats from countries like North Korea and Iran are evolving now, and so must our strategies and weapon systems. The current missile threats from rogue nations demand that the President's decision to make immediate improvements is honored.
Rebeccah L. Heinrichs is a senior fellow at Hudson Institute where she specializes in nuclear deterrence and missile defense.

 

[Housecarl]

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China’s Modernizing Military

The People’s Liberation Army is aiming to become the dominant force in the Asia-Pacific, strengthening China’s hand toward Taiwan and international disputes in the South China Sea.

www.cfr.org

China’s Modernizing Military

PLA soldiers prepare for a military parade in 2017. China Daily via Reuters
The People’s Liberation Army is aiming to become the dominant force in the Asia-Pacific, strengthening China’s hand toward Taiwan and international disputes in the South China Sea.

Backgrounder by Lindsay Maizland

February 5, 2020





The Chinese government is working to make its military stronger, more efficient, and more technologically advanced to become a top-tier force within thirty years. With a budget that has soared over the past decade, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) already ranks among the world’s leading militaries in areas including artificial intelligence and anti-ship ballistic missiles.
Experts warn that as China’s military modernizes, it could become more assertive in the Asia-Pacific region by intensifying pressure on Taiwan and continuing to militarize disputed islands in the East and South China Seas. U.S. President Donald J. Trump’s administration believes China is a great-power rival, though the PLA still has a way to go before it can challenge the United States, experts say.
What catalyzed the PLA’s modernization?
The modern Chinese military got its start during the civil war (1927–1949) between Chinese Communist Party (CCP) forces and nationalist Kuomintang forces. The guerrilla-style army relied on a mass mobilization of Chinese citizens, and the PLA largely preserved this organizational structure in the following decades to protect its borders.
A turning point came in the 1990s, when the CCP witnessed two demonstrations of U.S. military power in its hemisphere: the Gulf War and the Taiwan Strait Crisis. Struck by the sophistication of U.S. forces, Chinese leaders acknowledged that it lacked the technology to wage a modern war and prevent foreign powers from intervening in the region. Officials launched an effort to catch up to top-tier militaries by increasing defense spending, investing in new weapons to enhance anti-access area denial (A2/AD), and establishing programs to boost the Chinese defense industry.
Another shift began in 2012, when President Xi Jinping came to power. Championing what he calls the Chinese Dream, a vision to restore China’s great-power status, Xi has gone further to push military reforms than his predecessors. Xi leads the Central Military Commission, the PLA’s highest decision-making body, and he has committed to producing a “world-class force” [PDF] that can dominate the Asia-Pacific and “fight and win” global wars by 2049.
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How are the services being reformed?
Xi has focused on making big, structural changes. Among his most significant reforms are new joint theater commands, deep personnel cuts, and improvements to military-civilian collaboration. He is pushing to transform the PLA from a largely territorial force into a major maritime power.
Army. The army is the largest service and was long considered the most important, but its prominence has waned as Beijing seeks to develop an integrated fighting force with first-rate naval and air capabilities. As the other services expanded, the army shrunk to around 975,000 troops, according to the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). Reforms have focused on streamlining its top-heavy command structure; creating smaller, more agile units; and empowering lower-level commanders. The army is also upgrading its weapons. Its lightweight Type 15 tank, for example, came into service in 2018 and allows for engagement in high-altitude areas, such as Tibet.
More on:

China

Military Operations

Defense and Security

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Xi Jinping

Navy. The navy has expanded at an impressive rate to become the world’s largest naval force in terms of ship numbers. In 2016, it commissioned eighteen ships, while the U.S. Navy commissioned five. The PLA’s ship quality has also improved: RAND Corporation found that more than 70 percent of the fleet [PDF] could be considered modern in 2017, up from less than 50 percent in 2010.
Experts say the navy, which has an estimated 250,000 active service members, has become the dominant force in China’s near seas and is conducting more operations at greater distances. Its modernization priorities include commissioning more nuclear submarines and aircraft carriers. China has two aircraft carriers, compared to the United States’ eleven. A third carrier, which is being built domestically, is expected to be operational by 2022.

