Quotes of the Day:

"Innovators and creative geniuses cannot be reared in schools. They are precisely the men who defy what the school has taught them." 

- Ludwig von Mises

“The best teachers are those who show you where to look, but don't tell you what to see.” 

- Alexandra K. Trenfor

"A good teacher is one who can understand those who are not very good at explaining, and explain to those who are not very good at understanding." 

- Dwight D. Eisenhower

1. Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, October 1, 2023

2. Special Operations News - October 2, 2023 | SOF News

3. Building a Theory: Ukraine’s Way of War by Mick Ryan

4. Ukraine says it has a massive database the American embassy can use to track every last weapon the US has sent to Kyiv

5. Leaked U.S. strategy on Ukraine sees corruption as the real threat

6. High-Level Iranian Spy Ring Busted in Washington

7. The West has a massive Chinese spy problem

8.  Ukraine and US Need a New Strategy for a Longer War by Hal Brands

9. Marine Special Operators Seeking New Tech, AI for Future Missions

10. The U.S. Can Learn from Ukraine's Theory of Victory

11. The Clash of Xivilizations?

12. Why Multilateralism Still Matters

13. Opinion This is what the U.S. is getting by aiding Ukraine by Max Boot

14. Beijing’s House of the Dragon

15. Putin’s 5 catastrophic miscalculations

16. U-2 Spy Plane Just Keeps Getting Better and Better

​17.  Trying to Turn Ukraine Into 'Neutral' Finland or Austria Would Be a Disaster

18. Never Forget the Battle of Mogadishu

19. How much aid the U.S. has sent to Ukraine, in 6 charts

20. Counterinsurgency to the Shores of Tripoli

1. Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, October 1, 2023

Maps/graphics/citations: https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-october-1-2023

Key Takeaways:

• Russian forces are conducting tactical counterattacks in the Robotyne area as part of their elastic defense against ongoing Ukrainian offensive operations in western Zaporizhia Oblast. The situation south of Robotyne is fluid as some tactically significant field fortifications have changed hands several times.
• The Russian information space continues to falsely portray Western aid to Ukraine as escalatory in order to discourage continued Western support for Ukraine.
• The status of the Wagner Group remains unclear amid reported negotiations about the Wagner Group’s future cooperation with the Russian government.
• ISW will revise its assessment about the prospects for the Wagner Group to reemerge an as effective military organization if the Wagner Group successfully reconstitutes as a large, unitary organization under Rosgvardia, the Russian MoD, or a similar organization.
• Russian forces conducted another series of drone strikes against Ukraine on the night of September 30 to October 1.
• Russian forces continued offensive operations along the Kupyansk-Lyman line, near Bakhmut, along the Avdiivka-Donetsk City line, in the Donetsk-Zaporizhia Oblast border area, and in western Zaporizhia Oblast and marginally advanced in western Zaporizhia Oblast.
• The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) officially announced the beginning of its regular fall 2023 conscription cycle on October 1.

RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE CAMPAIGN ASSESSMENT, OCTOBER 1, 2023

Oct 1, 2023 - ISW Press

Download the PDF

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, October 1, 2023

Angelica Evans, Nicole Wolkov, George Barros, Karolina Hird, and Frederick W. Kagan

October 1, 2023, 5:30pm ET

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

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

Note: The data cut-off for this product was 12:15pm ET on September 30. ISW will cover subsequent reports in the October 1 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment.

Russian forces are conducting tactical counterattacks in the Robotyne area as part of their elastic defense against ongoing Ukrainian offensive operations in western Zaporizhia Oblast. The situation south of Robotyne is fluid as some tactically significant field fortifications have changed hands several times. Geolocated footage posted on September 30 shows Ukrainian forces striking Russian troops trying to enter a trench system about 1km southwest of Robotyne near the T0408 Robotyne—Tokmak road.[1] Footage posted on September 13 shows that Ukrainian forces had previously occupied segments of this trench and thus appear to have lost it to Russian counterattacks between September 13 and 30.[2] ISW has recoded this area from Ukraine's counteroffensive to Russian advances.

A Ukrainian soldier analyzed the footage of the area and noted that the aforementioned Russian-controlled trench is a strongpoint in an interconnected system of trenches, firing systems, and dugouts that lie between Robotyne and Novoprokopivka.[3] The Ukrainian soldier noted that the trenches are connected by underground tunnel-like structures and that Russian forces are prioritizing the defense of these positions, which have tactical significance in the area between Robotyne and Novoprokopivka.[4] Geolocated footage posted on October 1 shows Russian forces striking a Ukrainian vehicle just south of the middle of the three trenches and about 1km west of the easternmost trench in the system, suggesting that Ukrainian forces control the easternmost trench and are attempting to push westward to recapture the remaining two trenches and connected dugouts and firing positions.[5] Commercially available satellite imagery indicates that Russian forces destroyed this vehicle between September 25 and 28, indicating that Russian forces repelled a Ukrainian attack and reconsolidated Russian positions near the trench systems in late September. The reported continued presence of Russian forces in the western and central trenches suggests that Russian forces have been conducting successful limited tactical counterattacks south of Robotyne and that the tactical situation in this area is complex and dynamic.

The Russian information space continues to falsely portray Western aid to Ukraine as escalatory in order to discourage continued Western support for Ukraine. Newly appointed United Kingdom Defense Secretary Grant Shapps stated in an interview with the Telegraph published on September 30 that he held talks with unspecified (likely UK) “Army leaders” about moving “more training and production” of military equipment into Ukraine.[6] UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak walked back Shapps’ statement on October 1 and stated that the UK has no immediate plans to deploy military instructors to Ukraine.[7] Sunak clarified that it may be possible for the UK to conduct some training in the future in Ukraine but stated that the UK would not send British soldiers to fight in the ”current conflict.”[8] Russian Security Council Deputy Chairperson Dmitry Medvedev, a notably nationalistic and extreme voice in the Russian government, called Shapps’ since-clarified statement a “push” toward a ”third world war.”[9] Medvedev regularly voices alarmist rhetoric and continues to portray any Western aid to Ukraine as escalatory in an attempt to undermine Western military aid to Ukraine.[10] His comments are part of a long-running Russian information operation along these lines and do not mark any sort of inflection.

Several Russian milbloggers also expressed baseless paranoia in response to UK officials’ statements by claiming with no evidence at all that the UK intends to help train Ukrainian forces for future operations in Crimea.[11] The milbloggers’ claims are likely also a part of a Russian information operation intended to portray Western military aid and continued support for Ukraine as escalatory. Russian milbloggers have noted broad indicators such as Ukrainian strikes on military targets in Crimea and on Russian Black Sea Fleet (BSF) assets to suggest that western forces are currently aiding Ukrainian forces in preparations to launch military operations in Crimea.[12] Ukrainian strikes against Crimea and BSF assets are more likely part of Ukraine’s interdiction campaign assisting Ukrainian counteroffensive operations in western Zaporizhia Oblast.[13]

The status of the Wagner Group remains unclear amid reported negotiations about the Wagner Group’s future cooperation with the Russian government. The Wagner Group’s main combat elements are split across several countries, including Belarus, the Central African Republic, Libya, and Mali, and there is no clear unified leader for the Wagner Group.[14] Russian President Vladimir Putin publicly embraced former Wagner Group commander and current Ministry of Defense (MoD) employee Andrey Troshev on September 29 and stated that he and Troshev discussed how Troshev would be involved in the formation of new volunteer detachments that perform combat missions primarily in Ukraine.[15] Some Wagner group elements reacted negatively to Putin’s embrace of Troshev and have now put forward an alternative leader. A prominent Wagner-affiliated Telegram channel announced on October 1 that Yevgeny Prigozhin’s 25-year-old son Pavel Prigozhin has taken over “command” of the Wagner Group, and that Pavel Prigozhin is negotiating with Rosgvardia about having the Wagner Group rejoin combat operations in Ukraine.[16] The prominent Wagner-affiliated source reported that Wagner fighters would not have to sign contracts with the Russian MoD and that the Wagner Group would retain its name, symbols, ideology, commanders, management, and existing standard operating principles.[17] A Russian insider source claimed that Pavel Prigozhin is not an independent actor and is under the influence of Wagner Security Service head Mikhail Vatanin, indicating that some Wagner personnel are interested in rallying around a Prigozhin-linked alternative to the Kremlin- and MoD-aligned Troshev, even if that alternative is not an independent entity.[18] A different pro-Wagner source claimed on September 30 that Rosgvardia Head Viktor Zolotov is considering allowing Wagner Group elements to join Rosgvardia as a separate Wagner unit, though the Pavel Prigozhin camp has not commented specifically on how its branch of the Wagner Group may operate with Rosgvardia.[19]  It is unclear what the Kremlin thinks the relationship(s) between Wagner elements and the Russian government are. Rosgvardia is directly subordinate to the Russian Presidential Administration, which makes Putin’s public embrace of Troshev and subordinating Wagner elements to the Russian MoD noteworthy. The MoD would have to provide the equipment and supplies for a large, reconstituted force under Rosgvardia in any case, since Rosgvardia does not have the logistical infrastructure to do so on its own.

ISW will revise its assessment about the prospects for the Wagner Group to reemerge an as effective military organization if the Wagner Group successfully reconstitutes as a large, unitary organization under Rosgvardia, the Russian MoD, or a similar organization. ISW previously assessed that disjointed Wagner Group elements were unlikely to pose a serious military threat to Ukraine without bringing the full suite of effectiveness Wagner had as a unitary organization under Yevgeniy Prigozhin’s and Dmitry Utkin’s consolidated leadership. This initial assessment will be invalidated if the Wagner Group reestablishes itself as a coherent and large formation under the Russian government with effective centralized leadership.

Russian forces conducted another series of drone strikes against Ukraine on the night of September 30 to October 1. The Ukrainian General Staff reported on October 1 that Ukrainian air defenses downed 16 of 30 Shahed 131/136 drones that Russian forces launched.[20] Ukrainian Air Force Spokesperson Colonel Yuriy Ihnat stated that Shahed drones have a large power reserve and are highly accurate, which enables them to strike targets far from their launch points.[21] Ihnat stated that unspecified actors, likely Russian authorities and their allies, are working to make Shahed drones and other Russian weapons more resistant to electronic warfare and more difficult to down.[22] A Russian milblogger noted that Ihnat is likely referring to small noise-resistant Comet satellite signal receivers that Russian drone producers have begun installing on domestically produced Shahed drones.[23]

Key Takeaways:

• Russian forces are conducting tactical counterattacks in the Robotyne area as part of their elastic defense against ongoing Ukrainian offensive operations in western Zaporizhia Oblast. The situation south of Robotyne is fluid as some tactically significant field fortifications have changed hands several times.
• The Russian information space continues to falsely portray Western aid to Ukraine as escalatory in order to discourage continued Western support for Ukraine.
• The status of the Wagner Group remains unclear amid reported negotiations about the Wagner Group’s future cooperation with the Russian government.
• ISW will revise its assessment about the prospects for the Wagner Group to reemerge an as effective military organization if the Wagner Group successfully reconstitutes as a large, unitary organization under Rosgvardia, the Russian MoD, or a similar organization.
• Russian forces conducted another series of drone strikes against Ukraine on the night of September 30 to October 1.
• Russian forces continued offensive operations along the Kupyansk-Lyman line, near Bakhmut, along the Avdiivka-Donetsk City line, in the Donetsk-Zaporizhia Oblast border area, and in western Zaporizhia Oblast and marginally advanced in western Zaporizhia Oblast.
• The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) officially announced the beginning of its regular fall 2023 conscription cycle on October 1.

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

• Russian Main Effort – Eastern Ukraine (comprised of two subordinate main efforts)
• Russian Subordinate Main Effort #1 – Capture the remainder of Luhansk Oblast and push westward into eastern Kharkiv Oblast and encircle northern Donetsk Oblast
• Russian Subordinate Main Effort #2 – Capture the entirety of Donetsk Oblast
• Russian Supporting Effort – Southern Axis
• Russian Mobilization and Force Generation Efforts
• Activities in Russian-occupied areas

Russian Main Effort – Eastern Ukraine

Russian Subordinate Main Effort #1 – Luhansk Oblast (Russian objective: Capture the remainder of Luhansk Oblast and push westward into eastern Kharkiv Oblast and northern Donetsk Oblast)

Russian sources claimed that Russian forces conducted limited ground attacks along the Kupyansk-Lyman line and made marginal advances between September 30 and October 1. A Russian milblogger claimed on September 30 that Russian forces made unspecified advances near Kyslivka (20km southeast of Kupyansk) and that fighting is ongoing near Petropavlivka (7km east of Kupyansk), Synkivka (9km northeast of Kupyansk), and Dvorichna (17km northeast of Kupyansk).[24] Another milblogger claimed that fighting occurred in the Serebryanske forest area (11km south of Kreminna) but that the intensity of fighting in the Luhansk direction has decreased over the past week.[25] Ukrainian Eastern Group of Forces Spokesperson Captain Ilya Yevlash stated on October 1, however, that no combat engagements occurred in the Kupyansk-Lyman direction.[26] Footage published on October 1 purportedly shows elements of the 7th Motorized Rifle Brigade (2nd Luhansk Army Corps) operating near Bilohorivka (10km south of Kreminna).[27]

The newly created Russian 25th Combined Arms Army (CAA) is reportedly fully staffed with over 17,000 personnel. Yevlash reported on October 1 that the 25th CAA has deployed south and west of Kreminna in order to replace the elements of the significantly degraded 41st Combined Arms Army (Central Military District) and 76th Airborne (VDV) Division.[28]

Russian sources claimed that Ukrainian forces conducted unsuccessful ground attacks near Kreminna on October 1. The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) claimed on October 1 that Russian forces repelled Ukrainian attacks near Dibrova (7km southwest of Kreminna) and in the Serebryanske forest area.[29] A Russian milblogger claimed on September 30 that Ukrainian forces regularly conduct unsuccessful attacks west of Kreminna to interfere with Russian operations on the bank of the Siverskyi Donets River near Bilohorivka, as well as near Torske (12km west of Kreminna) and Terny (17km west of Kreminna).[30]

Russian Subordinate Main Effort #2 – Donetsk Oblast (Russian objective: Capture the entirety of Donetsk Oblast, the claimed territory of Russia’s proxies in Donbas)

Ukrainian forces continued offensive operations near Bakhmut on October 1 and have made confirmed marginal advances. Geolocated footage published on September 30 indicates that Ukrainian forces marginally advanced east of Andriivka (10km southwest of Bakhmut).[31] Additional geolocated footage published on October 1 indicates that Ukrainian forces marginally advanced northeast of Andriivka.[32] The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) stated that elements of the Russian Southern Grouping of Forces repelled Ukrainian attacks near Klishchiivka (7km southwest of Bakhmut), Andriivka, and Kurdyumivka (13km southwest of Bakhmut).[33] Russian sources claimed on September 30 and October 1 that Ukrainian forces continued unsuccessful attempts to break through to the railway line near Klishchiivka and Andriivka.[34]

Russian forces continued offensive operations near Bakhmut on October 1 but did not make any confirmed gains. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces conducted unsuccessful attacks near Klishchiivka and Andriivka.[35] Ukrainian Eastern Group of Forces Spokesperson Ilya Yevlash stated on October 1 that Russian forces have concentrated over 10,000 personnel in Bakhmut itself.[36]

Russian milbloggers claimed on September 30 and October 1 that Russian forces are counterattacking and holding defensive positions along the railway near Klishchiivka and Andriivka.[37] A Kremlin-affiliated milblogger claimed on October 1 that Russian forces also conducted unsuccessful attacks northeast of Klishchiivka.[38]  A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces completely control Kurdyumivka and claimed that control of Klishchiivka and Andriivka is contested as of September 30.[39] Another Russian milblogger claimed that fighting south of Bakhmut reminds him of the situation in Izyum in the fall of 2022 (alluding to Ukraine’s Kharkiv Oblast counteroffensive) because the situation is very bad for both sides and ”fraught with serious risks.”[40] The milblogger noted that he does not think that the Bakhmut front will collapse as it did in Izyum in September 2022, however.[41] Russian sources claimed that Russian forces have established positions in the eastern part of Orikhovo-Vasylivka (10km northwest of Bakhmut) as of September 30.[42]

The Russian MoD claimed on October 1 that Russian forces repelled a Ukrainian attack near Krasnohorivka (8km northwest of Avdiivka).[43]

Russian forces continued ground attacks along the Avdiivka-Donetsk City line on October 1 but did not make any confirmed advances. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces conducted unsuccessful attacks near Novoselivka (15km northeast of Avdiivka), Stepove (8km northwest of Avdiivka), Avdiivka, Vesele (on the northwestern outskirts of Donetsk City), Marinka (just southwest of Donetsk City), and Novomykhailivka (10km southwest of Donetsk City).[44] A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces also conducted unsuccessful attacks near Sieverne (6km west of Avdiivka) and from Opytne (3km southwest of Avdiivka).[45] A Russian news aggregator claimed that Russian forces attacked south of Avdiivka on September 30.[46] Another Russian milblogger amplified footage on October 1 claiming to show elements of the Russian 9th Motorized Rifle Brigade (Donetsk People’s Republic [DNR] 1st Army Corps) operating in the Avdiivka direction.[47] Yet another Russian milblogger posted footage on September 30 claiming to show elements of the Russian 1453rd Regiment (1st Slavic Brigade, DNR 1st Army Corps) operating near Avdiivka.[48]

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

Russian sources claimed that Ukrainian forces conducted unsuccessful limited offensive operations in the Donetsk-Zaporizhia Oblast border area on October 1. The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) claimed that Russian forces repelled four Ukrainian attacks near Pryyutne (16km southwest of Velyka Novosilka).[49] A Russian milblogger claimed that the intensity of Ukrainian attacks in this area has significantly decreased as of September 30.[50] The milblogger claimed that Ukrainian forces are rotating and replenishing units in preparation to possibly resume attacks near Pryyutne and Novomayorske (18km southeast of Velyka Novosilka).[51]

Russian forces conducted counterattacks in the Donetsk-Zaporizhia Oblast border area and reportedly restored some lost positions on October 1. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces conducted unsuccessful attacks near Novodarivka (15km south of Velyka Novosilka).[52] A Kremlin-affiliated Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces conducted successful counterattacks from Pryyutne and restored lost positions.[53] The milblogger claimed that Russian forces conducted unsuccessful counterattacks in the direction of Staromayorske (9km south of Velyka Novosilka).[54] A Russian news aggregator claimed that Russian forces achieved unspecified success during offensive operations near Pryyutne and counterattacks from Urozhaine (9km south of Velyka Novosilka) on September 30.[55]

Ukrainian forces continued offensive operations in western Zaporizhia Oblast on October 1 and made confirmed marginal gains near Robotyne. Geolocated footage published on September 29 indicates that Ukrainian forces marginally advanced northwest of Robotyne (13km south of Orikhiv).[56] The Russian MoD claimed that Russian forces repelled two Ukrainian attacks in the direction of Robotyne and Verbove (18km southeast of Orikhiv).[57] Another Russian milblogger claimed that Ukrainian forces have reduced the intensity of their attacks near Orikhiv and are rotating forces in preparation for resumed attacks in this direction.[58] A Russian news aggregator claimed that Ukrainian forces continued unsuccessful attacks near Verbove and Novopokrovka (16km southeast of Orikhiv) on September 30.[59] Another Russian milblogger claimed on October 1 that Russian and Ukrainian forces skirmished near Novofedorivka (21km southeast of Orikhiv).[60] A Russian milblogger claimed that elements of the Russian 56th Guards Air Assault (VDV) Regiment (7th Guards VDV Division) repelled Ukrainian attacks near Novofedorivka.[61] Another Russian milblogger posted footage on September 30 claiming to show elements of the Russian 108th VDV Regiment (7th VDV Division) repelling Ukrainian attacks near Verbove.[62] A Kremlin-affiliated Russian milblogger claimed that Russian and Ukrainian forces skirmished near Bilohiria (15km southeast of Orikhiv).[63]

Russian forces conducted limited counterattacks in western Zaporizhia Oblast on October 1 and marginally advanced near Robotyne. Geolocated footage published on September 30 indicates that Russian forces marginally advanced south of Robotyne.[64] Additional geolocated footage published on September 29 indicates that Russian forces marginally advanced northwest of Verbove.[65] The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces conducted unsuccessful attacks near Novodarivka and Verbove.[66] Russian sources claimed that Russian forces counterattacked near Novoprokopivka (13km south of Orikhiv) and from Verbove but did not specify an outcome.[67]  Russian milbloggers posted footage on October 1 claiming to show elements of the Russian 177th Naval Infantry Regiment (Caspian Sea Flotilla) operating near Dorozhnianka (34km east of Orikhiv).[68]

Russian forces struck Kherson Oblast with guided aerial bombs overnight on September 30 – October 1. Ukrainian Southern Operational Command Spokesperson Captain First Rank Nataliya Humenyuk stated on October 1 that Russian forces launched 16 guided aerial bombs at Kherson Oblast and targeted residential and agricultural infrastructure.[69] The Kherson Oblast Administration noted that two guided aerial bombs struck a residential quarter in the Beryslav area in the afternoon of October 1.[70] A Russian milblogger posted footage of Russian Aerospace Forces (VKS) dropping a FAB-500 aerial bomb on Ukrainian positions on an island in the Dnipro River delta.[71]

Russian sources claimed that Ukraine fired two “Hrim-2” missiles at occupied Crimea on October 1. The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) claimed that Russian air defense shot down two “Hrim-2” missiles over Dzhankoy, and that some debris fell on the Dzhankoy area.[72] The Ukrainian Resistance Center noted that Russian forces are transferring air defense equipment to Simferopol, likely in an effort to further augment Russian air defense capabilities in occupied Crimea.[73]

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

The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) officially announced the beginning of its regular fall 2023 conscription cycle on October 1.[74] The Russian MoD announced that Russian authorities will call up 130,000 conscripts who will train with formations for five months, and then be assigned to their units.[75] The MoD explicitly stated that conscripts will not deploy to occupied Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhia, or Kherson oblasts or participate in combat operations in Ukraine.[76]   Ukrainian Luhansk Oblast Head Artem Lysohor noted on October 1 that Russian authorities are also conscripting people in occupied Ukraine.[77] Russian authorities are steadily increasing penalties for ignoring conscription notices: Russian authorities increased fines for ignoring a summons from 3,000 to 30,000 rubles ($31 to $310), introduced new fine up to 500,000 rubles ($5,181) for organizations that do not provide enlistment offices information to issue summons, and banned summoned conscripts from leaving Russia.[78]

Russian military administrators continue facing problems granting benefits to fighters of irregular units due to their informal status under Russian law. The Vostok Battalion claimed on October 1 that an irregular unit, likely referring to the Donetsk People's Republic's “Kaskad” formation, did not receive state awards for its participation in combat when other regular units did because the unit formation exists outside of Russia’s “legal framework” as a relic from when the Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) was not officially part of the Russian Federation.[79] The Vostok Battalion complained that the unit’s personnel cannot receive combat veterans benefits despite serving as part of a frontline unit, whereas noncombatant Russian National Guard personnel did receive benefits when performing security duties in the rear.[80]

A Kremlin-linked milblogger complained that the attritional fighting and a lack of infantry have degraded formerly “elite” Russian Spetsnaz, Airborne Forces, and Naval Infantry units into “ordinary trash.”[81] The source stated that these units used to be elite prior to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine but that the Russian military has turned all their forces into infantry because there is a great need for infantry.[82] The source acknowledged that there is a lack of Russian infantry but argued that the Russian military should consider how to improve the quality of Russia’s regular infantry and then think about how to employ elite forces more appropriately instead of using elite forces as a stopgap for regular infantry’s short fallings for convenience's sake.[83]

Activities in Russian-occupied areas (Russian objective: Consolidate administrative control of annexed areas; forcibly integrate Ukrainian citizens into Russian sociocultural, economic, military, and governance systems)

Nothing significant to report.

