Korea has not been the only battleground since the end of the Second World War. Men have fought and died in Malaya, in Greece, in the Philippines, in Algeria and Cuba and Cyprus, and almost continuously on the Indo-Chinese Peninsula. No nuclear weapons have been fired. No massive nuclear retaliation has been considered appropriate. This is another type of war, new in its intensity, ancient in its origin--war by guerrillas, subversives, insurgents, assassins, war by ambush instead of by combat; by infiltration, instead of aggression, seeking victory by eroding and exhausting the enemy instead of engaging him. It is a form of warfare uniquely adapted to what has been strangely called "wars of liberation," to undermine the efforts of new and poor countries to maintain the freedom that they have finally achieved. It preys on economic unrest and ethnic conflicts. It requires in those situations where we must counter it, and these are the kinds of challenges that will be before us in the next decade if freedom is to be saved, a whole new kind of strategy, a wholly different kind of force, and therefore a new and wholly different kind of military training.

John F. Kennedy, 35th President of the U.S.

Remarks at West Point to the Graduating Class of the U.S. Military Academy, June 06, 1962

Informal Institute for National Security Thinkers and Practitioners

Quotes of the Day:

“It is only when you meet someone of a different culture from yourself that you begin to realize what your own beliefs really are."

– George Orwell

“It’s always good to act crazy first, because later you can appear normal.”

– Dr. Hunter S. Thompson

"Where success is concerned, people are not measured in inches, or pounds, or college degrees, or family back-ground; they are measured by the size of their thinking."

– David Schwartz

1. OSS Society puts awards dinner on the radar

2. How Oct. 7 Upended America’s Global Military Strategy

3. China Detains Employees at Apple iPhone Factory Run by Foxconn

4. Japan’s Ishiba and his Military Ambitions

5. U.S. Sees Opening to Sideline Hezbollah Politically in Lebanon

6. Taiwan Leader Urges Calm Amid Military Threats From Beijing

7. Netanyahu-Gallant rivalry complicates Israeli response to Iran attack

8. To attack enemy space capabilities, Army eyes doubling expert cadre

9. Sabotage: Protecting European Transportation Networks from Russia

10. Washington Misunderstands Crisis Communication With China

11. Congress Should Create an Economic Statecraft and Security Commission

12. EU advances $38 billion Ukraine loan plan tied to Russian assets

13. Propagandists keep trying to use ChatGPT, OpenAI report says

14. New Vision For Lift Fan Aircraft Family Grows From Special Operations X-Plane Program

15. Ukraine allies meeting postponed after Biden pulls out over Hurricane Milton

16. ‘Florida isn’t safe’: Ron DeSantis is unfit for hurricane response, activists say

17. Sweden Presents First NATO ‘Deterrence and Defense’ Plan

18. USS Boxer provides disaster relief after typhoon hits Philippines

19. Bridging the Gap: Why Conventional Forces Need Irregular Warfare Training

20. CSA's Articles of the Year (The Harding Project)

21. AI and Intelligence Analysis: Panacea or Peril?

22. The Age of Depopulation: Surviving a World Gone Gray

23. Confluence of Epic Hurricanes, Election Ensnare Military in Misinformation Deluge

1. OSS Society puts awards dinner on the radar

Sadly we have to honor LTG Hughes posthumously on 19 October at the awards dinner.. But we can take solace in that he knew he was being recognized.

You can still RSVP to attend HERE

OSS Society puts awards dinner on the radar

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2024/oct/9/inside-beltway-oss-society-puts-awards-dinner-on-r/

The annual William J. Donovan Awards Dinner honors the Office of Strategic Services — OSS — an agency created during World War II by U.S. Army Maj. Gen. William J. Donovan, shown here. It was the predecessor of the CIA … more >

By Jennifer Harper - The Washington Times - Wednesday, October 9, 2024

NEWS AND OPINION:

A unique and convivial gathering will take place on Oct. 19 in the nation’s capital.

That would be the annual William J. Donovan Awards Dinner — a well-attended event that honors the Office of Strategic Services, an agency created during World War II by Army Maj. Gen. William J. Donovan. It was the predecessor of the CIA and powered by some of America’s greatest unsung heroes who served at the “tip of the spear” in the nation’s defense.

The host of the event is the OSS Society, a charitable organization founded in 1947 by the aforementioned Gen. Donovan himself. There will be a three-course gourmet French meal and a tribute to chef Julia Child — who was an OSS veteran — and dancing to the music of the era.

The evening will commemorate the 80th anniversary of D-Day, the 75th anniversary of NATO’s founding and the liberation of the Hotel Ritz in Paris by Ernest Hemingway — whose son Jack served in the OSS. Col. David Bruce, London branch chief of the OSS, and members of the French Resistance also played hefty roles.

Arriving at the hotel on Aug. 25, 1944, Hemingway ordered approximately 50 dry martinis for those present at the time, according to historic accounts.

“The recipient of this year’s William J. Donovan Award was one of the most revered figures in the intelligence community who passed away on October 5th: Patrick Hughes former Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency and a retired U.S. Army officer,” the OSS Society said in a written statement shared with Inside the Beltway.

“After his passing, GovCon executive and veteran advocate Michael Bosco wrote that ’LTG Hughes embodied dedication, patriotism, and leadership, inspiring many within the intelligence and military communities. His legacy will endure through the people he mentored and the contributions he made to our nation.’ The award will be presented to him posthumously. Before he passed, General Hughes wrote an acceptance speech that will be delivered by Lieutenant General Donald L. Kerrick, U.S. Army (Ret.),” the OSS Society added.

The William J. Donovan Award® Dinner, the preeminent annual gathering of the U.S. intelligence and special operations communities, will be held in Washington, DC, on October 19, 2024. David Ignatius described it as a "wonderful celebration of our country at its best."

This year's recipient of the Donovan Award is former DIA director LTG Patrick Hughes, USA (Ret.). We will also honor Janet Braun, Medal of Honor recipient Col. Paris Davis, USA (Ret.), and former DDO Gregory Vogle. We will commemorate the 80th anniversaries of D-Day and the liberation of Paris.

Individual tickets can be purchased online by clicking here. If you or your company would like to be a sponsor of this year's dinner, you'll need to download the invitation by clicking here. (Click on the down arrow above the horizontal line in the upper right-hand portion of the screen.) Fill out the response form on pages five and six, save the invitation to your computer, and send it back by email, or by "snail mail" to the address below.

To reserve a room at the Ritz-Carlton, 1150 22nd Street NW, for October 18, 2024, and October 19, 2024, at the reduced price of $399 per night, call 202-835-0500 by September 20, 2024, and mention The OSS Society’s room block. Reservations can also be made online by clicking here.

Additional rooms are available on the same dates at the Washington Marriott Georgetown, 1221 22nd Street NW, for $229. Reservations can be made until September 27, 2024. Call 202-872-1500 and mention The OSS Society’s room block. Reservations can also be made online by clicking here.

If you cannot attend the dinner but would like to make a tax-deductible donation to The OSS Society to help us educate Americans about the importance of strategic intelligence and special operations to the preservation of freedom - and honor Americans who have served at the "tip of the spear" as our Nation's first line of defense since World War II - please click here. Thank you in advance for your generous support.

The OSS Society’s mission has never been more imperative.

2. How Oct. 7 Upended America’s Global Military Strategy

This is a very good read that does a good job of explaining the administration's strategy and how it has been "upended."

What should be debated is the highlight excerpt below. Has the US military demonstrated flexibility and "nimbleness?" Has the US demonstrated political will to sustain support for its strategic partner? Of course the real challenge or perhaps we should say, danger, is that the US cannot sustain the posture in perpetuity. (At least not without significant defense increases which is something that should be discussed).

Excerpts:

It was a plan that reflected the heightened priority the Trump and Biden administrations placed on deterring China and Russia in the years ahead. But it collided with the upsurge of violence in the Middle East that began last year on Oct. 7.

The war sparked by Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel in October 2023 that left 1,200 people dead quickly spread. As fighting flares across Lebanon, Gaza, Syria, Iraq, the Red Sea and Iran, many of the U.S. assumptions about how to cope with dangers in the Middle East tinderbox have been upended.

At the center of the new reality is the recognition that Israel, a nation that has long prized its independence but is now embroiled in conflicts on multiple fronts, has found itself increasingly dependent on the U.S. military. Over the past year, it has relied on supplies of American munitions, and benefited from U.S. help in shooting down enemy missiles and drones, as well as the rapid deployment of American naval and air forces to deter more substantial Iranian attacks.

...

Tough questions lie ahead for Israel as well. Hamas’s surprise attack last year has led many Israeli military analysts to conclude their government can’t be assured that it will receive early warning of an enemy attack and needs to have more forces in place to defend its frontiers.

“What the U.S. military demonstrated is that it is flexible and nimble enough to respond to a crisis and that the U.S. has the political will to sustain the increase in posture in support of a strategic partner,” said Dana Stroul, who left her post as the Pentagon’s top Middle East civilian official in December.

“The challenge is always going to be that the U.S. can’t sustain that posture in perpetuity,” she said.

How Oct. 7 Upended America’s Global Military Strategy

The plan was to shift forces to deal with China and Russia. It ran into Middle East headwinds.

https://www.wsj.com/politics/national-security/how-oct-7-upended-americas-global-military-strategy-9e288f96?mod=hp_lead_pos6

By Michael R. GordonFollow and Nancy A. YoussefFollow

Oct. 9, 2024 9:00 pm ET

After the U.S. fight against Islamic State wound down, the Pentagon came up with a recipe for keeping watch over the Middle East while using the bulk of its forces to deal with the greater threats it saw from China and Russia.

The U.S. would cut back its military presence in the region to a handful of ships, a couple of Air Force squadrons and a few thousand troops in Iraq and Syria. Carrier battle groups wouldn’t be stationed regularly in the region.

To augment American capabilities, the Pentagon would rely on naval and aerial drones to gather intelligence and lean on an emerging security collaboration among Israel and Arab states to combat threats from Iran. If things threatened to get out of hand, the Pentagon reasoned, it could always temporarily surge forces back into the region.

It was a plan that reflected the heightened priority the Trump and Biden administrations placed on deterring China and Russia in the years ahead. But it collided with the upsurge of violence in the Middle East that began last year on Oct. 7.

The war sparked by Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel in October 2023 that left 1,200 people dead quickly spread. As fighting flares across Lebanon, Gaza, Syria, Iraq, the Red Sea and Iran, many of the U.S. assumptions about how to cope with dangers in the Middle East tinderbox have been upended.

At the center of the new reality is the recognition that Israel, a nation that has long prized its independence but is now embroiled in conflicts on multiple fronts, has found itself increasingly dependent on the U.S. military. Over the past year, it has relied on supplies of American munitions, and benefited from U.S. help in shooting down enemy missiles and drones, as well as the rapid deployment of American naval and air forces to deter more substantial Iranian attacks.

Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system last month intercepting a rocket attack launched from Lebanon. Photo: Jim Urquhart/Reuters

An MH-60S Seahawk helicopter delivering cargo to the flight deck of aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, during a replenishment-at-sea. Photo: U.S. Navy

The U.S. has had to modify its strategic priorities to adapt. Struggling to head off an all-out Middle East war, the Pentagon has deployed two aircraft carrier battle groups to the region for much of the year. Twice, it has had to shift a carrier from the Pacific, leaving no carrier in Asia for weeks at a time. Before Hamas attacked Israel last year, the U.S. hadn’t planned to keep a carrier in the Middle East on a regular basis.

And while the Pentagon is hoping that further escalation can be avoided, some military experts say that a substantial American military role will be needed in the region for years to come.

“We’ve been trying to shoehorn events in the theater into a mental construct,” said retired Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie, a former head of the U.S. Central Command, which is responsible for the Middle East. “We need to recognize that if we want to actually have an effect on events in the theater and deter Iran, we are going to have to put forces into the region.”

Washington has pulled out the stops to come to Israel’s aid before. During the 1973 war, President Richard Nixon ordered the Pentagon to carry out Operation Nickel Grass—the largest aerial supply of weapons and supplies since the Berlin Airlift, when the U.S. flew supplies to areas of the German city that were under Allied control to get around a Soviet land blockade.

But a growing threat and the prolonged confrontation between Israel, Iran and the Iran-backed militias in Lebanon, Iraq, Gaza and Yemen have combined to present a new challenge for Washington.

The fast-flying ballistic missiles and evasive drones that are used by Iran and its regional proxies allow for limited reaction time and are more sophisticated than the dangers the U.S. and Israel confronted decades ago.

The open-ended conflicts also have gone on far longer than the wars Israel fought in the past, taxing its resources. The 2006 war against Hezbollah in Lebanon lasted 34 days, while the 2014 fight against Hamas in Gaza took 51 days. The current fight in Gaza has just entered its second year.

This wasn’t the Middle East the Pentagon anticipated when the Biden administration took office.

In the early months of the war, the U.S. stuck to the plan of surging in naval and air forces to stave off a wider war. But the commitments began to add up, turning what the Pentagon hoped would be a short-term crisis into an extended military presence.

In April, the U.S. and allied partners rushed to help defend Israel against an Iranian barrage of more than 300 missiles and drones. American F-15 and F-16 aircraft shot down dozens of Iranian drones that were heading toward Israel, while a U.S. destroyer fired an SM-3 missile to knock down a ballistic missile.

A U.S. Navy F/A-18F Super Hornet fighter aircraft launching from the flight deck of the USS Theodore Roosevelt on the Philippine Sea in April. Photo: Mcs Aaron Haro Gonzalez/U.S Navy/Zuma Press

Tensions soared in August following Israel’s killing of a top Hezbollah commander in Beirut and a Hamas political leader in Tehran. Concerned that Iran might attack Israel or U.S. forces before all of the reinforcements arrived, the Pentagon took the unusual step of advertising the presence in the region of the USS Georgia, a missile-carrying submarine whose undersea movements are generally kept secret.

To expedite the arrival of American forces and better position them to take action, U.S. commanders also ordered a dozen F/A-18 fighters and an E-2D Hawkeye surveillance plane to take off from the USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier and operate from a base in the Middle East.

All told, the U.S. has nearly doubled the number of fighter jets in the region over the past year, adding hundreds of airmen to support new squadrons of F-15E Strike Eagles, F-16s, A-10s and drones, the Pentagon has said.

The U.S. has also bolstered its air defense in Iraq, Syria and Saudi Arabia to protect its forces from attacks by Iranian-backed proxies, adding some of its much-demanded Patriots back into the region.

With Israel facing a continuing threat from Iran and its proxies, some former Israel officials said the country of about 10 million is increasingly dependent on Washington.

The Rise of Hezbollah in the Middle East

China Detains Employees at Apple iPhone Factory Run by Foxconn

Taiwan says investor confidence may be damaged after four Taiwanese are held

https://www.wsj.com/world/china/china-detains-employees-at-apple-iphone-factory-run-by-foxconn-c5f38f6d?mod=hp_lead_pos10

By Joyu Wang

Oct. 10, 2024 5:28 am ET

The Taiwanese employees worked at a complex run by Foxconn in Zhengzhou, China. Photo: ann wang/Reuters

TAIPEI—Four Taiwanese employees at Chinese facilities that make products for Apple have been detained by local authorities, Taiwanese officials said, the latest example of corporate detentions that have hurt business confidence.

The employees worked at a complex run by Taiwan’s Foxconn Technology Group in Zhengzhou, China, said Taiwanese agencies responsible for managing relations with China. One of the agencies said the employees were accused of an offense akin to breach of trust, although the exact nature of the allegations couldn’t be determined.

The Zhengzhou facility plays a central role in Apple’s iPhone supply chain and has sometimes been called iPhone City.

Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council, which handles policy toward Beijing, quoted Foxconn as saying that the company didn’t suffer any financial loss connected to the actions of the employees. Foxconn didn’t reply to a request for comment.

The council described the allegations as bizarre and said improper detention could severely damage investor confidence in China. It urged Chinese authorities to conduct a swift and transparent investigation into the matter.

The council in June upgraded its alert level for travel to China to the second-highest level, saying Taiwanese people should avoid nonessential trips. It said Beijing’s tightened national-security laws have led to Taiwanese citizens being illegally detained or interrogated.

The move came after China announced new rules targeting individuals it labels as “Taiwan independence die-hards,” threatening them with the death penalty. Taiwanese officials said such measures put many Taiwanese working in China at risk.

Taiwan’s semiofficial Straits Exchange Foundation said it has met with Foxconn and the families of the detainees and is helping them. The foundation handles business issues with China.

Representatives of the Zhengzhou police department couldn’t immediately be reached for comment. Apple didn’t reply to a request for comment.

In 2023, Foxconn faced an investigation by Chinese tax and land authorities, coinciding with a short-lived attempt by Foxconn founder Terry Gou to run for president of Taiwan. Foxconn later paid a small fine to one province’s tax authority.

Foreign businesses in China have been spooked by detentions in recent years. A Japanese pharmaceutical executive was formally arrested in October 2023 after being detained in March, while an Australian journalist was held for more than three years before her release last year.

Chinese officials have said they want to encourage foreign investment. In August, the Shanghai city government said one of its most pressing economic challenges was the hollowing out of the “fruit chain”—a reference to Apple’s move to diversify production of some electronics to countries such as India and Vietnam.

Write to Joyu Wang at joyu.wang@wsj.com

4. Japan’s Ishiba and his Military Ambitions

Excerpts:

In the long term, Ishiba will now have to put more emphasis on the home front rather than on the international one. The LDP faces upper-house elections in the middle of next year. The previous general election, which the LDP won comfortably although with a reduced presence in the Diet, was held in October 2021. The party has been in power since 1955 with two breaks, having overseen the country’s recovery from World War II, the country's economic miracle, and its post-1990 stagnation.

The party was hit with a scandal that drove Kishida from power and somewhat tarnished its standing. With 13 newcomers in his 20-member cabinet, Ishiba will be gambling that the fresh faces will help to stem further losses in the upcoming snap election. Ishiba’s party support base is small and he inherits a divided party. Initial polls after the inauguration of the new cabinet gave its approval ratings of just over 50 percent, well below that of its predecessors He faces an economy that deteriorated in the first quarter but is likely to feature stronger wage growth and moderating inflation, expected to boost consumer spending along with a weak currency likely to drive export growth.

Defense/Security

Japan’s Ishiba and his Military Ambitions

https://www.asiasentinel.com/p/japan-shigeru-ishiba-military-ambitions?utm

His Asian NATO plan is a nonstarter but there are other gambits

Oct 10, 2024

∙ Paid

By: Rupakjyoti Borah

The sun also rises. Photo from JMSDF

Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba’s plan for an Asian counterpart to the 32-member North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), one of the most controversial ideas he put forth during his electoral campaign, as expected has run into rough weather even before it takes off. His new foreign minister Takeshi Iwaya downplayed the proposal, telling a press conference that “it’s one idea for the future" among a range of efforts designed to improve regional security.

The Biden administration in Washington, DC last week called it “premature” and said there are no plans to do so. NATO is a military alliance and an attack on any one member of NATO will automatically trigger Article 5 which “provides that if a NATO Ally is the victim of an armed attack, each and every other member of the Alliance will consider this act of violence as an armed attack against all members and will take the actions it deems necessary to assist the Ally attacked.” No nation in Asia wants any part of such an arrangement.

But that doesn’t mean there won’t be an energetic defense policy. The 67-year-old Ishiba is a one-time defense minister and director general of Japan’s Defense Agency and is known as a defense geek, and is somewhat more bellicose than most of his predecessors in a country pacifist by nature since its defeat in World War II. He has included two former defense ministers in his new cabinet, signaling that he is taking security threats from China, Russia, and North Korea with the utmost seriousness, and has argued for an expanded nuclear umbrella in Asia.

Certainly one of Japan’s biggest challenges is on the North Korean front where China is a useful actor, including for Japan since China has substantial, although hardly total, levels of influence on Pyongyang. He presented his NATO idea in a commentary for the Hudson Institute in the US and has also proposed that Japanese troops be stationed in American territory. While the latter could certainly be considered, the fact remains that more or less Japanese society seems to be antipathetic to the idea.

For one thing, Ishiba is hardly politically stable, having called for elections later this month in a bid to shore up his standing within the ruling Liberal Democratic Party. His victory in the LDP presidential elections came after an acrimonious intra-party contest in which nine candidates entered the fray, in which he narrowly defeated Sanae Takaichi, who is seen as the late former PM Shinzo Abe’s intellectual successor. This was his fifth challenge for the leadership – the most of any pretender to the LDP throne, an indication of the internal opposition he has previously faced in the party despite his popularity with the LDP’s grassroots and outside the party, on which he hopes to capitalize in the upcoming polls. The fact that the presidential elections went into a run-off itself means that there was substantial opposition to his candidature.

If Ishiba survives the national polls on October 27, which he is favored to do, he is likely to find other foreign policy running room, including taking a more energetic role in the Japan-US alliance signed in San Francisco in 1951, although the joker in the deck is the outcome of the US Presidential election on November 5. Should former President Donald Trump win, all bets are off because of Trump’s unpredictability. Vice President Kamala Harris will likely stay in lockstep with outgoing President Biden’s policies.

In any case, Japan has room to maneuver in Asia where the US is stretched elsewhere by wars in Ukraine and the Middle East. Washington would welcome policy assistance with breakaway Taiwan in its campaign to divorce from Beijing although that would likely goad Beijing to unleash economic retribution against the thousands of 20,000 Japanese small and medium enterprises doing business on the mainland.

Japan under Ishiba’s immediate predecessors expanded reciprocal access agreements with Australia, the U.K., and the Philippines and increasingly involved the country in defense maneuvers in the South China Sea. The country is a member of the four-member Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, which is not a military alliance, and which in its most recent meeting with President Joe Biden in September couldn’t bring itself to issue a strong communique mentioning China, as Asia Sentinel reported on October 8. While the Quad, which also includes Australia, India and the US, has been getting stronger in the last couple of years with the grouping having meetings at the highest levels, it is hardly spoiling to become a fully-fledged defense treaty organization.

Ishiba makes his international debut at this week's ASEAN Summit in Laos and will attend the ASEAN-Japan Summit on October 10. ASEAN, built on consensus, has no intention of wading into a military alliance since they have close relations with China, especially on the economic front and it is worth noting that all the ASEAN countries have joined the China-led Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

In addition, there are many problems that need to be addressed at home like the economy and the fact that Japan has a declining population. In addition, the issue of rural depopulation needs to be addressed. During the administration of the former Japanese PM, Fumio Kishida, Tokyo decided to increase its defense budget to 2 percent of its GDP by 2027, which is a big leap forward for Japan. In addition, it is also not clear how much support is there for the Asian NATO concept even within the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP)

What in the long term

In the long term, Ishiba will now have to put more emphasis on the home front rather than on the international one. The LDP faces upper-house elections in the middle of next year. The previous general election, which the LDP won comfortably although with a reduced presence in the Diet, was held in October 2021. The party has been in power since 1955 with two breaks, having overseen the country’s recovery from World War II, the country's economic miracle, and its post-1990 stagnation.

The party was hit with a scandal that drove Kishida from power and somewhat tarnished its standing. With 13 newcomers in his 20-member cabinet, Ishiba will be gambling that the fresh faces will help to stem further losses in the upcoming snap election. Ishiba’s party support base is small and he inherits a divided party. Initial polls after the inauguration of the new cabinet gave its approval ratings of just over 50 percent, well below that of its predecessors He faces an economy that deteriorated in the first quarter but is likely to feature stronger wage growth and moderating inflation, expected to boost consumer spending along with a weak currency likely to drive export growth.

Dr Rupakjyoti Borah is a Senior Research Fellow with the Japan Forum for Strategic Studies. The views expressed here are personal.

