Quotes of the Day:

“With patient and firm determination we will press on until every valley of despair is exalted to new peaks of hope, until every mountain of pride and irrationality is made low by the levelling process of humility and compassion; until the rough places of injustice are transformed into a smooth plane of equality of opportunity; and until the crooked places of prejudice are transformed by the straightening process of bright-eyed wisdom.”

-Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

“Here is the true meaning and value of compassion and nonviolence, when it helps us to see the enemy’s point of view, to hear his questions, to know his assessment of ourselves. For from his view we may indeed see the basic weaknesses of our own condition, and if we are mature, we may learn and grow and profit from the wisdom of the brothers who are called the opposition.”

-Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Six Principles of Nonviolence are:

Principle one: Nonviolence is a way of life for courageous people. It is active nonviolent resistance to evil. It is aggressive spiritually, mentally and emotionally.

Principle two: Nonviolence seeks to win friendship and understanding. The result of nonviolence is redemption and reconciliation. The purpose of nonviolence is the creation of the Beloved Community.

Principle three: Nonviolence seeks to defeat injustice, not people. Nonviolence recognises that evildoers are also victims and are not evil people. The nonviolent resister seeks to defeat evil, not people.

Principle four: Nonviolence holds that suffering can educate and transform. Nonviolence accepts suffering without retaliation. Unearned suffering is redemptive and has tremendous educational and transforming possibilities.

Principle five: Nonviolence chooses love instead of hate. Nonviolence resists violence of the spirit as well as the body. Nonviolent love is spontaneous, unmotivated, unselfish and creative.

Principle six: Nonviolence believes that the universe is on the side of justice. The nonviolent resister has deep faith that justice will eventually win. Nonviolence believes that God is a God of justice.

1. Transcript of the ADDRESS OF REVEREND DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. New York State Civil War Centennial Commission Park Sheraton Hotel, New York City Wednesday Evening, September 12, 1962

2. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, JANUARY 15, 2023

3. National Security and the Middle Class

4. The U.S. Army Needs Mobile, Long-Range, And Precise Artillery

5. Will a Trillion Dollars Per Year Buy America a Better Defense?

6. TikTok Tries to Win Allies in the U.S. With More Transparency

7. Auburn Banned TikTok, and Students Can’t Stop Talking About It

8. TikTok Must be Banned in US and Free World

9. Information literacy courses can help students tackle confirmation bias and misinformation

10. China’s True COVID Death Toll Estimated To Be in Hundreds of Thousands

11. China says 60,000 people have died of Covid since early December

12. Death toll in Russian missile strike in Ukraine rises to 40

13. U.S. begins expanded training of Ukrainian forces for large-scale combat

14. The U.S. Marine Corps: Now An Access-Denial Force to Fight China?

15. Putin Should Be Shocked: Ukraine Keeps Killing Russia's Missiles

16. The Problem With Primacy - America’s Dangerous Quest to Dominate the Pacific

17.  Wartime Putinism – What the Disaster in Ukraine Has Done to the Kremlin—and to Russia

​18. ​Martin Luther King Jr.’s ‘Letter From Birmingham Jail’

1. Transcript of the ADDRESS OF REVEREND DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. New York State Civil War Centennial Commission Park Sheraton Hotel, New York City Wednesday Evening, September 12, 1962

From one of my daily email feeds (The Morning Dispatch <hello@thedispatch.com>). Dr. King's speech is worth re-reading today. The full transcript can be downloaded at his link: http://www.nysm.nysed.gov/common/nysm/files/mlk-transcription.pdf?utm_source=ActiveCampaign&utm_medium=email&utm_content=MLK+on+the+Emancipation+Proclamation&utm_campaign=MLK+on+the+Emancipation+Proclamation

"please take a few minutes to read (or listen to) Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s speech commemorating the 100th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln issuing his Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation. Delivered in New York City on September 12, 1962, King’s address made sure to celebrate the United States’ founding ideals—and the ideals Lincoln espoused in the Proclamation—before turning to the myriad ways the country was failing to live up to them. Here are some key passages:"

Transcript of the ADDRESS OF REVEREND DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. New York State Civil War Centennial Commission Park Sheraton Hotel, New York City Wednesday Evening, September 12, 1962 

If our nation had done nothing more in its whole history than to create just two documents, its contribution to civilization would be imperishable. 

The first of these documents is the Declaration of Independence and the other is that which we are here to honor tonight, the Emancipation Proclamation. All tyrants, past, present and future, are powerless to bury the truths in these declarations, no matter how extensive their legions, how vast their power and how malignant their evil.

The Declaration of Independence proclaimed to a world, organized politically and spiritually around the concept of the inequality of man, that the dignity of human personality was inherent in man as a living being. The Emancipation Proclamation was the offspring of the Declaration of Independence. It was a constructive use of the force of law to uproot a social order which sought to separate liberty from a segment of humanity.

Our pride and our progress would be unqualified if the story ended here. But history reveals that America has been a schizophrenic personality where these two documents are concerned. On the one hand she has proudly professed the basic principles inherent in both documents. On the other hand she has sadly practiced the antithesis of these principles.

The unresolved race question is a pathological infection in our social and political anatomy, which has sickened us throughout our history, and is still today a largely untreated disease.

How has our social health been injured by this condition? The legacy is the impairment of the lives of nearly twenty-million of our citizens. Based solely on their color, they have been condemned to a sub-existence, never sharing the fruits of progress equally. The average income of Negroes is approximately thirty-three hundred dollars per family annually, against fifty-eight hundred dollars for white citizens. This differential tells only part of the story, however, the more terrible aspect is found in the inner structure and quality of the Negro community. It is a community artificially but effectively separated from the dominant culture of our society. It has a pathetically small, grotesquely distorted, middle class. There are virtually no Negro bankers, no industrialists; few commercial enterprises worthy of the name of businesses, the overwhelming majority of Negroes are domestics, laborers, and always the largest segment of the unemployed. If employment entails heavy work, if the wages are miserable, if the filth is revolting, the job belongs to the Negro.

And every Negro knows these truths and his personality is corroded by a sense of inferiority, generated by this degraded status. Negroes, north and south, still live in segregation, housed in slums, eat in segregation, pray in segregation and die in segregation. The life experience of the Negro in integration remains an exception even in the north.

The imposition of inferiority, externally and internally, are the slave chains of today. What the Emancipation Proclamation proscribed in a legal and formal sense has never been eliminated in human terms. By burning in the consciousness of white Americans a conviction that Negroes are by nature subnormal, much of the myth was absorbed by the Negro himself, stultifying his energy, his ambition and his self-respect. The Proclamation of Inferiority has contended with the Proclamation of Emancipation, negating its liberating force. Inferiority has justified the low living standards of the Negro, sanctioned his separation from the majority culture, and enslaved him physically and psychologically. Inferiority as a fetter is more subtle and sophisticated than iron chains; it is invisible and its victim helps to fashion his own bonds.

This somber picture may induce the somber thought that there is nothing to commemorate about the centennial of the Emancipation Proclamation. 

But tragic disappointments and undeserved defeats do not put an end to life, nor do they wipe out the positive, however submerged it may have become beneath floods of negative experience.

The Emancipation Proclamation had four enduring results. First, it gave force to the executive power to change conditions in the national interest on a broad and far-reaching scale. Second, it dealt a devastating blow to a system of slave-holding and an economy built upon it, which had been muscular enough to engage in warfare on the Federal government. Third, it enabled the Negro to play a significant role in his own liberation with the ability to organize and to struggle, with less of the bestial retaliation his slave status had permitted to his masters. Fourth, it resurrected and restated the principle of equality upon which the founding of the nation rested.

When Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation it was not the act of an opportunistic politician issuing a hollow pronouncement to placate a pressure group. Our truly great presidents were tortured deep in their hearts by the race question. Jefferson with keen perception saw that the festering sore of slavery debilitated white masters as well as the Negro. He feared for the future of white children who were taught a false supremacy. His concern can be summed up in one quotation: “I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just.”

Lincoln’s torments are well known, his vacillations were facts. In the seething cauldron of sixty-two and sixty-three Lincoln was called the “Baboon President” in the North, and “coward”, assassin, and savage in the South. Yet he searched his way to the conclusions embodied in these words; words already quoted this evening: “In giving freedom to the slave we assure freedom to the free, honorable alike in what we give and what we preserve.” On this moral foundation he personally prepared the first draft of the Emancipation Proclamation, and to emphasize the decisiveness of his course he called his cabinet together and declared he was not seeking their advice as to its wisdom but only suggestions on subject matter. Lincoln achieved immortality because he issued the Emancipation Proclamation. His hesitation had not stayed his hand when historic necessity charted but one course. No President can be great, or even fit for office, if he attempts to accommodate to injustice to maintain his political balance.

The Negro will never cease his struggle to commemorate the Emancipation Proclamation by making his emancipation real. If enough Americans in numbers and influence join him, the nation we both labored to build may yet realize its glorious dream.

There is too much greatness in our heritage to tolerate the pettiness of race hate. The Declaration of Independence and the Emancipation Proclamation deserve to live in sacred honor; many generations of Americans suffered, bled and died, confident that those who followed them would preserve the purity of our ideals. Negroes have declared they will die if need be for these freedoms. All Americans must enlist in a crusade finally to make the race question an ugly relic of a dark past. When that day dawns, the Emancipation Proclamation will be commemorated in luminous glory.

2. RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, JANUARY 15, 2023

Maps/graphics: https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-january-15-2023

Key inflections in ongoing military operations on January 15:

• Ukrainian officials specified that a Russian Kh-22 missile struck a residential building in Dnipro City on January 14, killing at least 25–30 civilians.[29] Ukrainian officials clarified inaccurate reporting that Ukrainian air defenses may have caused the destruction to the building, noting that Ukraine does not have the capability to shoot down Kh-22 missiles.
• Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin awarded medals to Wagner Group forces for the capture of Soledar, likely in an ongoing effort to frame the capture of Soledar as a Wagner accomplishment rather than a joint effort with the Russian Armed Forces, as the Russian Ministry of Defense previously claimed.[30]
• The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces repelled Russian ground assaults near Makiivka and Bilohorivka, Luhansk Oblast.[31] A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces are transferring Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) off-road vehicles from Russia to Luhansk Oblast, possibly for use in combat.[32]
• Russian sources claimed that Russian forces finished clearing Soledar and attacked Ukrainian positions to the north, west, and southwest of the settlement.[33] A Ukrainian source reported that Russian forces captured a mine west of Soledar near Dvorichchia on January 15.[34]
• Russian forces continued to attack Bakhmut and areas to the north, east, south, and southwest of the city.[35] Russian forces made marginal territorial gains southwest of Bakhmut near Andriivka.[36]
• Ukrainian Kherson Oblast Military Advisor Serhiy Khlan stated that Russian forces increased their presence in occupied Kherson Oblast and that some Wagner Group forces arrived in Kherson Oblast.[37] Russian occupation head of Kherson Oblast Vladimir Saldo claimed that the restoration of the Henichesk-Arabat Spit bridge improved Russian logistics into occupied Kherson Oblast.[38]
• A Russian servicemember reportedly detonated a grenade in a building where Russian soldiers quartered in Belgorod Oblast, Russia, possibly in a fratricidal act of resistance against mobilization.[39] A Russian source reported that the grenade attack killed three and injured 10 mobilized personnel.[40]

RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, JANUARY 15, 2023

Jan 15, 2023 - Press ISW

Download the PDF

understandingwar.org

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, January 15, 2023

Kateryna Stepanenko, George Barros, and Mason Clark

January 15, 7:45 pm ET

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

ISW is publishing an abbreviated campaign update today, January 15. This report focuses on Russia’s likely preparation to conduct a decisive strategic action in 2023 intended to end Ukraine’s string of operational successes and regain the initiative.

The Kremlin is belatedly taking personnel mobilization, reorganization, and industrial actions it realistically should have before launching its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 invasion and is taking steps to conduct the “special military operation” as a major conventional war. Russian President Vladimir Putin began publicly signaling preparations for a protracted war in early December 2022, pledging that Russia will improve upon the mistakes of its earlier military campaigns and setting conditions for a protracted war in Ukraine.[1] Putin notably remarked on December 7 that the “special military operation” in Ukraine could be a “lengthy process” and made several further public appearances throughout December indirectly outlining his goals to: improve the Russian war effort’s mobilization processes, revitalize Russia’s defense industrial base, centralize the Kremlin’s grip over the Russian information space, and reinstate the Russian Ministry of Defense’s (MoD) authority.[2]

The Kremlin is likely preparing to conduct a decisive strategic action in the next six months intended to regain the initiative and end Ukraine’s current string of operational successes. Russia has failed to achieve most of its major operational objectives in Ukraine over the past eleven months. Russian forces failed to capture Kyiv, as well as Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, and to maintain gains in Kharkiv Oblast or hold the strategic city of Kherson. The Russian air and missile campaign targeting Ukrainian critical infrastructure under Army General Sergey Surovikin in late 2022 also failed to generate significant operational effects or demoralize Ukrainian society, as the Kremlin likely intended. Putin and senior Kremlin officials continue reiterating that Russia has not abandoned its maximalist objectives despite Russian defeats on the battlefield.[3] While Putin has not changed his objectives for the war, there is emerging evidence that he is changing fundamental aspects of Russia’s approach to the war by undertaking several new lines of effort.

ISW has observed several Russian lines of effort (LOEs) likely intended to support a decisive action in the next six months.

LOE 1: The Kremlin is intensifying both near- and long-term force-generation efforts. Putin and the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) announced plans to drastically expand the conventional Russian military by forming new divisions, reinstating pre-2010 military districts in western Russia, and increasing the conscription age — all indicating Russian intent (though likely not actual capability) to reform the Russian military to conduct large-scale conventional warfighting.[4] Ukrainian intelligence reported that the Kremlin seeks to raise the number of military personnel to two million by an unspecified date (from about 1.35 million personnel as of September 2022), while Western intelligence officials noted that Russian military command is in “serious preparations” for a potential second wave of mobilization.[5] Some Kremlin officials have begun discussing proposals to expand eligibility protocols for conscription, active mobilization, and the mobilization reserve, while Russian state structures are attempting to resolve past problems issuing mobilization summonses.[6] Putin himself signed orders that expanded eligibility for mobilization by allowing the mobilization of convicts on November 4.[7]

LOE 2: The Russian military is conserving mobilized personnel for future use — an inflection from the Kremlin’s initial approach of rushing untrained bodies to the front in fall 2022. Putin stated on December 7 that the Russian Armed Forces have not yet committed all mobilized personnel from the first mobilization wave to the frontlines, likely to take time to train and equip these forces for a later, concentrated use.[8] Conventional Russian forces (as opposed to the Wagner Group and the DNR/LNR proxy forces) have not conducted major offensive operations and have mostly maintained defensive positions since the series of successful Ukrainian counteroffensives in summer and fall 2022. ISW has monitored conventional Russian units regrouping and training in Belarus and in Russia.[9]

LOE 3: Russia is attempting to reinvigorate its defense industrial base (DIB): The Kremlin began placing a significant emphasis on the resurrection of the Russian DIB in December. Putin has held several senior meetings and visited defense enterprises throughout the country since December.[10] Putin publicly acknowledged issues with supplies, such as the lack of reconnaissance drones, and notably demanded that one of his ministers issue state defense procurement contracts in a shorter-than-planned timeframe.[11] Putin and other Kremlin officials have also entertained vague discussions that Russian authorities may nationalize property to support the Russian war effort.[12]

LOE 4: Putin is re-centralizing control of the war effort in Ukraine under the Ministry of Defense and appointed Russia’s senior-most uniformed officer, Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov, as theater commander. The Kremlin is also reinstating the original planners of the war and belatedly attempting to correct command-structure deficiencies. Army General Sergey Surovikin and previous Russian theater commanders failed to achieve the decisive operations Putin — likely unrealistically — intended them to achieve. The Kremlin appointed Gerasimov as the Commander of the Joint Grouping of Forces in Ukraine on January 11 after previously sidelining Gerasimov throughout the full-scale invasion.[13] The Russian MoD also appointed three deputies to closely work with Gerasimov on the expanded scale of tasks pertaining to the “special military operation.” The Kremlin likely intends Gerasimov and his newly appointed deputies to both prepare Russia for a protracted war and take command of a major effort in 2023.

LOE 5: The Kremlin is intensifying its conditioning of the Russian information space to support the war. The Kremlin is shaping the information space to regenerate support for the invasion by reintroducing pre–February 24 narratives and undertaking measures to regain control over war coverage, after previously ceding this space to a variety of independent actors. Kremlin officials resumed promoting a false narrative in late 2022 that the existence of an independent Ukraine threatens Russian sovereignty and culture, justifying Russia’s invasion and ongoing Russian sacrifices as inevitable and necessary “self-defense” measures.[14] Kremlin propagandists have also intensified narratives about the international legal consequences awaiting Russia if it does not win the war, likely to stoke fears of defeat and motivate rededication to the war.[15] The Kremlin has intensified efforts to develop relations with and co-opt prominent pro-war milbloggers who have emerged as a powerful alternative to Putin and the Russian MoD’s deliberately vague war coverage.[16]

The Kremlin’s effort to prepare for a likely intended decisive strategic action in 2023 is not mutually exclusive with the Kremlin’s efforts to set conditions for a protracted war. ISW is not forecasting a “last ditch” Russian effort to win the war in Ukraine. The war will not end, and Russia will not necessarily lose, if any of the possible actions discussed below fail. Russia’s rapid attempt to capture Kyiv and conduct a regime change within the first two weeks of the war was a failed strategic decisive action, for example. Many of the aforementioned indicators — such as the Russian MoD’s proposal to create many new Russian divisions — are almost certainly in part intended to support a long-term effort beyond any decisive action planned for calendar year 2023. However, ISW does not assess the Kremlin is simply staying its course as it prepares for a protracted war.

Russia’s decisive strategic action in 2023 can manifest itself in multiple possible courses of action (COAs) that are not mutually exclusive. According to US military doctrine, a military can undertake a decisive action at every level of war to produce a definitive result and achieve an objective.[17] Decisive actions can be at the tactical, operational, or strategic level and can be either offensive or defensive.[18]

COA 1: A major Russian offensive, most likely in the Luhansk Oblast area. Russian forces may seek to conduct a major offensive in the Luhansk Oblast area. The full capture of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts remain the Kremlin’s official war goals and are among Russia’s most achievable (though still highly challenging) objectives given Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts are logistically the easiest territories for Russia to capture. Russian forces have been deploying additional forces to Luhansk Oblast and undertaking other significant activities since 2022, which ISW assesses can support an offensive operation in Luhansk Oblast.[19] ISW continues to assess that Russian forces are unlikely to conduct an offensive in southern Ukraine in Kherson or Zaporizhia oblasts.[20] The Dnipro River separates the frontline in Kherson Oblast and is a serious obstacle to maneuver. Russia’s layered field fortifications array in Kherson Oblast and extensive mining in Zaporizhia Oblast indicate Russian forces are prioritizing defensive operations in both provinces.[21]

COA 2: A Russian defensive operation to defeat and exploit a Ukrainian counteroffensive. The Kremlin redeployed significant military units from the southern (Kherson) direction to Luhansk Oblast in late 2022 and established field fortifications in Luhansk Oblast, as well as in Belgorod and Kursk oblasts in Russia.[22] ISW has reported on many observed indicators that Ukrainian forces seek to conduct counteroffensives in 2023.[23] Ukrainian officials have long been publicly signaling their intent to conduct counteroffensives in 2023.[24] Russian milbloggers have also been long warning about Ukrainian counteroffensives.[25] Russia seeks to secure Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts — territories the Russian government has (illegally) claimed as Russian territory — and to avoid another significant defeat like the rout in Kharkiv Oblast or the withdrawal from Kherson City. These were both significant events that degraded Russian morale and the perception of Russian forces’ ability to secure their larger objectives for the full “demilitarization and denazification” of Ukraine. Russian forces may seek to successfully defeat a Ukrainian counteroffensive and deprive Ukraine of the initiative by destroying a significant proportion of mechanized Ukrainian forces. Such a successful Russian decisive action could then enable Russian forces to develop a counteroffensive to exploit disorganized and exhausted Ukrainian forces.