Significant activity in Belarus (Russian efforts to increase its military presence in Belarus and further integrate Belarus into Russian-favorable frameworks and Wagner Group activity in Belarus)

Wagner Group trainers in Belarus may have provided Belarusian territorial defense elements captured Ukrainian vehicles for tactical training. The Belarusian Ministry of Defense (MoD) posted photos on September 25 showing Belarusian Mogilev territorial defense forces using a Ukrainian-made KrAZ Cobra vehicle (very likely captured from Ukrainian forces) at the Osipovichi Training Ground.[84] A Russian source hypothesized that Russian forces may have given the captured vehicle to Belarus following the withdrawal from Kyiv in early 2022 or Wagner Group forces used it in training following their relocation to Belarus.[85]

ISW will continue to report daily observed Russian and Belarusian military activity in Belarus as part of ongoing Kremlin efforts to increase their control over Belarus and other Russian actions in Belarus.

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

2. Special Operations News - October 2, 2023 | SOF News

Special Operations News - October 2, 2023 | SOF News

sof.news · by SOF News · October 2, 2023

Curated news, analysis, and commentary about special operations, national security, and conflicts around the world.

Photo / Image: A CV-22 Osprey flies over Fort Walton Beach, Florida. (USAF photo by Senior Airman Christopher Callaway, April 24, 2015).

Do you receive our daily newsletter? If not, you can sign up here and enjoy it five (almost) days a week with your morning coffee (or afternoon tea depending on where in the world you are).

SOF News

Drug Testing by NSW. The Navy will begin randomly testing its special operations forces for steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs beginning in November, taking a groundbreaking step that military leaders have long resisted. Rear Adm. Keith Davids, commander of Naval Special Warfare Command, announced the new program Friday in a message to his force, calling it necessary to protect their health and military readiness. The Navy will be the first to begin random testing, but Army Special Operations Command said it will soon follow suit, although no start date has been set. “The Navy will start randomly testing SEALs and special warfare troops for steroids”, CBS News, September 29, 2023.

AFSOC Summit. Air Force Special Operations Command hosted the annual Technology, Acquisition, Sustainment Review summit at Cannon Air Force Base, N.M., Sept. 27-28, 2023. TASRs are Air Force-directed annual tri-chair summits designed to ensure AFMC is meeting warfighters’ needs. During the two-day summit, Cannon Air Commandos showcased AFSOC’s pathfinding legacy through operational capability demonstrations. TASR attendees saw how AFSOC techniques and equipment, like forward arming and refueling point teams and the Compact Loading Adapter and Wench System, are key to building a resilient and ready Air Commando force. “Air Force Special Operations Command hosts annual Technology, Acquisition, Sustainment Review summit”, Cannon Air Force Base, September 29, 2023.

Birth of Modern ARSOF. The road to the establishment of a two- and three-star command for ARSOF was long. Three individuals played key roles in the formation of USASOC and SF Command. “You Have Arrived”: 1st Special Operations Command and the Birth of Modern ARSOF”, U.S. Army, October 1, 2023.

Cutting Army SOF Strength. Congress is concerned about proposed cuts to Army Special Operations Forces and is asking questions on the 3,000 or more personnel who will be trimmed from the United States Army Special Operations Command (USASOC) structure. “Lawmakers, Army headed for a fight over cuts to special operations forces”, Defense One, September 28, 2023.

Best Books on SEALs. Dive into the culture and history of the Navy’s SEAL teams through the written word. “The 5 best books about Navy SEALs – according to Navy SEALs”, Task & Purpose, September 26, 2023.

Australia’s Tactical Response Team. Topics covered include history, mission, roles, selection and training, equipment, weapons, vehicles, and operations. “The Tactical Response Team: One of Australia’s Best Kept Secrets”, by Milo Ritchie, Grey Dynamics, September 30, 2023.

SOF History

SOAC. On October 1, 2012, the Army Special Operations Aviation Command (USASOAC) was activated at Fort Bragg.

75th Ranger Regiment. On October 1, 1974, the 2nd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment was established. On October 3, 1984, the 75th Ranger Regiment and 3/75th was established.

Merrill’s Marauders. On October 3, 1943, the 5307 Composite Group – Merrill’s Marauders was established. It would fight in the Pacific theater during World War II.

Gothic Serpent. On October 3, 1993 – Operation Gothic Serpent, Battle of Mogadishu took place. It would end on October 4. https://sof.news/history/operation-gothic-serpent/ At the end of the battle a U.S. helicopter pilot was missing which would prompt a days-long search for until he was released by Somali insurgents. https://sof.news/conflicts/gothic-serpent-super-64/

Ambush in Niger. On October 4, 2017. Four soldiers of 3rd SFGA died in an ambush in Niger.

Ukraine Conflict

Counteroffensive. The Ukrainian military continues its offensive operations. The advances are small and incremental. Successful interdiction of Russia’s logistical network continues with the use of long-range artillery and rockets.

Updates on Ukraine. An analysis of the war in Ukraine with a discussion of whether there is a stalemate or not. Weekend Update, by Phillips O’Brien, October 1, 2023. The Institute for the Study of War has published its Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment dated September 30, 2023.

Help Special Operations Forces (SOF) personnel with spine injuries receive the healthcare options, education, and care they need.

Asia

CRS Report – China Primer: The People’s Liberation Army (PLA). The Congressional Research Service has updated a report on China’s military. Topics include PLA organization, strategy and goals, modernization, key capabilities, and defense expenditures. CRS IF11719, PDF, 3 pages, September 26, 2023. https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF11719

CRS Report – China Primer: Uyghurs. The Congressional Research Service has updated a publication about the Muslim ethnic minority group living in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) in the far northwest of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The document covers topics related to history, force labor, forced assimilation, mass internment, U.S. responses, and the East Turkestan Islamic Movement. PDF, 3 pages, updated September 22, 2023. https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF10281

Montagnards – SF Warrior Brothers. Terry Lloyd writes about how American Special Forces sought out the help of the Indigenous Montagnard peoples of the Central Highlands of Vietnam and their traditional homelands in Laos and Cambodia. Coming from a deep warrior culture, the Montagnard soon accepted the Green Berets as ‘warrior brothers’. “How the Montagnards of Vietnam became the Special Forces’ warrior brothers”, We Are the Mighty, September 25, 2023.

Europe

Armenia. The small Armenian Chrisitan enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh has long been a part of historical Armenia. However, since December 2022, this region of 120,000 people has been under siege by Azerbaijan. It has recently endured a long blockade of food and medicine and shortages of electricity, fuel, and internet access. Now the occupants face an authoritarian rule, religious persecution, or worse by Azerbaijan or fleeing to Armenia. “Tragic Dispatches From Nagorno-Karabakh: Armenian Christians Flee Another Genocide”, by Lela Gilbert, Religion Unplugged, September 26, 2023.

Exodus From Nagorno-Karabakh. Most of the ethnic Armenians in the breakaway region have fled Azerbaijan. Cars, buses, trucks, and tractors are carrying refugees out along a ‘humanitarian corridor’ after a lightening military operation to by Azerbaijan to occupy the region. The region had been under blockade by Azeri forces for over nine months – causing food and fuel shortages. The World Health Organization says that over 100,000 residents have fled the region. “Three quarters of Karabakh population already out in swift exodus”, Reuters, September 29, 2023.

For an understanding of the legal implications of the conflict read “The Evolving Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict – An International Law Perspective”, by Michael Schmitt and Kevin Coble, Articles of War, Lieber Institute at West Point, September 29, 2023.

Tension in Northern Kosovo. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization has increased its presence in northern Kosovo due to rising tensions between Serbia and Kosovo (Google Maps). Some news reports same an additional 600 troops have been deployed to the area. The UK is reported to have sent in 200 troops. The United States has criticized the buildup of Serbian forces along the border with Kosovo. “NATO bolsters forces in Kosovo as US urges Serbia to withdraw from border”, Politico, September 30, 2023.

Afghanistan

Kabul NEO and JPME. Gary Anderson, a retired Marine Corps officer with a lot of Afghanistan experience, laments the deplorable state of our military professional education system. He points to the chaotic Afghan withdrawal of the summer of 2021 as well as the chaotic non-combatant evacuation operation at Hamid Karzai International Airport (HKIA) as an example. He questions why our top generals didn’t push the Department of State to stage the NEO out of Bagram Air Field instead of HKIA. Read more in “Why Our Generals Can’t Think”, Military.com, September 2023.

Family Reunification. The U.S. Department of State has updated its “Family Reunification for Afghans” webpage. The page describes the different immigration options for Afghan family reunification based on citizenship, immigration status, and how the Afghan entered the United States. Updated Sep 2023.

https://www.state.gov/afghanistan-family-reunification/

Monthly Update. News about Afghanistan, relocation, immigration, resettlement, humanitarian crisis, commentary, Kabul NEO hearings, National Resistance Front (NRF), NGOs and biometrics, ‘gender apartheid’, #AfghanEvac caseworker guide, and more. Read it all here at Afghan Report, September 30, 2023.

SOF News Book Shop

View our selection of books about special operations forces at the SOF News Book Shop.

Books, Podcasts, Videos, and Movies

Sentinel. The October 2023 issue is now online. Topics include book reviews, intelligence failures during the 1972 Easter Offensive, SOAR convention in Las Vegas, dental CAPs in Thailand, and more. https://www.specialforces78.com/chapter-78-newsletter-for-october-2023/

Armor. The summer 2023 issue is now online. Several articles of interest for the tank community in the professional bulletin of the Armor Branch. PDF, 44 pages. https://www.dvidshub.net/publication/issues/67587

Upcoming Events

October 3, 2023

2023 Virtual MOG Mile

Three Rangers Foundation

October 16-20, 2023

SOAR XLVII

Special Operations Association

November 29-30, 2023

SOF & Irregular Warfare Symposium

Defense Strategies Institute

December 8, 2023

Winter Cruise

Combat Diver Association

SOF News is not a ‘money making’ enterprise; but we do have administrative, operating, and publishing expenses. Individuals and businesses provide the funds to defray these expenses. Their contributions are deeply appreciated. Learn how you can support SOF News.

sof.news · by SOF News · October 2, 2023

3. Building a Theory: Ukraine’s Way of War by Mick Ryan

Excerpts:

As I noted earlier, these themes do not in themselves comprise the Ukrainian Way of War. But, they are important aspects of national capacity that contributes to such an approach. And there are other elements of national capacity that contribute which, given the copious notes I took during my visit, I haven’t had the opportunity to ponder and write about yet. I will get to these topics in the coming week.

But one key subject that I think will provide a useful framework for developing the thesis of a unique Ukrainian Way of War is ‘strategic culture’.

The idea of strategic culture developed during the Cold War. In a 1977 report by Jack Snyder, called “The Soviet Strategic Culture: Implications for Limited Nuclear Options”, strategic culture was defined as the “sum total of ideals, conditional emotional responses, and patterns of habitual behaviour that members of the national strategic community have acquired through instruction or imitation and share with each other with regard to strategy”.

As another author on the topic writes:

Strategic culture provides an analytical lens through which to better view the continuities underlying international crises and the motivations of a state’s actions. Often these are undergirded by a state’s historical tendency to preserve its perceived spheres of influence. Strategic Culture can leave enduring legacies in a state’s strategic thinking for decades.

Others, Colin Gray in particular, have written about the importance of strategic culture, and how it ‘works’. Indeed, Gray spent an entire chapter in his book Modern Strategy exploring the concept. Others such as Beatrice Heuser and Tom Mahnken has also written on the topic, and Routledge in 2024 will publish a series of essays on the subject.

Therefore, as I progress my exploration of the notion of a Ukrainian Way of War, the concept of strategic culture will be an important intellectual framework to consider.

That concludes this final Ukrainian visit diary. There is so much more that I have learned and collected during my visit that I will be writing about over the coming weeks and months. But, more than learning about how Ukraine is fighting this war, I have also increased my appreciation of the nation of Ukraine over the past week. It is a fascinating country, and I have so much more to learn about it. I am already thinking about my next trip back there.

I hope these Ukraine diary posts have been interesting and informative. Thanks for following my adventures!

Building a Theory: Ukraine’s Way of War

https://mickryan.substack.com/p/building-a-theory-ukraines-way-of?utm

Ukraine Visit Diary #3

MICK RYAN

OCT 2, 2023

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As I write this, I am on the long, slow train that takes me away from Kyiv and back to Poland.

I am sad to leave this beautiful city, it’s amazing people and the friends I have made there. It is city that has charmed me on each of my visits so far. During my time in Ukraine, I have also been able to speak to an array of people during this visit to better inform my theory about the developing Ukrainian Way of War.

As I described in my first post in this series, the focus on my visit to Ukraine was examining how it fights the war, not individual battles or campaigns. To that end, a variety of discussions with different military and government officials has provided a huge amount of information to support my research.

But, it is important to note that the intellectual underpinnings of the Ukrainian approach to fighting this war were developed well before the 2022 Russian invasion.

Thinking About a Future Russian Invasion

During one of my discussions with a senior Ukrainian official, he described some of the thinking and planning that was undertaken by the senior personnel in the Ukrainian Armed Forces in 2021. By that point, there was a general sense that some form of major Russian operation was likely. These discussions centred on how Ukraine could not afford to fight how Russia would fight and how much of its former-Soviet doctrine stipulated.

They would need an asymmetric approach to respond to any significant Russian military operation against Ukraine. This asymmetric approach would seek to utilise what the Ukrainians believed were the key advantages they had over the Russians.

First, Ukraine had a geographical advantage. It was far larger than all of Russia’s other targets in the past two decades (Chechnya, Georgia, Crimea). As such, Ukraine could utilise both its size as well as the different varieties in terrain to absorb the Russians while giving Ukraine time to mobilise. The size of Ukraine would also necessitate long Russian supply lines. Ukraine believed that the Russians had a targetable vulnerability with their tactical logistics, and attacking this would be a priority.

Second, Ukraine had been fighting the Russians since 2014. They had learned much over that time and could apply these lessons in any future conflict against Russia. During this period the Ukrainians were able to test and hone evolved command and control approaches, which moved away from the Ukrainian Armed Forces foundational Soviet-era approaches. The experience of Ukrainian leaders in The Donbas was added to with their explore to foreign ideas during NATO training and participation in UN peacekeeping operations. As one of my other interlocutor’s during the week described to me, “the mindset of our officer corps changes over that period and we developed a whole new generation of military leaders.”

Third, societal unity was crucial. While two revolutions since 1991, and the Russian actions in 2014, had stimulated Ukrainian politics and identity, any response to a large scale Russian operation against Ukraine would demand societal unity. This would be vital in sustaining any war effort. But if this unity could be achieved and sustained, it would prove to be a key asymmetry against a Russian military whose members were unlikely to have the same sense of purpose and motivation as the Ukrainian military.

Driven by the Ukrainian Commander in Chief, these discussions provided a firm intellectual foundation for the Ukrainian response in the lead up to, and during, the February 2022 large scale Russian invasion.

Beyond Battle: Fighting the War

In war, winning battles matters. Ultimately, any national approach to war must enable military personnel to win in combat.

However, my exploration of this war stretch well beyond the examination of the many battles and campaigns that have been executed since February 2022. Sustaining a warfighting effort requires the development and constant adaptation of a military strategy, which is aligned with the overall national (political) objectives of a conflict. And in the execution of their military strategy, the Ukrainians have evolved their own distinct approach to war.

As I highlighted in my two previous dispatches from Kyiv, a range of different discussions with senior officials over the past week has helped to flesh out my hypothesis. In my first post I explored areas such as training, procurement and digital transformation. In my second post, the focus was a digital age people’s war, which I explored through the lens of the Battle of Moshchun in early 2022.

But other themes were apparent in my discussions this week. My sense is that together, these do not comprise the entirety of the Ukrainian Way or War. But they are important components, and I explore them in more detail below.

Balancing Strategic and Tactical Action

It is no great revelation that the General Staff are the central coordinating hub for Ukraine’s military operations. While much is delegated to lower level headquarters, the General Staff must still balance resourcing between the demanding tactical operations in the south, east and norther east of the country, with the variety of operational enablers (strike, artillery, EW, aviation, logistics, etc) that support these ground campaigns.

At the same time, strategic strike operations are also overseen by the General Staff with many strikes being personally endorsed by General Zaluzhnyi. The Ukrainians have to achieve a balance between their operational and strategic strike activities, while also ensuring strategic strike aligns with political objectives. Finally, the number of weapons available for strategic strike is limited - prioritised targeting is vital.

The Ukrainians have adopted many NATO doctrinal processes for the strike process. This includes intelligence collection, strike planning and the assessment of the effectiveness of strikes. They have formed a joint targeting staff which oversees the process. As such, Ukraine’s strategic strike operations are a hybrid Soviet-NATO approach with a heavy dose of Ukrainian innovation.

If we look back on this time last year, there is a significant difference in the Ukrainian strategic strike activities. Now, there is a much greater quantity of operations being conducted against the Russians, particularly in occupied Crimea and in Russia itself. Ukraine now has multiple different capabilities for these strike operations including indigenously developed drones and missiles, special forces activities, and maritime strike drones as well as missiles such as Storm Shadow and SCALP provided by the West.

A variety of military and political targets can now be covered by Ukrainian strike operations. And, as we have seen this week, the Ukrainians have attacked a Russian electricity sub-station to send a message that Russian attacks on Ukrainian power infrastructure over winter risk a symmetrical response from Ukraine.

Overall, this balancing of tactical and strategic activity is an important capability for Ukraine - and any other nation - to protect itself. Ukraine has developed this capacity through the brutal experience of war. It will be an important part of post-victory Ukrainian military capacity as well. Deterring future Russian military operations against Ukraine will be an important part of how, post-war, they secure their nation and ‘win the peace’.

Intelligence

During the war, head of Ukraine’s military intelligence - Lieutenant General Kyrylo Budanov - has gained a prominence rarely seen for senior military intelligence leaders during wartime. Partially, this is because of his reputation as a fearless special forces leader. But it is also because he has been willing to nurture the creativity of his people in the conduct of strategic intelligence and strike activities, while also speaking publicly more frequently than his peers in other nations.

In the process, Budanov has kept in the spotlight the centrality of effective intelligence operations as part of a nation’s warfighting capacity. This isn’t a particularly new lesson. Good intelligence has been crucial to all military operations all the way back into antiquity.

What is new is how Budanov and the Ukrainian system more generally, has been able to blend traditional collection and assessment methods with civil sources and analysis. Added to this has been the myriad of intelligence feeds, including raw data, assessments and post-strike analysis - from the many nations that are supporting Ukraine.

Ukraine appears to have been better at this meshing of military, civil and allied intelligence than the Russians. According to some of my interlocutors, this hasn’t just been the result of the 2022 Russian large-scale invasion. Ukraine was able to experiment with this approach during its operations in the Donbas from 2014 onwards, and as such, this provided a good foundation for further adaptation to Ukrainian intelligence methods once the invasion commenced in February 2022.

But initiatives such as the 2021 National Resistance Law, which supported partisans and human intelligence collection in occupied areas, has also assisted in the development in the current Ukrainian approach to intelligence operations.

Finally, those I spoke to spoke of their ability to better understand Russian doctrine and operations than Western institutions because Ukraine had been such an integral part of the USSR’s military system. Not only does that assist in anticipating Russian intentions, it also helps in identify gaps in Russian capabilities (such as operator training) that can be exploited. Finally this knowledge of the Russian military and intelligence services underpins the conduct of Ukrainian deception operations.