5. U.S. Sees Opening to Sideline Hezbollah Politically in Lebanon

Wishful thinking? Can you kill the "idea" (ideology) behind Hezbollah?

I am reminded of Medgar Evers' great quote though he meant it in a very positive way and not in the negative way I am using it.

"You can kill a man, but you can't kill an idea." —Medgar Evers

U.S. Sees Opening to Sideline Hezbollah Politically in Lebanon

Biden administration seeks government free of militants’ influence in wake of Israeli strikes

https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/lebanon-government-us-hezbollah-sideline-ab73290d?mod=hp_lead_pos5

By Jared MalsinFollow, Summer SaidFollow and Adam Chamseddine

Oct. 9, 2024 9:00 pm ET

BEIRUT—The Biden administration is pushing to use Israel’s offensive against Hezbollah as an opening to end the militant group’s long-running dominance by electing a new Lebanese president, U.S. and Arab officials familiar with the discussions said.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken called the leaders of Qatar, Egypt and Saudi Arabia in recent days to ask them to support the election of a new Lebanese president. Senior White House official Amos Hochstein has also told Arab officials that the weakening of Hezbollah by Israeli attacks should be viewed as an opportunity to potentially break a political impasse. The country’s political parties have been unable to agree on a new president since the previous leader, Michel Aoun, left office at the end of his term in 2022.

The U.S. initiative aims to address frustrations with years of ineffective government that have prevented reforms and entrenched the power of Lebanon’s political elites, including Hezbollah, which is also an influential political party. The effort marks a shift away from the administration’s calls just weeks ago for an immediate cease-fire, and some in the country and region fear pressing to empower a candidate now could set off the sort of sectarian fighting that has torn apart the country in recent decades.

“What we want to see come out of this situation, ultimately, is Lebanon able to break the grip that Hezbollah has had on the country—more than a grip, break the stranglehold that Hezbollah has had on the country and remove Hezbollah veto over a president,” State Department spokesman Matt Miller told reporters this week.

Years of U.S.-backed efforts to impose reforms on Lebanon’s system of government have led to few changes. The country’s society is fractured by sectarian and political divisions that were entrenched during French occupation following World War I, with elites from its major groups—Sunni Muslims, Shia Muslims, Christians and Druze—divvying up government portfolios.

The U.S. initiative to push Hezbollah from power has support from Saudi Arabia, said Saudi officials familiar with the matter. The oil-rich Persian Gulf country until recent years had played a large role in shaping the political and economic course of Lebanon.

U.S. special envoy Amos Hochstein, left, meeting with Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati in Beirut in August. Photo: anwar amro/AFP/Getty Images

The U.S. initiative hinges on key Lebanese leaders including Prime Minister Najib Mikati and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, the leader of another Shiite faction and a key conduit to Hezbollah in cease-fire negotiations, who will be needed to bring Lebanon’s political factions together to elect a new president, according to diplomats familiar with recent discussions. Lebanon’s president is the commander in chief of the armed forces and is seen as being a key to putting in place an empowered Lebanese government that could better handle the current crisis.

Mikati and Berri last week said they supported the election of a new president, but have also expressed appreciation for Hezbollah in its battle against Israeli forces. Hezbollah’s de facto leader, Deputy Secretary-General Naim Qassem, this week rejected calls for a political rearrangement while the war with Israel is ongoing.

Lebanon’s president is elected by the country’s 128-member parliament, where no single bloc has the seats to choose a new leader on its own. Without the support of Hezbollah and its allies, it isn’t clear how a political consensus would come together.

Officials from Egypt and Qatar—which have played a key role in cease-fire negotiations in both Gaza and Lebanon—told U.S. officials they view the American plan as unrealistic and even dangerous. In talks with U.S. officials, they have argued that Israel will never succeed in destroying Hezbollah and that the group must be a part of any political settlement to the conflict.

Egypt has also expressed the concern that trying to meddle in Lebanese politics during the crisis could heighten the risk of internecine fighting in a country that suffered a debilitating civil war that ended in 1990. Many of the country’s political factions are led by former warlords from that conflict.

Anyone seen as taking power as a result of Israel’s attacks on Lebanon could face blowback from the Lebanese public and rival political forces, political analysts and diplomats said.

When Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982 in a campaign against the Palestine Liberation Organization, it backed the election of a new president, Bachir Gemayel, the Maronite Christian leader of the far-right Lebanese Forces. He was assassinated weeks after taking office.

Solders in 1984 drive though the streets of war-torn Beirut and pass by a portrait of Bachir Gemayel, a president of Lebanon who was assassinated in 1982. Photo: Peter Charlesworth/LightRocket/Getty Images

“The more a new Lebanese president is seen to have come to office on the coattails of Israeli military actions with American support, the more discredited I think he will be among many Lebanese,” said Robert Ford, a former U.S. ambassador to Syria and Algeria.

Lebanon’s lack of a president has left it with only a caretaker government for the past two years, a leadership vacuum that has worsened the country’s economic crisis, which began in 2019 and which the World Bank says is one of the worst in the past century and a half. The implosion of Lebanon’s economy pushed millions of people into poverty and left the state ill-equipped to handle the crisis brought on by the current war.

Government institutions have been hollowed out by years of corruption and political deadlock. Parliament hasn’t met since May. The Lebanese currency has lost 97% of its value against the U.S. dollar since 2019, rendering government salaries all but worthless. Many Lebanese had learned to cope with almost no government electricity, relying instead on private generators. The Lebanese army, which receives some aid from the U.S., is weaker than Hezbollah.

Israel’s escalating attacks on Hezbollah—including a ground offensive and more than 3,000 airstrikes over the past four weeks—have uprooted as many as a million people from their homes, the government says. More than 2,000 people have been killed in Lebanon since the fighting began last year, most of them since Israel intensified its campaign against Hezbollah in September.

“If the war escalates, we will go back to the dark ages,” said Amin Salam, the Lebanese minister of economy and trade.

A man driving a car loaded with belongings while fleeing Beirut’s Dahiyeh neighborhood last week. Photo: Manu Brabo for WSJ

“We have little remaining telecommunications still functioning, and our ports and airports, if those get hit, we will be a country with no internet, no communications, no entry or exit point. We will be a deserted island,” he told The Wall Street Journal.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday called on the Lebanese people to take action to get rid of Hezbollah.

“You have an opportunity to save Lebanon before it falls into the abyss of a long war that will lead to destruction and suffering like we see in Gaza. It doesn’t have to be that way,” he said. “You can now take back your country.”

The Rise of Hezbollah in the Middle East

Taiwan Leader Urges Calm Amid Military Threats From Beijing

Lai Ching-te, who China accuses of separatism, says Beijing has no right to represent Taiwan

https://www.wsj.com/world/china/taiwan-leader-urges-calm-amid-military-threats-from-beijing-a4d614fa?mod=latest_headlines

By Joyu Wang

Follow in Taipei and Austin Ramzy

Follow in Hong Kong

Oct. 10, 2024 7:13 am ET

Five months ago, China greeted the inauguration of Taiwan’s president, Lai Ching-te, with combat drills that encircled the island and the threat of more to come.

So when Lai gave a major speech Thursday, Beijing and Washington were listening to just how forcefully he would address Taiwan’s relationship with China, which claims the self-ruled island as its own.

Lai reasserted his stance on Taiwan’s sovereignty, and that Beijing had no right to represent it, but his comments directed at China were also a call for calm.

“Taiwan is determined to maintain peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait and achieve global security and prosperity,” Lai said in a national address marking the origins of the Republic of China, the official name for the government in Taipei that once ruled all of China. “It is also willing to work with China to respond to climate change, prevent infectious diseases, maintain regional security, pursue peace and common prosperity, and bring benefits to people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait.”

Taiwanese security officials said this week that they expected China to launch new drills in response to Lai’s speech, regardless of what the Taiwanese leader said. At his inauguration in May, Lai said that China and Taiwan “are not subordinate to each other,” comments that likely riled Beijing.

Soldiers stood in front of a Taiwan flag ahead of National Day celebrations in Taipei. Photo: ann wang/Reuters

The Chinese military said its drills in May were “strong punishment for the separatist acts.” The exercises showed how it might encircle and strangle the island with a blockade.

Lai said Thursday that Taiwan would continue to resist such pressure.

“The People’s Republic of China has no right to represent Taiwan,” Lai said, referring to the government in Beijing, which claims Taiwan as part of its sovereign territory, despite having never ruled it. “We’ve overcome challenge after challenge, yet the Republic of China has always stood strong, and the people of Taiwan have remained resilient.”

In Beijing, Mao Ning, a spokeswoman for China’s foreign ministry, shot back at Lai, rejecting any assertion of Taiwan’s sovereignty. “Taiwan has never been a country and will never be a country,” she said during a regular daily briefing.

The back-and-forth between the two sides is keeping tensions high in what is a vital piece of the U.S. security puzzle in the Pacific.

Lai’s predecessor, Tsai Ing-wen, was largely credited with a cautious approach that gave Beijing little opportunity to lash out, even as she and Lai’s Democratic Progressive Party have largely been skeptical about closer ties with China. Lai, who comes from a wing of the party that has at times favored independence, has sought to project a similar message of calm, analysts said.

“The takeaway message is that Taiwan under President Lai has no plans to rock any boats,” said Wen-ti Sung, a Taipei-based nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Global China Hub. “Taiwan wants to project an image of continuity and stability as manifested in increasingly pragmatic rhetoric from the Lai administration over the issue of China.”

Performers during celebrations in Taipei on Thursday. Photo: An Rong Xu/Bloomberg News

In a background briefing with reporters after Lai’s speech, a Taiwanese official described the address as an olive branch to China, citing Lai’s professed willingness to work with Beijing on various issues despite ongoing military pressure.

The U.S. has called on China not to respond with further military exercises.

“These are routine domestically focused addresses that have historically prompted little response from Beijing. This year should be no different,” a U.S. official said after Thursday’s speech. “We see no justification for a routine annual celebration to be used as a pretext for military exercises. We urge Beijing to act with restraint.”

The uncertainty is set to continue as Lai settles into a four-year term that stretches into 2028 and American voters elect a new president in November.

The U.S., which maintains a robust but unofficial relationship with Taiwan, is required by law to sell weapons to the island for its self-defense, but whether Washington is obliged to defend the island from Chinese invasion has been ambiguous.

President Biden has said that the U.S. military would step up in Taiwan’s defense, and Vice President Kamala Harris hasn’t indicated that she would take a different approach if elected to succeed him.

Her opponent, former President Donald Trump, has repeatedly questioned the benefit of supporting Taiwan and called on the island to spend more on its own defense.

“If Harris wins, then what I think we’re going to see is continuity,” said Lev Nachman, a political scientist who teaches at National Taiwan University in Taipei. “But if Donald Trump is elected, we’re going to get sort of the opposite, where we’re going to get a lot of risk and uncertainty.”

Lai secured the presidency this year by defeating two opposition candidates who campaigned for closer ties with China. For the first time, his Democratic Progressive Party, which maintains the more skeptical approach to China shown by the new president, is in a third consecutive term in power, reflecting in part heightened fears of a Chinese invasion.

A large screen in Beijing showed news that China’s military had started a two-day drill around Taiwan in May. Photo: Kyodonews/Zuma Press

Lai set the stage for his Thursday address at a weekend event in front of a stadium full of spectators in Taipei as part of the celebrations ahead of National Day, which commemorates a 1911 uprising that led to the end of Chinese imperial rule and the 1912 establishment of the Republic of China.

“The People’s Republic of China can never be the motherland of the people of the Republic of China,” Lai said at the event on Saturday. “The Republic of China has been rooted in Taiwan…for 75 years, so I don’t see the need to keep discussing this relationship,” he said.

A spokeswoman for Beijing’s Taiwan Affairs Office called Lai’s remarks a “historical paradox,” claiming he was pushing for independence and had “evil intentions.”

China has made its own position evident through regular air and naval exercises around the island. People’s Liberation Army aircraft now regularly conduct drills across a so-called median line in the Taiwan Strait, the 100-mile-wide waterway between China and Taiwan, that they once rarely crossed.

The day before Lai’s Thursday address, the PLA conducted its 35th “combat patrol drill” around Taiwan this year, the 19th such exercises since Lai took office in May. At least 20 warplanes and warships were sent near Taiwanese airspace and waters on Wednesday, Taiwan’s defense ministry said.

Beijing also now regularly dispatches warships to points surrounding Taiwan, about eight each day, twice the average before March, said Chieh Chung, a defense analyst and assistant professor at Taiwan’s Tamkang University.

Last month, China tested an intercontinental ballistic missile carrying dummy warheads over the Pacific, the first such launch in more than four decades and one that analysts regarded as a warning to the U.S. about intervening in any potential conflict over Taiwan.

Dancers dressed in inflatable military costumes took part in National Day celebrations in Taipei on Thursday. Photo: An Rong Xu/Bloomberg News

Despite the tensions and Chinese military activity, half of Taiwan’s public believes that a war with China isn’t imminent, though many view Chinese aggression as a significant threat to Taiwan’s security, a recent poll indicated.

About 62% of respondents in the poll conducted by Taiwan’s military-backed Institute for National Defense and Security Research said they don’t believe a Chinese invasion is likely within the next five years. More than 70% said closer ties with the U.S. and Japan could enhance Taiwan’s security, but only about half said they believed the U.S. would directly intervene if war breaks out over Taiwan.

Hsu Ching-neng, a 55-year-old civil servant who lives in New Taipei City, dismissed threats from China, saying that closer ties between Taiwan and sympathetic countries in the region could work as a deterrence against Chinese aggression.

“Even if we kiss up to China and try to make peace, it’ll still want to invade us no matter what,” Hsu said while attending the National Day ceremony in front of the Presidential Office on Thursday.

For 47-year-old Cheng Kai-len, a pharmacist from New Taipei, it is more pressing for the new president to focus on domestic and economic issues such as the low birthrate—a challenge that leaders on both sides of the Taiwan Strait are wrestling with.

Write to Joyu Wang at joyu.wang@wsj.com and Austin Ramzy at austin.ramzy@wsj.com

7. Netanyahu-Gallant rivalry complicates Israeli response to Iran attack

The challenges of a parliamentary system? Israel certainly does not need this kind of friction of what should be the equivalent of the US national command authority (i.e., President & SECDEF).

Netanyahu-Gallant rivalry complicates Israeli response to Iran attack

Divisions inside the Israeli government, as well as between Netanyahu and the White House, are converging at a critical moment for the Middle East.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/10/09/netanyahu-biden-gallant-israel-iran/

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant at a news conference in Tel Aviv in 2023. (Abir Sultan/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock/Pool/Reuters)

By Steve Hendrix and Shira Rubin

October 9, 2024 at 12:58 p.m. EDT

JERUSALEM — There was nothing surprising about the meeting planned Wednesday in Washington between the Israeli defense minister and his American counterpart until Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu abruptly blocked the trip hours before takeoff — exposing tensions not just between the two governments but also between Netanyahu and his own defense chief. And not for the first time.

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin have met or spoken more than 80 times over the last year, but their latest consultation was scheduled at a particularly delicate moment, as the region braced for Israel to respond to Tehran’s Oct. 1 missile attack, possibly before the Yom Kippur holiday begins Friday.

Now divisions inside the Israeli government and across the Atlantic are converging, with Netanyahu apparently incensed over his lack of direct contact with President Joe Biden and a cabinet rivalry overshadowing Israel’s security deliberations.

People check out with the remains of an Iranian missile near the Dead Sea, south of the Israeli city of Arad, on Thursday. (Heidi Levine for The Washington Post)

“Netanyahu is clearly trying to assert control and weaken Gallant to the point where it could weaken the relationship with the United States,” said Chuck Freilich, former deputy head of Israel’s National Security Council and senior researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv.

Gallant hails from Netanyahu’s own Likud party, but the two have found themselves frequently at odds as Israel’s war has expanded from Gaza to Yemen to Lebanon and now, possibly, to Iran.

Following World news

Following

The two have publicly split on numerous key strategic decisions, including the timing of a cease-fire and hostage deal with Hamas as well as a potential role for the Palestinian Authority in the future governance of Gaza. But Gallant is also seen as a future rival for party leadership, which political observers said is likely to have played a role in the last-minute grounding of his flight to Washington.

Netanyahu — who has an increasingly fractured relationship with Biden and, until Wednesday, hadn’t spoken with him in almost two months — was not pleased with Gallant’s solo trip, believing the White House was attempting to go around him and discuss the response to Iran directly with his defense minister, according to two Israeli officials familiar with the situation. Like others in this article, they spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.

“The prevailing assessment is that Netanyahu is afraid that Biden might give Gallant credit, and wants to show his political base within the Likud that he is keeping Gallant from coordinating with the Americans,” Itamar Eichner, a military correspondent for the daily Yedioth Ahronoth, wrote Wednesday.

Israel is preparing to hit back at Tehran for last week’s barrage of almost 200 ballistic missiles, killing a Palestinian in the West Bank and hitting at least two military bases.

Israeli hawks are pushing for a massive response, including possible strikes on Iran’s nuclear research sites or oil production facilities. Moderates and the Biden administration are lobbying for a more measured retaliation, hoping to avoid an all-out regional war.

The unexpected order to block Tuesday’s flight came directly from Netanyahu, an Israeli official said, and would not be lifted until his two conditions had been met: that Netanyahu and Biden talk by phone, and that the Israeli security cabinet vote to approve a military strike on Iran.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin at the Pentagon on June 25. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

The prime minister has been expecting a one-on-one call with Biden for days, the official said, and the two leaders finally spoke Wednesday, according to a statement from the prime minister’s office.

The call had been on Biden’s schedule for several days, a person familiar with his schedule said. Pentagon officials said Gallant’s meeting with Austin could still occur this week.

“Netanyahu is saying, ‘If I can’t talk to Biden, I will not allow my defense minister to do it,’” said Yossi Melman, a longtime intelligence columnist for the Haaretz newspaper. “I’m sure that Gallant will eventually go to Washington ... but the relations are awful.”

Biden’s team denied Tuesday that the president was avoiding a conversation with Netanyahu. But his irritation with the prime minister is no secret, following months in which Israel has largely brushed aside U.S. efforts to broker a cease-fire in Gaza and has carried out major strikes or operations in Lebanon, Syria and Tehran without warning American officials.

“No administration has helped Israel more than I have,” Biden told reporters Friday. “None. None. None. And I think Bibi should remember that,” he added, using Netanyahu’s nickname.

Washington has urged Israel not to target Iran’s oil or nuclear facilities. That was expected to be part of discussions Wednesday with Gallant, who has formed a close working relationship with Austin. They talk so often that it’s become a common joke in Israeli security circles that Gallant gets along better with Austin than he does with Netanyahu.

Gallant’s and Netanyahu’s offices declined to comment.

The bad blood between the two goes back at least to March last year. Netanyahu attempted to fire Gallant when he raised concerns about the government’s campaign to overhaul Israel’s judicial system, citing the turmoil it was creating in the military. The prime minister was forced to back down in the face of massive street protests, and the two have served together, uneasily, ever since.

Gallant has not publicly staked out his views on the scope of a potential Iran strike, but he has built a reputation as one of the only members of the security cabinet willing to publicly challenge the prime minister.

“Gallant is one of the few moderate voices,” said Melman, who wrote a book about Iran’s nuclear program. “You can assume that he is very attentive to the American requests.”

In April, after a previous missile and drone attack by Iran that was largely intercepted, Israel acceded to U.S. advice to “take the win” — carrying out a largely symbolic strike that did limited damage to an Iranian air defense unit.

In recent months, Israel has inflicted heavy blows on Hezbollah, Iran’s largest and most strategically significant armed proxy. Israel blew up the group’s electronic devices in mid-September; less than two weeks later, it assassinated Hezbollah leader Hasan Nasrallah. Last week, Israeli troops invaded southern Lebanon for the first time since 2006.

Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations, Amir Saeid Iravani, described the country’s latest missile attack as an attempt “to restore balance and deterrence.” But it could just as easily pull Tehran into the kind of direct confrontation that analysts say it has long sought to avoid.

As Israel mulls how to retaliate, various options are on the table, each fraught with complications.

Hitting Iranian oil fields could send global energy prices soaring on the eve of the U.S. election and spark retaliatory attacks from other Iranian-backed groups on oil installations operated by American allies in the Persian Gulf.

It is unclear how much Israel could do on its own to meaningfully damage Iran’s nuclear program, since most of the infrastructure was moved dozens of meters underground after 2021, when Israel purportedly targeted the Natanz nuclear compound near Isfahan, according to Beni Sabti, a researcher in the Iran program at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv.

“Big explosions look good on television,” Sabti said. “But it is not clear that it would send the necessary message.”

But it remains a popular option for Israeli hard-liners, including former prime minister Naftali Bennett.

“If not now, when?” Bennett said Tuesday on X. “NOW is the time to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities and regime.”

Freilich, the former national security official, said the desire to eliminate Iran’s nuclear threat is widespread in Israeli security circles. But he and other military experts agreed the country would need the United States — and it would be in Israel’s interest to wait until Washington is more open to helping.

“I think Israel has to keep a lid on things until after the U.S. election,” Freilich said. “And then there is the potential to hit the nuclear sites.”

Rubin reported from Tel Aviv. Karen DeYoung in Washington contributed to this report.

By Steve Hendrix

Steve Hendrix has been the Washington Post's Jerusalem bureau chief since 2019. He came to the Post in 2000 and has written for just about every section of the paper: Foreign, National, Metro, Style, Travel, the Magazine. He has reported from the Middle East, Europe, Africa, Asia, the Americas and most corners of the United States.follow on X @SBHendrix

By Shira Rubin

Shira Rubin is a reporter for The Washington Post based in Tel Aviv. She covers news from Israel, the Palestinian territories and the region, with a focus on politics, culture, science and women's health.follow on X @shira_rubin

8. To attack enemy space capabilities, Army eyes doubling expert cadre

Note the multi-domain graphic form FM 3-0 at the link: https://breakingdefense.com/2024/10/to-attack-enemy-space-capabilities-army-eyes-doubling-expert-cadre/?mc_cid=04970a9465&mc_eid=70bf478f36

To attack enemy space capabilities, Army eyes doubling expert cadre - Breaking Defense

"We're very much complimentary to the Space Force and to the other services, but we truly do see space as that critical component to set the theater well in advance of phase one operations," Col. Donald Brooks, commandant of the Space and Missile Defense Center of Excellence, told Breaking Defense. "When the first round is shot, the missile is shot, space needs to be there months, if not years, in advance to help set those conditions."

breakingdefense.com · by Theresa Hitchens · October 9, 2024

Two British Army Special Operations Brigade soldiers, left, and a Soldier with the US Army 18th Space Company, 1st Space Brigade, right, guard a small tactical vehicle equipped with a miniaturized tactical space system during Project Convergence Capstone 4 experimentation at White Sands Missile Range, Feb. 28, 2024. (US Army photo by Brooke Nevins)

WASHINGTON — The Army could more than double the number of soldiers with expertise in space operations if top brass approves a proposal by Army Space and Missile Defense Command (SMDC) to implement the service’s new(ish) space vision, according to SMDC officials.

The idea is to create a new space-centered military occupational specialty, called “40D Space MOS,” that for the first time would include non-commissioned officers, Col. Mark Cobos, head of SMDC’s 1st Space Brigade, told Breaking Defense on the cusp of the annual Association of the US Army (AUSA) conference.

Right now, he explained, only about 500 commissioned officers have space specialities, with another 874 enlisted soldiers essentially being “borrowed” from other specialty units such as intelligence or air defense for short periods of three to four years. The new MOS is envisioned to initially include “upwards of 1,800 billets” for enlisted personnel by fiscal 2030. The plan also would bolster the officer corps up to some 800 by FY32.