Many of the aforementioned Russian lines of effort could support both COA 1 and COA 2; these scenarios are not mutually exclusive. Russian forces could be preparing for a major offensive operation or, alternatively, larger spoiling attacks short of a general offensive operation. The indicators could also support a counterattack to take advantage of a Ukrainian counteroffensive that Russian forces expect to stop.

The most dangerous course of action (MDCOA) of a Russian offensive against northern Ukraine remains unlikely at this time. However, the Kremlin is creating planning flexibility and will likely expand Russia’s military presence in Belarus in the period leading up to planned major exercises (which could possibly support a combat operation) in September 2023. ISW continues to track Russian and Belarusian activities that could in time support a new Russian attack on Ukraine from Belarus. Russia will likely deploy more forces to Belarus under the rubric of the Zapad (West) 2023 and Union Shield 2023 exercises that will likely occur in September 2023.[26] The Kremlin deployed a senior Russian officer, Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Ground Forces Oleg Salyukov — one of Gerasimov’s three newly appointed deputies — to Belarus on January 12.[27] Salyukov may be intended to create command-and-control structures necessary for a Russian operational strike group. These are anomalous activities that intensify the information operation that Russia will attack Ukraine from Belarus and could support an offensive, though ISW assesses an offensive is still a low-likelihood scenario at this time. There continues to be no evidence that Russian forces in Belarus have created the command-and-control structures necessary for an operational strike group as of this publication.[28]

The Kremlin retains its maximalist goals to seize all of Ukraine, despite its poor conduct of the war to date. The Kremlin has been slow to effectively fix its flawed invasion for almost a year and has repeatedly opted for short-term solutions such as: repeatedly cycling through theater commanders and retaining a fragmented command structure, introducing crypto-mobilization campaigns as opposed to full-scale mobilization, failing to control the Russian information space by allowing different pro-war factions to partition the information space, and consistently disrupting the Russian military’s chain of command. The Kremlin’s apparent new attention to Russian military failures will not allow the Kremlin to fix its conduct of the war in the immediate term if at all, and the flaws in Russia’s original campaign design — and the subsequent losses incurred — will be difficult to replace.

Russian forces remain dangerous, and Ukraine requires sustained support. Ukraine requires further and timely Western support to adequately prepare for the Russian COAs for 2023 outlined above. Ukraine’s Western allies will need to continue supporting Ukraine in the long run even if a Russian decisive action in 2023 fails, as the Kremlin is nonetheless preparing for a protracted war. The West must continue its support to Ukraine’s efforts to defeat Russia’s invasion — and must do so quickly. The Russian military, as the saying goes, retains a vote on the course of the war despite its weaknesses and is actively setting conditions for major operations as the war enters its second year.

Key inflections in ongoing military operations on January 15:

• Ukrainian officials specified that a Russian Kh-22 missile struck a residential building in Dnipro City on January 14, killing at least 25–30 civilians.[29] Ukrainian officials clarified inaccurate reporting that Ukrainian air defenses may have caused the destruction to the building, noting that Ukraine does not have the capability to shoot down Kh-22 missiles.
• Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin awarded medals to Wagner Group forces for the capture of Soledar, likely in an ongoing effort to frame the capture of Soledar as a Wagner accomplishment rather than a joint effort with the Russian Armed Forces, as the Russian Ministry of Defense previously claimed.[30]
• The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces repelled Russian ground assaults near Makiivka and Bilohorivka, Luhansk Oblast.[31] A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces are transferring Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) off-road vehicles from Russia to Luhansk Oblast, possibly for use in combat.[32]
• Russian sources claimed that Russian forces finished clearing Soledar and attacked Ukrainian positions to the north, west, and southwest of the settlement.[33] A Ukrainian source reported that Russian forces captured a mine west of Soledar near Dvorichchia on January 15.[34]
• Russian forces continued to attack Bakhmut and areas to the north, east, south, and southwest of the city.[35] Russian forces made marginal territorial gains southwest of Bakhmut near Andriivka.[36]
• Ukrainian Kherson Oblast Military Advisor Serhiy Khlan stated that Russian forces increased their presence in occupied Kherson Oblast and that some Wagner Group forces arrived in Kherson Oblast.[37] Russian occupation head of Kherson Oblast Vladimir Saldo claimed that the restoration of the Henichesk-Arabat Spit bridge improved Russian logistics into occupied Kherson Oblast.[38]
• A Russian servicemember reportedly detonated a grenade in a building where Russian soldiers quartered in Belgorod Oblast, Russia, possibly in a fratricidal act of resistance against mobilization.[39] A Russian source reported that the grenade attack killed three and injured 10 mobilized personnel.[40]

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

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

Observed indicators for the MDCOA in the past 24 hours:

• Nothing significant to report.

Observed ambiguous indicators for MDCOA in the past 24 hours:

• The Ukrainian General Staff reported on January 15 that unspecified Russian and Belarusian military units continue to perform unspecified tasks near the Belarusian-Ukrainian border.[41]
• Radar data indicates that Belarusian forces may have erected new structures around Velykiy Bokov airport near Mazyr, Belarus, 58km north of the Belarusian-Ukrainian border.[42]

Observed counter-indicators for the MDCOA in the past 24 hours:

• The Ukrainian General Staff reiterated that it has not observed Russian forces in Belarus forming a strike group as of January 15.[43]

[24] https://abcnews.go.com/International/expect-strikes-deeper-deeper-russia...; https://isw.pub/UkrWar120422; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAAmRSLIaVo&ab_channel=UkraineMediaCente...; https://zn dot ua/ukr/UKRAINE/reznikov-rozpoviv-koli-prodovzhitsja-kontrnastup-sil-oboroni-.html; https://www.pravda.com dot ua/eng/news/2022/12/11/7380306/; https://fakty.com dot ua/ua/ukraine/20221206-ukrayini-sogodni-ne-potribna-dodatkova-mobilizacziya-reznikov/; https://nv dot ua/ukr/ukraine/politics/ukrajina-otrimaye-zahidni-tanki-ta-boyovi-litaki-zayaviv-reznikov-novini-ukrajini-50288954.html; https://armyinform.com dot ua/2022/12/04/mobilizovani-ta-vagnerivczi-ne-mayut-navychok-voyuvaty-vzymku-sergij-cherevatyj/; https://twitter.com/DefenceU/status/1594372791360491520; https://news.sky.com/story/ukraine-war-will-be-over-by-spring-predicts-c...;

[26] Zapad exercises occur once every four years and should in principle not occur again until 2025. The Kremlin used Zapad 2021 in September 2021 to prepare for its February 2022 invasion of Ukraine Russian forces may again accumulate significant forces in Belarus under the guise of exercises. https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign...

[29] https://www.facebook.com/kpszsu/posts/pfbid02PoWQshJ55g2BegcNWK2E7F8UKra...; https://suspilne dot media/359160-rosiani-pocilili-u-budinok-v-dnipri-sili-ppo-zbili-18-z-28-krilatih-raket-rf-326-den-vijni-onlajn/; https://t.me/Bratchuk_Sergey/27100

[35] https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid0xBAALczVonQJCWpMw38...; https://armyinform.com dot ua/2023/01/15/na-bahmutskomu-napryamku-syly-oborony-zavdayut-znachnyh-vtrat-rosarmiyi-sergij-cherevatyj/; https://t.me/voenkorKotenok/44447; https://t.me/wargonzo/10334; https://t.me/rybar/42709

[36] ttps://twitter.com/PaulJawin/status/1614339966057811970

https://twitter.com/GeoConfirmed/status/1614624560564895754

understandingwar.org

3. National Security and the Middle Class

Excerpts:

Dealing with the external security threats I outlined in my opening is essential to protecting our future. But systemically extending the notion of the American Dream to all Americans and sustaining a large middle class is also central to our nation’s long-term viability, strength, and welfare. HP3 is an initial effort to find a practical, nonpartisan, and effective solution to achieve this at the community level. 

National Security and the Middle Class

By Jack Gardner

January 16, 2023

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2023/01/16/national_security_and_the_middle_class_875865.html?mc_cid=98a10b65c4

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine reminds us that the world is still a very dangerous place where many nations and non-state actors hold world views fundamentally different than those of most Americans. Having spent much of my life in the military looking at these threats, I’m concerned that they are more menacing now than several decades ago. But I also feel reasonably confident that if we stay vigilant, work with our allies, and, in a bipartisan manner, leverage our huge advantages our national security apparatus can effectively deal with them.

But since I retired from the military, I sense another threat to our future. An equally challenging one that also requires a systemic national security response. In this case, though, the threat is internal and centers around the fragile state of our middle class and limitations on economic mobility. To me this threat runs to the core of who we are as a nation. 

Our country was founded on the premise that every person can succeed if they apply themselves. Many have, and over time we built a large middle class that has proven to be a source of strength for the nation. But for some Americans this success has remained aspirational, and over the last few decades the gap between those succeeding and those falling behind has grown. And the impact has been felt across the nation, from rural areas to Rust Belt communities to large cities.

According to Pew Research, in 1971 the percentage of American adults living in middle-income households was 61%. In 2021 it was 50%. During this same period the percentage of adults in upper tier income households rose from 14 % to 21%, while those in lower income households grew from 25 to 29%. In general terms, the middle class has declined and the number in the upper- and lower-income levels has increased. 

This is not just an economic challenge but a national security issue that is becoming an existential threat. A thriving middle class and achievable economic mobility drive a belief in institutions and political stability, which is central to our basic functioning as a rational, practical, and civil democracy. Watch any newscast today for 5 minutes and you’ll see that we have lost this.  

I also believe that our ability to serve as a source of moral force that men and women of goodwill around the globe can recognize is dependent on sustaining the belief that we are a politically stable middle class nation that champions opportunity and fairness.

This is a complex issue driven by numerous factors. A loss of manufacturing over decades has been a key one. Another is the rapid pace of technological change that is increasingly driving which skills are paid well. A third involves the impact of race over several centuries. Compounding all this are unknowns about the long-term impact of Covid on education, wages, employment, and the workforce. 

And a central challenge is the fact that our politics have become so polarized there’s no space for frank conversation on functional solutions. Widely differing agendas have become so fragmented that we have lost a practical sense of life and a focus on a common American interest – the idea that everyone, no matter who you are, where you live, or where you are from, can succeed here.

Successive U.S. administrations have formed their own response to these challenges at the national level with varying success. At this point we need to reassess execution at the tactical or community level, where a majority our focus is on mitigation - not on solving the core challenges upstream. We specifically need to find a bipartisan systemic solution that aligns the community’s efforts on the overarching goal, identifies the tactics to achieve it, and provides a leadership governance structure that can debottleneck and get things done.

In an attempt to do this, in mid-2019 a small group, which I am a part of, started a pilot effort in the community of Haverhill, Massachusetts. The intent is to build a systemic community process that enables all public-school students to achieve a true living wage job. A job that supports a good home, transportation, and the ability to raise a family if desired. The goal is to not operate on the margins but to make success the norm for every student. And in the process develop a bipartisan model that could be employed in other U.S. communities. 

The pilot program, called HP3 – or Haverhill Public-Private Partnership – centers around a systemic community process run by a public-private partnership that coordinates, integrates and focuses community programs and resources to achieve the singular goal – every public school student achieves a living wage job.

The program leverages the work of the schools and social organizations and emphasizes a series of core tasks. These include engaging students and parents from 6^th grade through high school about interests and career planning, providing mentors on a grand scale, and eliminating transportation as an obstacle to success. The most essential task is to convene a group of community leaders annually and, acting much like a project management team, assess progress and refocus collective community efforts toward the singular goal. Basically, identify what else needs to be done or better resourced to achieve the objective.

The program is still in its infancy and we see this as a 10-year effort at a minimum. We recently hired a full-time HP3 Director who possesses extensive leadership experience and is the perfect person to lead a complex nonstandard mission. And to date we have executed several components of the career exploration program and recently completed a pilot mentor program. Perhaps most significantly, a segment of the community that includes the Mayor, School Superintendent, local Community College President, several members of the City Council, Chamber of Commerce President, and parts of the business community support the program and believe that a sustained systemic effort can succeed. Time will tell. Achieving this goal clearly was not realistic a decade ago. It is now. A host of tools and resources are available that change the equation – flexible and creative Community College programs, professional credentialing courses for in-demand skills, virtual tours of career fields and businesses, structured apprenticeships/internships, and affordable ride-share options to get there are just some examples. There are others. And as divisive as our politics appear, in the past we have found ways to collaborate in narrow areas when the situation desperately required it. Look back to the late 1930s when the animosity between supporters of the New Deal and parts of the business community was as severe as our current divide. But by 1940 they put aside huge differences and orchestrated the mobilization of the U.S. industrial base that ultimately won the Second World War. Today, we need to isolate this one area – every public student to a true living wage job – from the divisive emotional issues that define our current politics and generate a similar common sense of purpose to address another clear threat to our future.

Dealing with the external security threats I outlined in my opening is essential to protecting our future. But systemically extending the notion of the American Dream to all Americans and sustaining a large middle class is also central to our nation’s long-term viability, strength, and welfare. HP3 is an initial effort to find a practical, nonpartisan, and effective solution to achieve this at the community level. 

Jack Gardner is a retired U.S. Army Lieutenant General. He is the founder of the 21^st Century Jobskills Project, a nonprofit organization based in Alexandria, VA focused on facilitating all public school students in achieving true living wage jobs.

4. The U.S. Army Needs Mobile, Long-Range, And Precise Artillery

Excerpts:

The U.S. Army anticipated much of what the Russian army would do in Ukraine with respect to its artillery, particularly its use of long-range strike systems to attack opposing fires systems, command and control centers, fixed installations, and troop concentrations. Recognizing it was both outnumbered and outranged by Russian fires systems, the U.S. Army created the LRPF program as one of its six core modernization priorities.

Much of the LRPF effort has been directed at developing very long-range fires. The PrSM will, at minimum, reach out 500 kilometers. The LRHW is envisioned to reach several thousand kilometers. There is also the relatively new SMRF system intended to service targets in the space between the range of the PrSM and that of the LRHW. The Army plans to employ versions of the Tomahawk Land-Attack Missile and Standard Missile 6 as its mid-range weapons. Each of these systems will incorporate advanced guidance technologies.

The Army has paid some attention to extending the range and precision of tactical systems. It is developing the ERCA, a tracked system based on the current 155mm M109 Paladin. With a longer barrel than the Paladin and employing rocket assisted projectiles, the ERCA can engage targets out to 70 kilometers.

Range and precision are just two of three critical features to future fires systems that the Army has addressed in its LRPF program. It still needs to address the third feature, which is the mobility of fires systems.

The U.S. Army Needs Mobile, Long-Range, And Precise Artillery

By Dan Gouré

January 16, 2023

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2023/01/16/the_us_army_needs_mobile_long-range_and_precise_artillery_875860.html?mc_cid=98a10b65c4

The U.S. Army is currently investing in two of the three critical capabilities for future fires systems (artillery, rockets, and missiles). These capabilities are range and precision. The Army even calls its fires modernization effort the Long-Range Precision Fires (LRPF) program. But what Army fires systems also need is mobility. While new systems such as the Extended Range Cannon Artillery (ERCA), Precision Strike Missile (PrSM), Strategic Mid-Range Fires (SMRF) and the Long-Range Hypersonic Weapon (LRHW) will be deployed in mobile configurations, the current plan does not envision a mobile system to replace the aging towed M777s, 155mm howitzers that equip a variety of formations, notably the Stryker Brigade Combat Teams (SBCTs).

This is a mistake. The Army needs to invest in a mobile 155mm howitzer, at least for its SBCTs. There are a number of foreign, truck-mounted 155mm systems already in service around the world that could be acquired.

To a large extent, the Russia-Ukraine conflict has turned into an artillery/missile war. Early on Russia was firing as many as 20,000 shells a day. The Russian army is paying particular attention to counter-battery fires, looking to use its advantages in long-range artillery systems to eliminate Ukraine’s artillery.

Russian early success with its artillery and rocket systems led to the decision by the U.S. and other NATO countries to provide Kyiv with longer-range fires systems and precision-guided artillery projectiles. These systems have proven highly effective as well as survivable. The West has delivered an array of long-range fires systems, such as the Multiple Launch Rocket System (MLRS), the High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS), and the M109 and PzH2000 tracked 155mm howitzers. Ukraine also has been the recipient of hundreds of old-style towed artillery pieces, including obsolescent U.S. M777s. However, these systems lack the range of MLRS and HIMARS or the survivability of tracked howitzers.

Russia has claimed to have successfully destroyed a number of MLRS and HIMARS launchers, which Western sources have dismissed as propaganda. Russia also has apparently not had much success against Western self-propelled howitzers, such as the M109. However, Russia seems to have had success in locating and attacking Ukraine’s towed artillery pieces, both old Soviet equipment and the more modern Western models, which demonstrates how it would fare in a wider conflict. This success has generally been attributed to the inherently low survivability of unprotected artillery and the length of time it takes towed pieces to set up fires and then redeploy.

The U.S. Army anticipated much of what the Russian army would do in Ukraine with respect to its artillery, particularly its use of long-range strike systems to attack opposing fires systems, command and control centers, fixed installations, and troop concentrations. Recognizing it was both outnumbered and outranged by Russian fires systems, the U.S. Army created the LRPF program as one of its six core modernization priorities.

Much of the LRPF effort has been directed at developing very long-range fires. The PrSM will, at minimum, reach out 500 kilometers. The LRHW is envisioned to reach several thousand kilometers. There is also the relatively new SMRF system intended to service targets in the space between the range of the PrSM and that of the LRHW. The Army plans to employ versions of the Tomahawk Land-Attack Missile and Standard Missile 6 as its mid-range weapons. Each of these systems will incorporate advanced guidance technologies.

The Army has paid some attention to extending the range and precision of tactical systems. It is developing the ERCA, a tracked system based on the current 155mm M109 Paladin. With a longer barrel than the Paladin and employing rocket assisted projectiles, the ERCA can engage targets out to 70 kilometers.

Range and precision are just two of three critical features to future fires systems that the Army has addressed in its LRPF program. It still needs to address the third feature, which is the mobility of fires systems.

Portions of the Army, notably the Armored Brigade Combat Teams (ABCTs) with their M109 Paladins and HIMARS, already have mobile artillery. But the rest of the Army’s combat formations, consisting of SBCTs and Infantry Brigade Combat Teams (IBCTs) still rely largely on towed 155mm artillery for long-range fires. It makes no sense to invest in modern, mobile fires systems for the ABCTs while hampering the otherwise highly mobile SBCTs with a towed artillery system. But even in the IBCTs, a mobile artillery system would be more survivable. The combination of mobile artillery and longer-range precision projectiles will create a more lethal and survivable fires capability for the SBCTs and IBCTs.

The Army needs to complete its fires modernization effort by acquiring a mobile 155mm artillery system, at a minimum, for the SBCTs. Fortunately, the Army has readily available options. A number of countries have developed truck-mounted 155mm systems that the Army could acquire. These include the French Caesar, Israeli Atmos, British Archer and U.S. Brutus. The French, British and Israeli systems are operational. Colombia recently announced it was buying the Israeli Atmos system. France has committed some 30 Caesar systems to Ukraine.