Military Materiel

The war in Ukraine is a war of industrial systems. There have been many articles and reports that have explored this dimension of the war since February 2022. And as several of my interlocutors this week described, there is no recent precedent for the war.

This has resulted in slow political decision making in the west about increasing defence production (which is an ongoing problem). It also means that most politicians have no personal experience, or even a historical understanding, of the kinds of quantities of defence material - including munitions, equipment and a range of consumables - that are necessary in a war such as the one ongoing in Ukraine.

Image: President Zelenskyy Twitter / x

Ukraine has evolved an approach to military material that three main elements.

First, enhance indigenous production. During the Cold War, Ukraine was a powerhouse of military production. It built tanks, rockets, munitions and a variety of other defence materiel. But, like nations in the west, the post 1991 environment saw this significantly downsized. Because of the huge consumption of munitions for Soviet era equipment, Ukraine is slowly rebuilding its munitions capacity. But it is also building things such as UAV, missiles and other equipment. And, is entering into joint partnerships with companies such as Rheinmetall (to build tanks) and Baykal to build increasing capable drones. This expansion of indigenous defence industry is a work in progress.

The second part of Ukraine’s military material approach is securing donations from foreign countries. From the beginning of the war, this has involved a range of precision munitions, vehicles, UAVs, support vehicles, tanks, helicopters and a long list of other defence materiel. This has resulted in a menagerie of NATO equipment in service now with the Ukrainian armed forces. But as one of my interlocutors described, “it is a zoo, but it is our zoo.” For the short to medium term, Ukraine will remain reliant on foreign donations of military materiel.

The third and final component of Ukraine’s,souring of defence equipment and consumables is procurement on the global arms market. I covered this briefly in a previous post. Ukraine is competing in a sellers market. And it is competing to buy munitions with nations that have donated to Ukraine and are seeking to backfill their own inventories. This is a difficult environment for Ukraine and it’s supporters. It is hard to see this situation changing without major interventions by western nations to increase their defence production.

Centrality of Societal Unity

This is a topic that was raised by everyone I spoke to during my time in Kyiv. Whether it was senior officials or those working outside of government, social unity is a central element in how Ukraine is waging this existential fight to defend itself against Russia.

In a previous post, I explored the concept of People’s War, and how Ukraine had appropriated an old idea and updated it for the 21st century. It is an important concept because at the heart of how Ukraine is fighting this war is a social contract between the government and the people. The government, which sets the direction for the war, calls on the people to volunteer to serve in the military as well as in a variety of other organisations which engage in direct hostilities against the enemy or who support military operations and emergency services.

At the same time, the government commits to employing those people cleverly and ethically. We have seen this in places such as the offensive on the southern front where military commanders have balanced advancing with not arbitrarily wasting the lives of their soldiers.

Image: President Zelenskyy Twitter / x

This is a key asymmetry between Ukraine and Russia. While both have a ‘social contract’ with their people, the Ukrainian version of this values individuals as well as the survival of the state. People, their service as well as the potential future contribution to the wider society in many different endeavours, matters to Ukraine.

It is hard to argue this is the case for Russia. There, the social contract with the people is heavily weighted towards the government. While the Putin government commits to protecting the Russian people from an array of threats (many totally imagined), it extracts a huge sacrifice from its citizens to do so.

Many Russian soldiers are considered to be little more than ‘meat in uniform’ or ‘expendable bullet catchers’. It is a repulsive ideology and a social contract that is focussed mostly on the survival of the current regime rather than rights of individuals or defence of the nation writ large. And it manifests in soldiers on the frontline with much lower motivation than their Ukrainian counterparts.

My sense is that sociologists, anthropologists and many other specialists in the humanities and sciences are going to study this asymmetry in social contracts between Russia and Ukraine for a long time to come.

Be that as it may, the social contract that exists between the Ukrainian government and its people is crucial to how they are fighting this war. It underpins societal cohesion, and manifests in the many different organisations that have arisen in the past 18 months to support citizens and the military. And it supports the ongoing recruitment of Ukrainians to fight in the service of their nation.

The Ukrainian Way of War

As I noted earlier, these themes do not in themselves comprise the Ukrainian Way of War. But, they are important aspects of national capacity that contributes to such an approach. And there are other elements of national capacity that contribute which, given the copious notes I took during my visit, I haven’t had the opportunity to ponder and write about yet. I will get to these topics in the coming week.

But one key subject that I think will provide a useful framework for developing the thesis of a unique Ukrainian Way of War is ‘strategic culture’.

The idea of strategic culture developed during the Cold War. In a 1977 report by Jack Snyder, called “The Soviet Strategic Culture: Implications for Limited Nuclear Options”, strategic culture was defined as the “sum total of ideals, conditional emotional responses, and patterns of habitual behaviour that members of the national strategic community have acquired through instruction or imitation and share with each other with regard to strategy”.

As another author on the topic writes:

Strategic culture provides an analytical lens through which to better view the continuities underlying international crises and the motivations of a state’s actions. Often these are undergirded by a state’s historical tendency to preserve its perceived spheres of influence. Strategic Culture can leave enduring legacies in a state’s strategic thinking for decades.

Others, Colin Gray in particular, have written about the importance of strategic culture, and how it ‘works’. Indeed, Gray spent an entire chapter in his book Modern Strategy exploring the concept. Others such as Beatrice Heuser and Tom Mahnken has also written on the topic, and Routledge in 2024 will publish a series of essays on the subject.

Therefore, as I progress my exploration of the notion of a Ukrainian Way of War, the concept of strategic culture will be an important intellectual framework to consider.

That concludes this final Ukrainian visit diary. There is so much more that I have learned and collected during my visit that I will be writing about over the coming weeks and months. But, more than learning about how Ukraine is fighting this war, I have also increased my appreciation of the nation of Ukraine over the past week. It is a fascinating country, and I have so much more to learn about it. I am already thinking about my next trip back there.

I hope these Ukraine diary posts have been interesting and informative. Thanks for following my adventures!

4. Ukraine says it has a massive database the American embassy can use to track every last weapon the US has sent to Kyiv

Ukraine says it has a massive database the American embassy can use to track every last weapon the US has sent to Kyiv

Business Insider · by Matthew Loh

Ukrainian soldiers are seen during their shooting training at the front with US-made weapons in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine on March 04, 2023Mustafa Ciftci/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

• Ukraine said it tracks all American-provided weapons through a system the US embassy can access.
• A Ukrainian lawmaker said it lets US officials trace every single piece of weaponry to its warehouse.
• Her comments come after Ukraine was reported to have had foreign-provided weapons stolen last year.

Ukraine said it now has a meticulous system for storing and tracking US-provided munitions that the American embassy can access anytime.

Oleksandra Ustinova, a Ukrainian member of parliament who leads a commission tracking foreign military aid, told CBS News' "60 Minutes" that serial numbers of every single piece of US weaponry sent to Ukraine are in a database that the American embassy in Kyiv can view.

US officials can then visit the warehouses storing the equipment to see the inventory for themselves, she said.

"They can come, type in, let's say, a Javelin or a HIMARS and see in which brigade it is, and then go check it if they don't believe," Ustinova said.

The member of parliament showed "60 Minutes" a video of her in what she said was a top-secret warehouse storing Javelins from the US.

Ustinova's comments come after Military.com published an article in July about a Pentagon report that highlighted how a Russian-led criminal ring in Ukraine was able to steal weapons sent to Kyiv for the war.

The stolen weapons included a grenade launcher and a machine gun, and were taken by Russians who had joined a volunteer battalion, per the outlet.

The Pentagon report, dated October 6, 2022, said the theft occurred in June 2022, per CNN.

This Pentagon report didn't explicitly say that the stolen weapons were American. But it detailed several such incidents in a section discussing Ukraine's methods of tracking US weapons, CNN reported.

In August 2022, a group of volunteer battalion members also stole 60 rifles and nearly 1,000 rounds of ammunition "presumably for sale on the black market," CNN reported, citing the Pentagon documents.

Another highlighted incident involved $17,000 worth of bulletproof vests being stolen by Ukrainian criminals pretending to be aid workers, per CNN.

These plots were eventually foiled or disrupted by Ukraine's intelligence services, and the equipment was recovered, the Pentagon report said, per CNN.

Ustinova, who for years was an anti-corruption activist before she became a lawmaker, told CBS News that Ukraine needed to cleanse itself of corruption.

"We have to get rid of this cancer, which is corruption because otherwise, we're not gonna survive," she said to the channel.

The channel's report was a wide-ranging segment on how the billions of dollars in US aid to Ukraine are used in the country, and how American and Ukrainian lawmakers seek to ensure they're appropriately used to fund the war effort.

The US has committed more than $43.8 billion in security assistance and military aid to Ukraine since the start of the war, reported Insider's Charles Davis.

As of December, the equipment sent to Ukraine includes advanced HIMARS artillery systems, more than 10,000 Javelin anti-armor systems, at least 186 Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicles, and 198 Howitzer guns.

Business Insider · by Matthew Loh

5. Leaked U.S. strategy on Ukraine sees corruption as the real threat

Leaked U.S. strategy on Ukraine sees corruption as the real threat

By NAHAL TOOSI

10/02/2023 05:00 AM EDT

Politico

A report obtained by POLITICO details specific plans to reform Ukrainian institutions and warns Western support may hinge on cutting corruption.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and President Joe Biden meet in the Oval Office on Sept. 21. Graft in Ukraine has long been a concern of U.S. officials all the way up to Biden. But the topic was deemphasized in the wake of Russia’s February 2022 full-scale invasion. | Evan Vucci/AP

10/02/2023 05:00 AM EDT

Biden administration officials are far more worried about corruption in Ukraine than they publicly admit, a confidential U.S. strategy document obtained by POLITICO suggests.

The “sensitive but unclassified” version of the long-term U.S. plan lays out numerous steps Washington is taking to help Kyiv root out malfeasance and otherwise reform an array of Ukrainian sectors. It stresses that corruption could cause Western allies to abandon Ukraine’s fight against Russia’s invasion, and that Kyiv cannot put off the anti-graft effort.

“Perceptions of high-level corruption” the confidential version of the document warns, could “undermine the Ukrainian public’s and foreign leaders’ confidence in the war-time government.”

That’s starker than the analysis available in the little-noticed public version of the 22-page document, which the State Department appears to have posted on its website with no fanfare about a month ago.

The confidential version of the “Integrated Country Strategy” is about three times as long and contains many more details about U.S. objectives in Ukraine, from privatizing its banks to helping more schools teach English to encouraging its military to adopt NATO protocols. Many goals are designed to reduce the corruption that bedevils the country.

The quiet release of the strategy, and the fact that the toughest language was left in the confidential version, underscores the messaging challenge facing the Biden team.

The administration wants to press Ukraine to cut graft, not least because U.S. dollars are at stake. But being too loud about the issue could embolden opponents of U.S. aid to Ukraine, many of them Republican lawmakers who are trying to block such assistance. Any perception of weakened American support for Kyiv also could cause more European countries to think twice about their role.

When it comes to the Ukrainians, “there are some honest conversations happening behind the scenes,” a U.S. official familiar with Ukraine policy said. Like others, the person was granted anonymity to discuss a sensitive issue.

Ukrainian graft has long been a concern of U.S. officials all the way up to President Joe Biden. But the topic was deemphasized in the wake of Russia’s February 2022 full-scale invasion, which Biden has called a real-life battle of democracy against autocracy.

For months, Biden aides stuck to brief mentions of corruption. They wanted to show solidarity with Kyiv and avoid giving fuel to a small number of Republican lawmakers critical of U.S. military and economic aid for Ukraine.

More than a year into the full-scale war, U.S. officials are pressing the matter more in public and private. National security adviser Jake Sullivan, for instance, met in early September with a delegation from Ukrainian anti-corruption institutions.

A second U.S. official familiar with the discussions confirmed to POLITICO reports that the Biden administration is talking to Ukrainian leaders about potentially conditioning future economic aid on “reforms to tackle corruption and make Ukraine a more attractive place for private investment.”

Such conditions are not being considered for military aid, the official said.

A spokesperson for Ukraine’s foreign ministry did not respond to requests for comment. But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has fired several top defense officials in a recent crackdown on alleged graft — a message to the United States and Europe that he’s listening.

The Integrated Country Strategy is a State Department product that draws on contributions from other parts of the U.S. government, including the Defense Department. It includes lists of goals, timelines for achieving them and milestones that U.S. officials would like to see hit. (The State Department produces such strategies for many countries once every few years.)

A State Department official, speaking on behalf of the department, would not say if Washington had shared the longer version of the strategy with the Ukrainian government or whether a classified version exists.

William Taylor, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, said many ordinary Ukrainians will likely welcome the strategy because they, too, are tired of the endemic corruption in their country.

It’s all fine “as long as it doesn’t get in the way of the assistance we provide them to win the war,” he said.

The document says that fulfilling American objectives for Ukraine includes making good on U.S. promises of equipment and training to help Ukraine’s armed forces fend off the Kremlin’s attacks.

The confidential version also describes U.S. goals such as helping reform elements of Ukraine’s national security apparatus to allow for “decentralized, risk-tolerant approach to execution of tasks” and reduce “opportunities for corruption.”

Although the NATO military alliance is not close to allowing Ukraine to join, the American strategy often cites a desire to make Ukraine’s military adopt NATO standards.

One hoped-for milestone listed in the confidential version is that Ukraine’s Defense Ministry “establishes a professionalized junior officer and non-commissioned officer corps with NATO standard doctrine and principles.”

Even the format and content of Ukrainian defense documents should “reflect NATO terminology,” a confidential section of the strategy says.

One target includes creating a “national level resistance plan.” That could allude to ordinary Ukrainians fighting back if Russia gains more territory. (The State Department official would not clarify that point.)

The U.S. also wants to see Ukraine produce its own military equipment by establishing a “domestic defense industry capable of supporting core needs” as well as an environment that boosts defense information technology start-ups, according to one of the confidential sections.

U.S. officials appear especially concerned about the role of an elite few in Ukraine’s economy.

“Deoligarchization, particularly of the energy and mining sectors, is a core tenet to building back a better Ukraine,” the public part of the strategy declares. One indicator of success, the confidential version states, is that the Ukrainian government “embraces meaningful reforms decentralizing control of the energy sector.”

The United States appears eager to help Ukrainian institutions build their oversight capacities. The goals listed include everything from helping local governments assess corruption risks to reforms in human resources offices.

As one example, the strategy says the U.S. is helping the Accounting Chamber of Ukraine enhance its auditing and related work in part so it can track direct budget support from the United States.

The strategy describes ways in which the United States is helping Ukraine’s health sector, cyber defenses and organizations that battle disinformation. It calls for supporting Ukrainian anti-monopoly efforts and initiatives to spur increased tax revenue for the country’s coffers.

The confidential portion calls for Ukraine’s financial systems to “increase lending to encourage business expansion” and a reduction in the state’s role in the banking sector.

One envisioned milestone for that section is that “Alfa Bank is transparently returned to private ownership.” That appears to be a reference to an institution now known as Sense Bank, which was previously Russian-owned but nationalized by Ukraine.

The U.S. strategy appears intent on ensuring that Ukraine not only retains its orientation toward the West but that it develops special ties with America.

One way Washington believes that will happen is through the English language. The strategy indicates the United States is offering technical and other aid to Ukraine’s education ministry to improve the teaching of English and that it believes offering English lessons can help reintegrate Ukrainians freed from Russian occupation.

U.S. officials also are helping Ukraine build its capacity to prosecute war crimes in its own judicial system. The desired milestones include the selection of more than 2,000 new judges and clearing up a backlog of over 9,000 judicial misconduct complaints.

The strategy also calls for rebuilding the U.S. diplomatic presence in Ukraine, expanding beyond Kyiv to cities such as Lviv, Odesa, Kharkiv and Dnipro.

Due to earlier staff drawdowns spurred by the full-scale Russian invasion, “the embassy remains in crisis mode,” one of the public sections states. (The State Department official would not discuss the current Embassy staffing numbers.)

As they have in past communications reported on by POLITICO, U.S. officials note inventive ways in which the United States is providing oversight of American aid to Ukraine despite facing limitations due to the war. Those efforts have included using an app called SEALR to help track the aid.

POLITICO

Politico

6. High-Level Iranian Spy Ring Busted in Washington

I guess we should have expected this. 

Excerpts:

Why an Iranian operative is still at the Pentagon, especially in a job which gives her daily access to classified information that puts the country’s most sensitive military operations at risk, is another matter entirely. “The optimistic reading,” says Theroux, “is that they were watching her to see what she does and the FBI has her apartment all teched up. But to be an optimist you have to believe the FBI is clean, rather than see this as a huge counterintelligence failure. Though, of course, it’s not a failure if they were complicit.”

So far, however, the evidence points to a less optimistic reading: The Biden administration allowed Malley to push an Iranian agent into sensitive national security positions because she was best equipped to carry out the administration’s own policy—to appease a terror regime with American blood on its hands. Because the number of American officials who want to be responsible for protecting Iran’s nuclear weapons program is limited, the White House went outside the federal bureaucracy for someone who was well-connected to the regime, and would relish the job of advancing its interests—an Iranian spy.

Congress needs to demand the Biden White House make Malley and Tabatabai available to testify immediately. It must also press to interview the security officials who buried evidence of Tabatabai’s covert activities, putting her in a position to endanger the lives of American civilians and special forces operators. It’s time to find out why the interests—and now the personnel—of the Iranian “death to America” regime intersect so frequently with those of America’s own ruling party.

High-Level Iranian Spy Ring Busted in Washington

The trail that leads from Tehran to D.C. passes directly through the offices of Robert Malley and the International Crisis Group

Tablet · by Lee Smith · October 2, 2023

The Biden administration’s now-suspended Iran envoy Robert Malley helped to fund, support, and direct an Iranian intelligence operation designed to influence the United States and allied governments, according to a trove of purloined Iranian government emails. The emails, which were reported on by veteran Wall Street Journal correspondent Jay Solomon, writing in Semafor, and by Iran International, the London-based émigré opposition outlet which is the most widely read independent news source inside Iran, were published last week after being extensively verified over a period of several months by the two outlets. They showed that Malley had helped to infiltrate an Iranian agent of influence named Ariane Tabatabai into some of the most sensitive positions in the U.S. government—first at the State Department and now the Pentagon, where she has been serving as chief of staff for the assistant secretary of defense for special operations, Christopher Maier.

On Thursday, Maier told a congressional committee that the Defense Department is “actively looking into whether all law and policy was properly followed in granting my chief of staff top secret special compartmented information.”

The emails, which were exchanged over a period of several years between Iranian regime diplomats and analysts, show that Tabatabai was part of a regime propaganda unit set up in 2014 by the Iranian Foreign Ministry. The Iran Experts Initiative (IEI) tasked operatives drawn from Iranian diaspora communities to promote Iranian interests during the clerical regime’s negotiations with the United States over its nuclear weapons program. Though several of the IEI operatives and others named in the emails have sought to portray themselves on social media as having engaged with the regime in their capacity as academic experts, or in order to promote better understanding between the United States and Iran, none has questioned the veracity of the emails.

The contents of the emails are damning, showing a group of Iranian American academics being recruited by the Iranian regime, meeting together in foreign countries to receive instructions from top regime officials, and pledging their personal loyalty to the regime. They also show how these operatives used their Iranian heritage and Western academic positions to influence U.S. policy toward Iran, first as outside “experts” and then from high-level U.S. government posts. Both inside and outside of government, the efforts of members of this circle were repeatedly supported and advanced by Malley, who served as the U.S. government’s chief interlocutor with Iran under both the Obama and the Biden administrations. Malley is also the former head of the International Crisis Group (ICG), which directly paid and credentialed several key members of the regime’s influence operation.

The Iran Deal

The IEI, according to a 2014 email from one Iranian official to one of Iran’s lead nuclear negotiators, “consisted of a core group of 6-10 distinguished second-generation Iranians who have established affiliation with the leading international think-tanks and academic institutions, mainly in Europe and the US.” The network was funded and supported by an Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) official, Mostafa Zahrani, who was the point of contact between IEI operatives, and Iran’s then-Foreign Minister Javad Zarif.

According to the correspondence, the IEI recruited several U.S.-based analysts, including Tabatabai, Ali Vaez, and Dina Esfandiary, all of whom willingly accepted Iranian guidance. These Middle East experts were then subsequently hired, credentialed, supported, and funded by Malley and the ICG where he was president from January 2018 until January 2021, when he joined the Biden administration. Malley was also ICG’s program director for Middle East and North Africa before the Obama administration tapped him in February 2014 to run negotiations for the Iran nuclear deal. Vaez joined the ICG in 2012 and served as Malley’s top deputy.

Emails quoted in the stories show that even once in government, Malley directed Vaez’s actions at ICG, sending him to Vienna where the Iranian and U.S. teams held nuclear negotiations. “Following the order of his previous boss Malley, Ali Vaez will come to Vienna,” Zahrani reportedly wrote Zarif in an April 3, 2014, email. “Who from our group do you instruct to have a meeting with him?”

Vaez wrote Zarif directly after the Iranian foreign minister expressed dissatisfaction with an ICG report on Iran. “As an Iranian, based on my national and patriotic duty,” wrote Vaez in an October 2014 email, “I have not hesitated to help you in any way; from proposing to Your Excellency a public campaign against the notion of [nuclear] breakout, to assisting your team in preparing reports on practical needs of Iran.”

These emails likely explain why Vaez was unable to obtain a security clearance in order to join Malley in the Biden administration. At the same time, they raise the question of why Malley sought to bring Vaez into the State Department in the first place, and why he remained in close operational contact with him even after he was denied a security clearance.

After the Iran deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), was finalized in July 2015, ICG hired another IEI operative as a consultant—Adnan Tabatabai, not to be confused with Pentagon official Ariane Tabatabai. Like Vaez, Adnan Tabatabai also pledged to dedicate his efforts to the Iranian regime.