SMDC is hoping for a decision from Army leadership by the end of October, Cobos added, although obviously the command hasn’t any authority on the timeline.

What’s The Army Doing In Space?

The Army long has had officers specializing in space under its F40 designation given that, as officials are always keen to point out, the service is the biggest military user of space capabilities. The new plan to pump up space personnel has two goals, SMDC officials explained.

First, more operators are needed to help the land service ensure that crucial satellite communications (SATCOM) and positioning, timing and navigation (PNT) capabilities are available during conflict. This includes, for example, acquiring commercial SATCOM services to augment limited military satellite access.

Second, and perhaps more importantly, trained soldiers are needed to run offensive operations against enemy satellite capabilities deep inside hostile territory. For example, this could include deploying small numbers of soldiers far forward with mobile jamming equipment.

Cobos noted that 1st Space Brigade soldiers already are starting to train in realistic environments where space operations are taking place “within hand grenade range” of enemy forces. In a recent exercise, he said, a 1st Space Brigade soldier “conducted a high altitude, low opening (HALO) tandem parachute jump with the 10th Special Forces Group at the National Training Center” to practice penetrating deep into enemy territory to conduct counterspace activities — though he did not provide details related to the secret squirrel-style exercise.

The two “principle bullets” in the “Army Space Vision Supporting Multidomain Operations [PDF]” published in January stipulate that the service needs to both “integrate” US space capabilities into its operations and “interdict” adversary space operations “simultaneously,” said Col. Donald Brooks, commandant of the Space and Missile Defense Center of Excellence in Colorado Springs, Colo.

“One of the Army’s core competencies is Joint Forcible Entry Operations, where an Army Task Force projects combat power deep in order to be able to establish the conditions so that follow-on Army forces can can move through that seized airfield or [other territory],” he told Breaking Defense. “And all of those Army core competencies, from a purely geometry standpoint, are what what you refer to as ‘behind those lines.’ We use terms like to be able to ‘penetrate,’ to be able to ‘isolate and disintegrate’ an adversary.”

Army Multi-Domain Operations includes space control activities, especially deep inside enemy territory. (Image: Army 4th Infantry Division)

“Disintegration” is a term of art defined in the Army’s Field Manual 3.0 [PDF] that establishes the service’s overarching doctrine; although it is not a term included in the capstone space doctrine governing joint force operations, Joint Publication 3-14. (Individual service doctrine feeds into joint doctrine, but joint doctrine in the end takes primacy over collective US military operations.)

“Disintegrate means to disrupt the enemy’s command and control, degrading the synchronization and cohesion of its operations. Disintegration prevents enemy unity of effort and leads to a degradation of the enemy’s capabilities or will to fight. It attacks the cohesion of enemy formations and their ability to employ combined arms approaches and work effectively together,” the Army manual explains.

The stress on the concept’s application to space operations, according to Brooks and Cobos, is something relatively new in the Army Space Vision.

“The new part of it really is the requirement at tactical echelons for tactical organizations to be able to interdict an adversary’s use of space,” Cobos said.

Supporting Combatant Commands, Coordinating With Space Force

The personnel with the new 40 MOS designation would be integrated with a number of different Army units.

First, they would serve in the seven “space control planning teams” under the 1st Space Brigade, that work with the various regional combatant commands, Cobos said. Those planning teams already are embedded in “multiple theaters,” he said, and coordinate with Space Force components to provide the combatant commander with planning and “targeting” solutions — based on what capabilities are required for a specific task.

“That is exactly how we do fires across a whole bunch of things, from cruise missiles that come off of submarines or destroyers to the fires that the Army can bring and the fires that the Air Force can be able to service,” Cobos explained.

“Fires” is a military term signifying using weapons to create lethal and/or nonlethal effects on targets. Army officials have previously said that they only intend to take “non-kinetic” actions to disrupt, degrade or destroy adversary space systems, such as electromagnetic warfare and cyber operations.

So for space “fires,” Cobos said the Army can provide tactical capabilities for discreet, close-up-and-personal operations against enemy facilities or systems that perhaps the other services can’t.

A commander thus could decide that “instead of this really large system over right here that’s tethered — and it requires a lot of power and bandwidth and has a huge footprint and signal,” it was better to choose a “surgical tool” such as a “small force” that could get into the “extended deep” region of the battlefield “to be able to do this very small thing,” he said.

Space specialists also will make up a “space control company” under the new Theater Strike Effects Group (TSEG) pilot at Indo-Pacific Command. That TSEG, which is designed to undertake those interdiction operations, was approved along with the Army Space Vision. That pilot will achieve initial operating capability on Oct. 1, 2027, Cobos said.

“It will initially stand up with space control electronic warfare capabilities,” Brooks said. Over time, the TSEG will move on to “fielding and building the counter-surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities, high-altitude and [navigation war] formations as well.”

SMDC also hopes to soon be able to add a TSEG for European Command, following a month-long “experiment-slash-exercise” that he said has helped prove the unit’s value.

“I’m a little biased; I was the commander of the TSEG for that exercise, but I really do believe that we won over a lot of the leaders in EUCOM,” Brooks said.

Finally, the specialists also will support the Army’s Multi-Domain Task Forces, which each will have a space control company. The service has three such task forces and is “soon going to grow the fourth and fifth,” Brooks said.

“We’re very much complimentary to the Space Force and to the other services, but we truly do see space as that critical component to set the theater well in advance of phase one operations … when the first round is shot, the missile is shot, space needs to be there months, if not years, in advance to help set those conditions,” he said.

9. Sabotage: Protecting European Transportation Networks from Russia

Sabotage. A key component of Unconventional Warfare. As Doug Livermore notes NATO countries should beware.

We should keep in mind the importance of unconventional warfare. Although irregular warfare is the fashionable term at the heart of IW is UW.

The US definition of Unconventional warfare is "Activities conducted to enable a resistance movement or insurgency to coerce, disrupt or overthrow a government or occupying power by operating through or with an underground, auxiliary, and guerrilla force in a denied area.:

Another way to describe UW is this way: UW consists of military and paramilitary operations that are conducted with the support of indigenous or surrogate forces. The goal of UW is to exploit a hostile power's vulnerabilities in order to achieve U.S. strategic objectives.

UW is a core activity of irregular warfare and can include: guerrilla warfare, sabotage, subversion, intelligence activities, and unconventional assisted recovery.

Sabotage: Protecting European Transportation Networks from Russia

Ukraine has been sabotaging Russia’s railways with success — vulnerable NATO nations should take note.

cepa.org · by Doug Livermore · October 9, 2024

Russia’s heavy reliance on its rail network for military logistics has highlighted the crucial role of transportation systems during conflicts. And how vulnerable — rail is by its nature a long, fixed system almost impossible to defend at all times. Saboteurs, be they on foot or commanding a drone, find rich opportunities for destruction.

Russia’s senior leaders may be extremely nasty, but they aren’t stupid. They know that NATO’s European allies also rely heavily on integrated transportation networks to move troops, equipment, and supplies. Without these systems, the alliance would be unable to deploy reinforcements to oppose or deter a Russian invasion. Meanwhile, there are growing signals that Russia is already testing its destructive skills on Western networks through sabotage and cyber-attacks.

Rail’s vulnerability is underlined by its centralized nature and length (as noted above) but also because it relies on key nodes, bridges, and junctions that serve as chokepoints. This makes it a prime target for disruption, as France learned from suspected Russian sabotage against its own rail networks that marred the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics this year. Germany too has suffered a series of attacks

Get the Latest

The lessons learned from Ukraine’s own campaign to degrade Russia’s rail system offer a blueprint for European nations to protect their own transportation networks.

Strengthening physical security at key points — European countries must enhance the security of their rail networks, particularly at key nodes like signaling points, bridges, and junctions. Critical hubs, such as major railway depots, maintenance yards, and switching stations, should be prioritized. These areas are pivotal to keeping the network operational and present vulnerabilities that could be exploited. Increasing physical surveillance, employing specialized security personnel, and establishing rapid response teams will reduce the risk of sabotage.
Improving cybersecurity to protect transportation control systems — Modern transportation networks are increasingly reliant on digital control systems. Cyber-attacks on these systems can cause Europe-wide disruption. Countries should invest in cybersecurity measures to protect the rail-control digital infrastructure, such as switching stations, signaling systems, and automated control systems. Regular cybersecurity audits, implementing advanced encryption protocols, and enhancing collaboration between cyber defense agencies are key steps in reducing vulnerabilities.
Using modern technology for real-time monitoring— European governments should integrate advanced technologies, such as satellite surveillance, drone reconnaissance, and sensors, to monitor critical infrastructure. This real-time monitoring will allow for rapid detection of potential sabotage activities and enable quick responses to prevent large-scale disruption. Developing a centralized command center to coordinate sensor information will provide a more comprehensive view of potential threats.
Enhancing interagency and international collaboration — Protecting transportation networks from sabotage requires close cooperation between national security agencies, intelligence services, and law enforcement. European countries should continue building robust coordination mechanisms that allow for the timely sharing of intelligence on potential threats. Furthermore, enhancing collaboration with NATO, the European Union, and Ukraine to monitor and address transportation infrastructure vulnerabilities will strengthen collective security efforts.
Promoting public awareness and civil defense participation — Citizens should be engaged to identify and report potential sabotage attempts. Countries can develop public awareness campaigns that educate citizens about the importance of protecting transportation infrastructure and encourage them to make contact if they see something of concern.
Developing contingency plans for rapid repairs — As seen in the case of Russia’s rail network, even minor disruption can have significant logistical knock-on consequences. European nations should continue preparing contingency plans for the rapid repair of transportation infrastructure in the event of sabotage. This could include pre-positioning repair materials and equipment near critical infrastructure points, training specialized teams for swift restoration, and conducting regular drills to ensure readiness.

This program of improved physical security, better cybersecurity and use of technology, enhancing interagency collaboration, and involving the public, would rapidly deliver dividends.

What must be avoided at all costs is the continuation of business as usual. During the Cold War, the Soviets had developed plans to attack NATO states behind the lines. The problem has only worsened with more porous borders and easily available encrypted communications. Inaction is an open invitation to a ruthless enemy.

Doug Livermore is the President of Livermore Strategic Solutions Ltd. and the Deputy Commander for Special Operations Detachment – Joint Special Operations Command in the North Carolina Army National Guard. In addition to his role as the Director of Engagements for the Irregular Warfare Initiative, he is the National Director of External Communications for the Special Forces Association, National Vice President for the Special Operations Association of America, Director of Development of the Corioli Institute, and serves as Chair of the Advisory Committee for No One Left Behind.

Disclaimer: The views expressed are the author’s and do not represent official US Government, Department of Defense, or Department of the Army positions.

Europe’s Edge is CEPA’s online journal covering critical topics on the foreign policy docket across Europe and North America. All opinions are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the position or views of the institutions they represent or the Center for European Policy Analysis.

cepa.org · by Doug Livermore · October 9, 2024

10. Washington Misunderstands Crisis Communication With China

I am sure we continue to talk past each other as neither side truly embraces the Sun Tzu concept to know yourself and your enemy.

I am reminded of a 2011 trip to China with students from the National War College (the last thing I did in the Army before I reached mandatory retirement!). At a reception I met a PLA Senior Captain (one star) who taught crisis action planning at the Chinese National Defense University. As she was chatting me up trying to elicit information from me I was amazed that her questions revolved around the Bible and deeply theological questions for which I had few answers and explanations. I asked her why she was so interested in the Bible and these theological questions. She explained that she taught crisis action planning and that she had never been to the US so she needed to learn about America. Her idea was that since she knew the US was a "Chiristian nation" (her words), if she learned about the Bible and Christianity she would be able to understand US strategic decision making. Now of course that is a data point of one so it may not be representative. But if that is how one PLA flag officer thinks it is no wonder that China and the US talk past each other. Maybe it is not just Washington that misunderstands crisis communication as the author argues.

Excerpts:

These are among some of the policy recommendations that would demonstrate to Beijing America’s higher resolve. Concurrently, Washington should signal a stronger commitment to its Indo-Pacific allies through other means to bolster its credibility. Greater U.S. security assistance to the region, a strengthened network of American alliances, more dispersed and durable bases with forward-deployed forces, and greater U.S. economic engagement are all ways to enhance American credibility in the region. Fortunately, the Biden Administration has made progress on most of these fronts.

More broadly, this issue cannot be viewed outside the context of wider competition: it is inherently linked to U.S. national interests. The preservation of the American alliance system in Asia is essential to Washington’s core security objectives. By showing a willingness to tolerate higher risk, America demonstrates that its resolve to preserve its alliances is ironclad.

A paradox of deterrence is that sometimes states must be more risk-tolerant to preserve peace. The return of great power competition means a return to these Cold War games of chicken. Expecting China to embrace the values of communication is unrealistic absent a more sustained willingness by the United States to signal its staying power. Otherwise, America’s Indo-Pacific position will deteriorate. This is not to say that LOCs are not important––they are vital to prevent catastrophe; to aspire to their sustained maintenance in the context of U.S.-China competition is a laudable foreign policy objective. But Beijing will weaponize laudable aims if it serves its interests.

For decades, Washington has sought to maintain LOCs with China, only to be rebuffed, ignored, or engaged in bad faith. As Einstein is believed to have said: “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.” China has made its intentions clear. It is about time we changed our approach.

Washington Misunderstands Crisis Communication With China

By Lucas de Gamboa

October 10, 2024

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2024/10/10/washington_misunderstands_crisis_communication_with_china_1064141.html?mc_cid=04970a9465&mc_eid=70bf478f36

On April 1st, 2001, the skies above the South China Sea turned from routine to perilous. A U.S. EP-3 surveillance plane, silently patrolling international waters near Hainan Island, suddenly found itself in the crosshairs of a Chinese J-8 interceptor. The jet, in a reckless fashion, closed in on the American aircraft. Through such fateful miscalculation, it collided with the EP-3, sending the Chinese pilot to a tragic death. Miraculously, the U.S. crew managed to coax their damaged plane to a forced landing on Chinese soil and survived.

The incident nevertheless triggered a tense standoff. Though effective diplomacy by Secretary of State Colin Powell diffused the crisis, the EP-3 incident nevertheless highlighted a new major fault-line between Beijing and Washington: the absence of consistent military-to-military lines of communication (LOCs).

Relations between China and the United States are even more fraught today. Rising nationalism on both sides mean that should something like the EP-3 incident happen again, there is no guarantee cooler heads will prevail, explaining why America has dedicated so much diplomatic capital on this issue. These efforts, however, though commendable, fundamentally misunderstand China’s interests and may even undermine deterrence in the Indo-Pacific. Paradoxically, to strengthen its deterrence in the region, the United States needs a more risk-tolerant approach that reduces its overemphasis on communication.

Why China rejects Lines of Communication

Why are LOCs so central to U.S.-China diplomacy? Simply put, China frequently disrupts these channels to signal its dissatisfaction. A notable example occurred in 2022 when Beijing suspended bilateral LOCs following then-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan. Confidence in these lines had already been eroding even before the Speaker’s visit, but her trip put this issue on the forefront of U.S.-China competition, all while raising bilateral tensions.

For Americans with decades of familiarity with crisis communication, China’s conduct in this regard is difficult to comprehend. As tensions rise it is natural to seek ways to communicate misunderstandings and de-escalate. Yet these beliefs misread the sources of Chinese conduct.

China’s regime operates through a top-down model. On everything from society and the economy to the military (PLA), China’s system is one of centralized control. This means lower-level PLA officers lack the authority to make decisions without higher-up’s acquiescence. But this explanation alone is unconvincing; local and bureaucratic actors still exercise agency in China, and the PLA’s systematic unprofessional behavior near or around U.S. troops and allies dispels the notion that Beijing’s leaders are unaware of their military’s conduct.

A more compelling explanation for China’s behavior lies in its post-colonial history and broader international ambitions. Historically, China was the dominant power in its region, but the West's rise disrupted what Beijing considered this natural harmony. As a result, China resents Washington’s hegemonic role in the current global system, viewing America’s economic and political dominance as contrary to the rightful course of history. Accordingly, Beijing now seeks to weaken U.S. influence and ultimately create a new Asian and global order centered on its economic and political interests

A key aspect of this ambition is Beijing’s desire to end America’s security architecture in the Indo-Pacific. Therein lies the connection to LOCs. From China’s perspective, Washington’s focus on LOCs serves to institutionalize an American military footprint in its periphery. Establishing and maintaining these lines would require Beijing to tacitly accept the long-term presence of American forces around China; consequently, Washington’s means by which to put a ceiling on tensions serves instead to legitimize American military dominance.

Relatedly, for China to establish LOCs with the American military would mean giving up an important means of coercive leverage. Because a direct attack on an American ally is likely to be costly in lives and treasure, Beijing has instead employed a strategy deemed by the Pentagon as “gray zone” warfare: provocative military actions that do not cross the threshold of constituting a direct attack, but that, through their persistence and rising intensity, gradually erode allied capabilities or resolve.

For China, these actions are designed to slowly undermine America’s security blanket. By psychologically or materially exhausting allies and gradually encroaching on established red lines, China aims to rupture America’s security system by either convincing allies that American protection is moot, or by creating a fait accompli whereby an ally’s continued security position would be untenable. A textbook example of this dynamic is the recent tension between the Philippines and the PRC over the Sierra Madre whereby China’s gray zone tactics have sought to gradually erode the Philippines’ position in the South China Sea by upping the ante of aggressive conduct.

Establishing LOCs would harm this strategy. Gray zone salami-slicing inevitably involves taking unpredictable actions; under these circumstances, keeping the enemy guessing about what will result in an escalation lends greater coercive credibility to threats. To communicate with Washington, therefore, would be to undermine what makes gray zone action so attractive. As the U.S. lacks a clear understanding of what might trigger open conflict, the absence of communication fosters restraint on American officers and presidents they may otherwise avoid, enabling China to take advantage of its brinkmanship.

What Washington can do

This situation should give American leaders pause. China’s post-colonial identity and security goals make it cautious in establishing LOCs, yet Washington’s intense diplomatic focus on this issue risks sending the wrong message. Persistent American efforts to de-escalate through establishing LOCs might unintentionally signal a lack of resolve to confront China, which could embolden further aggression. Moreover, by making LOCs a central point in its diplomatic agenda, Washington allows Beijing to turn communication into a political football of bilateral relations. The results neither serve U.S. interests nor help ease tensions.

What, then, should Washington’s approach be? Counterintuitively, the answer lies in the U.S. demonstrating a willingness to court greater risk in military hotspots, even in the absence of LOCs, as well as in greater American engagement in the Indo-Pacific region. This signals to China that U.S. resolve is high through its demonstration of a higher risk threshold, thereby undermining incentives for Beijing’s present conduct. Moreover, by raising the risk of escalation, America signals to Beijing the greater need for crisis communication; given the many domestic economic and political issues China already faces, a more risk-tolerant Washington may even push Beijing to be more amenable to crisis contacts.

These prescriptions should not be overly confrontational, however. China’s recent aggressive conduct has alienated many countries; for Washington to match it in unprofessionalism would do greater harm than good. America should instead strive to be firm yet responsible in its more assertive conduct. For example, Washington could use Coast Guard cutters to escort Philippine resupply vessels to the Sierra Madre, backed with over the horizon capability to maintain America’s escalation dominance. Washington’s freedom of navigation maneuvers should also be more willing to encroach upon Chinese outposts in the South China Sea, and U.S. naval vessels and aircraft should be more present in and around Taiwan during Chinese exercises. Allied vessels and aircraft should accompany all these measures to the greatest extent possible to signal multilateral displeasure with Beijing.

These are among some of the policy recommendations that would demonstrate to Beijing America’s higher resolve. Concurrently, Washington should signal a stronger commitment to its Indo-Pacific allies through other means to bolster its credibility. Greater U.S. security assistance to the region, a strengthened network of American alliances, more dispersed and durable bases with forward-deployed forces, and greater U.S. economic engagement are all ways to enhance American credibility in the region. Fortunately, the Biden Administration has made progress on most of these fronts.

More broadly, this issue cannot be viewed outside the context of wider competition: it is inherently linked to U.S. national interests. The preservation of the American alliance system in Asia is essential to Washington’s core security objectives. By showing a willingness to tolerate higher risk, America demonstrates that its resolve to preserve its alliances is ironclad.

A paradox of deterrence is that sometimes states must be more risk-tolerant to preserve peace. The return of great power competition means a return to these Cold War games of chicken. Expecting China to embrace the values of communication is unrealistic absent a more sustained willingness by the United States to signal its staying power. Otherwise, America’s Indo-Pacific position will deteriorate. This is not to say that LOCs are not important––they are vital to prevent catastrophe; to aspire to their sustained maintenance in the context of U.S.-China competition is a laudable foreign policy objective. But Beijing will weaponize laudable aims if it serves its interests.

For decades, Washington has sought to maintain LOCs with China, only to be rebuffed, ignored, or engaged in bad faith. As Einstein is believed to have said: “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.” China has made its intentions clear. It is about time we changed our approach.

Lucas de Gamboa is a senior at Columbia University. He is a Saltzman Student Scholar at SIPA’s Saltzman Institute of War and Peace and was co-president of Columbia's Alexander Hamilton Society chapter. He is also a research assistant at Columbia Law School and was a Hamilton National Defense Fellow.

11. Congress Should Create an Economic Statecraft and Security Commission

Why don't we just learn to embrace political warfare? We should keep in mind that any problem can be made insoluble if enough congressional commissions are established to discuss it (note my irreverent sarcasm).

But economic statecraft is one part of political warfare (it is one of the elements of national power). We need to consider employing all the elements of national power in concert. We have to stop stovepiping the elements of national power which I think is one of the important arguments of the authors below. But we need to look for a unifying concept which is what George Kennan brought us in 1948. Now we talk about irregular warfare but we should really be embracing political warfare (which must include economic statecraft as Kennan outlines) because political warfare is at the heart of strategic competition.

George Kennan:

“Political warfare is the logical application of Clausewitz's doctrine in time of peace. In broadest definition, political warfare is the employment of all the means at a nation's command, short of war, to achieve its national objectives. Such operations are both overt and covert. They range from such overt actions as political alliances, economic measures (as ERP--the Marshall Plan), and "white" propaganda to such covert operations as clandestine support of "friendly" foreign elements, "black" psychological warfare and even encouragement of underground resistance in hostile states.”

http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/history/johnson/65ciafounding3.htm

The Congressional Commission might want to start with reading these observations and recommendations from the American Way of Irregular Warfare (https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PEA301-1.html)

Observation 1: U.S. Tactical-Level Formations Have

Performed Admirably in Irregular Warfare Campaigns

Observation 2: Irregular Warfare Missions Require

Irregular Warfare Campaigns

Observation 3: The U.S. Military Is Not Well Organized

for Irregular Warfare Campaigns

Observation 4: The United States Lacks the Concepts,

Doctrine, and Canon Necessary to Be Effective in

Population-Centric Conflicts

Observation 5: There Is Insufficient Professional Military

Education for Irregular Warfare

Observation 6: The U.S. National Security Enterprise Is

Structured to Fail in Population-Centric Conflicts

Recommendation to Congress: Mandate an Independent

Review of U.S. Strategic Failure in Population-Centric

Conflicts

Recommendation to the President: Reorganize the

Executive Branch Around the Security Challenges of the

21st Century

Recommendation to Concerned Citizens: Establish

an Institution Outside Government Dedicated to

Understanding American Irregular Warfare

Competition with other nations is the primary national security con- cern of the United States.1 This includes competition with the revi- sionist powers of China and Russia,2 the “central challenge to U.S. prosperity and security,”3 and rogue regimes (e.g., Iran, North Korea) that threaten to destabilize regions through “their pursuit of nuclear weapons or sponsorship of terrorism.”4 Deterring the aggression of these adversaries will certainly require that the United States expand the lethality of its conventional and nuclear capabilities to sustain its military supremacy.5

However, actual competition and conflict with these nation-states will most likely be irregular. 6 This reflects a deliberate calculus by our adversaries, who understand that “conventional or nuclear war with the United States would be risky and prohibitively costly,” 7 but that the United States is vulnerable to irregular approaches. Rather than risk conflicts with casualty numbers that are “virtually unthinkable,” these adversaries will continue to deploy a blend of information, legal, and proxy warfare in challenging the United States and its allies. 8 These irregular approaches allow America’s adversaries to turn the “demo- cratic norms and institutions” of the United States and its allies against them, allowing for contestation without direct military action 9

See also: "An American Way of Political Warfare: A Proposal" https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PE304.html

Congress Should Create an Economic Statecraft and Security Commission

By David Rader & Elaine Dezenski

October 10, 2024

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2024/10/10/congress_should_create_an_economic_statecraft_and_security_commission_1064139.html?mc_cid=04970a9465&mc_eid=70bf478f36

The United States has a few powerful tools to conduct economic warfare and strengthen its economic security. Unfortunately, many of them operate independently, without coordination, lacking strategic guidance, and sometimes without political leadership having an inventory of them at all. Congress should replicate its recent success with the PPBE Commission and create a similar Commission on Economic Statecraft and Security to further address this problem. This Commission would lend itself to the same bi-partisan, expert-led, professionally staffed, and with unfettered access as other commissions, but focus on finding ways to make economic agencies (e.g., the SEC, CFTC, FTC, etc.) a more useful part of America’s economic security apparatus.