Air Force. The air force has also grown, with 395,000 active service members in 2018. It has acquired advanced equipment, some thought to be copied from stolen U.S. designs, including airborne warning and control systems, bombers, and unmanned aerial vehicles. The air force also has a collection of stealth aircraft, including J-20 fighters. In 2015, RAND Corporation estimated that half of China’s fighters and fighter-bombers were modern.
Rocket Force. Responsible for maintaining China’s conventional and nuclear missiles, the rocket force was elevated to an independent service during reforms in 2015. It has around 120,000 active troops. China has steadily increased its nuclear arsenal—it had an estimated 290 warheads [PDF] in 2019—and modernized its capabilities, including the development of anti-ship ballistic missiles that could target U.S. warships in the Western Pacific, as part of its A2/AD strategy. China reportedly has the most midrange ballistic and cruise missiles, weapons that until recently the United States and Russia were prohibited from producing.
The PLA is also developing hypersonic missiles, which can travel many times faster than the speed of sound and are therefore more difficult for adversaries to defend against. While Russia is the only country with a deployed hypersonic weapon, China’s medium-range DF-17 missile is expected to be operational in 2020. The Pentagon has said it will likely be several years before the United States has one.
Strategic Support Force. Established during the 2015 reforms, the Strategic Support Force manages the PLA’s electronic warfare, cyberwarfare, and psychological operations, among other high-tech missions. With an estimated 145,000 service members, it is also responsible for the military’s space operations, including those with satellites.
How much does China spend on its military?
China’s Ministry of Finance said the 2019 defense budget was $177 billion, however, analysts’ estimates are often higher than what Beijing reports. The PLA enjoyed a soaring budget as China’s economy boomed over the past few decades. Defense spending increased more than sevenfold, from $31 billion in 1998 to $239 billion in 2018, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), making it the second-largest spender in the world, behind the United States.

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[Housecarl]

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What’s the state of China’s defense industry?
For much of its history, the PLA relied on foreign military equipment, especially from Russia. But in recent decades, the Chinese government has invested heavily in state-owned and private-sector defense companies. Xi has pushed to reduce barriers between the two, emphasizing what he calls military-civil fusion. Many firms have forged relationships with foreign companies and universities, allowing them to acquire technologies and know-how with military applications. Experts say this has been especially helpful for developing the PLA’s automation and artificial intelligence capabilities.
Much of the PLA’s equipment is now built domestically. In fact, China is estimated to be the world’s second-largest arms producer, trailing the United States and ahead of Russia, according to a 2020 report by SIPRI. Most of its exports go to developing countries, such as Pakistan. China still imports some specialized equipment, such as jet engines, and has been accused of copying Russia’s, the United States’, and other countries’ designs without permission.
How does the military serve China’s defense and foreign policy interests?
The PLA is the armed wing of the CCP, and its main objective is to protect the party’s rule, which it fears rival countries, particularly the United States, aim to undermine. It plays a critical role in achieving Xi’s objective of becoming the dominant power in the Asia-Pacific, and its overarching strategic objective is to safeguard China’s sovereignty, security, and development interests. Its top priorities are deploying military infrastructure on disputed islands in the South China Sea, particularly the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands; preventing Taiwanese independence; and securing its land borders with fourteen countries, including India and North Korea. The PLA, however, is not responsible for internal security, which falls on the People’s Armed Police.
Some experts have said that Taiwan is the main catalyst for the PLA’s modernization. The island has been governed independently for decades, but Beijing views it as a part of China. The Xi government has taken an aggressive approach, saying in a 2019 defense white paper that the PLA would “resolutely defeat anyone attempting to separate Taiwan from China.” While many analysts don’t expect Beijing to use force against Taiwan soon, it could use its military to discourage independence movements and deter U.S. involvement in future conflicts.