In an email from 2014, as the agreement was being negotiated, Adnan Tabatabai wrote to Zarif about the foreign minister’s meeting in Vienna with IEI operatives: “As you will have noticed, we are all very much willing to dedicate our capacities and resources to jointly working on the improvement of Iran’s foreign relations. Iran is our country, so we, too, feel the need and responsibility to contribute our share. When I say “we” I mean the very group you met.”

In early 2021, shortly before he joined the Biden administration, Malley brought a third IEI operative, Dina Esfandiary, into the ICG. ICG did not respond by press time to Tablet’s email requesting comment on its employees’ role in an Iranian spy ring.

In February 2021, Malley hired Ariane Tabatabai to join his Iran team at the State Department. The emails document her cloying determination to prove her worth to the Iranian regime. Shortly after the 2014 meeting in Vienna, Ariane Tabatabai sent Zahrani a link to an article she’d co-authored with Esfandiary. “As I mentioned last week, Dina and I wrote an article about the nuclear fuel of Bushehr [nuclear power plant] for the Bulletin which was published today. Our goal was to show what is said in the West—that Iran does not need more than 1500 centrifuges—is wrong, and that Iran should not be expected to reduce the number of its centrifuges.” Zahrani then forwarded the email to Zarif.

In June 2014, Ariane Tabatabai emailed Zahrani to say she’d been invited to conferences in Saudi Arabia and Israel and asked for his prior approval of her trips. “I would like to ask your opinion too and see if you think I should accept the invitation and go,” she wrote. Zahrani replied that “Saudi Arabia is a good case, but the second case [Israel] is better to be avoided.” She responded: “Thank you very much for your advice. I will take action regarding Saudi Arabia and will keep you updated on the progress.” There is no record of Tabatabai traveling to Israel.

A month later, she again wrote Zahrani asking for additional instructions. She’d been invited to join academic experts Gary Samore and William Tobey to brief House members on the Foreign Relations, Armed Services, and Intelligence committees. “I am scheduled to go to the Congress to give a talk about the nuclear program,” she wrote the IRGC official. “I will bother you in the coming days. It will be a little difficult since both Will and Gary do not have favorable views on Iran.” Zahrani forwarded the email to Zarif.

Ariane Tabatabai’s correspondence with Zahrani offers clear evidence that Malley’s protégé was an active participant in a covert Iranian influence campaign designed to shape U.S. government policy in order to serve the interests of the Iranian regime. Her requests for guidance from top Iranian officials, which she appears to have faithfully followed, and her desire to harmonize her own words and actions with regime objectives, are hardly the behavior of an impartial academic, or a U.S. public servant. Tabatabai’s emails show her enthusiastically submitting to the control of top Iranian officials, who then guided her efforts to propagandize and collect intelligence on U.S. and allied officials in order to advance the interests of the Islamic Republic.

“I know what a spy network looks like,” says Peter Theroux, a veteran Mideast analyst who is now retired from the CIA, where he was awarded the Career Intelligence Medal for his service. During his 25 years at the agency, Theroux was frequently called on to analyze the Iranian regime and its foreign spying and terror networks. “This is how recruited assets speak to their handling officers. There’s lots of the mood music around that correspondence saying, let me know what you need me to collect. It seems clear who’s the subordinate here—what you’d call responsive to tasking.”

In response to a Tablet email requesting comment on Malley’s and Tabatabai’s role in an Iranian spy ring, a State Department spokesman wrote: “We have seen the Semafor article, which does not presume it was a ‘spy ring,’ and we reject that characterization. Rob Malley remains on leave and we have no further comment due to privacy considerations. The Biden-Harris administration appointed Ariane Tabatabai to serve various roles in the U.S. government because of her expertise on nuclear and other foreign policy issues.” The Defense Department did not respond by press time to Tablet’s email requesting comment on Ariane Tabatabai’s role in an Iranian spy ring.

Whether the IEI is best characterized as an Iranian “spy ring” or as a “regime-directed influence operation” is a semantic question that beggars the larger question of how any responsible U.S. security official in possession of Tabatabai’s correspondence could have cleared her to enter the State Department building or the Pentagon—let alone cleared her to work as a chief of staff in the Defense Department, with direct access to the most sensitive real-time details of U.S. special forces operations.

It seems likely that by the time of her appointment to the Pentagon’s special operations office, Tabatabai’s covert activities on behalf of the Iranian regime were well known in Biden administration and intelligence circles. “The hoops you have to jump through to get a bare-bones top secret clearance even without compartments or special access programs are enormous,” says Theroux. “They grill you on your foreign contacts. Contacts with any foreign government raise more red flags than Bernie Sanders’ honeymoon. Contacts with senior officials from enemy governments, classified as non-frat governments like Russia, China, Cuba, as well as Iran, are in a different category altogether—what would normally be totally disqualifying.”

There is also the fact that, as early as 2014, as Tablet has reported, the Obama administration was spying on Israeli officials and their contacts within the United States, including U.S. lawmakers and pro-Israel activists. The fact that U.S. intelligence services routinely disobeyed guidelines preventing them from unmasking the identities of U.S. persons recorded in transcripts of foreign intelligence intercepts has been exhaustively demonstrated in a long series of U.S. government reports, Congressional investigations, and other reporting. Since Zarif’s communications and the IRGC’s communications were also collected, U.S. officials would have known about the IEI—and about the names of those working on behalf of Iran, such as Vaez and Tabatabai.

Theroux suggests that a range of U.S. authorities would have likely known about Malley’s involvement with the IEI as well—and that Malley would have been well aware of what they knew. “When I was on the National Security Council, the National Security Agency would call to alert me when my name had popped up in a conversation among bad actors,” Theroux recalls.

The facts of Malley’s involvement with the IEI and its agents are likely to have been old news within the Biden administration; the impending publication of the IEI emails is likely the reason why Malley was put on leave in April and had his security clearances suspended. As news of emails and their impending publication circulated in Washington, the administration moved him to the sidelines before Republican officials had the chance to demand his head on a spike.

Why an Iranian operative is still at the Pentagon, especially in a job which gives her daily access to classified information that puts the country’s most sensitive military operations at risk, is another matter entirely. “The optimistic reading,” says Theroux, “is that they were watching her to see what she does and the FBI has her apartment all teched up. But to be an optimist you have to believe the FBI is clean, rather than see this as a huge counterintelligence failure. Though, of course, it’s not a failure if they were complicit.”

So far, however, the evidence points to a less optimistic reading: The Biden administration allowed Malley to push an Iranian agent into sensitive national security positions because she was best equipped to carry out the administration’s own policy—to appease a terror regime with American blood on its hands. Because the number of American officials who want to be responsible for protecting Iran’s nuclear weapons program is limited, the White House went outside the federal bureaucracy for someone who was well-connected to the regime, and would relish the job of advancing its interests—an Iranian spy.

Congress needs to demand the Biden White House make Malley and Tabatabai available to testify immediately. It must also press to interview the security officials who buried evidence of Tabatabai’s covert activities, putting her in a position to endanger the lives of American civilians and special forces operators. It’s time to find out why the interests—and now the personnel—of the Iranian “death to America” regime intersect so frequently with those of America’s own ruling party.

Tablet · by Lee Smith · October 2, 2023

7. The West has a massive Chinese spy problem

Excerpts:

Ultimately, no patchwork of laws, no matter how thorough, will be adequate to the task of stopping Chinese espionage. It will require multiple segments of society to treat the motives, affiliations, and money of Chinese nationals — and Americans defending Chinese interests — with much higher degrees of suspicion.

This higher level of scrutiny raises uncomfortable questions at the intersection of national security, civil liberties, and race. But only a whole-of-society vigilance can counteract a Chinese communist espionage and influence offensive that is running rampant in every corner of American society and throughout the world.

The West has a massive Chinese spy problem

BY DAVID WILEZOL, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR - 09/26/23 7:30 AM ET

https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/4218603-the-west-has-a-massive-chinese-spy-problem/

A bevy of headlines in just the last few weeks concerning Chinese spying should force the West to bolster its China-focused counterintelligence efforts.

On Sept. 10, the Sunday Times reported that MI5, Britain’s domestic security agency, had arrested a researcher working for the UK House of Commons’ China Research Group on suspicions of being a Chinese spy. The 28-year old man, reportedly named Chris Cash, would have had access to many members of the British parliament.

While the success of whatever activities he is alleged to have undertaken is unknown, one Whitehall source speculated, “I’m pretty sure he [the researcher] turned some backbenchers from China hawks into being apathetic about Beijing.”

That wasn’t the only news out of the UK. The Times also reported on Sept. 12 that MI5 warned the Conservative Party in 2021 that two potential candidates for Parliament could be agents of China’s United Front Work Department (UFWD) — its chief agency for overseas foreign influence and propaganda efforts.

Closer to home, National Review’s Jimmy Quinn reported on Sept. 10 that aides to New York City Mayor Eric Adams had traveled to China with one of the defendants in the Justice Department’s case against Chinese nationals accused of operating an illegal, government-run police station in New York City. The news has echoes of previous Chinese operations in the U.S., which positioned agents close to Sen. Diane Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.). And in August, the Department of Justice arrested two Navy sailors for allegedly passing classified information to China on U.S. naval activities, ship designs and weaponry.

Meanwhile, the Canadian government announced on Sept. 7 the opening of an inquiry into Russian and Chinese meddling in national elections. Earlier this year, The Global and Mail cited Canadian intelligence reports indicating that Chinese intelligence ran an influence operation designed to keep Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberal Party in power and defeat Conservative legislators considered hostile to Beijing’s interests. Chinese efforts included undisclosed political contributions and forcing Chinese students to volunteer on campaigns. This scheme resembles successful Chinese efforts to infiltrate and influence the Australian parliament in the last several years.

This kind of penetration of Western institutions is downright subtle compared to the news out of India. Various Indian press outlets have reported on a diplomatic standoff between Chinese officials and employees at the Taj Palace in Delhi, the host city for last week’s G20 summit.

According to the Times of India, a Chinese delegation refused to submit 20 bags of “suspicious equipment” to a security screening, resulting in a 12-hour dispute with hotel security staff. The hotel served as the Brazilian president’s lodging, and was also very close to the ITC Maurya hotel, where President Biden was staying. Ultimately the Chinese agreed to take their gear back to the Chinese embassy in India.

Clearly, China is undaunted in its boldness to run operations against targets in the West and elsewhere. As Australian researcher Alex Joske details in his superb 2022 book “Spies and Lies: How China’s Greatest Covert Operations Fooled the World,” the Chinese Ministry of State Security’s “symbiosis with united front networks, business empires, public diplomacy and universities is as strong as ever.”

Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.), chair of the U.S. Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, said last month that “We’re just beginning to scratch the surface in terms of this activity on American soil.” The pervasiveness of the problem is clear, but the solution to shutting down Chinese operations inside the U.S. is far from easy.

Chinese agents do not always operate under the cover of a government affiliation, such as a diplomatic posting. The CCP commonly recruits (or otherwise convinces) ordinary Chinese citizens, such as university students and businesspeople, to participate in its spying and influence campaigns.

U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies cannot track the activities of every single Chinese national in the U.S., as a matter of both practicality and non-discrimination. But it can take a few steps to close gaps.

First, Congress should broaden the legal parameters of what constitutes illegal Chinese operations in the U.S., with a special concentration on the academic and business arenas. For example, all activities associated with China’s Thousand Talents program, which recruits Western scientists to China to funnel American know-how to Chinese institutions, should be viewed as supporting espionage and intellectual property theft and consequently shut down.

Chinese commercial entities, which have been under-scrutinized by law enforcement as front companies, must be regarded as espionage platforms, with their members either prosecuted or expelled. Finally, the federal government must increase reporting requirements surrounding contact between Chinese nationals and U.S. government officials (including members of Congress and their staffers) and individuals supporting the U.S. defense-industrial base.

Ultimately, no patchwork of laws, no matter how thorough, will be adequate to the task of stopping Chinese espionage. It will require multiple segments of society to treat the motives, affiliations, and money of Chinese nationals — and Americans defending Chinese interests — with much higher degrees of suspicion.

This higher level of scrutiny raises uncomfortable questions at the intersection of national security, civil liberties, and race. But only a whole-of-society vigilance can counteract a Chinese communist espionage and influence offensive that is running rampant in every corner of American society and throughout the world.

David Wilezol is a senior fellow for U.S. foreign policy at the American Foreign Policy Council. He formerly served as chief speechwriter for Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

8. Ukraine and US Need a New Strategy for a Longer War by Hal Brands

I missed this.

Conclusion:

Don’t lose sight of what Ukraine, with Western support, has achieved: When Russian troops invaded, few thought the country would last this long or fight this well. But in a conflict that shows few signs of ending, Ukraine’s — and America’s — challenges are only beginning.

Ukraine and US Need a New Strategy for a Longer War

By Hal Brands

Bloomberg Opinion

September 22, 2023

https://www.aei.org/op-eds/ukraine-and-us-need-a-new-strategy-for-a-longer-war/

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy visited the United Nations and the White House this week, seeking more support for his country in a war that won’t end anytime soon. Zelenskiy’s chief backer, the US, will need a shift in strategy to help Ukraine survive and prevail in a protracted war, even as the politics of the conflict get harder in Washington.

It may seem odd to forecast a grim, protracted struggle just as Ukrainian troops are finally opening gaps in Russia’s strong defensive lines. But barring a catastrophic collapse of Russian resistance, Ukraine won’t liberate all of its territory this year. The war may not end next year, either, given that Russian President Vladimir Putin is likely pinning his hopes for victory on the return of Donald Trump as US president — and a corresponding collapse in Western unity — after November 2024. The fighting may well drag into 2025 or even longer, presenting new challenges in a new phase of the war.

Phase one of US strategy, in 2022, involved giving Ukraine enough aid to avoid losing while also inflicting appalling costs on the invaders. The success of that effort led to phase two: preparing Ukraine for a counteroffensive meant to claw back territory and perhaps make peace on favorable terms. This phase has been more disappointing, due to slow progress on the battlefield — and the fact that Putin is so committed to victory that he was always unlikely to come to terms.

Even now, the peace Putin wants would leave Ukraine indefensible and dismembered. So unless the US opts for disengagement — tantamount to Ukrainian defeat — it needs to start addressing the problems a longer war will confront.

The first involves assessing, and perhaps adapting, military strategy. Ukraine’s current offensive initially struggled because the country sought to mimic Western tactics without the advantages, such as air superiority, Western militaries have come to expect.

The US and its allies need to start equipping Ukraine now for operations in 2024 and after. The question is whether they should be preparing Ukraine for a similar offensive next year, or perhaps helping it employ a more familiar, if less ambitious, strategy of attrition. This would involve localized offensives combined with ramping up long-range strikes meant to sever Russia’s supply lines and gradually make its military position unsustainable.

Second, a longer war may require accepting higher risks of escalation. At the outset, Washington stepped across Putin’s red lines gingerly. More recently, the US has committed to provide sophisticated capabilities such as Abrams tanks and F-16 fighter jets.

These commitments are meant to show that Putin can’t simply outwait the West. But if a new theory of victory involves coercing, rather than directly evicting, Russian forces, Ukraine will need longer-range ATACMS missiles and other systems to vastly increase the pain it inflicts by targeting Putin’s forces wherever they occupy Ukrainian soil.

Third, Washington must tighten the economic squeeze. Sanctions have injured but not crippled Putin’s economy, which continues to churn out weapons for the war. The Treasury and State Departments are already cracking down on sanctions evasion, with the announcement last week of further penalties on 150 individuals and entities. The next step might be lowering the price cap the Group of 7 imposed on Russian oil sales, to reduce Putin’s revenue without throwing global energy markets into chaos.

Fourth, Washington must prevent a long war from becoming a source of weakness and distraction. The record to date is encouraging: Since February 2022, the US has dialed up production of artillery shells and other weapons, while expanding and strengthening its global alliance network.

But a protracted war means an ongoing drain on US resources. So it creates an imperative, as well as an opportunity, for greater outlays in the US defense industrial base — in everything from securing rare-earths supply chains to stocking up on the missiles and munitions Washington would need in a conflict of its own, potentially over Taiwan.

This is all easy to say but hard to do, because the politics of the war are getting nastier in the US. Congressional support for Ukraine remains strong. But because House Speaker Kevin McCarthy is hostage to the most obstreperous members of his Republican coalition, he is struggling to keep the US government open, let alone secure another big tranche of funding for Ukraine.

Meanwhile, the three candidates who account for perhaps three-quarters of the prospective Republican primary vote — Trump, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy — are all skeptical, to some degree, of aid for Ukraine. Because elite sentiment usually drives popular sentiment on foreign policy, their opposition could shift views among Republican voters over time.

Don’t lose sight of what Ukraine, with Western support, has achieved: When Russian troops invaded, few thought the country would last this long or fight this well. But in a conflict that shows few signs of ending, Ukraine’s — and America’s — challenges are only beginning.

9. Marine Special Operators Seeking New Tech, AI for Future Missions

Marine Special Operators Seeking New Tech, AI for Future Missions

nationaldefensemagazine.org · by Sean Carberry

9/29/2023

By

Marine Raiders and contractors with Marine Forces Special Operations Command demonstrate the rapid accessory integration device (RAID).

Marine Corps photo

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Just as the Marine Corps is engaged in transformation under its Force Design 2030 plan, Marine Forces Special Operations Command has embarked on a campaign to innovate and modernize for emerging and future threats.

According to the Marine Special Operation Forces 2030 plan, modernization efforts center on four themes or pathways of innovation: “the Cognitive Operator, MARSOF as a Connector, Combined Arms for the Connected Arena and Enterprise Level Agility.”

What that generally translates to is smaller teams of “cognitive raiders” — operators with higher levels of technological training and advanced equipment — operating in increasingly complex environments, MARSOC Commander Maj. Gen. Matthew Trollinger said during a panel at the Modern Day Marine conference. And panelists told a largely industry audience that they are looking for new technologies that reduce the physical and cognitive burden on operators while increasing their capabilities.

The names of three of the panelists were withheld due to their status as active MARSOC operators. They were referred to as critical skills operator “staff sergeant M”; special operations capability specialist “gunny A”; and communications specialist, “sergeant H”.

Gunny A said many of MARSOC’s current technologies are “one-trick ponies” that constrain mission options. “We’ll probably need help with commercial-off-the-shelf systems that can get around these so-called one-trick ponies that take up a lot of space in our deployment containers.”

Analysts and fusion specialists have grown used to training and getting certified for field operations by finding workarounds with current equipment, but “I don’t believe that should always be the answer,” he said.

“I feel like we can solve this with industry by creating some sort of desktop software applications, web-based applications, that [have] that data aggregation as well as other features,” he continued.

“Now looking at that in the lens of an intelligence professional, trying to be able to get all of these different applications to just talk to each other so we don’t have to have five different screens up, four different applications up on each screen, just so I can best fuse the all-source intelligence picture,” he said. “This would save a ton of time in day-to-day tasks, and it would be a lot more efficient in providing the commander the most relevant and useful information to make decisions.”

Staff sergeant M said the convention hall was full of weapons and systems designed to increase lethality — loitering munitions, more accurate GPS and hardened systems — that could help operators.

“All of those things are interesting to me, because something as simple as the GPS being knocked out — keeping a [small, unmanned aircraft system] out of the sky — keeps me from the [force protection] that I need to conduct a patrol and have an effect on an area,” he said.

Another need is “rapidly deployable communications equipment that enables blue force tracking,” he said. “So not only is it tracking individuals, we can do things like jump with it, dive with it — those areas where we look into the conflict space, and we’re dealing with people who are looking at the way we present ourselves in a spectrum. That will be one of the areas that I would say we need help. When we look at Southeast Asia and those regions, the ability to hide in the noise is the number one thing I think we need to attack.”

From a communications standpoint, smaller, simpler form factors and plug-and-play technology was high on the wish list, said sergeant H.

“In terms of training, we need to be able to do everything as efficiently as possible,” she said. She pointed to the rapid accessory integration device, or RAID, plate — a body-worn plate that combines various communications devices and controllers into a lighter form factor — as an example of new technology that could make “my life 10 times easier because I don’t have to fight with an operator with three radios in his pack and on his kit.

“I can say, ‘Hey, I got this one thing for you, and I can troubleshoot with you,’” she continued. “Not only do I need to be able to do my job, but they also have communicators who are also critical skills operators on the team who need to be able to use that gear. And they’re not going to be blessed with as much opportunity to be able to use that gear as us and be as proficient in it. So how can the gear be made easy enough for us to teach them on the fly so they can operate it if we’re not around?”

Trollinger said new technologies and devices need to “lessen the burden on the individual, because I’m all about making sure that people have what they need, or we can relieve them of something that they don’t need to have hanging over them or weighing them down.”

One overarching technology that could address a number of command’s needs is artificial intelligence, Col. Ian Fletcher, MARSOC’s assistant chief of staff for plans and resourcing, told reporters.

The first step is understanding where AI fits and how best to utilize it, which has been a challenge for the entire Defense Department, he said.

“We have to redefine it as AI as a decision learning or decision making or an orientation tool that is not an end-all-be-all right now,” he said.

“One of the things that I’ve learned with many of the hats that I wear … if you distill it down to observe, orient, decide and act, the observe and orient is really the fundamentals of what we’re trying to engage within the AI space,” he said.

“If you think about how the human mind makes decisions, we historically make decisions off of all five senses until we start moving away, and then it reduces very quickly down to three, down to two,” he said. “And sadly enough, down the last 20 years, a lot of our most significant decisions were made on one sense — strike TV — where you saw, you got a rapid orientation and you made a decision based on a characterization of that environment.”