In March 2024, a bipartisan group of former high-level government officials serving on the Planning, Programming, Budget, and Execution (PPBE) Commission delivered to Congress its final report on reforming the Department of Defense (DoD). The goals of the Commission, and the recommendations it issued, were squarely focused on assessing, analyzing, and addressing structural deficiencies in DoD resourcing procedures that impacted the effectiveness of the United States military. The two-year commission, which held more than 400 interviews and solicited input from Congress, DoD, academia, and the private sector, was a critical exercise in reforming government institutions to meet present-day security threats. Ultimately, the Commission made 28 recommendations on how Congress and the DoD can work together “to better maintain the security of the American people.” Increasingly, however, the security of the American people is not maintained by DoD alone.

In today’s highly integrated global economy, authoritarian adversaries are using economic warfare to achieve geopolitical ends – warfare that demands fit-for-purpose tools of economic defense and counteroffensive capacities. Economic threats to American security are substantial. No country is more capable of using economic levers to impact U.S. and global security than China, which has explicitly committed to using its economic power to overthrow the American-led global order.

Lawmakers and policymakers in Washington are thinking through how to configure and empower Departments and Agencies across the entire government to play a more meaningful role in the US-China economic competition. While Congress’ Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has done critical work in identifying the economic security and competition landscape between the US and China – as well as making recommendations on how to prevail – there is continued demand for a much broader response to include other countries and responses beyond new legislative ideas. A Commission would provide a different value than the Select Committee because it would be comprised of former government officials currently serving in the private sector with deep domain expertise. Rather than introducing laws, the Commission would propose changes to rules and regulations and serve as a liaison back to the commercial entities, causing the effects and receiving the harm of economic warfare. It could also look at the broader global economy and regional economic considerations.

Today, much of America’s response to China’s economic coercion, illegal activities, statecraft, and warfare is charged to the Departments of Defense, State, Commerce, and Homeland Security, each with narrow economic authorities, but sometimes overlapping areas of focus and jurisdiction. Law enforcement and the intelligence community sit alongside the federal agencies. However, there are many other economic agencies – such as the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Commodity Futures Trading Corporation (CFTC), Export-Import Bank (Ex-Im), and the International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) – which can and should play a role in America’s broader national security toolkit. These agencies are limited in how much of a role they can play in protecting America by disparate and often outdated authorities. There is also the need for greater coordination and improved efficiencies between the numerous agencies and authorities that should be tasked with defending America’s economic security.

There are a range of legislative and policy ideas being touted regarding how the U.S. can improve its economic security apparatus. Expanding the scope of export controls, implementing outbound investment screening regimes, reconfiguring trade agreements, and introducing more sanctions are among them. Each of these serves a valuable role in America’s economic statecraft and security but are different shades of the same, previously used colors. What America needs to optimize and maximize the utility of the large government it has created is for a bipartisan commission to determine how existing, yet unused tools can be refitted, new laws or rules can solve critical problems, or how agencies previously considered outside of national security can step into the fold. America needs all its departments and agencies involved in addressing our most pressing challenges as it relates specifically to China and more broadly to economic statecraft.

For example, the commissioners could assess how expanding the scope of the SEC to consider whether a company that is financially propped up by an adversary of the U.S. is good for capital creation in the marketplace. The commission would also determine if the CFTC is sufficiently authorized and resourced to address pricing opacity, artificial supply constraints, and market manipulation of commodities by Chinese entities. There are countless examples of how a commission could help Congress better understand what is missing from these organizations as it thinks of ways to reduce the flow of capital into China as it feeds weapons to the enemies of the U.S., harasses our allies and partners, and mismanages its shipping monopoly to the detriment of global trade flows.

David Rader is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the former deputy director of the U.S. Defense Department’s Global Investment and Economic Security.

Elaine Dezenski is a senior director and the head of the Center on Economic and Financial Power at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. She was formerly an acting and deputy assistant secretary for policy at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

12. EU advances $38 billion Ukraine loan plan tied to Russian assets

Some potentially good news.

EU advances $38 billion Ukraine loan plan tied to Russian assets

Stars and Stripes · by Jorge Valero · October 9, 2024

Europe

ByJorge Valero

Bloomberg •

The European Union gave preliminary backing to a non-refundable loan package for Ukraine of up to €35 billion ($38.3 billion) backed by immobilized Russian central bank assets as it seeks to sustain Kyiv’s war efforts. (Wikimedia Commons)

The European Union gave preliminary backing to a non-refundable loan package for Ukraine of up to $38.3 billion backed by immobilized Russian central bank assets as it seeks to sustain Kyiv’s war efforts.

The member states’ envoys endorsed on Wednesday the new mechanism backed by Group of Seven nations that would use the proceeds derived from the frozen assets to pay back the loan. The approval process, which also requires the European Parliament’s nod, is expected to be completed by the end of October.

The U.S. and the E.U. had initially agreed on contributing similar amounts of about $20 billion each as part of the G-7’s $50 billion package, but Washington demanded a more durable sanctions regime from Europe to ensure the windfall profits remain available.

The current immobilization requires unanimous renewal by the 27 member states every six months.

The E.U. is in the process of trying to adjust its sanctions regime so it only needs to be renewed every 36 months. A U.S. official said Washington fully intends to participate in the $50 billion commitment to Ukraine but that the scale of its contribution depends on what assurances the E.U. can give that the Russian assets will remain immobilized.

Hungary, which has often delayed or blocked E.U. efforts to support Ukraine, has so far withheld backing for changes in the sanctions framework, saying any decision should wait until after U.S. elections on Nov. 5. E.U. leaders plan to raise the matter with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban next week during their quarterly summit in Brussels, diplomats said.

Any progress would help provide clarity for G-7 nations, which are expected to complete their pledges to the $50 billion package in a ministerial meeting on Oct. 25.

More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com

Stars and Stripes · by Jorge Valero · October 9, 2024

13. Propagandists keep trying to use ChatGPT, OpenAI report says

Propagandists keep trying to use ChatGPT, OpenAI report says

The report said groups seeking to influence elections were trying to automate tasks with the AI tool but had struggled to make meaningful breakthroughs.

NBC News · by Kevin Collier

Propagandists seeking to influence elections around the globe have tried to use ChatGPT in their operations, according to a report released Wednesday by the technology’s creator, OpenAI.

While ChatGPT is generally seen as one of the leading AI chatbots on the market it also heavily moderates how people use its product. OpenAI is the only major tech company to repeatedly release public reports about how bad actors have tried to misuse its Large Language Model, or LLM, product, giving some insight into how propagandists and criminal or state-backed hackers have tried to use the technology and may use it with other AI models.

OpenAI said in its report that this year it has stopped people who tried to use ChatGPT to generate content about elections in the U.S., Rwanda, India, and the European Union. It’s not clear whether any were widely seen.

In one instance, the company described an Iranian propaganda operation of fake English-language news websites that purported to reflect different American political stances, though it’s not clear that those sites have ever gotten substantial engagement from real people. They also used ChatGPT to create social media posts in support of those sites, according to the report.

In a media call last month, U.S. intelligence officials said that propagandists working for Iran, as well as Russia and China, have all incorporated AI into their ongoing propaganda operations aimed at U.S. voters but that none appear to have found major success.

Last month, the U.S. indicted three Iranian hackers it said were behind an ongoing operation to hack and release documents from Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.

Another operation that OpenAI says is linked to people in Rwanda was used to create partisan posts on X in favor of the Patriotic Front, the repressive party that has ruled Rwanda since the end of the country’s genocide in the early 1990s. They were part of a larger campaign that repeatedly spammed pro-party posts on X, a documented propaganda campaign that posted messages — often the same few messages — more than 650,000 times.

The company also blocked two campaigns this year — one created social media comments about the E.U. parliamentary elections, and another created content about India’s general elections — very quickly after they began. Neither got any substantial interaction, OpenAI said, but it’s also not clear whether the people behind the campaigns simply moved to other AI models created by different companies.

OpenAI also described how one particular Iranian hacker group that targeted water and wastewater plants repeatedly tried to use ChatGPT in multiple stages of its operation.

A spokesperson for Iran’s mission to the United Nations didn’t respond to an email requesting comment about the water plant hacking campaign or propaganda operation.

The group, called CyberAv3ngers, appears to have gone dormant or has disbanded after the Treasury Department sanctioned it in February. Before that, it was known for hacking water and wastewater plants in the U.S. and Israel that use an Israeli software program called Unitronics. There is no indication that the hackers ever damaged any American water systems, but they did breach several U.S. facilities that used Unitronics.

Federal authorities said last year that the hackers were often able to get into Unitronics systems by using default usernames and passwords. According to OpenAI’s report, they also tried to get ChatGPT to tell them the default login credentials for other companies that provide industrial control systems software.

They also asked ChatGPT for a host of other things in that operation, including information about what internet routers are most commonly used in Jordan and how to find vulnerabilities a hacker might exploit, and for help with multiple coding questions.

OpenAI also reported something cybersecurity and China experts have long suspected but hasn’t been made explicitly public. Hackers working for China — a country the U.S. routinely accuses of conducting cyberespionage to benefit its industries and which has prioritized artificial intelligence — conducted a campaign to try to hack the personal and corporate email accounts of OpenAI employees.

The phishing campaign was unsuccessful, the report claims. A spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

A consistent theme of malicious actors’ use of AI is that they often try to automate different parts of their work, but the technology so far hasn’t led to major breakthroughs in hacking or creating effective propaganda, said Ben Nimmo, OpenAI’s principal investigator for intelligence and investigations.

“The threat actors look like they’re still experimenting with different approaches to AI, but we haven’t seen evidence of this leading to meaningful breakthroughs in their ability to build viral audiences,” Nimmo said.

Kevin Collier

Kevin Collier is a reporter covering cybersecurity, privacy and technology policy for NBC News.

NBC News · by Kevin Collier

14. New Vision For Lift Fan Aircraft Family Grows From Special Operations X-Plane Program

Is this a leap ahead concept for vertical lift?

New Vision For Lift Fan Aircraft Family Grows From Special Operations X-Plane Program

A new fan-in-wing concept could be scaled to offer valuable runway-independent capabilities for more than just special operations missions.

Joseph Trevithick

Posted on Oct 8, 2024 8:56 PM EDT

twz.com · by Joseph Trevithick

Aurora Flight Sciences has released new renderings of an uncrewed fan-in-wing vertical take-off-and-landing capable demonstrator aircraft it is currently working on, as well as of a revised vision for a scaled-up cargo aircraft based on the same technology. The demonstrator is being developed under a U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) program centered on interest in a new high-speed, runway-independent special operations transport plane. Aurora’s unveiling of the new renders also comes amid growing interest from the U.S. Air Force in similar capabilities to support more general distributed logistics missions, especially in contested environments during future high-end conflicts.

Aurora, a subsidiary of Boeing, shared the new renders and provided more information about the work it is doing as part of DARPA’s Speed and Runway Independent Technologies (SPRINT) program earlier today. DARPA awarded new SPRINT contracts to Aurora, as well as Bell, earlier this year. SPRINT, which kicked off last year, is directly tied U.S. Special Operations Command’s (SOCOM) High-Speed Vertical Takeoff and Landing (HSVTOL) project.

A rendering showing Aurora’s current SPRINT uncrewed demonstrator design, at right, and a scaled-up crewed cargo aircraft concept based on the same technology, at left. Aurora Flight Sciences

“Aurora and Boeing are collaborating on the development of key technologies that combine to deliver a revolutionary solution to mobility challenges in contested environments and across distributed military bases,” according to a press release from Aurora. “Fan-in-wing (FIW) technology combines an embedded lift fan with a blended wing body design to enable vertical lift agility without sacrificing the payload capacity and aerodynamic efficiency associated with today’s fixed wing aircraft.”

“The team is currently designing an uncrewed demonstrator with a 45-ft wingspan and 1,000-pound payload capacity for the SPRINT program,” the release adds. “The propulsion system includes off-the-shelf turbofan and turboshaft engines that would power the vehicle to a maximum of 450 knots true airspeed (KTAS).”

The new rendering of the SPRINT demonstrator is broadly in line with one that Aurora put out in May. It has a blended-wing platform with a v-tail along with three lift fans in a triangular arrangement – one to either side of the central fuselage section and another in the nose end. The revised render shows more streamlined intakes for the main engines underneath the body.

One of the new renderings of Aurora’s SPRINT demonstrator design. Aurora Flight SciencesA rendering Aurora released of its SPRINT demonstrator concept back in May. Aurora Flight Sciences A rendering of Aurora Flight Sciences revised SPRINT design concept. Aurora Flight Sciences

“Earlier this year, the team completed the first of three major test events scheduled for the current phase of the SPRINT program to prove out the feasibility of the FIW technology,” according to Aurora. “The ground effect test, conducted using a 4.6-ft wingspan model with three lift fans, showed that suck down effects created by the lift fans in hover were negligible and that the landing gear is set to the appropriate height to minimize adverse pitching moments from forming during ground operations. Wind tunnel tests planned for late 2024 and early 2025 include a stability and control test using a 9-ft full wingspan aircraft model and a 5¼-ft semi-span embedded lift fan test to model aerodynamic effects.”

A picture of an actual test article Aurora has been using in the development of its SPRINT demonstrator. Aurora Flight Sciences

“Aurora’s concept is designed to meet or exceed the challenging program objectives that DARPA set for the program. For example, the blended wing body platform is capable of 450 knot cruise speed, and the embedded lift fans with integrated covers allow a smooth transition from vertical to horizontal flight,” the company has also said in the past. “The design also leverages existing engine solutions, shortening development risk and timelines. In addition to VTOL, the aircraft is capable of short take-off and vertical landing (STOVL), super short take-off and landing (SSTOL), and conventional take-off and landing.”

Aurora is currently aiming to reach first flight with the SPRINT demonstrator in 2027. However, the company is already looking to the future.

“The technology demonstrated in the SPRINT X-plane could be scaled to medium and heavy lift aircraft, creating a future family of systems. For example, Aurora envisions a manned, 130-ft wingspan aircraft with four lift fans and 40-ft payload bay,” today’s press release explains. “The FIW aircraft could meet or exceed the payloads, ranges, and speeds typical of fixed wing military transport aircraft while delivering the tactical advantage of true vertical takeoff and landing.”

The rendering Aurora has now released of this larger fan-in-wing design concept shows significant changes from the one it put out back in 2023. The new design has a tailless modified cranked kite planform with lower profile air intakes on top of the rear end of the central body. Like the 2023 render, Aurora’s revised vision for a larger crewed fin-in-wing aircraft still features four lift fans two on either side of the central body.

One of the new renderings of Aurora’s scaled-up design derived from the SPRINT demonstrator. Aurora Flight Sciences

The design seen in the new rendering appears to reduce some stealthy features and magnify others, notably with the elimination with the vertical tails. What Aurora showed in 2023 did have sharper and narrower wing sections, as well as a more pronounced beak-like nose and chine line along the forward edge of the central body.

A rendering of a larger fan-in-wing design concept that Aurora released in relation to the SPRINT program back in 2023. Aurora Flight Sciences A rendering of Aurora Flight Sciences’ SPRINT design concept. Aurora Flight Sciences

The new Aurora rendering also notably shows changes to the design of the lift fan covers. The design the company presented last year had split covers – different versions of the original concept showed circular and hexagonal cover shapes – while the new one has multi-sectioned covers. This is very reminiscent of how the lift fan in the nose of the 1960s-era Ryan Vertifan was covered. The Vertifan had a three-fan configuration that is otherwise similar in some very broad respects to Aurora’s SPRINT demonstrator design. An artist’s conception of a fan-in-wing Special Operations Forces Transport Aircraft (SOFA) concept from Lockheed in the 1980s also shows similar sectional fan coverings.

A close-up look at the sectioned covers in their open position in one of the new Aurora renderings. Aurora Flight SciencesThe two Ryan XV-5A prototypes. Ryan Aeronautical via the SDASM Archives The two Ryan XV-5A Vertifan prototypes. The aircraft have the covers for the lift fans in their noses open, but the ones over the lift fans in their wings closed. Ryan Aeronautical via the SDASM ArchivesAn artist’s conception of Lockheed’s 1980s-era Special Operations Forces Transport Aircraft (SOFA) concept. Lockheed via Ebay An artist’s conception of Lockheed’s 1980s-era Special Operations Forces Transport Aircraft (SOFA) concept, an earlier fan-in-wing design. Lockheed via Ebay

It is worth noting here that 40 feet is also how long the payload bay is on standard-length variants of the venerable C-130 family, which has long been used as a baseline for mid-tier military airlifter development. Boeing used this same dimensional rubric when crafting a concept that it unveiled last year for a new stealthy aircraft that could be configured as a transport or an aerial refueling tanker. That design, which is intended to take off and land from traditional runways, also has a blended wing body planform that is similar in some broad strokes to Aurora’s proposed SPRINT-derived cargo plane.

A stealthy blended wing body design concept Boeing unveiled publicly in 2023. Boeing A model depicting the blended wing body concept Boeing unveiled in January 2023. Boeing

The War Zone has also previously pointed out on multiple occasions how Aurora’s work under SPRINT is broadly evocative of a host of vertical and short takeoff and landing-capable designs the U.S. military has at least explored since the 1980s. Supporting special operations missions was a central theme in many of those past development efforts, as you can read about more in this exhaustive two-part feature.

SPRINT together with HSVTOL underscores significant continued interest, especially within the Air Force special operations community, in new, more capable and survivable runway-independent platforms, especially to help get personnel in and out of denied or otherwise sensitive locales. The significant speed and range capabilities that both of those efforts are targeting could be particularly attractive for future operations across the broad expanses of the Pacific region.

“I think the high speed/range, high-speed kind of lower profile ability to get in and out of places that don’t require long runways, I think that would be attractive to any combatant commander,” Air Force Lt. Gen. Michael Conley, head of Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC), said in regards to SPRINT and HSVTOL at a media roundtable on the sidelines of the Air & Space Forces Association’s (AFA) main annual conference last month. “It’s certainly a capability we need in the Indo-Pacific, just because of the geography, regardless of an [specific] adversary.”

At the same time, it is not hard to see how the Air Force more broadly, as well as other branches of the U.S. military, might be interested in the kinds of capabilities that designs being developed under SPRINT and HSVTOL, or variants or derivatives thereof, might offer. The U.S. Marine Corps and the Air Force, especially, increasingly envision future operations, especially in the context of a high-end fight against a potential adversary like China, as dispersed affairs. Distributing forces across a large number of operating locations, including far-flung forward sites with limited infrastructure, is seen more and more as not only advantageous, but critical for reducing vulnerability. Large established bases will be prime targets in any future large-scale conflict.

A Marine F-35B about to be rearmed with inert AIM-120s and Stormbreaker glide bombs on a stretch of road next to the Pacific coastline in California during an exercise in 2023. Road operations are among the tactics seeing a resurgence within the U.S. military as part of broader efforts to reduce reliance on traditional runways. James Deboer A Marine F-35B sitting on a stretch of highway in California during a recent exercise. James Deboer

In line with this, diverse and distributed logistics chains are also increasingly seen as essential for supporting these operations, especially in contested environments. A high-speed, long-range, runway-independent, and highly survivable cargo aircraft, crewed or uncrewed, could easily be a part of that future ecosystem.

In fact, the Air Force Research Laboratory just put out a request for information (RFI) about potential Runway Independent Mobility / Next Generation Intra-theater Airlift (NGIA) aircraft last month. NGIA builds on an earlier concept dubbed Last Tactical Leg, according to Aviation Week, which was first to report on this development.

“The Last Tactical Leg proposal envisions an autonomous, hybrid-electric short- or vertical-takeoff-and-landing aircraft,” Aviation Week’s story explains. “This proposed airlifter would deliver small, urgently needed supplies from logistics hubs to forward bases, even with battle-damaged runways on both ends.”

“The Department of the Air Force’s (DAF’s) goal [with NGIA] is to enhance existing airlift capability and capacity with an intra-theater platform that can fight through damaged infrastructure on responsive timelines,” according to the RFI for that effort. AFRL is now “seeking information on advanced configurations, propulsion and power generation/regulation concepts and technologies for a contested logistics aircraft with attributes for agility in the objective area, airlift capacity, speed, range and survivability to sustain joint force operations within the contested environment.”

All of this sounds very much in line with Aurora’s vision for scaled-up designs based on the SPRINT demonstrator. Bell has also previously laid out a concept for a scalable family of advanced tilt-rotor aircraft that is tied in with its SPRINT and HSVTOL work, and that you can read more about here. Bell previously teamed with Boeing to develop the V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor, variants of which are in service with AFSOC, as well as with the Marines and U.S. Navy.

A rendering Bell released in 2021 showing three tiers of HSVTOL concepts, including two crewed examples (at left and center) and a small uncrewed type (at right). Bell

The Air Force and Marine Corps, as well as the U.S. Army, have already been exploring smaller uncrewed vertical takeoff and landing-capable drones to support logistics requirements and other mission sets. The Air Force has been experimenting with light fixed-wing aircraft converted into drones as small uncrewed airlifters, as well.

It does still remains to be seen whether a working design of any kind emerges from SPRINT, HSVTOL, or NGIA. If one does, whether it actually enters operational service with the Air Force or any other branch of the U.S. military is also an open question.

“There’s a lot of hard things,” AFOSC head Lt. Gen. Conley said at the AFA conference last month again while speaking about SPRINT and HSVTOL. “Some of it’s just the technological pieces of the engines and trying to get enough lift and enough size.”

“I think, conceptually as an Air Force, we struggle a little bit with how big is big enough … as you look at the developmental models, some of them are, you know, the size of a sedan. And then… another iteration would be the size of about a UH-60 [Black Hawk helicopter]. And then you get up to a little bigger … probably C-130 ‘lite,'” he continued. “And I think as an Air Force that’s used to move in a lot of big things, and a lot of people, and a lot of pallets, and big amounts of cargo, there’s a little bit of a mental block there.”