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Does China want to project military power globally?
Many analysts believe China wants to be the dominant military power in the Asia-Pacific, capable of deterring and, if needed, defeating the United States in a future conflict. But it’s unclear whether China’s ultimate ambition is to project power throughout the world, much like the United States does today.
The Chinese government said in its 2019 white paper that it will “never threaten any other country or seek any sphere of influence.” It maintains a no-first-use nuclear policy, has no military alliances, and claims to oppose interference in other countries’ affairs.
Joel Wuthnow, a China expert at the U.S. National Defense University, told CFR that, at least in the near term, the PLA will be kept busy close to home. “China is still a long way from becoming a global force like the U.S. military because their attention is confined to the region,” he says.
Yet, as Beijing’s economic interests expand through Central Asia and Europe—part of its Belt and Road Initiative—the military could increasingly be called to operate abroad. Some U.S. officials, including Vice President Mike Pence, warn that the colossal development project could eventually be used for military purposes. However, Beijing claims this is untrue, with most projects currently protected by Chinese private security companies.
China opened its first overseas base in Djibouti in 2017, despite swearing off bases in one of its first white papers nearly two decades earlier. There were reports in 2019, which Chinese officials denied, that China was constructing another base in Cambodia. China has conducted an increasing number of joint military exercises, including with Pakistan, Russia, and members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. PLA service members also participate in UN peacekeeping missions, with more than 2,500 active peacekeepers as of 2019.
What are the PLA’s major challenges?
Acknowledging in its 2019 defense white paper that the PLA “still lags far behind the world’s leading militaries,” the Chinese government believes it must invest more in new technologies and improve logistics. But many analysts say the military’s main challenge is personnel, in that it has struggled to recruit, train, and retain a professional fighting force. “The skills are the most difficult things to teach and teach quickly,” says IISS’s Meia Nouwens. “And with the Chinese military, the scale is enormous.”
Part of this stems from a lack of experience: the PLA hasn’t fought a major military conflict in the forty years since it invaded Vietnam (it had a brief confrontation with Vietnam in 1988). Additionally, some experts have found that recent reforms have increased pressure and stress on service members.
Another challenge has been corruption and what Chinese leaders perceive as weakening loyalty to the CCP. During Xi’s first six years in office, as part of a wider anticorruption campaign, he oversaw the punishment of more than thirteen thousand PLA officers, including one hundred generals, for giving and accepting bribes, according to the U.S. Department of Defense.
How are countries responding to China’s military rise?
The U.S. military maintains a strong presence in the Asia-Pacific region, with bases in Australia, Guam, Japan, Singapore, and South Korea. But as China’s military approaches parity with U.S. forces, the United States could have a harder time deterring Chinese assertiveness [PDF]. The Trump administration has increasingly treated Beijing as an adversary, characterizing both China and Russia [PDF] as “revisionist powers” intent on “trying to change the international order in their favor.” Through its Free and Open Indo-Pacific strategy, the United States has sought to strengthen its regional alliances, including with Japan and South Korea, protect freedom of navigation at sea, and maintain peace and rule of law.
China’s neighbors are also on alert. In 2019, Japan’s defense ministry identified China as the country’s greatest national security threat. Tokyo plans to boost defense spending and purchase U.S. weapons, and it has reinterpreted its pacifist constitution to give the military greater latitude. At the same time, though, South Korean President Moon Jae-in has tried to avoid confrontation and even strengthen ties with Beijing, in an effort to defuse the threat from North Korea. Another U.S. treaty ally, the Philippines, has also tilted toward Beijing. President Rodrigo Duterte has visited China multiple times, signed agreements to strengthen cooperation, and courted Chinese investors. However, tensions between Manila and Beijing persist over their competing claims in the South China Sea. Other Southeast Asian nations with claims, including Vietnam, have relatively small defense budgets, and they have not yet been able to coordinate joint military actions through the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
Taiwan, which has increased its purchases of U.S. weapons, including F-16 fighters, assumes that the United States will defend it in the case of a Chinese attack. However, as China has enhanced its military capabilities, some Taiwanese officials have reportedly questioned whether Washington would do so.
CFR’s Mira Rapp-Hooper points out that many governments face the same challenge of having to respond to China’s military modernization while preserving close economic ties with Beijing. “They’re grappling with the reality that China is their closest trading partner, and the United States is their closest defense ally,” she says. “Most likely, U.S. allies will not make a single choice between the two, but they may shift toward China if they come to doubt American staying power in the Pacific.”

 

[Housecarl]

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Dingxin: China's top-secret desert airbase - Asia Times

It is not uncommon to see live fire drills at China’s top-secret Dingxin Test and Training airbase in the Gobi Desert. The area has long been a military

www.asiatimes.com

Dingxin: China’s top-secret desert airbase

The base supports the development of tactics and weaponry and advanced training in complex scenarios
By Dave Makichuk

It is not uncommon to see live fire drills at China’s top-secret Dingxin Test and Training airbase in the Gobi Desert.

The area has long been a military and weapons testing stronghold for the People’s Liberation Army Air Force, hosting a fleet of aggressor fighters, as well as full-scale aerial target drones, converted from antique MIG clones.