The command is taking a step back and pulling physical maps back out to emphasize the need to get Marines on the same page, he said.

“Because while AI may help you basically accelerate observation and then accelerate a point of orientation, you still have to create a mental model; you still have to create a heuristic; you still have to create and visualize yourself.”

And that’s not something the force wants to replace, he added. “I think we want to get to the point where the data begins to be binned, but we’ve educated the force to use a new model of heuristics, a new model of the ability to interact with it, and then ask iterative questions.”

Fletcher emphasized that MARSOC is not developing any AI systems or capabilities independently but generating a requirement in line with the Special Operations Command and Marine Corps enterprises.

“What we’re doing is establishing a vision that allows us to leverage off of everybody else’s innovation and ensure that it’s converging together in that littoral contact space,” he said.

One place the command is studying is Ukraine, he said. The war is providing a “live learning lab where their AI space engines, and within the European architecture, is accelerating to the degree where it is very interesting to watch, because they’re getting to a point of data fusion and tipping and queuing that we have yet to be able to fully exploit within the DoD side,” he said.

Fletcher said he’s met with Ukrainian intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance teams and discussed how AI can help the process.

“As we’re working through how to do track warfare in nonpersistent ISR space, how do you leverage AI and AI engines to hold pieces of data over in time so you can generate enough awareness, enough understanding to turn that into an actionable point?” he said. “We got to explore a lot with Palantir’s Maven system, but also some of the homegrown Ukrainian systems like the Delta system out there.”

Given all the questions to be answered about what AI can and should do, MARSOC is taking a cautious approach to the technology.

“One of the challenges with AI, especially within defense acquisitions, [is] you begin to break into multiple layers of security,” he said. “So, there’s a cyber consideration there. There’s an operational integration; there’s a data integration.”

It’s not just data integration, he said, it’s data aggregation.

AI “is only as smart as the data that’s coming into it,” he said. “The usefulness of an AI tool is as useful as the machine learning that’s associated with it, and the body of knowledge and the amount of user interfaces that can educate the AI, whether or not its characterization of the environment is what it needs to be.”

Given the Defense Department needs AI in the classified space, there are limits to the user base and interfaces feeding into the machine learning, he said.

“I would compare and contrast that with some of the AI engines that are being used by commercial industries today, where you’re open into an unclassified space and you have countless users available that can integrate,” he continued.

Thus, MARSOC is “trying to navigate with industry how to properly do this within a cybersecurity-informed environment, within a policy-informed environment, within an environment where we’re mindful and protecting DoD and U.S. government data so we don’t jump fully into the ChatGPT world” where an AI could end up writing operational orders for the military, he said. ND

Topics: Emerging Technologies

nationaldefensemagazine.org · by Sean Carberry

10. The U.S. Can Learn from Ukraine's Theory of Victory

Excerpts:

In this way, Ukraine is ahead of most allied countries, having established a Ministry of Digital Innovation in 2019, which serendipitously, has been crucial to its liberalization, civil-military collaboration, and battlefield success to date.

Civic society has been essential to Ukraine’s intelligence collection, especially in the first months of Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion, by tapping into the national digital infrastructure to report Russian tactical dispositions, which enabled Ukraine’s earliest strategic victories.

Ukraine applied these lessons and deployed a homegrown battle management software known as Delta, which debuted in 2021. A year later, the software now aggregates data collected across Ukraine and the broader internet, for analysis and decisions down to the tactical level. Delta harnesses Ukraine’s culture of digital innovation, off-the-shelf technologies like Starlink, and institutionalizes Silicon Valley–style agility into nearly every layer of Ukrainian national security.

The U.S. Can Learn from Ukraine's Theory of Victory

thecipherbrief.com

September 29th, 2023 by Lucas Crumpton, |

Lucas Crumpton is Crumpton Global’s Chief of Staff, Director of Business Strategy and an expert on modern warfare. He is also a partner at Crumpton Ventures, focusing on investments in disruptive technologies at the nexus of national security and commercial enterprise.

View all articles by Lucas Crumpton

OPINION — Ukraine’s dogged defense against Russian aggression has enabled battlefield innovations that are transforming warfare as we know it—this much is obvious to most observers. Less well known, is Ukraine’s novel theory of victory: a smart and aggressive strategy of simultaneously winning a war and rejuvenating the economy and national infrastructure.

This evolution in thinking is about “resilience,” which focuses on prosperity in the present and future, as opposed to “reconstruction,” which focuses on restoration of the past.

Ukraine’s dual-pronged approach, if successful, is its fastest path to securing its borders and earning an enduring and prosperous peace.

Ukraine’s U.S. allies have not yet recognized today’s dynamic, blended, digital realities of society and conflict. The old thinking is perpetuated by ossified bureaucratic structures and norms unsuited for this new reality. Leaders who cling to a traditional, deeply bifurcated, sequenced concept of war and peace will be left behind in tomorrow’s asymmetrically lethal wars.

The nature of war has changed, and Washington must change with it.

In Ukraine, the U.S. must lead NATO to provide comprehensive air defense capabilities that not only provide a battlefield advantage but also protect all strategic Ukrainian infrastructure (not just in Kyiv). This must happen in concert with the development of new energy production and resilient grid networks.

Ukraine’s Energoatom power company is already working with Westinghouse to develop nationwide nuclear power, including 11 new nuclear plants and 2,000 safe micro-reactors that will revolutionize their energy industry.

And Ukraine’s KyivStar telecommunications giant has built resilience by adding generators to power 14,000 cell towers, independent of grid outages. With this version of an “iron dome,” Ukraine can serve as a model for air defense, resilient energy innovation, and energy sovereignty.

Read also The Ukraine Diaries: Ukraine Embodies the Values We Were Raised to Believe In by former senior CIA Officer Glenn Corn exclusively in The Cipher Brief

Washington also should support the rapid development of national communications and digital systems that both address the wartime necessities of intelligence, air defense, and cyber operations while fusing core civil services like healthcare, emergency response, education, and anti-corruption transparency.

In this way, Ukraine is ahead of most allied countries, having established a Ministry of Digital Innovation in 2019, which serendipitously, has been crucial to its liberalization, civil-military collaboration, and battlefield success to date.

Civic society has been essential to Ukraine’s intelligence collection, especially in the first months of Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion, by tapping into the national digital infrastructure to report Russian tactical dispositions, which enabled Ukraine’s earliest strategic victories.

Ukraine applied these lessons and deployed a homegrown battle management software known as Delta, which debuted in 2021. A year later, the software now aggregates data collected across Ukraine and the broader internet, for analysis and decisions down to the tactical level. Delta harnesses Ukraine’s culture of digital innovation, off-the-shelf technologies like Starlink, and institutionalizes Silicon Valley–style agility into nearly every layer of Ukrainian national security.

Read also The Future of Cyberwar is being Shaped in Ukraine by Cipher Brief Senior National Security Columnist Walter Pincus

These civil resilience efforts are modernizing Ukraine’s defense industry (MDI), to include curriculum development and training. Ukraine’s Ministry of Strategic Industries already has a proven track record, recruiting civilian private-sector technologists to enable the production of twice the amount of ammunition in all of 2022 thru May of 2023, alone. (For its part, the United States will not reach similar growth metrics for munitions production until 2028.)

Ukraine’s MDI, manifested as exported products and services, also generates national revenue while contributing to overall Western security and defense.

This approach demands that the Ukraine’s allies forsake the conventional, bifurcated notion of a war that is only followed by economic development. The West can leverage this new blended concept of building civilian resilience and winning at war, if only Washington recognizes its possibilities.

It’s an ambitious overhaul that requires the United States and its allies to rethink current aid amounts and distribution, which are currently parceled out in chunks across scattered domains.

Ukrainians have demonstrated, in ways that nobody in the West predicted, that their national integrity remains intact and that they can win the war and with continued Western support, they can also secure the peace.

Follow Cipher Brief CEO & Publisher Suzanne Kelly for a series of Behind-the-Scenes images from The Cipher Brief’s Trip in Ukraine on LinkedIn

The Cipher Brief is committed to publishing a range of perspectives on national security issues submitted by deeply experienced national security professionals.

Opinions expressed are those of the author and do not represent the views or opinions of The Cipher Brief.

11. The Clash of Xivilizations?

(As an aside I am seeing more and more analysis from young people, some very young as in this case, making it into various media outlets. This is a good thing. We need our young people engaged, thinking critically, and contributing to the debate.).

Excerpt:

Despite the above analysis, the state-owned Global Times maintains that the GCI will forge cooperative relationships with other countries, rebutting the American notion of an inevitable “clash of civilizations” between the West and the rest. However, there are no clearer signals of the CCP’s strategic intentions than the official statements and actions of its leaders. Their directives reveal that they will use subversive methods abroad to shape how countries evaluate the legitimacy of the party’s foreign policy and domestic rule. In deploying influence and information operations globally, the CCP is waging the very cultural warfare it purports to reject in order to best the West in global moral leadership.

The Clash of Xivilizations?

China's latest messaging tool, the Global Civilization Initiative, is set to take the CCP's information and influence apparatus worldwide.

The National Interest · by Andrew Weaver · October 2, 2023

In March 2023, Chinese president Xi Jinping launched the “Global Civilization Initiative” (GCI), his third such effort to build an international “community of common destiny”—the Chinese president’s euphemism for a world order in which China predominates. By garnering international endorsements for the principle of “respect[ing] and support[ing] the development paths independently chosen by different peoples,” the GCI seeks to undercut the moral primacy of liberal democracies and legitimize autocratic governance models like Xi’s regime.

Left unanswered by China watchers in the West, however, is how the Chinese party-state will implement this newest strategic initiative beyond the intercultural exchanges that Xi claimed would be the GCI’s primary focus. The following analysis of Chinese Communist Party speeches and state media about the implementation of the GCI reveals much on this score.

These Chinese Communist Party (CCP) statements indicate that while serving as a platform for some legitimate cultural exchanges, the Global Civilization Initiative will likely act as a benign front for expanding the CCP’s information and influence operations already working to control global public discourse on the party. Information operations will likely entail efforts to expand the global operations of state media companies and increase the export of CCP propaganda that celebrates the party’s governance model. Augmenting this global propaganda campaign will be CCP influence operations that recruit political and intellectual elites, primarily in the Global South, to promote policies within their home countries that align with China’s interests.

Information Operations

Recent statements by CCP officials reveal that the GCI will act as a foreign propaganda tool. Specifically, the initiative will advance Xi’s ongoing campaign to increase China’s global “discourse power” by exporting CCP propaganda—a media offensive designed to legitimize the party’s values among targeted audiences and preemptively stem the flow of subversive ideologies back into China. Consider the recent statements of Wang Huning, who serves as the Chairman of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference. This organization coordinates the party-state bureaucracy’s overseas influence and information operations. In May, he stated that officials should “accelerate the construction of Chinese discourse and narrative system, and deepen exchanges and mutual learning among civilizations” to “showcase the achievements of Chinese civilization.”

This statement echoes Xi’s directive delivered at the 20th National Party Congress to “tell China’s stories well” by creating a CCP-friendly global media ecosystem, one circumventing Western networks. It likewise dovetails with an existing policy of deploying Chinese culture to inspire favorable perceptions of the CCP. A state media analysis of Xi’s external propaganda policy encouraged officials to “make good use of excellent Chinese culture in external propaganda, explain Chinese civilization in foreign propaganda, to soften the attitude, change the viewpoints and transform the stance of the international audience.”

As such, this synchronized messaging in leadership directives indicates that the GCI will parallel, if not absorb, existing efforts to make global public opinion more supportive of Xi’s regime through external cultural propaganda campaigns. Accordingly, the GCI’s intercultural dialogues and other public diplomacy initiatives will likely amplify an image of China that celebrates the party’s autocratic governance system, crowding out more objective media narratives that would exhibit that system’s reliance on mass repression.

Still, in its infancy, the GCI has yet to deliver policy outcomes on the scale of the Belt and Road Initiative or even Xi’s prior Global Security and Global Development Initiatives. Nevertheless, this latest initiative has already strengthened China’s “discourse power” within the nations of the Global South. For instance, the CCP’s Propaganda Department organized the August 2023 BRICS High-Level Media Forum, where state media outlets from the organization’s five members pledged to cooperate on “enhanc[ing] the discourse power of BRICS countries” through media industry coordination. Such coordination between state media outlets would allow elites to spread their preferred narratives, especially those of the Russian and Chinese governments that already wage information warfare to further their geopolitical ambitions.

It is worth noting that the same BRICS summit also prohibited coverage by independent journalists, further underscoring the restrictions on press freedom resulting from governments following the CCP’s lead in enhancing their state “discourse systems.” Since the CCP primarily targets the developing world in its information operations, these efforts to expand China’s “discourse power” under the GCI will likely amplify the propaganda of ruling elites in the Global South while repressing independent journalists’ investigations into public affairs. As such, this summit illustrates the threat posed to free expression by Chinese information operations deployed under the guise of “mutual learning” between civilizations.

Without more concrete data on policy outcomes, examining official Chinese writings on the implementation of the GCI and information operations writ large may offer insights into the initiative’s future development as a propaganda tool. For example, the state-owned China Daily newspaper suggested that artificial intelligence and big data technologies should be used to expedite “cultural information” sharing across global media networks, indicating that the party will leverage emerging technologies to rapidly disseminate propaganda before Western media can spread more objective narratives. Such high-tech propagandizing would complement the party’s conventional tactics of establishing overseas state media outlets, acquiring majority equity stakes in independent foreign media organizations to control their content, and paying for inserts in mainstream Western newspapers to inject party narratives into democratic societies.

Though civilian wings of the Chinese party-state operate these culturally flavored information operations, they also dovetail with the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) “media warfare” initiative that broadcasts a peaceful and harmonious image of China to engender favorable perceptions of its military operations. As such, ample precedent exists in the history of Chinese information operations to contend that the GCI will amplify state propaganda across mainstream and emerging media platforms, particularly when China is engaged in provocative behavior that may undermine its preferred image of a peaceful rising power.

Believing that the GCI is a campaign for propagating Chinese culture would confuse the initiative’s means and ends. In reality, the GCI uses cultural propaganda to legitimize the CCP’s revisionist activities as it seeks to undermine Washington’s leadership in setting international norms of state behavior.

Influence Operations

While its information operations will make broad efforts at shaping public opinion, the CCP will likely use the GCI as a platform for conducting targeted influence operations and espionage against foreign governments. President Xi’s claim that the GCI would commit the CCP “to deepen[ing] interactions with political parties and other organizations to expand the convergence of ideas and interests” clarifies that the initiative expands the party’s foreign political influence. Yet the above assessment regarding more subversive activities is substantiated by the fact that the initiative was unveiled at the CCP’s High-Level Meeting with World Political Parties. The party’s International Liaison Department (ILD) coordinated this diplomatic event, which forges connections with foreign governments to collect intelligence on their internal politics and recruit assets for spying and influence operations. According to researchers at the Hoover Institution, the ILD uses this party diplomacy to befriend and recruit “up-and-coming foreign politicians” so that they promote pro-China policies once they attain higher office.

CCP leaders’ statements likewise suggest that these influence efforts will expand beyond parties to reach the whole intellectual ecosystem that informs policy debates in democratic societies. ILD

Director Liu Jianchao, for instance, wrote in a China Daily editorial that GCI would promote “cultural dialogue” through “political parties, parliaments, research institutions, schools, enterprises, and NGOs,” indicating that his organization would work to co-opt individuals across the breadth of civil society so that they promote pro-China policies among their home countries’ elites. One could argue that the ILD’s cultural exchanges with foreign elites may not occasion efforts to recruit intelligence assets, given the apolitical substance of such meetings. The history of Chinese overseas espionage tactics, however, would suggest otherwise. Indeed, Chinese intelligence operatives often recruit assets under the guise of promoting Chinese culture to evade suspicion and induce cooperation from the target, according to the U.S.–China Economic and Security Commission. Furthermore, the Ministry of State Security (MSS), China’s overseas intelligence collection agency, even operates a front organization called the “China International Cultural Exchange Center.” Cultural exchanges between corporations and universities, as ILD Chair Liu recommended, would also provide the MSS with opportunities to deploy non-official operatives, often private individuals acting by proxy, to recruit assets in the private sector and academia—a frequently employed tactic, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Accordingly, cultural exchanges may share the beauty of Chinese culture with foreign audiences. Yet, they also enable the Chinese security apparatus to increase the party’s influence within and insight into the domestic affairs of foreign countries.

If history is any guide, Chinese intelligence will likely conduct espionage under the auspices of the GCI. Additionally, GCI illuminates the future direction of the party’s influence operations deployed in the name of “intercivilizational collaboration.” For example, in his GCI inaugural speech before political parties from Latin America, Africa, Central Asia, and Southeast Asia, Xi promised “to share governance experience with political parties and organizations”—a reiteration of longstanding PRC policy to instruct foreign parties in establishing one-party dictatorships within their home countries. Described by scholars as “authoritarian learning,” this emboldening of autocratic elites in developing countries is likely to increase now that it has been enshrined as a core tenet of one of Xi’s global initiatives.

Outside of co-opting national politicians to advance pro-China narratives and policies in their home countries, CCP leadership statements reveal an intent to recruit state and local level officials for the same purpose. This intent is made evident by recent remarks delivered by the President of the Chinese People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries (CPAFFC)—a United Front organization that, according to the State Department, “directly and malignly influence[s] state and local leaders to promote the PRC’s global agenda.” Consistent with State’s characterization, President Lin Songtian claimed that the GCI would deploy city-to-city diplomacy and public diplomacy with the aim of “empathizing people, convincing people with reason, and conveying truth with words” to “enhance the international community’s awareness and understanding of our country’s development achievements, development path, political system, and values.”

That CPAFFC aims to flood local and state audiences with CCP propaganda is evident in this statement; left unsaid, however, is the fact that the organization uses this subnational diplomacy to recruit local officials to advocate for China-friendly policies that their national government may be unwilling to implement. CPAFCC also exploits the implicit threat of revoking bilateral investment deals between Chinese and foreign cities to pressure local governments into endorsing the CCP’s illegitimate territorial claims, as occurred when a sister-city agreement between a Chinese and an American city stipulated that the latter could not have any association with Taiwan for the partnership to go forward. Even when purportedly promoting Chinese culture, CPAFFC will likely create networks of subnational influence to move the targeted country’s domestic politics towards China’s interests.

Spreading “Xivilization”

Despite the above analysis, the state-owned Global Times maintains that the GCI will forge cooperative relationships with other countries, rebutting the American notion of an inevitable “clash of civilizations” between the West and the rest. However, there are no clearer signals of the CCP’s strategic intentions than the official statements and actions of its leaders. Their directives reveal that they will use subversive methods abroad to shape how countries evaluate the legitimacy of the party’s foreign policy and domestic rule. In deploying influence and information operations globally, the CCP is waging the very cultural warfare it purports to reject in order to best the West in global moral leadership.

Andrew Weaver is a sophomore at Columbia University studying Political Science and Chinese. He has worked with the U.S. government and think tanks on research projects pertaining to China’s foreign policy. The views expressed here are his own and do not reflect the opinions or beliefs of the organizations with which he is affiliated.

Image: Shutterstock.

The National Interest · by Andrew Weaver · October 2, 2023

12. Why Multilateralism Still Matters

Excerpts:

The United States is not alone in facing strong domestic pressures. Europe is struggling with the consequences of the war in Ukraine, and growing support for far right parties, none of which bodes well for following through on a commitment to the global South. The United Kingdom, fresh from a summer of strikes and expected to have the worst inflation in the G-7 this year, has largely abdicated its leadership role among developing countries by cutting its development budget and abolishing its Department for International Development. China, too, is struggling as it contends with deepening economic stagnation. India is continually beset by divisive internal politics and, though it has made progress in reducing poverty, it has not succeeded in creating a more inclusive politics or overcoming identity-based divisions. Brazil, after a polarized election and turbulent transition, has only recently emerged from a period of highly divisive leadership.

In the face of such domestic constraints in these countries, international cooperation is difficult and even more essential. Yet no single institution stands head and shoulders above all others. Multilateral institutions forged out of a desire to reject the West have shown little sign of being able to build a consensus or a set of priorities for the global South. The expansion of the BRICS, for example, lacks credibility as an alternative forum for leadership since its two most powerful members, India and China, hardly see eye to eye. The G-20’s New Delhi Leaders’ Declaration, with its focus on reformed multilateralism, is certainly ambitious, but whether these agreements can be implemented is less clear. And Brazil, the next host country, will need to build the momentum. The G-20 may be more important for enabling active and sustained dialogue than for delivering results.

It is also hard to imagine the G-7 as a serious contender for leadership of the global South. The forum’s tight knit and values-based cohesion is impressive, as is the effort to integrate a second tier of partners at its meetings. But the rest of the world has been excluded and is moving on. There may no longer be a single institution that can be a panacea. But in the absence of a viable alternative, a sustained effort to reform existing multilateral institutions will be necessary. This means updating membership and providing the financial resources that can enable institutions to deliver on their ambitions. These institutions must be supported by a cluster of smaller, agile institutions, which can move swiftly to resolve an increasingly complex and diverse set of problems. Ultimately, however, the commitment to building effective multilateralism will need to be forged at home.

Why Multilateralism Still Matters

The Right Way to Win Over the Global South

By Leslie Vinjamuri

October 2, 2023

Foreign Affairs · by Leslie Vinjamuri · October 2, 2023

In September 2022, when world leaders met in New York for the previous edition of the UN General Assembly, much of the week was dominated by Western officials’ efforts to win over the so-called swing states—countries including India and South Africa that were sitting on the fence about the war in Ukraine. But many of these countries were not content to be part of an unreformed United States–led Western order. They refused to put their full support behind Kyiv, or even to support a resolution condemning Russia for its violation of Ukraine’s territorial integrity. Instead, they favored an agenda that balanced their own national interests and principles.