A C-130J Hercules, one of the main airlifters currently in U.S. military service. Lockheed Martin

Conley’s general sentiments here have been echoed by other Air Force officials in the past.

“There were … thousands, maybe, of C-47s, and they were all over the Pacific [during World War II],” Gen. Kenneth Wilsbach, then head of U.S. Pacific Air Forces (PACAF), said back in 2022. “They weren’t fast, but they can carry a lot, and they tackled the logistics problem of the Pacific by having a lot of tails to … move equipment.”

Although “it got there at 120, maybe 150 knots … it worked,” he added. “We could have something like that … where you don’t have to have it going 500 knots,” but the logistics effort wouldn’t “eat a lot of tail numbers to be able to get the small bits of equipment and pieces to the various spots that we intend to deploy from.”

“Does it have to be manned? Can it be unmanned? Does it have to be 10,000 pounds or 5,000 pounds [payload capacity-wise]? Can I do vertical lift? Can I do it on an airship [or] a slow-moving low-altitude blimp?” now-retired Gen. Mike Minihan, then head of Air Mobility Command, asked rhetorically while speaking about future airlift requirements in an interview with Aviation Week last year. “There’s a lot of opportunity when it comes to how you approach that.”

It is worth remembering here that the Air Force did briefly operate a fleet of C-27J Spartan cargo aircraft between 2008 and 2013. Those aircraft had been acquired specifically to support intra-theater airlift requirements as part of what was originally a joint program with the Army. The Air Force ultimately curtailed those plans ostensibly due to budgetary limitations and divested all of its Spartans. Some of those C-27Js subsequently ended up in the Army’s special operations aviation inventory.

A C-27J Spartan assigned to US Army Special Operations Aviation Command. US Army

SOCOM and AFSOC have clear interest currently in seeing SPRINT and HSVTOL through to the delivery of an operational capability. Aurora’s latest renderings show how that work could further evolve into designs to support a wider array of mission sets.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

Joseph Trevithick

Deputy Editor

Joseph has been a member of The War Zone team since early 2017. Prior to that, he was an Associate Editor at War Is Boring, and his byline has appeared in other publications, including Small Arms Review, Small Arms Defense Journal, Reuters, We Are the Mighty, and Task & Purpose.

twz.com · by Joseph Trevithick

15. Ukraine allies meeting postponed after Biden pulls out over Hurricane Milton

Ukraine allies meeting postponed after Biden pulls out over Hurricane Milton

The Ramstein group coordinates military support for Kyiv, but a key meeting has been shelved for now.

https://www.politico.eu/article/ukraine-allies-meeting-postponed-after-biden-pulls-out-over-hurricane-milton/?utm

Listen

A rescheduled date has yet to be announced. | Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images

October 9, 2024 1:25 pm CET

By Joshua Posaner

BERLIN — A summit of allied countries aimed at coordinating more military support for Ukraine set for Saturday Oct. 12 has been postponed following the cancellation of U.S. President Joe Biden's visit to Germany.

At the end of a three-day trip to Germany, Biden was due to chair a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, a loose alliance of more than 50 countries known as the Ramstein Format, named for the air base in which it is usually held.

"The October 12, 2024 event is postponed," the U.S.-managed Ramstein Air Base said in an emailed note on Wednesday. "Announcements about future Ukraine Defense Contact Group meetings will be forthcoming."

The grouping coordinates military support for Kyiv, and is a critical platform for discussing the ramp up in supplies of air defense systems and ammunition to the war-ravaged country.

However, as Hurricane Milton bears down on the Florida coast this week the White House announced early Tuesday that Biden's trip to Germany wouldn't happen.

Ahead of the Ramstein meeting, Biden was set to hold talks with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer in Berlin on the Saturday morning, while Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was also set to present his so-called Victory Plan at Ramstein later in the day with the hope of securing further military support.

Asked late Tuesday whether the Ramstein summit could be rescheduled to coincide with a meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels set for Oct. 17 and 18, U.S. Defense Department spokesperson Sabrina Singh said talks were ongoing.

"We're just figuring this out right now," Singh said during a briefing. "So when there's more updates to provide, I certainly will. But the president just pulled down his trip this morning. So we're working through those details."

16. ‘Florida isn’t safe’: Ron DeSantis is unfit for hurricane response, activists say

Unfair criticism? I do not have enough knowledge to judge much of the criticism. But it seems these critics simply want to politicize climate change and disasters for their climate change agenda.

But I have been watching Governor DeSantis giving his briefings this week and he has been providing a masterclass on how to give a briefing on disaster relief/response operations. His communications skills are excellent and he demonstrates a deep understanding of what his emergency services are doing throughout his state.

‘Florida isn’t safe’: Ron DeSantis is unfit for hurricane response, activists say

The Guardian · by Dharna Noor · October 9, 2024

Ron DeSantis, Florida’s Republican governor, is back in the spotlight as he briefs residents on the arrival of Hurricane Milton, amid warnings it could be one of the most powerful storms to ever hit the state.

DeSantis, who dropped his presidential campaign in January, is as governor responsible for implementing Florida’s emergency plan by coordinating agencies, marshaling resources and urging residents to follow evacuation orders.

It’s a role he is unfit to play because of his record on the climate crisis, Florida activists say.

“Florida isn’t safe with DeSantis at the helm of our state government,” said Matthew Grocholske, 20, campaign strategy lead with the Orlando, Florida, chapter of the youth-led Sunrise Movement.

Less than two weeks after it was slammed by the deadly Hurricane Helene, the state is bracing for Hurricane Milton, a category 5 storm.

graphic showing potential impacts of hurricane milton

Florida environmentalists say that DeSantis’s policies to boost fossil fuels, suppress carbon-free energy and ignore global heating have fueled the climate crisis that has exacerbated such hurricanes. DeSantis’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

DeSantis on Wednesday urged millions of Floridians in Milton’s expected path to evacuate. “We are bracing and are prepared to receive a major hit,” he said.

Hurricanes – including Helene – are becoming more dangerous due to the climate crisis, caused primarily by the burning of fossil fuels. DeSantis’s policies have fueled that crisis with his policies and rhetoric, climate advocates say.

US emergency crews struggle as climate crisis fuels ‘unprecedented’ competing disasters

“When it comes to our climate crisis, Ron DeSantis is easily the worst governor in Florida’s history,” said Delaney Reynolds, 25, a PhD student in climate resilience at the University of Miami and lead plaintiff in a 2018 youth-led climate lawsuit against the state government.

DeSantis’s opposition to climate action began early in his career. One day after taking office in 2013, the then congressman voted against a measure proposed after Hurricane Sandy to guarantee people could collect on federal flood insurance claims.

During his 2018 run for governor, he pledged to protect Florida’s Everglades and waterways. But though he admitted that “human activity contributes to changes in the environment,” he also said: “I am not a global warming person.” More recently, he has gone further, slamming climate action as “woke”.

There is ample evidence that warmer ocean temperatures fuel more powerful storms, and preliminary studies show Helene’s strength was made far more likely by global heating.

Yet as Florida was battered by record-breaking rain this past June, DeSantis staunchly denied any potential link to the climate crisis.

“This clearly is not unprecedented,” he said at a news conference at the time. “I think the difference is, you compare 50 to 100 years ago to now, there’s just a lot more that’s been developed, so there’s a lot more effects that this type of event can have.”

In August DeSantis’s administration sparked outcry for its so-called Great Outdoors Initiative, which included plans to pave over thousands of acres at nine state parks and erect 350-room hotels, golf courses and pickleball courts. In May, the governor made headlines for signing legislation scrubbing most references to climate change from state law. The policy, which took effect on 1 July, restructured the state’s energy policy to nullify goals to boost wind and solar, instead focusing on hardening energy infrastructure against “natural and manmade threats”.

“We’re restoring sanity in our approach to energy and rejecting the agenda of the radical green zealots,” DeSantis posted on X.

During his run for president in the 2024 Republican primary, DeSantis also promised to ramp up domestic oil and gas production and fend off electric vehicle mandates, moves that climate experts warned would have boosted greenhouse gas emissions.

His promises rhymed with his state policies. This past legislative session, DeSantis reportedly quietly helped craft a ban on wind energy infrastructure in Florida. And he also signed a far-reaching energy omnibus bill boosting the gas industry and increasing the barriers to purchasing electric vehicles.

“The Florida we grew up loving is slipping away with each storm, and DeSantis is ignoring that,” said Yoca Arditi-Rocha, executive director of the Orlando-based non-profit Cleo Institute, which advocates for climate education. “We’re losing the places that define who we are as Floridians, and DeSantis is moving us in that direction, ignoring this crisis in his own backyard because of political reasons.”

Last year DeSantis turned down federal aid for energy efficiency, electrification and slashing carbon pollution. In 2022, he vetoed from the state budget a $5m allocation for a hurricane shelter in a north-east Florida town, and barred the state’s pension fund from making investment decisions that consider the climate crisis. And the previous year he adopted a bill banning Florida’s cities from adopting 100% clean energy goals. Such policies have exacerbated the climate crisis which fuels hurricanes like Milton and Helene, Grocholske said.

“The catastrophic level of this hurricane is directly due to the policies our state government is passing,” said Grocholske. “It’s clear that [DeSantis’s] administration has been one of the biggest threats to climate justice our state has faced in its history.”

Perplexingly, as DeSantis has attacked climate efforts, he has backed environmental conservation, saying he channels the conservationist president Theodore Roosevelt. This year alone, he announced funds to restore the Everglades, address harmful algae blooms, and directed revenue generated from a tribal compact to fund flood control and water quality improvement.

DeSantis reportedly refuses Harris’s calls as Florida braces for new hurricane

Arditi-Rocha said her organization “applauds” DeSantis’s conservation efforts, noting some of them could help protect the health of crucial carbon sinks. But those moves cannot make up for his pro-fossil fuel policies, she said.

“Climate change is this overflowing data, and DeSantis is coming in with towels,” she said. “He’s putting on more and more towels without turning off the faucet, without tackling the root of the problem.”

DeSantis often describes his conservation initiatives as economically beneficial. But by increasing carbon emissions, he is costing the state money and lives, said Reynolds.

“Frankly, he should be given a special merit of honor for so overtly, consistently and consciously failing to address the cause of our climate crisis,” she said. “What he has done will tragically cost our state untold billions, if not trillions, of damage for generations to come.”

The Guardian · by Dharna Noor · October 9, 2024

17. Sweden Presents First NATO ‘Deterrence and Defense’ Plan

Sweden Presents First NATO ‘Deterrence and Defense’ Plan

thedefensepost.com · by Giulia Bernacchi · October 9, 2024

The Swedish government has presented a bill proposing that the country makes an armed force available to NATO to address potential threats in the North Atlantic.

Pending approval from the Swedish parliament, the bill outlines Stockholm’s contribution of ground troops, marine units, naval vessels, and combat aircraft to the alliance.

“This is a historic decision. For the first time as an ally, we will contribute an armed force to NATO’s collective defense,” said Swedish Foreign Minister Maria Malmer Stenergard.

The Swedish assets will support NATO forces in the North Sea and the Baltic Sea, where Sweden shares a maritime border with Russia.

“NATO is the ultimate guarantor of European and transatlantic security,” said Minister of Defense Pål Jonson.

“The bill that the government is now presenting to the Riksdag will enable Sweden to contribute to NATO’s deterrence in a credible and reliable way, in the spirit of solidarity,” he added.

Boosting Defense Efforts

After the Russia-Ukraine conflict erupted in 2022, Sweden became the last country to join NATO in March.

Sweden’s decision to boost its defense efforts aims to create a deterrence mechanism to prevent possible Russian threats.

In April, Stockholm announced a plan for deploying a battalion of 600 soldiers to Latvia, including CV90 armored vehicles and Leopard 2 main battle tanks, to be implemented in 2025.

Since joining NATO, the Scandinavian country has significantly increased its military spending.

While the proposed budget for 2025 is 135 billion Swedish kronor ($13 billion), or 2.4 percent of GDP, it could reach 185 billion Swedish kronor ($17 billion) by 2030, corresponding to 2.6 percent of GDP.

thedefensepost.com · by Giulia Bernacchi · October 9, 2024

18. USS Boxer provides disaster relief after typhoon hits Philippines

And the US military gives a masterclass in foreign disaster relief operations.

USS Boxer provides disaster relief after typhoon hits Philippines

militarytimes.com · by Diana Correll · October 9, 2024

The amphibious assault ship Boxer and elements of the embarked 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit are now operating in the Philippines providing disaster relief assistance in the aftermath of Typhoon Krathon that devastated the islands last month.

The Boxer, which got underway in July from San Diego, is delivering supplies including tarps, shelter kits, and food packets to remote areas in the Philippines to support the U.S. Agency for International Development’s relief operations.

“The primary focus of our mission is helping the people of the Philippines recover as quickly and safely as possible,” Marine Corps Col. Sean Dynan, commanding officer of the 15th MEU, said in a statement. “Alongside the Armed Forces of the Philippines and USAID, our forces will help coordinate and transport relief supplies to those who were most affected in the Batanes Islands. Humanitarian assistance in an expeditionary environment is what we train to do, and it is one of the reasons we are forward deployed as an amphibious force.”

Marine promoted by identical twin brother while deployed with 15th MEU

Gunnery Sgt. Joseph Morelli was afforded the opportunity to effectively look in the mirror and promote his identical sibling, Albert, to sergeant.

The Boxer and the 15th MEU are working alongside the I Marine Expeditionary Force’s Marine Rotational Force – Southeast Asia to distribute these supplies.

Other U.S. forces sent to the Philippines following the typhoon include a Marine Corps KC-130J Hercules aircraft from Marine Aerial Refueler Transport Squadron 152, 1st Marine Aircraft Wing, based out of Okinawa in Japan.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin signed off on providing aid to the Philippines, per the request of the island’s government.

Krathon struck the Philippines on Sept. 30 before moving on to hit Taiwan, prompting the evacuation of hundreds of families, the Associated Press reports.

The Boxer initially deployed in April, but was sidelined and returned to San Diego due to damage on its rudder. The ship got underway again in July.

19. Bridging the Gap: Why Conventional Forces Need Irregular Warfare Training

Again, I would offer the following observations and recommendations from the American Way of Irregular Warfare (https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PEA301-1.html) to the author and anyone who wants to consider irregular warfare.

Observation 1: U.S. Tactical-Level Formations Have

Performed Admirably in Irregular Warfare Campaigns

Observation 2: Irregular Warfare Missions Require

Irregular Warfare Campaigns

Observation 3: The U.S. Military Is Not Well Organized

for Irregular Warfare Campaigns

Observation 4: The United States Lacks the Concepts,

Doctrine, and Canon Necessary to Be Effective in

Population-Centric Conflicts

Observation 5: There Is Insufficient Professional Military

Education for Irregular Warfare

Observation 6: The U.S. National Security Enterprise Is

Structured to Fail in Population-Centric Conflicts

Recommendation to Congress: Mandate an Independent

Review of U.S. Strategic Failure in Population-Centric

Conflicts

Recommendation to the President: Reorganize the

Executive Branch Around the Security Challenges of the

21st Century

Recommendation to Concerned Citizens: Establish

an Institution Outside Government Dedicated to

Understanding American Irregular Warfare

Competition with other nations is the primary national security con- cern of the United States.1 This includes competition with the revisionist powers of China and Russia,2 the “central challenge to U.S. prosperity and security,”3 and rogue regimes (e.g., Iran, North Korea) that threaten to destabilize regions through “their pursuit of nuclear weapons or sponsorship of terrorism.”4 Deterring the aggression of these adversaries will certainly require that the United States expand the lethality of its conventional and nuclear capabilities to sustain its military supremacy.5

However, actual competition and conflict with these nation-states will most likely be irregular. 6 This reflects a deliberate calculus by our adversaries, who understand that “conventional or nuclear war with the United States would be risky and prohibitively costly,” 7 but that the United States is vulnerable to irregular approaches. Rather than risk conflicts with casualty numbers that are “virtually unthinkable,” these adversaries will continue to deploy a blend of information, legal, and proxy warfare in challenging the United States and its allies. 8 These irregular approaches allow America’s adversaries to turn the “demo- cratic norms and institutions” of the United States and its allies against them, allowing for contestation without direct military action 9

See also: "An American Way of Political Warfare: A Proposal" https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PE304.html

I would also offer these additional comments:

1. While I have long said IW is the military contribution to political warfare and political warfare is strategic competition, I of course can live with IW is the military contribution to strategic competition with one word change (from "the" to "a"). IW is A (or one) military contribution to strategic competition. I also think it is very important to recognize that IW can take place before conflict and will definitely take place during all phases of conflict (e.g., during large scale combat operations/major theater war) and will most likely continue to take place during post-conflict operations. During conflict it will take place in the enemy's rear area as well as occupied territory and in territory adjacent to the theater of operations and could take place around the world wherever our adversaries have interests. The two common themes during strategic competition and all phases of conflict and post conflict is that IW is population focused and IW is intended to create dilemmas for our adversaries and mitigate their IW activities against us. This idea allows us to counter their efforts as well as seize the initiative and conduct proactive activities against our adversaries through, by, and with the full range of indigenous forces and populations and friends, partners, and allies.

It seems to me that we are mixing IW and strategic competition. Not everything we might do in strategic competition is IW. The Joint Concept for Competing (2023) is actually a very useful guide for DOD's contribution to strategic competition (access it here: https://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/joint-concept-competing ). It includes IW but is not exclusively IW. it should be developed into the broad DOD concept for strategic competition.

This is why I recommend the one word change from IW is THE military contribution to strategic competition to IW is A military contribution to strategic competition.

2. Are considering IW too broadly? Perhaps we should consider focusing specifically on the IW threats posed by the Dark Quad and VEOs: China's Unrestricted Warfare, the Three Warfares, and the Belt and Road Initiative), Russia's non-linear or new Generation Warfare, Iran Unconventional warfare (through the Iran Action Network), north Korea's political warfare/blackmail diplomacy strategies with Juche characteristics, and the terrorist and influence activities of Violent Extremist Organizations (VEOs). We should not be afraid to say we need to counter these threats. I get the emphasis on acting faster than the enemy's decision cycle and seizing the initiative that we love to tout - we are all Boyd cycle (OODA loop aficionados) . But I think focusing on these threats from the "Big 5" (Dark Quad plus VEOs) must give DOD some concrete direction as well as justify operations. And the messaging beyond DOD might be better served by stating the specific IW threats we face. Creating dilemmas for our adversaries is being proactive and seizing the initiative and counters our adversaries' IW activities.

3. Leadership emphasis on IW is key. There must be national level support for IW as A contribution to strategic competition. This must come from the White House and the principles of the NSC (particularly SECDEF, SECSTATE, ODNI and DCIA, USAID, Treasury, and Justice). To that end I have drafted a "directive" for IW support to Strategic Competition. I based it on the model of NSDD 32 from 1982 which was President Reagan's National Security Strategy. It was a classified strategy with only some 36 original copies (of course it has been declassified - https://irp.fas.org/offdocs/nsdd/nsdd-32.pdf). I can make the argument that this strategy helped contribute to our success in the Cold War. I will probably contribute a version of this document to the Irregular Warfare Institute's call for papers for policy recommendations for the new administration (https://irregularwarfare.org/articles/call-for-submissions-policy-recommendations-for-the-new-administration/).

In addition to leadership, there must be a process for interagency task forces and coordination at the NSC level. I recommend reprising President Clinton's 1997 Presidential Decision Directive 56 (PDD 56) for the Management of Complex Contingency Operations. This provides a disciplined structure for an interagency process that could be adapted for strategic competition at the national level. The bottomline is there must be national level leadership to focus on this area of national security and a national level interagency process that will allow assessments to gain understanding of problems and to develop interagency approaches to solving complex political-military-economic problems.

4. Just some additional general questions for food for thought:

(1) What are our IW proficient campaign HQs?

(2) How do we man and develop IW proficient HQs?

(3) Who is our IW champion?

• In DOD?

• In Congress?

• In the civilian interagency?

(4) Can we develop IW certified personnel – certified in IW campaigning and strategy development? Should we?

(5) Can conventional forces support resilience building if their priority is on LSCO/warfighting in preparation for the “Davidson window?” (China's attack of Taiwan by 2027)

• Should they be engaged in this at the expense of preparing for the Davidson window?

• Why is there so much emphasis on the conventional force in IW?

Let me close with some excerpts from a paper I am drafting on IW.

In the complex realm of warfare, there is a profound difference between operational wisdom and intellectual posturing. Nowhere is this more evident than in the debate surrounding the definition of Irregular Warfare (IW). For years, professionals and scholars alike have argued over the nuances of this term, fixating on its precise wording rather than focusing on what truly matters: strategy and campaign planning that actually achieve U.S. objectives. In this discourse, the narrow obsession with defining IW risks diverting attention from the critical intellectual labor required to master this unique form of conflict.

Having been deeply involved in the process of crafting the Unconventional Warfare (UW) definition in 2009, I can attest firsthand to the limitations of such definitional debates. While certain aspects of the UW definition were valuable, the process also felt stifling—a bureaucratic exercise with diminishing returns. Ultimately, the definitions we create are useful only to a point; beyond that, they become less relevant to the pressing need for sound strategy and operational effectiveness. This realization has led me to abandon the endless argument over the definitions of UW and IW altogether.

The next generation of military and civilian professionals may continue to quibble over definitions, clinging to what might be considered “pet rocks”—those beloved yet irrelevant arguments that do nothing to advance our understanding of the fight at hand. They may never heed the wisdom of T.E. Lawrence, who recognized that “irregular warfare is far more intellectual than a bayonet charge.” Lawrence understood that this form of warfare demands deep thinking, adaptability, and a mastery of strategy, not simply tactical proficiency or word games over definitions.

If we focus solely on a definition, we fail to appreciate the intellectual rigor required to succeed in IW. Those who cannot discuss the strategic and operational aspects of IW—who instead retreat to the safety of definitional arguments—have lost their intellectual credibility.

There is a deeper philosophical truth here, too. We will reach a higher level of understanding only when we transcend our need for rigid definitions.

Irregular Warfare doesn't care if our definition of it is "right" or "wrong." It cares whether we have the intellectual fortitude to understand its nuances, adapt to its challenges, and execute strategies that win. At the end of the day, the measure of success in IW is not found in words but in outcomes. And those outcomes hinge on whether we, as a force, can move beyond the limiting constraints of definitions to engage in the far more difficult work of strategy, adaptation, and operational excellence.

I am writing the above paper to counter all the IW naysayers who like to nitpick the definitions and doctrine.

Bridging the Gap: Why Conventional Forces Need Irregular Warfare Training - Irregular Warfare Initiative

irregularwarfare.org · by Austin Wesley · October 10, 2024

The Army is undergoing a major transition as it refocuses toward its pacing threat and modernizes for Large Scale Combat Operations (LSCO) against a near-peer adversary. In preparing for this future possibility, it should not forget the lessons of the past 20 years nor fall into the post-Vietnam trap of forswearing irregular warfare (IW) and solely focusing on conventional warfare. Historically, the Army has struggled to institutionalize lessons learned from IW operations which resulted in an organization that was reactive to irregular threats and often failed to achieve strategic objectives. The Army has an opportunity to avoid these past mistakes and take a more holistic approach to how it operates in current and future environments. To proactively compete against the United States’ adversaries, Army conventional forces need to understand IW and break the reactive cycle by institutionalizing IW throughout the Army’s Professional Military Education (PME) system.