As such, Dingxin airbase in Gansu Province is roughly analogous to Nellis Air Force Base in the United States, with a bit of Eglin Air Force Base and Edwards Air Force Base mixed in, according to a report in The Drive.

With relative seclusion, wide-open airspace, expansive training range complexes, and good weather for year-round flying operations, Dingxin is home to the country’s highest-profile fighter and attack aircraft exercises, including the annual air-to-air focused Golden Helmet and air-to-ground focused Golden Dart competitions, the report said.

Large force employment (LFE) exercises like Red Sword, roughly similar to the United States Air Force’s Red Flag, and Red and Golden Shield, which include advanced competitive training for Chinese surface-to-air missile, anti-aircraft artillery, and electronic warfare units, also occur at and near the base, the report said.

The base’s huge apron can facilitate well over 100 aircraft of all different types and does so regularly. Virtually every aircraft type in the PLAAF’s inventory has passed through the base and most do so regularly.

The pink and beige-painted aggressors, which include Su-30s and J-10s, as well as less capable types, are a staple at Dingxin Test and Training Base and provide “red air” support for the exercises and tests that occur there, the report said.

The installation’s training and tactics development activities are run by the Tactical Training Center’s 175th Air Brigade and the resident test unit that supports more cutting-edge flight test programs is the 176th Air Brigade, according to Scramble Magazine.

In recent satellite imagery, roughly 13 H-6 bombers and other variants are shown on the ramp, along with six J-10s, 5 Su-27/30/J-11 Flanker derivatives, 12 JH-7s, six F-7s, four F-8s, and three Y-9 transports.

 

[Housecarl]

Hummm.....

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Change in Pakistan will only bring in new puppets - Asia Times

From Day 1 of the current Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) regime, it was written on the wall that the engineered political discourse that brought Imran

www.asiatimes.com

February 7, 2020
Change in Pakistan will only bring in new puppets

By Imad Zafar

From Day 1 of the current Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) regime, it was written on the wall that the engineered political discourse that brought Imran Khan and his party to power would not be sustainable for very long. Only someone incapable of understanding political dynamics and unaware of the inability of the PTI to govern could have thought that Khan would not eventually shoot himself or his backers in the foot. So what was inevitable from Day 1 is now gradually being recognized by the powers that be, and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) is trying to finalize a deal with the military establishment to retake control of the government.

Prime Minister Imran Khan is facing a tough challenge in the form of a new PML-N that instead of locking horns with the establishment has compromised on its ideology and now wants to return to power through an in-house change or a midterm election. The distance between the PML-N and the invisible forces is gradually diminishing, and as a result, one after another jailed party stalwarts are being granted bail by the same courts that just a few weeks back were reluctant to release them.

Recently Hamza Shahbaz, the son of PML-N president Shahbaz Sharif, was granted bail in the Ramzan Sugar Mills corruption case, and if insiders are correct, very soon former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and another PML-N stalwart, Ahsan Iqbal, will also be released.

The first target of the PML-N was to get out of the dead-end street where both Khan and his backers were teaching the party a lesson for creating an anti-establishment narrative in the province of Punjab, and many top party officials were booked under dubious circumstances. Former finance minister Ishaq Dar was one of the PML-N leaders who were targeted for standing by the party in the time of crisis. Dar’s property was confiscated by the government in a case that has no grounds, as any sane person can see that he was targeted for not only opposing non-productive expenses in the government budget, but also trying to end the hegemony of the establishment over the finances and resources of the country.

Just recently the Lahore High Court stopped the government from auctioning Dar’s property. Dar still has no regrets for taking a stance that according to him was for the betterment of the country.

On many occasions talking to this correspondent from London, he never discussed his financial losses due to the fabricated cases lodged against him by PTI and its backers, nor has he spoken of the character-assassination campaign against him. In fact, he seems solely concerned with the deteriorating economy, saying that it is painful to watch the demise of an economy he once rescued and then through hard work not only strengthened it but also was able to make it flourish. But for the cult PTI vote bank, Dar remains an absconder who kept the economy ticking through artificial measures.

However, the reality is that if it were possible, PTI would never have hesitated to adopt gimmicks and artificial measures to boost the ailing economy. This was also the case with former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, who is considered to be close to Nawaz Sharif and Maryam Nawaz and who is languishing in jail for a crime he never committed. So perhaps Sharif made a calculated move on the power chessboard by backing General Qamar Javed Bajwa’s extension as Chief of Army Staff unconditionally and secured his party’s future.