A year later, the ambition was largely the same—but the script had changed. At the 2023 UN General Assembly, Western officials once again made appeals to the global South’s leading countries. This time, though, these officials calculated that the way to win these countries’ support and backing on Ukraine was to champion new approaches to multilateralism and development partnerships. Part of this campaign has been driven by a heightened awareness of these states’ economic travails, but Washington’s growing rivalry with Beijing, which is itself seeking to lead the global South, is also a driving force. A tug of war to lead the global South has played out in other fora, including the recent G-20, ASEAN, and BRICS meetings.

The United States and China are not alone in trying to wrangle this large and important group of countries. Some of the major swing states themselves, especially India and Brazil, are seeking to lead this bloc. Kenya is also stepping forward, at least to lead in Africa, and made its own appeals at this year’s UN General Assembly, wooing the United States with an offer to send peacekeepers to Haiti, charming the Europeans with an Africa climate summit, and keeping the door open to both China and Russia. Leadership of the global South, and leadership by the global South, has come to dominate international summit diplomacy.

But all these contenders face domestic political realities that undercut their prospects of winning over developing countries. Populist politics and isolationist sentiments constrain many Western leaders. Slow growth, including in China, only exacerbates these constraints. Meanwhile, attempts by leading countries in the global South to create new international arrangements of their own have had limited impact and would-be leaders in Brasilia and New Delhi face their own domestic pressures.

No single leader from the global South is likely to emerge at present. But giving its major members a seat at the top table, in a more inclusive multilateral arrangement, remains more urgent than ever.

PLAYING CATCH-UP

China’s drive to provide infrastructure to many developing countries has helped weaken the West’s influence over the global South. For much of the past decade, Western nations watched as China launched its $1 trillion Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), and interest turned to concern as Beijing signed infrastructure agreements with almost 150 countries. In response, Western powers felt compelled to act, but they have moved slowly to formulate alternative sources of infrastructure financing that would promote liberal values.

In 2019, Australia, Japan, and the United States launched the Blue Dot Network, to drive investment toward high-quality infrastructure. Washington wanted to take the plan to the 2020 G-7 but the summit was canceled due to the pandemic, and progress stalled. The perceived lack of Western leadership was then compounded by the failure to lead on vaccine provision in developing countries and to develop an adequate response to the escalating need for debt relief.

U.S. President Joe Biden’s effort to restore the United States’ international image after coming to office in 2021 also included a renewed commitment to improve the functioning of the G-7. At the 2021 summit in Cornwall, the G-7 launched the Build Back Better World (B3W) initiative. B3W was designed to address an estimated $40 trillion shortfall in global infrastructure by using government funds to mobilize private capital. The initiative was intended to be global in scope, with a focus on low- and middle-income countries. Unlike China’s more narrow focus on ports, railways, and roads, B3W broadened the definition of infrastructure to include climate, health and health security, digital technology, and gender equity and equality.

A year later, following the invasion of Ukraine and the downsizing of Biden’s Build Back Better plan at home, the G-7 met in Germany and rebranded B3W as the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment (PGII). The ambition remained to unlock public and private capital for investments in infrastructure with a focus on energy, digital, health, and climate that aligned with Western standards. The United States intends to invest $200 billion alongside an overall G-7 target of $600 billion for infrastructure investment in the global South.

TURNING ON THE TAPS

Since its launch, the PGII has made slow progress, just as Washington’s ambition to broaden and deepen its appeal to the global South has grown. The United States has so far mobilized only $30 billion of its intended share of $200 billion.

Responding to countries in the global South’s demands to reform the structures of multilateral institutions established in the aftermath of World War II, the U.S. government has embraced calls to expand the UN Security Council and make it more accountable to the General Assembly. Last year, President Biden told the UN General Assembly that the United States would support the effort to expand the number of permanent and nonpermanent seats on the Security Council. The Biden administration then supported a successful G-20 decision in September to grant the African Union a seat at the table. And Washington is now calling on Congress to increase financing for the World Bank by $25 billion.

The Biden administration is also forging regional partnerships with countries from the global South. On the margins of this year’s UN General Assembly, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken presided over an event that launched a new Partnership for Atlantic Cooperation. This new forum brings together 32 countries—all of which, it was announced, “share a commitment to a peaceful, prosperous, open, and cooperative Atlantic region”—and focuses on boosting cooperation in science, technology, environmental protection, and development. The administration is also working across the Indo-Pacific to build agile and flexible partnerships, including the Quad, or Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, with Australia, India, and Japan.

But the United States is not the only country stepping up. In December 2021, the European Union launched the Global Gateway, its own bid for leadership and influence among developing countries. Under this initiative, the European Commission draws on the existing development funds of its member states to mobilize public and private investments of approximately $315 billion in infrastructure by 2027, in a bid to enhance connections with the global South. The EU aims to build partnerships rather than the dependency that the BRI has created. But the European bid, though impressive, is on a smaller scale than China’s, and all the usual EU rules and standards apply, which creates a far higher bar for recipient countries to jump over.

In the Pacific, in a bid to manage China’s assertiveness, Japan used its leadership of the G-7 to court potential partners at the group’s meeting in Hiroshima in May. Leaders of a number of countries that are not members of the G-7—Australia, Comoros, the Cook Islands, Brazil, India, Indonesia, South Korea, and Vietnam—were nonetheless invited to attend.

OUT OF THE CROWD

The West’s efforts may prove to be too little and too late to win over the global South. Several of these countries are already seeking their own leadership role. China, with its BRI program, stands out. As the world’s largest official creditor, and the largest trade partner to Africa and South America, it has already made the greatest inroads, but others are also in contention, using global summits to promote their own ambitions. In August, the BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) agreed to invite six new members: Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. It was an attempt, by China in particular, to form a rival to the G-7.

Beyond such international summits, a few countries are attempting to assert their own leadership hopes. At this year’s UN General Assembly, for example, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva launched his bid to lead the developing world by giving the global South a greater stake in international governance and stressing Brazil’s role as a climate leader. He sought to position his country as a champion of social inclusion and pointedly refused to take the side of China or the United States.

This year, though, India has been the standout, and has pursued an increasingly assertive role on the international stage. Following mounting pressure on New Delhi to choose a side in the war in Ukraine, India instead chose to play the field and build partnerships with multiple major powers and developing countries. It spent this year deepening its strategic relationship with the United States, and confirming its central role in the Quad and the BRICS.

But it is India’s yearlong leadership of the G-20 that has been its central organizing device, at home and abroad. New Delhi has used the G-20 to burnish its credentials as a leader of developing countries and a partner to major powers. The G-20 was staged as a road show consisting of hundreds of events that took place over the course of the year, and signage was spread out across the whole country. The goals of the G-20 were designed to be people-centric and inclusive, in areas including digital public infrastructure and investment in gender equality. The New Delhi Leader’s Declaration called for major reforms to reshape the existing multilateral order—especially to institutions including the World Bank and IMF. The declaration is ambitious, and it outlined bold plans to connect India to Greece and continental Europe via a rail and shipping route through the Middle East.

ALL POLITICS IS LOCAL

The sheer number of global appeals aimed at the global South is stunning. But these appeals have come late, and the gap between ambition and delivery is large. Domestic politics in the West are curbing instincts to globalism, as is summit fatigue. The limits of Western ambitions to lead were on particularly prominent display at this year’s UN General Assembly, where the leaders of France and the United Kingdom did not turn up. Nor did China and Russia’s. Biden was the sole leader of a Security Council state present. The coterie of cabinet ministers and support staff did little to cover up the glaring absence of the leaders of the veto-wielding powers.

In his speech at the General Assembly, Biden expressed his ambition to build new partnerships capable of tackling key global challenges. But his ability to forge a clear link between his foreign policy for the middle class and U.S. support for multilateralism remains tenuous. Economic forces, including the recent autoworkers’ strike, and political pressures, which may lead to a U.S. government shutdown, threaten his ability to lead internationally. Pushback from Republicans in Congress may stymie the president’s effort to secure more support for Ukraine. Moreover, Biden’s desire to maintain diplomatic contacts and cooperate with Beijing to address climate change make him susceptible to attacks for being soft on China. Europe and much of the rest of the world are growing increasingly nervous that former U.S. President Donald Trump could win the 2024 U.S. presidential election and upend the period of multilateralism that has been strengthened under Biden. The prospect of the United States delivering on an ambitious agenda for the global South seems remote in this context.

The global appeals aimed at the global South have come late, and the gap between ambition and delivery is large.

The United States is not alone in facing strong domestic pressures. Europe is struggling with the consequences of the war in Ukraine, and growing support for far right parties, none of which bodes well for following through on a commitment to the global South. The United Kingdom, fresh from a summer of strikes and expected to have the worst inflation in the G-7 this year, has largely abdicated its leadership role among developing countries by cutting its development budget and abolishing its Department for International Development. China, too, is struggling as it contends with deepening economic stagnation. India is continually beset by divisive internal politics and, though it has made progress in reducing poverty, it has not succeeded in creating a more inclusive politics or overcoming identity-based divisions. Brazil, after a polarized election and turbulent transition, has only recently emerged from a period of highly divisive leadership.

In the face of such domestic constraints in these countries, international cooperation is difficult and even more essential. Yet no single institution stands head and shoulders above all others. Multilateral institutions forged out of a desire to reject the West have shown little sign of being able to build a consensus or a set of priorities for the global South. The expansion of the BRICS, for example, lacks credibility as an alternative forum for leadership since its two most powerful members, India and China, hardly see eye to eye. The G-20’s New Delhi Leaders’ Declaration, with its focus on reformed multilateralism, is certainly ambitious, but whether these agreements can be implemented is less clear. And Brazil, the next host country, will need to build the momentum. The G-20 may be more important for enabling active and sustained dialogue than for delivering results.

It is also hard to imagine the G-7 as a serious contender for leadership of the global South. The forum’s tight knit and values-based cohesion is impressive, as is the effort to integrate a second tier of partners at its meetings. But the rest of the world has been excluded and is moving on. There may no longer be a single institution that can be a panacea. But in the absence of a viable alternative, a sustained effort to reform existing multilateral institutions will be necessary. This means updating membership and providing the financial resources that can enable institutions to deliver on their ambitions. These institutions must be supported by a cluster of smaller, agile institutions, which can move swiftly to resolve an increasingly complex and diverse set of problems. Ultimately, however, the commitment to building effective multilateralism will need to be forged at home.

• LESLIE VINJAMURI is Director of the U.S. and the Americas Program at Chatham House and Professor of International Relations at SOAS University of London.

Foreign Affairs · by Leslie Vinjamuri · October 2, 2023

13. Opinion This is what the U.S. is getting by aiding Ukraine by Max Boot

Excerpts:

The Russian armed forces have been devastated, thereby reducing the risk to front-line NATO states such as Poland and the Baltic republics that the United States is treaty-bound to protect. And all of that has been accomplished without having to put a single U.S. soldier at risk on the front lines.

That’s an incredible investment, especially compared with U.S. involvement in other recent wars. In Afghanistan and Iraq, both launched under a Republican administration, almost 7,000 U.S. troops were killed and more than 50,000 were wounded while Washington spent more than $8 trillion — only to see Afghanistan fall to the Taliban and Iraq come under Iranian influence.

Opinion  This is what the U.S. is getting by aiding Ukraine

Columnist

October 2, 2023 at 7:15 a.m. EDT

The Washington Post · by Max Boot · October 2, 2023

The good news is that Congress, at the last minute, averted a government shutdown, at least for now. The bad news is that billions of dollars of funding for Ukraine were stripped from the continuing resolution as a sop to House Republicans who want to cut off the embattled democracy altogether.

Aid to Ukraine still has the support of roughly two-thirds of both houses — something you can’t say about many other issues — but a dangerous milestone was reached last week when more House Republicans voted against Ukraine aid (117) than voted for it (101). That reflects a broader turn in Republican opinion, with only 39 percent of Republicans saying in a recent CBS News-YouGov poll that the United States should send weapons to Ukraine and 61 percent saying it shouldn’t.

To do the right thing for Ukraine, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) will now have to go against a growing portion of the Republican base. It is, nevertheless, imperative that he show a modicum of backbone and bring a Ukraine funding bill to the floor immediately. It is not only the right thing to do morally — we have an obligation to support a fellow democracy fending off an unprovoked invasion — but it also is the right thing to do strategically. In fact, it is hard to think of any U.S. foreign policy initiative since the end of the Cold War that has been more successful or more important than U.S. aid to Ukraine.

Yes, in absolute terms, Washington has given a lot of money to Ukraine: $76.8 billion in total assistance, including $46.6 billion in military aid. But that’s a tiny portion — just 0.65 percent — of the total federal spending in the past two years of $11.8 trillion.in the past two years. With U.S. and other Western aid, Ukraine has been able to stop the Russian onslaught and begin to roll it back.

In the process, Russia has lost an estimated 120,000 soldiers and 170,000 to 180,000 have been injured. Russia has also lost an estimated 2,329 tanks, 2,817 infantry fighting vehicles, 2,868 trucks and jeeps, 354 armored personnel carriers, 538 self-propelled artillery vehicles, 310 towed artillery pieces, 92 fixed-wing aircraft and 106 helicopters.

The Russian armed forces have been devastated, thereby reducing the risk to front-line NATO states such as Poland and the Baltic republics that the United States is treaty-bound to protect. And all of that has been accomplished without having to put a single U.S. soldier at risk on the front lines.

That’s an incredible investment, especially compared with U.S. involvement in other recent wars. In Afghanistan and Iraq, both launched under a Republican administration, almost 7,000 U.S. troops were killed and more than 50,000 were wounded while Washington spent more than $8 trillion — only to see Afghanistan fall to the Taliban and Iraq come under Iranian influence.

Republicans who claim to worry so much about corruption in Ukraine, even though there is no evidence that any U.S. aid has been misused, seldom had anything to say about the truly pervasive corruption in Afghanistan and Iraq, which siphoned off billions in U.S. taxpayer dollars. A forensic accountant who audited U.S. spending in Afghanistan from 2010 to 2012 found that about 40 percent of $106 billion in Defense Department contracts “ended up in the pockets of insurgents, criminal syndicates or corrupt Afghan officials.” Yet Republicans never proposed to end funding for that war.

The war in Ukraine also stacks up impressively compared with other proxy wars that Republicans, under the Reagan administration, did so much to support — from Afghanistan to Nicaragua to Mozambique. In Ukraine, we don’t have to worry about our weapons going to anti-American religious fundamentalists such as the Haqqani network. We are funding a free people fighting to preserve a liberal democracy that will be a stalwart member of the Western community for years to come.

Republicans often complain that the United States is doing the heavy lifting and our European allies aren’t doing their fair share. That’s not true in the case of Ukraine. This summer, the Kiel Institute for the World Economy reported that “Europe has clearly overtaken the United States in promised aid to Ukraine, with total European commitments now being twice as large.” Yet, despite the growing European assistance, Ukraine still relies on U.S. support; even combined, Europe and the United States can barely keep up with Ukraine’s need for artillery ammunition and other munitions as it wages an industrialized war of attrition.

By funding Ukraine, we are strengthening transatlantic ties and keeping faith with our closest allies. If we were to cut off Ukraine, that would be an unspeakable betrayal not only of the people of Ukraine but also of all of Europe. Stopping Russian aggression is an existential issue for the entire continent. Cutting off Ukraine would mean that the United States is turning its back on its post-1945 security commitment to Europe — a commitment that has underpinned the longest period without a major-power conflict since the emergence of the modern state system in the 17th century.

Supporting Ukraine is also needed to deter Chinese aggression. Some on the right claim that the war in Ukraine is a distraction from the Pacific, but that’s not how the Taiwanese see it. Taiwan’s representative in Washington noted this year that supporting Ukraine — as Taiwan is doing with humanitarian assistance — “will help to deter any consideration or miscalculation that an invasion can be conducted unpunished.”

Many Republicans understand that. “It’s certainly not the time to go wobbly,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said recently. But the MAGA wing of the party, led by former president Donald Trump, has turned against the war because of its isolationism and soft spot for Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, a war criminal whom some on the right ludicrously see as a champion of Christian values.

Ironically, many on the right claim to want a negotiated solution to the conflict while doing everything possible to ensure that Putin has no incentive to negotiate seriously. The more Republicans do to endanger aid to Ukraine, the more likely Putin is to assume he can outlast the West and keep fighting.

Once upon a time, Republicans understood the need to resist the “evil empire.” As a former Republican, it sickens me to see so many Republicans so eager to do Moscow’s bidding. But, mercifully, the vast majority of members of Congress — including many Republicans — still staunchly support Ukraine. McCarthy cannot let the MAGA caucus block the best investment the United States can make in its own security.

The Washington Post · by Max Boot · October 2, 2023

14. Beijing’s House of the Dragon

Conclusion:

Policymakers, analysts, military commanders, and the private sector now, more than ever, should look to understand the CCP’s driving ideology and how it interprets its own, and others, history. Failure to do this will leave us continually surprised about what comes next in the CCP’s House of the Dragon.

Beijing’s House of the Dragon

By William O’Hara

October 02, 2023

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2023/10/02/beijings_house_of_the_dragon_983187.html

Why Xi’s Actions Show This is Unlike Moscow’s Game of Thrones

The authoritarian regimes of China and Russia read like the fantastical universe of George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Fire and Ice-made famous by HBO’s Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon. One is trapped in the musings of attempting to cobble together its former greatness in Russia’s decision to invade Ukraine, assassinations at 30,000 feet, and jockeying competing alliances in a Game of Thrones style fashion. While the other, China, is mired in internal political strife, corruption, extramarital affairs, and seeming concern that their desired greatness is fading from reach-like the setting of House of the Dragon. While Russia’s Game of Thrones involves warring factions jockeying for loyalty to the throne, China’s House of the Dragon is about maintaining dominance, legitimacy, and power through violence, scheming, and control of power. But what does it all mean?

The latest episode of Moscow’s Game of Thrones ended spectacularly with the plane “crash” of former Putin confidant turned rebel, Yevgeny Prigozhin. Less spectacular publicly, yet still dangerously fascinating to watch, is the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) House of the Dragon’s removal of senior Chinese military and civilian officials by General Secretary Xi Jinping. While Vice News asked the question earlier this year who would win Moscow’s Game of Thrones, how do we account for the same questions for Beijing’s House of the Dragon?

Xi’s actions are not new. They go back well over a decade when his anti-corruption drive purged CCP ranks of corrupt officials- who also just happened to be Xi’s political enemies. This summer, those purges have continued with Xi implementing sweeping changes at the highest across all elements of China’s leadership structure. Xi removed first the leaders of the PLA Rocket Force for alleged corruption, he then removed China’s Foreign Minister Qin Gang, who according to the Wall Street Journal was removed due to an extramarital affair. Finally, Xi removed China’s Minister of National Defense and standing member of the PLA’s powerful Central Military Commission, General Li Shangfu. While the latter’s position is not equivalent and lacks the same power and authority as the U.S. Secretary of Defense, these removals and arrests should not be underplayed. Remember, this is not a nation-state army like the U.S. or even Russia. China’s military and security apparatus operate at the behest of the CCP, and specifically Xi. This is unlike the dynamic and less controlled Russian Game of Thrones.

In hindsight, Prigozhin’s actions were not a surprise because he had long telegraphed his displeasure publicly with Russia’s war effort, but his death was done in cold Russian fashion. Let’s call it Putin’s own “Red Wedding Revenge.” However, Western analysts and the press seemed caught off guard by Xi’s firings and removals. Like the first season of House of the Dragon with considerable time gaps between episodes, the CCP’s internal affairs and Xi’s firings play out over the years. They are anything but abrupt. Like Martin’s universe, these volatile events are inherently linked—if only, by the close chronology of their occurrence—and deserve a closer look at their underlying issues. Specifically, how does CCP ensure China does not become its own Game of Thrones. There is historical precedence after all from the Warring States period. CCP thinking and historical interpretation have evolved from historically blaming complexity, personality, and economic stagnation, to now implicating ideological decay as the decisive factor of the Soviet Union’s collapse.

There once was a saying in Mao’s 1950s China: “Russia-China’s Tomorrow.” For decades, both Beijing and Moscow have pursued regime security strategies that radically differ and no longer prove this aphorism to be true. Take Putin’s Russia for example. The atmosphere that enabled Putin’s rise and power structure over the past 20-plus years has been one of corruption, patronage, fear, and politically motivated killings. As recently written in the New Yorker, “more than anyone else in Russia, Prigozhin had used the war in Ukraine to raise his profile.” While Prigozhin’s rise is exceptional even in the Russian system, he exploited and benefitted from intricacies in the crony Russian system that confers patronage to those who are complicit in Putin’s criminal exercises of power. Prigozhin was a singular figure in Russia’s international atrocities in Syria, Africa, and now, Ukraine – and in Ukraine, he served another unique purpose for a time: one of an escape valve, where he could air grievances about Russia’s performance in the Russia-Ukraine war while insulating Putin from wider public backlash. The Game of Thrones is indeed complicated and messy to watch in Russia, but the show illuminates fissures in the Russian system and gives context to contrast China’s own House of the Dragon. Put simply, the CCP (and Xi) have spent decades understanding Russia’s circumstances and insulating itself from Russia’s ills.

The CCP are astute observers of Russia’s contemporary struggles and the lessons of the Soviet Union’s collapse, and their thinking continues to evolve and inform its own strategy to avoid repeating the same mistakes. Several recent papers have reflected this dynamic in CCP thought, including extensive translations of the newly revised 2021 history translated earlier this year is completely absent any diagnosis of the structural issues that are well documented in the USSR’s collapse. Xi puts corruption, ideological decay, and failure to adhere to Party standards as reasons for the USSR’s collapse. Understanding how CCP political thought is evolving, and how the CCP is recasting key historical events, are critical for clearer insights that put into context two key purges Xi has undertaken: the first purge of his political opponents a decade ago upon taking power, where he jailed for life his primary political opponent, Bo Xilai, former a Vice-Chairman of the PLA’s Central Military Commission (CMC), only surpassed by removing a current member of the CMC.