A truck-mounted howitzer has several advantages over towed artillery. Obviously, they are more mobile. This means that the artillery can more readily keep up with the other wheeled vehicles in the SBCTs. But more importantly, they can set up, shoot, and start moving in a matter of minutes. This means the unit can execute a mission and disperse before an enemy can find and target them. Given the proliferation of extremely sophisticated and highly responsive counter-battery capabilities, being able to “shoot and scoot” is the key to survivability.

More than a year ago, the Army conducted an evaluation of these four truck-mounted 155mm systems. It is likely that one of these will meet the SBCT’s requirements.

A non-developmental, truck-mounted 155mm howitzer might not be as flashy a modernization program as PrSM, LRHSW, or even ERCA, but it is equally important. Given the evidence from the Ukraine conflict, the Army needs to ensure that all its deployed artillery systems have a combination of range, precision, and mobility. The Army should, at a minimum, acquire a sufficient number of an existing truck-mounted 155mm howitzer to equip its Europe-based SBCT brigade.

Dan Gouré, Ph.D., is a vice president at the public-policy research think tank Lexington Institute. Gouré has a background in the public sector and U.S. federal government, most recently serving as a member of the 2001 Department of Defense Transition Team. You can follow him on Twitter at @dgoure and the Lexington Institute @LexNextDC. Read his full bio here.

5. Will a Trillion Dollars Per Year Buy America a Better Defense?

A harsh critique.

Conclusion:

If the Pentagon was a publicly-traded company, the board of directors would have fired the managers and would themselves be the target of a shareholders’ lawsuit. American taxpayers may not be ready to “pay any price, bear any burden” for an expensive military whose record since 1945 can charitably be described as “mixed” and is failing to deter America’s enemies.

Will a Trillion Dollars Per Year Buy America a Better Defense? | Defense.info

defense.info · By James Durso · January 14, 2023

The Pentagon had a very merry Christmas but all the American taxpayers got was a lump of coal.

The U.S. Congress passed an omnibus spending bill that awarded the Pentagon $45 billion more than originally requested – a record $816.7 billion dollars – out of $858 billion for the national defense establishment. The Veteran’s Administration, which is really just deferred defense spending, requested $301.4 billion, and the Intelligence Community budget request includes $26.6 billion for the Military Intelligence Program. There’s also probably something squirreled away at the Department of Homeland Security, but you get the picture.

And don’t forget the interest on the money the U.S. borrows, much of it from foreigners, to pay for national defense.

And that’s not enough for some.

H.R. McMaster, the former White House national security adviser, and other defense hawks, advocate the defense budget be increased to 4.5% of GDP or $1.2 trillion. McMaster justifies the budget increase because American “restraint” is to blame for aggressive moves by Russia and China, which will be news to citizens of the Middle East and Afghanistan who were on the sharp end of U.S. restraint.

And lately, McMaster claimed the U.S. is “underinvested in defense” and is unable to deter China, and positively noted Japan’s intent to double its defense budget. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, advocates a 3%-5% real increase to the budget each year for “preparing the military to meet the threats of the future while fighting the battles of today.”

Analyst Stephen Semler observes that “In just two years, Biden has signed off on over $1.72 trillion in military spending — $737 billion more than what the infrastructure bill and Inflation Reduction Act provide over *ten* years” and that about $240 billion of the omnibus bill spending for “nonmilitary programs” is for “military- and law enforcement–related activities.”

And, in 2022, the U.S. spent almost a defense budget’s worth of money – $724 billion – on interest on the public debt.

But, despite the record-breaking payday, the military is setting itself up for future disappointment.

Maj. Gen. John Ferrari, US Army (ret.) has pointed out that the Pentagon’s unrealistic, that is, too low, inflation assumptions are hiding a future potential $75 billion shortfall, a future “hollow force” that will be harder to overcome that in the 1980s. And the National Defense Industrial Association says the Pentagon will need an extra $42 billion next year to make up for inflation losses, and that from 2021 to 2023 the total loss of the Pentagon’s buying power will exceed $110 billion.

And even if inflation moderates in line with the administration’s hopes, the military will still be in trouble as defense sector inflation is typically 20 basis points higher than the Consumer Price Index, and, according to McKinsey: “DoD could lose over $100 billion in purchasing power within five years if the economy reenters a period of high inflation and low nominal topline increases in the defense budget, similar to what happened in the 1970s.”

In other words, there will be a lot of yelping for more money.

But what if the military gets less money?

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy agreed to the Freedom Caucus demand to freeze federal spending at 2022 levels, which could cut defense by $75 to $100 billion.

The hawks reacted as expected, but analyst William Hartung argues that a near-trillion-dollar defense budget hasn’t deterred guys like Putin and Xi, but it has enriched the five biggest defense contractors that swallow between $150 and $200 billion of the defense budget, and deliver most major weapons behind schedule and over budget. He suggests heeding the 2021

The Congressional Budget Office study “that outlined three options for saving over $1 trillion in Pentagon spending over the next ten years without damaging our defense capabilities.”

But just when the military wants an unprecedented haul of cash, its reputation taking a beating.

The Ronald Reagan Institute’s November 2022 national defense survey found that only 48 percent of those polled report “a great deal of trust and confidence in the military” – up three points from 2021, but still down 22 points from 2018. The survey also found a continued decline from 2021 in confidence in the military’s ability to keep the country safe (50% down from 57%) and act in professional and nonpolitical manner (35% down from 40%).

And the feelings about the military’s politicization are shared by the left and right, though for different reasons, the right opposed to “woke” programs and the left concerned about far-right extremists in the ranks.

And while large majorities favor increased spending on defense and border security, there is also an interest in a more engaged foreign policy, and an increase in foreign aid. And a recent Rasmussen poll found that half of likely voters disagreed with the $1.7 trillion, 4,155-page omnibus bill, thinking it was a “disaster” for the U.S., meaning the public may be receptive to a way to stay engaged in the world at a lower cost than the $8 trillion the U.S. blew through after 9-11.

The military isn’t the only public institution suffering a bad reputation, but it is used to basking in public esteem so it may not know how to recover.

The slide in the survey may have been exacerbated by the actions of military leaders in the wake of the violent demonstration at the Capitol on January 6th. And the chaotic retreat from Kabul in August 2021 – the first time the American people witnessed a defeat in real-time – also probably pushed the poll numbers lower.

A defeat in Afghanistan, what the Pentagon called a “mission transition,” commanders prioritizing social programs over battle skills, an epidemic of sexual assault, an all-time high suicide rate, the inability to pass a “clean audit,” and self-dealing by senior officers…no wonder the services are missing their recruiting targets, which will further weaken support for big defense budgets as a family with someone in uniform is more likely to support the Pentagon’s requests.

America’s military leaders may be unreconciled by the ending of the Cold War with the Soviet Union, which wasn’t marked by a victory parade through Red Square, but by Soviet citizens angry because the planned economy couldn’t deliver decent household appliances. The brass missed the Big Game and they and their confederates in the policy community may think that a splendid little proxy war with Russia will make the taxpayers forget the defeat in Afghanistan and all those wasted lives and dollars.

Unique in the world’s militaries, the Pentagon doesn’t think it is responsible for defending its country’s borders.

Instead of defending America, it defends American interests, which are often the mutable interests of the political class, and are not viewed overseas as positively as they are in Washington, D.C. green rooms and think tanks, many staffed by people whose children aren’t in uniform.

The military is an economic enterprise. It relies on a generous budget to not just pay itself, but also the captive defense contractors that build weapons and provide services – and hire former servicemembers. It’s not “Military, Inc.” like in Pakistan or Egypt but the military’s economic interests are often opposed to those of the American people, calling to mind Eric Hoffer: “What starts out here [the U.S.] as a mass movement ends up as a racket, a cult, or a corporation.”

U.S. President Joe Biden and NATO Secretary General have been calling for sacrifice in order to defeat Russia and usher Ukraine into NATO and the European Union (EU). Stoltenberg admits “it could take years…even if the costs are high, not only for military support, also because of rising energy and food prices.”

In 2022, the U.S. Congress giddily gifted $113 billion in war aid and economic support to Kyiv, but no one has publicly discussed the cost to replace military equipment shipped to Ukraine, but the U.S. Secretary of the Navy admits the aid has depleted the stocks the U.S. needs for its own defense.

And much of the weaponry shipped to Ukraine is at risk of diversion, according to the Organized Crime Index which reports “Ukraine is believed to have one of the largest arms trafficking markets in Europe. While it has long been a key link in the global arms trade, its role has only intensified since the beginning of the conflict in eastern Ukraine.”

In other words, just because it is fighting Russia, Ukraine hasn’t become more virtuous.

And right on time we learned some weapons bound for Ukraine wound up in the hands of criminal gangs in Finland, Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands, and Boko Haram and ISIS in Africa.

A rapid conclusion of the Russia-Ukraine war will do the American taxpayers a favor, so the U.S. can hand NATO to the Europeans and focus on Asia. (And France can finally get its European Union army.)

The Russian army has proved less fearsome that NATO imagined (an analytic shortfall that should publicly be addressed by Congress), so Europe should be able to defend itself. NATO was never a real coalition, anyway; it was just about America defending Europe, while the generous U.S. budget allowed Europe to spend its money on social welfare schemes and industrial protection.

The Freedom Caucus budget cut may get the attention of the E-Ring and motivate some reforms, though Congress can’t put all the blame on the Pentagon as it legislated many of the military’s inefficiencies into existence.

Congress should consider multi-year defense budgets to relieve contractors’ planning uncertainty and reduce the cost of weapons systems; giving DoD authority to spend Operations and Maintenance funds across several fiscal years to reduce budget turbulence and the “use it or lose it” mentality; another round of military base closings to drive infrastructure savings; reviewing domestic content legislation (the “Buy America Act”), and reexamining big-ticket programs like the $1.7 trillion dollar F-35 combat aircraft that has been plagued by delays, cost overruns, and technical faults, such as structural weaknesses, software glitches, faulty ejection seats, and a modernization program that is four years behind.

The Reagan Institute poll survey reported Americans still want to engage with the world and they recognize that China is the biggest threat to the U.S. On the other hand, only 40% think the U.S. should be “More engaged and take the lead” (down from 51% in February 2021) which may offer less leeway for military adventures, and a larger role for diplomacy. Worrying for Pentagon bosses, only 25% of those polled regard “Military leadership, such as officers and generals” as the best in the world (down 8 points from 2021).

Engagement with the world can be improved if the Congress rebalances funding for diplomacy and the military and security services that was deformed by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the response to 9-11.

More “resources,” that is, money, for the State Department, Commerce Department, and U.S. Trade Representative, with clear orders from the White House that they are the sales team, will help de-securitize relations with the rest of the world by emphasizing free and fair trade, as foreign policy without economic benefits for the U.S. is just a hobby for bureaucrats.

And as support for indefinite involvement in Ukraine is slipping, now may be the time to push Ukraine, America’s proxy, to restart negotiations with Russia, especially as the Republican Congress is dubious about sending even more aid to Ukraine.

Another to-do item is to examine the effects America’s sanctions policy has on trade and finance, as seen in the distortion of world supply chains – and the attendant shortages and price jumps that damage U.S. military readiness – caused by U.S. sanctions on Russia, and whoever else is the villain du jour.

Washington’s eagerness to sanction anyone and everyone is partly responsible for the BRICS effort to create a new reserve currency and rumblings about OPEC selling oil to China in exchange for Yuan, which, if successful, will permanently weaken the dollar and the United States.

Instead of parroting the Pentagon’s wish for budget increase of 3%-5% above inflation to fund another round of “great power competition,” the Republicans should hold hearings on how the nation’s financial challenges will affect its strategic choices, and discuss the opportunity costs of the proposed unprecedented defense spending levels that are crowding out other important discretionary spending, taking the opportunity to remind the military of Bernard Brodie’s maxim, “Strategy wears a dollar sign.”

Congress recently announced that a congressional bipartisan commission “will examine President Joe Biden’s 2022 National Defense Strategy and craft recommendations for its implementation.” The commission is attacked with familiar names but not, unfortunately, any economists who could examine the true, long-term cost of the defense strategy and then educate the public on the debt the Pentagon expects them to assume.

General Omar Bradley, the famed World War 2 commander observed, “Amateurs talk strategy. Professionals talk logistics.” At a time when the U.S. no longer commands the world’s economy as it did in 1945, America’s commanders must also talk economics so they will understand an enemy that can bring a government to heel, the “bond market vigilantes.”

In future wars, the Pentagon will have to understand war’s impact on the global supply chain before the commanders make their recommendations to the President, who will also have to consider the supply chain effects on the U.S. and world economy.

The need to minimize shocks to the global economy may shape how the war is fought, which will go against the grain of the military establishment which typically forgets that “the economy” pays for its cool gear and great benefits program.

Pentagon leaders should focus on rebuilding the military’s reputation with the public by:

1. Starting a conversation about how the military can help defend the country’s borders. In the U.S., this is regarded as a civilian, law enforcement function, but it’s time the taxpayers get something back for the money they grant the Pentagon every year, despite the aversion of the brass to this mission.
2. Ending the military’s epidemic of sexual assault and suicide, which are probably motivating responsible parents to keep their children away from military service.
3. Enforcing standards of behavior for senior officers. The Fat Leonard bribery scandal and current investigation of retired General John Allen for improperly lobbing for foreign interests are a signal to military leaders to stop talking about morality and ethics to the troops and start practicing what they preach. Also, a lifetime ban on retired senior officers working for foreign interests will underline to them where their loyalties lie.
4. Being upfront with the public about the true cost of the Pentagon’s future strategy, which is a greater threat to the public fiscal health than anything Putin or Xi can dream up.

If the Pentagon was a publicly-traded company, the board of directors would have fired the managers and would themselves be the target of a shareholders’ lawsuit. American taxpayers may not be ready to “pay any price, bear any burden” for an expensive military whose record since 1945 can charitably be described as “mixed” and is failing to deter America’s enemies.

James Durso (@james_durso) is a regular commentator on foreign policy and national security matters. Mr. Durso served in the U.S. Navy for 20 years and has worked in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq.

Credit Featured Photo: Photo 26392694 © Edwardgerges | Dreamstime.com

defense.info · By James Durso · January 14, 2023

6. TikTok Tries to Win Allies in the U.S. With More Transparency

Can TokTok be trusted? Many will argue absolutely not. See the following articles.

TikTok Tries to Win Allies in the U.S. With More Transparency

Chinese-owned app proposes giving U.S. officials oversight of its algorithms

https://www.wsj.com/articles/tiktok-tries-to-win-allies-in-the-u-s-with-more-transparency-11673836560?utm_source=pocket_saves

By Georgia WellsFollow

 and Stu WooFollow

Jan. 16, 2023 7:00 am ET

Two years into negotiations with U.S. regulators about whether TikTok will be able to remain in the country, the popular video-sharing app is trying a new tack: increased transparency.

In recent conversations with Washington lawmakers and civil-society organizations, TikTok has revealed details of a complex, $1.5 billion plan to reorganize the company’s U.S. operations, according to people familiar with the discussions.

TikTok previously has kept its plans largely quiet with such groups as the tech company continues to negotiate with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., or Cfius, an executive-branch panel deliberating over how TikTok can remain operating in the U.S.

The talks with U.S. officials and lawmakers have become more urgent for TikTok in recent months as federal and state politicians made moves to ban the app on government-issued devices. Congress is also considering a bill that would ban TikTok in the U.S. Lawmakers cite concerns that Beijing could access U.S. users’ data on TikTok, or shape what Americans see on the platform—accusations that the company has denied.

TikTok is hoping that details of its planned reorganization—and promised measures to ensure oversight of its content-recommendation algorithms—will convince potential allies in Washington of its ability to operate independently of its parent company, China-based ByteDance Ltd., according to the people familiar with the discussions.

A TikTok spokeswoman said it believes the proposal addresses concerns about content recommendation and user-data access with layers of government and independent oversight.

“We are not waiting for an agreement to be in place,” she said. “We’ve made substantial progress on implementing that solution over the past year and look forward to completing that work to put these concerns to rest.”

Creating a system for monitoring the secret algorithms that power TikTok’s video-sharing app is emerging as a central piece of the plan to assuage U.S. concerns about its content.

In conversations in Washington, TikTok executives have described how Oracle Corp. ORCL 0.47%increase; green up pointing triangle and other third-party monitors would review the code related to how TikTok selects which videos to serve to users, as well as how TikTok identifies which videos to delete, some of the people familiar with the discussions said.

ByteDance is trying to walk a fine line in talks with U.S. officials. Its goal is to maintain ownership of TikTok in the U.S., but also make the app’s operations more transparent and silo it off in a separate unit overseen by U.S. government-approved employees. TikTok is trying to convince lawmakers that with these measures in place, the app won’t pose a threat to U.S. citizens.

If TikTok doesn’t reach a deal, the U.S. government could try to force ByteDance to sell parts of its operations or leave the U.S. market.

Scrutiny of TikTok increased after an internal probe found TikTok employees misused their authority to access the data of journalists on the platform in an effort to identify leaks of company information.

Rep. Mike Gallagher (R., Wis.), one of the lawmakers concerned about TikTok’s ownership, said he is as worried about Beijing’s ability to influence videos on the platform as he is about user data. He said he is concerned about TikTok suppressing videos critical of China and its rulers, while promoting stories beneficial to them.

“For younger users, the concern isn’t that they’re using TikTok just to watch stupid videos,” said Mr. Gallagher, who co-sponsored a bipartisan bill to ban TikTok from operating in the U.S. “It’s that they’re relying on TikTok to get their news.”

As a part of its proposal, TikTok has said all of its systems related to serving content would be housed with Oracle. The code that runs these systems would be visible to both Oracle and third-party monitors, according to people familiar with TikTok’s proposal.

Since the summer, TikTok has routed all new traffic exclusively through Oracle and the proposal includes an audited process to delete the backup data.

American executives didn’t always understand what was happening with the app’s algorithms.

For example, in 2020, U.S. TikTok executives noticed views for videos from certain creators about the U.S. presidential election were mysteriously dropping 30% to 40%, people familiar with the episode said. When those executives asked their bosses in China, they found that TikTok’s algorithm team had tweaked certain aspects of the type of content shown on the app to play down political conversations about the election, and this had inadvertently buried the videos of a range of users, the people said.

Responding to questions about the incident, another TikTok spokeswoman said political content was popular on the app in 2020. She said the hashtags #trump, #biden, #trump2020, and #biden2020 garnered more than two trillion cumulative views monthly at that time​.​

In the new proposed arrangement, according to the people familiar with it, third-party monitors would check the code for the video-recommendation algorithms to detect whether it has been manipulated or if the Chinese government or other foreign actors have had access. Provisions in the proposal stipulate that if the U.S. government or the third-party monitors see anything that concerns them, there would be a process to flag the issues to TikTok, and ultimately to the U.S. government if necessary.

To try to address the security of user data, TikTok would create a new wholly owned subsidiary called TikTok U.S. Data Security, or USDS. The unit would be charged with safeguarding the app and report to an outside board of directors whose primary fiduciary responsibility would be to Cfius instead of ByteDance.

All of the employees hired into this 2,500-person unit would be subject to a set of requirements from the U.S. government, and would follow International Traffic in Arms Regulations, which would effectively bar Chinese nationals from working in USDS.

The Treasury Department, which oversees Cfius, didn’t respond to a request for comment.

TikTok has spent an estimated $1.5 billion setting up the Oracle data center, moving code and hiring and paying the third-party monitors, according to people familiar with the proposal. They said they expect such expenses to cost TikTok $700 million to $1 billion annually going forward, if TikTok reaches a deal.

TikTok also will likely need approval from Beijing for any structures that involve the company’s content-recommendation algorithms.

Proponents of TikTok’s proposal say these measures would make it impossible for the Chinese government to intervene in the TikTok app in the U.S.