However, the question arises as to why Sharif just gave up at a time when it was very clear that PTI’s backers were not able to make the rigged political discourse work, and it might have taken just a few more months before the establishment agreed to the demand for fresh elections.

Now that Sharif has surrendered and presented his younger brother Shahbaz as a bad cop, it has been continuously propagated by the PML-N leadership that Nawaz was not interested in a deal and it was Shahbaz who persuaded him to deal with the invisible forces.

But anyone who knows the structure of the PML-N and the Sharif clan knows that it has always been the elder Sharif who decides the political narrative of the party. Maryam may not always have agreed with her father’s decisions, but that is how the PML-N works, and without Nawaz Sharif’s approval Shahbaz could not make any decision or deal on his own. So Nawaz may have strengthened his position on the power board, but as far as political legitimacy and democratic credentials are concerned he has lost the battle.

The question now is whether Imran Khan will remain in power or Nawaz Sharif or Asif Ali Zardari of the Pakistan Peoples Party will come to power again. And that leads to a more important question of who will be ready to take responsibility for the failure of the “New Pakistan” project and will be ready to work to revive the economy.

Even Ishaq Dar would not be able to fix the economy within months or even a year, regardless of who is in government, be it PML-N, PPP or a coalition. Then the other problem is the wish of the invisible forces to repeal the 18th Amendment of the constitution, as it not only gives autonomy to the provinces but also deprives the central government of a lucrative budget. The economic turmoil means that the military establishment will need resources to keep its hegemony intact, and it might impose a condition whereby the new government will change how federal funds are allocated to the provinces and again give the control of the budget and resources of the provinces to the central administration. This could result in a deadlock, as neither the PML-N or PPP will be interested in committing political suicide by agreeing to repeal or change the provisions of the 18th amendment.

So this gives Khan a little room for maneuver. However, the question remains: Is he willing to set aside his narcissistic attitude and state of hallucination where he still thinks of himself as a celebrity sportsman who is not answerable to anyone even though he is a prime minister now therefore answerable to parliament and the masses?

In any case, change in some form is inevitable, as the architects of the current political discourse desperately need a new public face and some economic stability to continue their hegemony in state affairs. Whether Imran Khan will be able to survive miraculously or Sharif’s PML-N with its now-compromised narrative will lead the next government in a few months’ time remains to be seen. One thing is certain, however: Whoever forms the next government will have to take dictation from the powers that be, and the only difference will be a new set of political puppets who have better skill and experience than PTI in running the controlled democracy.

Asia Times is not responsible for the opinions, facts or any media content presented by contributors. In case of abuse, click here to report.

Imad Zafar
Imad Zafar is a columnist/commentator for newspapers. He is associated with TV channels, radio, newspapers, news agencies, and political, policy and media related think-tanks.

 

[Housecarl]

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No, The United States Doesn't Have An Automatic "Dead Hand" Trigger For Its ICBMs

If personnel in a missile alert facility are incapacitated for some reason during a crisis, it doesn't mean that the missiles launch automatically.

www.thedrive.com

No, The United States Doesn't Have An Automatic "Dead Hand" Trigger For Its ICBMs
If personnel in a missile alert facility are incapacitated for some reason during a crisis, it doesn't mean that the missiles launch automatically.
By Joseph Trevithick
February 7, 2020

• The War Zone

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A recent Air Force Magazine article has caused something of a stir after it highlighted systems and procedures that the U.S. Air Force employs to ensure it can still launch its Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missiles, if necessary, even if personnel in individual missile alert facilities are incapacitated for some reason. At first glance, it might appear that the United States has something of a "Dead Hand" arrangement to fire these world-ending weapons, drawing comparisons to systems the Soviet Union reportedly employed and that present-day Russia apparently still uses. However, a closer look at the American protocols shows the system is place is far from automatic and still has a number of checks and balances to prevent an inadvertent missile launch.

Air Force Magazine's Rachel S. Cohen included the mention of the need for watchstanders in missile alert facilities to routinely enter a "stand down" command into their control consoles in a recent story on Air Force Missileers. The publication of the piece followed the launch of an unarmed Minuteman III from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California as part of a routine test of the missile's accuracy and reliability. The inert re-entry vehicle splashed down as intended some 4,200 miles away in the Pacific Ocean at Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands.