The inference from Xi’s contemporary speeches is that Beijing increasingly saw corruption and ideological impurity as accelerants for a regime’s demise. Xi’s comments in 2012 elucidate this fact. At the time, he remarked: “Why was the Soviet Union dissolved? Why did the CPSU [Communist Party of the Soviet Union] collapse?” One important reason was the struggle in the ideological field. Historical nihilism rejected Soviet Union history, CPSU history, Lenin, and Stalin; it messed up the thinking. As a result, party branches perished; the party could not even control the military. Therefore, a big party like the CPSU dissipated; a big socialist power like the Soviet Union collapsed. This is a vital historical lesson.” Xi’s purges and litany of policies requiring greater adherence to party ideology show his determination to prevent the past from repeating and becoming a Russian Game of Thrones.

So, what do we need to understand? Expertise and insight into today’s increasingly ideological and nationalistic CCP are critical for forecasting conditions that could result in similar leadership volatility. As previously discussed, history, Xi’s words, and actions are key indicators to look at. However, be wary of anyone who predicts exactly what comes next.

While understanding Xi Jinping’s decision-making is inarguably important, trying to discern the place and timing of every decision is an extremely arduous task. No one’s crystal ball will be able to predict exactly where and when future firings might happen. As the CIA wrote for the freshly minted President Ford in August 1974 in the waning years of Mao’s disastrous Cultural Revolution, “Chinese Communist ideology seems certain to continue to play a critical role in shaping China's programs of political, economic, and social development.”

Policymakers, analysts, military commanders, and the private sector now, more than ever, should look to understand the CCP’s driving ideology and how it interprets its own, and others, history. Failure to do this will leave us continually surprised about what comes next in the CCP’s House of the Dragon.

William O’Hara is a career Department of Defense and Intelligence Community employee. He is currently the senior China planner and strategist at U.S. Special Operations Command. The views expressed here do not represent those of U.S. Special Operations Command, U.S. Department of Defense, or the U.S. government.

15. Putin’s 5 catastrophic miscalculations

Sounds like a "simple" failure of know yourself and know your enemy.

The five:

First, Putin has, over time, become obsessed with initiating and leading a global campaign against the West, the way the communist regime of the USSR did.

...

Second, Russia failed to recognize a recent hardening of Western attitudes.

...

Third, Russia’s plans for a rapid, overwhelming takeover of Ukraine betrayed a profound misunderstanding of the mood of Ukrainians themselves.

...

Fourth, Putin did not have an accurate understanding of the true state of his army. 

...

Finally, Putin did not have a grasp of the true state of the Russian economy. 

Conclusion:

For all that, Russian collapse is not inevitable. History teaches us that every successive Russian leader ends up adopting policies that are the reverse of his predecessor’s. Thus, while Vladimir Putin may have put the country on the road to ruin, his successor may right the Russian ship of state once Putin is out of the picture. That would mean a brighter future for Russia — and for everyone else.

Putin’s 5 catastrophic miscalculations

BY EVGENY SAVOSTIANOV, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR - 10/02/23 7:00 AM ET

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/4229872-putin-made-five-catastrophic-miscalculations/

What could Vladimir Putin have been thinking?

Since the start of the Ukraine war more than 18 months ago, many have wondered why Russia launched a unilateral war of aggression against its western neighbor — and why, despite grievous battlefield losses and major strategic miscalculations in the months since, the Kremlin continues to persist in this effort.

The answer can be found in a series of profound miscalculations that have been made by the Kremlin in recent years.

First, Putin has, over time, become obsessed with initiating and leading a global campaign against the West, the way the communist regime of the USSR did. His attempts to simply coopt democratic institutions have proven incompatible with his desire for lifelong rule, despite the pliability of many European leaders.

So the Russian president and his followers have persuaded themselves that a civilizational war between Russia and the West is both necessary and inescapable. In their eyes, the current struggle for Ukraine — once the seat of the Russian state — represents the opening salvo in such an effort.

That project, however, has failed.

While the Kremlin hoped in theory to rally a broad anti-Western front in support of its efforts, it has had tremendous practical difficulty in doing so. As a result, it has been forced to rely on assistance from a handful of rogue states such as Syria, Iran and North Korea to continue to fuel its war effort.

Second, Russia failed to recognize a recent hardening of Western attitudes. For years, Moscow had successfully wielded its “energy weapon” and nuclear blackmail to intimidate countries in the West. But even before the Ukraine war, European attitudes had begun to change as more and more policymakers grasped that the Kremlin was insatiable. They realized that it would no longer do to succumb to Russian intimidation.

Since February 2022, Ukraine’s heroic, steadfast resistance to Russian aggression and the massive difficulties experienced by the Russian military have only helped to reinforce for Western leaders that they must not retreat from the Kremlin.

Third, Russia’s plans for a rapid, overwhelming takeover of Ukraine betrayed a profound misunderstanding of the mood of Ukrainians themselves. In the run-up to the conflict, Russia’s president had managed to convince himself that, due to his government’s long-running efforts to subvert their society, Ukrainians writ large saw themselves not as an independent nation but as “Malorossy,” southern Russians, who needed to be reconnected to the Fatherland.

In so doing, Putin repeated the mistake made by the generals of the White movement of the Russian Revolutionary era. He assumed that his soldiers would be met with flowers instead of bullets. Russia’s forces were thus woefully unprepared for the ferocity and extent of Ukraine’s resistance.

Fourth, Putin did not have an accurate understanding of the true state of his army. After years of propaganda, showy parades and rosy pronouncements by his generals, Russia’s president was misled into believing that his country wielded a first-rate military, capable of waging and winning a continental conflict. The actual performance of the Russian military on the Ukrainian battlefield has showcased something very different, both to the Russians and to the rest of the world.

Finally, Putin did not have a grasp of the true state of the Russian economy. Having long relied on commerce with a compliant Europe, Moscow was unprepared for the abrupt, extensive economic isolation that has resulted from its war on Ukraine. Even now, Russian officials publicly extol the resilience of Russia’s economic sector and minimize the effect of Western fiscal and technological pressure. But their bluster masks a more sober reality: Western sanctions are only now beginning to bite, but they have already affected the Russian economy profoundly and will continue to do so.

All that leaves Russia with precious few options. Having profoundly alienated the West, the country now faces a future of profound isolation — or even of subservience to China. Despite the “no limits” partnership between Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping. The Chinese see Russia as a country in big trouble, or even potentially as a vassal.

Already, we are seeing the practical consequences of this uneven partnership, as Beijing supplants Moscow as the dominant power in Russia’s traditional sphere of influence of Central Asia and the Caucasus and creates new pathways to Europe there, bypassing Russia. This trend is liable to accelerate as the effects of Putin’s disastrous miscalculations become more and more pronounced.

For all that, Russian collapse is not inevitable. History teaches us that every successive Russian leader ends up adopting policies that are the reverse of his predecessor’s. Thus, while Vladimir Putin may have put the country on the road to ruin, his successor may right the Russian ship of state once Putin is out of the picture. That would mean a brighter future for Russia — and for everyone else.

Evgeny Savostianov was head of the Moscow KGB from 1990-1992. 

16.​ U-2 Spy Plane Just Keeps Getting Better and Better

And it flies routinely in Korea I think.

Excerpt:

The U-2 Dragon Lady Will Retire Soon

Over the years, different upgrades have been incorporated in the U-2 to help the platform retain an edge over competitors. In 2020, the Air Force’s entire U-2 fleet was installed with electro-optical reconnaissance system sensors. Although the U-2 is currently being fitted with advanced capabilities, the platform is set to retire in 2026. However, the Dragon Lady will continue to be used to test out new technology that can be implemented on other platforms.

U-2 Spy Plane Just Keeps Getting Better and Better

More recently, the U-2 deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq. It has been additionally used for a variety of purposes including scientific research, communications, and satellite calibration. 

19fortyfive.com · by Maya Carlin · September 30, 2023

Lockheed Martin’s U-2 Dragon Lady this week made its first flight with an updated avionics system. According to the manufacturer, the Avionics Tech Refresh (ATR) fitted onto the airframe will enhance the U-2’s capabilities.

Specifically, a new mission computer with an open-mission systems hardware and navigation software updates will enable the aircraft to communicate with platforms and networks at “disparate security levels.”

Introducing the Dragon Lady

Aviation buffs and industry analysts highly respect the U-2. It has been one of the country’s best secret aerial reconnaissance platforms for more than half a century.

After World War II, U.S. officials wanted advanced capabilities to better spy on their Soviet counterparts. The idea was to avoid a future surprise attack similar to Pearl Harbor. At the time, the U.S. relied on photographs taken of the USSR during the war, making the need for more current intelligence a top priority. The Beacon Hill Report, which was commissioned by the Air Force, determined that a plane able to take photographs of the Soviet Union would be the most efficient spy craft. The service solicited design plans from aircraft companies for a platform that could fly at 70,000 feet over a target with roughly 1,700 miles of operational radius.

Ultimately, Lockheed’s design was selected, and the U-2 “Dragon Lady” was born in the 1950s. The airframe flew in operations over the USSR during the Cold War. It also flew over China, Vietnam and Cuba. One U-2 piloted by Gary Powers was notoriously shot down over the Soviet Union in 1960 by a surface-to-air missile. Despite this incident, the platform continued to fly in service of the Central Intelligence Agency.

More recently, the U-2 deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq. It has been additionally used for a variety of purposes including scientific research, communications, and satellite calibration.

Specs and Capabilities

A lightweight, fuel efficient General Electric F118-101 engine powers the U-2, which means it does not have to refuel, even over long distances. As detailed by Military.com, “The U-2S Block 10 electrical system upgrade replaced legacy wiring with advanced fiber-optic technology and lowered the overall electronic noise signature to provide a quieter platform for the newest generation of sensors. The aircraft has the following sensor packages: electro-optical infrared camera, optical bar camera, advanced synthetic aperture radar, signals intelligence, and network-centric communication.”

The U-2 Dragon Lady Will Retire Soon

Over the years, different upgrades have been incorporated in the U-2 to help the platform retain an edge over competitors. In 2020, the Air Force’s entire U-2 fleet was installed with electro-optical reconnaissance system sensors. Although the U-2 is currently being fitted with advanced capabilities, the platform is set to retire in 2026. However, the Dragon Lady will continue to be used to test out new technology that can be implemented on other platforms.

Maya Carlin, a Senior Editor for 19FortyFive, is an analyst with the Center for Security Policy and a former Anna Sobol Levy Fellow at IDC Herzliya in Israel. She has by-lines in many publications, including The National Interest, Jerusalem Post, and Times of Israel. You can follow her on Twitter: @MayaCarlin.

From the Vault

‘Vacuum Bombs Destroyed’: Ukraine Footage Shows Putin’s Thermobaric Rockets Destroyed

BOOM! Ukraine Video Shows Precision Strike on Russian Air-Defense System

19fortyfive.com · by Maya Carlin · September 30, 2023

​17. Trying to Turn Ukraine Into 'Neutral' Finland or Austria Would Be a Disaster

Trying to Turn Ukraine Into 'Neutral' Finland or Austria Would Be a Disaster

19fortyfive.com · by Robert Farley · October 1, 2023

Can we turn Ukraine into Austria? Or perhaps Finland?

Along with a host of others, former Greek Minister of Finance Yannis Varoufakis has argued that the foundation for peace between Russia and Ukraine lies in the neutralization of the latter. And many in Europe and North America might prefer an outcome that soothes the conscience and allows Ukraine to maintain a degree of independence from Russia, however shadowy. Fortunately or no, the comparisons don’t hold up; trying to turn Ukraine into Cold War Austria or Cold War Finland is bound to lead to disaster.

Turn Ukraine Into Austria?

In the wake of World War II, the Allied powers detached Austria from Germany and divided it into four occupation zones. In 1955, Austria signed a treaty that ended this occupation but left the country permanently neutral and largely demilitarized. Austrian democracy survived and the Austrian economy thrived, despite the fact that Vienna became well-known as a venue for spy-on-spy conflicts during the Cold War.

Austria’s example would be relevant, but for two factors; Austria was a conquered (and guilty) combatant at the end of World War II, and Austria was not regarded as strategically consequential for the security of any of the European great powers. Unlike Ukraine, Austria had enthusiastically participated in a brutal war of extermination against Jews and Slavs on the Eastern Front.

While the Allies officially regarded Austria as a victim of Nazi aggression, it was also well-understood that many or most Austrians had joined the war willingly on the German side.

Critical to the legitimacy of the neutralization of Austria was the idea that the Austrians deserved what they got for their participation in the Nazi war machine. This belief was deeply held by the Soviets, but also extended to the Western Allies and even to the Austrians themselves. The Ukrainians (and most of their allies) understand themselves as victims of aggression rather than its perpetrators, resulting in a vastly different rhetorical environment.

Also, unlike the Ukrainian situation, Russia did not regard control of Austria as crucial to either its security or identity. Russian President Vladimir Putin made clear in his speech at the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine War that the stakes were not limited to security; they very much included Russia’s natural right to a sphere of influence in what Putin regarded as Russia’s ancestral lands.

This would put a neutral, disarmed Ukraine is a far more perilous position than Cold War Austria.

Can Ukraine Become Finland?

The USSR invaded Finland (a former territory of the Russian Empire) as part of the Nazi-Soviet Pact of 1939. While the Finns performed well in the first months of the Winter War, they were later forced to conclude a peace with the USSR.

When war broke out again in June 1941, Finland joined the Nazi cause and attempted to regain its lost territories, only to be forced into another surrender in September 1944. As with Austria, the USSR was able to impose an arrangement upon Finland because Finland, having thrown in its lot with the Nazis, was on the losing side of a catastrophic war.

Finland wasn’t quite in the same position as Austria (Finland’s war policy was quite measured, and generally speaking Finns avoided participating in the Holocaust), but nevertheless, the albatross of Nazi collaboration hung heavy over the country.

Finland was allowed to retain its democratic institutions and mostly allowed to govern its internal affairs. Finland’s latitude in foreign and security policies was sharply curtailed, however. Nor was Finland completely free to manage its affairs; the looming threat of Russian intervention had a negative impact on Finnish speech, literature, film, and culture, in large part because of the fear and reality of government censorship.

Finally, it’s worth noting that the Finns loved Finlandization so much that Finland immediately applied for NATO membership as soon as this war began.

What Will Kyiv Do?

The USSR and the Western Allies imposed neutrality on Austria and Finland through force of arms. This imposition carried with it the legitimacy not simply of might makes right, but also of the extermination of the foulest regime to disgrace the modern historical record. Moreover, the Finns and the Austrians (to different degree) accepted the justice of this verdict.

Ukrainians will not accept this judgment. They do not believe that they have done anything wrong, and do not believe that their sovereignty should be abrogated out of concern for the convenience of their next door neighbor. They do not believe that Russia will refrain from military, political, and economic intervention in Ukraine in the future.

Analysts who style themselves “realist” seem to like the idea of Ukrainian neutrality; it recognizes Russia’s right to a sphere of influence and reduces the American commitment to the region, goals that the anti-engagement school has long treasured. But these “realists” might as well ask for a dozen Shield helicarriers and a battalion of unicorns. Forcing Ukraine to accept “neutrality” after suffering substantial territorial losses to Russia in 2014 was a no-go; Kyiv had lost any trust that it had in Moscow’s intentions.

The situation today is much worse; Ukrainians across the society actively hate Russia and Russians, and will not accept an agreement that reduces or eliminates Ukraine’s ability to protect itself. “Realists” should take time to think through the actual dynamics of the political and military situation between Ukraine and Russia before holding forth on how to restrain and constrain Ukraine.

About the Author

Dr. Robert Farley has taught security and diplomacy courses at the Patterson School since 2005. He received his BS from the University of Oregon in 1997, and his Ph. D. from the University of Washington in 2004. Dr. Farley is the author of Grounded: The Case for Abolishing the United States Air Force (University Press of Kentucky, 2014), the Battleship Book (Wildside, 2016), Patents for Power: Intellectual Property Law and the Diffusion of Military Technology (University of Chicago, 2020), and most recently Waging War with Gold: National Security and the Finance Domain Across the Ages (Lynne Rienner, 2023). He has contributed extensively to a number of journals and magazines, including the National Interest, the Diplomat: APAC, World Politics Review, and the American Prospect. Dr. Farley is also a founder and senior editor of Lawyers, Guns and Money.

19fortyfive.com · by Robert Farley · October 1, 2023

​18. Never Forget the Battle of Mogadishu

Never Forget the Battle of Mogadishu

The failure to respond forcefully to terrorist provocations or to show weakness in the face of terrorism, such as we did in our chaotic pullout of Afghanistan in 2021 or in our botched response to al Qaeda’s attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya in 2011, will only compound America’s problems and create greater misery.

19fortyfive.com · by Brandon Weichert · October 2, 2023

“You left [Somalia] carrying disappointment, humiliation, and your dead with you,” boasted Usama Bin Laden in his infamous 1996 Fatwa—declaration of holy war—against the United States and its allies. He was referring to the infamous Battle of Mogadishu, otherwise known to the public as “Black Hawk Down,” thanks to the excellent writing of Mark Bowden and the brilliant filmmaking of Ridley Scott in the aftermath of the terrible events in the Somali capital from October 3-4, 1993.

Bin Laden’s statement was not mere gloating by the lanky jihadi leader. It was a tell—one that most Americans didn’t understand until many years thereafter. Unbeknownst to many in the West, as Somalia devoured itself in a multi-sided civil war, al Qaeda moved into the blighted East African failed state to provide training and supplies to the Somali faction led by the vicious warlord, Mohammed Farrah Aidid.

Specifically, the year before the Black Hawk Down incident occurred, in 1992, Egyptian-born al Qaeda military expert, Mohammed Atef, or “Abu Hafs” as he was known by his fellow terrorists, was deployed by Bin Laden to Somalia. There, he offered training to Aidid’s forces to instruct how to properly use rocket-propelled grenades (RPG) and how to use them to take down American helicopters.

This, of course, would prove decisive during the Somali engagement against the Americans on Oct. 3-4, 1993, when two Black Hawk helicopters belonging to the U.S. Army were successfully shot down by the Somalis during the Battle of Mogadishu.

As would later be revealed to the investigators for the 9/11 Commission, who were investigating al Qaeda’s history of aggression against the United States which ultimately led to the 9/11 attacks, it was determined that several al Qaeda operatives had deployed to Somalia to assist the Somalis in preparing to attack the Americans.

While U.S. intelligence does not believe al Qaeda plotted the attacks on U.S. forces deployed into Mogadishu on Oct. 3-4, 1993, the fact that U.S. forces had been sent to Somalia as part of a larger peacekeeping operation encouraged Bin Laden’s terrorist organization to exploit what it believed to have been an opportunity: to strike a decisive blow against the American military juggernaut.

Al Qaeda’s Mission

Since the Soviet Union’s pullout of Afghanistan in 1988, Bin Laden, who had fought alongside the CIA-funded anti-Soviet resistance fighters known as the Mujahideen, had created a faction of mostly Arab fighters and called it al Qaeda (or, “The Base” in Arabic).

Al Qaeda would be the vanguard for inspiring wider revolution throughout the Islamic world and would foster the restoration of the Islamic caliphate, the likes of which had not been seen since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in 1923. But to achieve this herculean task, Bin Laden needed to show his co-religionists that America was weak; that the superpower could bleed.

Thanks to al Qaeda’s assistance, the Somalis inflicted a terrible defeat upon the more powerful Americans.

At the Battle of Mogadishu, not only were two Black Hawk helicopters shot down by the equivalent of peasants, but 18 servicemen were murdered, an American pilot was captured and held hostage for days thereafter, and two Delta Force operators were murdered—with their bodies being paraded through the streets as trophies by the raging Somali hordes.

Bin Laden watched these scenes as they played out on CNN. He then saw as the mighty Americans – rather than seek retribution upon Mogadishu – fled Somalia.

Thus, Bin Laden could effectively make his case to the Islamic world that the Americans were the weaker horse. Because of this, Bin Laden believed that the future belonged to al Qaeda.

The U.S.-backed apostates who ruled over Islamic territories could be overthrown because the Americans – if scratched even slightly – would not have the backs of the apostates they had supported since the Cold War.

Al Qaeda’s vision of a pan-Islamic caliphate could be built.

The weakness the Americans displayed in the aftermath of the Battle of Mogadishu—choosing to run instead of fight—and the subsequent chaos, played into Bin Laden’s long-term plans. From the Somali example, Bin Laden began a series of probing operations. He bombed the World Trade Center a year later.

Bin Laden attacked U.S. embassies in Africa. Al Qaeda eventually blew up part of the USS Cole, a U.S. Navy destroyer, as it passed through Yemeni waters. Eventually, the terrorist organization hit America in the most spectacular way.

Weakness Begets Weakness

Bin Laden’s nefarious plots could have been delayed or even prevented had America responded. Like Hitler probing the will of the Allies by slowly invading Europe bit by bit, Bin Laden was poking the Americans to see when—and if—they’d finally respond to him.

When they did not, it encouraged him to go-for-broke on 9/11. And he did.

As we enter the 30th anniversary of the Battle of Mogadishu we must not only remember the American heroes of that awful event. We must also remember the lesson of that failed U.S. military operation.

The failure to respond forcefully to terrorist provocations or to show weakness in the face of terrorism, such as we did in our chaotic pullout of Afghanistan in 2021 or in our botched response to al Qaeda’s attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya in 2011, will only compound America’s problems and create greater misery.