Still, some China skeptics say they won’t trust a deal with TikTok as long as ByteDance owns the app.

“It is becoming more and more untenable for a company to comply with American laws and also comply with Chinese laws,” said Jacob Helberg, a senior adviser at the Stanford University Center on Geopolitics and Technology, who hasn’t seen the TikTok proposal.

Write to Georgia Wells at georgia.wells@wsj.com and Stu Woo at Stu.Woo@wsj.com

7. Auburn Banned TikTok, and Students Can’t Stop Talking About It

There are ways around the ban for those "addicted."

Excerpts:

The campus restrictions have come as 19 governors have banned the video app, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, from state-owned devices and networks in the past month and a half. The governors have declared such restrictions while negotiations continue to drag on between TikTok and the Biden administration, which is concerned that the popular app poses a national security risk by possibly giving the Chinese government an ability to surveil users.

Unlike the general state bans, though, the college prohibition brings that geopolitical fight front and center for TikTok’s biggest fans — young Americans. Two-thirds of teenagers in the United States use the app, making it second in popularity only to YouTube among that age group, according to the Pew Research Center.

The ban has left students at Auburn surprised and bemused, they said in conversations with The New York Times, especially because they are still able to access TikTok by switching to their data plans on their phones. Most seem prepared to work around it. But there is also change underway: The campus television station said that it would probably delete its nascent TikTok account, for example.

“Me and my friends have been talking about it ever since we first found out,” said Elizabeth Hunt, a 20-year-old Auburn junior from Birmingham, Ala., who lives on campus as a resident adviser. “I am a little annoyed that now anytime I want to get on the app, I’m going to have to use data and find ways around it.”

Auburn Banned TikTok, and Students Can’t Stop Talking About It

nytimes.com · by Sapna Maheshwari · January 15, 2023

The school’s prohibition brings a geopolitical fight front and center for TikTok’s biggest fans: young Americans.

Students at Auburn University’s campus on Tuesday, the day before classes resumed for the spring semester.Credit...Bob Miller for The New York Times

Destini Ambus, a senior at Auburn University in Alabama, was so surprised last month about a new ban of TikTok on state-owned devices and internet networks that she read the news alert about it aloud to her friends.

“We were like, ‘Oh, that’s weird, why would she do that,’ and laughed it off and moved on,” Ms. Ambus, 21, the editor in chief of the campus newspaper, said of the ban, which was ordered by the state’s governor, Kay Ivey. “It didn’t really occur to me when I saw that first email that it would be something that impacts me directly.”

That realization would come a few days later, when Auburn’s administration said that it would ban TikTok from campus Wi-Fi networks, joining several other public universities that have recently enacted similar restrictions.

The campus restrictions have come as 19 governors have banned the video app, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, from state-owned devices and networks in the past month and a half. The governors have declared such restrictions while negotiations continue to drag on between TikTok and the Biden administration, which is concerned that the popular app poses a national security risk by possibly giving the Chinese government an ability to surveil users.

Unlike the general state bans, though, the college prohibition brings that geopolitical fight front and center for TikTok’s biggest fans — young Americans. Two-thirds of teenagers in the United States use the app, making it second in popularity only to YouTube among that age group, according to the Pew Research Center.

The ban has left students at Auburn surprised and bemused, they said in conversations with The New York Times, especially because they are still able to access TikTok by switching to their data plans on their phones. Most seem prepared to work around it. But there is also change underway: The campus television station said that it would probably delete its nascent TikTok account, for example.

“Me and my friends have been talking about it ever since we first found out,” said Elizabeth Hunt, a 20-year-old Auburn junior from Birmingham, Ala., who lives on campus as a resident adviser. “I am a little annoyed that now anytime I want to get on the app, I’m going to have to use data and find ways around it.”

Colleges in Idaho, including Boise State University, and the University of Oklahoma recently said that TikTok was banned from their campus Wi-Fi networks. Some, like Idaho State University, went so far as to deactivate its official TikTok account. And more changes could be ahead: Gov. Greg Gianforte of Montana asked the Montana University System to stop allowing TikTok on its networks in a Jan. 3 letter, citing security risks.

In an email to students last week, just before Auburn’s 25,000 students returned from winter break, the school reiterated its ban and its effort “to protect valuable information and to reduce the possible cybersecurity threats associated with using TikTok.” But it also reminded students that they could still use the app on their personal or even Auburn-provided devices as long as they’re using their own cellular service. And the official Auburn Tigers TikTok account, which has 101,000 followers, remains active, though it has not posted since Dec. 2.

Auburn administrators declined interview requests for this article.

TikTok said that it was dismayed by the restrictions. “We’re disappointed that so many states are jumping on the political bandwagon to enact policies that will do nothing to advance cybersecurity in their states and are based on unfounded falsehoods about TikTok,” said Jamal Brown, a spokesman for TikTok.

“We’re especially sorry to see the unintended consequences of these rushed policies beginning to impact public universities’ ability to share information, recruit students and build communities around athletic teams, student groups, campus publications and more,” Mr. Brown added.

Students at Auburn say that TikTok is a form of entertainment — but it is also woven into campus life, with people using its short-form videos to highlight the school’s football team, sorority recruitment and occasional shopping trends.

Braden Haynes, a 22-year-old senior and station manager of Eagle Eye TV, the student-run television station, said that the station would probably just use Instagram Reels going forward. “We could use cellular data and post on it or have someone post from their apartment, but at the end of the day I think it’s too much work than it’s worth,” she said.

Ansley Franco, a 21-year-old senior from Augusta, Ga., said that when she was in a sorority at Auburn, TikTok became a key way for Greek organizations on college campuses to promote themselves, especially as rush and #RushTok became a national sensation at the school’s rival, the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. (The University of Alabama has not announced a ban of TikTok; representatives for the university didn’t return requests for comment.)

One former sorority sister at Auburn, for example, “did a new TikTok dance every day promoting Auburn Zeta Tau Alpha so people would see how much fun she was having with her ‘zisters,’” Ms. Franco said, adding that it would be a “huge hit” to Greek life at Auburn if the university’s ban extended to sorority TikTok accounts and related hashtags.

Ms. Franco said that she was not concerned about the security risks prompting the ban — a sentiment echoed by other students, including Ms. Hunt.

“From what I’ve heard and talking with my friends, I think we all have the same opinion that it just seems silly and not very warranted,” Ms. Hunt said. “While I do understand the concern around not knowing where your data is going, that’s not a TikTok-specific thing and all social media apps collect your data.”

The reactions from students reflect a significant disconnect between TikTok’s most avid users in America and the increasingly bipartisan concerns about privacy and security risks. Many lawmakers and regulators in the United States argue that TikTok can share sensitive data about the location, personal habits and interests of Americans with the Chinese government, and that the app can be used to spread propaganda.

A bipartisan bill introduced in Congress last month would ban the app for everyone in the United States. The attorney general of Indiana has sued TikTok, accusing the company of being deceptive about the security and privacy risks posed by the app.

Many lawmakers felt vindicated in their fears last month when ByteDance said that an internal investigation found its employees had inappropriately obtained the data of U.S. TikTok users, including that of two reporters. The company said that the employees involved in the scheme — two in China and two in the United States — had been fired. The Chinese company sought to emphasize its data security efforts over the past 15 months and its recent work moving the data of U.S. TikTok users to a cloud storage system operated by Oracle, the Silicon Valley software company.

For now, the ban has not appeared to change the lives of undergraduates too much.

When students opened the TikTok app on the campus Wi-Fi last week, they were able to see only the most recently posted video and no comments, according to Ms. Ambus. But students can still access the app on their own devices, through their personal Wi-Fi or cellular service. Ms. Franco said that when a teacher asked about the ban in her sports in America class last week, students said that they didn’t care about it and that they were still actively using TikTok.

Kurt Opsahl, the general counsel for Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit organization that advocates for digital privacy and free speech, said those limitations suggested that Auburn was making more of a statement than a new policy.

“There is a lot of political fervor over TikTok and its connections to the Chinese government, and this is coming out in the form of these perhaps symbolic bans,” Mr. Opsahl said.

Students are skeptical that a full removal of TikTok, like the one that happened in India in 2020, could occur in the United States.

“I really don’t think my generation, in particular, is going to really change the way we use the app,” Ms. Hunt said. “It’s so big at this point.”

nytimes.com · by Sapna Maheshwari · January 15, 2023

8. TikTok Must be Banned in US and Free World

Many young people view TikTok as a public good (though they do not use that term) as it provides useful information about all sorts of things from how to apply make-up to what clothes to wear to tips for teachers and more "practical" information as well as addictive entertaining videos. It also is becoming the main source of news for young people (obviously troubling) and linking to YouTube and Instagram. And it plays a role in commerce as "influencers" provide links to Amazon Storefront (https://www.amazon.com/b?ie=UTF8&node=23536810011) with links to all the clothes and items they are using. 

None of these calls for banning TikTok due to national security dangers or personal information exposure are resonating with young people (and least that is what my anecdotal evidence shows me. I read one retort to young people who say that they do not care of the Chinese are looking at their personal data because they are an open book. When faced with that statement just ask that person to give you his or her phone password and let you look through all the information on their phone.

Excerpts:

TikTok, a video-sharing app owned by Chinese company ByteDance, has, according to TikTok's own estimates, 1 billion users worldwide. In 2021, TikTok had approximately 87 million users in the US, according to Statista. Disturbingly, a recent study found that 10% of US adults get their news from the Chinese app, up from 3% in 2020.

Wray said that China's government can control the app's recommendation algorithm, "which allows them to manipulate content, and if they want to, to use it for influence operations."

"All of these things are in the hands of a government that doesn't share our values, and that has a mission that's very much at odds with what's in the best interests of the United States. That should concern us," Wray said in a speech at the University of Michigan.

TikTok Must be Banned in US and Free World

gatestoneinstitute.org · by Judith Bergman · January 16, 2023

Chinese law requires all Chinese companies to turn over information to the Communist Party upon request -- and ByteDance, the owner of TikTok, reportedly employs more than 130 Party members to ensure compliance. In December, it was revealed that ByteDance had used TikTok to surveil several journalists to track down the journalists' sources. Pictured: The headquarters of ByteDance in Beijing, China. (Photo by Greg Baker/AFP via Getty Images)

The United States recently banned TikTok from all federal government devices over growing security concerns. That is a good start.

TikTok, FBI Director Christopher Wray warned at the beginning of December, is controlled by the Chinese government, which is a national security concern.

TikTok, a video-sharing app owned by Chinese company ByteDance, has, according to TikTok's own estimates, 1 billion users worldwide. In 2021, TikTok had approximately 87 million users in the US, according to Statista. Disturbingly, a recent study found that 10% of US adults get their news from the Chinese app, up from 3% in 2020.

Wray said that China's government can control the app's recommendation algorithm, "which allows them to manipulate content, and if they want to, to use it for influence operations."

"All of these things are in the hands of a government that doesn't share our values, and that has a mission that's very much at odds with what's in the best interests of the United States. That should concern us," Wray said in a speech at the University of Michigan.

Wray's comments echoed those he made at the "Worldwide Threats to the Homeland" hearing held at the House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee on November 15.

"We do have national security concerns at least from the FBI's end about TikTok," Wray stated.

"They include the possibility that the Chinese government could use it to control data collection on millions of users. Or control the recommendation algorithm, which could be used for influence operations if they so chose. Or to control software on millions of devices, which gives it opportunity to potentially technically compromise personal devices."

Wray's concerns are not new -- actually, they come a bit late. In 2020, President Donald J. Trump, citing similar security concerns, tried to ban the app in the US, in addition to sanctioning the company, but several federal judges ruled against both sanctions and a ban, blocking his attempts. One judge ruled that the ban failed "to adequately consider an obvious and reasonable alternative before banning TikTok" and that the ban was "arbitrary and capricious."

"ByteDance's submission and compliance with Chinese law has rendered it a reliable, useful, and far reaching ear and mouthpiece for the Party and State," the Trump administration wrote at the time in a document motivating the proposed ban. The document cited ByteDance's commitment to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) as resulting in "systemic censorship of content across its platforms" and "the harvesting of user data."

In the document, the Trump administration stressed noted:

"ByteDance, as a company, and its subsidiaries are subject to PRC national security laws that require or compel the assistance of any Chinese citizen or entity in surveillance and intelligence operations. As ByteDance is subject to PRC jurisdiction, PRC laws can compel cooperation from ByteDance..."

Chinese law requires all Chinese companies to turn over information to the Communist Party upon request -- and ByteDance reportedly employs more than 130 Party members to ensure compliance, among other matters.

The Trump administration stated :

"One of the foremost national security risks presented by the TikTok mobile application in the United States is the possibility that the PRC government could, through lawful authority, extralegal influence (Communist Party) influence, or PRCISS, compel TikTok to provide systemic access to U.S. user's sensitive personal information. A number of press reports clearly indicate the PRC Government has already compelled TikTok to assist them for domestic surveillance, censorship, and propaganda action within China, and their compliance is indicative of how they are likely to respond to intelligence requests on U.S. users. Given the bounty of information TikTok could offer on foreign users, as well as the aforementioned cyber tactics employed by the PRC, the Department of Commerce assesses the PRC and PRCISS would not limit their use of TikTok to domestic concerns and would instead use it for foreign intelligence and surveillance."

Furthermore, similar to the concerns expressed by Wray, the Trump administration argued,

"The PRC government and the CCP can exert influence on ByteDance and, through the TikTok app, censor and shape content available to U.S. users in ways that can influence their opinions and views of China."

In April 2021, U.S. Senator Josh Hawley wrote:

"TikTok is a Trojan Horse for the Chinese Communist Party that has no place on government devices—or any American devices, for that matter.... TikTok has repeatedly proven itself to be a malicious actor."

According to Adonis Hoffman, a former chief of staff and senior legal advisor at the FCC who has served in legal and policy positions in the U.S. House of Representatives:

"Its algorithm is at once simple and sinister. Download the app on your smartphone and you have given China access to all your data... This opens a treasure trove of data on millions of Americans for the Chinese government to use whenever and however they choose. And history shows they use that data for nefarious purposes."

President Joe Biden reversed Trump's attempt at banning TikTok, signing an executive order in June 2021 that revoked Trump's proposed ban. Instead, the Biden administration has sought to work out the security concerns with ByteDance through a negotiated deal with the Chinese company that would reportedly allow TikTok to continue operating in the US without any change of ownership.

"Well, I think Donald Trump was right," Senator Mark Warner, D-Va., chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, recently said.

"I mean, TikTok is an enormous threat. So, if you're a parent, and you've got a kid on TikTok, I would be very, very concerned. All of that data that your child is inputting and receiving is being stored somewhere in Beijing."

Brendan Carr, a Republican commissioner at the Federal Communications Commission, said in November that the only way to resolve the national security concerns regarding TikTok would be to ban the app.

"I don't believe there is a path forward for anything other than a ban," Carr said. According to Axios:

There simply isn't "a world in which you could come up with sufficient protection on the data that you could have sufficient confidence that it's not finding its way back into the hands of the [Chinese Communist Party]," Carr said.

In October, Forbes revealed that a China-based team at ByteDance had planned to use TikTok to track the locations of an unspecified number of Americans.

In December, it was revealed that ByteDance had used the app to surveil several journalists to track down the journalists' sources.

According to Texas Governor Greg Abbott:

"TikTok harvests vast amounts of data from its users' devices -- including when, where and how they conduct internet activity -- and offers this trove of potentially sensitive information to the Chinese government,"

Also in December, Indiana became the first U.S. state to sue TikTok, for misleading users about the Chinese government's capacity to access their data and showing mature content to minors.

"The company's ownership of TikTok is problematic for two reasons," wrote Republican Senator Marco Rubio and Republican US Representative Mike Gallagher.

"First, the app can track cellphone users' locations and collect internet-browsing data — even when users are visiting unrelated website.

"That TikTok, and by extension the CCP, has the ability to survey every keystroke teenagers enter on their phones is disturbing. With this app, Beijing could also collect sensitive national security information from U.S. government employees and develop profiles on millions of Americans to use for blackmail or espionage...

Even more alarming than that possibility, however, are the potential abuses of TikTok's algorithm...

Its algorithm is a black box, in that its designers can alter its operation at any time without informing users... in the hands of ByteDance, it could also be used to subtly indoctrinate American citizens.

TikTok has already censored references to politically sensitive topics, including the treatment of workers in Xinjiang, China, and the 1989 protests in Tiananmen Square. It has temporarily blocked an American teenager who criticized the treatment of Uyghurs in China. In German videos about Chinese conduct toward Uyghurs, TikTok has modified subtitles for terms such as 'reeducation camp' and 'labor camp,' replacing words with asterisks."

In China, the content available on TikTok could not be more different. China serves up the "spinach version": science, physics, engineering and patriotism. In the US, TikTok serves up the "opium version." Tristan Harris, a former Google employee, said of China's approach to TikTok on CBS' 60 Minutes:

"It's almost like [the Chinese] recognize that technology is influencing kids' development, and they make their domestic version a spinach version of TikTok, while they ship the opium version to the rest of the world."

"If you're under 14 years old, they show you science experiments you can do at home, museum exhibits, patriotism videos and educational videos," said Harris of the content served by TikTok within China, adding that Chinese children were limited to only 40 minutes a day on the app.

"There's a survey of pre-teens in the U.S. and China asking, 'what is the most aspirational career that you want to have?' and in the U.S., the No. 1 was a social media influencer, and in China, the No. 1 was astronaut. You allow those two societies to play out for a few generations and I can tell you what your world is going to look like."

TikTok urgently needs to be banned from the US and the rest of the free world.

Judith Bergman, a columnist, lawyer and political analyst, is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Gatestone Institute.

gatestoneinstitute.org · by Judith Bergman · January 16, 2023

9. Information literacy courses can help students tackle confirmation bias and misinformation

​A view from Canada. This might be one of the most important life skills we teach our children and students today. (Of course a helluva lot of adults need it too).

Information literacy courses can help students tackle confirmation bias and misinformation

theconversation.com · by James Wittebols

When it comes to the news these days, what we choose to regard as trustworthy has more to do with our own world view than what kinds of news practices are worthy of trust.

Many people are seeking out news that aligns with their politics. But there’s just one problem with this: we are not always good judges of what constitutes trustworthy information and news.

That’s why learning about news and information literacy is so important. An information literacy course I teach at the University of Windsor, Information Searching and Analysis, tries to show students that the same phenomenon which makes us poor judges can also be turned around to make us better, more critical consumers of news and information.

The process I use in this information literacy course does not encourage “trust” in mainstream or legacy news media per se. Rather, students learn to assess news based on the characteristics of a news story: multiple, adversarial sources, the use of statistics and data in which the sources are named and can be accessed independently, the kinds of advertising present and whether it is related to the story.

First lesson: Check your confirmation bias

Confirmation bias suggests that our prior knowledge and experiences often inform our opinions. However, by becoming aware of our confirmation bias tendencies, we can begin to self-critique the way we process information and learn more about ourselves and how we interpret news and information.

The solution comes in the form of an experiential assignment in which students realize their confirmation bias tendencies. Students are tasked with a weekend assignment in which they look for and report on examples of confirmation bias around them and in media reports. They are told to focus mostly on themselves — how they often engage in confirmation bias.

By becoming aware of our confirmation biases, we can self-critique the way we process information and news. (Shutterstock)

The assignment is an eye opener. In their end-of-semester papers, 80 per cent of students in the Information Searching and Analysis class noted that the assignment was an important element of the course. Here are a few examples:

“I knew that in some aspects of my life, I may have exhibited confirmation bias towards certain ideas. However, I did not think it was as prominent as it was after the completion of the assignment.”

“…relating to my personal life, this was the most important assignment.”