Updating America's Land-Based Ballistic Missile 'Nuclear Sponge' Is A $100B+ Waste By Tyler Rogoway Posted in The War Zone
No, the USAF Hasn't Put its Nuclear Bombers Back on 24/7 Alert, YetBy Joseph Trevithick Posted in The War Zone
The Movie War Games Inspired President Reagan To Take Cybersecurity SeriouslyBy Tyler Rogoway Posted in The War Zone
The Air Force Found Airmen Boozing It Up In A Nuclear Missile Alert Facility In WyomingBy Joseph Trevithick Posted in The War Zone
USAF Replaces Bulky Tape Cartridges For Loading Launch Codes Into ICBMsBy Joseph Trevithick Posted in The War Zone

At present, the Air Force's three Missile Wings oversee 400 Minuteman IIIs in silos spread across Montana, Nebraska, and North Dakota. Another 278 missiles are in inventory for testing and other purposes. Missileers stand watch in hardened underground alert facilities in the missile fields 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.

Here’s the video of the unarmed Minuteman III test launch today, Feb. 5, 12:33 a.m., P.T. The missile flew about 4,200 miles across the Pacific, reaching Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands. Global Strike Command is #reliable #ready #lethal. Minuteman III launches from Vandenberg
— AFGSC (@AFGlobalStrike) February 5, 2020​

"The Airmen also spend their time on routine inspections and sending messages to others in the operation and to the ICBM itself. Missileers must give the weapon system what is essentially a “stand-down” order every six hours," Air Force Magazine's Cohen wrote in her recent piece. "If they don’t respond to that prompt within 10 minutes, the missiles will assume that its human operators are dead, and start looking for a launch command from one of the Pentagon’s nuclear mission control aircraft."

For this description, it might seem as if the missile alert facility's systems would begin initiating a launch sequence on its own if the operators were to miss one of the four prompts they get every day to let the computers known they're still alive. However, the reality is far less extreme.

USAF
Missileers assigned the 90th Missile Wing, headquartered at F.E. Warren Air Force Base in Wyoming, train in a launch control center within a missile alert facility.

What the Air Force Magazine piece is describing is that missile alert facilities have a built-in backup arrangement where, if it appears that the human operators are no longer capable of performing their duties, it goes into a mode where it cuts them out of the launch sequence. However, it still needs to receive a valid launch code from an outside source and will not automatically fire any missiles on its own.

The U.S. military does have a fleet of E-6B Mercury airborne command post aircraft equipped with the Airborne Launch Control System (ALCS), which you read about in more detail in past War Zone here and here, that do have the capability to remotely trigger a launch under various circumstances, something that is publicly known. They're not flying around sending out launch codes by default, though.
"There are ZERO ABNCPs [airborne command posts] in the air to respond to an inquiry," Robert Hopkins, a retired Air Force pilot and historian, wrote on Twitter. "ANY other [missile alert facility] capsule can respond, and failure to respond DOES NOT trigger a launch. It escalates inquiries."

Calling this “Dead Hand” is doom porn.

There are ZERO ABNCPs in the air to respond to an inquiry q6h.

ANY other capsule can respond, and failure to respond DOES NOT trigger a launch. It escalates inquiries.

AFM doesn’t publish TS launch procedures. @KingstonAReif Kingston Reif on Twitter
— Robert Hopkins (@CobraBall3) February 7, 2020​

It's also important to note that, in 1991, then-President George H.W. Bush ended the practice of keeping both nuclear-armed bombers and missile alert facilities on a 24-hour alert status that kept a number of them actively poised to strike targets in the Soviet Union and elsewhere at a moments notice. Today, the Air Force has a policy of so-called "open ocean targeting," whereby its Minuteman IIIs are, by default, pointed at open areas of the sea, specifically to prevent a catastrophe from an accidental launch. During an actual crisis, personnel would need to re-target these weapons before firing them.

Today, the primary role of America's ICBM force within the country's nuclear triad is to act as as a "sponge" to "soak up" an opponent's warheads, which could otherwise be employed against other targets. This has long called into question its basic utility, Dead Hand or not, especially when considering the costs of maintaining and modernizing it, something The War Zone has highlighted in the past.

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