A 19FortyFive Senior Editor and an energy analyst at the The-Pipeline, Brandon J. Weichert is a former Congressional staffer and geopolitical analyst who is a contributor at The Washington Times, as well as at the Asia Times. He is the author of Winning Space: How America Remains a Superpower (Republic Book Publishers), Biohacked: China’s Race to Control Life (Encounter Books), and The Shadow War: Iran’s Quest for Supremacy (July 23). Weichert occasionally serves as a Subject Matter Expert for various organizations, including the Department of Defense. He can be followed via Twitter @WeTheBrandon.

19fortyfive.com · by Brandon Weichert · October 2, 2023

​19. How much aid the U.S. has sent to Ukraine, in 6 charts

Please go to the link here to view the charts: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/how-much-aid-the-u-s-has-sent-to-ukraine-in-6-charts

How much aid the U.S. has sent to Ukraine, in 6 charts

World Oct 1, 2023 9:14 PM EDT

PBS · by Jonathan Masters, Council on Foreign Relations · October 1, 2023

Every year, the United States sends billions of dollars in aid — and much more than any other country — to beneficiaries around the world in pursuit of its security, economic, and humanitarian interests.

Heading into 2022, U.S. foreign assistance was driven by various priorities of the Biden administration, including combating climate change, responding to the COVID-19 pandemic, and countering authoritarianism. But since Russia’s invasion in February of that year, Ukraine has become far and away the top recipient of U.S. foreign aid. It’s the first time that a European country has held the top spot since the Harry S. Truman administration directed vast sums into rebuilding the continent through the Marshall Plan after World War II.

Since the war began, the Biden administration and the U.S. Congress have directed more than $75 billion in assistance to Ukraine, which includes humanitarian, financial, and military support, according to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, a German research institute. (This figure does not include all war-related U.S. spending, such as aid to allies.) The historic sums are helping a broad set of Ukrainian people and institutions, including refugees, law enforcement, and independent radio broadcasters, though most of the aid has been military-related. Dozens of other countries, including most members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the European Union, are also providing large aid packages to Ukraine.

Source: Antezza et al., Ukraine Support Tracker, Kiel Institute for the World Economy

Much of the aid has gone toward providing weapons systems, training, and intelligence that Ukrainian commanders need to defend against Russia, which has one of the world’s most powerful militaries. Many Western analysts say the military aid provided by the United States and other allies has played a pivotal role in Ukraine’s defense and counteroffensive against Russia. U.S. and allied leaders consider Russia’s invasion a brutal and illegal war of aggression on NATO’s frontier that, if successful, would subjugate millions of Ukrainians; encourage Russian President Vladimir Putin’s revanchist aims; and invite similar aggression from other rival powers, especially China.

NATO allies are particularly wary of being pulled directly into the hostilities, which would dramatically raise the risk of a nuclear war. However, as the fighting has progressed, many donor governments have shed their reluctance to give Ukraine more sophisticated assets, such as battle tanks and modern fighter aircraft. In the summer of 2023, the United States agreed to allow its European allies to train Ukrainian pilots to operate U.S.-made F-16s and to eventually have those allies supply the warplanes to Kyiv.

Nineteen months into the war, the Biden administration had provided or agreed to provide Ukraine with a long list of defense capabilities, including Abrams battle tanks, anti-aircraft missiles, coastal defense ships, and advanced surveillance and radar systems. In July, the Biden administration sparked some controversy in agreeing to supply Ukraine with cluster munitions, which are banned by most countries because of the risk their undetonated components can pose to civilians many years after their use.

Source: U.S. Department of Defense

When compared with U.S. assistance to other top recipients, both in recent years and in decades past, the extraordinary scale of this aid comes into view.

However, the magnitude of U.S. aid to Ukraine might seem less remarkable in comparison to what the Pentagon is budgeted each year, or what the Treasury was authorized (via the Troubled Asset Relief Fund) to bail out Wall Street banks, auto companies, and other sectors of the economy during the U.S. financial crisis.

When compared with the critical support to Ukraine from other countries, the size of U.S. aid stands out.

However, some European governments, such as Norway, Latvia, and Estonia, are making far larger financial contributions to Ukraine relative to the size of their own economies.

Chelsea Padilla and Joseph Wehmeyer contributed research to this article.

This article originally ran on the Council on Foreign Relations website.

PBS · by Jonathan Masters, Council on Foreign Relations · October 1, 2023

​20. Counterinsurgency to the Shores of Tripoli

Excerpts:

These precepts of naval statecraft during the Age of Sail remain relevant for U.S. strategists and commanders seeking effective approaches to defend the freedom of the sea from the maritime militias and coastal forces of China or Russia today. Now, as then, success depends on the ability to mesh diplomatic partnerships with the deployment of balanced naval forces, combining both large combatants ready for high-intensity combat and smaller combatants and craft able to conduct distributed operations and wage lower-intensity competition. In 2009, then-Commander Jerry Hendrix suggested creating what he called “influence squadrons,” and in an August 2022 Proceedings article for this series, Captain Josh Taylor described a task force centered on a large expeditionary mothership and comprised of offshore patrol vessels for operations in the South China Sea.14 Such creative fleet architectures would be recognizable to Commodore Preble were he alive today.

The U.S. Navy and Marine Corps have faced maritime insurgencies and gray-zone competitors since their formative days. U.S. sailors and Marines have succeeded against such threats before, and, by applying insights from the past, they can do so again.

Counterinsurgency to the Shores of Tripoli

The Navy’s operations against Barbary corsairs at the start of the 19th century provide salient lessons for operating in the gray zone today.

By Captain B. J. Armstrong, U.S. Navy

October 2023 Proceedings Vol. 149/20/1,448

usni.org · October 1, 2023

Whether in the Black Sea, Baltic, or across the Indo-Pacific today, potential maritime adversaries have been developing abilities to achieve their goals below the threshold of war. Called “salami slicing,” maritime insurgency, gray-zone operations, or hybrid war, these operations, short of full-scale armed conflict, have ample historical precedent. While the Age of Fighting Sail can seem removed from the challenges of the 21st century, today’s strategists and naval professionals can learn a great deal from the period. The U.S. Navy’s conflict with Tripoli at the dawn of the 19th century—a maritime war between two smaller powers operating in the shadows of great empires—offers a deep view of maritime conflict and competition short of existential total war. From the importance of small combatants to the vital nature of partnerships, the First Barbary War (1801–1805) offers valuable insights in approaching competition and conflict in the gray zones of this century.

Countering maritime insurgencies in the gray zone is not a new mission—indeed it was the U.S. Navy’s founding mission. The force that would fight the First Barbary War was created in 1798 with the birth of the Department of the Navy for the express purpose of defending U.S. merchant shipping and seaborne commerce from a challenge to freedom of the sea. That challenge was posed by a great power in a key littoral region, without a declaration of war—namely, the threat posed by France in the Caribbean during what came to be known as the Quasi War. In a maritime competition that included elements of insurgency and episodes of outright combat, U.S. forces contended with many dynamics familiar to the contemporary operating environment: hostile use of private military contractors as irregular maritime forces (in France’s case, privateers), the pluses and minuses of working with partners and allies, and challenges maintaining effective maritime presence on distant stations. The gray-zone conflict between the United States and France resolved itself not through victory or defeat, but instead with a negotiated settlement in December 1800 to simply make the conflict “go away” as both sides realized it was distracting from their larger interests.1 Peace, however, was not what the rest of the world had planned for the young United States.

In May 1801, less than six months after the end of the Quasi War (1798–1800), Pasha Yousef Karamanli sent troops into the courtyard of the American Consul’s house in Tripoli to cut down the flagpole—a North African tradition symbolizing the declaration of war. Karamanli unleashed corsairs, as his Mediterranean privateers were known, on U.S. merchant ships and civilian mariners in the Mediterranean and eastern Atlantic. U.S. Navy ships and crews that sailed to the Mediterranean were largely the same ones that had fought the French, and they brought insights and combat experience from the previous conflict that they would apply to its second.

The Ships

In addition to its large frigates, the U.S. Navy deployed smaller ships to fight the Barbary pirates, including the 12-gun schooner Enterprise (shown here on the right) with Lieutenant Andrew Sterrett in command. The Enterprise made the first capture of the war when Sterrett and his crew defeated the Tripoli on 1 August 1801. (Oil painting by Rodolfo Claudu, 1951 (U.S. Naval Academy Museum collection))

During the Quasi War, Navy Secretary Benjamin Stoddert proposed a balanced navy with a squadron of ships-of- the-line supported by frigates and smaller vessels. However, the Peace Establishment Act, passed in 1800 by a Federalist Congress to protect some parts of the Navy from cost-cutting plans of the newly elected Jeffersonian Republicans, had sacrificed the largest planned capital ships as a political compromise to save the frigates that had served well against the French. The squadrons that deployed to the Mediterranean were made up of the Joshua Humphreys–designed super-frigates, traditionally sized smaller frigates, and small “unrated” combatants. Up against the small but nimble commerce raiders of the Tripolitan marine, the heavy, 44-gun frigates, such as the Constitution and the President, were overkill. Even the smaller 38- and 36-gun frigates, including the Philadelphia and Chesapeake, were large and easy to see coming, providing the Pasha’s corsairs ample opportunities to escape.

The first U.S. Navy squadron deployed to the Mediterranean, under the command of Commodore Richard Dale, included four frigates plus the 12-gun schooner Enterprise. She and her near-sister the Experiment were procurement and tactical experiments in the value of small combatants that had proved their worth, having made the most enemy captures across the entire U.S. fleet during the conflict with France. These and other smaller ships had played outsized roles in the Quasi War thanks to their ability to work the shallows and blend into local maritime traffic to maintain an element of surprise. Once deployed to the Mediterranean, the Enterprise had the first engagement and made the first capture of the Barbary War when Lieutenant Andrew Sterett and his crew defeated the Tripoli on 1 August 1801.2

After Dale was recalled, a second squadron deployed to the Mediterranean under the command of Commodore Richard Morris, bringing new ships but a similar force design centered on large frigates. Morris did not have much more success than Dale before being recalled himself; his lack of activity and questionable decision-making resulting in his court-martial and dismissal from service. When Morris was replaced by Captain Edward Preble as Commodore in 1803, however, the operations of the squadron changed both because of Preble’s aggressive leadership and also because the force design of the squadron changed. Unlike his predecessors, Preble’s squadron complemented the big frigates with a robust contingent of schooners and brigs, including the Enterprise, Vixen, Scourge, Nautilus, Syren, and Hornet.

These small combatants ranged the Mediterranean and played critical roles in Preble’s operations. Enforcement of the blockade on Tripoli was most often operationalized by pairing a frigate with a small combatant. The frigates provided the firepower and supplies needed to stay on station, while the schooners and brigs could use their speed and shallow draft to work closer to shore and chase down the enemy or deter them from leaving harbor. The utility of this approach was demonstrated not only by its successful application, but also by the dismal results when it was not employed—most notably when Captain “Bad Luck Bill” Bainbridge ran the Philadelphia aground in 1803. The mishap occurred while close to shore chasing a blockade runner, resulting in the capture of the frigate and its entire crew—the greatest single U.S. loss of the war. The reason the deep-draft Philadelphia was so close to shore as to strike the unmarked rocks was because Bainbridge had sent his speedy and shallow-draft consort Vixen on another mission. In contrast, when Preble was maintaining the blockade with the Constitution a few months later, he kept the Enterprise close, allowing the two ships to operate as a pair. When they discovered the ketch Mastico attempting to escape Tripoli harbor, the Enterprise’s shallow draft allowed her to head inshore and drive the Tripolitan ship out into blue water where she was compelled to surrender under the heavy guns of the Constitution. Preble and the Enterprise’s skipper, Lieutenant Stephen Decatur, renamed the captured ship the Intrepid.3

The U.S. squadron’s tactics changed when Commodore Edward Preble took command in 1803 because he was more aggressive than his predecessors, but also because the composition of the force changed to one combining big frigates with a robust contingent of smaller schooners and brigs. (Oil Painting By Orlando S. Lagman)

The Intrepid, commanded by Decatur and crewed with a raiding party of volunteers, made its famous nighttime attack on Tripoli to burn the Philadelphia a few weeks later. The mission was conducted as a team, with the Intrepid backed up by the 16-gun brig Syren, commanded by Lieutenant Charles Stewart. The Syren was able to blend in with the local merchant traffic and get in close enough to the harbor to provide the Intrepid vital support and supplies as Decatur and his crew fought their way out after setting the Philadelphia ablaze. While the Syren was small enough to get into the shallows to help the Intrepid, when a gale swept in as they made their escape, the brig was large enough to shepherd her partner through the dangerous storm.4

The small combatants soon became the utility infielders of Preble’s squadron. They convoyed U.S. and friendly merchant ships, moved supplies and dispatches between the squadron’s larger ships, fought close to shore during Preble’s attacks on Tripoli Harbor in summer 1804, and maintained the blockade. When William Eaton and his rag-tag army of Bedouins, mercenaries, and a small detachment of Marines began their march from Alexandria across the desert to Derna, the American small combatants were his lifeline. Landing supplies and money along the shore to help keep the mercenaries and tribal leaders going, the Navy’s logistical tail was critical to the combined army’s ability to make it to the outskirts of Derna. When they arrived before the city, it had been 25 days since they had any meat to eat, and 15 days since their bread ran out. Thankfully, they were met by the brig Argus and the sloop Hornet, which landed food and artillery to enable them to seize the town.5

Once Eaton and his forces were ready to begin their assault on Derna, the Argus and Hornet were joined by the schooner Nautilus, all under the command of Master Commandant Isaac Hull. The ships anchored themselves in key positions off the harbor’s fortress and provided the critical gunfire support Eaton’s army needed to rout the defenders. Once Lieutenant Presley O’Bannon and his Marines had raised the American flag over the fortress and allied forces secured control of the town, the small combatants began a rotation to retrieve supplies. The Navy’s support, both with guns and logistics, maintained the defense of Derna as Tripolitan reinforcements arrived to lay siege. While the Marines earned their memory and heritage on the “shores of Tripoli,” it was the Navy’s small combatants that provided the support necessary for success.

Small combatants were indispensable to operations in the shallows and were key to the Mediterranean squadron overall as Edward Preble turned disappointment and debacle into operational success against Tripoli. The squadron’s schooners, brigs, and sloops provided distributed protection to American merchants on the high seas, shallow-water capabilities and maneuverability, and the fire support and maritime logistics necessary for Eaton’s army to succeed. These operational capabilities remain deeply relevant today. Operations in the gray zones, archipelagos, and contested waters of the Indo-Pacific, particularly the “Asian Mediterranean” of the South China Sea, might benefit from a larger number of small combatants to complement the large surface combatants that comprise the bulk of today’s U.S. Navy. In addition to fulfilling key navy missions, those same small combatants would be critical to the work of Marine littoral regiments.

The Supporters

The First Barbary War is often remembered in U.S. naval heritage as an example of the fledgling service sailing alone and unafraid into dangerous waters, with European powers cast as self-interested or ineffectual against Tripolitan depredations against freedom of the sea.6 Yet reviewing the correspondence and reports of the officers who led the conflict, it becomes clear that not only were the Americans not “alone” in the conflict, but there are many examples in which the U.S. Navy’s success relied on the support of other navies and nations. The Royal Swedish Navy, the Kingdom of Naples, and even the British Royal Navy were all important partners at different junctures.

When Tripoli declared war in 1801, it had been preying on Western merchant traffic for decades, and the practice of corsairing between European and North African powers dated back nearly to the time of the Crusades. When Richard Dale’s squadron entered the Mediterranean for the first time, the kingdoms of Sweden and Denmark were already at war with Tripoli. The Americans arrived to discover ready partners.

As early as October 1801, the Swedes expressed their desire to “act in concert” with U.S. naval leaders as the first squadron began convoys in the Mediterranean.7 By December, the Danes were meeting with U.S. diplomats and exchanging intelligence on Tripoli and their negotiations with other Barbary states, including sharing naval plans.8 While the partnership with the Danes never provided more than information sharing, the Royal Swedish Navy operated directly with the Americans. The U.S. commodores and Swedish admirals coordinated who would be permitted to pass through the blockade on Tripoli and collaborated on naval diplomacy involving the rest of the Mediterranean.9 They went as far as to coordinate the deployment of their frigates to maximize coverage and enforcement of the blockade.10 The partnership between the Swedes and the Americans, however, only lasted for a year. Rear Admiral Cederström, commanding the Swedish forces in the Mediterranean, completed negotiations for a peace treaty with Tripoli in October 1802 with the assistance of Napoleon’s diplomats.

When Edward Preble arrived in command of the U.S. squadron, instead of Sweden he turned to the Kingdom of Naples for partnership. This kingdom was made up of the island of Sicily and portions of the peninsula that included the important ports of Naples and Livorno. Like Sweden, the kingdom had been at war with Tripoli for several years. Unlike the northern Europeans, however, Naples appeared to do very little about the conflict. Preble discovered that basing his ships out of the British strongholds of Gibraltar and Malta, as the previous commodores had, could result in logistical strain when Royal Navy ships in the Mediterranean arrived for resupply. Instead, he moved his main base to Syracuse on the eastern end of Sicily, where the governor offered port facilities and use of his armories, warehouses, and Admiralty court to support the Americans.11

Preble may be best known for his aggressive combat operations against Tripoli, but it was his naval diplomacy and work with partners that laid the foundations of those operations. After moving the American base to Syracuse, Preble expanded his collaboration with Naples. As he planned an assault on Tripoli harbor for the summer of 1804, he knew that while his heavy frigates provided good motherships and heavy guns for a littoral campaign and his small combatants would be important, he needed more and smaller gunboats to threaten Tripolitan forces deep within the harbor. Unable to obtain them from home, he visited Naples and entered discussions for Sicilian support. With the help of James Leander Cathcart, an American Consul living in Livorno, Preble convinced the king to provide not only gunboats, but also sailors to crew them under U.S. officers.12 The Sicilian gunboats, commanded by heroic officers including Stephen Decatur, Richard Somers, and James Decatur, played a critical role in the direct attacks on Tripoli in July and August 1804.

The other element that made U.S. attacks on Tripoli that summer possible was Preble’s work to establish a collaboration with the Royal Navy in the Mediterranean. While the British and French were taking a hiatus from their decades-long conflict under the Treaty of Amiens, the Royal Navy maintained a strong presence in the Mediterranean. Preble had already encountered issues with some British commanders, contributing to the decision to move his base to Syracuse. He worked hard, however, to maintain positive relations with British Governor Sir Alexander Ball in Malta and the commander of the Royal Navy’s station ship Captain Charles Schomberg. The British-controlled island was one of the closest ports to the shores of Tripoli. As Preble obtained his Sicilian gunboats and planned his summer assault, he knew logistics would be key to success.

Preble laid the groundwork for British support months earlier when he authorized passports to allow British ships to pass through the blockade from Malta to pick up cattle they had purchased to help feed their populace. When it came time to call in the favor, the British agreed to help the Americans with logistics for their squadron. William Higgins, the U.S. naval agent in Malta, received support from the government in helping him lease ships to carry supplies to the squadron while it remained on station in the Gulf of Sidra. Captain Schomberg even loaned the Americans casks from his warehouse to transport critical fresh water to the assault force.13

The development of partners in the First Barbary War is an often overlooked, but critical element of U.S. operations. William Eaton’s ability to cobble together a force of Bedouin tribes, mercenaries from southern Europe, and Tripolitan rebels for the march on Derna is relatively well known in naval history. Efforts of the American commodores to work with European powers in the region, on the other hand, is insufficiently recognized. Dale and Morris’s collaboration with the Swedes and the Danes, and Preble’s naval diplomacy with the Sicilians and the British, were important elements of how the Americans planned and executed everything from blockade to convoys, to attacks on Tripolitan forces. The naval leaders were also in a vital collaboration with State Department Consuls and civilian naval agents. Far from fighting the Barbary corsairs alone, partnerships with European naval forces were vital to U.S. success.

The Right Ships and Supporters for Maritime Competition

U.S. Navy operations during the war with Tripoli were about much more than ships fighting and sinking other ships. The conflict spanned a range of naval operations from convoys and commerce protection to blockade, bombardment, and support for boots on the ground. The commerce-raiding conflict launched by the Tripolitans, a kind of maritime insurgency, required a response in kind. This meant the U.S. Navy needed to conduct maritime security patrols, support a counterinsurgency ashore against Pasha Karamanli, and launch attacks and raids on Tripoli’s ships, harbors, and land targets. These key elements of naval strategy required more than just ships-of-the-line, built to stand in combat against great power navies of the world. They required a balanced force design and partnership with other navies and nations for the Americans to be successful.

These precepts of naval statecraft during the Age of Sail remain relevant for U.S. strategists and commanders seeking effective approaches to defend the freedom of the sea from the maritime militias and coastal forces of China or Russia today. Now, as then, success depends on the ability to mesh diplomatic partnerships with the deployment of balanced naval forces, combining both large combatants ready for high-intensity combat and smaller combatants and craft able to conduct distributed operations and wage lower-intensity competition. In 2009, then-Commander Jerry Hendrix suggested creating what he called “influence squadrons,” and in an August 2022 Proceedings article for this series, Captain Josh Taylor described a task force centered on a large expeditionary mothership and comprised of offshore patrol vessels for operations in the South China Sea.14 Such creative fleet architectures would be recognizable to Commodore Preble were he alive today.

The U.S. Navy and Marine Corps have faced maritime insurgencies and gray-zone competitors since their formative days. U.S. sailors and Marines have succeeded against such threats before, and, by applying insights from the past, they can do so again.

usni.org · October 1, 2023

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