“I think it was the most impactful and (will) stick with me the longest.”

“It was an insanely enriching experience for me to pull my biases out of the woodwork, particularly for someone like myself who regards themselves as quite unbiased when it comes to anything.”

“…extremely valuable was the consciousness I developed in regard to (how) social media was exclusively forming my opinions… I believe this is perhaps the most universal function of the class.”

The course uses a flipped classroom approach. Flipped classrooms use class time for discussion, group activities and experiential education instead of lectures and passive forms of learning.

The key is self-confrontation. All the ways to engage in confirmation bias cannot be conveyed through a dry explanation of the concept. The point is to not preach or lecture them about their “faults.” Rather, it is about letting them understand for themselves how confirmation biases can result in inaccurate learning that may have negative effects.

Media framing

Over the rest of the semester students explore a social justice issue by looking at how interest groups, journalists and academic researchers have treated the issue. This serves to give them a holistic view of the information field and leads to a better understanding of both the issue and the social dynamics that inform debate about it.

Greater information literacy enables us to assess how trustworthy the news we see on social media is. (Shutterstock)

It is also crucial that students understand the nature of sponsored content and other native ads which may look like news but embed a point of view.

News, information and misinformation play a significant role in improving and undermining democratic discourse and decision-making. Educators at all levels will need to give news and information literacy greater attention to ensure students know how to critique the news they encounter.

theconversation.com · by James Wittebols

10. China’s True COVID Death Toll Estimated To Be in Hundreds of Thousands

​We will likely never know.​

China’s True COVID Death Toll Estimated To Be in Hundreds of Thousands

TIME · by Bloomberg

The nearly 60,000 Covid-related deaths China reported for the first five weeks of its current outbreak, the largest the world has ever seen, may underestimate the true toll by hundreds of thousands of fatalities, experts said.

China’s abrupt pivot from Covid Zero in early December unleashed a surge of omicron infections and led to 59,938 virus-related deaths in the nation’s hospitals through Jan. 12, the National Health Commission disclosed this weekend.

While the number swamps the few dozen deaths previously recorded in the official tally — which drew widespread criticism both at home and abroad, including from the World Health Organization — experts say it’s still likely to be an underestimate given the enormous scale of the outbreak and the mortality rates seen at the height of omicron waves in other countries that initially pursued a Covid Zero strategy.

“This reported number of Covid-19 deaths might be the tip of the iceberg,” said Zuo-Feng Zhang, chair of the department of epidemiology at the Fielding School of Public Health at University of California, Los Angeles.

While the figure is roughly in line with what Zhang estimated might be coming from the country’s hospitals, he said it’s only a fraction of the total Covid deaths across the country.

Using a report from the National School of Development at Peking University that found 64% of the population was infected by mid-January, he estimated 900,000 people would have died in the previous five weeks based on a conservative 0.1% case fatality rate. That means the official hospital death count is less than 7% of the total mortality seen during the outbreak.

The official toll translates to 1.17 deaths daily for every million people in the country over the course of five weeks, according to a Bloomberg analysis. That’s well below the average daily mortality rate seen in other countries that initially pursued Covid Zero or managed to contain the virus after relaxing their pandemic rules.

When omicron hit South Korea, daily deaths quickly climbed to nearly seven for every 1 million people. Australia and New Zealand saw mortality nearing or topping four per million a day during their first winters with omicron. Even Singapore, which had a well-planned and gradual shift away from its zero tolerance approach, had deaths peak at about two per million people daily.

“These figures would suggest that China is having a very mild wave, with very few deaths per case,” Louise Blair, head of vaccines and epidemiology at the London-based predictive health analytics firm Airfinity, said in an email. “It would be the lowest of any country/region abandoning a zero Covid policy.”

It could be that many of the country’s deaths occurred in nursing care facilities or at home, explaining some of the undercount, she said, as China’s latest disclosure only counted hospital deaths. Reports of overwhelmed crematoriums around the country suggest excess mortality is at a high level.

The group currently estimates China’s total Covid-related death count is about 390,000, with a potential range of 77,000 to 945,000 based on fatalities seen in other countries, she said.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus welcomed the new numbers from China, saying they allow for a better understanding of the situation and the potential impact of the Covid wave in China. He also asked the country to continue sharing such information and provide a more detailed breakdown of data by province over time.

New Definition

China narrowed the definition of Covid mortality after it dismantled its zero tolerance approach, with health authorities asking hospitals to limit Covid deaths to those who died from respiratory failure after contracting the virus.

That led to a dearth of deaths reported throughout December and early January. Of the 60,000 Covid deaths disclosed over the weekend, a little more than 9% succumbed to respiratory failure, the NHC said. The rest died of underlying diseases following a Covid infection, the agency said.

The number of deaths is expected to increase as the virus continues its relentless trek across the country, since mortality tends to lag infections by a few weeks, officials said. The Lunar New Year Holiday, which starts Jan. 21 and involves millions of people traveling to their hometowns, could increase its spread, said Ali Mokdad, a professor at the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation and chief strategy officer for population health at the University of Washington.

The group’s modeling efforts forecast 1.2 million to 1.6 million deaths in China by the end of 2023, depending on what mitigation measures the country puts in place, Mokdad said.

China is capable of accurately tracking Covid mortality despite the size of its current outbreak, UCLA’s Zhang said, thanks to data from its public security, civil administration and hospital systems.

“More detailed information and transparent data on China’s coronavirus situation need to be shared with the World Health Organization, other countries and China’s own people,” he said.

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Contact us at letters@time.com.

TIME · by Bloomberg

11. China says 60,000 people have died of Covid since early December

China says 60,000 people have died of Covid since early December | CNN

CNN · January 14, 2023

CNN —

Close to 60,000 people have died of Covid in China since the country abruptly abandoned its tight “zero-Covid” policy in early December, a medical official from the National Health Commission (NHC) told a press conference in Beijing on Saturday.

Jiao Yahui, head of the NHC’s medical affairs department, said China recorded 59,938 Covid-related death between December 8 and January 12. Of those deaths 5,503 came from respiratory failure caused by Covid infections, and 54,435 were people infected with Covid as well as underlying diseases, such as cancer and cardiovascular diseases.

China has previously listed only those Covid patients who succumbed with respiratory failure as having died of Covid. In the month after December 8, China reported only 37 deaths from local Covid cases, according to figures released on the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) website – even as the outbreak has overwhelmed hospitals and crematoriums amid apparent Covid surges in multiple cities.

The World Health Organization and the United States have accused China of “under-representing” the severity of its current outbreak, while top global health officials have also urged Beijing to share more data about the explosive spread of Covid in China, where reports have emerged of overwhelmed hospitals and funeral homes.

On Saturday, WHO director-general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus spoke to Chinese Health Minister Ma Xiaowei about the surge.

Chinese officials shared information including the latest numbers on outpatient clinics, hospitalizations, patients requiring emergency treatment and critical care, and hospital deaths, the WHO said in a statement.

“WHO is analyzing this information, which covers early December 2022 to January 12, 2023, and allows for a better understanding of the epidemiological situation and the impact of this wave in China,” it said.

The health organization also requested a more detailed breakdown of data by province over time and asked the Chinese government to continue to share further sequences of the coronavirus with open access databases.

Jiao, the NHC medical official, said fever clinical visits and Covid hospitalizations in China have already peaked.

According to the NHC, fever clinic visits – both in cities and rural areas – have been declining since the peak when more than 2.86 million people visited them on December 23, 2022.

On January 12, 477,000 people visited fever clinics across China, Jiao said Saturday.

The NHC said hospitalizations of Covid-19 patients also peaked on January 5, 2023, when 1.63 million people was hospitalized, and 1.27 million Covid patients were still in hospital as of January 12, Jiao added.

Despite the new figures, Yanzhong Huang, a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations, said doubts were likely to remain over China’s data.

“The sharp revision is an official response to international criticism of the lack of transparency and accuracy in China’s reporting of Covid-related data,” Huang said.

“Given the still huge gap between the official count of Covid deaths and the international estimate, I don’t think the revision will quell outside doubts on the government data.”

Medical workers treat a Covid-19 patient with severe symptoms at a hospital in Shanxi province on January 9.

Wei Liang/China News Service/VCG/Getty Images

Frustration is rising over Covid drug shortages in China, and there are no easy answers

Jin Dongyan, a virologist at the University of Hong Kong, said the revision to China’s death toll “should be the first step towards a more timely, open and transparent sharing of Covid statistics (between) China and the world.

“Particularly, the most important information includes the infection rate in the general population, the infection rate in the elderly, the admission and occupancy of hospitals and ICUs, the number of deaths directly attributed to Covid and the number of deaths due to worsening of underlying diseases,” the virologist said.

“In addition, they should share the results of variant analysis. Besides the number of deaths from hospitals, the total number of Covid-related deaths should also be provided. Both Chinese people who are experiencing the tsunami and the rest of the world need to know more about the Covid statistics in China.”

CNN’s Philip Wang and Kristie Lu Stout contributed to this report.

CNN · January 14, 2023

12. Death toll in Russian missile strike in Ukraine rises to 40

Death toll in Russian missile strike in Ukraine rises to 40

Reuters · by Herbert Villarraga

• Summary
• Companies
• German defence minister resigns

DNIPRO/KYIV, Ukraine, Jan 16 (Reuters) - The death toll from a Russian missile strike in the Ukrainian city of Dnipro rose to 40 on Monday with dozens more missing, making it the deadliest civilian incident of Moscow's three-month campaign of hurling missiles at cities far from the front.

Germany's Defence Minister Christine Lambrecht resigned on Monday after remarks over the war criticised as tone deaf, setting the stage for what is expected to be one of the most important weeks in outlining Western military support for Kyiv.

With allies due to meet on Friday at a U.S. air base in Germany to discuss military aid, Berlin is under intense pressure to allow exports of its Leopard battle tanks, which Ukraine hopes will become the backbone of a new armoured force.

Ukrainian officials acknowledged little hope of finding anyone else alive in the rubble of Saturday's attack in Dnipro, but President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said the rescue in the central Ukrainian city would go on "as long as there is even the slightest chance to save lives".

"Dozens of people were rescued from the rubble, including six children. We are fighting for every person!" Zelenskiy said in an overnight televised address.

Moscow denies intentionally targeting civilians in a campaign of air strikes since October that have knocked out power and water in Ukrainian cities, and says the incident in Dnipro was caused by Ukrainian air defences.

Kyiv says it has no way of shooting down the anti-ship missile it says struck an apartment building in Dnipro on Saturday during Russia's latest volley of attacks.

At least 40 people were killed in the attack with 30 still unaccounted for, city official Gennadiy Korban said. He said 75 people were wounded including 14 children.

TANK WEEK

The German government said Chancellor Olaf Scholz had accepted the resignation of Lambrecht and would soon appoint a new defence minister to replace her.

Her exit comes just three days before she was due to host her U.S. counterpart, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, and four days before allies gather at Ramstein air base in Germany for the next meeting to coordinate military support for Kyiv.

[1/18] Emergency personnel work at the site where an apartment block was heavily damaged by a Russian missile strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Dnipro, Ukraine January 16, 2023. REUTERS/Clodagh Kilcoyne

Lambrecht had been criticised in recent days for tone deafness after an upbeat New Year's Eve message filmed in front of fireworks, in which she spoke of the opportunities she had to meet "interesting, great people" as a result of the Ukraine war.

The coming week is expected to see intense diplomacy to secure additional weapons for Kyiv, with the focus on Germany's reluctance so far to supply tanks or let its allies send them.

France, the United States and Germany have all pledged armoured fighting vehicles this month, but Western countries had so far stopped short of offering main battle tanks. Britain broke that taboo over the weekend by offering a squadron of Challengers.

Moscow has accused the West of escalating the conflict, although Russia also says the supply of tanks would not affect the course of the war. The British tanks "will burn like the rest", Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday.

Eastern and central European NATO allies mainly rely on German-built Leopards, seen as the Western tanks most suited to forming the core of a new Ukrainian armoured force. Poland and Finland said last week they would like to send them, but that requires Berlin's permission.

Ukrainian forces recaptured swathes of territory during the second half of 2022. But the front lines have largely been frozen in place for the past two months, despite intense fighting in which both sides are believed to have taken heavy losses. Kyiv says new Western armour would break the stalemate, giving its forces the capability to break through Russian defensive lines.

Moscow claimed to have captured the eastern salt-mining town of Soledar last week, in what would be its biggest battlefield success since last August. Kyiv says it still has some presence in the town and fighting continues.

"Put simply, THE BATTLE CONTINUES," Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Maliar said on the Telegram messaging app. "Everything else is unverified information."

Ukraine's Western allies say the fight for Soledar, with a pre-war population of barely 10,000, is unlikely to have much wider impact, except insofar as the huge losses there could sap manpower both sides need for decisive battles that lie ahead.

Ukraine has been warning that Moscow could be planning a new assault in coming weeks, including from close ally Belarus, which has allowed Russia to use its territory as a staging ground but has so far resisted joining the war directly.

Russia and Belarus began joint military aviation exercises on Monday. Minsk said the drills are defensive and it will not enter the war.

"We're maintaining restraint and patience, keeping our gunpowder dry," said Pavel Muraveyko, first deputy state secretary of Belarusian Security Council, according to a post on the Belarusian defence ministry's Telegram app on Sunday.

Additional reporting by Lidia Kelly and Dan Peleschuk Writing by Peter Graff; Editing by Frank Jack Daniel

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Reuters · by Herbert Villarraga

13. U.S. begins expanded training of Ukrainian forces for large-scale combat

U.S. begins expanded training of Ukrainian forces for large-scale combat

‘We want the Ukrainians to have a capability to successfully defend their country,’ Gen. Mark A. Milley said in an interview

By Dan Lamothe

January 15, 2023 at 9:47 p.m. EST

The Washington Post · by Dan Lamothe · January 16, 2023

ABOARD A U.S. MILITARY AIRCRAFT OVER EUROPE — The U.S. military has launched an expanded, more sophisticated training program of Ukrainian forces that is focused on large-scale combat and meant to bolster Ukraine’s ability to take back territory from Russian forces, the Pentagon’s top general said Sunday.

Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said on a flight from Washington to Europe that the training began Sunday at the Grafenwoehr Training Area in Germany and will continue for five or six weeks. About 500 soldiers will go through the initial version of training, focused on what the military calls combined-arms warfare, in which tanks, artillery, combat vehicles and other weapons are layered to maximize the violence they inflict.

“We want the Ukrainians to have a capability to successfully defend their country,” Milley said. “Ukraine is doing nothing more than defending itself, and they are trying to liberate Russian-occupied Ukraine.”

The training, first disclosed in planning late last year, begins as the United States and its allies lock in an ever-growing list of weapons that could be used in an expected Ukrainian counteroffensive within months. The Biden administration approved the transfer of $3 billion in weapons on Jan. 6, marking the single largest transfer of arms to Ukraine since Russia invaded nearly a year ago, as the administration seeks cooperation from other allies to provide similar arms. Among the weapons in the U.S. package are 50 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles and motorized howitzer artillery.

Other nations, including Britain, Poland and France, have pledged complementary weapons, including battle tanks, and Ukraine has pressured Germany to do the same. Milley said the challenge will be determining how quickly the Ukrainian military will be ready and trained to use all of the new military equipment. The situation will be eased because some of the Ukrainian forces already are familiar with other armored weapons, such as the T-72 tank.

“It’ll take a bit of time,” Milley said. “Five, six, seven, eight weeks, who knows. We’ll see what happens here. But in terms of the criticality of it, the need is now.”

The general plans to spend the week in Europe, meeting with European counterparts, viewing the training, observing logistics hubs through which weapons flow, and participating in a planning conference that will include NATO allies and Ukrainian military officials. On Friday, he and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin will participate in a gathering of the Ukraine Contact Group, in which countries supporting the government in Kyiv come together, assess what Ukraine needs and make commitments about what they can provide.

Milley said that Ukraine’s first priority is finding more air defenses, a continuing challenge highlighted by a Russian missile attack on a civilian apartment complex in the city of Dnipro on Saturday that killed dozens of people.

“They’re getting hit every few weeks with really significant attacks, and they’re attacks on the civilian infrastructure,” the general said. “The Russians are consciously, as a matter of policy, attacking civilians and civilian infrastructure. That in of itself is a war crime.”

The Washington Post · by Dan Lamothe · January 16, 2023

14. The U.S. Marine Corps: Now An Access-Denial Force to Fight China?

Excerpts:

Clausewitz’s remedy is to keep defense perimeters short while using artillery to offset the mismatch between ground forces at a particular place and time. Marines and their Japanese allies can’t shorten the defensive line along the Ryukyus—the islands are where they are—but at the same time the islands are fixed and immovable on the map. This is an advantage of considerable scope. No Chinese merchantman or PLA Navy ship of war can plow through an island. In the end, then, the challenge of island-chain defense is all about keeping PLA amphibious forces from landing along the Ryukyus while barricading the straits.

This is a sturdy defense line.

Straits are narrow seas by definition. So think about the Ryukyu defensive line as a series of short interlocking cordons overshadowed by missiles fired from shore, sea, or aloft. That’s a workable operational design. Despite his misgivings toward cordon warfare, in fact, the Prussian master might crack a smile if he beheld Force Design 2030 in action.

Let’s hope so.

The U.S. Marine Corps: Now An Access-Denial Force to Fight China?

19fortyfive.com · by James Holmes · January 14, 2023

This week Yomiuri Shimbun reported that the U.S. Marine Corps intends to found a Marine Littoral Regiment capable of island-hopping along Japan’s Ryukyus chain, which arcs from the southernmost home island of Kyushu, through Okinawa at the chain’s midpoint, almost to within sight of northern Taiwan. Small sensor- and missile-equipped detachments will comprise the new regiment, helping it scout out hostile naval and air forces and pummel them should they draw near.

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The Marine Littoral Regiment constitutes part of Force Design 2030, Commandant David Berger’s concept for partly reconfiguring the Marine Corps as an access-denial force. Under the concept marines will fan out among the southwestern islands in concert with U.S. sea and air forces and the Japan Self-Defense Forces. Expeditionary units drawn from the regiment will “stand in,” defying China’s anti-access arsenal, rather than stand off for the sake of force protection.

And yield geographic space to China by default. The Marine Corps and the allies will refuse to give ground.

The regiment’s twin goals: to deny China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) access to the southwestern islands, safeguarding sovereign Japanese territory, and to deny Chinese naval and mercantile shipping the ability to transit the waters between the islands. Defend the islands while barring the straits and you cement the island chain into an offshore Great Wall in reverse—a fortified geographic barrier guarded by American and Japanese sentinels.

In turn you imprison the PLA Navy and Air Force within the China seas, depriving them of maneuver space that’s essential to bluewater operations.

It’s a truism in military strategy, as in sports, that the home team commands an innate edge over any visiting team. Its bases, forces, and manpower are nearby, as are likely battlegrounds. It knows the physical and human terrain better than any visitor could. Etc. China has leveraged its home-field advantage vis-à-vis U.S. and allied forces, strewing cruise, ballistic, and hypersonic missiles and missile-armed aircraft along its coastal zones. Operating in conjunction with the PLA Navy’s fleet of submarines and surface patrol craft, these shore-based implements of sea power can make things tough even on a stronger visiting team.

But what if two home teams square off? Japanese and Chinese armed forces play on the same fields, so they enjoy similar advantages. These Asian heavyweights have waged a back-and-forth series since the seventh century. Japan has dominated Sino-Japanese contests since the 1890s; China wants the championship back. If China is tapping the logic of home-field advantage, the United States and Japan are belatedly repaying the compliment, putting strategic geography, alliance diplomacy, and maritime might to work for themselves.