Bridging the Gap: Why Conventional Forces Need Irregular Warfare Training – Insider: Short of War

Doctrinal Framework and Definitional Ambiguity

To understand the Army’s role in Irregular Warfare we must start with doctrine, which provides the framework to understand how the Army supports the joint force and prepares for and deters conventional and irregular war. Doctrine recognizes the importance of conventional deterrence, and the resources required to do so, but also the significant contribution the Army provides to the joint force throughout the competition continuum as outlined in Figure 1 below. The Army’s doctrinal foundation, ADP-1, The Army, states “The primary responsibility of our Army is to conduct prompt and sustained land combat as part of the joint force.” Furthermore, “when not engaged in direct conflict, the Army focuses its efforts on conducting operations to prepare for and deter war.” It is easy to interpret this section as simply deterrence through modernization and training; however, doctrine codifies two categories of war, conventional and irregular, so what does the Army do to prepare for and deter an irregular war?

Doctrine does not provide an exact answer, but it does provide broad missions that are irregular in nature for which Army forces should prepare. FM 3-0, Operations, lists the four strategic roles the Army has when supporting the joint force: “Army forces shape operational environments, counter aggression on land during crisis, prevail during large-scale ground combat, and consolidate gains. The Army fulfills its strategic roles by providing forces for joint campaigns that enable integrated deterrence of adversaries outside of conflict and the defeat of enemies during conflict or war (emphasis added).” This highlights the need for Army conventional forces to maintain proficiency in tasks other than LSCO to effectively support the joint force, most of which the Army is already conducting.

Lessons from Vietnam

Irregular Warfare is often assumed to be the sole responsibility of Special Operations Forces (SOF) who are specifically organized and trained to conduct such missions. However, conventional forces have been and will continue to be involved to varying degrees. During the Vietnam War, for example, US military involvement evolved from an IW approach to LSCO. In this conflict, irregular warfare was carried out by conventional and special operations forces. Although not yet in the Army’s lexicon in 1962, General Paul Harkins, commander of Military Assistance Command Vietnam (MACV), was tasked with what is now termed Foreign Internal Defense (FID), which is defined as a “whole-of-government approach to strengthen a foreign government against ongoing or potential internal threats.” Throughout the war, the Army employed most of the FID tools outlined in Figure 2 to defeat the enemy. The United States military involvement began with advising and assisting the South Vietnamese Army and evolved to LSCO against a uniformed North Vietnamese army. There was not a clean transition where one form of warfare stopped and another started, rather it was a simultaneous mix of conventional and irregular warfare to varying degrees based on the operational environment.

Failing to learn

Following the evacuation of all United States forces from Vietnam, the Army quickly shifted its focus to countering a Soviet invasion in Eastern Europe. Unfortunately, most lessons from the war were quickly forgotten, and doctrine, Professional Military Education (PME), and training focused exclusively on LSCO. Only SOF retained some institutional knowledge on IW

while the rest of the Army wanted to move past the perceived failures in Vietnam. The Army would be forced to relearn those lessons 25 years later in Iraq.

Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF) provides a contemporary example of conventional forces conducting IW. In contrast to Vietnam, OIF began with LSCO and then transitioned to IW. After achieving a decisive victory over the Iraqi Army and removing Saddam Hussein from power, the Army began stability operations (an IW operation) to transition the “responsibility for security and governance to legitimate authorities other than US forces.” A growing insurgency quickly rendered stability operations ineffective, and the Army was asked to conduct a mission it was wholly unprepared for: counterinsurgency (COIN) operations.

An Army trained and organized to fight a conventional war had to shift its focus to conducting COIN operations with no institutional knowledge or current doctrine. The former Vice Chief of Staff of the Army, General Jack Keane, later noted that the Army did not “have any doctrine, nor was it educated and trained, to deal with an insurgency… After the Vietnam War, we purged ourselves of everything that had to do with irregular warfare or insurgency, because it had to do with how we lost that war. In hindsight, that was a bad decision.” The lack of doctrine and training resulted in limited success against a well-resourced and growing insurgency. It was not until 2007 when the new COIN manual was published and instituted by General Petraeus, that violence decreased and the Army regained the initiative. Significant resources, both blood and treasure, were expended unnecessarily because the Army at that time was trained, equipped, and organized almost exclusively for LSCO.

In addition to COIN operations, another mission along the IW spectrum the Army received that it was unprepared for, was to train and equip the newly reconstituted Iraqi Army to fight an insurgency, known today as Security Force Assistance (SFA). Unfortunately, the majority of conventional forces were not trained, prepared, or resourced to conduct SFA. There was not even a doctrinal definition of SFA until 2006 which made it difficult for US combat units to effectively train a partner force for COIN operations. The result was a slow and inconsistent SFA effort requiring the United States Army to maintain the lead in most combat operations. Having failed to codify lessons from Vietnam, conventional units were largely ineffective in preparing Iraqi forces to take ownership of their security. Following this early failure, former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates correctly assessed the importance of conventional force proficiency in SFA when he stated “the standing up and mentoring of indigenous armies and police—once the province of Special Forces—is now a key mission for the military as a whole.” Conventional forces, regardless of their perceptions of warfare, yet again were conducting IW through SFA in Iraq.

The Vietnam War and OIF demonstrate conventional forces’ critical and enduring role in IW and how the Army continues to modernize and train for the fight it wants, not the fight it will likely face. Change is difficult in large organizations and “the only thing harder than getting a new idea into the military mind is to get an old one out.” IW is not a new idea and changing the belief that LSCO should be the Army’s near-exclusive focus will be challenging.

Recommendations for Improvement

There are several actions the Army can take to mitigate the risk of failing to learn from previous conflicts. The most important steps occur within the Army’s Professional Military Education (PME) system. The first step in breaking the reactive cycle of, and attitude towards, IW is to institutionalize lessons learned into Non-Commissioned Officer (NCO) and officer PME. Army leaders of all ranks will continue to misunderstand IW and their role in it unless they are provided the tools to do so. America’s adversaries do not want to fight the United States in a conventional war so they rely on irregular warfare to achieve their objectives. The Army must adapt or risk being unprepared in future conflicts.

This includes incorporating the definition of IW, its activities and operations, and case studies of conventional forces employment throughout PME curriculum, rather than during a single block of instruction taught exclusively by SOF professionals. Although SOF leaders provide a unique perspective and likely have a depth of experience to share, having IW taught by SOF only reinforces the misperception that IW is exclusively a SOF mission. It is important for conventional force leaders to understand doctrine and how they support the joint force through IW. PME mostly omits any discussion regarding IW and when mentioned, is quickly overshadowed by the concern with LSCO. This approach results in an NCO and officer corps that are ill equipped to analyze and solve the complex problems that await them in their next assignment.

Repetitions are key as well. In addition to formal instruction, PME schools should incorporate an IW component in planning exercises where students can be challenged to think creatively and critically. Give leaders the training repetitions in a classroom environment, with experienced cadre, where they can ask questions and understand how the adversary may react when faced with an irregular threat. Instructors can challenge students to find the best possible outcome, which likely won’t result in a decisive victory. Students will quickly realize there is not a single correct answer, and ambiguity is inherent in every IW operation.

Furthermore, exposure to the aspects of IW must happen early and often by implementing these PME updates as early as the Advanced Leader Course and Captains Career Course. Between Security Force Assistance Brigade (SFAB) deployments, State Partnership Program (SPP) engagements, COIN operations, CT operations, and multinational exercises around the globe, the actions of tactical-level leaders can impact the operational and strategic levels. Company-level leaders should understand how their efforts support their operational-level headquarters’ mission and often Department of State objectives as well. Understanding how all these activities work towards a common goal will likely shape these leaders’ mindsets as they plan for and conduct partner-nation engagements and operations.

Making these changes is not a zero-sum equation. IW instruction should not replace anything in the existing curriculum, rather it should be woven into existing courses that already discuss these topics. Including IW elements into planning exercises may change how they are conducted but does not degrade their effectiveness nor prolong their execution. Army uniformed and civilian instructors have the knowledge and skill to make these changes, enabling students to tackle the challenges they will likely face.

Conclusion

The Army must stand ready to defeat our adversaries in ground combat, but as history has shown, it must also be ready and able to effectively wage IW to support the joint force. Conventional forces in particular must expand their understanding and appreciation for their role in IW. This is not a SOF problem; it is an Army problem. Disregarding the lessons learned from Vietnam, and again after OIF, perpetuates a reactive IW readiness cycle leaving the Army wholly unprepared for the next irregular fight. It must institutionalize this hard-fought knowledge in PME to better conduct IW now and prepare for the irregular war it is likely to fight, not just the war it wants to fight.

Austin Wesley is an active duty US Army Engineer officer. He has served in multiple engineer formations including armored, stryker, and light airborne. Major Wesley is a recent CGSC graduate and currently serves as the Battalion Executive Officer for 3-364th Brigade Engineer Batallion at Joint Base Lewis-McChord.

The views expressed are those of the author(s) and do not reflect the official position of the Irregular Warfare Initiative, Princeton University’s Empirical Studies of Conflict Project, the Modern War Institute at West Point, or the United States Government.

Main Image: U.S. Army Lt. Gen. David Petraeus enjoys a cup of tea with a group of local Afghans (U.S. Army Photo by Pfc. Leslie Angulo)

If you value reading the Irregular Warfare Initiative, please consider supporting our work. And for the best gear, check out the IWI store for mugs, coasters, apparel, and other items.

20. CSA's Articles of the Year (The Harding Project)

I love the title (and the article) "Drink, Think, Link"

CSA's Articles of the Year

Techcraft, electromagnetic spectrum, and online communities

https://www.hardingproject.com/p/csas-articles-of-the-year?utm

Zachary Griffiths

Oct 10, 2024

General Randy George, the Chief of Staff of the Army, recognized three articles as his articles of the last year.

“Techcraft on Display in Ukraine” by Cmd. Sgt. Maj. Brian A. Hester, Cmd. Sgt. Maj. Dennis Doyle, and Cpt. Ronan A. Sefton.
“Enabling Maneuver in Large Scale Combat Operations” by Sgt. Maj. Shane Short.
“Drink, Think, Link” by LTC Erik Davis and LTC Nicholas Frazier in Military Review Online Exclusive.

Congratulations to these authors! You can catch them talking about their articles next week at AUSA on Monday.

Add CSA's AOY to your Calendar

21. AI and Intelligence Analysis: Panacea or Peril?

Conclusion:

Intelligence issues are typically not the result of insufficient information collection but rather analysis. In the face of intelligence failure, deploying new and highly sophisticated collection capabilities is not necessarily the answer. AI can definitely help. The capability to rapidly identify relationships within large data sets will certainly increase the efficiency of intelligence analysis and lead to the construction of more precise assessments. Generative AI can also help, but not completely solve, the problems associated with cognitive biases and mental models. But this requires that intelligence organizations scrub the data used for training the model to ensure that it is representative of thoughtful and validated analytical methodologies that seek to avoid bias. Additionally, as data is the integral component of any AI system, intelligence organizations should seek legitimate and legal approaches to acquire private sector data while simultaneously recognizing the inherent issues of compatibility, structure, and trust associated with this data. This is a challenging undertaking, as the private sector will certainly exhibit a reluctance to provide data to a government entity for fear of impacting economic bottom lines or violating consumer trust. Addressing this condition requires robust engagement and strategies to ensure data acquisition while simultaneously balancing private organizations’ concerns.

To contend with the problem of hallucinations, higher-quality training data coupled with tools such as retrieval augmented generation (a feature that fact-checks sources) can help. In the near term, generative AI’s use for intelligence will still necessitate the analyst expending time validating and double-checking AI’s contribution, which calls into question the utility of this technology. However, the time investments now will certainly yield dividends in the long term as intelligence organizations test and experiment with various models. Adoption and experimentation of this technology will facilitate its maturation, and training data can improve, fostering greater integration of generative AI into intelligence tradecraft.

Perhaps the most pivotal facet undergirding the success of generative AI into the field of intelligence is acceptance by the analytical community. AI technologies are not replacements for humans; rather, they are enabling systems that still require a human “in the loop” to operate and to improve functionality. Intelligence operations contend with ambiguity and complexity to quickly identify shifts and changes in the environment and correspondingly to provide this information to those with the authority and power to make and execute decisions. Automation and speed do not absolve intelligence analysts of their primary duty to ask and consider the right questions at the right time to deliver timely and accurate intelligence. Intelligence professionals should not view AI as a panacea or a peril, but rather as a tool that will no doubt improve over time.

AI and Intelligence Analysis: Panacea or Peril? - War on the Rocks

warontherocks.com · by Noah B. Cooper · October 10, 2024

In today’s chaotic world, professional intelligence analysts must contend with nearly endless data streams, which risk overwhelming them while also exacerbating the impact of cognitive biases. Is AI the answer, or do the flaws that currently afflict AI create yet more risks?

In fact, AI is neither a panacea nor a peril. Like other emerging technologies, AI is not an instant “out of the box” solution but rather a capability that continues to evolve. Today, AI can augment human capabilities and enhance the analysis process by tackling specific challenges. However, AI is not without issues. This means its value lies in serving as a complementary capability to the expertise and judgment of human intelligence analysts.

Before the wholesale adoption of AI in support of intelligence analysis, it is essential to understand the specific problems facing analysts: coping with large volumes of data; the acquisition of data from non-traditional sources; and, perhaps most vexing of all, the impacts of cognitive biases that impact the objectivity of intelligence assessments. AI can play a valuable role in alleviating these challenges, but only if humans are kept in the loop.

Become a Member

Data Overload, Integrity, and Bias

Separating the wheat from the chaff, or sorting through the volumes of information collected daily, is a primary problem vexing the U.S. intelligence community today. This is despite the investment in automated means of collection and the corresponding infrastructure to store, organize, and structure bulk data for future retrieval and examination by intelligence analysts. Though this impressive process likely consumes a significant portion of the U.S. intelligence community’s budget, information nonetheless “falls on the floor” or goes unanalyzed by human analysts.

A simplistic argument would contend that too much data is a condition preferable to not enough data. However, intelligence failures such as the 2003 misidentification of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, the failure of Israeli intelligence to discern what became the imminent invasion of a combined Arab army led by Egypt and Syria in 1973 (leading to the Yom Kippur War), and possibly the October 7, 2023 surprise incursion and attacks by Hamas into Israel suggests that an overabundance could prove detrimental to the vitally important process of intelligence analysis, particularly if analysts are unable to sort and sift through the information available to identify those key indicators of an adversary’s intentions.

Processing a growing amount of information requires the intelligence analyst to comb through, identify, and synthesize disparate data points into a judgment — which, when done well, reduces uncertainty. However, cognitive biases coupled with the problem of too much data or poor data quality plague this process, leading to imprecise assessments that could contribute to policy and decision-making failures, increased risks to military operations, and other disadvantageous and cascading outcomes. Given the challenging nature of intelligence analysis, could AI help avoid these consequences and provide decision-makers with crucial, objective, and accurate information?

If the promise of AI holds true, then generative AI technologies such as ChatGPT, which are based upon large language models, can add efficiencies to the analysis process. For example, generative AI could summarize lengthy texts (e.g., foreign grey literature), translate foreign languages, conduct open-source sentiment analysis, and perform various other functions. Moreover, generative AI could assist in the development of intelligence assessments. This does not alleviate human intelligence analysts of their pivotal function. Still, generative AI could serve as an adjunct to the analysis process, aiding in identifying analytical flaws or inconsistencies.

While these are promising functions, and it is reasonable to assume that intelligence agencies have already incorporated such technologies into their everyday processes, generative AI is not without its faults. First, generative AI does little to alleviate the perennial problem of analytical bias. Generative AI technologies constructed on large language models rely upon preexisting data sets, which are inherently unstructured and potentially flawed. Linked to this point, today’s generative AI models are prone to mistakes and can provide false or inaccurate content. These “hallucinations” relate to the development of generative AI models; despite training using a large corpus of data, if the generative AI system encounters an unfamiliar word, phrase, or topic — or if the data is insufficient — it will make an inference based upon its understanding of language and will give an answer that the system deems logical, but which could be erroneous.

Second, the information needed to determine an adversary’s capabilities and intentions is no longer solely the purview of governments. Non-governmental organizations, private entities, social media companies, and others have emerged as important data brokers possessing the information required to understand the strategic environment and to construct accurate intelligence assessments. The use of generative AI in intelligence analysis needs to address the associated underlying issues of data access, quality, and bias.

Thinking about Thinking: The Villainous Nature of Mindsets

It is a fallacy to believe that humans fully control their thought processes. The human mind exhibits instinctive and unconscious tendencies to process new information. For instance, humans exhibit an inclination to seek patterns, such as cause-and-effect relationships, which aid in analyzing the unknown or when presented with new problem sets. Moreover, as a component of survival instincts, individuals subconsciously develop mental models or cognitive and perceptual biases that impact human judgment and decision-making. Mental models are components of the human subconscious that guide our daily actions through mental shortcuts that we execute without conscious control.

In terms of intelligence analysis, a mental model is a paradigm that guides an analyst’s thought process on how an adversary will act or how a situation will unfold. The advantages associated with mental models vary depending on context and circumstances. Nonetheless, mental models can promote critical thinking, aid in decision-making, and incorporate diverse perspectives into the analytical or decision-making process. Ideally, the combination of multiple mental models could contribute to more positive intelligence analysis outcomes.

Conversely, extensive experience or knowledge on a topic could prove detrimental, as a mental model may prompt an individual to reject new and contradictory information or to process it incorrectly. Perhaps the most concerning aspect of mental models is the tendency to resist change. Once an analyst has developed an assessment, especially if the assessment has undergone review and approval, an analyst’s mental model may preclude them from accepting new and substantive information that alters the character of their assessment.

A stark example of mental models aggravating analytical biases is the failure of Israel’s intelligence apparatus to correctly identify Arab intent in the lead up to 1973 Yom Kippur War. Following the success of the 1967 Six-Day War, Israel developed an organizational and institutional adherence to what Israeli intelligence referred to as the “conception.” The conception acted as an analytical framework for Israeli intelligence and policymakers, shaping their perspectives on Arab activities, which held that, given Israel’s overwhelming success in the 1967 war, Egypt and Syria would not attack absent the other, Arab forces would not attack absent surface-to-surface ballistic missiles that could threaten and place Israeli airfields and civilian populations at risk, and that the combined Arab armies would not attack unless they could contend with Israeli air superiority via the provision of Soviet air defense capabilities. Israeli intelligence analysts exhibited a predisposition to examine incoming intelligence solely in relation to the conception, and attempts to derive Arab intentions based upon strategic calculations rather than tactical realities fostered the production of imprecise assessments, leading to the surprise attack by the combined Arab forces.

AI to the Rescue?

Intelligence agencies are information-centered organizations, meaning that the organization’s foundation relies upon a consistent inflow of data. Analysts subsequently transform this “raw” data into coherent information for customer presentation or delivery. Rarely, if ever, do the totality of facts regarding an issue present themselves for a nearly definitive conclusion. Instead, an intelligence agency strives for accuracy in its assessments through reliance upon inconclusive facts ascertained through intelligence collection operations and assumptions derived from analysts’ knowledge, expertise and training. Despite being well-versed in their understanding of the historical aspects of the issue and, more importantly, their tradecraft, the adverse effects of mental models consistently loom over intelligence assessments. Given the potential unconscious and involuntary influence of mental models, could generative AI pierce through the inherent bias of human cognition to provide unbiased and objective assessments?

To address this question, it is first necessary to understand how generative AI can enable the intelligence analysis process. Perhaps the primary contributing function of generative AI to intelligence analysis is the ability to distill complexity into more manageable core components for an analyst. Specifically, AI can process large amounts of structured and unstructured data from multiple, disparate sources and determine linkages within the data that are not readily apparent to a human analyst. Moreover, presuming the capability of the generative AI’s large language model, it could fuse information from multiple intelligence disciplines (e.g., signals, human, geospatial intelligence, etc.), presenting a clearer depiction of the issue at a faster rate. The value of actionable intelligence, particularly in time-sensitive scenarios, is high, and thus, the vastly faster processing speeds of AI to identify patterns and correlations are quite valuable to the analyst. As an ancillary benefit, the greater timeliness associated with delivering actionable intelligence acts as a relationship-strengthening measure between an intelligence organization and its customers.

The ability of a human to interact with a generative AI system — even if the prompt contains confusing grammar, misspellings, and a lack of punctuation — and receive a useful response is a demonstration of natural language processing. Natural language processing facilitates the interaction between humans and AI, and enables systems to process and understand human text and speech. There exists an estimated 7,164 languages in the world today. Additionally, the amount of data produced daily is likely in the range of 300–400 million terabytes. From an intelligence perspective, analyzing even just a fraction of this data, especially when the source is in a foreign language, is a difficult and time-consuming task. Natural language processing alleviates the translation burden and can aid in extracting pertinent information from textual data such as articles, books, and other documentation. Perhaps even more important, as this technology matures, the need to recruit, train, and retain linguists in difficult and esoteric language sets diminishes.

It’s All About the Data

Data analysis and natural language processing represent just a sampling of generative AI’s applications to intelligence operations. Indeed, the promise of AI could yield manifold benefits in the field of intelligence analysis beyond these two functions. However, AI is not without issue. It is vitally important to highlight that the core functionality of generative AI derives from the data employed to train the model. If the dataset contains bias, the model will continue to promulgate and perhaps even amplify those biases. Thus, we return to the perennial problem of negative mental models impacting the analysis that could potentially feed generative AI systems. The primary consequence of leveraging pre-existing intelligence datasets is the unknown implication of biases contained in the finished analytical products. The injection of such datasets could continue the diffusion of skewed analysis, creating a cyclical process that exponentially adds to the compendium of imprecise and possibly dubious intelligence products.

The potential of generative AI systems to provide misleading outputs, or hallucinations, formed from incomplete or inaccurate data is a common problem and an inherent limitation of today’s AI technology. Generative AI systems assess the next word, phrase, image, or other outputs in a combination based on observable patterns in the training data. In the absence of data or the presence of extraneous data, generative AI will deduce the most likely sequence of content, which may contain falsehoods or simply bogus information. As such, human knowledge, experience, expertise, and intuition will continue to remain the vital components of intelligence tradecraft until this technology matures.

It follows that quality data is essential for using generative AI for intelligence analysis purposes. Perhaps just as important is acquiring the data. Data is certainly a commodity: a lucrative product for purchase, sale, or collection. Though intelligence organizations expend perhaps a disproportionate amount of their funding on sophisticated intelligence collection capabilities, which acquire highly classified material, with the proliferation of publicly available or open-source information, governments no longer possess a monopoly on data. Data in the private sector can prove just as valuable, if not more so, than data collected from highly technical means. Therefore, an intelligence organization should pursue the acquisition of such data. However, several challenges arise when a government attempts to acquire data from the private sector, which include trust issues, proprietary concerns, and compatibility problems.

Generally, the private sector collects individual data to improve a company’s products and services by personalizing them for its customers, to understand consumer behavior, and to improve customer retention. We have all likely experienced targeted marketing campaigns based on our browsing history, past purchases, and demographics. Additionally, multimedia streaming companies often offer customized experiences through playlists or recommendations on what to listen to or watch next. Ultimately, a consumer-based company analyzes data to develop and maintain customer relationships by appealing to their desires. While much of this data appears trivial, if the company freely shares data with the government, it may damage consumer trust and generate negative public perceptions of the company. Moreover, there are ethical concerns regarding sharing one’s data, particularly regarding the individual’s given (or lack of) consent to share their data with a government entity.

In addition to consumer-based companies, a vast industry exists that collects and sells data on individuals and businesses. Data brokers collect data from various public and private sources and, in turn, sell it for such purposes as marketing, risk analysis, and business intelligence. Additionally, think tanks, non-governmental organizations, educational institutions, and various others that conduct data collection and analysis activities produce a wealth of publicly available data. Sharing this data with a government entity could prove problematic, though. Private organizations may deem their data proprietary as it provides a competitive market advantage, and thus, sharing could impact their market positions. Moreover, private entities structure data specific to their uses, and as such, compatibility issues such as data schema variations, data integrity, and data security are likely to necessitate costly integration solutions.