In short, the allies are harnessing their own advantages. One hopes their nautical Great Wall proves so forbidding that it deters China from trying to breach it. If so we will never learn who wins when home team meets home team on the field of battle.

And not knowing will be fine.

Now, as U.S. Marines and their comrades chart strategy and operations in the Ryukyus, they should take heed of Carl von Clausewitz’s sage counsel on “cordon warfare.” An offshore Great Wall is nothing more than a distended defensive perimeter with immovable guard towers, namely the islands themselves. Clausewitz vests little faith in defensive lines. “The obstacle they offer the attacker,” he maintains, is “worthless without powerful fire to support it. Otherwise it is good for nothing.”

Clausewitz was thinking mainly of armies trying to protect extended lines during land warfare in nineteenth-century Europe. That was his experience. But his warnings are sound even in twenty-first-century Asia. Think about perimeter defense in algebraic terms. By definition any line is a series of infinitely many points, while the contender that can mass superior force at any given point tends to prevail in combat. No defender can be stronger than its likely foe at infinitely many points, so the edge goes to the attacker. The attacker simply masses combat power at some point along the line, overwhelms the defenders, and punches through.

Clausewitz’s remedy is to keep defense perimeters short while using artillery to offset the mismatch between ground forces at a particular place and time. Marines and their Japanese allies can’t shorten the defensive line along the Ryukyus—the islands are where they are—but at the same time the islands are fixed and immovable on the map. This is an advantage of considerable scope. No Chinese merchantman or PLA Navy ship of war can plow through an island. In the end, then, the challenge of island-chain defense is all about keeping PLA amphibious forces from landing along the Ryukyus while barricading the straits.

This is a sturdy defense line.

Straits are narrow seas by definition. So think about the Ryukyu defensive line as a series of short interlocking cordons overshadowed by missiles fired from shore, sea, or aloft. That’s a workable operational design. Despite his misgivings toward cordon warfare, in fact, the Prussian master might crack a smile if he beheld Force Design 2030 in action.

Let’s hope so.

A 19FortyFive Contributing Editor, Dr. James Holmes is J. C. Wylie Chair of Maritime Strategy at the Naval War College and a Nonresident Fellow at the Brute Krulak Center for Innovation and Future Warfare, Marine Corps University. The views voiced here are his alone.

19fortyfive.com · by James Holmes · January 14, 2023

15. Putin Should Be Shocked: Ukraine Keeps Killing Russia's Missiles

Putin Should Be Shocked: Ukraine Keeps Killing Russia's Missiles

19fortyfive.com · by Stavros Atlamazoglou · January 16, 2023

Ukraine War Update: The Russian military continues to kill Ukrainian civilians. On the 326th day of the war, Russia launched another wave of missiles against Ukrainian cities, killing more than 30 people, including children.

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On the ground, the Russian forces claim to have captured Soledar, a small salt mining town a few miles to the north of Bakhmut.

Led by the infamous Wagner Group private military company, the Russian assault had pushed the Ukrainian defenders back, but the town was still contested on Saturday.

The Russian Casualties in Ukraine

The Russian forces pay for their minor advances with extremely heavy casualties.

The Russian forces are losing an average of 500 men every single day. Beyond the obvious force generation problem this high rate of casualties creates, it also takes a toll on the Russian morale.

Overall, the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense claimed that as of Sunday, Ukrainian forces have killed approximately 115,290 Russian troops (and wounded approximately twice to thrice that number), destroyed 286 fighter, attack, bomber, and transport jets, 276 attack and transport helicopters, 3,106 tanks, 2,094 artillery pieces, 6,183 armored personnel carriers and infantry fighting vehicles, 437 Multiple Launch Rocket Systems (MLRS), 16 boats and cutters, 4,846 vehicles and fuel tanks, 219 anti-aircraft batteries, 1,872 tactical unmanned aerial systems, 186 special equipment platforms, such as bridging vehicles, and four mobile Iskander ballistic missile systems, and 749 cruise missiles shot down by the Ukrainian air defenses.

The Russian Missile Attacks Continue

Over the weekend, the Russian military unleashed another wave of missiles against Ukraine. The latest missile attack targeted civilian targets. In Dnipro, a Russian missile struck a large nine-story residential building killing at least 30 people and wounding scores more.

A 15-year-old girl was killed in the strike.

According to the Ukrainian Air Force, the Russian military struck the building with a Kh-22 Kitchen anti-ship missile.

If this initial battle damage assessment ends up being accurate, it will further support the estimate that the Russian military is running out of ballistic and cruise missiles.

Designed to sink American aircraft carriers, the Kh-22 Kitchen cruise missile costs almost half a million dollars.

The Russian forces have already used Kh-22 anti-ship and S-300 anti-aircraft missiles against ground targets in the past. Over the summer, the British Military Intelligence assessed that was the result of a dwindling missile arsenal.

As the war drags on and the Russian strategy continues to largely hinge on missile attacks against Ukrainian critical infrastructure and urban centers, the likelihood is that the Russian arsenal is quickly depleting.

Since October, Russia has launched more than 1,100 ballistic and cruise missiles against Ukraine.

Although the Ukrainian military intercepted dozens of Russian cruise missiles, enough got through to inflict substantial damage. In the wake of the latest Russian missile strikes, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky once more asked the West to support his country with air defenses.

The Ukrainian military will be receiving MIM-104 Patriot air defense systems from the U.S. and Germany.

But the weapon systems will take some time to be delivered to a Ukraine in dire need of protection from the Russian air attacks.

Expert Biography: A 19FortyFive Defense and National Security Columnist, Stavros Atlamazoglou is a seasoned defense journalist specializing in special operations, a Hellenic Army veteran (national service with the 575th Marine Battalion and Army HQ), and a Johns Hopkins University graduate.

19fortyfive.com · by Stavros Atlamazoglou · January 16, 2023

16. The Problem With Primacy - America’s Dangerous Quest to Dominate the Pacific

Since Van Jackson left government after the Obama administration I do not think he has ever found a US policy ​to support. He is one of the more extreme critics of US policy.

Excerpts:

It is still unclear if Asian states can actually create a new Non-Aligned Movement. But the very fact that leaders are so committed to trying suggests that Washington’s attempts to ensure regional states fully comply with its demands to smite China are at best ill fated. At worst, U.S. efforts will actively undermine the country’s standing and destabilize the area. The semiconductor gambit, for instance, demands fracturing Asian economic integration, which will flatline the region’s growth. Washington’s maneuvers could also prompt China to engage in even more aggressive conduct abroad or further stoke nationalist sentiments at home, leading in turn to more militarism from the United States. This dangerous cycle is far from appealing to Asia, which is why most of the continent’s states would prefer working together to foster nonalignment over abetting a great-power competition.

If the United States really cares about stability in Asia, it must become a partner to any nonaligned bloc rather than an obstacle to its creation. To do so, it should increase export quotas and offer price controls for imports of commodities that are of great importance to Asian and Pacific economies. This step will aid key sources of regional economic development and bolster Asian interdependence. Washington must also help the region manage its growing levels of sovereign debt, which could cause a serious regionwide depression. It should open up international markets to governments that improve the relationship between capital and workers instead of engaging in sustained labor repression. And it should offer reparations to the many societies the United States has damaged, such as the Marshall Islands (devastated by U.S. nuclear testing), Cambodia and the Philippines (which owe the United States debts odiously incurred by previous, corrupt autocratic regimes), and Guam (a colonial possession that has not been afforded a chance at self-determination).

These steps would all signal that Washington has the interests of Asia’s people at heart, that it is not out to control others, and that it understands it cannot coerce its way to peace. But to take any of these measures, the United States must first shed its ambitions of primacy. The country must respond to Asia as it exists, rather than treating it as an abstract arena in which it can conduct power politics.

The Problem With Primacy

America’s Dangerous Quest to Dominate the Pacific

By Van Jackson

January 16, 2023

Foreign Affairs · by Van Jackson · January 16, 2023

In its policies toward Asia, the United States has long sought to reconcile its unsurpassed military, economic, and rule-setting prowess with a desire for stability. Until recently, this was not hard to accomplish. Washington’s international dominance coincided with the post-1979 “Asian peace”—a period of remarkable stability in East Asia and the Pacific—and so the United States had little trouble holding sway over the region without provoking any conflicts. Over time, Washington even came to believe that U.S. supremacy and regional tranquility could not just coexist but were causally related. As a result, U.S. policymakers made maintaining Asian primacy the foundation of their regional strategy, arguing that without Washington’s leadership, Asia would devolve into warfare.

But as the American author James Baldwin wrote in 1963, “time reveals the foundations on which any kingdom rests, and eats at those foundations, and it destroys doctrines by proving them to be untrue.” Even if U.S. primacy was once a source of regional stability, there is little basis to think it will promote harmony today. The United States’ global power has diminished over the past generation, making it harder for Washington to direct the world. Other states have a newfound desire and capacity to resist, subvert, lash out against, or seek alternatives to U.S. preferences, including through violence. And the power of these countries is likely to continue to grow. It defies history to expect that dusk will never come for U.S. hegemony, especially as China—the world’s most populous state and Washington’s primary global competitor—draws power from its central place in the international economic system.

Nevertheless, two of the most recent U.S. presidents—Barack Obama and Donald Trump— charged themselves with the task of indefinitely propping up the sun. And President Joe Biden has picked up where both presidents left off. Initially, that meant taking steps to constrain Beijing. Now, it means taking steps to weaken the country. Obama started the process by launching a high-profile “pivot to Asia” designed to bolster the United States’ regional military presence as a check against China’s rise while interweaving his country’s economy into that of eight states close to China’s borders. Trump, who saw how China’s important economic position afforded it growing global influence, launched a trade war with Beijing. His administration also deepened Washington’s ties to Taiwan. Biden has increased the U.S. military buildup, facilitated a regional military buildup, and attempted to assemble the beginnings of an anti-Chinese containment coalition along with local Asian powers.

These choices run headlong into what the preservation of peace demands. Kneecapping China’s economy, engaging in an endless arms race, aligning with local despotic regimes to encircle Beijing, and alienating smaller countries by demanding that they choose between China and the United States might give Washington more short-term power in Asia. But these are the ingredients of regional fracture and eventual war, not stability. The United States’ Asia policy, then, is at an unacknowledged crossroads. Washington can support regional peace or pursue regional primacy, but it cannot do both.

OUT OF CONTROL

The United States has been working hard to remain on top in Asia for well over a decade. In 2010, then U.S. Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes declared that the Obama administration was trying “to get America another fifty years as leader.” Under Trump, a declassified White House strategy document showed that the United States’ supreme interest in Asia was maintaining “U.S. strategic primacy” as well as Washington’s “diplomatic, economic, and military preeminence.” The “loss of U.S. preeminence in the Indo-Pacific,” the administration claimed in the document, “would weaken our ability to achieve U.S. interests globally.”

The Biden administration remains faithful to this path. In its 2021 strategy, it declared that “leading the world” was in the United States’ “undeniable self-interest.” It went on to say that the country’s interests “compel the deepest connection to the Indo-Pacific” and that the United States’ presence would be “most robust in the Indo-Pacific and Europe.” The Pentagon has promised that 2023 will be “the most transformative year in US force posture in the region in a generation,” a line likely meant to be reassuring but that comes off as ominous. The Department of Defense is making good on this promise by modernizing its large traditional presence in Northeast Asia while increasing its footprint in the Pacific Islands and Australia—areas that the Chinese military cannot seriously contest. It is also rolling out a suite of new lethal weapons such as the B-21 nuclear-capable stealth bomber. Unveiled in December with the fanfare of a new iPhone, the B-21 has an eye-watering price tag of $203 billion, which is somehow under the original budget.

For Washington, the increased emphasis on Asia has been largely driven by the fear that China’s growing strength will impinge on the United States’ ability to shape the global order. The Pentagon has described Beijing as a “near-peer competitor” and a “pacing threat.” In response, the United States has entered an arms race against a rapidly modernizing People’s Liberation Army (PLA). It is a contest with no apparent end. The U.S. defense budget went from $700 billion in 2018 to $768 billion in 2020. For 2023, it will eclipse $850 billion. Aid to Ukraine accounts for only a little over $50 billion of that total. The United States is also offering ever more advanced weapons technologies to friends and allies.

The U.S. strategy toward China is containment in all but name.

Washington’s efforts to retain its primacy in the region go beyond amassing and proliferating armaments. To achieve even greater dominance, the United States has turned the global political economy into a zero-sum struggle against Beijing. Biden has retained Trump-era student-visa restrictions targeted at the Chinese and expanded his predecessor’s tariffs, sanctions, and company blacklists. In October, for example, administration officials banned U.S.-made semiconductor technology from being sold to Washington’s self-proclaimed competitor. It is a remarkable step, given that semiconductors were largely irrelevant to global power politics until the United States christened them a major focal point of national security. By characterizing these technologies—which are found in everyday goods such as smart phones and televisions—as vital to national strength and prosperity while also declaring that its nemesis must not be allowed to have them, Washington has made its radical militarism readily apparent.

The United States’ fixation on crippling China’s access to semiconductors entails more than export bans. In its October guidelines, the Commerce Department also restricted U.S. corporations from engaging in any semiconductor-related research, development, or financing with Chinese entities. “We are ahead of [China],” explained U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo. “We need to stay ahead of them. And we need to deny them this technology that they need to advance their military.”

This is not the rationale of a country that is simply balancing Chinese power or trying to stop Beijing from creating a sphere of influence. It is not the strategy of a state trying to decouple from the Chinese economy. It is containment in all but name.

PRIMACY VERSUS PEACE

For the United States, there are many problems with a strategy based around trying to stop China’s rise. One is that on a basic level, it will not work. There is no reason to believe that spending over a trillion dollars modernizing the U.S. nuclear arsenal or selling submarines to Australia will cause China to do anything but continue arming itself as quickly as possible. China has spent years preparing for a techno-containment strategy from the United States, launching its “Made in China 2025” initiative in 2015 precisely to guarantee that it has a strong domestic technology industry. And the rest of Asia is not willing or able to isolate Beijing under current political conditions.

What maintaining U.S. primacy will instead do is menace the Asian peace. The massive military investments needed to ensure the United States remains the Indo-Pacific’s dominant power require outarming China in areas of its highest capability, close to Chinese shores and far from the U.S. homeland. It is an impossible task. Consider, for instance, the steps Washington must take to fight a war over Taiwan. China has the natural, massive advantage of being close to the island’s coasts, all of which fall within range of Chinese air defenses. To repel a PLA attack against Taiwan, the United States would need absurd levels of modern weaponry—meaning a blank check for the Pentagon. It would have to engage in what the sociologist C. Wright Mills once called “the idiot’s race”: amassing missiles and crafting military positions that stoke jingoism on both sides, heighten instability, and lead each state to adopt the most malign interpretations of the other’s intentions. One must squint quite hard to discern a theory of stability in a strategy that demands a favorable imbalance of military power, the active proliferation of weapons platforms, and muscle flexing in the name of signaling resolve.

Risking military escalation is only one of the ways that primacy has an antagonistic relationship to stability. As I argued in Pacific Power Paradox: American Statecraft and the Fate of the Asian Peace, any U.S. drive for economic dominance will also undermine regional stability because it involves breaking up the economic structures that have played a vital role in preventing war in the Pacific. The East Asian development model based on exports and interdependence was made possible because political leaders decided to prioritize national development over nationalist revanchism. Asian heads of state put dozens of territorial disputes, many of which still endure, on the back burner in order to create a thicket of regional institutions to encourage trade and informal, consensus-based habits of diplomacy. The result was both spectacular economic growth and remarkable stability.

American officials are demanding that Asian states work against their own interests.

In decades past, Washington’s economic primacy was rarely contested by other states, and so the actions it took to remain central to Asian trade and financial flows were subtler and less visible. In the 1980s, the Reagan administration asserted control over the region by making sure that burgeoning regional institutions remained informal and were led by the private sector. In the 1990s, the Clinton administration succeeded in opposing a Malaysian-led East Asian Economic Caucus and a Japanese-led Asian Monetary Fund—both of which would have excluded the United States. The George W. Bush administration deliberately marginalized the East Asia Summit, which did not yet include Washington. But times have changed. Today, the United States no longer has a central position in Asian political economy. Its bid to assert greater control from the periphery therefore requires a brusquer approach with a much heavier hand than in the past—including potentially wrecking the economic interdependencies that have helped keep the peace.

Washington’s drive to outcompete China gave rise to a full-court diplomatic press to convince Asian governments that they should divest of Huawei—admittedly one of the Communist Party’s tech titans but also a major, affordable global telecommunications provider across the Indo-Pacific. The recently launched quest to cut off China from advanced data-processing technologies so far involves cajoling Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan to comply with ever-tightening restrictions on trade, investment, and intellectual property. And there is no reason to expect this round of economic strangulation to be the end of the pain it seeks to inflict. Instead, it is Mills’s “idiot’s race” again, but with economic policy. If, as Washington believes, China is an aggressive power on the march, the last thing the United States should want is for Beijing to be cut off from other countries’ markets. Without such access, China would have even less of an incentive to restrain itself.

Beijing, of course, also has a revisionist desire to promote its interests. The Chinese Communist Party is hardly a force for peace. But the reality is that China is now embedded in Asia’s financial and economic system in ways that the United States is not, giving Beijing the kind of political weight in Asia that Washington lacks. In addition to being a major regional financier, China is Asia’s central hub in a manufacturing network that produces finished goods for markets across the world. It is the single largest trading partner for most economies. It has created numerous institutions that connect the region, most famously the Belt and Road Initiative. Crucially, China belongs to most of the agreements that make up Asia’s economic architecture, such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, the Chiang Mai Initiative for intraregional currency swapping, the Asian Bond Markets Initiative, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations-Plus Three (China, Japan, and South Korea), and the Trilateral Cooperation Secretariat. Washington, by contrast, belongs to none of these.

U.S. officials, then, are demanding that Asian states work against their own long-term interests. They insist that Asian governments betray the interdependence that has fostered regional peace because doing so might give Washington—not Asia—a marginal advantage in a geopolitical struggle of questionable merit. In the best of times that would be unrealistic, and this is far from the best of times. As China grows more and more embedded in Asia’s regional architecture, the United States is in a worse material and symbolic position to levy such demands than at any point since the end of the Cold War.

READING THE ROOM

So what should Washington do instead? It could start with a dose of simple pragmatism. Asian governments want stability more than anything, and they know what serves their interests in this respect better than the United States ever could. Centering statecraft on the concerns of Asian societies would require a dramatic shift in how the United States conducts itself in the region, but it would also be the surest way to consolidate—rather than further embrittle—the Asian peace.

If it tuned in, Washington would learn that small states are wary of being forced to take sides in a great-power competition. They are pleading instead for geopolitical openness and strategic pluralism in the spirit of the Non-Aligned Movement: the Cold War era collection of postcolonial states that refused to be subordinated to either the Soviet Union or the United States. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations, for instance, has repeatedly stated it will not choose between China and the United States. East Timor’s president has made it clear that just because his country seeks China’s help economically does not mean it is “taking sides.” Indonesia as well as some Pacific Island governments have expressed an interest in establishing suppliers’ cartels for valuable raw materials such as nickel, which would give these countries the money and modest political leverage they need for true autonomy. And as Singaporean Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan declared last September, “Nobody wants to be forced to make invidious choices. Nobody wants to become a vassal state or a cat’s paw.”

Asian leaders are also wary of any measure that would cause China’s economy to implode. It is easy to see why. The region’s economies are so interconnected with China’s that if the latter tanked (whether as a result of U.S. containment efforts or Beijing’s own failures), the rest of Asia would go down with it. Regional leaders therefore want to buoy—and profit from—the local great-power economy, one that helped insulate Asia from the worst of the 2008 global financial crisis. Asian governments are not naive about the risks of dealing with China, and it is true that in states where corruption reigns, Chinese investments seem to make nepotism, kleptocracy, and structural violence worse. But regional elites are also not paranoid about China, as the United States appears to be.

Small states are wary of being forced to take sides in a great-power competition.

It is still unclear if Asian states can actually create a new Non-Aligned Movement. But the very fact that leaders are so committed to trying suggests that Washington’s attempts to ensure regional states fully comply with its demands to smite China are at best ill fated. At worst, U.S. efforts will actively undermine the country’s standing and destabilize the area. The semiconductor gambit, for instance, demands fracturing Asian economic integration, which will flatline the region’s growth. Washington’s maneuvers could also prompt China to engage in even more aggressive conduct abroad or further stoke nationalist sentiments at home, leading in turn to more militarism from the United States. This dangerous cycle is far from appealing to Asia, which is why most of the continent’s states would prefer working together to foster nonalignment over abetting a great-power competition.

If the United States really cares about stability in Asia, it must become a partner to any nonaligned bloc rather than an obstacle to its creation. To do so, it should increase export quotas and offer price controls for imports of commodities that are of great importance to Asian and Pacific economies. This step will aid key sources of regional economic development and bolster Asian interdependence. Washington must also help the region manage its growing levels of sovereign debt, which could cause a serious regionwide depression. It should open up international markets to governments that improve the relationship between capital and workers instead of engaging in sustained labor repression. And it should offer reparations to the many societies the United States has damaged, such as the Marshall Islands (devastated by U.S. nuclear testing), Cambodia and the Philippines (which owe the United States debts odiously incurred by previous, corrupt autocratic regimes), and Guam (a colonial possession that has not been afforded a chance at self-determination).

These steps would all signal that Washington has the interests of Asia’s people at heart, that it is not out to control others, and that it understands it cannot coerce its way to peace. But to take any of these measures, the United States must first shed its ambitions of primacy. The country must respond to Asia as it exists, rather than treating it as an abstract arena in which it can conduct power politics.

• VAN JACKSON is Senior Lecturer in International Relations at Victoria University of Wellington and the author of Pacific Power Paradox: American Statecraft and the Fate of the Asian Peace.
• MORE BY VAN JACKSON

Foreign Affairs · by Van Jackson · January 16, 2023

17. Wartime Putinism – What the Disaster in Ukraine Has Done to the Kremlin—and to Russia

Excerpts:

Wartime Putinism is an experiment in deferring problems. Further Ukrainian advances on the battlefield or even the military status quo may force Putin to layer a second mobilization on top of the mobilization of reservists he declared in September 2022, something he will avoid as long as he can. A second mobilization would test the bona fides of wartime Putinism. Mobilization is itself traumatic, and mobilization without military progress is more than traumatic. It is a rebuke to those in positions of military and political responsibility. But Russia’s first round of mobilization occurred amid battlefield setbacks, and the Kremlin survived it intact. A version of this cycle might simply repeat itself. Or the government may opt for expanding the conscription of young men.

Wartime Putinism could also undermine itself through stasis. Russia can unite around the bleak mission of not losing a war for only so long. After the end of the Soviet Union, in 1991, Russian President Boris Yeltsin promised prosperity, political liberty, and Russia’s integration into Europe. He fell short in the execution, but at early stages of his rule those goals represented a galvanizing mission for post-Soviet Russia, and between 1991 and 2000, Yeltsin did bring Russia closer to the free market and to Europe. During his tenure, Putin’s mission has been more nebulous: stability and prosperity at home after the economic disruptions of the 1990s; Russian military might abroad; and a seat at the table of international politics. Putin’s 2022 war has damaged Russia’s international reputation, and it has dented the perception of Russian military might. What is left is the drive for stability through militarization, a paradoxical political aspiration.

Wartime Putinism is a reduced Putinism, and it would be impossible to describe today’s Russia (to Russians) as an ascendant power. It is, rather, an embattled power. This explains the frenzied media campaign to drum up support for the war, which masks the fact that Putin has committed Russia to a long cycle of stagnation. Isolation and sanctions will together contribute to Russia’s economic and technological decline. Nobody can say how long Putin can walk this dispiriting tightrope. Putin’s warpath does not lead from point A to point B but is a circuitous route that leads from point A back to point A. A fine-tuned method for avoiding failure, wartime Putinism has all the hallmarks of a dead end.

Wartime Putinism

What the Disaster in Ukraine Has Done to the Kremlin—and to Russia

By Michael Kimmage and Maria Lipman

January 13, 2023

Foreign Affairs · by Michael Kimmage and Maria Lipman · January 13, 2023

Winning a long war requires a mobilization of troops and supplies that can outlast the other side. Positive objectives and clearly defined goals are the path to victory. After the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt was able to mobilize American society around the imperative of Japan’s unconditional surrender. After a shocking attack on U.S. soil, Americans rallied around the objectives of defeating Japan, avenging the assault on Pearl Harbor, and eliminating the threat posed by imperial Japan. Those goals would have been sufficient to sustain the U.S. war effort, but Americans had an additional aim: to strike a blow for democracy. By defeating Japan, the United States would encourage the democratization (and, by extension, the Americanization) of Asia.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has not followed this classic formula. In fact, he has inverted it, by attacking Ukraine first and only then attempting to mobilize Russian society. He has described what Russia is doing in Ukraine not as a war but as a “special military operation.” He has never articulated a set of persuasive objectives; his stated goals have shifted over time. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has at various points aimed to halt an invented genocide, to “de-Nazify” a country that was not fascist, to liberate Ukraine’s allegedly Russian nature, and to demilitarize the country—even though it posed no real threat to Russia. According to VTsIOM, a state-owned polling institution, a majority of Russians considered Ukraine a friendly country before the war. Only 11 percent of Russians saw Ukraine as an enemy.

It is tempting to see Putin’s war as a total failure. From Kyiv to Kherson, Russia has endured significant battlefield losses. It has solidified Western support for Ukraine on a scale unthinkable before the war and provoked a formidable response from Kyiv. As Ukraine’s military improves, Russia’s prospects for ending the war on its terms are fading away—not that these terms have ever been clear. Russia also faces sanctions imposed by many of the world’s richest and most technologically advanced countries. With so many forces arrayed against Putin, some experts have speculated about a possible crackup of his regime.

But the regime in the Kremlin is hardly on the verge of collapse. Putin has used the war to clamp down on Russian society, to pull elites even closer to him, and to shore up his domestic position. No longer able to lean on his reputation as a foreign policy genius—capable of wresting Crimea from Ukraine (as he did in 2014) or making Russia a serious player in the Middle East (as he did in 2015)—the Russian president has instead focused on militarizing the state and the public sphere, purging those who openly dissent from the government’s position on the war, and stoking militant anti-Westernism among the wide swaths of the public that if not pro-war are at least genuinely anti-antiwar.

Call it “wartime Putinism.” More repressive and less flexible than prewar Putinism, it has imposed the spirit of war on the Russian population. The price of not winning a war, however, is a panoply of negative objectives: not losing, not giving up, not admitting defeat, not allowing anything to threaten the survival of the regime. A fundamentally empty project, wartime Putinism is a Faustian bargain with Russia’s future. The Kremlin is no longer achieving a record of success but enforcing a narrative of success that is at odds with the reality on the ground. The war has created a version of Putinism that offers diminishing returns.

NORMALIZING WAR

Putin has never been shy about waging war. His tenure as Russia’s president began with an inherited conflict in Chechnya and entanglement in Moldova. In 2008, when he was serving as prime minister, Russia invaded Georgia. And two years after he became president again in 2012, Putin annexed Crimea and infiltrated eastern Ukraine. By 2015, Russia’s military and intelligence services were taking an expeditionary turn, intervening in Syria, meddling in foreign elections, and flexing their muscles in Africa. Putin has long enjoyed being filmed and photographed as Russia’s commander in chief, and he has turned the public celebration of victory in World War II into a keystone of post-Soviet Russian identity.

This was the political and cultural trajectory that led to Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Yet that invasion was a turning point, a rupture even, making Putin’s government inseparable from war. Russia’s operations in Ukraine are on a different scale from those of Putin’s previous wars. The stakes are higher, as is the level of political repression.

Putin has exploited the war to reduce the political liberties of Russians to zero: no right to free speech, no right to assembly, no right to organize opposition to the government. The imprisonment of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, which occurred before the war, might have been more conspicuous without the war. Indeed, the tug of war between Putin and opposition forces escalated in 2012, when Putin came back to the Kremlin for his third presidential term, and in 2018, at the peak of Navalny’s efforts to forge an alternative to Putinism. This tug of war has vanished.

Putin has never been shy about waging war.

Meanwhile, wartime Putinism has had a surprisingly limited effect on the Russian economy. The same technocrats who warned Putin of the war’s potentially devastating consequences about a month before it began have worked hard to keep the Russian economy going since February 2022. Sanctions are closing off options for the Russian military and for some Russian businesses (for instance those that deal in metallurgy, automotive parts, machinery, and equipment), whereas other Russian businesses (those that deal in food or aluminum, for example) have been holding their own. Sanctions may prove more meaningful over time, yet they have not done that much to alter the lives of ordinary Russians. Those with means can still live comfortable lives. Those without means did not have much to lose, anyway. The government has been spending money lavishly on pensioners, poorer Russians, and those connected to the war effort; unemployment is low. If middle-class Russians and small-business owners have been hurt by the war, they are adjusting. At least for now, Russia shows every sign of being able to muddle through economically.

And for the time being, Putin can depend on the acquiescence of the Russian population. To what degree Putin is viewed as an effective wartime leader is hard to say. But very few Russians, even those who would not have opted for war back in February 2022, want their country to lose in Ukraine. Defeat can be feared even in a disastrous war, and Putin is politically insulated by such fear. Even if winning is beyond him at this point, many Russians believe they need him as their leader to stave off defeat.

Still, there are relatively few true believers in Putin’s war in Russia. They tend to be older, politically marginalized, and living in remote regions of the country. These are the people for whom Putin’s arguments about Western malignance most acutely resonate. According to a November 2022 Levada poll, 81 percent of Russians over the age of 55 have negative feelings about the West. For these Russians, Ukraine oscillates between being an enemy aligned with the West and a part of Russia, living since 2014 under an illegitimate government and suffering from the artificial Ukrainian identity imposed on it by nationalist fanatics in Ukraine and by those in the West that fund and encourage these fanatics.

Among the political elite, outright criticism of the invasion is inconceivable.

The problem with true believers is that their beliefs can get in the way. An ad hoc assembly of bloggers and commentators on the messaging service Telegram have drummed up the kind of support for the war that state-run media outlets cannot inspire—something more spontaneous and sincere, with all the emotional power of social media. But it is from these same corners of the Russian media ecosystem that vocal criticism of Russia’s military tactics has emerged. Many of them think that the war is not being fought aggressively enough. Over the past few months, the Kremlin has tolerated these voices, but it has also reined them in. After all, these figures are pro-war and pro-regime. Now and then, they have to be reminded to stay within their limits.

Among the political elite, outright criticism of the war is inconceivable. The Russian government forces critics out of the country, intimidates those who stay, and prosecutes those who are not intimidated. Those still in Russia face professional retaliation, public stigmatization, and arrest for opposing the war. Ilya Yashin, a leading opposition politician, was arrested and sentenced to eight and a half years in prison for discussing the massacre that Russian forces carried out in the Ukrainian city of Bucha. Almost 400 others have had criminal cases brought against them as a result of their antiwar activism, and more than 5,500 have been fined, detained, or banned from certain activities. In the absence of an effective opposition party or movement, overtly antiwar statements register as isolated gestures, underscoring the Kremlin’s seemingly unshakable hold on Russia’s political sphere and on Russian public opinion.

Despite being so visibly in control of the political scene, the Kremlin is taking no chances. Western media has focused on the military mobilization initiated in September. At least as consequential has been the militarization of the public sphere. Only a minority of Russians are actively engaged in the war, but all must demonstrate their acquiescence in the war, an acquiescence that does not imply passionate support. The mass media, the cultural world, and the educational sector have all played a role in either justifying the war or in laying the groundwork for a war that will last as long as Putin thinks it must. Sometimes the goal is to stoke the emotions of war. A more subtle goal is to make the war seem routine, an organic and inevitable part of Russian life.

WALKING A TIGHTROPE

Wartime Putinism is an experiment in deferring problems. Further Ukrainian advances on the battlefield or even the military status quo may force Putin to layer a second mobilization on top of the mobilization of reservists he declared in September 2022, something he will avoid as long as he can. A second mobilization would test the bona fides of wartime Putinism. Mobilization is itself traumatic, and mobilization without military progress is more than traumatic. It is a rebuke to those in positions of military and political responsibility. But Russia’s first round of mobilization occurred amid battlefield setbacks, and the Kremlin survived it intact. A version of this cycle might simply repeat itself. Or the government may opt for expanding the conscription of young men.

Wartime Putinism could also undermine itself through stasis. Russia can unite around the bleak mission of not losing a war for only so long. After the end of the Soviet Union, in 1991, Russian President Boris Yeltsin promised prosperity, political liberty, and Russia’s integration into Europe. He fell short in the execution, but at early stages of his rule those goals represented a galvanizing mission for post-Soviet Russia, and between 1991 and 2000, Yeltsin did bring Russia closer to the free market and to Europe. During his tenure, Putin’s mission has been more nebulous: stability and prosperity at home after the economic disruptions of the 1990s; Russian military might abroad; and a seat at the table of international politics. Putin’s 2022 war has damaged Russia’s international reputation, and it has dented the perception of Russian military might. What is left is the drive for stability through militarization, a paradoxical political aspiration.

Wartime Putinism is a reduced Putinism, and it would be impossible to describe today’s Russia (to Russians) as an ascendant power. It is, rather, an embattled power. This explains the frenzied media campaign to drum up support for the war, which masks the fact that Putin has committed Russia to a long cycle of stagnation. Isolation and sanctions will together contribute to Russia’s economic and technological decline. Nobody can say how long Putin can walk this dispiriting tightrope. Putin’s warpath does not lead from point A to point B but is a circuitous route that leads from point A back to point A. A fine-tuned method for avoiding failure, wartime Putinism has all the hallmarks of a dead end.

• MICHAEL KIMMAGE is Professor of History at the Catholic University of America and a Visiting Fellow at the German Marshall Fund. From 2014 to 2016, he served on the Policy Planning Staff at the U.S. Department of State, where he held the Russia/Ukraine portfolio.
• MARIA LIPMAN is a Senior Visiting Fellow at the Institute of European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies of the George Washington University and Co-Editor of the Institute’s newly launched website Russia.Post.
• MORE BY MICHAEL KIMMAGEMORE BY MARIA LIPMAN

Foreign Affairs · by Michael Kimmage and Maria Lipman · January 13, 2023

18. Martin Luther King Jr.’s ‘Letter From Birmingham Jail’

Martin Luther King Jr.’s ‘Letter From Birmingham Jail’

“We will reach the goal of freedom in Birmingham and all over the nation, because the goal of America is freedom.”

By Martin Luther King Jr.

KING ISSUE

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Editor’s Note: Read The Atlantic’s special coverage of Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy.

The Atlantic · by Martin Luther King Jr. · 

Images above: King is ready for a mug shot (left) in Montgomery, Alabama, after his 1956 arrest while protesting the segregation of the city's buses. His leadership of the successful 381-day bus boycott brought him to national attention. Right: In 1967, King serves out the sentence from his arrest four years earlier in Birmingham, Alabama.

In April 1963, King was jailed in Birmingham, Alabama, after he defied a state court’s injunction and led a march of black protesters without a permit, urging an Easter boycott of white-owned stores. A statement published in The Birmingham News, written by eight moderate white clergymen, criticized the march and other demonstrations.

This prompted King to write a lengthy response, begun in the margins of the newspaper. He smuggled it out with the help of his lawyer, and the nearly 7,000 words were transcribed. The eloquent call for “constructive, nonviolent tension” to force an end to unjust laws became a landmark document of the civil-rights movement. The letter was printed in part or in full by several publications, including the New York Post, Liberation magazine, The New Leader, and The Christian Century.

The Atlantic published it in the August 1963 issue, under the headline “The Negro Is Your Brother.”

My Dear Fellow Clergymen:

While confined here in the Birmingham city jail, I came across your recent statement calling my present activities “unwise and untimely.” Seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my work and ideas. If I sought to answer all the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would have little time for anything other than such correspondence in the course of the day, and I would have no time for constructive work. But since I feel that you are men of genuine good will and that your criticisms are sincerely set forth, I want to try to answer your statement in what I hope will be patient and reasonable terms.

I think I should indicate why I am here in Birmingham, since you have been influenced by the view which argues against “outsiders coming in.” I have the honor of serving as president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an organization operating in every southern state, with headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. We have some eighty-five affiliated organizations across the South, and one of them is the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. Frequently we share staff, educational and financial resources with our affiliates. Several months ago the affiliate here in Birmingham asked us to be on call to engage in a nonviolent direct-action program if such were deemed necessary. We readily consented, and when the hour came we lived up to our promise. So I, along with several members of my staff, am here because I was invited here. I am here because I have organizational ties here.

But more basically, I am in Birmingham because injustice is here. Just as the prophets of the eighth century b.c. left their villages and carried their “thus saith the Lord” far beyond the boundaries of their home towns, and just as the Apostle Paul left his village of Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to the far corners of the Greco-Roman world, so am I compelled to carry the gospel of freedom beyond my own home town. Like Paul, I must constantly respond to the Macedonian call for aid.

Moreover, I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial “outside agitator” idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.

You deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations. I am sure that none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes. It is unfortunate that demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham, but it is even more unfortunate that the city’s white power structure left the Negro community with no alternative.

In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self-purification; and direct action. We have gone through all these steps in Birmingham. There can be no gainsaying the fact that racial injustice engulfs this community. Birmingham is probably the most thoroughly segregated city in the United States. Its ugly record of brutality is widely known. Negroes have experienced grossly unjust treatment in the courts. There have been more unsolved bombings of Negro homes and churches in Birmingham than in any other city in the nation. These are the hard, brutal facts of the case. On the basis of these conditions, Negro leaders sought to negotiate with the city fathers. But the latter consistently refused to engage in good-faith negotiation.

Then, last September, came the opportunity to talk with leaders of Birmingham’s economic community. In the course of the negotiations, certain promises were made by the merchants—for example, to remove the stores’ humiliating racial signs. On the basis of these promises, the Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth and the leaders of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights agreed to a moratorium on all demonstrations. As the weeks and months went by, we realized that we were the victims of a broken promise. A few signs, briefly removed, returned; the others remained.

As in so many past experiences, our hopes had been blasted, and the shadow of deep disappointment settled upon us. We had no alternative except to prepare for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and the national community. Mindful of the difficulties involved, we decided to undertake a process of self-purification. We began a series of workshops on nonviolence, and we repeatedly asked ourselves: “Are you able to accept blows without retaliating?” “Are you able to endure the ordeal of jail?” We decided to schedule our direct-action program for the Easter season, realizing that except for Christmas, this is the main shopping period of the year. Knowing that a strong economic-withdrawal program would be the by—product of direct action, we felt that this would be the best time to bring pressure to bear on the merchants for the needed change.

“Wait” has almost always meant “Never.”

Then it occurred to us that the March election [for Birmingham’s mayor] was ahead, and so we speedily decided to postpone action until after election day. When we discovered that Mr. Connor [the commissioner of public safety, Eugene “Bull” Connor] was in the runoff, we decided again to postpone action so that the demonstration could not be used to cloud the issues. Like many others, we waited to see Mr. Connor defeated, and to this end we endured postponement after postponement. Having aided in this community need, we felt that our direct-action program could be delayed no longer.