When taken in aggregate, the compilation of this data has the potential to add to the compendium of intelligence data and provide rich insights to inform complex intelligence problems. It is difficult to argue against incorporating additional data, as it will enhance the intelligence analysis process. But the question of how an intelligence agency can acquire and utilize this information remains. The issues of trust, proprietary data, and compatibility will no doubt aggravate the acquisition of such information. Still, it would prove worthwhile as ingesting additional data sets into intelligence databases, particularly those enabled by generative AI, will enhance the analysis process. In doing so, intelligence organizations should exhibit caution to avoid inheriting the biases within the original data.

Conclusion

Intelligence issues are typically not the result of insufficient information collection but rather analysis. In the face of intelligence failure, deploying new and highly sophisticated collection capabilities is not necessarily the answer. AI can definitely help. The capability to rapidly identify relationships within large data sets will certainly increase the efficiency of intelligence analysis and lead to the construction of more precise assessments. Generative AI can also help, but not completely solve, the problems associated with cognitive biases and mental models. But this requires that intelligence organizations scrub the data used for training the model to ensure that it is representative of thoughtful and validated analytical methodologies that seek to avoid bias. Additionally, as data is the integral component of any AI system, intelligence organizations should seek legitimate and legal approaches to acquire private sector data while simultaneously recognizing the inherent issues of compatibility, structure, and trust associated with this data. This is a challenging undertaking, as the private sector will certainly exhibit a reluctance to provide data to a government entity for fear of impacting economic bottom lines or violating consumer trust. Addressing this condition requires robust engagement and strategies to ensure data acquisition while simultaneously balancing private organizations’ concerns.

To contend with the problem of hallucinations, higher-quality training data coupled with tools such as retrieval augmented generation (a feature that fact-checks sources) can help. In the near term, generative AI’s use for intelligence will still necessitate the analyst expending time validating and double-checking AI’s contribution, which calls into question the utility of this technology. However, the time investments now will certainly yield dividends in the long term as intelligence organizations test and experiment with various models. Adoption and experimentation of this technology will facilitate its maturation, and training data can improve, fostering greater integration of generative AI into intelligence tradecraft.

Perhaps the most pivotal facet undergirding the success of generative AI into the field of intelligence is acceptance by the analytical community. AI technologies are not replacements for humans; rather, they are enabling systems that still require a human “in the loop” to operate and to improve functionality. Intelligence operations contend with ambiguity and complexity to quickly identify shifts and changes in the environment and correspondingly to provide this information to those with the authority and power to make and execute decisions. Automation and speed do not absolve intelligence analysts of their primary duty to ask and consider the right questions at the right time to deliver timely and accurate intelligence. Intelligence professionals should not view AI as a panacea or a peril, but rather as a tool that will no doubt improve over time.

Become a Member

Noah B. Cooper is a career U.S. Army military intelligence officer with nearly 20 years of experience. He received an MA from John’s Hopkins University and an MA from King’s College London. The views expressed in this paper are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the U.S. Department of the Army, U.S. Department of Defense, or the U.S. government.

Image: Spc. Elaina Nieves

Commentary

warontherocks.com · by Noah B. Cooper · October 10, 2024

22. The Age of Depopulation: Surviving a World Gone Gray

I have had the good fortune (despite the depressing topic) to listen to the expert, NIck Eberstadt, lecture on various aspects of this subject in DC and Seoul over the past several months. We have been waiting for this paper that consolidates some much of what he has been teaching us.

We need to pay attention to what I think is a profound conclusion and a way that we should think about the future of humanity.

Excerpts:

The era of depopulation is nigh. Dramatic aging and the indefinite decline of the human population—eventually on a global scale—will mark the end of an extraordinary chapter of human history and the beginning of another, quite possibly no less extraordinary than the one before it. Depopulation will transform humanity profoundly, likely in numerous ways societies have not begun to consider and may not yet be in a position to understand.

Yet for all the momentous changes ahead, people can also expect important and perhaps reassuring continuities. Humanity has already found the formula for banishing material scarcity and engineering ever-greater prosperity. That formula can work regardless of whether populations rise or fall. Routinized material advance has been made possible by a system of peaceful human cooperation—deep, vast, and unfathomably complex—and that largely market-based system will continue to unfold from the current era into the next. Human volition—the driver behind today’s worldwide declines in childbearing—stands to be no less powerful a force tomorrow than it is today.

Humanity bestrides the planet, explores the cosmos, and continues to reshape itself because humans are the world’s most inventive, adaptable animal. But it will take more than a bit of inventiveness and adaptability to cope with the unintended future consequences of the family and fertility choices being made today.

The Age of Depopulation

Surviving a World Gone Gray

By Nicholas Eberstadt

November/December 2024

Published on October 10, 2024

Foreign Affairs · by Nicholas Eberstadt · October 10, 2024

Although few yet see it coming, humans are about to enter a new era of history. Call it “the age of depopulation.” For the first time since the Black Death in the 1300s, the planetary population will decline. But whereas the last implosion was caused by a deadly disease borne by fleas, the coming one will be entirely due to choices made by people.

With birthrates plummeting, more and more societies are heading into an era of pervasive and indefinite depopulation, one that will eventually encompass the whole planet. What lies ahead is a world made up of shrinking and aging societies. Net mortality—when a society experiences more deaths than births—will likewise become the new norm. Driven by an unrelenting collapse in fertility, family structures and living arrangements heretofore imagined only in science fiction novels will become commonplace, unremarkable features of everyday life.

Human beings have no collective memory of depopulation. Overall global numbers last declined about 700 years ago, in the wake of the bubonic plague that tore through much of Eurasia. In the following seven centuries, the world’s population surged almost 20-fold. And just over the past century, the human population has quadrupled.

The last global depopulation was reversed by procreative power once the Black Death ran its course. This time around, a dearth of procreative power is the cause of humanity’s dwindling numbers, a first in the history of the species. A revolutionary force drives the impending depopulation: a worldwide reduction in the desire for children.

So far, government attempts to incentivize childbearing have failed to bring fertility rates back to replacement levels. Future government policy, regardless of its ambition, will not stave off depopulation. The shrinking of the world’s population is all but inevitable. Societies will have fewer workers, entrepreneurs, and innovators—and more people dependent on care and assistance. The problems this dynamic raises, however, are not necessarily tantamount to a catastrophe. Depopulation is not a grave sentence; rather, it is a difficult new context, one in which countries can still find ways to thrive. Governments must prepare their societies now to meet the social and economic challenges of an aging and depopulating world.

In the United States and elsewhere, thinkers and policymakers are not ready for this new demographic order. Most people cannot comprehend the coming changes or imagine how prolonged depopulation will recast societies, economies, and power politics. But it is not too late for leaders to reckon with the seemingly unstoppable force of depopulation and help their countries succeed in a world gone gray.

A SPIN OF THE GLOBE

Global fertility has plunged since the population explosion in the 1960s. For over two generations, the world’s average childbearing levels have headed relentlessly downward, as one country after another joined in the decline. According to the UN Population Division, the total fertility rate for the planet was only half as high in 2015 as it was in 1965. By the UNPD’s reckoning, every country saw birthrates drop over that period.

And the downswing in fertility just kept going. Today, the great majority of the world’s people live in countries with below-replacement fertility levels, patterns inherently incapable of sustaining long-term population stability. (As a rule of thumb, a total fertility rate of 2.1 births per woman approximates the replacement threshold in affluent countries with high life expectancy—but the replacement level is somewhat higher in countries with lower life expectancy or marked imbalances in the ratio of baby boys to baby girls.)

In recent years, the birth plunge has not only continued but also seemingly quickened. According to the UNPD, at least two-thirds of the world’s population lived in sub-replacement countries in 2019, on the eve of the COVID-19 pandemic. The economist Jesús Fernández-Villaverde has contended that the overall global fertility rate may have dropped below the replacement level since then. Rich and poor countries alike have witnessed record-breaking, jaw-dropping collapses in fertility. A quick spin of the globe offers a startling picture.

Start with East Asia. The UNPD has reported that the entire region tipped into depopulation in 2021. By 2022, every major population there—in China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan—was shrinking. By 2023, fertility levels were 40 percent below replacement in Japan, over 50 percent below replacement in China, almost 60 percent below replacement in Taiwan, and an astonishing 65 percent below replacement in South Korea.

As for Southeast Asia, the UNPD has estimated that the region as a whole fell below the replacement level around 2018. Brunei, Malaysia, Singapore, and Vietnam have been sub-replacement countries for years. Indonesia, the fourth most populous country in the world, joined the sub-replacement club in 2022, according to official figures. The Philippines now reports just 1.9 births per woman. The birthrate of impoverished, war-riven Myanmar is below replacement, too. In Thailand, deaths now exceed births and the population is declining.

In South Asia, sub-replacement fertility prevails not only in India—now the world’s most populous country—but also in Nepal and Sri Lanka; all three dropped below replacement before the pandemic. (Bangladesh is on the verge of falling below the replacement threshold.) In India, urban fertility levels have dropped markedly. In the vast metropolis of Kolkata, for instance, state health officials reported in 2021 that the fertility rate was down to an amazing one birth per woman, less than half the replacement level and lower than in any major city in Germany or Italy.

Dramatic declines are also sweeping Latin America and the Caribbean. The UNPD has calculated overall fertility for the region in 2024 at 1.8 births per woman—14 percent below the replacement rate. But that projection may understate the actual decline, given what the Costa Rican demographer Luis Rosero-Bixby has described as the “vertiginous” drop in birthrates in the region since 2015. In his country, total fertility rates are now down to 1.2 births per woman. Cuba reported a 2023 fertility rate of just over 1.1, half the replacement rate; since 2019, deaths there have exceeded births. Uruguay’s rate was close to 1.3 in 2023 and, as in Cuba, deaths exceeded births. In Chile, the figure in 2023 was just over 1.1 births per woman. Major Latin American cities, including Bogota and Mexico City, now report rates below one birth per woman.

Sub-replacement fertility has even come to North Africa and the greater Middle East, where demographers have long assumed that the Islamic faith served as a bulwark against precipitous fertility declines. Despite the pro-natal philosophy of its theocratic rulers, Iran has been a sub-replacement society for about a quarter century. Tunisia has also dipped below replacement. In sub-replacement Turkey, Istanbul’s 2023 birthrate was just 1.2 babies per woman—lower than Berlin’s.

Global fertility has plunged since the population explosion in the 1960s.

For half a century, Europe’s overall fertility rates have been continuously sub-replacement. Russian fertility first dropped below replacement in the 1960s, during the Brezhnev era, and since the fall of the Soviet Union, Russia has witnessed 17 million more deaths than births. Like Russia, the 27 countries of the current European Union are about 30 percent below replacement today. Together, they reported just under 3.7 million births in 2023—down from 6.8 million in 1964. Last year, France tallied fewer births than it did in 1806, the year Napoleon won the Battle of Jena; Italy reported the fewest births since its 1861 reunification; and Spain the fewest since 1859, when it started to compile modern birth figures. Poland had its fewest births in the postwar era in 2023; so did Germany. The EU has been a net-mortality zone since 2012, and in 2022 it registered four deaths for every three births. The UNPD has marked 2019 as the peak year for Europe’s population and has estimated that in 2020, the continent entered what will become a long-term population decline.

The United States remains the main outlier among developed countries, resisting the trend of depopulation. With relatively high fertility levels for a rich country (although far below replacement—just over 1.6 births per woman in 2023) and steady inflows of immigrants, the United States has exhibited what I termed in these pages in 2019 “American demographic exceptionalism.” But even in the United States, depopulation is no longer unthinkable. Last year, the Census Bureau projected that the U.S. population would peak around 2080 and head into a continuous decline thereafter.

The only major remaining bastion against the global wave of sub-replacement levels of childbearing is sub-Saharan Africa. With its roughly 1.2 billion people and a UNPD-projected average fertility rate of 4.3 births per woman today, the region is the planet’s last consequential redoubt of the fertility patterns that characterized low-income countries during the population explosion of the middle half of the twentieth century.

But even there, rates are dropping. The UNPD has estimated that fertility levels in sub-Saharan Africa have fallen by over 35 percent since the late 1970s, when the subcontinent’s overall level was an astonishing 6.8 births per woman. In South Africa, birth levels appear to be just fractionally above replacement, with other countries in southern Africa close behind. A number of island countries off the African coast, including Cape Verde and Mauritius, are already sub-replacement.

The UNPD has estimated that the replacement threshold for the world as a whole is roughly 2.18 births per woman. Its latest medium variant projections—roughly, the median of projected outcomes—for 2024 have put global fertility at just three percent above replacement, and its low variant projections—the lower end of projected outcomes—have estimated that the planet is already eight percent below that level. It is possible that humanity has dropped below the planetary net-replacement rate already. What is certain, however, is that for a quarter of the world, population decline is already underway, and the rest of the world is on course to follow those pioneers into the depopulation that lies ahead.

THE POWER OF CHOICE

The worldwide plunge in fertility levels is still in many ways a mystery. It is generally believed that economic growth and material progress—what scholars often call “development” or “modernization”—account for the world’s slide into super-low birthrates and national population decline. Since birthrate declines commenced with the socioeconomic rise of the West—and since the planet is becoming ever richer, healthier, more educated, and more urbanized—many observers presume lower birthrates are simply the direct consequence of material advances.

But the truth is that developmental thresholds for below-replacement fertility have been falling over time. Nowadays, countries can veer into sub-replacement with low incomes, limited levels of education, little urbanization, and extreme poverty. Myanmar and Nepal are impoverished UN-designated Least Developed Countries, but they are now also sub-replacement societies.

During the postwar period, a veritable library of research has been published on factors that might explain the decline in fertility that picked up pace in the twentieth century. Drops in infant mortality rates, greater access to modern contraception, higher rates of education and literacy, increases in female labor-force participation and the status of women—all these potential determinants and many more were extensively scrutinized by scholars. But stubborn real-life exceptions always prevented the formation of any ironclad socioeconomic generalization about fertility decline.

Eventually, in 1994, the economist Lant Pritchett discovered the most powerful national fertility predictor ever detected. That decisive factor turned out to be simple: what women want. Because survey data conventionally focus on female fertility preferences, not those of their husbands or partners, scholars know much more about women’s desire for children than men’s. Pritchett determined that there is an almost one-to-one correspondence around the world between national fertility levels and the number of babies women say they want to have. This finding underscored the central role of volition—of human agency—in fertility patterns.

Sitting along the street during rush hour in Beijing, November 2020

Thomas Peter / Reuters

But if volition shapes birthrates, what explains the sudden worldwide dive into sub-replacement territory? Why, in rich and poor countries alike, are families with a single child, or no children at all, suddenly becoming so much more common? Scholars have not yet been able to answer that question. But in the absence of a definitive answer, a few observations and speculations will have to suffice.

It is apparent, for example, that a revolution in the family—in family formation, not just in childbearing—is underway in societies around the world. This is true in rich countries and poor ones, across cultural traditions and value systems. Signs of this revolution include what researchers call the “flight from marriage,” with people getting married at later ages or not at all; the spread of nonmarital cohabitation and temporary unions; and the increase in homes in which one person lives independently—in other words, alone. These new arrangements track with the emergence of below-replacement fertility in societies around the globe—not perfectly, but well enough.

It is striking that these revealed preferences have so quickly become prevalent on almost every continent. People the world over are now aware of the possibility of very different ways of life from the ones that confined their parents. Certainly, religious belief—which generally encourages marriage and celebrates child rearing—seems to be on the wane in many regions where birthrates are crashing. Conversely, people increasingly prize autonomy, self-actualization, and convenience. And children, for their many joys, are quintessentially inconvenient.

Population trends today should raise serious questions about all the old nostrums that humans are somehow hard-wired to replace themselves to continue the species. Indeed, what is happening might be better explained by the field of mimetic theory, which recognizes that imitation can drive decisions, stressing the role of volition and social learning in human arrangements. Many women (and men) may be less keen to have children because so many others are having fewer children. The increasing rarity of large families could make it harder for humans to choose to return to having them—owing to what scholars call loss of “social learning”—and prolong low levels of fertility. Volition is why, even in an increasingly healthy and prosperous world of over eight billion people, the extinction of every family line could be only one generation away.

COUNTRIES FOR OLD MEN

The consensus among demographic authorities today is that the global population will peak later this century and then start to decline. Some estimates suggest that this might happen as soon as 2053, others as late as the 2070s or 2080s.

Regardless of when this turn commences, a depopulated future will differ sharply from the present. Low fertility rates mean that annual deaths will exceed annual births in more countries and by widening margins over the coming generation. According to some projections, by 2050, over 130 countries across the planet will be part of the growing net-mortality zone—an area encompassing about five-eighths of the world’s projected population. Net-mortality countries will emerge in sub-Saharan Africa by 2050, starting with South Africa. Once a society has entered net mortality, only continued and ever-increasing immigration can stave off long-term population decline.

Future labor forces will shrink around the world because of the spread of sub-replacement birthrates today. By 2040, national cohorts of people between the ages of 15 and 49 will decrease more or less everywhere outside sub-Saharan Africa. That group is already shrinking in the West and in East Asia. It is set to start dropping in Latin America by 2033 and will do so just a few years later in Southeast Asia (2034), India (2036), and Bangladesh (2043). By 2050, two-thirds of people around the world could see working-age populations (people between the ages of 20 and 64) diminish in their countries—a trend that stands to constrain economic potential in those countries in the absence of innovative adjustments and countermeasures.

A depopulating world will be an aging one. Across the globe, the march to low fertility, and now to super-low birthrates, is creating top-heavy population pyramids, in which the old begin to outnumber the young. Over the coming generation, aged societies will become the norm.

Policymakers are not ready for the coming demographic order.

By 2040—except, once again, in sub-Saharan Africa—the number of people under the age of 50 will decline. By 2050, there will be hundreds of millions fewer people under the age of 60 outside sub-Saharan Africa than there are today—some 13 percent fewer, according to several UNPD projections. At the same time, the number of people who are 65 or older will be exploding: a consequence of relatively high birthrates back in the late twentieth century and longer life expectancy.

While the overall population growth slumps, the number of seniors (defined here as people aged 65 or older) will surge exponentially—everywhere. Outside Africa, that group will double in size to 1.4 billion by 2050. The upsurge in the 80-plus population—the “super-old”—will be even more rapid. That contingent will nearly triple in the non-African world, leaping to roughly 425 million by 2050. Just over two decades ago, fewer than 425 million people on the planet had even reached their 65th birthday.

The shape of things to come is suggested by mind-bending projections for countries at the vanguard of tomorrow’s depopulation: places with abidingly low birthrates for over half a century and favorable life expectancy trends. South Korea provides the most stunning vision of a depopulating society just a generation away. Current projections have suggested that South Korea will mark three deaths for every birth by 2050. In some UNPD projections, the median age in South Korea will approach 60. More than 40 percent of the country’s population will be senior citizens; more than one in six South Koreans will be over the age of 80. South Korea will have just a fifth as many babies in 2050 as it did in 1961. It will have barely 1.2 working-age people for every senior citizen.

Should South Korea’s current fertility trends persist, the country’s population will continue to decline by over three percent per year—crashing by 95 percent over the course of a century. What is on track to happen in South Korea offers a foretaste of what lies in store for the rest of the world.

WAVE OF SENESCENCE

Depopulation will upend familiar social and economic rhythms. Societies will have to adjust their expectations to comport with the new realities of fewer workers, savers, taxpayers, renters, home buyers, entrepreneurs, innovators, inventors, and, eventually, consumers and voters. The pervasive graying of the population and protracted population decline will hobble economic growth and cripple social welfare systems in rich countries, threatening their very prospects for continued prosperity. Without sweeping changes in incentive structures, life-cycle earning and consumption patterns, and government policies for taxation and social expenditures, dwindling workforces, reduced savings and investment, unsustainable social outlays, and budget deficits are all in the cards for today’s developed countries.

Until this century, only affluent societies in the West and in East Asia had gone gray. But in the foreseeable future, many poorer countries will have to contend with the needs of an aged society even though their workers are far less productive than those in wealthier countries.

Consider Bangladesh: a poor country today that will be an elderly society tomorrow, with over 13 percent of its 2050 population projected to be seniors. The backbone of the Bangladeshi labor force in 2050 will be today’s youth. But standardized tests show that five in six members of this group fail to meet even the very lowest international skill standards deemed necessary for participation in a modern economy: the overwhelming majority of this rising cohort cannot “read and answer basic questions” or “add, subtract, and round whole numbers and decimals.” In 2020, Ireland was roughly as elderly as Bangladesh will be in 2050—but in Ireland nowadays, only one in six young people lacks such minimal skills.

The poor, elderly countries of the future may find themselves under great pressure to build welfare states before they can actually fund them. But income levels are likely to be decidedly lower in 2050 for many Asian, Latin American, Middle Eastern, and North African countries than they were in Western countries at the same stage of population graying—how can these countries achieve the adequate means to support and care for their elderly populations?

In rich and poor countries alike, a coming wave of senescence stands to impose completely unfamiliar burdens on many societies. Although people in their 60s and 70s may well lead economically active and financially self-reliant lives in the foreseeable future, the same is not true for those in their 80s or older. The super-old are the world’s fastest-growing cohort. By 2050, there will be more of them than children in some countries. The burden of caring for people with dementia will pose growing costs—human, social, economic—in an aging and shrinking world.

That burden will become all the more onerous as families wither. Families are society’s most basic unit and are still humanity’s most indispensable institution. Both precipitous aging and steep sub-replacement fertility are inextricably connected to the ongoing revolution in family structure. As familial units grow smaller and more atomized, fewer people get married, and high levels of voluntary childlessness take hold in country after country. As a result, families and their branches become ever less able to bear weight—even as the demands that might be placed on them steadily rise.

Just how depopulating societies will cope with this broad retreat of the family is by no means obvious. Perhaps others could step in to assume roles traditionally undertaken by blood relatives. But appeals to duty and sacrifice for those who are not kin may lack the strength of calls from within a family. Governments may try to fill the breach, but sad experience with a century and a half of social policy suggests that the state is a horrendously expensive substitute for the family—and not a very good one. Technological advances—robotics, artificial intelligence, human-like cyber-caregivers and cyber-“friends”—may eventually make some currently unfathomable contribution. But for now, that prospect belongs in the realm of science fiction, and even there, dystopia is far more likely than anything verging on utopia.

THE MAGIC FORMULA

This new chapter for humanity may seem ominous, perhaps frightening. But even in a graying and depopulating world, steadily improving living standards and material and technological advances will still be possible.

Just two generations ago, governments, pundits, and global institutions were panicking about a population explosion, fearing mass starvation and immiseration as a result of childbearing in poor countries. In hindsight, that panic was bizarrely overblown. The so-called population explosion was in reality a testament to increases in life expectancy owing to better public health practices and access to health care. Despite tremendous population growth in the last century, the planet is richer and better fed than ever before—and natural resources are more plentiful and less expensive (after adjusting for inflation) than ever before.

The same formula that spread prosperity during the twentieth century can ensure further advances in the twenty-first and beyond—even in a world marked by depopulation. The essence of modern economic development is the continuing augmentation of human potential and a propitious business climate, framed by policies and institutions that help unlock the value in human beings. With that formula, India, for instance, has virtually eliminated extreme poverty over the past half century. Improvements in health, education, and science and technology are fuel for the motor generating material advances. Irrespective of demographic aging and shrinking, societies can still benefit from progress across the board in these areas. The world has never been as extensively schooled as it is today, and there is no reason to expect the rise in training to stop, despite aging and shrinking populations, given the immense gains that accrue from education to both societies and the trainees themselves.