You may well ask: “Why direct action? Why sit-ins, marches and so forth? Isn’t negotiation a better path?” You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent-resister may sound rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word “tension.” I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth. Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and half-truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, so must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.

The purpose of our direct-action program is to create a situation so crisis-packed that it will inevitably open the door to negotiation. I therefore concur with you in your call for negotiation. Too long has our beloved Southland been bogged down in a tragic effort to live in monologue rather than dialogue.

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One of the basic points in your statement is that the action that I and my associates have taken in Birmingham is untimely. Some have asked: “Why didn’t you give the new city administration time to act?” The only answer that I can give to this query is that the new Birmingham administration must be prodded about as much as the outgoing one, before it will act. We are sadly mistaken if we feel that the election of Albert Boutwell as mayor will bring the millennium to Birmingham. While Mr. Boutwell is a much more gentle person than Mr. Connor, they are both segregationists, dedicated to maintenance of the status quo. I have hope that Mr. Boutwell will be reasonable enough to see the futility of massive resistance to desegregation. But he will not see this without pressure from devotees of civil rights. My friends, I must say to you that we have not made a single gain in civil rights without determined legal and nonviolent pressure. Lamentably, it is an historical fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. Individuals may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their unjust posture; but, as Reinhold Niebuhr has reminded us, groups tend to be more immoral than individuals.

We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct-action campaign that was “well timed” in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word “Wait!” It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This “Wait” has almost always meant “Never.” We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that “justice too long delayed is justice denied.”

We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we still creep at horse-and-buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say, “Wait.” But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can’t go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son who is asking: “Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?”; when you take a cross-country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading “white” and “colored”; when your first name becomes “nigger,” your middle name becomes “boy” (however old you are) and your last name becomes “John,” and your wife and mother are never given the respected title “Mrs.”; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of “nobodiness”—then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.

You express a great deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws. This is certainly a legitimate concern. Since we so diligently urge people to obey the Supreme Court’s decision of 1954 outlawing segregation in the public schools, at first glance it may seem rather paradoxical for us consciously to break laws. One may well ask: “How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?” The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that “an unjust law is no law at all.”

Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust. All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority. Segregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an “I–it” relationship for an “I–thou” relationship and ends up relegating persons to the status of things. Hence segregation is not only politically, economically and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and sinful. Paul Tillich has said that sin is separation. Is not segregation an existential expression of man’s tragic separation, his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness? Thus it is that I can urge men to obey the 1954 decision of the Supreme Court, for it is morally right; and I can urge them to disobey segregation ordinances, for they are morally wrong.

King has a heavyweight in his corner after he is jailed in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1967. (Mario Tama / Getty)

Let us consider a more concrete example of just and unjust laws. An unjust law is a code that a numerical or power majority group compels a minority group to obey but does not make binding on itself. This is difference made legal. By the same token, a just law is a code that a majority compels a minority to follow and that it is willing to follow itself. This is sameness made legal.

Let me give another explanation. A law is unjust if it is inflicted on a minority that, as a result of being denied the right to vote, had no part in enacting or devising the law. Who can say that the legislature of Alabama which set up that state’s segregation laws was democratically elected? Throughout Alabama all sorts of devious methods are used to prevent Negroes from becoming registered voters, and there are some counties in which, even though Negroes constitute a majority of the population, not a single Negro is registered. Can any law enacted under such circumstances be considered democratically structured?

Sometimes a law is just on its face and unjust in its application. For instance, I have been arrested on a charge of parading without a permit. Now, there is nothing wrong in having an ordinance which requires a permit for a parade. But such an ordinance becomes unjust when it is used to maintain segregation and to deny citizens the First-Amendment privilege of peaceful assembly and protest.

I hope you are able to see the distinction I am trying to point out. In no sense do I advocate evading or defying the law, as would the rabid segregationist. That would lead to anarchy. One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law.

Of course, there is nothing new about this kind of civil disobedience. It was evidenced sublimely in the refusal of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego to obey the laws of Nebuchadnezzar, on the ground that a higher moral law was at stake. It was practiced superbly by the early Christians, who were willing to face hungry lions and the excruciating pain of chopping blocks rather than submit to certain unjust laws of the Roman Empire. To a degree, academic freedom is a reality today because Socrates practiced civil disobedience. In our own nation, the Boston Tea Party represented a massive act of civil disobedience.

We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was “legal” and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was “illegal.” It was “illegal” to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler’s Germany. Even so, I am sure that, had I lived in Germany at the time, I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers. If today I lived in a Communist country where certain principles dear to the Christian faith are suppressed, I would openly advocate disobeying that country’s antireligious laws.

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I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizens’ Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and that when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress. I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that the present tension in the South is a necessary phase of the transition from an obnoxious negative peace, in which the Negro passively accepted his unjust plight, to a substantive and positive peace, in which all men will respect the dignity and worth of human personality. Actually, we who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.

The question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love?

In your statement you assert that our actions, even though peaceful, must be condemned because they precipitate violence. But is this a logical assertion? Isn’t this like condemning a robbed man because his possession of money precipitated the evil act of robbery? Isn’t this like condemning Socrates because his unswerving commitment to truth and his philosophical inquiries precipitated the act by the misguided populace in which they made him drink hemlock? Isn’t this like condemning Jesus because his unique God-consciousness and never-ceasing devotion to God’s will precipitated the evil act of crucifixion? We must come to see that, as the federal courts have consistently affirmed, it is wrong to urge an individual to cease his efforts to gain his basic constitutional rights because the quest may precipitate violence. Society must protect the robbed and punish the robber.

I had also hoped that the white moderate would reject the myth concerning time in relation to the struggle for freedom. I have just received a letter from a white brother in Texas. He writes: “All Christians know that the colored people will receive equal rights eventually, but it is possible that you are in too great a religious hurry. It has taken Christianity almost two thousand years to accomplish what it has. The teachings of Christ take time to come to earth.” Such an attitude stems from a tragic misconception of time, from the strangely irrational notion that there is something in the very flow of time that will inevitably cure all ills. Actually, time itself is neutral; it can be used either destructively or constructively. More and more I feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than have the people of good will. We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people. Human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through the tireless efforts of men willing to be coworkers with God, and without this hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation. We must use time creatively, in the knowledge that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. Now is the time to lift our national policy from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of human dignity.

You speak of our activity in Birmingham as extreme. At first I was rather disappointed that fellow clergymen would see my nonviolent efforts as those of an extremist. I began thinking about the fact that I stand in the middle of two opposing forces in the Negro community. One is a force of complacency, made up in part of Negroes who, as a result of long years of oppression, are so drained of self-respect and a sense of “somebodiness” that they have adjusted to segregation; and in part of a few middle-class Negroes who, because of a degree of academic and economic security and because in some ways they profit by segregation, have become insensitive to the problems of the masses. The other force is one of bitterness and hatred, and it comes perilously close to advocating violence. It is expressed in the various black nationalist groups that are springing up across the nation, the largest and best known being Elijah Muhammad’s Muslim movement. Nourished by the Negro’s frustration over the continued existence of racial discrimination, this movement is made up of people who have lost faith in America, who have absolutely repudiated Christianity, and who have concluded that the white man is an incorrigible “devil.”

I have tried to stand between these two forces, saying that we need emulate neither the “do-nothingism” of the complacent nor the hatred and despair of the black nationalist. For there is the more excellent way of love and nonviolent protest. I am grateful to God that, through the influence of the Negro church, the way of nonviolence became an integral part of our struggle.

If this philosophy had not emerged, by now many streets of the South would, I am convinced, be flowing with blood. And I am further convinced that if our white brothers dismiss as “rabble-rousers” and “outside agitators” those of us who employ nonviolent direct action, and if they refuse to support our nonviolent efforts, millions of Negroes will, out of frustration and despair, seek solace and security in black-nationalist ideologies—a development that would inevitably lead to a frightening racial nightmare.

Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself, and that is what has happened to the American Negro. Something within has reminded him of his birthright of freedom, and something without has reminded him that it can be gained. Consciously or unconsciously, he has been caught up by the Zeitgeist, and with his black brothers of Africa and his brown and yellow brothers of Asia, South America and the Caribbean, the United States Negro is moving with a sense of great urgency toward the promised land of racial justice. If one recognizes this vital urge that has engulfed the Negro community, one should readily understand why public demonstrations are taking place. The Negro has many pent-up resentments and latent frustrations, and he must release them. So let him march; let him make prayer pilgrimages to the city hall; let him go on Freedom Rides—and try to understand why he must do so. If his repressed emotions are not released in nonviolent ways, they will seek expression through violence; this is not a threat but a fact of history. So I have not said to my people: “Get rid of your discontent.” Rather, I have tried to say that this normal and healthy discontent can be channeled into the creative outlet of nonviolent direct action. And now this approach is being termed extremist.

But though I was initially disappointed at being categorized as an extremist, as I continued to think about the matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label. Was not Jesus an extremist for love: “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.” Was not Amos an extremist for justice: “Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.” Was not Paul an extremist for the Christian gospel: “I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus.” Was not Martin Luther an extremist: “Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise, so help me God.” And John Bunyan: “I will stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my conscience.” And Abraham Lincoln: “This nation cannot survive half slave and half free.” And Thomas Jefferson: “We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal …” So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice? In that dramatic scene on Calvary’s hill three men were crucified. We must never forget that all three were crucified for the same crime—the crime of extremism. Two were extremists for immorality, and thus fell below their environment. The other, Jesus Christ, was an extremist for love, truth and goodness, and thereby rose above his environment. Perhaps the South, the nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.

A 1964 attempt to integrate a motel restaurant in St. Augustine, Florida, lands King in county jail. (Bettmann / Getty)

I had hoped that the white moderate would see this need. Perhaps I was too optimistic; perhaps I expected too much. I suppose I should have realized that few members of the oppressor race can understand the deep groans and passionate yearnings of the oppressed race, and still fewer have the vision to see that injustice must be rooted out by strong, persistent and determined action. I am thankful, however, that some of our white brothers in the South have grasped the meaning of this social revolution and committed themselves to it. They are still all too few in quantity, but they are big in quality. Some—such as Ralph McGill, Lillian Smith, Harry Golden, James McBride Dabbs, Anne Braden and Sarah Patton Boyle—have written about our struggle in eloquent and prophetic terms. Others have marched with us down nameless streets of the South. They have languished in filthy, roach-infested jails, suffering the abuse and brutality of policemen who view them as “dirty nigger-lovers.” Unlike so many of their moderate brothers and sisters, they have recognized the urgency of the moment and sensed the need for powerful “action” antidotes to combat the disease of segregation.

Let me take note of my other major disappointment. I have been so greatly disappointed with the white church and its leadership. Of course, there are some notable exceptions. I am not unmindful of the fact that each of you has taken some significant stands on this issue. I commend you, Reverend Stallings, for your Christian stand on this past Sunday, in welcoming Negroes to your worship service on a nonsegregated basis. I commend the Catholic leaders of this state for integrating Spring Hill College several years ago.

But despite these notable exceptions, I must honestly reiterate that I have been disappointed with the church. I do not say this as one of those negative critics who can always find something wrong with the church. I say this as a minister of the gospel, who loves the church; who was nurtured in its bosom; who has been sustained by its spiritual blessings and who will remain true to it as long as the cord of life shall lengthen.

When I was suddenly catapulted into the leadership of the bus protest in Montgomery, Alabama, a few years ago, I felt we would be supported by the white church. I felt that the white ministers, priests and rabbis of the South would be among our strongest allies. Instead, some have been outright opponents, refusing to understand the freedom movement and misrepresenting its leaders; all too many others have been more cautious than courageous and have remained silent behind the anesthetizing security of stained-glass windows.

In spite of my shattered dreams, I came to Birmingham with the hope that the white religious leadership of this community would see the justice of our cause and, with deep moral concern, would serve as the channel through which our just grievances could reach the power structure. I had hoped that each of you would understand. But again I have been disappointed.

I have heard numerous southern religious leaders admonish their worshipers to comply with a desegregation decision because it is the law, but I have longed to hear white ministers declare: “Follow this decree because integration is morally right and because the Negro is your brother.” In the midst of blatant injustices inflicted upon the Negro, I have watched white churchmen stand on the sideline and mouth pious irrelevancies and sanctimonious trivialities. In the midst of a mighty struggle to rid our nation of racial and economic injustice, I have heard many ministers say: “Those are social issues, with which the gospel has no real concern.” And I have watched many churches commit themselves to a completely otherworldly religion which makes a strange, un-Biblical distinction between body and soul, between the sacred and the secular.

I have traveled the length and breadth of Alabama, Mississippi and all the other southern states. On sweltering summer days and crisp autumn mornings I have looked at the South’s beautiful churches with their lofty spires pointing heavenward. I have beheld the impressive outlines of her massive religious—education buildings. Over and over I have found myself asking: “What kind of people worship here? Who is their God? Where were their voices when the lips of Governor Barnett dripped with words of interposition and nullification? Where were they when Governor Wallace gave a clarion call for defiance and hatred? Where were their voices of support when bruised and weary Negro men and women decided to rise from the dark dungeons of complacency to the bright hills of creative protest?”

Yes, these questions are still in my mind. In deep disappointment I have wept over the laxity of the church. But be assured that my tears have been tears of love. There can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love. Yes, I love the church. How could I do otherwise? I am in the rather unique position of being the son, the grandson and the great-grandson of preachers. Yes, I see the church as the body of Christ. But, oh! How we have blemished and scarred that body through social neglect and through fear of being nonconformists.

There was a time when the church was very powerful—in the time when the early Christians rejoiced at being deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed. In those days the church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society. Whenever the early Christians entered a town, the people in power became disturbed and immediately sought to convict the Christians for being “disturbers of the peace” and “outside agitators.” But the Christians pressed on, in the conviction that they were “a colony of heaven,” called to obey God rather than man. Small in number, they were big in commitment. They were too God-intoxicated to be “astronomically intimidated.” By their effort and example they brought an end to such ancient evils as infanticide and gladiatorial contests.

Things are different now. So often the contemporary church is a weak, ineffectual voice with an uncertain sound. So often it is an archdefender of the status quo. Far from being disturbed by the presence of the church, the power structure of the average community is consoled by the church’s silent—and often even vocal—sanction of things as they are.

But the judgment of God is upon the church as never before. If today’s church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century. Every day I meet young people whose disappointment with the church has turned into outright disgust.

Perhaps I have once again been too optimistic. Is organized religion too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our nation and the world? Perhaps I must turn my faith to the inner spiritual church, the church within the church, as the true ekklesia and the hope of the world. But again I am thankful to God that some noble souls from the ranks of organized religion have broken loose from the paralyzing chains of conformity and joined us as active partners in the struggle for freedom. They have left their secure congregations and walked the streets of Albany, Georgia, with us. They have gone down the highways of the South on tortuous rides for freedom. Yes, they have gone to jail with us. Some have been dismissed from their churches, have lost the support of their bishops and fellow ministers. But they have acted in the faith that right defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. Their witness has been the spiritual salt that has preserved the true meaning of the gospel in these troubled times. They have carved a tunnel of hope through the dark mountain of disappointment.

I hope the church as a whole will meet the challenge of this decisive hour. But even if the church does not come to the aid of justice, I have no despair about the future. I have no fear about the outcome of our struggle in Birmingham, even if our motives are at present misunderstood. We will reach the goal of freedom in Birmingham and all over the nation, because the goal of America is freedom. Abused and scorned though we may be, our destiny is tied up with America’s destiny. Before the pilgrims landed at Plymouth, we were here. Before the pen of Jefferson etched the majestic words of the Declaration of Independence across the pages of history, we were here. For more than two centuries our forebears labored in this country without wages; they made cotton king; they built the homes of their masters while suffering gross injustice and shameful humiliation—and yet out of a bottomless vitality they continued to thrive and develop. If the inexpressible cruelties of slavery could not stop us, the opposition we now face will surely fail. We will win our freedom because the sacred heritage of our nation and the eternal will of God are embodied in our echoing demands.

King’s fingerprints, taken on June 11, 1964, upon his arrest in St. Augustine, Florida. (Lincolnville Museum and Cultural Center)

Before closing I feel impelled to mention one other point in your statement that has troubled me profoundly. You warmly commended the Birmingham police force for keeping “order” and “preventing violence.” I doubt that you would have so warmly commended the police force if you had seen its dogs sinking their teeth into unarmed, nonviolent Negroes. I doubt that you would so quickly commend the policemen if you were to observe their ugly and inhumane treatment of Negroes here in the city jail; if you were to watch them push and curse old Negro women and young Negro girls; if you were to see them slap and kick old Negro men and young boys; if you were to observe them, as they did on two occasions, refuse to give us food because we wanted to sing our grace together. I cannot join you in your praise of the Birmingham police department.

It is true that the police have exercised a degree of discipline in handling the demonstrators. In this sense they have conducted themselves rather “nonviolently” in public. But for what purpose? To preserve the evil system of segregation. Over the past few years I have consistently preached that nonviolence demands that the means we use must be as pure as the ends we seek. I have tried to make clear that it is wrong to use immoral means to attain moral ends. But now I must affirm that it is just as wrong, or perhaps even more so, to use moral means to preserve immoral ends. Perhaps Mr. Connor and his policemen have been rather nonviolent in public, as was Chief Pritchett in Albany, Georgia, but they have used the moral means of non-violence to maintain the immoral end of racial injustice. As T. S. Eliot has said: “The last temptation is the greatest treason: To do the right deed for the wrong reason.”

I wish you had commended the Negro sit-inners and demonstrators of Birmingham for their sublime courage, their willingness to suffer and their amazing discipline in the midst of great provocation. One day the South will recognize its real heroes. They will be the James Merediths, with the noble sense of purpose that enables them to face jeering and hostile mobs, and with the agonizing loneliness that characterizes the life of the pioneer. They will be old, oppressed, battered Negro women, symbolized in a seventy-two-year-old woman in Montgomery, Alabama, who rose up with a sense of dignity and with her people decided not to ride segregated buses, and who responded with ungrammatical profundity to one who inquired about her weariness: “My feets is tired, but my soul is at rest.” They will be the young high school and college students, the young ministers of the gospel and a host of their elders, courageously and nonviolently sitting in at lunch counters and willingly going to jail for conscience sake. One day the South will know that when these disinherited children of God sat down at lunch counters, they were in reality standing up for what is best in the American dream and for the most sacred values in our Judaeo-Christian heritage, thereby bringing our nation back to those great wells of democracy which were dug deep by the founding fathers in their formulation of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.

Never before have I written so long a letter. I’m afraid it is much too long to take your precious time. I can assure you that it would have been much shorter if I had been writing from a comfortable desk, but what else can one do when he is alone in a narrow jail cell, other than write long letters, think long thoughts and pray long prayers?

If I have said anything in this letter that overstates the truth and indicates an unreasonable impatience, I beg you to forgive me. If I have said anything that understates the truth and indicates my having a patience that allows me to settle for anything less than brotherhood, I beg God to forgive me.

I hope this letter finds you strong in the faith. I also hope that circumstances will soon make it possible for me to meet each of you, not as an integrationist or a civil-rights leader but as a fellow clergyman and a Christian brother. Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear-drenched communities, and in some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.

Yours for the cause of Peace and Brotherhood,

Martin Luther King Jr.

This article appears in the special MLK issue print edition with the headline “Letter From Birmingham Jail” and was published in the August 1963 Atlantic as “The Negro Is Your Brother.“ © 1963 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., © renewed 1991 Coretta Scott King. All works by Martin Luther King Jr. have been reprinted by arrangement with the Heirs to the Estate of Martin Luther King Jr., care of Writers House as agent for the proprietor, New York, New York.

The Atlantic · by Martin Luther King Jr. · 

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Senior Fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Senior Advisor, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

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email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com