Remarkable improvements in health and education around the world speak to the application of scientific and social knowledge—the stock of which has been relentlessly advancing, thanks to human inquiry and innovation. That drive will not stop now. Even an elderly, depopulating world can grow increasingly affluent.

The lack of desire for children is why the extinction of every family line could be only one generation away.

Yet as the old population pyramid is turned on its head and societies assume new structures under long-term population decline, people will need to develop new habits of mind, conventions, and cooperative objectives. Policymakers will have to learn new rules for development amid depopulation. The basic formula for material advance—reaping the rewards of augmented human resources and technological innovation through a favorable business climate—will be the same. But the terrain of risk and opportunity facing societies and economies will change with depopulation. And in response, governments will have to adjust their policies to reckon with the new realities.

The initial transition to depopulation will no doubt entail painful, wrenching changes. In depopulating societies, today’s “pay-as-you-go” social programs for national pension and old-age health care will fail as the working population shrinks and the number of elderly claimants balloons. If today’s age-specific labor and spending patterns continue, graying and depopulating countries will lack the savings to invest for growth or even to replace old infrastructure and equipment. Current incentives, in short, are seriously misaligned for the advent of depopulation. But policy reforms and private-sector responses can hasten necessary adjustments.

To adapt successfully to a depopulating world, states, businesses, and individuals will have to place a premium on responsibility and savings. There will be less margin for error for investment projects, be they public or private, and no rising tide of demand from a growing pool of consumers or taxpayers to count on.

As people live longer and remain healthy into their advanced years, they will retire later. Voluntary economic activity at ever-older ages will make lifelong learning imperative. Artificial intelligence may be a double-edged sword in this regard: although AI may offer productivity improvements that depopulating societies could not otherwise manage, it could also hasten the displacement of those with inadequate or outdated skills. High unemployment could turn out to be a problem in shrinking, labor-scarce societies, too.

States and societies will have to ensure that labor markets are flexible—reducing barriers to entry, welcoming the job turnover and churn that boost dynamism, eliminating age discrimination, and more—given the urgency of increasing the productivity of a dwindling labor force. To foster economic growth, countries will need even greater scientific advances and technological innovation.

A mother holding her newborn in Royal Oak, Michigan, February 2022

Emily Elconin / Reuters

Prosperity in a depopulating world will also depend on open economies: free trade in goods, services, and finance to counter the constraints that declining populations otherwise engender. And as the hunger for scarce talent becomes more acute, the movement of people will take on new economic salience. In the shadow of depopulation, immigration will matter even more than it does today.

Not all aged societies, however, will be capable of assimilating young immigrants or turning them into loyal and productive citizens. And not all migrants will be capable of contributing effectively to receiving economies, especially given the stark lack of basic skills characterizing too many of the world’s rapidly growing populations today.

Pragmatic migration strategies will be of benefit to depopulating societies in the generations ahead—bolstering their labor forces, tax bases, and consumer spending while also rewarding the immigrants’ countries of origin with lucrative remittances. With populations shrinking, governments will have to compete for migrants, with an even greater premium placed on attracting talent from abroad. Getting competitive migration policies right—and securing public support for them—will be a major task for future governments but one well worth the effort.

THE GEOPOLITICS OF NUMBERS

Depopulation will not only transform how governments deal with their citizens; it will also transform how they deal with one another. Humanity’s shrinking ranks will inexorably alter the current global balance of power and strain the existing world order.

Some of the ways it will do so are relatively easy to foresee today. One of the demographic certainties about the generation ahead is that differentials in population growth will make for rapid shifts in the relative size of the world’s major regions. Tomorrow’s world will be much more African. Although about a seventh of the world’s population today lives in sub-Saharan Africa, the region accounts for nearly a third of all births; its share of the world’s workforce and population are thus set to grow immensely over the coming generation.

But this does not necessarily mean that an “African century” lies just ahead. In a world where per capita output varies by as much as a factor of 100 between countries, human capital—not just population totals—matters greatly to national power, and the outlook for human capital in sub-Saharan Africa remains disappointing. Standardized tests indicate that a stunning 94 percent of youth in the region lack even basic skills. As huge as the region’s 2050 pool of workers promises to be, the number of workers with basic skills may not be much larger there than it will be in Russia alone in 2050.

India is now the world’s most populous country and on track to continue to grow for at least another few decades. Its demographics virtually assure that the country will be a leading power in 2050. But India’s rise is compromised by human resource vulnerabilities. India has a world-class cadre of scientists, technicians, and elite graduates. But ordinary Indians receive poor education. A shocking seven out of eight young people in India today lack even basic skills—a consequence of both low enrollment and the generally poor quality of the primary and secondary schools available to those lucky enough to get schooling. The skills profile for China’s youth is decades, maybe generations, ahead of India’s youth today. India is unlikely to surpass a depopulating China in per capita output or even in total GDP for a very long time.

The coalescing partnership among China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia is intent on challenging the U.S.-led Western order. These revisionist countries have aggressive and ambitious leaders and are seemingly confident in their international objectives. But the demographic tides are against them.

A revolution in family formation is underway in societies around the world.

China and Russia are long-standing sub-replacement societies, both now with shrinking workforces and declining populations. Iran’s population is likewise far below replacement levels. Population data on North Korea remain secret, but the dictator Kim Jong Un’s very public worrying late last year about the national birthrate suggests the leadership is not happy about the country’s demographics.

Russia’s shrinking numbers and its seemingly intractable difficulties with public health and knowledge production have been reducing the country’s relative economic power for decades, with no turnaround in sight. China’s birth crash—the next generation is on track to be only half as large as the preceding one—will unavoidably slash the workforce and turbocharge population aging, even as the Chinese extended family, heretofore the country’s main social safety net, atrophies and disintegrates. These impending realities presage unimagined new social welfare burdens for a no longer dazzling Chinese economy and may end up hamstringing the funding for Beijing’s international ambitions.

To be sure, revisionist states with nuclear weapons can pose outsize risks to the existing global order—witness the trouble North Korea causes despite a negligible GDP. But the demographic foundations for national power are tilting against the renegades as their respective depopulations loom.

As for the United States, the demographic fundamentals look fairly sound—at least when compared with the competition. Demographic trends are on course to augment American power over the coming decades, lending support for continued U.S. global preeminence. Given the domestic tensions and social strains that Americans are living through today, these long-term American advantages may come as a surprise. But they are already beginning to be taken into account by observers and actors abroad.

Although the United States is a sub-replacement society, it has higher fertility levels than any East Asian country and almost all European states. In conjunction with strong immigrant inflows, the United States’ less anemic birth trends give the country a very different demographic trajectory from that of most other affluent Western societies, with continued population and labor-force growth and only moderate population aging in store through 2050.

During a funeral in the Bronx, New York, June 2024

Shannon Stapleton / Reuters

Thanks in large measure to immigration, the United States is on track to account for a growing share of the rich world’s labor force, youth, and highly educated talent. Continuing inflows of skilled immigrants also give the country a great advantage. No other population on the planet is better placed to translate population potential into national power—and it looks as if that demographic edge will be at least as great in 2050. Compared with other contenders, U.S. demographics look great today—and may look even better tomorrow—pending, it must be underscored, continued public support for immigration. The United States remains the most important geopolitical exception to the coming depopulation.

But depopulation will also scramble the balance of power in unpredictable ways. Two unknowns stand out above all others: how swiftly and adeptly depopulating societies will adapt to their unfamiliar new circumstances and how prolonged depopulation might affect national will and morale.

Nothing guarantees that societies will successfully navigate the turbulence caused by depopulation. Social resilience and social cohesion can surely facilitate these transitions, but some societies are decidedly less resilient and cohesive than others. To achieve economic and social advances despite depopulation will require substantial reforms in government institutions, the corporate sector, social organizations, and personal norms and behavior. But far less heroic reform programs fail all the time in the current world, doomed by poor planning, inept leadership, and thorny politics.

The overwhelming majority of the world’s GDP today is generated by countries that will find themselves in depopulation a generation from now. Depopulating societies that fail to pivot will pay a price: first in economic stagnation and then quite possibly in financial and socioeconomic crisis. If enough depopulating societies fail to pivot, their struggles will drag down the global economy. The nightmare scenario would be a zone of important but depopulating economies, accounting for much of the world’s output, frozen into perpetual sclerosis or decline by pessimism, anxiety, and resistance to reform. Even if depopulating societies eventually adapt successfully to their new circumstances, as might well be expected, there is no guarantee they will do so on the timetable that new population trends now demand.

National security ramifications could also be crucial. An immense strategic unknown about a depopulating world is whether pervasive aging, anemic birthrates, and prolonged depopulation will affect the readiness of shrinking societies to defend themselves and their willingness to sustain casualties in doing so. Despite all the labor-saving innovations changing the face of battle, there is still no substitute in war for warm—and vulnerable—bodies.

Depopulation will transform how governments deal with their citizens and with one another.

The defense of one’s country cannot be undertaken without sacrifices—including, sometimes, the ultimate sacrifice. But autonomy, self-actualization, and the quest for personal freedom drive today’s “flight from the family” throughout the rich world. If a commitment to form a family is regarded as onerous, how much more so a demand for the supreme sacrifice for people one has never even met? On the other hand, it is also possible that many people, especially young men, with few familial bonds and obligations might be less risk averse and also hungry for the kind of community, belonging, and sense of purpose that military service might offer.

Casualty tolerance in depopulating countries may also depend greatly on unforeseen contingent conditions—and may have surprising results. The Russian invasion of Ukraine has provided a test. Both countries had very low birth rates on the eve of the invasion. And both the authoritarian aggressor and the democratic defender have proved willing to absorb grievous casualties in a war now grinding through its third year.

China presents perhaps the biggest question mark when it comes to depopulation and a willingness to fight. Thanks to both the one-child policy that was ruthlessly enforced for decades and the unexpected baby bust since the program was suspended nearly ten years ago, China’s military will perforce be manned in large part by young people who were raised without siblings. A mass-casualty event would have devastating consequences for families across the country, bringing entire lineages to an end.

It is reasonable to wager that China would fight ferociously against a foreign invasion. But such casualty tolerance might not extend to overseas adventures and expeditionary journeys that go awry. If China, for example, decides to undertake and then manages to sustain a costly campaign against Taiwan, the world will have learned something grim about what may lie ahead in the age of depopulation.

A NEW CHAPTER

The era of depopulation is nigh. Dramatic aging and the indefinite decline of the human population—eventually on a global scale—will mark the end of an extraordinary chapter of human history and the beginning of another, quite possibly no less extraordinary than the one before it. Depopulation will transform humanity profoundly, likely in numerous ways societies have not begun to consider and may not yet be in a position to understand.

Yet for all the momentous changes ahead, people can also expect important and perhaps reassuring continuities. Humanity has already found the formula for banishing material scarcity and engineering ever-greater prosperity. That formula can work regardless of whether populations rise or fall. Routinized material advance has been made possible by a system of peaceful human cooperation—deep, vast, and unfathomably complex—and that largely market-based system will continue to unfold from the current era into the next. Human volition—the driver behind today’s worldwide declines in childbearing—stands to be no less powerful a force tomorrow than it is today.

Humanity bestrides the planet, explores the cosmos, and continues to reshape itself because humans are the world’s most inventive, adaptable animal. But it will take more than a bit of inventiveness and adaptability to cope with the unintended future consequences of the family and fertility choices being made today.

NICHOLAS EBERSTADT is Henry Wendt Chair in Political Economy at the American Enterprise Institute.

Foreign Affairs · by Nicholas Eberstadt · October 10, 2024

23. Confluence of Epic Hurricanes, Election Ensnare Military in Misinformation Deluge

Not misinformation. The amount of DISINFORMATION (deliberately disseminating false information for malign purposes) coming from prominent people is simply amazing. And that it is believed by so many people is even more amazing. Does anyone really think the military or government is capable of manipulating the weather? Prove it to me if you do.

Confluence of Epic Hurricanes, Election Ensnare Military in Misinformation Deluge

No, the Department of Defense Is Not Manipulating the Weather.

October 8, 2024| Sonner Kehrt

thewarhorse.org · by Sonner Kehrt · October 8, 2024

Perhaps nothing illustrates the power of misinformation in America better than what happened Monday morning when retired Army Lieutenant Gen. Michael Flynn hit the send button on a social media post: He shared a video that claimed “weather modification operations” that are “clearly connected” with the Department of Defense were responsible for Hurricane Helene’s “assault” on the Carolinas.

“You have to listen to this clip,” Flynn told his 1.7 million followers on X. “Another ‘conspiracy theory’ about to be exposed for the truth behind weather manipulation?”

Within 15 hours, the post by former President Trump’s one-time national security advisor had more than half a million views. Add that to the 43 million views of alt-right Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene’s claims late last week that, “Yes they can control the weather.”

Now compare that to the post by the Poynter Institute’s “PolitiFact” immediately debunking the weather modification theory with its most untruthful “Pants on Fire!” rating a day after Helene made landfall: After 10 days, that post had all of 11,400 views—less than 2% of Flynn’s audience.

With the storm-battered Southeast bracing for another massive hurricane and the hyperpartisan election just four weeks away, government officials and rescue workers aren’t just battling the elements, they’re fighting against a spiraling misinformation war.

“The combination of the two just makes the misinformation even more drastic,” says Josephine Lukito, a professor at the University of Texas at Austin’s School of Journalism and Media who studies misinformation. “There’s more misinformation, and people seem to be falling for it more.”

Many of the false narratives involve the military, which is so often at the heart of conspiracy theories—hiding evidence of UFOs at Area 51 or working with Trump to take down a cabal of satan-worshiping global elites. But the claims circulating in the wake of Hurricane Helene and the build up to Milton have been more immediate, more personal: The military doesn’t want to help you.

In fact, it may want to harm you.

Troops On The Ground

Almost as soon as Hurricane Helene made landfall on Sept. 26, a narrative started spinning up on social media: The government had botched the response to the storm—on purpose.

While much of the false information focused on FEMA’s response, dark narratives about the military also circulated, spread by far right influencers and military veterans alike.

In the immediate aftermath of the hurricane, more than 6,000 National Guardsmen activated for search and rescue and to help clean up the wreckage. But online, people posted they hadn’t seen guardsmen in their neighborhood. In a disaster the size of Helene, rescuers can’t be everywhere at once. But online, posters began to circulate the false idea that maybe the Guard wasn’t deployed at all.

And Fort Liberty, the U.S. Army’s largest military base, home to the famed 82nd Airborne Division, is in North Carolina, mere hours from some of the state’s hardest-hit areas. Some conspiratorial posts asked why soldiers from the base weren’t immediately mobilized. But active duty troops typically do not deploy as first responders to natural disasters.

In the social media ecosphere—on alt-tech platforms like Rumble, Gab, and GETTR, as well as more mainstream sites like X—these questions quickly coalesced into a grab bag of conspiracy theories. The military wasn’t deploying soldiers for hurricane response because the Pentagon decided they would be put to better use in the Middle East or Ukraine instead. President Biden and Vice President Harris wanted to prevent red state voters from casting their ballots—or even wanted them dead. The federal government was planning to seize land in western North Carolina for lucrative lithium mining contracts.

None of that was true.

“If troops are being deployed and [people] don’t necessarily see it in their geographic area, this is a ‘Is this really happening?’-type question,” Lukito says.

“There’s a lot of political actors that can take advantage of that.”

Trump Fuels ‘No Rescue’ Narrative

On Saturday, former President Trump amplified the idea that the military had not responded to the hurricane, claiming at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, that there had been “no helicopters, no rescue” in North Carolina. That is untrue: The North Carolina National Guard says it has rescued hundreds of people and delivered more than a million pounds of supplies, some of it by helicopter.

But even as top FEMA officials and local sheriffs begged residents to sign up for federal emergency aid while beating back misinformation, a new false narrative was gaining traction online: The military had perfected the science of weather control and was now weaponizing it against conservatives.

“We have an inherent distrust of our government,” says Pablo Breuer, the board chair of the counter disinformation nonprofit Disarm Foundation and a career Navy veteran.

US Military Can’t Sustain Arctic Operations, ‘Let Alone Dominate,’ Experts Say

“It’s very easy to stir up fear, uncertainty, doubt, and angst by stoking fear that the military is not really there to protect you. They’re there to oppress you.”

An analysis by The War Horse and UC Berkeley’s Human Rights Center of 40 different social media platforms found that two days before Greene’s viral “they can control the weather” post, comments connecting the military to weather manipulation spiked on Gab, a social media platform favored by the far right.

Virginia National Guard Black Hawk helicopter crews work with a scuba rescue crew from Chesterfield County, Virginia, to rescue residents trapped by Hurricane Helene. (Photo courtesy of National Guard)

“I’d bet my life it was the U.S. Military using their HAARP Technology manipulating the weather to destroy a large portion of Red States and people before the election,” one user wrote, before moving on to antisemitic tropes. The user’s profile featured pro-Russia, white nationalist content.

It’s not a new idea. HAARP—a research program studying the upper atmosphere based at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and initially funded by the military—has long been fodder for conspiracy theorists. Back in January, right-wing agitator and white nationalist Laura Loomer asked on X whether the “deep state” was using HAARP to control the weather when a blizzard threatened turnout for the Iowa caucus. It was not.

“We all know @NikkiHaley has a lot of friends in the defense industry and Military industrial complex,” she tweeted.

Posts about geoengineering the weather also spiked on other social media sites after Helene. Some of those posts, particularly on more mainstream platforms, pushed back on misinformation, and social media users quickly added context in X’s Community Notes debunking Greene’s viral post.

But views of Flynn’s and Greene’s “weather manipulation” posts dwarfed the number of views on X, for example, of carefully crafted posts from some notable climate scientists about the deadly confluence of extreme weather.

“The fingerprints of #ClimateChange are all over what has transpired in recent weeks and may yet occur in coming days,” Daniel Swain, a climate scientist, posted in a thread Monday.

“There are still thousands of folks in dire need. … Helping them is and should remain the primary short term priority. Yet if we can’t also manage to have the harder conversations regarding natural hazard risk & disasters & climate change in the moments when people are actually paying attention, we’re never going to solve any of the underlying problems.”

Military Cannot Just Deploy Itself

Just days before Hurricane Helene slammed into the state, the Georgia National Guard’s Headquarters Company of the 110th Combat Sustainment Support Battalion prepared for a long-planned nine-month deployment to Poland, to support U.S. forces and allies stationed in Europe.

Online, that and other deployments were held up—inaccurately—as proof that the military didn’t want to save American lives.

Images of text messages, ostensibly from National Guardsmen and active-duty soldiers, began circulating, claiming troops were ready and willing to deploy to the disaster zone, but that “higher ups” weren’t allowing it.

But that’s not how disaster response works, Breuer says.

“We have more than enough troops and equipment to be able to do the things that the military is being asked to do overseas, and do the things that we want and need to do at home,” Breuer says. “We’re ready and willing to help anyone at any time.”

But he points out that the military cannot just deploy itself into a disaster zone.

Responding to a natural disaster the scale of Helene is a sprawling effort between local, state, and federal resources, as well as private and nonprofit organizations. Any military response is first provided by the National Guard, which is typically mobilized under state—not federal—control. Governors of affected states can request the support of Guard units from other states.

As claims about missing Guard troops proliferated online, National Guard units were already mobilizing. Before Hurricane Helene made landfall, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican, had already authorized 500 Guardsmen to respond to the storm, quickly adding another thousand troops as the storm battered Georgia. That number has since increased to 2,500.

North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat, initially activated more than 350 National Guardsmen as the storm moved into the Carolinas, and steadily increased that number as the scale of devastation became clear.

In total, more than 6,000 Guardsmen from 18 different states have mobilized to provide search and rescue and begin the cleanup effort.

In a news conference on Friday, Cooper, the North Carolina governor, expressed his frustration with the growing tide of misinformation.

“It can hurt our relief efforts,” he said. “It … demoralizes National Guard soldiers who are out here for days and days and people who are working in emergency management who are working around the clock to help people.”

Award-Winning Journalism in Your Inbox

Federal troops can also help with disaster recovery, but it’s not their primary mission—and the military typically doesn’t deploy federal troops without a request from a state governor, says DeeDee Bennett Gayle, the chair of the emergency management and homeland security department at SUNY Albany. Often, that only comes after an initial assessment of the damage.

Last Wednesday, President Biden announced that 1,000 soldiers from Fort Liberty and Fort Campbell in Kentucky were deploying to help with hurricane recovery efforts in North Carolina. On Sunday, the White House mobilized an additional 500 active duty troops after approving a request from the North Carolina governor.

Paratroopers at Fort Liberty load a CH-47 Chinook as they prepare to assist those affected by Hurricane Helene in western North Carolina. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Catessa Palone)

“We want to make sure that we’re being complementary, not out there doing something on our own,” Maj. Gen. Robert Davis, the director of operations for U.S. Northern Command, told WRAL News, stressing that the National Guard and FEMA take the lead in disaster response.

“Even going back as far as Hurricane Andrew in Florida, you see the signs, ‘Where’s the calvary?’” Bennett Gayle told The War Horse. “There’s very few things that you can have the federal government just impose within a state.”

Inauspicious Timing of Twin Hurricanes

A deluge of misinformation often follows natural disasters, but the timing of this fall’s powerful twin hurricanes is particularly inauspicious.

“Unfortunately, this one is happening just one month out from the election,” says Katherine Keneally, the director of threat analysis and prevention at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a nonprofit organization researching and countering extremism.

In such a hyperpoliticized environment, people look for sources of information they can rely on. Despite overall declining faith in institutions, the military still commands high levels of trust, experts say, and people claiming connections to the military are seen as more credible messengers about the government.

Our Journalism Depends on Your Support

Keneally cautions that it can be difficult to suss out whether or not somebody actually served—just because their social media profile says they’re a veteran doesn’t mean they are. But getting veterans, or people who claim to be, to amplify messages is a long-standing disinformation tactic.

“They are trying to say, you’re a good patriot, you went to save your country,” Keneally says. “Now look at what’s happening to your country that you swore your life to protect.”

As false narratives about the hurricane response gained traction, people claiming connections to the military were more than happy to offer their “insider take”—from Flynn, who served in the Army for more than 30 years and still draws a military pension, to veterans online claiming they personally knew troops who were prevented from responding to the storm.

But Breuer, who served in the Navy for 22 years, says that trusting individual veterans on social media over active-duty military leadership doesn’t make sense.

“The admirals and the generals that are in charge of the military … take an oath to defend and protect the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic,” Breuer says.

“That includes things like storms.”

This War Horse investigation was reported by Sonner Kehrt, with additional reporting from Anastasia Zolotova Franklin, Catherine Tong, Andrea Richardson and Alexa Koenig of the UC Berkeley Human Rights Center. The story was fact-checked by Jess Rohan and copy-edited by Mitchell Hansen-Dewar.

This story is part of an ongoing investigation into disinformation in collaboration with The War Horse, the Human Rights Center at the University of California, Berkeley, and the Center for Investigative Reporting, which produces Mother Jones and Reveal.

thewarhorse.org · by Sonner Kehrt · October 8, 2024

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Vice President, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Phone: 202-573-8647

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Vice President, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com

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

"A democracy is only as resilient as its people. An informed and engaged citizenry is the fundamental requirement for a free and resilient nation. For generations, our society has protected free press, free speech, and free thought. Today, actors such as Russia are using information tools in an attempt to undermine the legitimacy of democracies. Adversaries target media, political processes, financial networks, and personal data. The American public and private sectors must recognize this and work together to defend our way of life. No external threat can be allowed to shake our shared commitment to our values, undermine our system of government, or divide our Nation."

Access NSS HERE

Company Name | Website